Page 160 of Till Summer Do Us Part
“Wilder, if you ever want to be inside me again, I suggest you don’t lie.”
He winces and then runs his teeth over his lip ring. “Shit, when you say it like that.” He leans in close and whispers. “Pips, I can’t be certain if you put a nose on my face or a mini golf course with two holes.”
I gasp, but he keeps going.
“The eyebrows look like leeches. The eyes have zero dimension. And the hair looks like a dead raccoon.”
“Hey, I thought I did a good job on the hair.”
He shakes his head. “Terrible, Pips. Real bad. The only redeeming quality about the entire thing is my lip ring.”
I sit taller, because I thought the same thing. I smirk and say, “I did do a good job on the lip ring, didn’t I?”
“Very. Honestly, brings the whole thing together.”
“Yikes, who is that supposed to be?” Chad asks from behind me.
I look over my shoulder and stare up at him. “Your mother. Did I not capture her correctly?”
His face falls flat, and Wilder lets out a bark of a laugh while I sit there stunned, because where the hell did that come from? I don’t think I’ve ever been that quick on my feet.
Ever.
Yet I oddly feel really proud.
“Cute,” Chad says, moving away from me.
“Let me know her address so I can send it to her.”
He ignores me and walks over to where his wife is sitting while Wilder still laughs, trying to catch his breath.
“Oh fuck, that was good. Did you see the look on his smarmy face? Shit.” He wipes under his eyes. “I think you’re finally coming into your own, Scottie.”
I smile. Yeah, I think I am.
Chapter Twenty-Five
WILDER
“Welcome to our evening activities,” Sanders says as he struts around in a pair of basketball shorts and a construction vest with nothing underneath.
It’s a look, that’s for sure.
Scottie’s standing next to me, a smile on her face, looking happier than I’ve ever seen her. And it makes me fucking happy.
Ecstatic.
I remember the day I met her—she was worried, unsure, desperate to just make an impression and then get the hell out of the therapy session. Even when we first arrived at the camp, you could see there was something hanging over her. Something that was tamping down her joy, her energy.
But now…now she’s smiling. She exudes joy. She has an essence about her that’s addicting. And today has been no exception.
To be honest, I can’t remember the last time I had this much fun. From the complicated tandem bike ride to the ice cream to the lakeside blow job to the picnic and cloud watching, it’s beena day that I know I will never forget. And it’s not the activities that made this day special, it’s her reaction to the activities. It’s the innocence and the amusement in her expression that I will remember, because she’s come out of her shell.
Not to sound like a corny fuck, but she’s blossomed right in front of my eyes, and it’s one of the sexiest things I’ve ever seen.
“Tonight we will be mixing drinks, but not just any kind of drink. I want it to be a drink that represents you as a couple. I want you to think long and hard about your relationship, your journey, and morph that into a cocktail. Then we’ll be handing out the drinks to our judges, and they’ll pick a winner based on taste and creativity. As always, our winners will get a prize, and trust me, you’re really going to want to win this one.”
I lean into Scottie and say, “Hear that? A prize. A really good prize. Want to go three for three?”
