Page 107 of Summer Love

“I thought I knew reliable people too,” I shoot back.

Jace doesn’t answer. His face closes off.

My eyes slide to the shutters lined up side by side against the house. The paint’s flaking. The wood’s gray in places, where the salt has eaten into the surface. They need sanding, sealing, repainting. At least two days of work.

It took Jace half an hour to get them all off. Me? I’d have taken two days—or broken my neck trying.

“Thanks,” I murmur.

Jace shrugs.

“Now we’re even for last Sunday’s fundraiser.”

He knows.

He’s known all along. The posters, the logo, the new name, the turnout. He’s not thanking me. He’s settling a debt. Nothing more.

“Flip!” he calls.

The dog gets up, stretches, looks at me, looks at Jace. This time, he chooses his owner. They head back toward the gate.

I don’t watch them go. I bend down to pick up a rag that’s fallen near the ladder.

CHAPTER 35

Jace

Flip follows me to the middle of the yard, then doubles back and dives into the tall grass.

I roll my eyes and whistle. Nothing. He paws at the dirt, digs something up, backs up, shakes his head... and starts running in circles with an old orange frisbee in his teeth.

The plastic’s faded, cracked along one edge, but I recognize it.

We used to play with it on the beach, the three of us—Noah, Summer, and me. Noah missed every other throw. Summer adjusted hers for him, lower, slower, and he never noticed she did it on purpose. I did.

Flip stretches out in the grass with his prize. He’s not budging.

Any other time, I’d pick him up and carry him off. But not with Summer right there. Not with my thigh pulling tight after half an hour on a ladder. I won’t limp in front of her.

So I wait.

Summer’s not looking at me. She’s looking at her fingers, covered in sky-blue paint. She’s got sawdust in her hair. Her T-shirt’s wrecked, her shorts stained with paint. She sighs, wipes her forehead with the back of her hand, leaving a streak of grime across her temple.

Even like this, she’s beautiful. And it pisses me off.

She mutters that she’s going to rinse off and crosses the yard toward Grandpa and Grandma Hayes’s old beach shower—a warped wood floor, plank walls with gaps between the boards, a swinging door that never closed right.

Summer turns the faucet. The spray sputters, coughs, then the water runs steady.

I lean back against the house while Flip chews the frisbee.

Her T-shirt lands on the edge of the shower wall, then the denim shorts on top.

I can’t help watching Summer’s hands slide through her hair, the ties of her swimsuit knotted at her nape, water tracing the line of her shoulders.

I look away, toward the big cypress tree, the gate, the fence.

Or... I try to.