But all I could think about was my hands in his hair.

“Promise me,” Nick said, his voice rumbling and low, “that for the next ten seconds, you’re not going to say anything about dead bodies or fake pregnancies or anyone with the last name Ames.”

I felt my body listing toward his. My hands moved to his chest of their own volition. “I’ll give you seven,” I countered.

He brought his hands up to my fingertips, touching them lightly. He leaned forward, his lips stopping a fraction of an inch from mine, then moved his hands to the sides of my face. His fingers were rough and callused.

And warm.

“I can make seven work.” He grinned and closed his lips over mine.

I should have pulled back, but I didn’t. I shouldn’t have lost myself to it—to him—but I did. On some level, I was aware that I suddenly had his shirt fisted in my hands, that I wasn’t sitting next to him anymore, but on top of him.

His hands trailed down to my waist as he pulled back from the kiss. “Seven.”

My phone buzzed. I ignored the text, but it was followed by another and another. I looked down at my phone. Lily.

“Trouble in paradise?” Nick asked me.

I was on my feet before I’d even finished reading the message. “You don’t even know.”

CHAPTER 37

“Where is he?” I asked.

Lily led me through the crowd, then stopped when we got close to the long line of grills that they’d finished setting up since Nick and I had disappeared. “There.”

J.D. Easterling had some nerve, showing up here. When I finally saw him, however, I realized that was an understatement. Lily had omitted one key fact from her text.

“He didn’t,” I said.

Lily swallowed hard. There were still some noticeable pie bits in her hair. “He did.”

The fact that Lily’s father had decided to attend the festivities was surprising enough, the kind of move meant to communicate to everyone, but especially to Aunt Olivia, that he was still the same man—Lily’s father, John David’s father, a prominent member of the circles in which all of these people ran.

But J.D. hadn’t just come here. More specifically: he hadn’t come here alone.

“Why would he bring her?” Lily was practically shaking.

I grabbed her arm and held it. “I have no idea.”

Ana was wearing a blue sundress—white shrug with capped sleeves, sedate ponytail low on the nape of her neck. She looked all-American and wholesome.