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I nod. Only for the summer.
“Ooh! I know.” Marci clicks her fingers. “We should go to the quarry.”
A cold flush passes over me, and I clear my throat.
Marci’s face falls. “Shit, I forgot about that, June. Sorry.”
“Sorry?” Belle glances from Marci to me and back again. “About? What happened?”
“It’s nothing actually,” I say, waving a hand. “Just a silly thing that happened when we were kids and I couldn’t swim.” I chuckle. “It’s like a gut reaction every time someone mentions the quarry. Silly.”
“Olivia pushed June into the quarry from Diver’s Point when we were kids,” Marci says, since Hannah and Belle are a couple of years younger than us. “She nearly drowned.”
“I couldn’t swim great,” I say, “and I got the wind knocked out of me. It’s not as bad as it sounds. Just a memory.”
“It sounds shitty to me,” Belle replies. “I mean, what kind of kid pushes another kid into the water like that? From high up?”
I wave a hand. “She thought it was a funny prank. Anyway, uh, yeah. I think that would be fun. We could hike Old Man’s Trail.”
“Exactly.” Marci slaps the table. “Then it’s decided. Next weekend?” Marci’s the type of person to run into things headfirst without hesitation. She’d also beat someone up for me if they looked at me wrong now. Back in high school, Marci kept her distance a lot of the time, mostly because of Billy getting in the way.
“Sounds great,” I say, because I want more of this time. Time to think and breathe and pull myself together without being in Cash’s sexy orbit. With these girls, I can relax.
It’s silly, but the end of summer seems too close. I’m already anticipating what it will be like to leave Heatstroke. Cash. Alex.
That has to be the tequila.
“Oooh, don’t look now, Han, but guess who just walked in the front door?” Belle nudges Cash’s sister.
“Savage,” Marci says, grinning from ear to ear. “Savage is here.”
“Whatever.” Hannah’s cheeks are pink. “I don’t care. He’s just Savage. Doesn’t even read. That’s sacrilege to a librarian.” But it’s clear she cares a lot because her gaze is fixed on the bar.
I follow her line of sight, and my stomach jolts. Savage isn’t alone. Cash is with him, and every woman in Longhorn’s is staring right at him and whispering.
I look away quickly, taking a breath to calm myself. My head swims from the thought of another woman touching him. Good thing I didn’t have another tequila.
Before I can do anything stupid, like, say, go over there and act like I’m more than just the nanny or a friend, a guy steps up to the side of the table. He’s good-looking, but I don’t recognize him from around town. Blond hair shaved on the sides, the top swept back. He’s come over from the table of guys next to ours, and they all watch in anticipation.
“Hi,” he says, sweeping a hand over his chin. “Name’s Charlie.”
“June.”
The other girls watch the exchange with interest, except for Hannah, who’s still staring at Savage.
“Wanna dance?”
“Charlie,” I begin, as I look over at the bar where Cash has already collected an entourage of women, talking, touching, laughing. “Sure. Why not?”
Twenty
CASH
“Hearyou might be singing in that big talent show at the end of summer,” the woman says, leaning on the bar beside me. She’s making a show of pressing her breasts together under a strappy silk top and trying her best to direct my gaze toward her cleavage. She tosses her hair and lays her fingers on my forearm, stroking my skin.
I shift away from her. “Nope.”
“You aren’t?” she asks. “Aw, why not? You’re the Cash Taylor. I bet if you played, folks from all over Texas would come.”
