Chapter 46
COLT
The dishes could wait. “Let’s go shower,” I said.
“I don’t have any clothes here.”
“You can shower here, go home, and change, and then I want to spend the day with you. Does that work for you?”
She smiled. “That works for me.”
I followed her up the stairs and into the bathroom.
She had already reached into the shower and turned the water on, steam beginning to curl up toward the ceiling by the time I came through the door.
She pulled my shirt over her head and dropped it with a casualness that undid me completely.
I could not wait to have more mornings just like this.
I pulled off my shorts and stepped in after her.
The water was hot. She turned her face up into the spray and closed her eyes, her hands pushing her wet hair back from her face. I stood behind her and watched the water run down her spine and thought about how I was going to carry this image with me for the rest of my life.
I reached past her for the shampoo on the shelf. She opened her eyes and glanced back at me.
“Turn around,” I said.
She turned. I worked the shampoo into her hair slowly, my fingers moving through the curls, my fingertips massaging her scalp. She let out a loud sigh and dropped her head back.
“That feels so good,” she said. “You have a future as a shampoo boy.”
I laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind if the ranch business fails.”
I kept working, careful with the knots and taking my time. There was something about it that felt more intimate than almost anything else we’d done. This was just care. I wanted to take care of her. I wanted to do it every morning for the rest of my life.
She rinsed and turned around to face me. She reached up and ran her hands through my hair, returning the favor without saying anything about it. Her nails scraped gently against my scalp. I had to work to keep my eyes open.
“You’re going to put me to sleep,” I said.
“You need to relax,” she said. “I can see how stressed you are.”
She wasn’t wrong. The last few days had been a lot. The legal situation. The calls. The investors. The weight of knowing a man was actively building a campaign designed to tear down everything I’d spent years building. She rinsed my hair with the same gentleness I’d used on hers.
I reached for her then, not with any urgency, just pulling her in under the spray with me. Her arms came around my waist and her cheek pressed against my chest. The water ran over both of us. I held her there and breathed her in.
“You okay?” she asked quietly.
“Yeah,” I said. “Better than I’ve been in a long time.”
She tilted her head up and kissed my jaw. I turned my head and kissed her mouth. We stayed under the hot water until the water started to run lukewarm.
I wrapped her in a towel and then grabbed another one for myself. I dressed in shorts and a button-up shirt while she put on her dress from last night.
“How long do you need?” I asked.
“Fifteen minutes?”
“I’ll be over,” I said.
She gave me a quick kiss. “See you soon, sexy.”
I drove us into town and parked in the main parking area. The same lot all the tourists used. It felt strange to play tourist, but I liked the idea of seeing the place from a new perspective. I took her hand as we walked the main stretch without any real destination.
Summer had her hair down and her sunglasses on. She was wearing cutoff jean shorts and a pink tank top that made her tan look even darker. She looked like summer itself.
We stopped for iced coffees at a place on the corner she liked. The girl behind the counter recognized Summer and started making her order before she’d said a word.
“The usual?” the girl asked.
“Please.” Summer looked at me. “He’ll have whatever’s strongest.”
“Cold brew,” I said. “Straight.”
The girl looked me over once. I was sure she recognized me. I was kind of famous these days. Then she looked at Summer and back at me and something in her expression shifted into something knowing and slightly delighted.
“Sure thing,” she said.
We took our drinks outside and kept walking. The town was alive in the way it got on a good summer afternoon. Families. Dogs. A group of teenagers on bikes who nearly took out a sandwich board outside the sub shop. The smell of sunscreen and fried food drifting from the direction of the boardwalk.
Summer walked beside me with her iced coffee and pointed things out as we went. She knew everything about this place. Every corner of it. It was in her the way Texas was in me. She was completely at home.
We drifted into the first shop without planning to.
It was one of those places that sold everything at once—local jewelry, candles, beach gear, postcards.
Summer picked up a small ceramic thing shaped like a wave and turned it over in her hands.
I watched her put it back and move to the next display.
There was a rack of swimwear near the back. I drifted toward it, drawn to an iridescent bikini that reminded me of a mermaid tail.
“What are you doing?” she asked from somewhere behind me.
“Looking.” I held it up and looked at it and then looked at her over the top of the rack.
She raised her eyebrows. “No.”
“We’re getting this.”
“I don’t need a new bikini.”
“You don’t need it,” I agreed, pulling it off the rack. “I want to see you in it.”
“Baby, there’s not much to see. It’s very tiny.”
I carried it up to the counter. Summer was biting her lower lip the way she did when she was trying not to smile.
“Thank you,” she said.
“It’s me that’s going to be thanking you,” I said. “And then when I take it off you and make you scream, you can thank me.”
She laughed and looped her arm through mine as we headed back toward the parking lot, our bags swinging between us. We were dropping off our bags and heading back for more shopping.
I was thinking about what else I could put her in. Maybe more of that lingerie. A sharp intake of breath from Summer beside me brought me back to the moment.
“Oh shit,” she murmured.
I looked at what had her cursing.
My car was covered in paint.
“Colt,” Summer said.
“I see it.”
A small crowd had already gathered on the sidewalk around the lot, people stopping and pointing and pulling out their phones. I heard a woman saying something to the man beside her. I heard my name.
Then I heard the horn.
At the far end of the lot, a familiar car with blacked-out windows was speeding toward the exit of the lot.
Two men on foot were standing directly in front of the vehicle with their arms spread wide, not moving.
A woman on the sidewalk had stepped off the curb to stand beside them.
The car lurched forward an inch with the driver blasting the horn.
Someone threw a large fountain drink directly onto the windshield. It exploded in a spray of ice and dark soda that ran down the glass in sheets. The horn kept going.
I put my arm out in front of Summer and stepped slightly in front of her. She didn’t argue. I felt her hand close around my forearm. The driver’s door swung open.
Judd Mathers stepped out onto the asphalt looking like a man ready for a boxing ring. His face was red. His collar was open. He scanned the parking lot, then found me.
He started across the lot with long strides. He was about to commit at least one felony. Maybe two because of the paint damage and I was absolutely pressing charges. If he wanted to get physical, I was down.
But he didn’t get far.
The crowd that had gathered on the sidewalk moved.
A man I recognized as the owner of the hardware store across the street planted himself directly in Judd’s way with his arms folded across his chest. More people filtered in from the sidewalk.
Ten, then fifteen. All of them standing between me and Judd.
Judd looked around at them with disgust. “Get out of my way,” he said.
Nobody moved. I almost laughed but I heard a deep voice say something. And then someone else repeated it.
“Judd Mathers, hit the road. Surfside ain’t yours to sell.”
It was rough and slightly off-rhythm and not particularly poetic, but it was loud. The chant grew louder with every second as more people took it up. Several people were recording as the chant turned into a bit of a song.
Judd’s hands curled at his sides. I watched him decide what he was going to do. Cost versus benefit. Risk versus reward. He looked at the crowd. He looked at the phones. And then he looked at me. I looked back at him and said nothing.
Whatever conclusion he reached, it wasn’t in his favor and he knew it. The redness in his face shifted from fury to humiliation, which in my experience was the more dangerous of the two. Humiliation, unlike fury, tended to make men small.
He pointed at me across the distance between us.
His finger shook slightly. He didn’t say anything.
Just turned around, walked back to the car, and got in.
The crowd parted just enough to let the vehicle pull out of the lot.
Someone slapped the back panel as it went by. The horn gave one last short blast.
Summer’s hand loosened on my forearm. I turned to look at her. “You okay?” I asked.
“I’m fine.” She looked at my car. “Your car is not fine.”
I looked at the car. The paint was already starting to set in the afternoon heat.
“No.” I laughed. “It’s not. I guess I’ll be fixing the gouge. Maybe I’ll leave it until everyone’s done fucking with my car.” I pulled out my phone and took a few pictures. “I need to call my attorney.”
When he answered, I could tell I was on speaker phone. I could hear him shuffling papers in the background. “Colt, what can I do for you?”
I told him what happened.
“How many witnesses?” he asked.
“Thirty, minimum. Lots of videos.”
“Good.” The shuffling stopped. “Don’t touch the car. Don’t wash it. Don’t move it if you can help it. I want photos of everything before it dries any further. Multiple angles. And I want a written account from you tonight while it’s fresh.”
“I’ll send the pictures,” I said.
“This is going to be very useful to us,” he said. “He’s building a case against you for tortious interference and harassment and meanwhile he’s throwing paint on your car. He’s rattled, Colt. Rattled people make mistakes. This is a mistake.”
“I know.” I ended the call and looked at the bags in our hands. For now, it would be a good bag holder. I took her bags, pushed the unlock button on the key fob, and put the bags in the trunk.
She was looking at me. “Done?”
“Yep, let’s finish our shopping spree. I want to know where you got that hot little number.”
“I’m not going back in there with you.”
“Fine, I’ll go by myself. I have plenty of ideas about what I like.”
“You’re terrible.”
“I’m thinking red,” I said. “Maybe something with ties. I like the idea of unwrapping you. What are your feelings about leather?”
“Sticky.”
I laughed. “Agreed. Lace?”
“I could do lace.”
“Red. Black. Maybe green.”
“I only have one body,” she said.
“We’re going to have lots of time. An outfit a day.”
“Alright, let’s do this,” she said.