Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
Maple
I do not know what came over me, but I just couldn’t stand seeing Macy giving me that look again. The one that said she thought she was better than me. I probably sounded like an idiot flirting with Holt, and probably made this living situation even more uncomfortable for him.
Get messy with you, baby??
Jesus. I hadn’t even been day drinking when that slipped out. And then Grandma Gracie went and called me a veterinarian when I’m a glorified canine whisperer for celebrity dog owners who have money to burn on stupid shit like pet counseling. Holt McGrath is going to think I’m an absolute psycho.
Holt swings Grandma out of the Jeep like she weighs nothing. Grandma hoots her excitement being in his arms and looks so happy I don’t think I’ll ever have the heart to tell her that Holt’s not my fiancé. Maybe I can just slink back to Charlotte at the end of the summer and Grandma will be confused enough to forget this whole charade entirely.
Holt waits for me on the couch with a romance novel in his lap as I get Grandma changed into pajamas, make her a mug of chamomile tea, and get her situated in bed. She’s already asleep by the time I get her clothes put away and her bedroom door shut behind me.
“She’s asleep,” I whisper to Holt.
His head lifts, eyes wide. He points to the book, where his finger keeps his place in the historical romance. “I had no idea ankles were so sexy.”
I laugh softly and grab my purse. “The people in that book would be scandalized to see my whole leg.”
Holt’s eyes dip down to take in my bare legs. I swear I can feel his gaze on my skin. He swallows hard and puts the book down on the coffee table to head for the front door. “Let’s see if we can find this weekend’s secret bonfire, huh?”
I brighten at the prospect. I haven’t attended a summer bonfire in Anchor Lake in years. “Any ideas where it could be?” I didn’t even know who was behind the location choice, but they did a great job keeping everyone guessing from week to week.
Holt helped me into the Jeep, rounded the hood, and climbed behind the wheel to head home. I liked that he was a gentleman. Helping me into the car, his hand on my lower back, paying for our lunch…I noticed all of it. Dexter hadn’t been too keen to do those things, saying women were equal to men and didn’t need his help. I mean, he’s right, but I wanted his help. The distinction is key.
“No idea, but I was thinking we could take Gracie’s canoe out and find it that way. I could use some rowing to burn off the donuts and hot dogs.” Holt pats his washboard abs like he’s suddenly grown a potbelly from one day of junk food.
We don’t spend much time at the cabin, just enough to throw on sweatshirts and grab Mookie. She’s sporting a harness and leash in case we find the bonfire, but Holt makes a makeshift bed out of blankets for her in the bottom of the old canoe out back. The moon is high in the sky and a few fireflies light the way as we trudge through the backyard and over to the edge of the water. Smoke climbs into the dark from several fires along the rim of the lake.
The canoe doesn’t look as good as I remember it from my youth. It’s smaller, more rickety, and it even looks like some wood rot might have caused a slight hole in the bottom. Although that could just be a trick of the light. Holt assures me he’s taken it out recently and it was seaworthy. I climb in and have a seat on one of two slats across the width of the canoe. Mookie looks up at me from her bed at the bottom like she’s asking me to save her.
Holt hands me two paddles, throws his shoes into the canoe, and shoves it the rest of the way into the water. The thing floats perfectly, even when Holt splashes over and hops in with ease. The canoe bobs dangerously under his weight, but settles as I hold on to the sides in a death grip.
“You know how to swim, right?” Holt asks, taking an oar from me.
I bobble the remaining one, almost dumping it into the water before we’ve gotten even two yards from the shoreline. “Yep. I’m just not a strong swimmer. I like land-based physical activities.”
Holt grins and starts paddling us further out onto the lake. Water seeps into my tennis shoes, but I figure that’s par for the course in an old canoe. “Do you like skiing? Hiking? Rock climbing?”
“Whoa there, Mr. REI.” I finally get the oar situated in my hands and dip the ends into the water to help out. “I’m more of a yoga and Pilates girl.”
Bam!
My oar slams into his and slips right out of my hand. The splash it makes as it falls into the lake gets my legs all wet. I reach over the edge of the canoe and snatch it out of the water before it sinks, but the sudden movement tips the canoe. Holt yips and counterbalances. Mookie whimpers from the bottom. Little ripples of water fan out from our canoe. Holt and I stare at each other as the thing slowly steadies without catastrophe. My hands are shaking as I turn back around and try rowing again.
“Sorry about that.”
Holt shakes his head, but he’s still smiling when I peek a glance at him. We make it almost into the middle of the lake when Holt points out a particularly large plume of smoke on the northwest side of the lake.
“There! I bet that’s the bonfire. Let’s head that way.”
Thank God for his muscles, because my shoulders start burning and we aren’t even close to the bonfire. I rest in between paddles. I stretch my fingers down to my toes to get some blood back in my arms, but find that my feet are almost completely submerged in water.
“Uh, Holt? Is the boat filling with water?”
The splashes from his oar fall silent. He curses under his breath a moment later. “Yeah, I think so. Must be the added weight of two of us.”
Panic starts to seep in along with the lake water. “Uh, should we turn around? I mean, Mookie might be swimming soon.”
She jumps to her feet and off the pile of blankets at the mention of her name. Her little legs are completely submerged. She barks and I can tell she’s as terrified as me.
“Shit. Yeah, I think we better head back.” He starts rowing in earnest now.
Considering I don’t want the canoe to sink with both of us and Mookie in it, I dip my oar in and try to help out. Sadly, I don’t help. I mostly just clank my oar into his. One particular whack makes the end of my oar fall into the water uncontrolled, sending up a wave of water right in Holt’s face. He sputters and I dare to turn around. He’s soaked.
He’s not smiling now.
I mutter an apology, but then he whips his shirt over his head and words die on my lips. Why is he always half naked? And why do I like it so much? The light from the moon creates shadows across his muscles. The man is stacked with round, sinewy muscle that flexes and moves each time he digs his oar into the water. It’s basically crew porn, and I have a literal front-row seat.
The tip of the canoe hits some tall reeds sticking out of the water, which slows down the canoe. Holt curses again, this time a little more vehemently.
“Are we lost?” I ask, sitting on my seat doing absolutely diddly squat with my oar. Instead, I decide to save the dog and scoop her up into my lap. She licks my face for putting her on higher ground.
More reeds tug on the front of the canoe, and before I can question him further, we’re fully stopped.
“Umm.”
“Fucking hell,” Holt snaps. “I forgot flashlights.”
A giggle bubbles up my throat, but I try to swallow it back. “I have my phone.”
I pull it out of my back pocket and turn the flashlight on. The tiny ray of light is enough to show we’ve rowed right into a thick marshy area I didn’t see when we were rowing out.
Holt shifts forward and Mookie and I brace as the canoe rocks. His hand covers mine, shifting the phone to shine the light toward the embankment a good twenty feet away. He turns back to me, his hair in disarray from both the water I splashed on him and from running his fingers through it just now.
“Think you can swim it in?”
I look around, assessing the situation. More water has come into the canoe. My feet are completely submerged. There’s no dock anywhere near. And the canoe is stuck in the reeds. By the time we got it loose, we’d have sunk another few inches at the very least.
“Yeah, I can swim it.” I’m not sure about that, but I don’t seem to have much choice.
“Okay, leave the oars and the blankets. I’ll take Mookie.” Holt plucks her from my lap and tucks her between his shoulder and neck before gingerly climbing over the side of the canoe.
I wait until the thing stops rocking and then follow suit, taking much longer and whimpering every time the thing rocks in warning. I shouldn’t care if the whole damn canoe tips over. I can’t get much wetter than completely submerged in the lake. Which I am the second I successfully climb over the edge. At least the water’s warm this time of year.
Holt swims to the shore, his head moving several body lengths with each powerful stroke of his arms. I’m doing more of a doggy paddle with one arm while I hold my phone over my head in the other, inching my way across the lake. Mookie has climbed halfway on top of Holt’s head, her wet stubby tail in his face as she stares back at me struggling. Every few strokes, he turns around and looks for me, swiping the tail out of his face. If I wasn’t fighting for my life, I’d laugh my ass off.
Eventually, all three of us make it to shore, though we have to be a good half mile from the cabin still. Mookie is shaking in her harness, not from cold, because it isn’t cold outside, but probably from fright. Holt pulls me into his chest the second I drag myself out of the water. His hug is warm and tight and exactly the comfort I need when I’m sopping wet and pretty sure I inhaled some lake water into my lungs.
“Damn,” he murmurs, stroking the back of my wet hair. “This is why I don’t date anymore. I’m so sorry I didn’t check the boat. Or bring a flashlight.”
“It’s okay,” I pant into his naked chest. “I haven’t been on a date since Dexter the Dick. And this was far better of an evening than any of my dates with him.”
Holt’s chest rumbles and I have to pull my cheek off his chest to realize he’s laughing. The whole situation—minus our almost-drowning—makes me laugh too, and before you know it, we’re breaking apart, belly laughing at our adventure. Mookie whines and gives us her backside like she’s embarrassed to be seen with us.
Holt grabs my hand as our laughter winds down. “Let’s head home, huh?”
We walk hand in hand, the little flashlight on my phone giving off just enough light so that we don’t trip and hurt ourselves. It’s peaceful out, just an owl hooting in the distance, the smell of barbecues and bonfires layering over the scent of water and inner tubes left out in the sun all day. We don’t pass another soul on the little path that leads around the lake on the south side, which is good because we’re soaking wet and Holt’s only half dressed. I’m assuming everyone else actually made it to the bonfire.
“So…” Holt says after a good ten minutes of walking. “What do you actually do for work?”
“Ah.” I suck in a deep breath. I was wondering when that was going to come up again. Staring straight ahead, I force myself to tell the truth, even if Holt thinks I’m weird. Wouldn’t be the first time I heard someone say that about me.
“Well, I started out as a dog walker when I first went to college. I’ve always had a way with animals. But then I had my first complicated dog who kept trying to bite the other dogs. I worked with him every day and suddenly he wasn’t a biter any longer. Word spread, and before you knew it, I was dropping out of college to be a full-time pet counselor.”
Holt comes to an abrupt halt, tugging on my hand. “Maple.”
I cringe, refusing to look him in the eye. I don’t want to see him staring at me like a strange bug people want to poke with a stick but not actually touch with their bare hands. “Yeah, I know.”
“That’s amazing!”
My gaze flies to his. “Huh?” He’s smiling at me, not a trace of fear or disgust in his expression.
“That’s the coolest job I’ve ever heard of. No wonder Mookie likes you better.” He stoops to pick up Mookie, then leans in to study my face. “Wait, don’t you like your job?”
My eyebrows shoot up. “Oh, I love my job. It’s just most people think it’s…well, weird.”
“Who’s most people?”
My gaze shifts over his ear to the ring of trees that line the lake. “My parents, for sure. My brother, definitely. Even my yoga friends kind of tease me about it.”
I try to keep walking, but Holt holds me back until I look up at him again. “Well, those people are missing out on what a wonderful person you are. Takes a soft heart to communicate with animals. Most humans think animals are below them, while you treat them like beings that deserve understanding. I think that’s beautiful. Not weird.”
My heart melts. That has to be the nicest thing someone has ever said to me. It doesn’t escape me how delicious he looks in the moonlight without a shirt, wet brown hair askew, and a small dog tucked against his chest. I find myself leaning closer, just to be near someone who seems to actually see me. Even when he doesn’t have his glasses on.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
Holt leans in too and suddenly we’re just an inch or so apart. I bite my bottom lip with nerves and his gaze follows the motion. His warm hand comes up and cups my face, his thumb tugging my lip away from my teeth. My breath catches and his head dips. My eyes flutter closed and I feel the faintest brush of his lips before a wet snarl and the much sharper brush of canines slides along my chin.
Holt and I break apart.
“No, Mookie!” Holt snaps. The dog continues to snap and snarl at him, looking absolutely feral.
“May I?” I ask, holding my hands out.
“Please.” Holt hands the dog off to me and she immediately quits snarling. In fact her tongue comes out and licks across my chin.
I walk a few steps away and look her directly in the eyes, holding her far enough away she can’t lick her way out of this mess. “That wasn’t very nice, Mookie. We don’t bite when we’re mad. Barking is fine. Biting is not. How would you like it if I bit you when I was mad? Wouldn’t feel very nice, would it?” Mookie whimpers and tries to lunge for my face with her tongue lolling out. I hold her back and force eye contact.
“Are you done biting?” She whimpers again and I dip my head in a nod. “Okay. You’re forgiven.” I tuck her into my chest for a hug before turning her over to Holt. She swipes her tongue across his chin and he nuzzles his face into her fur. Those two together are quite adorable.
I turn and start walking back, the damp clothes feeling cold and uncomfortable now. Holt must put Mookie down because I hear her collar clinking as she trots behind me to catch up. The cabin is just ahead and I nearly sprint to get to it, thoughts completely frazzled. Despite the warm evening, I’m shivering now.
What the hell was that? I almost kissed Holt McGrath again!
I wasn’t lying when I said I haven’t dated anyone since Dexter. I certainly haven’t locked lips with a man either. I’m already living with Holt for the summer and pretending to be engaged to him. I don’t think adding kissing to our list of activities is a good idea. For a split second my whole body shivers at what that might feel like. All those muscles pressed against me? Those kind lips turning my insides to mush?
No! Not a good idea. Nope. I don’t even live in Anchor Lake. This has disaster written all over it. It’s probably just leftover feelings from my childhood crush anyway. Yeah, that’s it. My heart just hasn’t caught up to the fact that we’re adults now and simple kisses over bonfires aren’t actually simple once you’re an adult. They’re messy and lead to heartbreak, something I can’t afford after Dexter left me devastated.
Holt opens the cabin door, and I make a beeline for my suitcase. “I’m going to hop in the shower and head to bed!” I call over my shoulder.
Yes, I’m running away.
And no, I refuse to think of Holt while I let the water in the shower warm me back up.
Gracie’s diary
(62 years ago)
Dear Diary,
I met up with Hank again after school. He brought me wildflowers like he always does. My parents think I’m studying hard at the library. I just can’t help myself. The way Hank looks at me makes me feel alive for the first time. I’m not the prettiest girl in school, but I’m not the ugliest either. Hank just looks at me like I’m the only girl he sees. And I like that.
We sneak onto the MacGowans’ dock and talk since they’re never home anyway. Sometimes he kisses me. Those are my favorite days. Today his hand landed on my leg while we were kissing. He groaned and then his hand swept up my leg, under my skirt, and onto my thigh! When I tell you my entire insides started trembling like an earthquake! He gripped my thigh with his strong hand and then snatched his hand back out like he couldn’t believe he’d taken liberties.
I pulled back, panting like a dog.
“I’m sorry, Gracie,” he said, looking mad at himself.
I reached down and grabbed his wrist, holding his gaze while I tucked his hand back under my skirt. Oh my gosh, I can’t believe I was so bold! I’m like one of those feminists! Next thing you know I’ll be burning my bra!
His lips came back down on mine and we kissed for hours.
Until my lips were red and swollen and he had to keep rearranging his pants.
You won’t believe what I said. I just came right out with it.
“I love you, Hank.”
He reached up and smoothed my hair, looking at me so tenderly.
“I love you too, Gracie.”
Then we smiled at each other like that was that.
I’m going to spend my whole life with this boy, I just know it.
We haven’t told anyone about us yet. Just Linda, my best friend. And now you.
I love him, and I can’t wait to actually be with him.