Watching Savannah sit on the lip of the pool, her legs dangling in the water, fruity cocktail in hand, I really want to invest in a house with a pool now. There are a million things to do in a pool, and I want to explore every one of them with her.
Cassie and Ryder are playing Parker and Ruby in a game of chicken. Ruby’s a good match with Parker—at least this time the redhead can’t flash him and lose the game. It’s been a known downfall for us in more than one game. You’d think by now we’d be immune to it, but there’s always some way they sneak it in. Avery referees poolside, a large hat covering her brown hair, protecting her fair skin from the sun.
“You think Savannah wants to play?” Jackson asks.
“Not with you,” I say. Even though I can see the bait Jackson’s laying, I step into the trap.
“What if I ask her?”
“Not a chance in hell,” I say and shove him into the pool. Avery calls foul as water rains down on her, while Ruby and Cassie both promise sweet revenge. Before Jackson can retaliate, I peel off my shirt and jump in after him. We wrestle around, dunking each other and acting like five year olds. Jackson finally tires and goes to grab another beer leaving me alone in the pool.
I swim up to Savannah who’s still sitting composed on the lip of the pool. She holds up her arms and tries to lean back. I grab her wrist, ready to pull her in. “Don’t--” she says, her balance completely thrown off. I steady her with my other hand, tracing a path down her ribs to her hip.
“Don’t you trust me?”
“Not after this drink,” she says with a wrinkle of her nose. Can’t have that when I’m around. I take it as a personal offense when people make faces at their drinks in my presence. How dare I let them suffer when I’m here to make their dreams come true?
“Something wrong with your drink?” I ask. She offers it, and I pull myself up on the pool to take a sip. Her eyes trail a path over my chest—yet another reason to invest in a pool. The drink, however, makes me cough. That is not a drink; it’s leftover fruit puke. Like hell we’re gonna have drinks like that on my watch.
I hoist myself the rest of the way out of the pool and grab whatever swill someone wanted to call a margarita and chuck it onto the flowers.
“Watch the landscaping,” Shelby says.
“Jackson, where’s your liquor?”
“Where it always is,” he replies.
“Good. I’m taking it home, you’re abusing it.” I head for the den. He keeps the okay stuff in the kitchen for whatever reason—cooking, he says. In the den, I take out several bottles of liquor, tequila, triple sec. Things I’m going to need if we’re going to get this party started.
Heading back into the kitchen with my spoils, I find the culprit behind the terrible drinks in the freezer. Someone used those artificial ice pack freeze and serve drink mixes to make the margaritas. How could they, when Jackson’s stocked fresh limes and all the ingredients to make a perfect margarita?
It’s a crime, and when I find the one responsible for these freezer bags they better hope I’m in a forgiving mood.
Making do without a shaker, I start fresh, chucking the store bought shit straight into the drain where it belongs. Savannah comes in wearing a pair of cut offs and her bikini top. I pause in the middle of squeezing limes.
What was I doing again?
She leans on the counter, and I can’t help myself. I steal a glimpse of her in her bikini. How can there still be acres of skin I want to explore? It’s like every time I see her there’s somewhere else I want to kiss, suck, mark.
“Need a taste tester?” she offers.
“If it’s you, absolutely. If not, no.” I hold up the squeezed limes. “Wanna salt the rims of the glasses?”
She takes the lime from me, her fingers lingering on mine. Carefully, she runs the lime over the lip of the glass before dunking it in a tray of salt.
“How is it that you and I always end up around a tequila bottle?”
“Some of us are just blessed,” I say with a wink.
Savannah follows me back outside with a tray of glassware.
“Now that we’ve gotten rid of your nasty drinks—which if you ever bring back to our family dinner, I will take it as a personal insult and leave—now, let the party begin!”
“Blame Shelby,” Jackson says. “She was in charge of the drinks.”
“I was busy, sue me.”
“And this is why you can’t date—”
“Savy, we need to discuss suing Shelby.” I say, snagging a glass and pouring her the first drink. And to shut down the fight between Shelby and Jackson. We couldn’t put these two in a room without them arguing about the color of a white wall. When it came to Shelby’s dating life, Jackson thinks he has control of it and Shelby thinks Jackson eats shit for breakfast.
Savannah takes a sip from it before taking it from me. Shelby chucks a beach ball at my head, which I duck. Years of living with Tasha made my reflexes lighting fast. The two of them would probably be fast friends, and Jackson and I would live to regret the days we introduced them.