Our Scorching Summer (Perks & Benefits #2)

by Kels Stone

I’m falling for Nico Navarro. Fuck. Is this what it’s meant to feel like? Reckless and secure all at the same time? I’ve never had love handed to me before, not without deceit and pain tagging along.

“I would like you without all the things you buy me,” I confess. “And I would go broke trying to make you smile.”

It’s just sex. I force the reminder to replay in my head like an alarm with a broken snooze button.

Just sex that loosens my inhibitions and worries. Just sex that makes it clear that Nico has memorized the texture of the fabric woven through me, the patterns of who I am, and even the clusters of pulled strings and knots.

In the depths of my soul, I know I’m treading dangerous territory by entertaining any of ...

We’re two friends having sex. That’s what we’re good at; it’s what I’m good at. Lust. Passion. Fire. Not love. I simply need a reminder...

One sucker punch in my defense. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get over that. She’s somehow ten times more attractive now, if that’s even possible. No one else. Not for her and not for me.

The only thing our time in London has made me realize is that Lily Rodin is my first love, and I’m intent on making her my last and my only. Despite her resistance, however much it aches me to witness, I know she feels it too. She must. I can’t be entirely over my head.

I’d make an awful detective. I’d be a willing accomplice to whatever crime she wanted to commit.

“Admit you’ve wanted me for as long as I’ve wanted you. Admit you’re mine. Admit you belong to me.”

“I’m at your mercy, Lily,” I promise. “You’re not going to lose yourself if you give in. You have me, and I’ve got you.”

London has been a change of pace from Rio. I miss the people, the sun, and the beach every day, but London’s different

It probably has something to do with the fact I’m constantly getting laid by a man who can find my G-spot with his eyes closed. Or the fact that he’s taken the time to run his fingers over the chains around my heart, stirring it awake.

I keep trying to convince myself it’s the former, but I’m beginning to understand that I’m failing miserably. The matching ink on o...

“You need to fucking stop, Lily. I’m here with you, and we’re going to figure this out together.” His voice drops to an uncompromising note. “Whether you like it or not.” “I don’t like to rely on anyone.” “Be brave, sweet girl, and try,” he says. “I promise, I got you.”

I know Lily hasn’t come around to the idea of me helping directly—her independence is both admirable and wildly annoying—but I’ve managed to hack away at some of that stubbornness for the time being. I’m not planning on stopping any time soon.

She’s my everything. I may not truly understand what it means to be in love yet, but giving her my all feels like the right thing. It’s what I want to do.

Who would spend fifty dollars on one packet of snail goop? Ah, who am I kidding? If she wanted to swipe my credit card for llama spit eye cream that cost a thousand dollars, I’d buy her as many bottles as her little heart desired.

“People fall in love in all sorts of ways. There’s no use trying to understand how and who your heart will pull toward. It’s why romance is fun. It’s entirely unpredictable.” Like her. Like us.

I wonder if, by the end of the summer, Lily will grow to accept the idea of us instead of running away from it—no matter how messy and unpredictable it could be.

It could be just us on a chilly day in December, making pancakes and watching movies on our couch in front of our television before catching a flight the next day to ski in the Swiss Alps. Lily could write her books, and I could work on something remotely revolutionary.

A life shared with a person I can call home. The desire is surreal, and I ache for th...

I understand the film in its entirety. There’s something safe and comforting knowing after all the shit, the trials and tribulations, a happy ending awaits two peopl...

“You can try and lie to me all you want, pretty girl.” I lie down beside her, and the stiffness in her posture loosens immediately. “But I’m not convinced you don’t want to be in my arms right now.”

“I just want to feel you close,” I say. “Is that alright?” “Just this once.” Yeah, I’ve heard those words before.

Nico’s transformed into a different person over the past few days. Well, not really. But there’s something concrete about him now. A sort of protective barrier he’s put up around us.

Even still, my mind is scattered across a million different dimensions, with no time to shuffle through the sandbox of feelings I have for him.

“You know, you don’t have to suffer in that mind of yours all on your own.”

“But, Lily, I’m—” “Please, Nico,” I interrupt him, afraid of the next syllables about to fall from his lips. They’re words I know any woman who has ever spent time with him would beg to hear. But here I am, summoning every ounce of willpower to stop them.

would pluck stars from the sky if I asked him to. And he has changed. He made a plan for the summer, kept up with my carefully structured morning routine, and even started preventing his phone battery from falling below 50 percent since we landed in London.

But it’s temporary. This summer has not been rooted in reality. In the real world, with a sea of temptations and obligations, where Nico and I aren’t spending every second of every day around each other, the foundation we built this summer will turn to dust.

On any other morning-after, in any other place, and in any different time, I would have spilled that there’s a naked man beneath my mattress. But I can’t. Because the man is her brother-in-law. If Luca gets wind it, this will turn into a bloodbath. There’s no coming back from that.

There’s nothing like the sound of my best friend giggling after being apart. No matter the distance or time, everything is as it always was when we’re together. We’re still the same pair of souls from eight years ago. Avery, a turtle-saving Wonder Woman, and me, a liar.

The Navarro brothers sure do love bringing their women drinks first thing in the morning. No, wait. Avery is his wife. What Nico and I have is different—right?

If anything, I want each of his grazes to be imprinted on my skin. Maybe then, when summer expires, we and these past few months will feel real—not like a fever dream.

“We put on a good show.” I smile up at him, my heart beating fiercely in my chest. “Two months of method acting will do that.”

It’s strange how your life can morph and change in a few weeks without you even realizing it. But two months after deciding to ditch returning to New York, I’m struggling to reconcile the parts of me I’ve always kept close to my chest.

Confessing my feelings about Lily to my uptight brother, right in the middle of open water, may not have been my best-laid plan ever. But there’s no way he’d litter the ocean with my strangled body when he’s the CEO of an ocean conservation firm. Right?

After last night’s kiss and, well, this entire summer, there’s no use denying Lily and I are a hell of a lot more than friends. I don’t need Luca’s approval to pursue her, but I want it. I need him to understand this matters to me in so many more ways than a random hookup or a finicky relationship ever did.

“I love her.” There. A word so small, just four little letters, which barely scratches the surface of what I feel for Lily Rodin.

“How do you know you love her?” “I—I just do. I’ve never been in love before, but I’m pretty sure what I’m feeling is exactly what Mami and Papi have, and you and Ave.”

“I don’t ever want to be away from her. Somehow, I feel happier making Lily smile than at any other time in my life, and apart from all that, she lets me be entirely myself.”

“It only took Avery a few seconds to put together that you were under the bed on your first morning here. No matter how much you think you’re sneaking around in the mornings, we know. My wife’s already talking about the four of us raising our kids together.”

“Avery’s like wildfire. Something in her burns the way I do.” He tosses his head back, sending the wet clump of hair sticking to his forehead out of the way. “I’d trade anything to keep her alight, to make her smile or yell or, truly, anything at all as long as she wants to share it with me. I want nothing from her but to be around her.”

“That’s how I feel about Lily.” It’s a love that feels both generous and all-consuming.

“Then, if you really do love her, little brother, the only thing you can do is show her. They’re both strongheaded and painfully independent, but it’s what makes them so rewarding to love. At the center of it all, somethi...

I search my mind for anything I could wish for right now but come up short. I’m in Europe with my best friend, her husband, and the man who has been hacking away at the cage surrounding my heart. What more can I need?

“Lil, I know you can see Nico looks at you the way Luca looks at me.” “All men look at me that way.” “No. Not like that. I’ve seen guys trip up around you, sometimes even do things that border on harassment.” I grin despite the severity of the conversation. “But you’ve never mirrored them. Never really glanced their way, refilled their cup, or laughed at every single joke despite how wildly inappropriate it is. It’s different with Nico.”

She’s right, as always. Maintaining a friendship with someone who’s innately so much like yourself is almost frustrating. Where Avery is soft, I’m clad in stone, but everything in between has been my most rewarding and familiar relationship.

“It would be easier if we remained friends.” Because I can manage a friendship. It doesn’t come with strings that yank, tug, and pull on every inch of your rusted heart, somehow ...