The Summer We Fell (The Summer, #1)(3)

He squeezes me tight for only a second before gently detaching himself. He’s not quite as comfortable with displays of affection, but it’s hard to blame him. As the pastor’s son in a small town, his every move will be discussed at length…Most likely with his parents.

“How are you here so early?” I ask breathlessly.

“Because—” He glances over his shoulder with a grin. “—I wasn’t the one driving.”



It’s only then that I look past him, at the guy who’s now walking in. I blink. Once, twice. I had an image of who Luke would be: cute, all-American, the boy you bring home to Mom. Just like Danny.

But Luke is not cute. He is not the boy you bring home. He isn’t even a boy—he’s six and a half feet of lean muscle, in need of a shave, taut and tan and…dangerous, somehow. As different from Danny as anyone I’ve ever known.

The smile on my face flickers out. My mouth goes dry and my heart thuds in my ears. He isn’t smiling either. I can’t tell if he is uncomfortable or angry, but the nice guy I met by phone has completely vanished, and the one in his place already appears to not like me much.

“Hi,” I whisper, my voice uneven. There is something about his face that makes me feel compelled to stare: the odd color of his eyes—brown with a hint of green to them, the hollows beneath his cheeks, the unexpectedly soft mouth.

Danny throws an arm around my shoulders. “Told you she was the prettiest girl alive, didn’t I?”

Luke glances at me as if weighing Danny’s words. “You told everyone that, yeah.” It’s as close as he could come to arguing the point without doing so, yet here I stand, still staring at him and trying to ignore this insistent flutter that’s suddenly bloomed to life, low in my gut.

I swallow hard, shifting my gaze back to Danny. “I’m not off until five.”

He places a gentle kiss on my forehead. “Take your time. We’re driving up to Kirkpatrick to show Luke why he should stay for the summer.”

I force a smile to cover the unease I can’t even explain to myself. And based on Luke’s scowl, I’m guessing he feels it too.

THE SUN IS STARTING to slip by the time I arrive at the Allens’ tidy home, with its welcoming front porch and well-tended rose bushes in pale pink bloom.

Last year, all I wanted in the world was a cute house like this to come home to, a place where I’d be safe. I arrived here right after my stepbrother pulled my shoulder out of the socket, and I thought I’d be happy forever if I could call it mine.

It’s funny, the way you get what you want and just start wanting something else.

Tonight, I wish I could face-plant in bed for five minutes, or at least rinse the stink of the diner out of my hair. When you’re someone’s guest, though, you don’t get to be tired. You don’t get to have a bad day.

“Juliet?” Donna calls from the kitchen. “Come give me a hand with the potatoes, won’t you?”

Donna doesn’t mean any harm—she legitimately enjoys cooking and creating a nice home, and she always wanted a daughter to help in the kitchen, to pass these things on to. But being here often just feels like an extension of my workday—even in my dreams I’m refilling someone’s coffee or rushing off to find ketchup.

Luke and Danny are sitting at the table, glowing from an afternoon in the sun, hair still damp from the shower. Luke is sitting on the far side, in Danny’s normal seat. When he came into the diner, his height made him seem almost lanky. Seated, though, he’s too large for the table, for the room. We were four normal-sized people, perfectly balanced, without him. He’s thrown off our equilibrium, and it feels dangerous somehow.

Danny asks how work was while I drain the potatoes Donna boiled. If I could speak freely, I’d mention the church ladies who spent their entire lunch badmouthing me and saying they were surprised Danny hadn’t found someone else. I’d mention Mr. Kennedy put his hand on my ass again, or that some teens glued their tip to the table with ketchup.

“It was okay,” I reply instead, because the pastor got me the job, and I don’t want to seem unappreciative. The Allens think I’m quiet, but I’m not sure that’s true. There’s just so much I can’t say that it’s easier not to talk.

I mash the potatoes while the conversation quickly reverts back to surfing, the thing Luke and Danny bonded over last year. There are a thousand ways to describe a wave: bumpy or mushy or glassy or heavy, and they seem to be using all of them. I don’t know what any of it means, but when I glance over, I’m struck by the way Luke has come alive, talking about it. His eyes are bright, his smile is wide, and I think I’ve never seen anyone quite so magnetic in my entire life. I don’t even like him and I want to stare; I want to smile when he does.

The pastor’s car pulls into the driveway, and we move a little faster because he likes dinner served right away. He hugs his son and shakes Luke’s hand before he takes his place at the head of the table. I help Donna carry over the food and then slide onto the bench beside Danny, who presses his lips to the top of my head before his nose wrinkles.

“You smell like a cheeseburger,” he says with a grin.

Luke, across from us both, glances at me a moment too long, as if he’s waiting for me to explain myself. Perhaps he’s thinking the same things Mrs. Poffsteader did: that if I cared enough, I’d have taken the day off. That I’m some predatory girl using his friend for a free place to stay.