Chapter 26 #2
Sunny is the kind of quiet that means she’s actually observing everything around her. She thinks no one has her sussed out, but I do.
“She likes you too.” Sunny grins, plonking herself down on the sun lounger next to mine in a flop of flamingo-colored hair.
It’s fading at the ends, from the sun and the chlorine, but the sight of her sunburned nose and the tan lines across her shoulders makes me happy I brought them here.
She wraps her towel a little tighter and sighs contentedly.
I’m not sure I buy that. Sure, I think we had mind-blowing sex, but she slipped into her same cryptic self once we had our clothes back on.
“Terrence, if you don’t use it, you’ll lose it!
” Pepper says loudly from the center of the pool, her hands propped on her hips beneath the waterline.
Even her swimwear has suddenly become more modest—no more bikinis, just a red swimsuit that does absolutely nothing to prevent my mind from straying now that I know how perfect she is beneath it.
“I’m pretty sure they’re not talking about a hip replacement when they say that,” the old man grumbles, but he does push himself a few steps further, the sagging skin around his arms dark from three days by the pool.
Hopefully this escape from the city does him good, too—even if his cat has pissed on the carpet and clawed one of my mother’s armchairs.
Terrence certainly seems to have perked up somewhat since everyone else left this morning, either way.
Pretty sure his hearing aid was switched off for most of the past two days.
“We’re just friends.” I offer Sunny what I feel is right in this situation.
She might act eighteen, but she isn’t, and it’s not my place to share this thing between Pepper and me with her without permission.
Besides, hopefully at fifteen years old, sex is just an abstract concept she doesn’t really understand.
“Friends who boink?” Sunny blinks innocently at me, propping a flat hand across her brow to block the sun and see me better.
I choke on the sip of beer I just took, slamming my fist into my chest. Well, I stand corrected. Both Pepper and Mr. Clay look around in alarm, and I hold my hand up and manage to croak out an explanation, “Wrong hole.”
“That’s what she said.” The snort comes from under the breath of the teenager next to me.
Terrence and Pepper turn back to each other, the latter beginning to flap her hands as she explains the next part of her plan to him. Sunny’s eyes bore into the side of my face, and I force my face to be completely neutral as I meet her.
I let my eyes drift to the side and widen. “Oh my god, it’s KID R?TTEN!”
“What! Where?” Her jaw drops and her head spins around so fast I’m surprised it doesn’t pop off and roll away.
I’m up from the lounger and hightailing it outta here while she’s distracted thinking that her favorite pop-rockstar has somehow appeared on the beach.
“Hey!” she yells after me when she realizes it was a ruse. “Not cool, my dude!”
“Sorry, I thought I saw him but it was just a crow—they have the same hair!” I throw over my shoulder, dodging the rainbow volleyball that gets lobbed in my direction and grinning as I slip into the house.
***
“So like, no cap means I’m being for real.” Sunny flips her faded hair from her face and clocks the still confused look on Terrence’s. “As in, no lie,” she follows up.
The deep canyon between his eyebrows gets deeper. He looks as smart as I’ve ever seen him, in crisp beige linen suit pants and a white button-up tucked in—he even looks like he’s combed the four hairs left on his head.
“She means something is genuinely honest. It’s a reiteration,” Pepper supplies, brushing past me to pick up the wooden chopping board with little rounds of sliced baguette on.
The corners of her butter-yellow sundress flare outward as she spins back to the stovetop and stays to place them into a frying pan full of hot olive oil. It’s all I can do not to lift her onto this counter and peel it off her in front of everyone.
I sigh quietly and scrub the back of my hand over my face, the knife I’m using to finely chop fresh vine tomatoes still in it.
It’s the latest in an obscenely long line of inappropriate thoughts I’ve had today, and if she’s returning the sentiment, she hasn’t made it noticeable.
She has barely said two words to me all day.
I don’t want to push her, but fuck, I’ve never been frozen out after sleeping with someone.
I can’t help but feel a little…hurt? Disappointed?
Pissed? I search for the right word and come up empty.
I don’t know what it makes me feel, but whatever it is isn’t good.
“So, why can’t you just say that?” Mr. Clay asks, picking an orange from the fruit bowl next to him on the island countertop and splitting it open.
“She did, in her own way.” I shrug, picking a new tomato out of the brown paper bag and slicing it in two.
Sunny raises a hand in the air and starts tapping her forefinger finger repeatedly onto her thumb, nodding her head slowly.
“Okay, now you’ve lost me.” I pause chopping and frown at her.
“It means she agrees, like yassss queen.” Pepper appears at my side, peering at my chopping board closely enough that I get a hit of the sweet jasmine scent that has been lodged in my throat since last night.
“Am I the queen in this scenario?” I ask Pepper, handing her the knife as she gestures for it and letting her slide the board over.
“Yes,” three sets of voices respond emphatically all at once.