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He sat down on the edge of his bed in front of me, and I caught that subtle smirk of his trying to break through on his lips. He was amused. Obviously. Because I was insane.
“It’s just a Bible, Liv,” he said quietly.
Sure, just a Bible. A little book filled with pages that had been a catalyst towars.But yeah, just a Bible. I believed it when Neil said it, though. Believed he meant it, anyway.
“And it’s just faith,” he added.
“Faith,” I echoed, looking into his eyes. It didn’t make sense that so many different shades of brown could fit themselves into one pair of eyes, yet there they were, looking right at me like they knew me.
A kaleidoscope of warmth and depth and understanding.
Butfaith.I cleared my throat. I guess this was more of an appropriate time and place than any…
“And where does your faith come from, Neil? Because you truly believe in it, or because you were raised to?” I wasn’t asking to be an asshole. I genuinely wanted to know.
He didn’t take offense to it, thankfully. He just shrugged, thinking it over. “I don’t think I can really answer that, but regardless of how I was raised, I like having something to believe in. A hope that what we’re doing here goes beyond the surface of humanity.”
I nodded. It seemed simple enough.
“Life is too complex and intricate to be an accident,” he added.
I mulled it over, tossing it back and forth between logical and crazy, before settling on, “Isn’t it kind of cocky then, to believe that one being is responsible for it all?”
He shrugged again. “Maybe, maybe not. It’s just what I believe.”
I could respect that. “I can respect that.”
He smiled, curling his hand over my knee. “And what do you believe?” he asked with a gentle squeeze.
I skated my fingers down my leg until they landed on his, lacing through them. “That anything is possible,” I answered. And when I looked into his eyes, I felt the truth of those words on more than one level. In an alternate reality; in answer to another question altogether. It punched through so many of my layers that I felt like he was looking right at me. Right into the very core of who I was.
I shifted forward and kissed him. Silencing the questions and the fears those thoughts bubbled up to the surface. He leaned into me, deepening the kiss, and it got heated even faster than our last kiss did, making him quickly break away.
And then we were right back to where we’d started.
“I think we need to get out of my room,” he said through a flustered chuckle.
“Okay,” I breathed, my soft smile shifting into a smirk. “Need another cooldown?”
“Something like that.” He cleared his throat, adjusting his shorts.
Andokay.Not looking; definitely not looking.
I took a quick peek and snapped my wide eyes back up to his. Not lookingagain. My mouth was held open in a little “o.”
He laughed, wiping his hand down his face for the second time today in amusement. Or frustration. A combination of both that had his cheeks flushed and eyes lit.
“Let’s go swimming,” I suggested. “I think we could both use a cooldown—” I glanced at his lap again.Oops. “—now.”
He sighed. “Unless you have a bathing suit on underneath your clothes, I do not think that’s a good idea.”
I nudged his shoulder with mine as I slid off his bed, ignoring his adorable, gravelly emphasis on the wordnot. Okay,attemptingto ignore. “I have a bathing suit in my backpack,” I said.
His eyebrows rose. “Do you always carry around a spare bathing suit?”
“You never know when an opportunity is going to present itself, Neil.” I stared at him pointedly. “Case in point.”
“Fair enough.” He laughed. “Then let’s go swimming.