But he wasn’t a boy. He was so much more… The gravitas of it slammed into me like the sky falling. How could this amazing being, who by all rights shouldn’t even notice I existed, care enough to want to find out everything there was to know about me? I could never understand it.

He lifted a finger, a flawless finger, and twirled it into one of the wispy tendrils of hair that hung loose from my bun. The back of his hand almost brushed my cheek. So close… My breath caught.

“I thought you were gone for good,” I barely whispered.

He paused and his mouth opened slightly as if he were at a loss for words. Then he blinked and shook his head, chuckling under his breath. “You truly do not understand, do you?” He smirked as if enjoying a private joke, and gave my hair a gentle tug. If I tilted my face a fraction of an inch, it would be leaning against his hand… but I didn’t dare.

“I like this,” he said, looking at my messy bun.

I blushed. I looked a fright and I knew it. I put a hand to the side of my hair and turned away. For the first time since I came into the room, I remembered I was wearing only the tiny shorts and tank top. Crap, caught indecent again! Oh god, where was my robe?

“But I would like it better wet.”

I froze. Did I hear him right? I turned back to him slowly. “Did you say… wet?”

He grinned, his eyes sparkling, and then he caught me by the hand. “Come,” he said.

I was too distracted by the fact that my entire body had turned into complete jelly to protest as he drew me from the room. He was back! And he was… happy! And he was holding my hand! After the two days of stiff emotions and no physical contact at all, it absolutely undid me. To be smiled upon and touched by Riley, the boy of my very dreams! But oh god, where was he taking me?

“My parents…” I protested lamely as he took me downstairs toward the front door. How does one explain Super Grounded to a multidimensional godlike creature?

If he heard me, he ignored it, and I was thankful I still had my flip flops on as he hustled me outside. I stumbled on the front porch steps though, and immediately forgot about my prison sentence when I saw what was in the driveway. A pristine BMW Roadster, so black and shiny that its sleek paint seemed to absorb all light around it into an unfathomable dimension. The convertible top was down, revealing two blood-red leather seats, and the tires were so clean, it looked as if it had never been off the lot.