“I have so many questions about you,” she says as we walk down the beach sidewalk, the narrow planked walkway where the concrete meets the sand.

“You’ll be disappointed by how much mystery I lack. What you see is what you get.”

“I highly doubt that.” She gives me a side glance as she licks the green gelato from the cone.

“What about you? There are so many things I don’t know about you.”

“Fire away,” she answers with a smile.

“Why didn’t you go to college?” I start.

“I didn’t want to. I know that sounds like a rich brat kind of thing to say, but my parents wanted to spend a ridiculous amount of money to send me, and I just wasn’t ready for it. I knew what I would find there, and I wasn't interested. So I decided to take a year off…to think about my future.”

“Did you figure anything out yet?”

“I figured out that I like the beach.” Her body turns toward me as she walks and her left hand loops through my arm as she says, “Especially this one.”

When I glance at her, I notice the way the brightness in her smile fades as if she’s thinking about something that turns her mood. Perhaps it's the thought of ending up with a loser for a boyfriend who will only cause her pain and trouble if she chooses to stay with him.

“What about you?” she asks. “Why haven’t you left Wickett?”

“My brother and I were raised on the mainland in the foster system, but my brother aged out before I did, so once I turned seventeen, I just ditched the family scene to live with him. He taught me everything he knew.”

“He was a tattoo artist too?” she asks.

“No. He helped Murph run the business. He ran a lot of the business in town, actually. After getting his business degree online, he actually turned out pretty successful.”

“Do you want to talk about what happened to him?”

There isn’t a single part of me that wants to talk about what happened to Theo. The memory is a sour one, and the wound there is far from healed. But the way Sierra looks at me, like she’s actually eager and open to letting me talk about my life, even the rotten bits, has me wanting to hold her.

We reach a small street when we stop, no longer surrounded by other beachgoers. So we take a turn and walk down between two buildings. It’s quiet, secluded, but not as seedy as the alleyways by the tattoo shop. Once we find ourselves alone, she stops me and pulls my hand into hers.

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” she says as she squeezes my fingers.

“I will at some point.”

“That’s okay, Logan.” Her other hand snakes its way around my waist until our bodies are pressed together. And the contact lights a match inside of me, so I pull her closer and take her mouth with mine.