Page 169 of We Drank the Dawn

Sarah moaned. “Oh, I want that.” But then she grabbed my face and whispered over my lips, her voice suddenly frustrated. “I want to keep kissing you, Peter Thompson, but I’m still hurt that you kissed someone else.”

FIFTY-SEVEN

Sarah

Why was he smiling?

I slid down the front of Peter’s body as he gently put my feet on the ground.

He swiped a hand over his mouth, trying to hide laughter.

“Why are you laughing?” I stomped my foot, our arms still wrapped around each other. “It’s not funny!”

“You’re right. It’s not funny.” He pressed his mouth closed until he regained his composure. “Hear me out though…I didn’t kiss anyone that night.”

I frowned. “But, Cooper said⁠—”

He shook his head. “Cooper was just repeating what Cody told him. But Cody was lying.”

I scoffed. “What? That doesn’t even make sense. Why would he lie about that?”

“Because, he has the hots for you. And he figured it’d be fun to stir the pot.”

I wanted to protest that such a thing could ever be lied about, but then I remembered…Cody was kind of creepy. My memory revisited that evening on the porch—he had looked at me the same way Andre looked at Jackie. A shiver raced up my back—gross.

But seriously though? I spent so much time being angry about something that didn’t even happen? I demanded, “How do you know this?”

“Cooper had a suspicion that Cody was lying to us. And when Coop confronted him, he didn’t deny it.” Peter’s hand, under my shirt, kneaded my skin. Our hips were still pressed together and it took every ounce of my effort to focus. He continued, “This just happened two nights ago.”

“Wow,” I said, at a loss. “So what about the phone numbers?”

He shrugged. “I don’t remember the specifics of the game we were playing, but I do know it involved Harlan scouting out groups of ladies and kind of playing wingman—trying to get them to leave a number behind for one of us. It was still completely inappropriate for me as a married man, but that’s all that happened. And none of it would’ve happened if I wasn’t drunk.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

Oxygen whooshed from my lungs. “Thank goodness.”

“I’m sorry, Sarah, that you had to⁠—”

“Stop.” I shook my head, relishing in the way my body relaxed. “Don’t—no more sorries, okay? All is forgiven and we’re starting over.”

“Okay—”

“That said, if you ever get depressed again and reach for a beer, I’m cutting your hand off.”

Peter’s shoulders pulsed with a laugh. “Atta girl.”

“Now you can kiss me again.” I lifted my face, going to my tiptoes. But he pulled back, out of my reach. When I frowned up at him, his eyes danced with a wild light, like twinkling flames combating the darkness and my heart rolled.

I lightly smacked his chest. “What’s that look for?”

His excited hands gripped my sides. “Want to cross something off the list?”

“What?” I laughed. “I thought we were mostly done with that.”

He tsked and narrowed his eyes. “You know we’ll never really be done with the list. It’s too much a part of us.”