Page 92 of Hotter in the Hamptons

She caught a glimpse of him just as her body sliced down into the pool. She stayed under for a few moments longer than necessary, looking up at his blurry figure through the chlorine, her heart pounding.

She knew who it was, but it couldn’t be real. Perhaps her alcohol-soaked brain was making her see things—or maybe she’d fallen asleep in a lounge chair and was having a nightmare.

When she couldn’t hold her breath any longer, she burst to the surface.

“Lola?”

It was Justin.

Aly was sitting on the edge of the pool with her legs dangling in the water, her face registering shock. Lola looked at Aly, then back at Justin, then at Aly again.

Drowning would perhaps have been a more pleasant experience than having the two of them come face-to-face like this.

Justin had a suitcase and a backpack. He appeared rumpled, like he’d just gotten off a plane, but gorgeous too; his perfect skin shimmered with sweat in the golden-hour light. Something in Lola ached at the sight of him—and those big, strong arms.

Fuck.

For a moment, looking at each other, it was like nothing had changed—they’d never broken up, he’d never left her. All the love in the world was written on his face.

But then Aly cleared her throat, and Lola was brought back to earth.

She blinked the water out of her eyes. “What are you doing here?”

He took his sunglasses off. “Why don’t you have a bathing suit on?”

Anger quickly replaced the ache. “That’s what you want to say to me?”

Aly stood then and approached him stiffly. She stuck her hand out. “Aly,” she said, not smiling.

“Nice to meet you,” he said. “I’m Justin.”

Before she could stop herself, Lola blurted, “Aly’s my neighbor.”

Aly’s my neighbor?That was really how she wanted to explain the presence of Aly Ray Carter, the life-ruiner she’d been fucking all summer, to Justin, the boy who’d broken her heart?

But what else could she possibly say?

She wished the drunkenness would lift. This would be a hard situation to navigatewithoutthe fuzzy feeling coating her brain.

Aly shot a sidelong glance at Lola and tilted her head to the side, her brows lowered. She looked like she wanted to say something, but she didn’t.

Instead, she shook Justin’s hand—it looked like a firm squeeze too—and then, without another glance at Lola, turned on her heel and walked across the lawn to her house. She left her clothes on the ground. There was nothing notable about her gait as she walked away—not too slow, not too fast. If Lola didn’t know her, it would have read as casual. Aly seemed to be in complete control of herself, seemed to simply be giving two exes space to sort out their shit. But Lola knew better.

“Aly, wait,” Lola called. But Aly didn’t stop walking, and she didn’t look back. She opened the door to her family home and then closed it quietly behind her.

Lola’s heart twisted in her chest. This was bad. This wasreallybad. A door slam would have been better.

What must Aly think of Justin showing up like this? Of Lola not sayingthis is the woman I’m seeing? But how could she say that? How could she come out to Justin of all people?

There was perhaps an alternate universe where Lola ran after Aly and left Justin standing in the yard. Where she told Aly that she had nothing to worry about, that she would make Justin leave, that she even wanted to be her girlfriend and nothing could change that, not even her former great love showing up out of the blue.

But in this universe, Lola let Aly go.

She did not chase after her.

At least for now.

Instead, she told herself she’d triage the Aly situation later and deal with Justin first.

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