“Ohhhhh,” I start laughing now, uncontrollably, because you hear about rash wedding chapel runs in the movies—I never thought they were real.

“Right? But wait, it gets worse,” he says, rubbing his hand over his face at the memory. “Turns out Teresa…was the fiancé!”

“Oh shit!” I’m laughing even harder now, covering my mouth with my hand to stifle the noise.

“We got it annulled, of course. But I’m pretty sure she ended up calling off the wedding. Or the dude did. Never saw him, but she told me he found out,” Mason says, nodding at the memory.

“So…how does that fit with the tattoo?” I ask, and Mason takes a deep breath, finally pulling his arm out from under me and sitting himself up a little to pull off his shirt. And I now suddenly could not care less about the tattoo—because he’s lying back down, his bare skin right there, touching me, and it’s bronze, and it’s perfect, and there are abs happening and…oh my. I force myself to listen to him even though all I want to do is run my fingers up and down his chest.

“If you look carefully, you can still sort of see it,” he traces his finger over a few stripes within the delicate tiger wrapped around his bicep. I don’t know what he’s pointing at, exactly, but I take the opportunity to study his arm. “Look there…it’s her name. I tattooed that chick’s full f**kin’ name…on my arm! I covered it up with the tiger a few weeks later, but the guys kept calling me Mr. Teresa Westerhouse for months.”

It might have been a mistake that put the ink on him in the first place, but damn did it turn into something special. I can sort of see a few of the letters, but even knowing the story now as I do, I don’t see her name. I’m probably just a little drunk on the high of being in so much contact with Mason’s body—but right now, I’m ready to tattoo anything he wants on mine, just to get closer and to touch him more.

“I think it’s beautiful,” I let the words slip, and my eyes flair when they do, but I just hold my breath, thankful that from this angle, Mason can’t see my face.

“Yeah, well I think you’re beautiful,” he says in an instant, and now my heart is officially in my throat. His hand is back to stroking my hair, and he’s no longer trying to hide it, instead, his fingertips start at the very edge of my hairline, lacing deep into the strands, softly brushing them out across my bare shoulder.

When I feel his hand run lower down my neck and pull my head in close, I stop breathing, afraid that I’ll do something…say something…that will make him stop. In seconds, his lips are on my head, and I can feel him inhale. My body is telling me to look up, to make a move—to take a leap of faith. But then a familiar light floods his entire bedroom, and time actually freezes.

My dad has driven the same damned pickup truck for fourteen years. The lights cast a very distinctive hue, and when I first started dating Adam in high school, I had it down to a science. The second I saw those lights pour in through the front living room windows, Adam was quickly pushed out the back kitchen door.

“Shit, that’s my dad!” I say, practically jumping to my feet and cracking open Mason’s door. I step one foot into the hallway, just enough to flip the bank of lights off, and then my dad’s keys are at the door. I push Mason back into the room and shut his door again behind us, holding my finger up to my mouth. “Shhhhhhhhhh!” I say, giggling uncontrollably.

I lay my ear flat against the wood so I can hear my dad move through the kitchen, get a drink from the fridge, and kick his shoes off by the stairs. The fourth one creaks as he passes it, and I widen my eyes at Mason, warning him that he’s coming. Mason leans forward against me, pressing his own ear next to mine, and we both wait. It’s hard to tell, but it seems like my dad is standing at the top of the stairs in the middle of the hall for an unusually long time before he makes his way to his own bedroom. I finally hear his door close, and let out the breath I’ve been holding, sliding my back against the door so I’m facing Mason.

“Avery, you know we’re like…in our twenties, right?” Mason says, his dimples back again. I want to touch them. And now we’re inches apart, and his bare chest is right here, up against me, pinning me to the door.

“I know, I just…” I start to explain my craziness, but he stops me.

“I get it. It’s your dad. He scares the crap outta me, too. He’d kill me, you know?” he says, raising one eyebrow. His body is still right here—with me…against me. And now, it is all I can think about.