Page 22 of Summer's Edge

We reach the porch just as the first fat raindrops of the storm start falling. They’re making the smoldering embers on the grill hiss and white smoke rise.

“Good thing I took all the food inside,” he says looking around. “We should go in too. It’s gonna get worse.”

He’s still holding my hand and I let him lead me inside.

And then we just stand there in the doorway of the dusty, rundown old cabin. And just as he’s supposed to pull me into an embrace and give me another of those kisses that I’ve been thinking about all day today, he lets go of my hand and walks around the cabin, closing all the windows. I know how much he wants to kiss me. I can feel it in every look he gives me, especially the ones he doesn’t know I see. So why isn’t he? Frustrating doesn’t even begin to describe it.

It was dim before but now it’s almost pitch dark. There’s barely any light coming from outside, so I switch on the one inside. It casts a deep yellow light over the interior.

“What do we do now?” I ask and get a very shocked look from him. Shocked and full of lust that is. He knows exactly what we should be doing to pass the time.

“Tell ghost stories perhaps?” I add, grinning.

Because that other thing is still impossible, as far as he’s concerned. I can read that in his eyes too.

“I probably know enough to last the night,” he says and sits down in one of the rickety dining chairs. The one farthest from the bed.

“All right, so let’s hear one,” I say as I join him at the table. “But I warn you, I don’t scare easily.”

A part of me wants to just sit in his lap and get that kiss and all the rest that I’m craving. That we’re both craving. But then I’d probably just land on my ass on the hard floor and who needs that?

My mom, Barbie, told me how she had spent her youth always picking the wrong guy before she finally met my dad. I think I inherited that gene from her. But at least Edge is fun to hang out with, makes me feel safe and cooks. It could be worse, like it was for my mom.

But it could also be better. A lot better.

TEN

Edge

I lied. I don’t know a lot of ghost stories. Except the ones that feature the ghosts of my family. So that’s what I’ve been talking about for the past three hours, while the storm raged outside. I hardly ever talk about my family.

My parents died in a shootout with a bunch of lowlife Mexican gangsters who also killed Ruin’s family that night. But my grandparents and my little brother died in a house fire later that night when those same Mexican scumbags burned our house to the ground aiming to also kill anyone who might know their faces. Namely Ruin and me.

But we weren’t there.

We’d already taken my father’s Harley and ridden off, fearing that those Mexicans would come after us. Our plan was to lie low for a while, then come back and make sure they paid for what they did.

We eventually did make them pay, but not until years later with the Devils at our backs.

But those aren’t the stories I told Summer.

I told her about teaching my little brother to ride his bike and play catch in our back yard. I told her about cooking with my grandpa, about fishing with my dad, about my mom’s singing and my grandma's love of animals. At one point she had two dogs, four cats, a ferret and a bearded dragon living with us.

“But yeah, my mom had the most beautiful voice, and she’d sing all the time. While cooking and cleaning, in the shower, you name it,” I say. “I completely forgot about that. Her voice was good enough to go pro.”

I run my hand through my hair to look at Summer secretly, wondering if she’s bored to tears yet. She’s looking at me very intently though, her eyes glowing in the overhead light are kinda wet. I haven’t heard her munching on her tortilla chips for a while. Man, I hope she doesn’t start crying. By why would she? I’m not talking about sad things.

She slides her hand across the table and takes hold of mine.

“I’m so sorry about everything you lost,” she says.

“Nothing for it now,” I say in a choked off voice.

This is why I don’t talk about my family, and I don’t think about them. It never ends well. I have no idea why I just did.

“So, what MC did your dad belong to?” she asks. “Why didn’t they ride to avenge them?”

I chuckle and shake my head. “His club was just a group of guys and ladies who liked to ride. White Eagles MC… they did charity drives, made sure kids got to school safely and stayed off drugs, that kinda thing. They also held get togethers… these huge barbecues and whatnot for the whole town almost every month.”

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