Page 42 of Hot Summer

“It was too cloudy and cold for pool breakfast,” Cas said evasively.

“Well, the sun’s out now.” Femi grabbed her hand and dragged her up to sitting. “Come on.”

The air was cooler than Cas had expected, but the decking was already warm from the sunshine. She grabbed a fistful of pain au chocolats from the cupboard while Femi got to work on the coffee machine.

She jumped up onto the island counter and took a bite of her pastry. “How warm do you think it’s going to be today?”

“Probably pretty warm,” Femi said. He grabbed two mugs out of the cupboard and Cas opened the cutlery drawer beside her to hand him a spoon. “Not a cloud in the sky today.”

The bedroom door slid open, and Reece and Tia stepped out, Tia in Reece’s jumper, the sleeves rolled several times to free her hands.

“Morning, guys,” Reece said. He grabbed a banana and a satsuma out of the fruit bowl, and handed the satsuma to Tia with a kiss.

“Morning.” Femi opened the mug cupboard. “Coffee?”

“Yes, please,” Tia said. She slid onto the counter beside Cas and grabbed one of the pastries from the pile before starting to work on her orange.

Sienna wandered out as Femi finished making coffee and he handed her the last mug, pressing it into her hand with a soft smile. Sienna put her hand briefly on Femi’s biceps in thanks before moving to sit at the island, the legs of the stool scraping against the deck as she slid it out.

“We’ll be back,” Femi said. “Cas promised me pool breakfast this morning.”

“Oh, nice.” Sienna took a sip of her coffee and hummed her appreciation. “Anything you’re hoping to talk to him about when you’re floating around in the pool, Cas?”

One of the things she needed to talk about was playing out in front of her that very second.

“I’ve got a few talking points,” Cas said. She hopped down off the counter and swept her pastries into her arms. “Now, let’s get out there before they get the Voice of God to stop us.”

There was a small cupboard off the kitchen where, each night, they had to drag the pool floats so they didn’t blow away in the wind. There were some decorative ones—the giant flamingo, the ice cream shaped one—but Cas was partial to the enormous green and white striped one. It fit two people, was surprisingly comfortable, and had plenty of space to put snacks in the middle.

Femi carried their coffees and Cas dragged the float behind her with one hand, trying her best to ignore the snags in the wood on her way down. When they reached the edge of the pool, she flung it into the water and, after depositing her pastries and microphone on the pool deck, stripped out of her T-shirt and threw it onto one of the lounge chairs.

The pool water was ice cold, especially in the early morning air, and Cas shrieked as she went in. She bobbed up onto her toes to avoid getting her hair wet and, as quickly as she could, dragged the float over so she could hop on.

“You should have dragged it right to the deck,” Femi said. “Climbed on that way.”

“All right, Mr. Know It All,” Cas said. She slid to her side of the float and paddled her hands in the water so it could reach the edge. Femi set the coffees down, and once he was comfortably situated on the float, he grabbed their drinks, her microphone, and the handful of pastries before pushing off the pool wall so they floated away into the water.

“Now,” Femi said, unwrapping one of the pastries and stuffing the plastic into the pocket in his swim shorts. “What was so serious we needed to have pool float breakfast to talk about it?”

“You and Sienna,” Cas said simply. No sense beating around the bush.

Femi, though, was apparently going to try to play it cool. “I— What about her?”

“Anyone with eyes could see that you like her,” she said. She took a long sip of her iced coffee, humming appreciatively. Femi made the best iced coffee. “You get this big smile on your face whenever you look at her. And you were practically glowing when you came back from that date the other day.”

Femi inhaled a tiny gasp and ducked his head, suddenly shy. “It was hardly a proper date. It was just because we were ranked first—I didn’t even get to ask her.”

Cas laughed and unwrapped another pastry. “Would you have asked her if you were given the choice?”

“I mean...” Femi took an evasive sip of his coffee. “Probably, yeah. But how do you know she’d’ve said yes?”

Cas shot him a look. “You can’t be serious.”

“What do you mean?” Underneath the confusion on his face, there was an unmistakable hope.

Cas shrugged. She knew, without a doubt, that she was right, but it was hard to put it into words. To explain to Femi something so intangible, that was more about the way they moved together, the way they just were when the other was around. Like opposing magnets, always drawn together.

“You always have a good time together,” Cas said simply. She thought back to all the afternoons she found Sienna and Femi lying on the daybed, literally rolling around with laughter. “And I feel like you have really good banter, you know? And you obviously care about each other.”

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