She nods, fanning her face, looking as grateful for the break as I am. “It’s exhausting.”
“That’s on account of you working so hard, I’m guessing,” I say, ignoring the skeptical look she casts my way. But shewasworking hard in there, circulating and delivering drinks and making introductions, and I’ll bet she’s the one who noticed about the cooler. It’s like Greer said—she’s the fixed point in the room, the one everyone tends to orbit around, and this party’s not even for her.
I tilt my head back to look at the dark, clear sky above. At camp, you’d be able to see the stars by now, I’m guessing, and I let that thought settle over me, think about how my everyday view stands to change now. “I decided I’m going to take on the management role,” I say, surprising myself, and surprising her, I guess, because I see in my peripheral vision the way her head snaps my way. “You were right.”
“I didn’t say—” she begins, at the same time I say, “I want to do right by Paul and Lorraine. And my brother.”
And whatever she was going to say, she stops, and there’s a long silence, heavy with something unspoken. I lower my head, look over at her, see where she’s got the inside of her cheek caught between her teeth.Tell me,I’m thinking.Tell me what that look on your face is all about.But all she says is, “That’s great. You’ll be great.”
“Yeah. Thanks.” But it feels hollow, this exchange, and suddenly whatever’s inside that party feels preferable to the loaded moment out here.
I hear her take a deep breath, and then she raises her chin too, the long column of her throat pale in the dim light from the porch. “I’ve got a decision to make too, I think. I had this interview. To do somevolunteering.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” She tells me about it, never looking my way—legal advising, she says, for people who can’t afford it. At every turn, I hear what she’s doing, stuffing her language full of conditionals even as she fills me in:if I get it. I’ve never really done most of the kinds of cases they get. I’m not sure it’s the right time. I’ve never been that good with people.
“You’re good with people,” I say, atthat last one.
She laughs, that sharp edge of sarcasm elbowing me right in the ribs, and I keep quiet. It seems like she feels the silence more, and I don’t mind it, not right now. It bothers me, this thing with Zoe, that she’s talking herself out of this gig. She’d be good—I meant what I said that night at the bonfire. She’s smart as fuck, a hell of a lawyer, no matter what it cost my family personally.
An idea takes shape in my mind as I look up at the stars, as I think about the weekendahead at camp.
I can feel her look over at me, and after a minute I lower my head, catch her with eyes narrowed in suspicion. She knows my body like I know hers now. For a second it looks like she might say something, her full lips parting before closing again, pursing slightly in a way that sends a pulse of heat to my cock. She doesn’t try again, only heads over to the large blue cooler set on the concrete patio. I move quicker, bending downto pick it up.
“Okay, Lancelot, you can back off,” she says, nudging me. “I can pick up a cooler.”
“It’s heavy. Let me get it.” My voice is tinged with frustration, mostly because she’s bent over in that dress thing she’s wearing, and now I feel half-done-for, aroused and impatient and full of the need to get inside her again.
She pinches the back of my hand,hard, jarring me out of myself, and when I flinch it away, she grabs one handle of the cooler so now we’re sharing the weight, her side hanging lower than mine. She gives me a look like she’s captured the freaking flag, and I press down the laugh that’s suddenly sitting right behindmy breastbone.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” I say, no edge in it. I feel that familiar bubble of amusement alongside my desire. “You’re so stubborn.”
Her mouth opens in exaggerated shock. “I’mstubborn? I’d slap you for that, but I’d probably break my hand on that hard head of yours.” She huffs out an exasperated sigh, tugs on the cooler. “I can’t believe you’d call me stubborn, when you—”
“Don’t,” I say, tugging on my end. “Don’t bring up the thingabout driving.”
“It’s like you thinkIcan’tdrive.”
“I know you can drive. I justpreferto drive.”
“Because you’re stubborn!”
“Zo,” I say, keeping my voice calm, which gets her all the more riled up. “What do you ask Hammond every time we have breakfast at the lodge? Every.Fucking. Time?”
Even in the dim light from the porch lamp, I can see the way her face flushes. “That’snot the same.”
“Every time, you ask him ifhe wants eggs.”
“Aiden, it’srudeabout the cereal. If Lorraine makes eggs, he shouldn’t ask for cereal!” She blows a strand of hair away from her face, tugging again at the cooler, hard enough that her breasts move beneath the fabric of her shirt, dress, whatever the hell that thing is. Jesus, she’s hot. If we were having this fight in the cabin, I’d have it up around her waist by now.
“But Lorraine doesn’t care. Which means you shouldn’t care.You’rethestubborn one.”
“I am not—”
“Will you just let me take the fucking cooler?”
“Oh my God. I lift weights three days a week, Aiden. It’s not even heavy. It’s not like your dick is going to shrink if I—”
