Page 23 of Summer Love

The bike’s waiting out front of the store. I wedge the first bag into the basket, balance the second on top. The third I pin against me with one hand. This is never going to hold. I’ll lose one at the first turn.

You’ve got this, Summer.

I climb onto the bike. Everything wobbles. The basket tips, the top bag slides. I catch it just in time, reposition the third against me, and pedal.

Next stop: home.

CHAPTER 9

Jace

Ipush open the deck door. The orange end-of-day light falls across the lodge bar, catching the wood counter and the bottles lined up behind Yumi. The string lights are on between the palm trees. “Riptide” by Vance Joy plays from the speaker, and the upbeat song grates on my nerves.

After my lessons, I went back out to surf for over an hour, until it got too dark. I should have stayed in the water. It’s the only place my thoughts stop spinning.

And it didn’t work.

Every wave I caught dragged me back to the same place: her too-blue eyes, the surprise on her face—and my name in her mouth, let slip like a confession.

I shake my head. Evan’s already there, sitting at a high-top, a glass of soda in front of him. No alcohol, same as ever. He’s ordered a local beer for me.

I drop onto the stool across from him and take a long, cold pull. Evan watches me with that calm I envy as much as it gets under my skin. He waits.

“Jesus, Evan. You know who’s back?”

“Yeah.”

I set my beer down too hard on the table.

“What do you mean, yeah?”

“Ran into her last night. Flat tire on the highway. I drove her to the lodge.”

The stool creaks when I go stiff.

“Are you serious? And you don’t tell me? A text, Evan. All you had to do was type three words—‘Summer’s here’—and I’d have⁠—”

“You’d have what?”

He doesn’t raise his voice. It’s worse.

“I wouldn’t have been caught off guard like an idiot this morning.”

Evan doesn’t take offense. He never takes offense—which is what makes him insufferable and irreplaceable.

“I didn’t have five minutes, Jace. I had a shit day.”

“Try mine.”

“You want the long version?”

I don’t want the long version. I want to stay angry. But Evan’s already starting, in that flat cop voice of a guy who’s seen too much bullshit in a single day.

“This morning, seven a.m., some guy on the waterfront calls me in a panic. Two sea lions sprawled out on his deck. Blocking his front door, won’t budge. He wants me to arrest them.”

“Arrest them?”

“His words, not mine. Spent forty minutes trying to convince two six-hundred-pound animals they’d be better off on the beach. One of them barked at me. Worse than my boss.”