Page 3 of Summer with the Single Dad

Now, the only person he could look at was the beautiful woman with almond-shaped brown eyes, freckles, and a slender neck. His daughters weren’t wrong. She was very pretty. Gorgeous, in fact. He would guess she had at least one parent of Asian ancestry. Her hair was black with subtle highlights and hung in a long, sleek ponytail down her back.

“If you’ll follow me, I’ll get you all checked in to your cabin. Do you need a hand unloading?” He stood up, averting his eyes from her face at all costs. He’d never had such an intense, instant reaction to a woman like this before. Not even Carla.

It was throwing him for a loop, and he didn’t like it one bit.

“Uh, that’d be great. Thank you,” she said, following him out the door, but not before he stopped to grab the cabin key from the row of keys. It was the only one on the hook since the rest of the cabins were occupied.

However, him stopping so abruptly like that caused Justine to bump into his back.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she apologized, stepping back.

He glanced over his shoulder, flashing her a smile. “It’s okay. I shouldn’t have stopped so suddenly. Just this way.”

Her sleek black BMW SUV was parked on the gravel in front of his office—which was, in essence, just a little shack built onto the side near the brewery. Nothing fancy, nothing special. But it served its purpose as a place for him to conduct business with vendors, staff and guests.

She unlocked the SUV and popped the trunk.

“Oh, you can park in front of your cabin,” he said. “You don’t have to unload from here.”

Another rush of color entered her cheeks. “Oh … okay.” This forced her to wander behind the vehicle and manually close the hatch.

“It’s just down that lane there if you want to drive. I can meet you there.” He pointed in the direction of her cabin and waited for her to climb into her vehicle.

He welcomed the fresh air and the absence of this enchanting woman.

What the fuck was wrong with him?

Why was he having such a carnal, visceral reaction to her?

He reached cabin five in less than a minute, the gentle rumble of the BMW behind him. She parked in front of her cabin and turned off the engine.

He unlocked the door and opened it, then circled around to the hatch, which she’d already popped. She met him at the back and they both reached into the trunk at the same time.

Of course, they reached for totes adjacent to each other and the back of his hand brushed the back of hers.

Like he’d just touched an electric cattle fence, a shock raced through him.

She was the first to pull her hand away. “Sorry,” she murmured, adjusting her approach and grabbing the lidless tote in a different way so their hands were nowhere near each other.

“My fault,” he muttered, deciding to grab a big, plastic Coleman cooler instead. He followed her into the cabin, breaking his promise to himself to not check out her ass.

Dammit, she had a great ass.

A rocking ass. And it filled out those tight jeans like nobody’s fucking business.

He swallowed and made his way into the kitchenette, plunking the big cooler on the floor near the fridge.

“We have Wi-Fi,” he said, turning to face her. “Password is ‘ON THE FRIDGE’. But the ‘o’ in ‘on’ is a zero, and the ‘e’ in ‘fridge’ is a three. Then there’s an exclamation point at the end. You’ll see it in the guest binder on the coffee table.”

“On the fridge,” she breathed, a small grin curling her lips. “That’s clever. So when someone asks, what’s the Wi-Fi password? You can answer with: “It’s on the fridge’.”

They said that last bit in unison.

“My youngest brother came up with that gem.”

“I like it.”

He nodded, cleared his throat, and made his way into the kitchen. “The stove is gas. Nothing fancy, no tricks to it. Just don’t leave it on. Obviously. The shower, on the other hand, takes a solid minute to warm up. No matter what we do, it runs cold for a full sixty seconds before it starts to heat up. So don’t jump in then turn the water on because you’ll get a shock.”

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