Page 26 of The Spite Date (Small Town Sisterhood #1)

THE FUTURE’S LOOKING CORN-DOGGY

Bea

It hurts how much I’m enjoying watching Simon leap on the food.

Mostly because I don’t want to enjoy this.

I don’t want him to be absolutely adorable in his awkwardness today. Not being able to stand on his feet, rubbing his head, smiling like a lost puppy being given a treat—hungover Simon is too endearing for words.

Add in that he’s wearing a T-shirt for a women’s soccer team and that hat for the local minor league baseball team again, and he’s honest-to-god attractive.

He has to know it matters what he wears.

That any pictures of him taken in public will be circulated widely.

That people will talk about the teams whose logos he’s sporting.

Daphne’s told me stories about how much implied endorsements matter when you’re famous and regularly in the gossip pages.

Like the time the lead singer for her favorite band went on a public rant about women—it was ugly, and that’s all I’m saying about it—and then, because she’d been photographed at one of their concerts and often wore their T-shirts, she had to make a statement condemning his words.

Protestors showed up at her parents’ house because they didn’t think it was enough.

They didn’t think anything she did to condemn what he said was enough, and she’d still been a teenager.

So what celebrities and gossip-magnets wear?

It’s important.

“Why are these magic?” Simon asks me as he shovels a handful of fries into his mouth.

I barely resist smiling broader at him. “Carbs and grease are the rock to alcohol’s scissors.”

“I don’t know what that means, and I don’t care.”

I lower myself to the ground and eye his kids.

They eye me right back.

“Do we have to wait for you to finish to go and play?” the smaller boy in jeans and a hoodie asks Simon.

“Yes.” He twists the top off his Coke, takes a swig that reminds me of him downing the champagne straight off the bottles last night, and then sighs as one of his normal smiles stretches to his cheeks. “You shouldn’t be unattended.”

I glance at the three security guards.

When I look back at Simon, he’s watching me.

He’s in dark sunglasses, but I can still tell he’s watching me. “Bea.”

“Yes?”

“How old were your brothers when you let them run loose?”

“Ryker and Griff already had a lot of freedom when I moved home to take care of them. With Hudson, probably eleven? The whole community here helped watch out for him. They knew our situation. It was both good and bad.”

He turns his head in his boys’ direction.

“We’re thirteen,” the taller one with the deeper voice who’s in a T-shirt and shorts says.

He looks more like his dad and is almost as tall as Simon too. He’s the one who took the call telling me the party was real, I’m certain.

“I know,” I tell him. “You smell thirteen.”

“We smell thirteen?” the smaller one says.

I nod. “It’s a very distinct smell. Like day-old pizza, dirty socks, and boundary-pushing.”

Simon beams at me. “That does describe the smell quite well.”

“Griff was thirteen when he became my responsibility. I’ve done thirteen-year-old boys twice. They all smell the same.”

“Nevertheless, would you like to join us as the boys attempt to win every stuffed animal and a multitude of pastries here at this carnival today?”

Is he for real?

The man who last night told me he doesn’t like me because I didn’t tell him I was trolling my ex with our date now wants me to walk all around the carnival with him?

I like that he seems to like me today, but I’m also wary.

Happens when you’re in one too many relationships where you realize you’ve been used.

What does Simon actually want?

“If you aren’t needed back at work,” he adds hastily.

Almost awkwardly, in fact.

I glance around.

As expected, several groups of people sitting on the grass around us are blatantly watching us.

No doubt listening in.

Daphne’s also mentioned a few times how being in the spotlight got old.

That if she’d been born into a normal family, no one would’ve cared if she’d attended protests and talked about her favorite causes while she was at parties.

Or wore a T-shirt supporting a band she didn’t know was problematic until after the fact.

She would’ve been one more face in the crowd known as the overall population on Earth.

But she wasn’t one more face in the crowd, and she knew she could use the attention to her advantage, no matter how she felt about the lack of privacy.

Ironically enough, embracing the spotlight to take advantage of her family’s name to bring attention to injustices toward the world’s animals is what eventually got her disinherited.

She was a blemish on her family’s reputation.

I don’t know how much Simon cares about his reputation, but I’m sure he cares about his sons’ privacy.

So I tread lightly with my answer. “Are you sure you want me to come with you?”

He smiles at me as he munches on the last of the fries. “Why not? You’re a marvelous conversationalist, you know all there is to know about this town, and I daresay you could teach me a thing or two about keeping thirteen-year-old boys on their best behavior.”

This isn’t adding up with the things he said about not liking me while he was tipsy last night.

But again, I don’t want to call him on it while we have an audience.

“At this stage in my life, I’d rather teach teenagers all the ways to annoy their parents since I don’t have to live with them anymore. ”

He tips his head back and laughs, which draws even more attention.

But then he clutches it with both hands and draws it back to center.

And I crack up.

I can’t help it.

“You are really hungover, aren’t you?”

“So very, very much so.”

“Mum said he got pissed last night,” the smaller of the twins tells me.

“Charlie. You know to tell Americans it’s drunk and not pissed . Bea will think I’m angry otherwise.”

The smaller boy—Charlie, it seems—grins.

The bigger of the twins—clearly Eddie, if I’ve identified Charlie correctly—is also grinning.

I’d keep smiling too—it’s way more fun being on this side of watching teenagers push boundaries—but I’m working through being confused and wary.

I arch a brow at Simon. “So you weren’t angry?” I murmur.

His attention snaps to me so quickly that I imagine he’s feeling it in his head. “I—did I…say I was?”

People are watching.

So I don’t answer.

He slides his sunglasses down his nose and makes real eye contact with me.

My skin tingles, and I resist the urge to rub my nipples, which have contracted so fast and hard that they ache.

All because Simon is staring into my soul with those blue eyes.

It should be illegal for a man to be this attractive.

And it’s not just the perpetual smile that I’m still suspicious of, or those perfect blue eyes, or the way he carried me out of the ladies’ room last night, or how he’s wearing a women’s soccer team’s T-shirt.

It’s all of it together.

I swallow hard. “You don’t remember last night, do you?”

His Adam’s apple bobs, and he shoots a glance toward his kids before sliding his sunglasses back up his nose. “Are you decent with any of these carnival games? I’m certain I’ll be rubbish at all of them, but I can hardly teach my boys that they must try if I don’t try myself.”

If he weren’t Simon Luckwood, and if I had any interest in dating someone, I’d be planning to set up a time to talk to him later about what happened last night.

But he is Simon Luckwood. Beloved world-famous actor with a big life that’s likely to only get bigger.

And I’m a small-town girl who’s gotten everything I want from the spotlight, and whose ex has gotten far more by abusing my short time in the spotlight, so we’re definitely not talking about this later.

There is no later .

This is—fuck.

What is this?

Tying up loose ends?

Sure. Let’s go with that. “I’m banned from doing musical chairs, but otherwise, I’m as good as anyone else.”

“Why are you banned from musical chairs?” Charlie asks.

“They think I cheat.”

“Why would you cheat at that dumb game?” Eddie wants to know.

“Because every prize is a full-size cake.”

Both boys’ eyes go round, exactly as you’d expect of teenage boys being told they could win a whole cake for themselves.

“And you can’t play? For real?” Charlie says.

I nod. “Six years ago, when Hudson was about your age, I won three out of every four times I got in line. Natural talent. I haven’t been allowed to participate ever since.”

“They still have it? We can still win cakes?” Eddie asks.

“Yep. And they save the best cakes for last. Mrs. Snyder makes this carrot cake that will turn your world upside down. And don’t get me started on Mrs. Johnston’s red velvet cake.

I don’t even like red velvet cake, but I’d do things I can’t actually say out loud in front of minors to get her red velvet cake. ”

“You should play for us,” Charlie says.

Eddie’s head bobs up and down. “We’ll tell them you don’t cheat.”

“They’ll believe us. We get away with everything now that Dad’s famous.”

“It’s true. Last year, we got caught trying to smoke grass under the bleachers at school, but as soon as Mom told them she was sending Dad to get us, they said it wasn’t a problem after all. They didn’t want to bother him. But our principal did want his autograph.”

Deep breath, Bea. Deep breath.

They are not my kids.

I don’t have to—nope, I can’t hold it in. “ You were smoking grass ?”

Simon chuckles. “Plucking it right out of the ground thinking it was the real weed,” he says cheerfully.

“Next time, we’re not using notebook paper and dandelions,” Eddie says.

“ Next time being when you’ve reached the age of maturity,” Simon says.

“And when your prefrontal cortexes have fully developed,” I add.

“Exactly what Ms. Best said.” Simon smiles at his boys. “Otherwise, I will have to tell your grandparents that you two are hooligans.”

Both of them freeze.

I decide to actively not wonder about their relationship with Simon’s parents, because I don’t want to know.

He dusts his hands on his jeans. “Shall we go and enjoy?”

“Simon.”