The Summer Boyfriend
Christina Benjamin
Crown Atlantic Publishing
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.
Copyright © 2018 by Christina Benjamin
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Crown Atlantic Publishing
Version 1.1
June 2018
To Lucy & Ruby.
May your summer be endless just like your love.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Epilogue
Also by Christina Benjamin
The Practice Boyfriend Info
The Almost Boyfriend Info
The Goodbye Boyfriend Info
The Holiday Boyfriend
The Stand-In Boyfriend Info
The Maybe Boyfriend Info
The Accidental Boyfriend Info
The Summer Boyfriend Info
About the Author
Acknowledgments
Prologue
There are only two rules this summer. Don’t ask questions and don’t get attached. Too bad everyone knows rules are meant to be broken.
1
Joy
“Your turn, Jo,” Kendall drawled from her spot in the cozy corner booth of their favorite beach bar. “Kiss, Marry, Kill.”
“No way. I’m not playing,” Jo replied, taking a swig of her illegal beer.
It was nearly sunset and still a balmy eighty degrees in the dimly lit bar. And playing childish games only raised the temperature—and Jo’s agitation. She didn’t have time for stupid games. She may have just turned nineteen, but her carefree days were long gone.
“But it’s your birthday,” Kendall whined. “You have to play.”
Jo crossed her arms. “Exactly, it’s my birthday, Kendall, and I don’t wanna play.”
“Oh, come on. You’re never any fun.”
Jo furrowed her brow, trying to recall how the hell Kendall had become her best friend. They’d known each other since kindergarten but was that really all it took to claim the position? They were total opposites. Kendall was confident and outgoing, with zero fear of repercussions, while Jo was constantly looking over her shoulder, trying not to live up to her less than flattering reputation. The only thing Jo and Kendall really had in common was their love of surfing and sometimes Jo’s brother Lucas.
Kendall and Lucas were in love with each other, but both were too stubborn to admit it. Mostly, they spent their time one-upping each other for attention and driving Jo crazy. Lucas was at the bar tonight, which meant things were only going to go from bad to worse for Jo. If it weren’t her birthday, Jo would already have left. But she was currently sitting at a table full of drinks and rowdy female lifeguards she’d just been appointed head of. She had to at least stay until the sun went down or she’d never earn their respect.
“Come on, Jo,” Eden shouted. “Just play along, it’ll be fun.”
Jo scowled at Eden and the rest of the girls at the table. The whole lot of them were traitors. “Not gonna happen,” Jo replied before draining the rest of her beer.
“Fine! I’ll go,” Kendall replied, a mischievous gleam sparking her honey brown eyes. “I’d kiss Ethan, marry Ryan and kill Lucas.”
Jo spit out the swig of beer she’d just taken while the girls at the table let out a collective whoop and clinked their beer bottles before knocking them back. She shook her head and scowled. So much for keeping a low profile. Every guy in the bar was looking at their unruly table—but that had probably been Kendall’s goal. She never missed an opportunity to show Lucas what he was missing.
“Seriously?” Jo barked, wiping beer spray off her arms. “Bring up my brothers again and I’m leaving.”
“Damn, you’re salty tonight!” Kendall cracked, laughing her raspy laugh.
“Because I didn’t want to come out to begin with.”
“You never want to come out,” Kendall shot back.
“Because I have other obligations.”
“Yeah, yeah. We all know about the amazing man in your life that takes up all of your time, but you deserve to cut loose once in a while, girl. You’re not an old maid yet. You just turned nineteen. It’s time to celebrate!”
Jo rolled her eyes and took another drink of her beer. She may not be an old maid, but she certainly felt that way sometimes. She was nineteen, still living at home and barely passing her online college courses. Definitely not the life she’d envisioned for herself.
She swallowed her frustrations with another swig of beer. “It’s my last night off before ACE starts. I think I’m gonna head home and call Kai.”
“No way,” Kendall replied. “That boy does not get you tonight. You may have landed lead tower at ACE this summer, but you’ve gotta earn our loyalty.”
The rest of the lifeguards cheered along with Kendall, calling for another round of drinks.
Jo sighed. She knew the drill. It was one of the last days the eight female lifeguards at her table would have off for the next six weeks of summer. They were just blowing off steam. But still, why did they always have to get so raunchy? And why the hell did they always have to involve her brothers?
That was one of the many problems with having three good-looking older brothers. Cousins really, but that was just a technicality. It didn’t make a difference how Jo was related to Ryan, Ethan and Lucas Wright. No matter what she said there was no stopping her friends from making them the object of lust or loathing.
Eden, a fellow lifeguard who was a few years older than Jo bumped her shoulder conspiratorially. “Come on, Jo. Just play along. Besides, you know Kendall won’t quit until she’s gotten Lucas’s attention.”
“I know but she’s on another level tonigh
t. And she’s talking about my brothers, one of whom you’re dating. Doesn’t it bother you?”
Eden shrugged. “Nah. Kendall’s just blowin’ off steam. I think she might be a little pissed you beat her out for lead tower.”
Jo rolled her eyes. “I earned that spot.”
“You may have, but since your uncle’s the one with the final say you know people are gonna talk.”
Jo pinched the bridge of her nose. She did know. That was the other problem with being part of the Wright family. Lanai was small and the Wright family was large. That somehow made them the subject of gossip on the island.
It didn’t help that from the moment Jo had come into this world, she’d been a subject of gossip. And it really didn’t help that just a few years ago another gossip bomb concerning her had erupted. Jo hated that everyone on the island thought they had the right to weigh in on her personal life. It made her grateful she had such a big supportive family to get her through all of the shit she’d been dealing with over the past few years. And that’s why she was so protective of them.
A fresh round of drinks arrived at the table and Kendall knocked hers back.“Lighten up, Jo. We’re just having some fun,” Kendall said. “Your brothers are all about fun.”
“You would know,” Jo shot back.
“What the hell do you mean by that?”
“I mean, when are you and Lucas gonna quit having fun and just admit you’re crazy about each other?”
A collective ‘Ooooo’ went around the table of girls.
“About the same time you get that stick outta your ass,” Kendall fired back.
“Fine,” Jo said. Her brothers taught her not to back down from a pissing match. “I’ll play, but not when my family is the subject of your fun. End of story.”
“We wouldn’t have to talk about them if they weren’t so damn fine,” Eden added with a giggle.
Jo cut her eyes at her friend. “Seriously? Whose side are you on?” she asked, while mentally reminding herself to give Eden the worst shift assignments next week.
Eden had been dating Jo’s middle brother, Ethan, for a few years now. She should know better than to egg Kendall on. But it seemed the only thing obvious to Eden at the moment was the effect all the alcohol was having on her. She giggled and held her hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay, we’ll leave the sexy ass Wright boys outta this, right Kendall?”
“Fine,” Kendall replied. “But I’m not letting you off the hook that easy, Jo.” She uncapped her flask and took a long swig. “I’ve got a dare for ya.”
Shit. Kendall Walker, dares and liquor, not good!
Jo knew her best friend pretty well and when Kendall started breaking out the hard stuff it always led to dares. Jo also knew it was always better to just go with the very first one Kendall came up with. Jo knew from experience—aka: the cucumber hot tub incident of ninth grade—that Kendall’s dares escalated quickly. The girl always took things too far.
“Ya know, you’re gonna get caught sneaking that stuff in here one of these times,” Jo warned, nodding to the flask Kendall shoved back into her purse.
“Thanks, Mom.” Kendall rolled her eyes. “Who’s gonna catch me? Uncle Theo? Aunt Lena?”
Eden snorted. “The whole coconut gossip line’s got your number, Kendall.”
Kendall and Eden laughed and bumped fists, while Jo grumbled. That was the trouble with living on the smallest island in Hawaii—in Lanai, everyone knew everyone. And after a while, everyone stopped caring about trying to hide their business—good, bad or otherwise. And Kendall was no exception.
When it came to drama, the girl was like all the Kardashians rolled into one. Maybe that’s why she was Jo’s best friend. She was the only girl on the island who knew what it was like to be the subject of island gossip twenty-four-seven. And she was damn good at telling people where to shove it when they put their noses where they didn’t belong. She’d even done it for Jo a time or two.
Okay, yeah. That’s why they were best friends. But it still didn’t mean Jo was down for another crazy dare night with Kendall.
Currently, Jo and her friends were sitting in Locos, the local beach bar that Kendall’s family owned. She and Jo weren’t of legal drinking age yet. But no one gave them any flack.
Lanai was sort of like its own country in that regard. If you were local and you handled your shit, you could pretty much conduct your life as you saw fit. And this week, that meant blowing off steam with cold beers and hot dancing before the ACE athletes rolled in and took over the quiet island of Lanai for the next six weeks of summer.
It was only Saturday. Jo still had one more day before her life was nothing but beach drills and swim meets. But she had to work a double at Locos tomorrow—something she was dreading. She would way rather spend the last day before ACE relaxing with her main man, Kai, on Maui, but every dollar she earned made their life better. Jo worked as much for Kai as she did for herself. That’s why getting the ACE gig was so important.
Jo would make more money lifeguarding at ACE in six weeks than she did the whole year with her lifeguarding and waitressing jobs combined. Of course since her uncle Jack hand selected the ACE lifeguards, people called foul when he appointed Jo as lead tower. She was the youngest lifeguard ever to capture the coveted position. Lead tower meant a bigger paycheck, but she was learning quickly it meant a bigger headache too.
But Jo was a damn good lifeguard. She’d been doing it every summer since she was fifteen. The fact that lifeguarding was still something she loved after everything she’d been through was a testament to how dedicated she was to the job.
Someone dropped a beer bottle at a table nearby and Jo cringed. Lifeguarding certainly beat waiting tables at Locos. She was not looking forward to a full day slinging food and slushy drinks for tourists tomorrow. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She had no intention of making it a long night. If she could just get Kendall’s stupid dare over with she could make it home and get a goodnight phone call in before Kai called it a night. She pictured him; his dark lashes, his blue-green eyes, his thick brown hair. He was why she was doing this.
Jo squared her shoulders and glared at Kendall. “What’s the dare?”
“No more stalling,” Kendall said, pinning Jo with a devious look. “You down or not?”
Shit, this wasn’t gonna be good. But backing down in front of the lifeguards Jo would be in charge of all summer was not an option. Not if she wanted them to take her seriously as lead tower. Jo lifted her chin. “You know I’m down.”
Kendall grinned, holding her pinky out. “Kiss the next guy that walks into the bar. On the lips.”
What a bitch. She couldn’t believe Kendall was going there. It was totally payback for bringing up Lucas. “I’m not exactly single, Kendall.”
Kendall just smirked. “You said you were down.”
Jo narrowed her eyes and linked pinkies with Kendall.
“A dare’s a dare,” Kendall replied.
The words sent a shockwave of déjà vu through Jo. The last time she’d said them she lost the most important person in her life. She shook the thought away. That wouldn’t happen tonight. Kai wasn’t even on Lanai. He was safe. And it wasn’t like she could lose Max twice.
Jo grabbed herself a fresh beer and shook away the foreboding feeling the words had conjured. They’re just words, Jo.
Hayden
Hayden stood outside the door to Locos staring at the worn coconut handles. The doors were useless, really. They didn’t even line up and were constructed from worn shutters with chipping yellow paint. They swung in either direction like the bar was some sort of tropical saloon. Why bother with doors at all? They wouldn’t keep anyone out. At 6’3”, Hayden could easily see over the top of them into the lively scene inside.
Sweat started to form on his brow and it had nothing to do with the humid Hawaiian weather. It was because the minute Hayden walked into the bar it would be game on. ACE officially started Monday, but he knew how these thing
s worked. The competition started the minute his plane touched down in Hawaii. Actually, it usually started the minute anyone recognized him and Googled his name. It was hard to blend in once people knew who he was.
Hayden took one more minute to check his true self—to lock it away where the whispers and insults couldn’t touch him. The minute he walked into that bar, he’d no longer be himself. He’d be Hayden Anderson: Olympic hopeful, cocky competitor, billionaire’s son . . . and all the other not so pleasant things that went along with his last name.
He hated it, but there wasn’t much he could do. Twenty years of resisting the fact that he was Archibald Anderson’s son taught him that much. Hayden was done fighting it. It was time to embrace the guy everyone thought he was. If it’s the asshole they want, then that’s who they’re gonna get.
Hayden pulled air into his lungs and exhaled deeply. He should be used to this by now, but he wasn’t. He hated it, actually. He’d never even wanted to take up swimming. He never should’ve been able to.
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