He grabs the bottle and tilts it over my body, sending another thin stream of liquid down my chest. The wine is silvery in the moonlight, and my skin, still slightly tanned from my time in Thailand, looks frosty gold. Ward is like something out of a myth—but not one of the coldly perfect gods. No, he’s one of the rugged, warm-blooded humans that tempts the stone-hearted goddesses down from the mountain. The hero that slays some three-headed beast before taking his woman on her back in the grass and dirt.
He slowly works his way down my stomach, cleaning up the trail of wine he left on my skin. I grow more ticklish as he moves lower, even laughing out loud when his tongue skirts the top of my belly button. He responds by trying to pour more wine down my stomach, but I grab the bottle before another drop can hit my skin.
“My turn.” I push him back slightly. “Out of your shirt.”
He still has the sling, but this time we’re not in a rush. He removes it slowly, then pulls off his shirt. His bare chest gleams in the moonlight.
For the first time, I’m able to get a good look at the tattoo on his bicep. I reach out and touch it. It’s done entirely in black ink, and when I tilt my head, I can just make out the swirling letters.
“Mona Catherine,” I read.
“My mom.” He gives a sad smile. “I know it’s cheesy. At least I managed to talk myself out of putting her name in a heart.”
“I think it’s beautiful.” I trace the ink with my finger. “Is this the only one you have?”
He raises an eyebrow. “Are you hoping for more?” He spreads his arms—only wincing a little—and grins. “You’re welcome to search.”
“Not until I take a guess first. I’m pretty sure there’s a formula for this sort of thing. Let’s see…” I purse my lips. “You don’t have a motorcycle—at least that I know of. No visible piercings. No scraggly facial hair. Wait—have you been in prison?”
He gives one of those half-smiles. “That depends. Do you find that sort of thing attractive or not?”
I poke him in the good shoulder. “You’re kidding, right? Because I don’t fool around with ex-cons.”
That gets a laugh, but it’s a hollow one. He draws back and dips his fingers absently into the pool next to us. He’s not looking at me, and my stomach drops. The question was meant as a joke, but now I’m afraid to know the truth.
“I’ve been arrested three times,” he says after a moment.
“Three!”
He shoots me an appropriately ashamed look.
“Stupid stuff,” he says, waving his hand. “The first time was when I was fifteen. For underage drinking.”
I raise the wine in a faux toast. “Drinking stolen booze even back then, huh?”
“I had better taste back then. Lots of cheap tequila.”
“Mm.” I take a swig of the wine, trying to process this. “What about the other two arrests?”
“The second incident was the only one I got real jail time for,” he says. “I got caught trying to steal some things from a convenience store. I was just… stupid. A stupid kid. I made a lot of mistakes.”
I dip my fingers in the water. “And the third time?”
“The third time was because of a bar fight. A couple of years ago.”
I open my mouth to respond, but he holds up a hand.
“Before you start lecturing me about the dangers of violence and all that, believe me, I know.” He points to his eye, which is still a little puffy and discolored.
“I wasn’t going to lecture you.”
He gives a laugh that sounds bitterer than I’m sure he intended. “You looked like you wanted to kick my ass back there at the spa.”
“You started a fight with four people. Not one. Four.”
“It wasn’t as bad as it looked.”
“You broke your nose! And your arm is—”
“I know. Don’t you think I feel like an idiot already?”
I look down at my lap. I’m suddenly aware that my shirt is still open, but I don’t care.
“Why?” I say finally.
He snorts. “It’s not like I wake up in the morning and think, ‘I’m going to bust some guy’s lip today’.”
“Geez, you know that’s not what I meant.”
He sighs. “Sometimes I just… you know. I just need to hit something.” He rubs the back of his head. “I was in a bad place for a while after my mom died. Be glad you didn’t know me then. But we’ve talked about this before. Sometimes you just need somewhere for all that confused energy to go.”
“I can think of a few better places than fighting.” I raise the wine bottle. “Lean back.”
But he catches my wrist before I can pour anything down his chest.
“What about you?” he says.
“What do you mean?”
“Tell me something about your past. Something you’re ashamed of.” His thumb brushes against the inside of my wrist. “Or something happy, if you’d prefer.”
I freeze. I don’t want to think about my past. And talking about it sounds even worse. But for some reason, I can’t find the strength to deny him. Not with the way he’s looking at me right now.
“When I was younger,” I say after a minute, “maybe eight or nine, I decided to run away. I was mad with my father about something, but I don’t remember what. Probably something really silly. I grabbed my favorite stuffed animal and stole a box of cereal out of the kitchen and just left. Walked right out the door.”
Ward smiles knowingly. “And your father came after you?”
“Oh, no,” I say, my own lips curling up slightly. “He let me march right out the door.” Probably not surprising, considering it was a bit of a walk from the door to the main gate, and even if I got that far, there wasn’t anywhere to go out here. “But he watched me. From one of the windows. I caught him peeking out from behind the curtains.”
I look down at the water in the pool beside us. Ward’s still holding my wrist, still sliding his thumb across my skin.
“Eventually, of course, I got bored and went back inside,” I continue. “I thought my father would be angry with me, but when I saw him, he acted like he hadn’t even noticed I’d been gone. And that was worse, in a weird way. I was upset because I thought that maybe he didn’t care.” I twist my hand around, locking my fingers with Ward’s. “And then I went back up to my room and found something on my bed. He’d left me an atlas with a note that said ‘Here are some maps for your next adventure.’” My father had never been overly emotional or over-the-top with his displays of affection. He rarely said things outright. But sometimes he’d do little things that showed me exactly how much he loved me.