27. Maddie
27
MADDIE
“Dammit, Jake!” Maddie cried as her brother stumbled in the apple orchard. To keep himself from falling, he had grabbed her sweatshirt, almost causing her to fall over.
Usually, that wouldn’t be a problem. But the apple-picking contest involved picking as many apples as they could from one orchard at the Pearsons’ farm, where Applepalooza was held, and then racing them over to dump in a barrel before the five-minute timer went off.
Because the contestants could only take what they could carry, Jake insisted they both stuff their sweatpants and sweatshirts with apples to maximize each run into and out of the orchard.
A little trip would mean that Maddie, who could barely move from the apples stuffed into her clothes, wouldn’t get back up again.
“Come on, Mad, we’re almost there.” Jake braced onto her elbow, sweat dripping down his temple. “Only like fifty feet to go.”
“Thirty seconds!” Ben Pearson called out from his lifeguard chair into a megaphone.
Shit. “Oh God, we’re never going to make it.” Maddie pumped her arms as she tried to push forward, the weight of the apples holding her back. They had to get the apples into the barrels for them to count, and each barrel was on top of a scale, so every single apple counted toward the final weight.
“Come on, Maddie and Jake!” Lindsay cried from the spectator line. She and the rest of their friends and family who weren’t in the race were gathered in a group near the end of their orchard lane.
Jake linked arms with her as best he could, hauling her forward. They were so close, but would they have time to transfer all the apples in?
Jake reached the apple barrel milliseconds before Maddie, then yanked his sweatshirt off, revealing his bare chest. He fought to keep as many apples as he could inside, but many fell out. “Come on, strip! Pants first, it’ll be easier.”
“ Twenty . . . nineteen . . .” the crowd chanted.
Oh my God. Her sweatshirt was one thing, but her sweatpants?
She was going to kill Jake for this.
Maddie wiggled out of her pants, cursing the day she’d ever let Jake talk her into this—and her damn competitiveness—as the crowd hollered. She’d even worn apple-red panties, never expecting that all Brandywood would see them.
Still, she kept most of the apples in her pants. Cinching the waist, she sprang to her feet and dumped the apples from the pants into the barrel.
“Ten . . . nine . . . eight . . .”
She yanked the sweatshirt off as apples tumbled onto the ground. No time to think about how cold it was or the fact that all the spectators were staring at her in a T-shirt and underwear. She dumped the apples from the sweatshirt, then gathered some of the fallen ones from the ground.
“Time’s up!” Ben called as the buzzer sounded.
The crowd cheered wildly. Maddie heaved deep breaths, her skin sticky, her clothes discarded somewhere on the grass. Before she could find them, Jake nearly toppled her with a bear hug. “You were awesome!”
She laughed into his chest. He still had apples in his pants—he hadn’t been able to get his pants off as fast as she had—but somehow, they’d picked almost three hundred pounds of apples.
Despite her best efforts, she couldn’t help but take a quick peek at Josh and Gina’s score, since they were only two lanes away.
One hundred twenty-seven.
Gina looked pissed.
She’d flat-out glared at Maddie earlier, clearly angry about that interaction with Brooks and her father.
“And the winners of the apple-picking race are Maddie and Josh Yaaaarddley!” Ben called out from the lifeguard chair.
Lindsay’s whoop broke through as the spectators left their roped-off section and raced toward them. Travis was only a couple of feet behind them, as well as Mom and Dad. “You guys were incredible,” Lindsay said, wrapping them both in a hug.
Mom found Maddie’s sweatpants and draped them behind her. “Great job, you two,” she said with a laugh. “I’m not sure it was worth flashing the whole town for, but still. Very creative.”
Dad shook his head. “You couldn’t pay me enough money to do that nonsense.” But his blue eyes shone with amusement, regardless of his words.
“Maybe next year, you and I should sign up. Give these two a run for their money,” Lindsay said to Travis with a wink.
He draped his arm around her. “Maybe. I don’t know if I have the same level of dedication as they do, though. Also, can we make sure they wash these apples before they make them into cider? Somehow Jake’s sweaty apples don’t have a ton of appeal.”
“I resent that,” Jake said, feigning offense. “I give them extra flavor.”
“Ben’s your friend. Talk to him about it,” Lindsay answered with a shrug. “I still believe half the reason the Pearsons started Applepalooza is for all the free labor picking apples.”
Maddie took the sweatpants from her mom, then wrinkled her nose at the streaks of dirt and smooshed rotten apples she’d stepped on while plunging into the orchard without care. “You have my backpack?” she asked Lindsay. “I don’t think I feel like putting these back on again.”
Lindsay nudged Travis, who lifted it. “The whole sweatpants look isn’t the right vibe for Applepalooza anyway.”
“Vibe or no vibe, put something on, for God’s sake,” Dad muttered. He frowned at Jake. “You, too.”
“I didn’t want my shirt to get dirty,” Jake said. “You packed it in there, right, Mads?”
She pulled it out and handed it over. As she straightened, she glanced back toward the spectators. “Naomi and Logan didn’t make it to see the race?”
She’d been keeping both eyes open for her older sister. They wouldn’t go a whole weekend with this sort of tension between them, would they?
Then again, Maddie wasn’t entirely sure she even knew what to say to Naomi at this point.
“Naomi’s helping Pops and Bunny set up for the pie competition, and I’m not sure where Logan is. Haven’t seen him all day,” Dad said.
“I think he was heading for some of the kids’ activities with Kayla and her daughter,” Mom said with a smile. “I might go over there and join them for a bit. It’s a little less crazy than all this.”
“Don’t forget we’ve got Auction-a-Peck in ten minutes.” Jake tugged his shirt on. “Don’t you want to see if Milton Hirsh steals a kiss from Maddie?”
Mom grimaced. “I think I’ll skip that one.”
Maddie didn’t want to think about that. The idea of auctioning off a kiss was the last thing she’d ever willingly volunteer for.
Secretly, she’d been hoping Brooks might turn up to it, though. Or just to the festival.
Of course, she wouldn’t want him to see her standing in her underwear.
“I’m gonna go change. Be right back.” She made a beeline down the orchard lane, farther from the crowd. She wanted to change her shirt, too, which felt just as sticky as her sweatpants had been. In fact, she would give anything for a shower right now.
When she was out of sight from anyone, she dropped her backpack and peeled off her shirt and sweatshirt. A stray apple tumbled from her sweatshirt and landed on her foot with a thump. “Dammit.”
A footstep crunched from behind her, then a deep male voice chuckled. “We have to stop meeting like this.”
Brooks.
She jerked upright, smacking the top of her head right into the branch of a tree. “Ow!” Her hair caught on a twig as she pulled away, and her eyes widened. Shit. I’m stuck.
And the bastard who’d caused this stood there with a smirk on his face, his thumbs looped into the pockets of his jeans, smelling like clean, manly soap rather than rotten apples and sweat.
“What the hell are you doing here?” she asked, tugging on her hair. She tried not to care that she was in a matching red bra and panty set.
“Enjoying the view,” he drawled, turning his baseball cap backward.
Ow, ow, ow.
Her hair was really tangled.
“Help me,” she snapped with wide eyes. She was already cold enough.
He stepped closer. “Is that any way to ask for a favor?”
He was enjoying this far too much.
“Help me, please ,” she gritted through clenched teeth.
Brooks removed his sunglasses, hooking them on the collar of his shirt. Now he was a breath away, so close that his thigh brushed up against hers, his arms on either side of her head as he deftly loosened the tangle in her hair.
When he’d finished, the tugging on her scalp eased, and she released a breath. “Thank you.” Then she made the mistake of lifting her chin to look him in those deadly gray eyes.
“My pleasure, Madison.”
Her heart slammed into her ribs painfully.
I’ve missed him.
He was so close now. All it would take was a slight lean from either of them, and they would be kissing.
His gaze flicked to her mouth, and one of his song lyrics floated through her mind. “Drink my desire . . . honey on your lips. Back against the wall . . . and my pressure on your hips.”
God.
They’d actually done that the other day.
Goosebumps rose on her skin.
She didn’t really care how he’d come up with those words, but she wanted that. Every inch of his sexual, seductive self. That voice whispering her name. He was so fucking good at it, too.
A soft click tore her from her trance. “What was that?” She whirled around to look, stepping away from him.
Brooks frowned at her. “What was what?”
“Didn’t you hear?—”
“Dude, Maddie . . . what the heck?” Logan said as he and Kayla rounded the corner. They stopped short, and Logan turned around to block Audrey from seeing her.
The little girl popped her head around Logan’s leg. “Hi, Miss Maddie!” She seemed oblivious to Maddie’s lack of clothes, thank goodness .
“I—” Maddie grabbed her orange-and-brown-plaid flannel shirt and pulled it on.
Fuck. Heat flooded her cheeks. Logan was already walking the other way, lifting Audrey onto his shoulders.
Kayla smiled at Brooks, then Maddie. “Good to see you again, Maddie. We’ll catch up in a few.” She followed Logan, laughing as she hurried to catch up.
Maddie’s fingers trembled as she buttoned the shirt. “Any chance they think that was a perfectly innocent encounter?”
“Is that what it was?” Brooks’s eyes gleamed wolfishly. “Why the hell are you out here only in a bra and underwear?”
“I was changing. I have to go over to the Auction-a-Peck in a couple of minutes, and I didn’t want to look like a crazy lady.” She pulled on a long, flowy white skirt, then took out her boots.
“I have a feeling I’m gonna regret asking what Auction-a-Peck is.”
Brooks’s look of amusement hadn’t faded.
“Laugh it up, Mr. Rock Star.” She found her hairbrush and loosed her hair from her ponytail, shaking it out. “It’s an auction. For apples. And kisses. The volunteer who comes out holding a peck-sized crate of apples—which is about thirty—also offers a kiss to the winner of each auction.”
“A kiss?” Brooks appeared skeptical.
“Yes.”
“Like on the mouth?”
“Yeah, but like a peck. Pay attention.” She applied lip gloss from a tube.
“I am paying attention.” He frowned. “So you’re going to kiss some random person who bids on the apples you’re holding?”
“I mean, I didn’t want to volunteer for this. My brother Jake signed me up. He got roped into it by one of my step-grandma’s friends. And the proceeds from the auction go to the senior center, so it’s a good cause.”
“Uh-huh.” Brooks’s frown deepened. “Well, good luck with that.” He started down the lane in the direction Kayla and Logan had gone.
“You’re not going to come bid?” She hurried to catch up with him.
“On you?”
“I mean, it doesn’t have to be on me.” She hesitated, then teased, “My brother Jake is volunteering, too, if that’s more up your alley.”
He guffawed. “Madison, there are far better ways to ask me to prove I’m straight, if that’s what you want to know. In fact, I would have been happy to prove it the other day, but I wasn’t the one who held back.”
If she didn’t know any better, he seemed . . . annoyed that she was doing this.
“So you won’t bid?” she asked, setting her hand on his forearm.
Brooks stopped, then turned to face her. “If I kiss you, it’s going to be because I know we both want it. Not because I won it in some auction, understood? I already crossed the line with you and regret it. You told me no last time. I accepted it and moved on. I won’t do it again.”
She gaped at him.
He really regretted the kisses they’d shared?
It wasn’t that she hadn’t wanted it. Is that what he thought? That she was holding back because she didn’t want him? She’d told him the other day that she wanted to keep going . . . it just wasn’t a good idea.
Of course, a man like Brooks probably wasn’t used to rejection. Who in their right mind would reject Brooks Kent?
She tugged her hand back from his forearm, feeling like a scolded child. “Understood.” Holding her head high, she hurried away from him.
“Wait, Madison,” he called after her.
“I have to go, Brooks. See you around.”
Maddie pushed forward without stopping, afraid that if she did, he might see her eyes welling with tears.
“I already crossed the line with you and regret it. You told me no last time. I accepted it and moved on. I won’t do it again.”
She knew, logically, this was for the best. But why did it sting so much more than she expected? I’ve only known him for a week.
She had to hold it together. Maybe, after the festivities were over, she’d have a serious talking to herself. It was time to keep her head held high. After all, he’d accepted there’d be nothing more between them and had moved on.
How, Maddie did not want to know.