Just a Summer Fling (12 page)

He moved then. All the way to the car, but somewhere around the back wheel on the driver’s side he ran out of steam and stood there, one big stride away from her, and he couldn’t trust himself to go any closer. “You can have another lesson,” he managed to say. “If you want. Or we could do something else. I could make you dinner.” Which was a stupid suggestion, because he was a pretty terrible cook. “You could break something at the cottage and I could fix it.”

She shook her head at that, embarrassed. “If I did that, would you trust me not to have a big fancy dinner set up to surprise you?”

“I’d come over in the morning,” he said, shuffling a little closer to her. “And I wouldn’t give you an exact time, so you wouldn’t be able to plan a brunch or something.”

“Crafty.” She wasn’t looking him in the eye. Her attention seemed caught by something else, and he wanted to wipe his hand over his face to check if there was something stuck to his skin. But then he licked his lips, unconsciously, nervously, and he saw her eyes widen. Oh.

It gave him his confidence back. This wasn’t the part he was supposed to be insecure about. She’d made it clear that she wanted him, physically. Abundantly clear, on multiple occasions. And he’d spent enough time around summer women to learn that they were no different from anyone else, not when it came to their desires. He knew what he was doing, for this part at least.

And maybe the confidence made him a little cocky,
because instead of moving forward and letting himself finally touch her warm, soft body, he stepped back. “Would you like a drink?” he asked, raising the beer bottle he’d almost forgotten he was holding. “I have beer, or Scotch. Red wine, but no white, I don’t think.”

She looked disoriented, and he liked it. “A beer would be good,” she finally said, but she didn’t sound convinced.

Of course she wasn’t convinced. She hadn’t driven out there for a beer. She’d come for the same thing she’d wanted from him every other time. This time, she’d won, and she was going to get it. But he could at least make her wait a while. He could drag it all out, torture her with anticipation and frustration. Sure, he’d be torturing himself as well, but he’d rather have this kind of suffering than the one he was facing down the line.

“Come sit,” he said quietly, starting toward the porch. He didn’t let himself turn to check, but he could hear the gravel crunching as she fell in behind him.

“You going to be cold?” he asked when they reached the top of the porch steps. He turned and nodded briefly to her clothing, with its damp spots.

She looked down at herself, then back at him. It was hard to tell in the dim light filtering out from inside the house, but he was pretty sure she was blushing. When she spoke, her voice confirmed his suspicion: the movie star was embarrassed. “I’m a mess. I didn’t think about . . . I should have cleaned up. God, I should have dried off at least! This is not how I’m supposed to look.”

“Not supposed to look real?” he asked. “You’re supposed to wear waterproof underwear or something?” He shook his head and gestured to his own jeans. “I’m a little soggy myself. And if you think any guy is ever going to complain about you wearing something that reminds him he recently saw you mostly naked, you’re crazy.” It wasn’t much fun to torture someone who was actually suffering from it. “Sit. I’ll get a blanket in case you get cold. And a couple beers.”

She did as she was told, and he did as he’d said he would. When he came back from inside she was sitting on the porch swing with her boots off and her feet curled up under her ass, and she looked tiny and delicate, more like someone to be protected than someone to be lusting after. Then she shifted a little and the light shone on the full roundness of her breasts, and that was it for his protective instincts.

He handed her one of the beers and then sat down beside her, the blanket between them. They were quiet for a while, until Ashley said, “Thank you.”

He looked at her quizzically, but didn’t ask for clarification. He just waited.

She smiled. “For the beer, and the blanket, and the swim, and the riding lessons. But mostly . . . it feels like . . . I don’t know. Thank you for letting me be here. For not chasing me off and telling me to leave you alone.”

“I’ve already tried that,” he said lightly. “It never seemed to do much good.”

She was quiet for too long this time, and he realized that his words had hit too close to home. Or maybe they’d hit exactly where he’d intended them to; maybe he still wanted to punish her, at least a little. But that wasn’t fair. “Sorry,” he said. The word wasn’t quite enough, so he tried to find a few more to go with it. “I’m glad you’re here.” That was true, on some level, and he should have just stopped talking, but instead he added, “It’s a bad idea and I should know better— I
do
know better—but I’m still glad you’re here.”

She whirled toward him with such vigor that he had to plant his feet to keep the swing from lurching out of control. “I don’t get that! What is it about me that’s so
poisonous
? Why is it a bad idea for us to spend some time together? I’m a nice person, Josh! I’m not . . .” Her voice trailed off, and her last words were barely audible. “Why am I a bad idea?”

What was he supposed to say to that? He could tell her it wasn’t anything personal. That was true enough, but he
didn’t think she’d believe it, not unless he went into a lot more detail than he really wanted to about it all. “Summer people,” he said heavily. He knew what he meant. Any of the other locals would know what he meant. They’d understand that it wasn’t just about the amount of time summer people spent in the place, it was everything. Wealth, status, celebrity, arrogance. The way they arrived like a swarm of locusts, sweeping over the quiet wilderness and changing everything in their paths. They assumed Vermont was theirs, that it was one more venue for their enjoyment, like an amusement park or something. They forgot that there were people who lived there year-round. People whose whole existences were anchored to the rocky soil, people who had been born there and were going to die there, just like their parents and grandparents before them. Josh was pretty sure the summer people thought the place was boxed up and stored away once fall came, and the people who’d served them all summer were packed away with it, with no thoughts or emotions or regrets about anything that had happened over the warmer months. “You treat us like we’re not real,” he said. It was the best he could do.

But Ashley didn’t look convinced. “What does that mean?”

“Like we don’t matter,” he tried again. Then he looked at her and saw how upset she looked. She’d come out for a quickie, and had gotten stuck with a beer and this instead. Not a pleasant surprise. So he added, “Not you.” But that wasn’t quite right. “Not
just
you. You’re not . . . you’re not the worst of them.”

She stared at him, and he knew there would be more questions. He’d try to answer them, but he wasn’t really sure he’d be able to. He wasn’t great with words at the best of times, and trying to explain something like this? “It’s just not a good idea. Getting involved with summer people. Sometimes it makes you forget who you are, and who
they
are. . . .”

“How do I treat you like you don’t matter?” Her voice
was shaky, and for a horrible moment he was afraid she was crying. He looked at her long enough to be sure her cheeks were dry, but he wasn’t really sure what he would have done if they’d been wet.

Probably if she’d been crying he’d have had the sense to shut up. Maybe he would have taken her in his arms, if she’d let him, and that probably would have led somewhere a hell of a lot better than this conversation. But she wasn’t crying, so, God help him, he kept talking. “Like I’m a piece of meat,” he said. “No. Not that dramatic. But you know what I mean.”

“The bar,” she said. “That was . . . It was a mistake. I was drunk and stupid and I did something stupid.”

“Yeah. I’ve done stupid stuff, too. Lots of it. I just . . . You aren’t that sort of person, right? Like, have you ever taken a dare like that before?”

“No!”

“But you did that time. Partly because of Jasmine. I know how she . . .” He stopped there. He didn’t want to tell Ashley about all that, and he could pretend to himself that it was because he didn’t want her to think less of Jasmine
. “
But partly you did it because you’re on vacation. You’re somewhere else, away from your real life. What happens in Vermont stays in Vermont. I get it.” He shook his head. He did get it. “But I’m not on vacation. This is real life, for me. You planning a dinner—for you, it’s just something funny, a silly thing you did one time on vacation. But for me . . . that was my cousin who saw you treating me like a boy toy. Like someone you’d decided to play with. She told my whole family about it. They laughed, mostly. Not a huge deal. But how would you feel if your whole family knew about some guy treating you like that? Some guy trying to seduce you while your cousin watched?”

“I screwed up that time, too,” she said. “I know.”

“Look, it’s not a tragedy,” he started. He might have had more to say, but they both heard the car coming, the low
purr of its engine and the crackle of gravel under its wheels, and then they both turned to see its headlights as it approached through the forest.

“Oh,” Ashley said. “You have a visitor.”

A rescuer. Someone who’d keep him from making a mistake with this woman. But now that escape was at hand, Josh knew for sure he didn’t want to get away. He’d chosen this mistake, and now he wanted to make it.

But when the car’s lights turned off, taking the glare out of his eyes, he recognized the vehicle, and a moment later, the driver who stepped out, and he knew that he wasn’t going to get the chance to make a new mistake that night. Not when one of his old ones was staring at him from the driveway.

Twelve

ASHLEY HAD NO
idea what to say. She remembered what she was wearing, and how ridiculous she must look with patches of dark everywhere her underclothes had soaked through her clothes. She knew her hair was a mess, and she wasn’t wearing any makeup. The woman walking toward them was absolutely going to pick up on all that. Then Ashley stopped worrying about that as her brain prompted her with the question it should have been asking from the start. What the hell was Jasmine McArthur doing at Josh’s cabin?

Maybe Jasmine had come out to ask him to do a few repairs? But it was Friday night, fairly late, and Jasmine was wearing high heels and a short dress. She was holding a bottle of wine in her hand. Ashley tried to keep her mind from leaping to the obvious conclusion.

“Josh,” Jasmine said in her low, sultry voice. “Hope you don’t mind me dropping by.” Then she squinted a little and said, “Ashley? Honestly, is that you? I barely recognize you, sweetie! Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Ashley said. Her voice sounded light and stupid next to Jasmine’s.

“You know the dare had a time limit, right?” Jasmine sounded amused. “I think it’s a little late to try to claim a prize now.”

Finally, Josh broke in, and his voice was as cold as Ashley had hoped it would be. “What can I do for you, Jasmine?”

Even in the moonlight, Ashley could see the way Jasmine’s eyes flared at Josh’s tone. She was excited by it. She wanted him angry. She sashayed a little closer to the deck. “You could fetch us a couple glasses, for a start.” She held up the bottle of wine. “Ashley, you’ll join us?”

As if Ashley was the one crashing the party. And as usual with Jasmine, the words held a little suggestiveness, the hint of the idea that maybe Ashley would be joining them for more than a drink.

“I should go,” Ashley said desperately. Spending time with Josh and the forest had stripped away her protective armor, and Jasmine was too sharp to be around without defenses.

Josh didn’t argue. He seemed to have removed himself from the situation almost entirely, just sitting there on the swing and watching the two women as they . . . as they what? As Jasmine toyed with Ashley like a cat would play with a mouse, probably. If Ashley’d had time to prepare, she could have given Jasmine a run for her money in the polished appearance department, but she’d never picked up the woman’s conversational fierceness. Yes, Jasmine was definitely a predator, and Ashley was the prey.

Or, more likely, Josh was the prey. Jasmine was just another summer woman making a booty call, treating Josh—what had he said? Treating him like he wasn’t real. Ashley was pretty sure she understood what he meant by that now. Treating him like a servant, really. An unpaid gigolo. At their beck and call, ready to perform at their whims. Was that how Josh thought Ashley had treated him?

Yeah, she needed to get out of there. She stood up, wishing it were darker so the others wouldn’t be able to see her messy clothes, or her messy face. At least she managed to keep herself mostly turned away from Josh. But Jasmine was watching her with savage glee, taking in every detail of her appearance, and her reaction.

“I’m up for another week at least, and I don’t have any guests for the next couple days. We should get together, sweetie.” Her smile was wicked as she glanced at Josh and then half whispered, “We could compare notes!”

Ashley wasn’t sure if the strange sound she made could count as a reply or not, and she didn’t think she had the self-control to clarify anything. She felt like an innocent, blundering around in some game Jasmine and Josh were playing together. Josh didn’t have a rule against summer women; he just didn’t want anything to do with Ashley. So let them sit there on the porch, let them talk about her and laugh.

But they wouldn’t likely be sitting on the porch for long. She refused to turn around, but by the time she’d scrambled to her car and backed it up, she could see them in the rearview mirror and Josh was already standing, he and Jasmine so close together Ashley couldn’t see any light between them.

She drove too fast on the way home. She eventually slowed down a little after she saw the eyes of some animal glowing at her from the forest and remembered that her bad night could get a hell of a lot worse if she murdered some wildlife just because she was upset.

By the time she got back to the cottage she was more or less under control, but she still had to keep herself from groaning when she saw Kevin and Charlotte sitting on the porch. They’d been spending every possible moment locked away in Charlotte’s bedroom, and
now
they were peacefully enjoying a nightcap in a shared space?

Because they’d expected her to be away all night, she realized as she parked and headed for the house. If there
was anything worse than the walk of shame in the morning, surely this was it—the walk of someone who couldn’t even manage to do something shameful.

Charlotte’s mouth was gaping open as Ashley approached. “He did
not
shoot you down!” she said, clearly waiting for an explanation.

But Ashley wasn’t ready for that conversation. Instead, she turned to Kevin. “Josh and Jasmine McArthur. They have a thing?”

His expression made it clear he knew something, but wasn’t sure how much he was supposed to share. He looked guiltily in Charlotte’s direction, and seeing her glare, made a face, then nodded reluctantly. “They did. That’s what I heard, at least. But it was a while ago. I didn’t know it had started up again. But Josh is always pretty quiet about that stuff.”

“‘That stuff,’” Ashley echoed. She supposed she was included in that generic term. Whatever nonsense she’d come up with, it was all just “stuff” that some summer woman had done.

“Sit down,” Charlotte said gently. “I’ll get you a drink. Wine? Or a cooler?”

Ashley looked at the amber liquid Kevin was restlessly sloshing around his glass. “Scotch,” she decided. It wasn’t quite right to drown your sorrows in a berry-flavored cooler.

Kevin stood up then. “I’ll get a glass,” he said.

“And ice,” Charlotte added. She and Kevin were drinking theirs straight, but apparently that would be too much for a Scotch neophyte.

Ashley was left with the vaguely comforting notion that the other two were combining efforts to take care of her. She should have been too proud to accept their pity and too strong to need it, but it felt nice to be babied a little.

“I like Kevin,” she said when he was safely out of earshot.

“Yeah,” Charlotte agreed. “He’s a good guy. And pretty
good in bed, too. I mean, not a lot of sophistication, but excellent enthusiasm and stamina.”

Ashley wondered what Josh would think about his cousin being described that way. Was Charlotte being dismissive? Treating Kevin as a sex object and nothing more? “Are you thinking it might be something long-term?” Ashley asked hopefully. After all, there was nothing wrong with a woman enjoying sex. Nothing wrong with starting a relationship with a little—

“Uh, no,” Charlotte said firmly. “How the hell would that work? We’re too different. Noncompatible, long-term.” She peered curiously at Ashley, obviously realizing her words weren’t what her friend had hoped for. “What’s going on with you? Are you getting prudish in your old age?”

“No.” Ashley shook her head impatiently, trying to make her ideas make sense. “I’m just . . . When I was talking to Josh, I thought I was starting to understand what he meant. But now I’m talking to you, and everything you’re saying makes total sense. I just can’t quite figure out how to mix the two together.”

The screen door opened and Kevin stepped outside. He’d obviously heard at least the last bit of their conversation, but he didn’t say anything until he’d poured Ashley a drink from the bottle stashed behind his chair and delivered it to her. Then he sank into his own seat and said, “Josh does the same thing.” He grinned at her. “He thinks there should be one set of rules for everyone, and the rules should be based on what’s best for him.” He took a sip of his drink, then shook his head a little. “No, not rules. He’s not a big fan of rules. Just . . . he thinks everyone’s the same, I guess. If it’s a bad idea for him to spend time with a gorgeous movie star, knowing it’s a short-term thing, then it must be a bad idea for everyone else, too.” He smiled at Charlotte, his expression open and affectionate with no hint of angst or worry. “He’s wrong.”

Charlotte raised her glass in a little toast to Kevin’s wisdom. Then she turned to Ashley. “But if he’s involved with Jasmine McArthur, you’re better off away from him. Messing around with him up here was one thing, but if you mess with her? If you piss her off? That’s something that could follow you down to L.A. That woman has a lot of influence.”

Kevin nodded. “Even up here, she’s not someone to mess with. She’s put some pressure on Josh, I know that. Pissed that he dumped her, so trying to punish him through his job.”

“So
he
dumped
her
? Why? How long ago? Does David know?” Ashley asked.

Kevin licked his lips. Maybe he was savoring the last drops of Scotch, or maybe he was buying time. “You should ask Josh for details on that,” he finally said. “For all of this, really. I shouldn’t be gossiping. I don’t know any of this firsthand, or even secondhand, because he’s never mentioned it to me. I’m just repeating shit I heard around town. It could all be wrong.”

Charlotte squinted at him and Kevin refused to meet her eye. Ashley knew her friend would do some digging and get whatever information she could out of the man. But probably he’d been right. If Ashley wanted to know about all this, she really should ask Josh. But she thought back to the scene on the porch, remembered how close Josh and Jasmine had been standing, and she wondered whether she’d ever get the chance to talk to him about it all. And she wondered just how much of his history she really wanted to know.

*   *   *

THE
early morning light should have brought clarity, but it really didn’t. Josh had no idea what he was doing. Well, he knew exactly what he was doing, but he wasn’t sure why he was doing it. Or whether he was going to be able to do it right.

He pulled the truck in beside Charlotte’s convertible and climbed out, then hesitated. Not too late to escape. He could
take the events of the night before as a lucky break, a way to extricate himself from whatever was going on with Ashley. Everything could go back to normal, if he just let it.

But instead he gently shut the door of the truck and headed up the stairs to the porch. He didn’t think he was too early, but there were no obvious signs of life. It was Saturday, a day he generally worked during the busy summer season, but a day off for others. Did people who were already on vacation sleep in extra late on weekends?

He didn’t want to wake anyone up, but it seemed a bit creepy to just sit there on the porch and wait. So he headed down the wood-and-stone steps toward the lake.

And that’s where he found her. No graceful pose, this time. She was just sitting there on the end of the dock, her feet in the water, her shoulders slumped as she stared down at her toes.

“Getting any bites?” Josh asked quietly.

Ashley twisted her upper body around and stared at him, obviously startled. Then her expression became calmer, and more remote. Less honest. “Fish, you mean? Nibbling my toes? Yeah, a few.”

He nodded. That was about as far as he could go with that conversational topic. So he lifted the paper bag in his right hand. “I brought muffins. From the bakery. If you’re hungry.”

She just stared at him. Apparently he wasn’t going to be able to bypass the conversation by offering a baked-goods bribe. There went Plan A.

So he took a few more steps forward, then nodded at the other side of the end of the dock. “Can I sit?”

She had to think it over, but finally, reluctantly, she nodded. He supposed he’d have to count that as a tiny victory.

He was wearing cargo shorts and sports sandals. Maybe it had been arrogant for him to leave his work boots in the truck—it probably seemed like he was planning a day of
relaxation rather than a quick apology before going to a job site. But Ashley wasn’t looking at his feet, or at any other part of him. She was staring out at the lake, clearly waiting for this human annoyance to go away and leave her in peace.