Page 75 of Until Next Summer

“Jess.”

My skin prickles. I whirl in the direction of Luke’s voice and see him relaxing in a hammock strung between two trees. His legs are stretched out and crossed at the ankles, his body all lean muscles and long limbs. There’s a notebook on his lap, a pen in his hand.

“You’re here!” I say, surprised at how happy I am. “I didn’t even have to beg you to come.”

“Indeed. Not quite socializing, but not hermit-ing, either.”

He brings one hand up to rest behind his head, which tugs the edge of his Henley up, exposing a sliver of flat stomach. I flash back to the memory of him in his swimsuit, dripping wet, and shake myself.

“Are you writing?” I ask, motioning toward the notebook.

He nods. “Working on an outline.”

“For…?”

“My next book.”

I smile. “You’re not giving anything away, are you?”

“And you’re not skipping the campfire, are you?”

I glance back over my shoulder. “I was late getting here, and there’s hardly any space left. I didn’t want to force my way in.”

He stares at me, that groove between his eyebrows deepening. The distant firelight casts shadows on his face, his lips, his cheekbones. “There’s room here.”

He indicates the space beside him, and I freeze, imagining lying next to Luke in the hammock, pressed against his side, his arm around me, my head on his chest. My body flushes with warmth.

No way in hell. I already have crush-adjacent memories of him from my teenage years, compounded by his revelation about his sex dreams, in addition to the fact that I’m becoming fond of him.

Plus: he’s absurdly handsome. There’s also that.

He must notice my hesitation, because he sits up, swinging his legs so they’re dangling off the side. “Come on,” he says, and scoots over.

I sit next to him. The hammock swings and sags, squishing us both to the middle, and I catch a whiff of theclean laundry scent of his clothes. Carefully, I shift away, leaving two or three inches of space between us.

Now I can breathe again.

“Where’s Scout?” I ask.

“Back at my cabin. Sleeping.” His voice catches, but he clears his throat and goes on before I can ask if anything’s wrong. “Thank you for watching her.”

“It wasn’t easy. She’s pretty high maintenance,” I say, smiling. Scout is so mellow it’s easy to forget she’s there: she slept twenty hours a day and followed me around the other four. I missed her last night, her quiet breathing from the foot of my bed.

“I appreciate it. And I’m guessing you and Hillary made up? You used your big-girl words and had an actual conversation?” His voice is gently teasing.

I roll my eyes, smiling. “Yes, we talked. And yes, we made up.”

“I’m proud of you,” he says, and I glow inside. Which is silly; I’m acting like a starstruck CIT again, hero-worshiping the coolest counselor of the summer.

“It’s a great idea, creating a co-op,” he continues. “I’d be interested in supporting something like that.”

I glance at him. “You would? How?”

“You mean how can I afford to, since I’m dirt poor?” he says dryly.

My cheeks warm. “You said you lost all the money from your advance…”

“I didn’t gamble it away or anything, if that’s what you were thinking.”

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