Addison snorted. “Ha! Using the word ‘popular’ to describe a Johnston...”
I was about to object, again questioning exactly why she’d dated Rowan if she disliked the family so much, when Matteo interrupted with a chuckle.
“Man, Tahira. You were so excited to have kids next door. Too bad they’re a plant nerd and a book nerd. They sound insufferable.”
Matteo hadn’t evenmetJuniper and Rowan. A sourness formed in my stomach. Yeah, I hadn’t exactly been kind about Rowan to Matteo, but he and Gia had to see how terrible Addison and Cameron were being, right? Didn’t Gia care that they were laughing at the girl she wanted to be our “makeover sidekick”? What happened to protecting Juniper? Not to mention she didn’t seem too bothered by this grow-op accusation.
“And don’t forget Leanne and her rabbits,” Addison continued. “She practically lives at the Johnstons’. The whole lot of them are exhausting.” She turned to Gia. “Too bad you have to spend your summer next door to them.”
Gia snuggled into Cameron’s arm. “I’m not thinking I’ll be there much.”
Matteo gestured to Cameron and Addison, smiling at me. “At least you met this crew so you’ll have some decent people to hang with instead of...what did you call them? Plant geeks?” He leaned into me for a kiss, but I wasn’t feeling it.
Actually, I wasn’t feeling any of these people at the table right now. I was burned out, annoyed—and so pissed that Addison freaking McLaughlin ended up ruining what could be my only day with Matteo for weeks. She’d made me want to defend Rowan. Which I didn’t want to do, especially in front of Matteo. Maybe I shouldn’t have been so negative about Rowan to my boyfriend. Rowan and I were on the Bloom team together now, and it would be easier to get along with him if Matteo weren’t mocking him every chance he got. I needed to tell him to chill about Rowan once we were alone.
I squeezed Matteo’s hand. I wished he and I had just driven alone in the Mustang so we could have left early and not had to deal with any of this pettiness. More than anything, I wanted to be back at the tiny house.
When everyone insisted on doing more sightseeing and souvenir shopping after lunch, I sort of had to go, too. But I must have looked irritated about it, because Matteo leaned in close when we were in a candy store. “Don’t worry, we’ll go for a drive after we get back. I need some time alone with you.”
“Yes, please,” I said. That was exactly what I needed, too.
After the drive back to Bakewell, I said a polite goodbye to Addison and Cameron as I got out of Cameron’s Jeep. Gia hopped out, too, gave Matteo a big hug, then climbed back into the Jeep and said she was going to hang out at Hyacinth’s with Cameron, which was fine with me. I had plans with my boyfriend.
Matteo drove us to this park outside town in the Mustang. On the way, he talked about his job, the new clothes he’d bought there, and some new friends he’d made. My annoyance from lunch was already fading. It made sense: Matteo and I were always best when it was just us. Too bad alone time was so rare.
After parking near a pond in the park, we found a picnic table overlooking the water and sat. The sun was setting by then, and the colors reflecting on the water were like light brushes of watercolors on dark paper. I took some pictures—not of either of us, but of the sky, the water, and the trees near the shoreline.
“The sunsets here look different,” I said.
“Is it because there’s less pollution or something?”
I shrugged. “I dunno.”
He took my hand in his. “You okay? You seemed quiet earlier.”
I nodded. “Yeah. Addison’s just not my favorite person in Bakewell. She was getting under my skin.”
“Really? Her and the dude seemed all right to me.”
“I don’t know about Cameron, but Addison’s been harassing Juniper for a while. Juniper is really nice, and Addison just rubs me the wrong way.” I still couldn’t believe that I had been enjoying my day withAddison—at least until lunch, when she did a great job of confirming my previous bad feelings about her.
“Well, she can’t be worse than the guy that made you spill shit all over yourself.”
I sighed. I didn’t want to talk about Rowan. Or Addison. Or even June, right now. I leaned into Matteo’s shoulder. “I’m glad we’re alone now.”
“Me too, baby. We got some great pictures today, though, didn’t we? Those ones outside the haunted-train thing were epic. We’re going to have to make sure we don’t post the same ones on our Instagrams at the same time. If we stagger them, we’ll have more engagement.”
I nodded. It was a good idea. “I’m not going to have a whole lot of photos other than those pics for a while. Still can’t find a good spot in Bakewell that’s not all grandma flowers.”
“You post first, then. I’ll have some shots from the Flirt Skincare launch on Wednesday. Alyssa says a ton of important people will be there, and—”
“What skin-care launch?”
“I told you, Alyssa and I are going to a product launch this week. Check out the Flirt Instagram after Wednesday; I’m sure we’ll be featured. The last launch we went to—”
“You’ve been to several launches with her? This is your coworker, right?”
“Yeah, I told you, her sister’s a publicist. We went to one for a tech company last week.”
