Page 38 of No More Secrets
She turned her head to the side. “Not as tough as Jax? Can’t handle a little juice?” she asked.
“You manipulative little —” he grinned.
“Be careful how you finish that sentence, Carter.” Her eyes had gone deeper than the Atlantic. “I was just making an observation. Obviously, given the current evidence, I can’t help but assume that your brother is more of a man than you are.” She shrugged delicately.
“My brother is puking in the sink.”
“No, I’m not,” Jax yelled from the kitchen.
“Sounds like he survived it. Are you afraid you won’t?” She was cocky now, and it was a fucking turn on.
Carter held up the glass. “What do I get, sweet Summer, if I drink your poison?”
“What do you want?” Her smile was slow and dangerous.
That smart mouth on his. That lithe body wrapped around him. Those sea goddess eyes opening in his bed in the morning. That’s what he wanted.
He leaned in an inch closer and those plush lips parted for him.
“You can owe me one,” he said, stopping a breath before her mouth.
He raised the glass, dipped a finger in it and painted it over her open lips. Her tongue darted out to taste his finger and he downed the contents of the glass. The touch of her tongue to his skin overrode the sensation of liquid garbage sliding down his throat.
“You owe me.”
“Try and collect,” she said saucily.
“Manipulative,” he said, pinching her as she walked past him.
“Calculated,” she tossed over her shoulder and sauntered back to the kitchen.
Jax was out of the sink and swigging soy sauce straight from the bottle. “I can’t get rid of the taste,” he groaned.
“Gimme that,” Carter said, snatching the bottle from him, and poured some into his own mouth.
––––––––
Carter retreated to the great room after dinner. It had been a productive day. Orders delivered, grass mowed, crops mulched with the clippings. Jax was showing off his car to Beckett, and peace once again reigned in the house.
He picked up a book and turned on some music, classical piano so as not to disturb Summer who was still working in the kitchen. She had changed, yet again, this time into cotton pants and a little tank under a soft sweater. Her hair was carelessly piled on top of her head. He liked her this way best.
Comfortable, unguarded.
He liked watching her work, enjoyed the way she alternated between squinting at her screen and smiling at it.
Lord knew what was going through her mind. Unfortunately, it washerthat kept running throughhismind.
She worked all day by his side, and then every night she sat at the kitchen island until yawns of exhaustion forced her upstairs to bed. He doubted she got enough sleep. By evening she was pale with shadows under her eyes, but still she soldiered on.
He’d looked up her blog the night before and was pleasantly surprised.
She wrote with a simple directness that made him feel like she was having a friendly conversation. There were behind-the-scenes posts from photo shoots or magazine events, but most of her posts trended toward health and lifestyle topics.
She shared interesting research and short snippets of the biographies of interesting people she met. He couldn’t quite connect the woman who diligently slaved for the higher-ups and advertisers of a magazine featuring skinny, pouting models to the one who wrote so passionately about the New York make-up artist to the stars who was supporting her parents and siblings in her home country of Namibia.
Others seemed to appreciate Summer’s blog, too. Each post had dozens of comments and hundreds of “shares.” Whatever those were.
He skimmed her last post on the farm on his tablet, frowning at a picture of himself before scrolling lower. There were more comments here. Ones that nearly made him blush.
