Our Secret Summer

Chapter 7

CHAPTER 7

For the past weeks, Dylan had been listening to financial advice podcasts, hoping to pick up some sort of miraculous tip that could help her make up for the money she’d lost. All these podcasts had accomplished, however, was to put her swiftly to sleep. As though her brain rejected any talk of money and chose to switch off at the sound of it.

As she crawled into bed, her AirPods already in her ears out of habit, she remembered an ad she’d seen recently—she couldn’t recall where—for steamy audiobooks read by big-name actors. She’d wondered at the time, perhaps prudishly, what times they were living in that this was now a thing. She can’t have been that uptight about it, however, because she had promptly downloaded the app, although she hadn’t listened to anything on it yet. She opened it on her phone and scrolled through the options.

Those really were some big names. Elisa Fox. Stella Flack. Brian Walsh and ooh, Ida Burton. For the life of her, Dylan could not resist Ida Burton. There had definitely been a time in her life when she’d wished she was Ida Burton, although, like every other person on the planet, Dylan hadn’t known that the magnificent Ida Burton had locked herself into a big, old Hollywood closet all that time. But none of that mattered anymore. Ida Burton was out and proud now and married to Faye Fleming. Dylan downloaded the story read by Ida Burton hoping for some sultry sapphic content to accompany her nap. Neither the app, nor the story, and least of all Ida, let her down.

Dylan didn’t sleep a wink—how could she with Ida Burton whispering sentences like that straight into her ears? She’d need to dive straight into the lake to cool off. She slipped into her bikini and headed downstairs.

What she saw there was even better than Ida’s sensual crooning in her ears.

Raffo stood in front of a canvas that was decidedly not blank. She was staring at it intently, paintbrush in hand. Dylan didn’t want to disturb her, but she also didn’t want to spy on her. Either way, she couldn’t look away if she tried.

She cleared her throat to announce herself.

Raffo turned around and gave her a funny look, before not-so-subtly raking her gaze from Dylan’s bare feet to her bikini-covered breasts.

“Sorry.” Raffo blinked, as though shaking something off her. “I didn’t hear you. I wasn’t expecting, um, yeah, this.” Her eyes raked over Dylan’s body.

“A swimsuit in a lake house?” Dylan wasn’t born yesterday—and Raffo had already declared her ‘good-looking’ the day before. “Or are you disappointed I’m not topless?” She followed up with a wide smile, conveying she was just joking. Although, after the story she’d just listened to, Dylan was feeling perhaps a touch too brazen. She immediately felt sorry for Raffo, who was nursing a severely broken heart.

“I hope you don’t feel you need to wear a top just because I’m here.” Raffo had, obviously, quickly regrouped. “Far be it for me to cramp your style.”

“You’re painting.” Dylan pointed out the obvious to deflect attention from the blush creeping up her cheeks.

“Not really.” Raffo turned to the canvas she’d been working on. “This is not painting, just noodling. Just greasing the wheels.”

“Whatever you say.” Dylan headed farther onto the deck. “I’m going for a swim.” She couldn’t help swaying her hips a little as she walked to the pier that stuck out from the deck. She dove straight into the water, hoping it would do its job of tamping down the Ida-Burton-created heat beneath her skin.

Raffo had just been feeling her way through the familiar motions of painting. She didn’t have a specific idea for a new work yet—it was too soon for that. She’d painted what could pass for a body of water, because the lake was omnipresent around her. But now, in said lake, Dylan was swimming in what could only be called a very skimpy bikini. Raffo inwardly chastised herself for not keeping her roving gaze in check earlier. Jesus. Luckily, Dylan had made light of it—as she did. Maybe that was the thing about Dylan. Despite the investment mistake she’d made, and the shame it saddled her with, she walked through life, at least life in her gorgeous lake house at Big Bear, with an infectious lightness—an airiness that Raffo craved for herself. Of course, now her glance was irresistibly drawn to the water again—and to the person swimming in it. Dylan swam away from the shore with long, strong strokes, heading deeper into the lake.

Then, out of nowhere, the image popped up in Raffo’s brain. The image she wanted to paint. The only image she could possibly paint right now. Unfortunately, it was also an image she couldn’t possibly paint. Not with her canvas out in the open like this, for Dylan to walk past twenty times every day. Argh. Raffo had been waiting, fruitlessly, for a moment like this for months now. For that magical flash of inspiration, that hell-yeah moment when she just knew—no doubt about it—that this was what she would paint next. It was an integral, indispensable part of her process.

She looked out into the water. Dylan was just a bobbing wet head of blond hair far away—she really was going for that swim. Maybe if Raffo asked for her permission, but still… She closed her eyes, took a breath, and the colors exploded onto the backs of her eyelids. Oh, fuck . This was wholly unexpected but so incredibly sweet and joyful. Just like that, it had come back to her. With every breath she took, her precious mojo rushed through her. Just like that, she knew, with every single fiber of her being, that she wanted to paint Dylan.

Topless.

Fuck .

She took another breath. Maybe she could paint her in that skimpy bikini—it would lend itself well to some adventurous color-blending. As though asking permission from her muse, which was a concept Raffo didn’t rationally believe in, except when she was in the throes of something exactly like this. She took another breath and closed her eyes in order to see what she had to see. Nope. No bikini, no matter how skimpy, in sight.

Raffo exhaled deeply as she braced herself for an awkward conversation over dinner later.