Page 28 of XOXO, Summer
I lean down and kiss the top of his head. “Good night. I love you.”
His arm flops onto me when I lie back again. “Love you.”
He probably fell asleep before Summer could make it back to bed. I’m stuck lying here wide awake, though,thinking about her and this mess we’ve found ourselves in with the cottage.
Getting out of the city meant getting rid of distractions and thinking about the ultimatum on the table. The offseason will give me the clarity I need to decide which direction I’m heading—retirement or another season or more. Coach swore to keep it under wraps and supported my decision either way, but I can’t keep him waiting much longer.
But Summer is a whole next-level distraction I didn’t see coming.Yet. . . I smirk. I need to focus on salvaging my career, not fucking the landlord. She’s not making it easy. Nothing worth the effort ever was.
I thought this would be a good break, but here I am, stuck in a small bed with my son kicking in his sleep, in a pink house with five women in a small town without so much as a stoplight.
There’s a lot on the line with my future, but all I can think about is how this summer just got a whole lot hotter.
CHAPTER 9
SUMMER
“That’s the tenant?” Winter asks, peering over my shoulder out the kitchen window. Basically, she’s spying like me.
Steam wafts from my coffee as I shamelessly stare at a shirtless Daniel. Every muscle coordinates to push Roman on the swing and sends my thoughts somewhere inappropriate considering he’s a guest in our home.
“Yep.” I take a gulp of coffee this time, feeling particularly thirsty this morning.
“Wow.”
“I know. It’s a problem.”
I turn when she opens a cabinet to get a coffee mug and try not to stare at the half-naked man in the yard. “A good one to have,” she says, pouring herself a cup of coffee. “Why don’t I get those kinds of problems? I get delayed shipments and the bees being moody and not producing properly, so I need to plant more flowers.”
“Back up. What do you mean, the bees are moody?”
She sits at a table with her mug in front of her, holding on to it like life itself is held inside. “Jeremy, the kid whodoes the yard work, mowed down the flowers near the hives. Now the bees are protesting.”
“By not producing honey?”
“Wouldn’t you if your favorite thing in the world, other than the queen bee herself, was gone in an instant?” I blink once and then again, not sure how to respond to that. “I owe the candlemaker eight gallons, or I’m not getting my next two shipments.”
“That is a problem.”
Taking a sip of her drink, she sets it down and looks at me. “The shop needs more products. I have a new honey mustard coming in and a lotion I’m dying to try, but if I don’t have the honey, I can’t keep the products coming.”
Having a honey hive on part of the property wasn’t something I encouraged. Dolly had bees before we moved in, but it was Winter who spent the time and made the effort to learn everything she could. I’m convinced it helped her through the death of our parents by giving her something to focus on, but I never thought she’d be returning after college to her hometown to open a shop. The income isn’t much, but she’s growing it month by month.
“What can I do to help?”
“Nothing. Jeremy felt bad, so he’s helping me plant the flowers when they come in this week. I’ll give him some honey-vanilla ice cream to take home. It’s his favorite.”
“Mine too.” I finish my coffee and rinse my mug, watching through the window again. “Daniel and Roman are still in full swing outside.”
“Pun intended,” she says, and laughs.
I walk over and wrap my arms around her to hug her. “You’ll figure this out. You always do, and if you can’t, we’re here for you.”
Patting my arms, she takes a breath of relief. “I know. I’ll keep you posted.”
“I’m going to check on our guests.”
“So, tell me. What’s the situation with the hot guy and his son again?”
