Page 29

“Here.” He takes the parcel and folds back the paper bag and the foil pan and squirts a drop of sauce onto the part I’m about to bite. Then he holds it out.

I open my mouth and he feeds me a bite, somehow making the meaty, savory flavor something erotic. The crispy, buttery pastrymelts in my mouth but crumbles on my lips, and he tilts his hand, wiping a crumb from the corner of my mouth.

I flush.

Why does he have the ability to melt me with just a look? With the slightest touch?

Noah’s pie is finished, and he insists on feeding me the rest of mine.

By the time I’m done I’m flustered, my panties are damp, and meat pies are high on the list of my favorite foods. “OK, you win. That was good.”

I’m still licking my lips, enjoying the lingering taste, when Noah leans in.

His gaze drops to my lips. I almost think he’s going to kiss me.

Then he wipes his thumb across a spot on my chin and feeds a final drop of sauce into my mouth and I try not to be disappointed. I still give his thumb a thorough sucking, hoping to have some of the effect on him he’s having on me, but he turns away, apparently unmoved.

“What did it feel like the first time you had a video go viral?” he says suddenly.

It surprises me, but it doesn’t take me long to form an answer. “Unreal.” I laugh. “I couldn’t believe it had really happened. And when I started to get more and more followers, it took a long time before I realized how it would change my life.”

He nods as if he’s thought about this before. “Do you like it?”

I lift a dry leaf from the jetty beside my thigh and let it flutter into the water below us. “Sometimes. Sometimes it’s great. Being able to share a hidden gem. Or when people are friendly and leave kind or encouraging messages.” There’s a pause and, of course, I think about this week’s awful ones.

“And sometimes it’s not,” says Noah heavily, reading my mind.

“Exactly.”

“What would you have done if you hadn’t become an influencer?”

“I always wanted to be a chef, but I’m not really a very good cook.” I smile at him. “I’m much better at eating and writing about food than I am at making it.”

“Sometimes I don’t know how you find so many ways to describe what I just feel. What I know. I love your channel. I find it hard to look away.”

A shiver runs right up my spine, and it’s me who can’t look away from the intensely honest expression on his face as he looks at me.

“What’s it like when you change? When you transform into a monster?” I don’t know what makes me ask him, except that moment where the walls seem to almost have come down. I want to stay here longer, so I sort of blurt the intimate question out.

“Shift.”

I frown. “Huh?”

“We call it shifting. And it’s hard to explain. I don’t think about it often. It just feels natural. I’ve been this way all my life.”

“I think it’s beautiful.” Since we’re being honest, I tell him, but I have to drop my gaze and when I hear his low chuckle, I squirm in place.

“Do you now? You’re the first human who’s ever said that to me.”

At this, I look up. “All the colors spreading over your skin? It’s amazing.”

“Maybe you’d like to watch it again.”

I can’t help matching his flirtatious grin as he pulls his shirt over his head and stands to unbutton his fly. “What, here?”

“Why not? No one’s around.”

I giggle, looking around to check, but he’s right. The area is isolated from the rest of town and surrounded by trees. The jettyis old and the building which looks like it used to be a storehouse or a club house is abandoned.