This Summer At The Lake

by Daphne James Huff

  “Of course I’m okay, why wouldn’t I be?” Cassie frowned.

  Logan bit his lip. He was not proud of what he’d done. The danger she’d been in—because of him.

  “Logan,” Cassie had on her most serious of faces. “What happened last night?”

  “I saw Spencer put something in your cup when you were with that guy in motorcycle boots.” He turned away, his face on fire with shame and guilt.

  Cassie gasped. He still didn’t look at her.

  “I was still so mad, and so drunk, I thought you deserved it.” He swallowed hard. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Why are you sorry? He’s the one that did it.”

  She didn’t sound mad, amazingly. He peeked over at her. She didn’t look thrilled, mostly curious and concerned.

  “I would never want anything to happen to you,” he said. The relief of seeing her safe was fading, and the lingering pain of his injuries was making it hard to breathe evenly. “I can’t believe I thought for even a second that was something anyone deserved. It took about three seconds after I got in the car that I demanded Hideki take me back to the party to make sure you were okay. But you weren’t there.”

  Cassie shook her head.

  “I left almost right after Spencer came up to me.”

  “With who?” Logan cringed. He sounded jealous and he had no right to be.

  “Marissa. She spilled my drink all over me so I wanted to go. We were both already pretty wasted. My sister picked us up.”

  Logan sat back against the pillow and buried his hands in his face. She hadn’t even drunk from her cup.

  “I freaked out when I didn’t see you there. When I got there, Spencer was laughing his ass off with his friends. I thought they did something to you, that you were passed out somewhere and they’d…”

  Logan remembered the hot anger coursing through him, giving him the courage to run up to them, and shove Spencer against the wall. He’d landed a few good punches before Spencer had fallen to the ground. It had felt good, to finally have that kind of power over him, to see Spencer cowering beneath him.

  It lasted all of three seconds, however, before the other guys had pulled him off and started wailing on him.

  Logan had fought back the best he could. Every ounce of frustration had poured out of him and into his fists. But all the righteous anger in the world was no match for four guys at once.

  He didn’t actually remember even getting to the hospital, but he assumed his cousin must have gotten him here. He hoped it hadn’t been his aunt. She’d already put up with enough of his idiocy for the summer.

  “I take it you, ah, confronted Spencer?” Cassie said, biting her lip. She was perched on the edge of her chair, leaning in as much as possible without actually touching him. “And it did not go well?”

  Logan shook his head, a grin spreading across his face.

  “You could say that…”

  His shoulders began to shake with the laughter he was holding in. As much as his face and ribs hurt, it felt good to finally have her near. It felt right.

  “This isn’t funny! He could have really hurt you! And it would be all my fault. Again.” Cassie looked stricken, and Logan stopped laughing. “He should have hurt me. I deserved it.”

  Logan sucked in a breath, his ribs groaning in protest.

  “If anything had happened to you last night, none of it would have been your fault,” Logan said emphatically, staring right into her eyes. “It’s not okay for people to treat you like that. I’m so, so sorry I put you in danger like that.”

  Cassie bit her lip as she took in his words.

  “I get that but…I still feel like this is my fault,” said Cassie, looking at him with her eyebrows drawn together as he shifted in the bed and winced. “I goaded Spencer all night. He was ready to burst and you were there, all set for a fight.” She frowned. “Are you taking the medicine the doctor prescribed? Not trying to play it tough?”

  Logan rolled his eyes. Even that tiny movement hurt, but to have bossy Cassie back in his life made everything slightly less agonizing.

  Wait, was she back in his life?

  “Of course it’s not your fault,” he said, ignoring the medication question. He slid a hand over hers that rested on the edge of the bed. “Spencer was the asshole. I was an asshole for not saying anything. Worse than an asshole, I mean you could have—”

  She held up a hand to his mouth. He closed his eyes at the touch of her skin on his lips and breathed her in. That was also painful, but worth it.

  “Logan, I’m not mad,” Cassie said, and looked away. She worried her bottom lip with her teeth for a minute then took a deep breath. “You’re not perfect. Neither am I. And that’s…okay.”

  He raised an eyebrow. She gave a weak chuckle.

  “I know, it’s not what you’d expect me to say, right?” She shook her head. “But all that pretending to be perfect was just making things so hard. For my parents, for me. I don’t want to be that fake person anymore.”

  A tear fell from her eye and Logan reached up to brush it away. She leaned into his hand and sighed, her breath hot on his skin.

  “I know I hurt you, in all possible ways, and you may never be able to forgive me. And that’s okay, too. I just…wanted to be sure you were okay.”

  She stood up, and his hand fell away.

  “You’re leaving?” his voice cracked.

  She hesitated next to the door.

  “Do you want me to stay?”

  She was giving him the choice. She’d forgiven him but he still hadn’t said out loud if he forgave her.

  Had he forgiven her?

  “How did you get here?” he asked instead.

  She stood at the door and blushed.

  “Hideki came to see me this morning.”

  Logan’s eyebrows shot up, by far the least painful movement he’d made that morning.

  “Hideki’s been here for a while,” said Logan, not sure why his cousin hadn’t mentioned a pit stop at the Hart’s lake house before coming to see him with a large to-go cup of black tea. The nurses had immediately taken it away, grumbling about caffeine addictions. “He just left when you came in, actually. Were you waiting in the hall or something?”

  She bit her lip and shook her head.

  “My dad didn’t want me to leave,” she said, her voice shaking. “There’s this party this afternoon, really important. He… he said if I left to see you, then I should just forget about Columbia. If they couldn’t trust me to do one simple thing, they couldn’t trust me to live thousands of miles away on my own.”

  Logan’s heart sank at the pain etched across her face. How could someone be so horrible to their own kid?

  Logan almost laughed at himself. His dad hadn’t been any better.

  Cassie walked back into the room and sat down again, this time in a chair further away from the bed. Should he ask her to sit closer? He decided he needed to hear what she had to say first.

  “That makes him sound really bad,” she admitted, looking down at her hands. “But my parents are under a lot of stress. You heard my mom wanted to leave my dad, but Di just told me he got a lawyer to cut her off completely if she doesn’t stay and play the part awhile longer.”

  A flash of Mitch Huntington sitting at the bar on the phone came to Logan and a pinprick of hope flickered in his heart. His mom hadn’t talked about her lawsuit at all lately, and he assumed that meant the worst. But maybe he’d gotten it all wrong…

  He brought his focus back to Cassie, staring miserably at her clasped hands.

  “That doesn’t make him sound much better,” Logan said with a frown.

  Cassie shrugged.

  “Whatever is happening with my parents is their business. But we stick together in our family. It’s not unreasonable for them to ask certain things of me in exchange for living the kind of life we do.”

  Logan raised an eyebrow again. This didn’t sound like her. Not the Cassie he knew, at least.

  “But you�
�re here? You picked me over your family?”

  Luckily he wasn’t hooked up to a heart monitor, or she’d have been able to hear his pulse racing as he waited for her reply.

  “No,” she said, still looking down. His heart deflated in an instant like a burst balloon. “I picked me.”

  She looked up and her eyes were two fierce green flames.

  “I didn’t know if you’d be able to forgive me. I spent over an hour crying in my room with Marissa, trying to figure out what to do. She told me to come, but of course she wants me at Missoula with her.” Cassie gave a rueful smile. “But what if I came and you didn’t want me here? I’d have given up so much for someone who didn’t even want me.”

  But Logan did want her. He cursed his stupid broken ribs for not letting him jump out of bed to show her just how much he wanted her. Instead, he held his breath, waiting for more.

  “And then I realized I’m still basing all my decisions on someone else. So what do I want? Do I want to go to the party? Not if it means smiling and pretending everything with my parents is fine, when it’s a total drama-fest. Do I want to go to New York? Not alone.

  “But…I do want to see you. One last time. Even if you don’t—”

  “I want you here!” Logan couldn’t stand it anymore. He threw off the blankets and swung his legs off the bed, trying to get as close as possible as quickly as possible. “I don’t care that you lied. I mean I do but… but it doesn’t matter and—ah!”

  Logan tried to push off from the bed and a stabbing pain had shot through his abdomen. Cassie rushed over and pushed him back down, choking back something between a laugh and a sob.

  “I’m so sorry I lied,” she said, tears starting to fall. Her hands were still on his chest, and he put his hands up to brush away tears for the second time that day. “But I’m not sorry I met you.”

  “I’m not sorry you met me, either,” he said with a smile that made his black eye twinge. “I did everything for myself for so long, I didn’t think I needed anyone’s help. Least of all from someone like you.”

  “You mean from a rich jerk?” She gave a lingering half-smile that set his heart racing beneath her palms.

  “I mean someone so perfect,” he said, blinking back tears. She really was perfect, too. “How could you know anything about pain and disappointment and life being hard?”

  Her smile fell and she started to pull her hands away.

  “But you’re so much more than perfect,” he said, rushing to explain. “You came to check on me before your dad asked you to. I was the one that pushed you away, and you were just trying to help. All you’ve ever done is help me. I don’t want to push you away anymore.”

  He leaned up as much as he could, taking her face in his hands.

  “I love you,” he whispered, as he let his lips gently brush against hers. He heard her soft intake of breath, and held his own as he waited to see what she’d do.

  “I love you, too,” came her soft reply. She ran her hands up his chest and into his hair, pulling him closer. His ribs groaned in protest, and his shoulder screamed in agony as their lips crashed together again and again.

  Totally worth the pain.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Cassie walked into the backyard, her head held high. She’d spent way too long at the hospital, curled up against Logan in the narrow bed before the nurses had finally come to shoo her away. She made it back home to find the party in full swing and ran up to her room to get ready.

  Marissa had been waiting for her with a very helpful pep talk, but Cassie’s hands were still shaking as she looked around the backyard. The dress she’d picked out last week for the party now seemed too tight; she could barely breathe. Her heart was pounding, but she told herself even if this was it for her family, she’d still have Logan on her side. She found her parents standing by the French doors leading into the house, greeting people as they milled about.

  Her dad’s eyes flashed as Cassie stood in front of them.

  “I need to talk to you.” She spoke softly, but her tone was firm. “Both of you. And Di.”

  Cassie glanced around and spotted her sister talking to one of the young golfers, but she rushed over when she saw the look Cassie shot her.

  As they all followed her into the kitchen, she could feel the annoyance radiating off of them.

  “This really isn’t appropriate to leave our guests so early in the evening,” her mom started, as she turned to face Cassie. With a wave of her hand, the servers and other staff left the kitchen. It was just the Harts now, Cassie facing her sister and parents, her heart beating a thousand miles an hour.

  Could she really say this?

  She thought of Logan, and the beating he’d taken when he thought he hadn’t been able to keep her safe. This couldn’t possibly be worse than that, could it?

  “I’m sorry I wasn’t here earlier,” she said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “But I had something to take care of.”

  “You mean that Hanes scum?” her dad spat. “I thought I made it clear that you weren’t to see him again.”

  Cassie took a deep breath. She could do this.

  “I’m still a part of this family,” she said, looking them all in the eye. “I may not always agree with you, or do things the way you want me to but I still want to make you proud, in my own way.”

  Her dad scoffed and her stomach lurched. She took another breath and kept going.

  “But I can’t play these games anymore. I can’t keep lying, to myself, to others. I want to go to Columbia. I want to be with Logan. I’m sorry if you’re not happy about that. I still love you all. I…I hope you can still love me.”

  She waited one more breath, then, seeing their angry faces, looked down, her eyes filling with tears.

  “Of course we love you,” said her mom, and Cassie looked up, her heart soaring. Her mom’s eyes were soft for the first time Cassie could ever remember. The facade had slipped a little, and Cassie thought she looked even more beautiful than normal. “I think your father may have been a little hasty this morning in his ultimatum. Things have been tense for everyone lately.”

  That was probably as close to the truth as she’d ever get, but it was enough to reassure Cassie that her future might be one she could actually look forward to.

  “It’s just…” Cassie’s mom glanced at her dad, whose lips were pursed in furious disappointment. “Things between your father and I aren’t quite sorted out. And the lawsuit he’s dealing with isn’t going the way we’d hoped. So there might not be quite as much for you at Columbia as we’d hoped.”

  Diana was scowling. That meant less for law school and her California lifestyle as well.

  Cassie’s face, however, lit up in a wide grin.

  “You mean I might have to get a job?” Her mind raced with the possibilities. Maybe she could find a job with Logan! And even if she didn’t, she knew he’d be there to help her figure it out. He’d be thrilled to finally be able to share his knowledge of something with her.

  “We’ll figure out all the details later,” said her mom, as the facade slipped back into place once again. “Let’s not ruin the party with all this talk of our troubles, okay?”

  Cassie followed them out back into the yard, her stomach filled with excited butterflies. She wouldn’t have to pretend to be happy—she was positively brimming with joy.

  She was still going to New York. Logan would be there with her. And they’d help each other figure things out as they went.

  Marissa caught up with her and linked her arm through Cassie’s.

  “I take it everything went okay?”

  All she could do was nod, not able to put it all into words quite yet.

  “Great!” Marissa squeezed her hand as they made their way down to the beach. “Hey, I meant to ask you before, who was that guy this morning?” Cassie shot her best friend a questioning look. Marissa’s eyes were sparkling. “The one who came to tell you about Logan?”

  “Hideki?
” Cassie grinned. “Logan’s cousin? I think I heard he’s going to Missoula this year…”

  Epilogue

  The commuter rail chugged along, the fake leather seats peeling and smelling faintly of smoke. Cassie had spread out her jacket across the seat before sitting down, and now her legs were crossed tight as a corkscrew. She looked around through narrowed eyes, careful to keep her hands firmly on her legs.

  Logan couldn’t help teasing her just a little.

  “I don’t think the smell is contagious if you touch something.” He raised an eyebrow and smirked.

  She rolled her eyes but kept her body as far away from the seats as possible.

  “We could have rented a car,” she said for the tenth time that morning.

  “But it’s my first time on a train! Isn’t that the surprise?” He grinned. She’d been building up to this surprise for weeks, giving him hints. Six months in New York and this was the first time they’d been to New Jersey. “Or are we going to the Jersey Shore?”

  His heart leapt. She’d taken him out to Coney Island one of their first weekends at school, so he’d already seen the ocean. But he couldn’t get enough of it.

  Cassie giggled.

  “You’re adorable when you’re excited.” She leaned over to give him a quick kiss. He grabbed the back of her head and held her to him, deepening the kiss. He still couldn’t get used to being able to do that in public.

  “And you’re adorable when you’re attempting to be thrifty,” he said when he finally pulled away.

  She flushed.

  It turned out the conversation Logan had overheard in the bar that summer hadn’t been about his mom’s lawsuit, but about Cassie’s parents’ divorce. It was going to be long and messy, no matter what they’d told her right before she had left for school.

  Then, the day after school had started, Logan’s mom had called with the news. Hart & Preston had paid out an undisclosed amount to five different women who used to work for them, Logan’s mother included. He told Cassie the money had all gone to paying for school, but he hadn’t been able to resist getting her a few things for her. It was a nice change to be able to afford more than the basics, but he knew how fast it could all go away. Columbia would last four long years; he wanted to be sure they could enjoy all of them.