Just a Summer Fling (13 page)

Another easy escape. But again, Josh didn’t take it. Instead, he lowered himself to the dock and stuck his feet in the lake next to Ashley’s. “Sorry about last night. You and me were talking, and then . . . not a pleasant interruption, I guess. You and Jasmine aren’t still friendly?”

Ashley shook her head. “But obviously you two are.”

Josh snorted. “Not really. Just those little visits. She’ll see me on the street or at the bar or something. She doesn’t usually come out to the house.”

“She didn’t seem to have any trouble finding it.”

“Yeah. I guess she’s been there before.” He wasn’t quite sure how he’d gotten himself in a situation where he felt like he needed to explain himself, but he added, “She left a couple minutes after you did. I could have asked you to stay, but I figured she’d take it better without an audience.”

Ashley finally looked at him. “But you’ve been with her before. Kevin said so, and it was obvious anyway. She somehow managed to get past your ‘no summer people’ rule, huh?”

Josh had known the conversation was going to go there. And now he was digging up history best forgotten, exposing aspects of himself best kept hidden, in order to repair a relationship that he knew was going to cause him pain in the long run. What the hell had happened to his sense of self-preservation? He looked at the woman sitting next to him and had his answer. Ashley Carlsen had happened to it. “She was the reason I made the rule,” he said reluctantly. “Or at least, she was the final straw.”

“Does her husband know?”

“I don’t think so. I’m not sure. I think . . .” Shit, he hated talking about this. But Ashley deserved a bit of an explanation. “I think she wanted to get caught. I don’t know why.
But she sure wasn’t sneaky about it, toward the end. But he never seemed to notice. . . . Maybe he just didn’t want to know. Didn’t want to have to deal with her, you know?” He kicked at the water a little and wished the conversation could end there. But if it did, there wouldn’t have been any point to starting it all. “I’d let myself believe in it all. In all the . . .” He tried to find words that would explain without offending. “This isn’t a ritzy resort area. The summer people who come here like to think they’re not snobs. They think they’re ‘getting back to basics’ and ‘exploring the wilderness.’ They’re building huge mansions for their ‘basics’ and ‘exploring’ from their luxury SUVs, but it’s what they want to think. And they think they want to hang with the locals. A lot of them even say they’re getting in touch with ‘real’ people.”

Ashley was frowning at him now. He couldn’t tell whether she was concentrating or getting ready to object. He decided he’d better just keep going and get it all out before she said anything to confuse him. “I used to believe all that. I hung out with their kids when I was younger. Played with their toys. And then I got older and needed a job, and I was good with my hands and I could tell myself that it was . . . I was like a craftsman, or something. I wasn’t an employee, because I had my own business. I worked
with
them, not
for
them. When they invited me to their parties, I went, and I had fun. We were all friends.”

Yeah, that was what he’d fooled himself into believing. It hadn’t been easy to maintain the illusion, but he’d worked hard at it, and he’d managed.

“You dated some of them,” Ashley prompted quietly.

“Sure, yeah. Why not? Just casual stuff, but that was fine. That was all I was looking for.”

“And you didn’t care if they were married.”

Now it was his turn to stare at the lake. “That was . . . It was at the end. I was starting to realize I wasn’t . . . I don’t know. I realized I was a toy, I guess. One more amenity
offered by the Vermont hospitality commission. So I was kind of pissed at them all. And you know Jasmine. She’s pretty good at making things seem like a good idea, even when you know they aren’t.”

“So, now you’re equating me making a stupid bet at a bar with you having a long-term affair with a married woman? A woman whose husband you work for?”

Josh shot a quick glance at Ashley, then looked away. He didn’t want to see her with that mix of anger and disappointment on his face. “I messed up,” he said. “They had a party and Jasmine was flirting with me and David saw it and went out of his way to talk to me like the hired help. It pissed me off. So I left, and when Jasmine caught up to me on the driveway . . .” He shrugged defeatedly. “It all kind of started from there.”

Ashley nodded slowly. Josh wasn’t sure if she’d already known the whole story; he was a little pissed at Kevin for having told her
anything
, but if the bastard had told her all this? That would be way over any line Josh had ever heard of, and final evidence, as if any was needed, that Kevin was getting his head turned around by the Hollywood crowd. But that was something to worry about later. For now, Josh had to wrap up whatever the hell he was doing with Ashley. “So that’s . . . I think that’s all of it. It’s why I don’t date summer people, and why I’ve been trying to avoid you. It’s why Jasmine came to my house last night, and why I sent her away.”

Ashley didn’t say anything for a while. Finally, she turned to look at him, and she waited until he made himself look back at her. “So why are you here now?” she asked quietly. “Wouldn’t it have been easier to just stay away? You had to know I’d be gone for good after that scene last night.”

“Yeah,” he said reluctantly. “I guess I figured you would be. And I guess . . . when it came right down to it, I guess I decided that wasn’t what I wanted.”

She nodded, and then turned back to the lake. “I’ve got
to tell you, Josh, I’m getting pretty damn tired of spending all my time worrying about what you want. Especially when you’re so totally undecided yourself. You know?”

He did know. He understood. But before he could admit to that, she added, “You know what I’m starting to wonder? I’m wondering whether maybe you just get off on rejecting me. Maybe
you’re
the one into revenge, but you’re too chicken to go after the people who actually hurt you so you’re focusing on me instead. It was fun for you to turn me down, and then it seemed like I was going to walk away, so now you’re here, saying whatever you think it’s going to take to get me wanting you again, so you can have the fun of shooting me down one more time.”

He didn’t know what to say. He was on his feet before he’d realized he was going to start moving. He’d opened his soul to her, told her things he’d never told anybody, confessed to his arrogance and stupidity and shameful behavior. On one level, he’d known she’d be mad, but somehow he’d fooled himself into thinking that maybe she’d understand a little, too. One more mistake to add to his long list. “Okay,” he said, as much to himself as to her. “Sorry to have bothered you.”

He turned and headed off the dock, refusing to let himself run or even walk fast. This wasn’t a big deal. It was a good thing, really. His heart was pounding faster than it should be and his stomach was tense and roiling; if he reacted that way to this tiny disappointment, how much worse would it have been if he’d let himself really care about her and then been dumped?

Kevin and Charlotte were on the deck when he walked by, sharing one chair and watching him like two bobcat kittens wondering if the passing wolf was going to notice them. Josh resisted the urge to growl. Or, at least, he made his growl sound like words. “You working today?” he asked his cousin.

“Do you need me?”

“No.” He didn’t need anybody. “But there’s work if you want it.”

Kevin hesitated, clearly torn between enjoying himself with his movie star and actually making a living. “Will you have hours for me next week?”

Josh wanted to punish the bastard for squealing to Ashley, but Kevin was Aunt Carol’s kid, and that bought him some serious forgiveness for being a loudmouth. The whole thing was too tiring; Josh just didn’t have the energy to hold a grudge. “Yeah, probably. I’ll see you at The Splash on the weekend, let you know then.”

And that was all. He gave Charlotte a courteous nod and got the hell out of there. He’d been planning to work on the Fullers’ gazebo, but that would be fidgety precision work. He wanted something that would use his whole body and let him burn off some frustration. The Claymore bush clearing would burn some energy, so he’d do that.

He headed out along the cottage road, trying to find a plan for the day, trying to think about other jobs he needed to get done. Trying to think about anything but the angry, disappointed woman he’d left behind him.

Thirteen

ASHLEY’S COPY OF
the script was already dog-eared and ragged, but it deteriorated even more when she threw it across the room. She watched it hit the wall and then flutter into a twisted heap on the hardwood floor. The little tantrum didn’t do the script any good, and it didn’t really help Ashley, either. She was still as frustrated and confused as she’d been all day.

Kevin was in the kitchen working on dinner, but Charlotte was sitting at the far end of the same sofa Ashley was on, and she wasn’t the sort to ignore someone else’s display of emotion. “You ready to talk about it now?”

Ashley wished she had something left to throw. Instead she flopped her body restlessly to the side. “There’s still nothing to say. It’s all just too . . . It’s supposed to be simple, isn’t it? You and Kevin are simple. You like spending time together, so you’re spending time together. That’s how these things are supposed to go!”

“Do you think it makes sense to compare you and Josh
to me and Kevin?” Charlotte’s tone was carefully neutral, but the question was pretty clearly rhetorical.

“Because Kevin isn’t a brooding, grudge-holding psycho, you mean?”

“Oh. I didn’t realize it was that simple. Yeah, if Josh is a psycho, you’re right! There’s nothing to talk about. Phew, it’s lucky you got rid of him so easily!”

Ashley made a face at her friend. “Not, like, a
psycho
psycho,” she admitted reluctantly. “But the brooding and grudge-holding are real.”

“Well, that doesn’t sound too healthy, either. I mean, life is too short to waste time with someone who gets upset over stupid stuff and can’t get over it.”

“Yeah!” Ashley looked at the crumpled script on the floor. “Except maybe it wasn’t stupid stuff, exactly, that he got upset over. Maybe it was actually some stuff he should have been a bit upset about. Maybe.”

“But he’s not letting it go. He’s not trying to move on, and he came here this morning to yell at you about it all. So screw him! It’s over.”

Ashley wished Charlotte wasn’t quite so good at this. “He is trying to move on, I guess. It’s not his fault Jasmine showed up last night. And he came over this morning to explain it all, not to yell at me.” She looked down toward the lake. “He brought muffins. From the bakery.”

“Muffins? I was unaware of muffins. We could have had them for breakfast.”

“No. I threw them in the lake.”

Charlotte was quiet for a few moments. Then she said, “That’s some excellent diva behavior you’re working on. The script, the muffins . . . You just need to throw a cell phone at someone and you’ll be a true star.”

“I was upset.”

“About what? What did he say that upset you?”

Good question. Ashley played back the conversation. She
hadn’t really enjoyed hearing about Josh and Jasmine’s history, but that wasn’t what had made her angry. What had it been, really? “Do you think I treat him like a toy? Like he’s one more amenity provided by the Vermont hospitality commission?”

“Is that what he said you did?”

“Not me. Not that specific. Just summer people in general. Summer women, I guess.”

“Huh.”

Ashley waited for more, but apparently Charlotte wasn’t planning to give it to her. “What? What does that ‘huh’ mean?”

“It means . . . well . . . I’ve only heard your side of the story. You told me the stupid stuff you did. Would you have done all of that to a guy back home? Taken the dare in the first place, and then refused to take ‘no’ for an answer? Even with the riding—it was mostly me, I admit, but I wouldn’t have been that pushy about riding lessons with someone back home. Up here, it’s like, yeah, we’re on vacation, so we’re being goofy. But they’re not on vacation.” She made an amused face in the direction of the kitchen. “Well, Kevin seems to be. But Josh isn’t.” She frowned thoughtfully in Ashley’s direction. “But there’s more to it than that, isn’t there? Maybe? I mean, me being pushy about riding, that was partly because I really, really want this part, but we could have flown back home and gotten riding lessons there, if we’d had to. I think part of it is . . . I think I really couldn’t believe that some backwoods nobody would say no to a big star like me.”

Ashley stared at her, and Charlotte stared back. “It doesn’t sound good, does it?” Charlotte asked quietly. “Makes me sound like a snob, like somebody who actually believes her own publicist. And I wasn’t thinking it consciously. But I think maybe there was an element of that involved.”

“And you’re saying you think maybe that’s part of it with me, too?”

“I don’t know, Ash. I don’t think you’re a snob. I don’t
think you’re full of yourself. But, honestly, when we’re working—and when are we
not
working, really, because all the parties and appearances and all the rest of that crap, that counts as work and we both know it—when we’re working we’re the centers of our little universes, aren’t we? It actually . . . Wow, I’d never thought about it before, but the ‘star’ thing actually makes more sense than I thought. We’re not just bright lights twinkling in the darkness of the movie theaters, we’re also huge, dense bodies with smaller objects rotating around them! We’re the centers of our solar systems.”

“I’m neither huge nor dense,” Ashley said. She really wanted to deflect Charlotte from the conversational path they seemed to be on.

But Charlotte barely seemed to hear her. “So it’d be pretty impressive if we could just shut that off entirely, wouldn’t it? There’s lots of self-centered people in the
regular
world, and then we get it all reinforced for us by being around people who actually act as if we’re the sun and they’re just planets.” She took a moment to appreciate her new understanding of the figure of speech, then shrugged. “I don’t know about the Vermont hospitality commission bit. But if the only side of the story I’ve heard is yours, and I still think he’s got a few reasons to feel a bit objectified? Then maybe he’s got a point.”

“By me.” Ashley worked hard to keep her voice from being shrill. “You’re saying that
I’ve
been objectifying him.”

“I don’t know,” Charlotte said carefully. “What do you think?”

“It was
two episodes
!” Ashley yelled at her friend. How the hell had Charlotte gotten so good at this after playing a therapist for two damned episodes?

She needed to think, but her brain was racing too fast for anything to make sense. She wanted . . . Oh. Yes. She wanted to lie back in the cold forest stream with her feet braced against the warm strength of Josh’s stomach, and she wanted to look
up in the sky and float. That was what she wanted, but she was pretty sure she wasn’t going to get it. “I’m going for a swim,” she told her friend. The lake wasn’t going to be as good as floating in the stream would have been, but it was the best she could manage.

*   *   *

“OF
course you’re coming,” Kevin said. He sounded genuinely confused, and not exactly pleased, by Ashley’s attempt to beg off his plans for the weekend. “It’s The Splash.”

“The event of the season,” Charlotte said cheerfully. “Got to see and be seen. And you said your potter friend had a stall at the craft fair, right? You want to see that, don’t you?”

“Yeah, I’ll drive in for that,” Ashley said. “But I probably won’t stay that long, so we should take separate cars.”

“Ash . . .” Charlotte started. Then she turned to Kevin. “You want to go get the car, babe?”

The car was about twenty feet from the doorway; everyone knew Charlotte was just trying to get Kevin out of the conversation. He smiled, happy to escape, but Ashley wished he’d stay and be a buffer.

“You won’t be a third wheel,” Charlotte said as Kevin headed out the front door. “It’s not like the two of us are gazing into each other’s eyes and doing baby talk; we’re just hanging out. If we’re having sex, you’re not really welcome, but all the rest of the time, you’re good. Seriously.” She paused for Ashley to absorb that truth, then added, “And you’d damn well better not be hiding from Josh Sullivan. That’s either over with, in which case it doesn’t matter, or it’s not quite over with, in which case you should get out there and figure it out. Right?”

Ashley sighed. “I just might not be great company.”

“You’ll be fine. It’s already almost dinnertime, so you’ll have a hot dog and a beer and you’ll be ready for fun. Now get some shoes on.”

Ashley let herself be pushed around and tried not to feel like an unwelcome imposition when Charlotte shoed Kevin into the back of the convertible and ensconced Ashley in the passenger seat.

As they drove, Kevin leaned forward and gave them a rundown of what they were heading for. “The Splash is our big summer festival. It’s not really in honor of anything. . . . Like, it’s not an ice cream fest or a lobster fest or whatever. It’s just pro-summer. The golf courses open their doors to nonmembers for the weekend, and there’s a fishing derby and a cool triathlon—kayak, mountain bike, and speed-hiking instead of the usual events—and there’s the craft festival, but you already know about that, and . . . I don’t know, just lots of random stuff. Some of it’s cool, some of it’s weird. But at night there’s a huge barbecue down in the park by the lake, and a dance afterward on the tennis courts. That’s the part everyone goes to, so that’s why we’re going.”

Everyone. Ashley resisted the temptation to inquire whether “everyone” included Josh. She wasn’t going to get over her obsession by talking about him all the time. “What’s a fishing derby?” she asked instead.

“It’s just a fishing contest. Certain timelines, and you see who can catch the biggest fish. Usually there’s some subcategories—different kinds of fish and different classes of fishermen or whatever. Some people take it really seriously.”

“I want to be in a fishing derby.” Ashley was surprised by the words as they came out of her mouth, but she took a moment to consult herself and realized that they were true. She looked over to see both Kevin and Charlotte giving her weird looks. At least Charlotte was driving, so she couldn’t stare quite as overtly as Kevin. “Not
this
fishing derby,” Ashley said quickly. “I’ve never fished in my life. But someday. A bucket-list thing, I guess. I’d like to enter a fishing derby.”

“What’s the appeal?” Charlotte asked after a moment. She sounded genuinely curious.

“Just . . . it’s just something to try. Something that means something to a whole group of people, and I’ve never even heard of it, and it just seems like I should give it a try. If they all like it, and they aren’t crazy . . .”

“Well, I wouldn’t go all the way to saying they aren’t crazy,” Kevin said. “You should talk to Mr. Ryerson in the place next door to you. He says he’s a recovered fish-a-holic, but I think his wife always watches him for a relapse. Some of these guys are pretty intense about their fishing.”

“I won’t be that intense,” Ashley decided. “But I’ll take it seriously. It won’t be a joke. I’ll spend some time figuring out . . . I don’t know, I guess figuring out how to fish, for starters, but then I’ll learn the right bait or techniques or whatever, and I’ll wake up really early on derby day to get a good start, if that’s allowed, and I’ll really concentrate on whatever it is people concentrate on when they’re fishing.”

“Will you have an outfit?” Charlotte asked.

“Only if there’s a reason for it. Like, a practical advantage. Not just to look cute.”

“Okay,” Charlotte said with a decisive nod, as if Ashley had been asking permission and Charlotte had decided to grant it. “That’s weird but cool. Do you have a timeline?”

“I need to do some investigation first. I’ll get back to you.”

Ashley felt good as they drove the rest of the way into town. She was being proactive. She was taking charge of her life. She was using her control to make some pretty strange decisions, but that was her right. And she thought she might really like this fishing thing.

*   *   *

WATCHING
fishermen weigh their catches for the derby was even more boring than fishing itself. Josh didn’t slow down as he walked past the docks.

It wasn’t like he had anywhere to go, really; The Splash was mostly just about wandering around and visiting. It was
one of the few breaks in the busy summer season, a rare chance to catch up with people who were working just as hard as he was and who wouldn’t get another chance to socialize until the last leaves fell and the tourists finally went home.