Page 184 of Summer Love

“Summer… I just crossed the country to explain this to you.”

She doesn’t answer. Her fingers stop on a piece of glass. I set my hand beside hers, not touching.

CHAPTER 60

Summer

“Summer! You gonna pick that up or what?” the boss barks from behind the counter.

Heads turn toward me.

“Jace, I⁠—”

“Faster than that!”

I shut my mouth. Jace doesn’t take his eyes off me.

My fingers close around a shard of glass. A thin red line forms at the crease of my thumb, but I don’t feel a thing. Jace gathers the pieces with the brush and sweeps them into the dustpan. His movements are precise.

“Can we talk after your shift?” he says gently. “I’ll wait.”

He slides the last shard into the dustpan and pushes up off his right leg to stand. He tilts his chin toward a table in the back.

“I’m gonna grab something to eat.”

My throat tight, I nod.

“I’m done around ten-thirty, once I close out.”

He nods and heads for table 8.

I stay kneeling and watch him until he settles in. He sets his backpack on the booth seat. A little cherry-red wooden board sticks out—the one he’d given me at Star Park. The one I’d thrown away.

“I’ve got 8,” Mavis says, crossing the floor and setting a menu in front of Jace.

No wink, no questions.

He gives her a tired smile.

“I’ll have a burger and a black coffee. Thanks.”

The shift picks back up.

I serve, I clear, I bring the check to the couple at table 6, I drop an order at the pass, I fill three coffee cups, I take back a plate of pancakes sent to the wrong table. My hands work. My head’s at table 8.

Every time I pass Jace, I feel his eyes on me. Not the look of a guy checking me out—soft, almost hesitant.

Mavis sets the coffee down in front of him, then the burger. He eats slowly. He watches the room, then his eyes come back to me.

He’s telling the truth.

Jace wouldn’t lie. Not about something like this.

“You were never a bet. Never.”

I drop two plates at table 3, I ring in another order, I pour a coffee at the counter.

If he’s telling the truth, that means for six years…