Wildfire (Maple Hills, #2)(73)
I feel like I’m sweating beneath the pressure of being around Jenna, but Aurora looks perfectly cool as she changes the topic. “Do you want anything from the ice cream shop in Meadow Springs?”
“I thought you were hiking?” Jenna says and I’m definitely sweating.
“Jen, how do you feel about having a huge food fight tonight instead of a pajama party?”
Xander says, quickly changing the topic.
“I do not feel good about it,” she says, instantly turning her attention to my roommate.
I take the attention being elsewhere as an opportunity to inhale the rest of my breakfast, while Aurora has already made a quick exit saying she needed to do something.
“I’m mad at you,” she says as we approach my truck.
“I know, sweetheart.”
I open the passenger door for her, holding her hand to help her climb in. The summer dress she’s wearing rises, the lace of her underwear just visible as she bends over to climb in and when she looks back at me, I realize this is supposed to be a punishment. “Really mad at you.”
“I accept and encourage you to continue reminding me how mad you are,” I say, closing the door.
Meadow Springs is a tiny little town not far from Honey Acres that’s popular with the staff.
I’ve been saying I’m going to visit since I got here, but there’s only so many hours in the day and I prefer spending it wandering around after Aurora.
Many of the other counselors like its one bar and come here for drinks when they’re not working, but bar hopping—would it be a bar hop since there’s only one place to drink?—is not on our agenda.
Despite her repeated declaration that she’s mad at me about my birthday, the second I open the truck door to help Aurora down she wraps her arms around my neck and kisses me. The amount of self-control and concentration I have to exercise on a daily basis to not touch her in front of other people is ridiculous. She sinks into me, her body smooth and soft and warm.
“Are you excited?” she asks, squeezing my hands as she climbs out of the truck.
She flattens her dress and straightens the straps and she looks so fucking good I’m considering if we should go back to Honey Acres at all. “That depends, are we going to the famous tea cozy museum? The only one of its kind and Meadow Springs Gazette-awarded tourist attraction of the year 1973?”
She throws her head back as she laughs and I just soak it all in. “I’m not sure you’ll be able to handle the excitement.”
Threading Rory’s fingers through mine, the realization hits me that we don’t have to pretend here, I can hold her hand and kiss her and don’t have to worry. She realizes it at the same time as I do, squeezing my hand tightly and looking at me with a soft expression on her face.
We’re not even out of the parking lot before I’m pulling her to me. My hand cups her face, tilting it up to mine so I can kiss her again. “You look so beautiful today.”
She huffs playfully, her hands finding the front of my t-shirt, keeping my body close to hers. “You say that every day.”
“Because I mean it every day.”
She lets me go, rejoining our hands and pulling me in the direction of the stores. “You just like me in this dress.”
The fire station comes into view and it’s the size of my house. “I like you in everything,” I say honestly. “And also in nothing at all.”
She gasps dramatically, stopping in her tracks just before we round the corner. “You can’t say that here, Russ! You’ll outrage the townspeople.”
She tuts and I realize she’s joking. “There aren’t any here right now to hear me.”
“People will just know. There’s a nosey old lady somewhere with her spidey-senses tingling because she knows you want to rip this sundress off and do disgusting and deviant things to me.”
“That’s exactly what I want to do to you.”
“And you will, later. But for now,” we turn the corner, “welcome to Meadow Springs shopping district.”
On first appearances, it appears that the shopping district is just two rows of family-owned stores running parallel from a fire station to a police station. I know they’re family owned, because the words appear at least three times on every store. “Wow, it’s exactly like being on Rodeo Drive,” I say looking at the three different bowling ball stores. “How do they have three different places to buy bowling balls, but not a drug store? And how can that possibly be economically viable?”
“Ooh,” she squeaks. “Big drama. So it was one family business—”
“Surprising.”
“—and when the dad died, the three sons couldn’t agree on how to run it, so they split into three stores and they all directly compete with each other. It’s a great source of stress for the people who just want to respect the sanctity of bowling and not get involved in family feuds.”
“Sanctity of bowling?” I’m amazed and confused—and unusually invested. “How do you know all this?”
She stops outside a bookstore and I realize we’ve walked the full length of the street in a couple of minutes. “Jenna keeps me updated. She goes to the Meadow Springs Committee of Commitments to Town Improvements and Other Important Announcements. We call it MSCCTIOIA for short.”