Hot Dad Summer

1. Daisy

***Daisy***

“Yo, lady, why does your dog smell like that?” My teenage driver rolled his window down and stuck his head out of it, jerking my anxiety even higher. His driving wasn’t the best when his head was inside the car. “I should get hazard pay for this. My car is never going to be the same.”

I turned my head to glare at the kid who’d introduced himself as Rat, despite the name on the ride sharing app being John. “Your car isn’t a car, Rat.”

His responding grin took some of the umph out of my frustration.

He was a charming kid, even if he was a lying liar who’d used his dad’s information to get his job driving hapless victims around.

I was pretty sure he was stoned and he’d already charged me twenty bucks for the weed cookie Hank had found and gobbled up with the ferocity of a dog who’d been drugged and starved for a day of travel.

Drugged by the vet and then drugged by a kid named Rat. Hank was having a great day.

“You need to get him checked. Hank is my boy, but Goddamn. Does weed make dogs’ farts smell worse? Google that shit.” Rat sped around a truck with tires larger than his car and took a turn like the GPS hadn’t been shouting about it for the last three minutes.

“My phone’s dead, Rat. You’re the one who Googled whether your edible was going to kill my dog, remember?

I’m already putting way too much faith in you.

Trusting a teenager with veterinary toxicology was not on my summer bingo card.

” Hank was sitting up in my lap, his head lolling and his tongue hanging out was almost as long as his ears.

The Bassett Hound apparently wouldn’t die from eating the weed cookie.

He’d just turn into an extra from a Cheech and Chong film.

Rat braked sharply and Hank’s head bumped the windshield.

“My bad, dude.”

“He’s fine. I’m pretty sure his skull was replaced with steel at birth.” I swore as Rat took another turn and then the Calloway Estate opened up in front of us and I almost wished I had longer in the car with my new friend. “This is going to be fine. Right?”

Rat leaned forward and whistled. “Damn D. This place is swanky. You think your boyfriend will invite me in and let me play on their gaming consoles? I bet they have sick consoles. They do, don’t they? Don’t bogart that shit, D.”

I stared at him with a blank expression on my face.

“Okay, okay. I’ll comfort you before I beg for shit.

Everything is going to be great. Your boyfriend’s going to be all over you and his dick will grow three inches and you’ll have free weed for the rest of your life.

” He winked at me, eyes completely off the driveway. “Now, let’s talk about the games.”

I covered my face and groaned. I’d shared too much with Rat.

I mean, I hadn’t shared anything about Tyler’s penis size because I wasn’t a pervert who talked to teenagers about sex.

I had shared my fears about how things had been kind of strained with Tyler since he moved back home six months earlier.

I couldn’t help it. I’d been quietly panicking for days.

I was putting everything into showing up for Tyler and our relationship, but I couldn’t help the unsettling feeling that I was the only one trying.

I pressed my left palm into my left eye; my right hand trapped because of Hank. “I don’t know if they have games like that. Their kids are young.”

“Figures.” He stopped the car, the wheels halfway off the road. “Hey, you know what? I have another edible. You want it? You look like you need it more than me. You, or the dog. I think he has a problem.”

My thoughts were still on Tyler, on the hundreds of dollars I’d spent on new lingerie, on the way Tyler hadn’t answered his phone over the last few days.

He knew I was coming. We’d planned our summer together months earlier and when we’d talked the week before he’d been excited. So, why did I feel like throwing up?

“Yo? The cookie?”

I glanced over at the cookie, an exact copy of the one Hank had inhaled. I didn’t dabble in drugs normally but I was feeling so anxious that I snatched it from him and shoved it into my purse. “I’ll give you money for it.”

“And the money for your dog’s nasty ass farts.”

“And the money for Hank’s farts, sure.” I took a deep breath and nodded towards the large lake house. “Go on. Let’s finish this fucked up ride from hell.”

“Hell yeah!” Rat revved the engine, as much as a smart car’s engine could rev, and we shot forward. “You’ve been my favorite rider ever! And my first!”

I let out a scream as we flew up the driveway. “Your first rider ever?!”

“Woo!” Rat slammed on the brakes just before we ran into the back of the giant black pickup truck parked in front of the four-car garage. “Sick truck!”

I unfolded my curvy body from the tiny, absolutely miniscule car and barely managed to get Hank on the ground without dropping him on his stoned head. After he was on his back on the smoothly paved driveway I spun around and glared at Rat. “You need more practice. This was terrifying.”

“Come on, girl, you know you liked it! I saw you smiling!” He climbed out, unfolding a long, lanky body that should not have fit inside the car. “We’re totally friends now. Give me your Insta. I’ll add you.”

I was about to argue with the idea of the two of us being friends on social media when my eyes moved past him and I didn’t see Tyler’s slightly embarrassing sportscar.

He never parked it in the garage because he wanted everyone to see the outrageously expensive car, so not seeing his car meant he wasn’t there.

He was supposed to be there. The anxiety I’d felt grew larger, large enough that Rat stopped ranting about video games and meeting up for a beer that he definitely couldn’t buy himself.

“Yo, girl, you good?”

Before I could tell him that I wasn’t, one of the garage doors opened and a blur with wild, blonde curls shot out on a tiny four-wheeler.

Hank came to life at my feet and let out a howl at the energy of chaos, his favorite thing in the world.

Usually, he was the one causing it, so he woke up excited but slightly confused.

While he was turning in a tight circle, looking for the chaos, or chasing his tail, I wasn’t sure, Tyler’s nephew had spotted me and let out a piercing scream.

“Aunt Daisy!”

Tyler’s older brother, Flynn, ran out of the garage, chasing his son. His sun-streaked blond hair was almost as wild as Charlie’s, and his bright blue eyes were already narrowed with exasperation. “Charlie! Charlie, stop!”

“Hey, D? He’s going to stop, right?” Rat sounded like he already knew the answer.

Charlie let out a loud war cry and dove off the four-wheeler, making me think he didn’t know how to stop. He executed a pretty decent roll and then popped up with an agility I’d never known, running at me parallel with the four-wheeler that hadn’t slowed down much.

Tyler’s other brothers, Max and Wes, came sprinting out of the garage, their daughters in front of them.

Hazel was dotted in paint and chasing her little cousin, Poppy, with a paintbrush and a wicked smile.

Poppy was more paint than little girl and despite running from Hazel, she looked thrilled about it.

Max was hard to miss behind them, tattooed and built like someone I wouldn’t want to meet in a dark alley. Wes was beside him, broad through the shoulders with a dark beard that made his usual serious expression look downright intimidating.

In the space of a second, I recognized that the dads had lost control of their children and needed help.

The muscle memory was there and the oftentimes unhealthy internal demand that I prove myself useful was ever present.

As always, that drive overrode the rest of my thoughts and I was grateful for the distraction from Tyler’s continued absence.

I moved forward to catch Charlie but Hank was still circling in front of me so I tripped over him and went down hard, the ominous ripping sound from my dress hurting more than the fall.

I groaned but before I could focus on the humiliation of tripping in front of Tyler’s older brothers, a louder sound filled the air.

“Aww, shit, man.” Rat appeared over me, his young face turned down. “Little dude just trashed my whip.”

“That thing is closer to whisper than whip, Rat.”

“Haters gonna hate.” He reached down and proved that he was stronger than his lanky frame suggested by grabbing me under the arms and lifting me to my feet. “D, you sure you aren’t interested in a younger man? You’re thicker than a snicker.”

“I will murder you.”

Before I could clap his cheeks and pinch them like the child he was, Max stepped up beside me. I hadn’t even seen him cross the driveway. He looked down at Rat’s hands, still loosely wrapped around my arms, and then lifted his gaze to Rat’s face.

Rat immediately let go of me.

Flynn came up on my other side, breathing a little hard from chasing Charlie. “You always hit on grown women, kid?”

“Only the hot ones.”

Wes stopped in front of me, his gaze moving over my scraped knee and torn dress instead of Rat. “You hurt?”

“I’m fine.” I looked between the three brothers and fought the strange urge to laugh. Max was still scowling at Rat, Flynn looked entertained, and Wes was studying my knee like it had personally offended him. “Everyone relax. Rat’s barley eighteen. His brain isn’t fully formed yet.”

“Eighteen in one month,” Rat muttered.

“Congratulations. I’m sure your frontal lobe is very excited.”

I clapped his cheeks and then pinched them like a grandma. Then I saw the damage Charlie’s four-wheeler had caused to the tiny car. Rat was right. His whip was trashed. “Damn. How much does a toy like that go for? I’ll write you a check.”

“You’re not paying for that.” Wes said it immediately.

Rat looked between the three brothers and then at me. “Damn, D. You got a whole security team up here.”

I rolled my eyes, but something about the three Calloway brothers standing around me made the back of my neck feel warm.

Everyone had frozen when the crash happened, even Charlie, but Rat’s loud laugh thawed them and proved the chaos never truly stopped. Charlie finished the run to me and climbed me like a tree to press a wet kiss to my cheek before jumping down to stare at Hank in awe.

“What is it?”

Hazel scoffed. “It’s a dog, doofus.”

Rat snorted. “Doofus? Where’d you learn your insults, kid?”

Poppy launched herself at me, covering me in paint. “Aunt Daisy! I missed you so much! Oh, you have something on your dress…”

My dress was already ruined so I squeezed her tight. “I can’t imagine what that something is.”

I was promptly relegated to second most interesting thing as the kids obsessed over a stoned Hank.

It gave me the chance to really look at Tyler’s brothers.

Flynn still wore the easy grin he seemed to have been born with.

Max had retreated a few feet but his hazel eyes were still fixed on me beneath his permanent scowl.

Wes stood closest, massive arms crossed over his chest, looking like the responsible adult in a family that had clearly run out of them.

Then I noticed something else. All three men looked really uncomfortable.

“What’s wrong? Where’s Tyler?”

Wes, the oldest brother, stepped forward, mouth twisted with tension. “He, uh, didn’t call you?”

“My phone’s been dead for hours. Why?” Anxiety twisted my stomach into knots. “Where is he?”

“He’s not here.”