“Oh. My. God,” Haddie said with a mixture of surprise and reverence. “Levi Rourke, did they…oil up your torso for this?”
Levi pinched the bridge of his nose and collapsed into a chair, swearing under his breath.
“Wait!” Haddie continued. “Did you wax your chest for this before they oiled you up?”
He didn’t have to look at the image Haddie was staring at to know what she was referring to. He might not have been invited to participate in the most recent year’s calendar due to the whole legal circus surrounding his suspension, but he remembered what the photographer and stylist had dressed him in the year before when the theme was Hometown Beginnings.
The stylist had somehow procured a pair of purple Muskie football pants and matching helmet with his high school number, 23, painted on it. It was only because of the bottle of whiskey at the studio that Levi was able to relax enough to hold that helmet and—yes—let the stylist oil him up.
“Any proceeds went to a combined scholarship fund for incoming athletes from all participating universities,” he grumbled. “They still do.”
He glanced up to see Haddie thumbing the screen on her own phone now, a goofy grin on her face. “There!” she declared, then set her phone onto the table. “I’m now a proud supporter of the NCAA Hometown Beginnings Scholarship Fund.”
Mrs. Pinkney clapped. “Wonderful! Always happy to turn another donor on to such a worthy cause.” Then she winked atHaddie, who responded with a curtsy.
“Mrs. Pinkney,” Haddie responded with triumph in her voice. “We will each take a double scoop of salted-caramel pretzel crunch, please!”
The other woman responded with a curt nod and then disappeared behind the candy/pastry/ice cream counter.
Haddie lowered herself to her seat and leaned across the tiny table so her eyes—and every other part of her face, for that matter—were an inch from Levi’s.
“I’m going to pin this calendar to the wall right above my headboard and keep it on the lovely month of June for all twelve months of the year,” she teased, referring to the month he appeared in the calendar, which was also the month of his own birthday.
Calamondin orange blossoms.
“Calawhat?” Haddie asked.
“What?” Levi parroted, and she was still right there, right in front of him, her nose crinkled and her soft pink lips pursed in a pout. “Did I say something?” Because he thought he’d onlythoughtthe thought.
“Something about orange blossoms,” she replied, dropping back into her seat.
Levi swallowed. “Your shampoo or perfume or whatever,” he replied, affecting as much nonchalance as he could muster while momentarily drunk on her scent. “It smells like this orange tree my mom used to grow.”
Haddie looked at him like he’d just sprouted a second head. “Look, I know just about everyone in this town has a greener thumbthan I’ll ever have—I mean, I’ve killed succulents—but I’m pretty sure orange trees are pretty hard to grow in Illinois, what with that thing we have calledwinter.”
Levi shook his head, coming out of his trance and straightening in his seat. “So, there is this citrus fruit, the calamondin, which is something between, like, an orange and a kumquat?” His brows drew together before he nodded to himself. “Yeah. A kumquat. And it grows on this smaller, indoor-outdoor tree that you can bring inside during the winter months. It was my mom’s favorite plant. And when she brought it inside…” He closed his eyes and took in a deep breath through his nose. “It smelled like summer whenever you walked by the tree, even if it was twenty below and grayer than gray outside. It smelled like…you.”
“Oh,” Haddie said softly, the teasing grin from her recent calendar discovery melting into a soft sort of reverence. “It’s a set,” she told him, her voice a bit hoarse so that she had to clear her throat. “Shampoo, conditioner, body spray. I get it at this little boutique around the corner from my apart—” But she cut herself off. “I used to get it there. Guess I’ll be in the market for a new scent soon.” She gave him a one-shoulder shrug.
“No!” Levi blurted out. “I mean, Chicago’s still a great place to visit, right? We could… er… You could always swing by the shop the next time you’re in town. If you wanted to. Because it suits you. The scent.”
Stop talking. Stop talking. Stop talking,he warned himself.
“Here we go!” Mrs. Pinkney cried from behind the counter, saving him from himself. But before he glanced up at the shopproprietor and the monstrous bowls of ice cream she’d just slid across the counter, he caught Haddie smiling shyly down at nothing in particular in her lap.
“I’ll grab those,” he mumbled, then ambled the two steps to the counter to retrieve the largest servings of ice cream he’d ever encountered. When he returned, setting down the mountains of ice cream on the table, Haddie seemed to have recovered from whatever was keeping her from meeting his gaze before.
“Yes!” she cried, clapping her hands together.
“Yes?” Levi asked. “No person should consume this much ice cream in one sitting, and I’m talking about just one of these bowls, split between us.”
Haddie scoffed and waved him off. “The words coming out of your mouth right now are words of a man who has never had salted-caramel pretzel-crunch ice cream, and you grew up here, Coach! There’s no way in hell you escaped the best thing to ever touch your tongue!” She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. “You know what I mean!”
He laughed while simultaneously trying to banish the thought of Haddie mentioning his tongue.
“I was…um…very strict about keeping my body healthy,” Levi admitted. “I hope you know I was joking before about calling myself a big deal around here, but the truth was—or I guess still is—that the Summertown football team is one of the most important things to this town. And when I was on that team—”
“Thestarof that team…” Haddie blurted out.
