Summer Heat (Cruel Summer #1)(27)

Why did she have to make everything so difficult?

It was like trying to mix oil and water, peanut butter and pepper. Nothing mixed, nothing worked. She was like this beat-down dog that refused to believe anyone had anything good to offer her.

And that’s when it hit me.

Maybe.

She truly believed there wasn’t.

Maybe the flaw wasn’t me.

Maybe it was just humans in general.

It haunted me the rest of the day, that thought, that pathetically sad thought, that in a world full of hatred — she never saw the light and truly believed that goodness was dead.

And that I wasn’t one of the ones who could change her opinion, since my only goal had been to sleep with her and walk away.

Well fucking done Marlo.





I SLAMMED MY hands down on the table. Sweat from my forehead dripped down my cheeks, off my chin — I was a complete mess. The studio was a nice ninety degrees. I had every freakin’ window open so I could get a breeze to blow through.

And I was pissed.

Still berating myself for how I’d acted with Marlo.

I knew he was trying to be nice.

But then he’d called me a bitch.

And I’d just reacted, reacted out of a need to keep my job, I thought he had been threatening me again and then it was too late.

Always too late with him.

I hung my head as the music poured over the system.

The dance moves weren’t necessarily hard, I just needed a partner, and I had too much pride to ask the one person who could probably do most of the numbers in his sleep.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Jackson’s deep voice reverberated through the room.

I groaned and wiped my face off with a towel. “I have no energy for your bullshit.”

“Aw, tuckered yourself all out getting pissed at Marlo during breakfast or have you just been dancing for the last four hours since your class ended.” Yeah, he wasn’t leaving. I heard no door shut.

With a sigh, I turned around and crossed my arms over my tight black tank top. “Both.”

He nodded, his smile reaching his eyes like he found amusement in my pain. And then he peeled off his shirt and tossed it on the ground.

I held up my hands. “That seriously wasn’t an invite, Jackson.”

“And as sad as I am about said circumstances between us…” He sauntered over to me, his jeans slung low on his hips. “…I’m actually here to save your tight ass.”

I gritted my teeth. “Compliment me in that way again, and I’m going to be shoving my equally tight foot up yours.”

He grinned. “Fair.”

I re-did my ponytail and grabbed the iPad, pressing play again for the song between Johnny and Baby, it was the epic Lover Boy song where she was crawling all around the floor and— “Aghhhh!” I tugged at my hair.

The music kept going.

And then hands were on my shoulders.

I jerked in surprise.

“Calm down…” Jackson laughed. “Again, I come in peace, walk me through the steps and I’ll adjust where necessary.”

“I must be desperate.” I hung my shoulders in defeat.

“Just tired,” he said in a soft voice that held no humor whatsoever.

I turned and stared into his green eyes. “I’m not sleeping with you.”

“I’m not offering my services.” His grin was back.

“Services.” I rolled my eyes. “You would call it that, like you’re just servicing a car engine, or checking the oil.”

He just shrugged as if it was all the same.

Men.

“Fine.” I closed my eyes and then opened them as I gripped his outstretched hands and started the cha-cha like they’d performed in the musical.

As his character had done, Jackson kept trying to throw me off, to grab me and pull me into his arms.

So basically, he was playing himself only better.

I laughed and pulled away then went to the corner of the room and started lip syncing. He lay back on the floor while I got on my hands and knees and crawled toward him, both of us lip-synching.

I found myself smiling more than once.

And then he abruptly stood and pressed stop on the iPad and crossed his arms. “Your soul is missing.”

“Excuse me?” I jumped to my feet and dusted off my clothes. “What the hell does that even mean?”

“It means,” he said with a sly smile. “That you don’t give two shits about me — in real life, that is — and when you act through the choreography you’re so focused on the next step, anticipating your next movement, that you lose that moment, that feeling when your soul tethers to the song, and by doing that, you join with your co-star in this fucking amazing threesome that makes you feel alive.” He grinned and then lowered his voice into a whisper. “Which means… I actually can’t help you, because you will never trust me enough to let go. Maybe that’s why you got a C, Ray… because you only trust in yourself when it comes to the dancing, and forget about trusting in the music, in your partner, in the joining of souls.”

With that, he grabbed his shirt and walked out of the room.

The screen slammed behind him.

Tears welled in my eyes as I hit my water bottle off the table.

Why was I even ready to cry?