Perfect Summer (9 page)

“That’s my sister, Emily, and her daughter, Addie. And last but not least, I’d like for you to meet Pastor Mike from the First Baptist Church. They’ve all come to check on me.” Davis pressed his lips together, trying not to laugh.

Years of practiced manners and the pretense of good breeding kicked in. Lilly’s back went ramrod straight, her chin went up, and her smile turned cold and polite. “Lovely to meet all of you. Would you please excuse me?”

Because she was wearing a thong, she didn’t dare turn on her heel and glide from the room. Instead, she continued to smile as she backed gracefully out, walked calmly down the hall into the bathroom, closed the door with a soft click, and threw the bolt.

She sank to her knees. Not since junior high when the entire school had taken to calling her Cinderlilly, because her clothes were old, outdated, and pilfered from Goodwill, had she felt this level of mortification. Unlike Cinderella, Lilly hadn’t married Prince Charming and lived happily ever after. She’d gotten pregnant, on purpose so she’d have to marry the much older oil baron, Franklin Ames, and suffered his inattention and the embarrassment of his affairs, all so she would never have to feel like this again.

Her daughter hated her, her lover had almost died, and she’d been introduced to his entire family while dressed as an over-the-hill Victoria’s Secret model—yes, this was definitely in the top five worst days of her life.

Lilly cast around for an escape route that didn’t involve walking out into the hall. A window on the back wall of the shower looked promising. She stood, walked to it, and flipped the latch at the top. With a shove, it popped open. She leaned out and took stock. They were on the second floor, making the drop a good twenty feet. She leaned farther out the window. About five feet from the house was a tree she might be able to jump to and then shimmy down.

“Nice to meet you, dear.” A light female voice came from the other side of the door. “We’ll see you later.”

Lilly turned to the door, but no one tried to open it.

“Thank you. Nice to meet you too,” she called out before she could stop herself. Manners were rote. She said things she didn’t mean and smiled when she wanted to cry. Life wasn’t just a stage, it was a three-ring circus.

Several sets of feet clopped down the wooden stairs and then out the front door. Lilly stepped back from the window. She had to get out of here. There was no way she could hold her head up in this town. By the time Davis’s family got done with her, she’d make the whore of Babylon look like a Sunday school teacher. In the least, she’d be the whore of Lambert. What if her friends in Austin found out?

She felt like the bitch of Lambert for even thinking about it. What people thought didn’t matter…or at least that’s what her mother had always told her. But it did matter.

Lilly took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. She couldn’t leave Davis alone. She’d stay the night, and tomorrow she’d face down the mortification of meeting his family by calling one of them and having them take over Davis’s care. Life was better with a plan.

“They’re gone.” Davis knocked lightly from the other side of the door. “Please don’t go. If it helps, Pastor Mike gave me a fist bump and a wink on the way out.”

She shook her head and opened the door. “That’s not funny.”

“Holy cow.” Slowly, his eyes ran down her body. “I missed the garter belt before. I was too busy trying not to laugh.”

“I hate you.” But she ruined the affect by smiling. Damn it, he could always make her smile.

“No, you don’t, you love me. You just haven’t figured it out yet.” He was dead serious.

Lilly looked away. She felt something for him, but she had a sneaking suspicion that she wasn’t capable of romantic love.

“Let’s get you back to bed.” Gently, she snaked an arm around his waist.

His jaw tensed, and he looked like he wanted to say something else but didn’t. He put his weight on her, and they shuffled back to bed.

“You know, last Sunday on the church bulletin board, I saw a class called Pole Dancing for Jesus. Want me to sign you up?” His gaiety was forced.

She’d hurt him, but she couldn’t tell him that she loved him because…well, it would make it harder to leave when the time came. And she didn’t just mean leaving this house. She meant leaving him. He was too young for her, and it was getting harder and harder pretending that he wasn’t.

“No, thanks. At home, I don’t have a pole to practice on. If I’m going to do something, I like to do it well.” She eased him back on the bed.

“I can see that about you.” Pain contorted his face, and he took several shallow breaths.

“Perfectionist to the core.” It was her biggest fault and virtue. She’d never admitted it to anyone.

“Perfection is an illusion.”

“You sound like my mother.” Lilly pulled the patchwork quilt up to his waist. “I’m going to change into something less…” She looked down. “Well…more.”

He caught her hand and pulled her back.

“Can I take a rain check on that outfit?” He swallowed and avoided her eyes. “I need another favor. Not that saving my life isn’t enough, but I need…um, help…you know…with the animals.”

Lilly stared at him. “Is that a euphemism for sex?”

“This is a working farm, and I was on my way to feed everyone before you got here.” His eyes wandered down her chest. “That is some outfit.”

“Animals?”

“Horses, cows, chickens, a couple of donkeys, and Bobby—the peacock. He’s a recent addition, hit by a car, but he’s recovered. Unfortunately, his faith in humanity has been shaken.”

“Does anyone need to be milked?” While she’d seen the process on Discovery Channel she preferred to get her milk from a carton labeled homogenized non-fat.

“No, ma’am. I raise beef cattle; the only milk they provide is for their calves.”

“Thank God.” She walked to the tiny dent in the wall that passed for a closet and opened the door. A couple of her dresses hung on the left, but the rest were his suits and shirts. “Where are the farm clothes?”

“Farms clothes?”

“Overalls, bandanas, straw hats, ornately stitched shirts with pearl buttons?” Perhaps the hit to the head had made him forget basic farm attire. “Farm clothes.”

“My life isn’t an episode of
Green Acres
.”

“Of course not.” But she was Zsa Zsa Gabor trapped in rural hell. Lilly didn’t do nature…anymore. She’d had enough of the outdoors from her hippy, tree-hugging, mostly unemployed parents who’d dragged her along on so many camping trips that she could assemble a tent blindfolded. “It’s just that I don’t have any jeans with me.”

Or at all. Jeans weren’t ladylike, and she was a lady.

He sighed like she’d slammed the weight of the world on his shoulders. “In the dresser, right side, bottom drawer.”

Lilly was in manure-coated, giant-overall-wearing, way-too-large-boots-flopping hell. Hair and sweat ran in her eyes as she schlepped a pail of chicken feed out to the coop. Usually, her idea of schlepping involved carrying her own makeup bag from her room down to the front door so the car service could load it. When she’d been thinking short vacation with Davis, manual labor hadn’t been on the itinerary.

Flipping the latch on the chicken coop, she eased the door open. A rooster fluffed his wings and strutted around, keeping one beady eye on her as his head bobbed forward with each step.

“Don’t start. I’m in no mood.” Why did men feel the need to strut?

A hen darted in front of Lilly squawking and pecking in her direction.

And there was always one harpy ready to fight for love.

“Please. He isn’t worth it. While his wattle is a wonderful shade of red, it is, in fact a wattle. I check every day to make sure I don’t have one.”

She looked down at the feed. Davis had said to throw it out in handfuls. That involved sinking her newly manicured fingernails into the gritty pellets. Not happening. Stepping back, she upended the pail right in front of her.

All hell broke loose.

Chickens flapped down from the coops. Fowl closed in from all sides like the Sharks surrounding the Jets from
Westside Story
.

Lilly could see the headline now—
When Chickens Attack. Remains of muck-spattered woman found in local chicken coop. Film at eleven
.

Not today…not this woman.

Lilly sprang for the door. One boot stuck in the mud, throwing her off balance. Her mouth opened to scream, and she went down, face first, in a heap of overalls and blonde hair. Something foul…and fowl hit her tongue. Lilly scrambled up, wiping away chicken poop and feathers from her cheeks with the forearm of the flannel shirt she’d borrowed. Fantastic—a free mud facial. Chickens darted and cackled at her feet. It sounded a lot like laughter. One brave sole pecked at Lilly’s red-stockinged foot—the boot having come off in the melee.

“You will pay for that.” Lilly pointed a mud-coated finger at the chicken. “You’re chicken and dumplings waiting to happen.”

The chicken backed off.

Intimidating the local fowl… Wouldn’t her vegetarian parents be proud?

Lilly had never gotten the whole veggie-only thing. Meat tasted good. She smiled. Her first act of defiance had been a bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit from McDonald’s. Her parents had claimed it was a gateway drug to the carnivore world. Now she was threatening chickens. Defiantly, she stomped—one-booted—to the nearest nest, grabbed the lone egg, and stomped to the door. “It’s the least you can do.”

She glared at the closest hen picking at the feed.

She threw the lock, pulled open the door, and sauntered back to sanity.

Ten minutes later, she walked through the front door.

Davis stood in the front hall. “Jesus, what happened?”

He was by her side in two strides. “Are you okay?”

“Fine. What are you doing out of bed?” Lilly didn’t even try to make herself presentable. She was dirty, smelly, and the inside of her mouth tasted like poop. “The hens from hell tried to kill me.”

“I was coming to check on you. I was worried.”

“Why?” She shrugged and headed toward the stairs. “The animal kingdom is not unlike the Junior League—survival of the fittest.” She turned back to him. “Let me help you upstairs, and then I’ll be in the shower for the next day and a half.”

Lilly was about to put her arm around him but thought better of it. “I’ll walk behind you in case you stumble. I’d have you lean on me, but I’m filthy.”

He caught her face in his hands. “It is my honor to lean on you, no matter the state of your clothes.” His eyes roamed her face. “Beautiful. You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.” His eyes crinkled in the corners, and he looked at her the way men in the movies always looked at their leading lady. “I love you.”

Her throat clogged like the entrance to the mall on the day after Thanksgiving. For the first time in her life, she found herself wanting to say “I love you” back.

Monday morning, Clint slipped into class right before the tardy bell and crammed his tall frame into his same seat in the back.

Summer leaned against her desk. Today’s tee shirt read
Prius Envy
, and she nodded to him as she watched him read it.

She had game. He saw her nod, and he added a wink. Her luscious lips curved up at the corners, and he wanted to feed her pancakes dripping with grade-A maple syrup.

“Everyone, please pass your thank-you notes to Mr. Grayson. I’ve already sent mine.” Her blue eyes crinkled in the corners, and that silky, dark-chocolate laughter filled his ears.

The pencil sculpture was sitting on his kitchen table, but he’d hung the note on his refrigerator. He liked the unusual.

Lots of students mumbled and rolled their eyes, but folded pieces of notebook paper and a few envelopes landed on Clint’s desk. Before Summer’s, he hadn’t received a thank-you note in…well…ever. Judging by the pile growing on his desk, every student had written one. Manners. His mother had insisted upon them, but somewhere along the way, he’d forgotten his. Summer hadn’t, and she cared enough to teach them to her students.

Clint squirmed in his chair. The five-minute phone call to the Lone Stars’ PR department for team merchandise hardly warranted gratitude. This morning, he’d spent more time deciding what to put in his coffee. Next time, he’d pick out the donations himself.

Summer pulled her iPhone out of her back pocket. “Can I have a drum roll please?”

The students beat on their desktops.

“The word of the day is”—she double clicked her iPhone—“abase. The first person to correctly define it wins a homework pass and gets to choose the music. Your sixty seconds starts”—she touched her keypad—“now.”

Hands shot up in the air.

Summer pointed to a very pregnant African-American girl in the front row. “The part of a house that’s underground. You know like all those people up north have.”

Summer shook her head. “No, but nice try. That’s a basement.”

Mario, the football player, waved his hand, and she pointed to him. “They use them in baseball—”

“Nope, sorry. That’s
a base,
but good thinking.”

Summer called on a thin girl with long, wavy, dark hair and John Lennon glasses. “Is it like when you take a spoon and a lighter—”

“Good guess, Andromeda, but…no.” Summer looked down at the phone. “Thirty seconds left. I’ll give you a hint. It’s like its cousin word, debase.”

There was lots of sighing, moaning, and come-on-man-we-can’t-let-her-wins.

Without thinking, Clint tapped the blonde girl in front of him on the shoulder. “What’s the big deal?”

The small, pale girl turned in her seat. “If Ms. A wins,
she
gets to pick the music of the day.”

“That’s right.” Summer waved her iPhone. “And I’m feeling an attack of the seventies.” She pulled a John Travolta
Stayin’ Alive
move. “Count down to Disco Divas.”

Clint shook his head. “Cruel and unusual punishment. I can’t let that happen.” His hands weren’t shaking too much. Maybe the key to public speaking was saving others from a fate worse than death. In a louder voice, he said, “Abase. To embarrass someone.”