Summer glanced up to find Vander watching her, and damn if her heart didn’t give a little extra beat. She threw him a wave, and he dipped his head in that sexy way she’d seen from him so many times when he sat at the back table in the Stockyard.
He continued to his destination, swinging the heavy chairs to rest on top of the table with a display of rippling muscle down his spine.
For a beat, Summer forgot to move or even breathe.
“We need more mason jars here!” A lovely woman with dark wavy hair swirling around her shoulders looked around for a helper for the centerpieces she was creating on the fly using candles and water.
“I got you,” Summer called back and hurried back into the lodge.
Nobody questioned her about pitching in—they just acted like it was a natural order of business to have strangers acting like they’d always been here.
The kitchen smelled like barbecue sauce and fresh strawberries. She found a big tray and filled it with mason jars from a nearby cupboard. When she returned to the woman who requested them, her eyes lit up.
“You’re Summer.”
She nodded, setting the tray on the table. “That’s right.”
“I’ve seen you around town. I’m Aspen.”
“Hi.”
Aspen pushed a stack of tealight candles her way. “Do you mind taking over with the centerpieces? I have to see about the flower arch.”
“Not at all.” She laughed at the impossibility of just producing a flower arch out of thin air.
Aspen tossed her a smile and rushed away.
By the time Summer filled each jar with water and floated a candle on top, the tables were all set up. She placed two jars on each long table and checked that Ben was staying out of trouble, but he and Navy had a bucket of sidewalk chalk and were drawing on the pavement.
Back in the kitchen, she filled her tray with food to be carried outside. “Behind you,” she said to a woman as she scooted by her.
The woman turned and Summer saw she had an infant strapped in a carrier on her chest. She recognized her from the Stockyard that day, when the security team quizzed her about the groceries and her car.
The woman offered her a smile and stepped aside to let her pass.
“I’m Rhae,” she offered.
“Hi, Rhae.”
After placing the covered dishes on the tables, she returned to see Rhae with her hands full.
“Here—let me take these.” Before the woman could protest, she took the box of plastic silverware and a big pack of napkins from her.
“Thank you. I feel like I’m in the way.”
Summer smiled. “You’re doing the most important job there is.” She glanced down at the sleeping baby nestled against her chest.
That earned her a smile.
Summer threw herself into the work as part of her kept waiting for someone to remind her that she didn’t really belong here. She’d waited on some of them plenty of times at the Stockyard, but she’d never hung out with the ranch owners, security guys or the women tied into the Black Heart orbit.
But they all treated her like an old friend, when she’d only served them burgers and refilled their drinks.
Ben ran past with Navy chasing him. Both of them wore a mustache of whipped cream that they’d obviously scooped off the triple decker strawberry pound cake the ladies whipped up.
She couldn’t help but laugh and shake her head. She felt a stare on her and looked up…right into Vander’s eyes.
The man stood in the middle of the hustle and bustle like the only thing he’d been tasked with doing was looking at her.
