Love on the Lake (Lakeside 2)

Teagan

I get up extra early the following morning and make a fresh batch of muffins, then leave them on the counter with a note for Aaron to help himself to as many as he’d like.

Dillion drops Van at the office since he is in the middle of consulting on a project for Footprint, and we drive around to the other side of the lake for our meeting with the homeowner. “Okay, so what’s Aaron’s story?”

“I was wondering how long it would take you to bring him up.” Dillion grins as she taps the steering wheel to the beat of the music coming through the speakers. “We grew up together, and he hung out with my brother, Billy, in high school, but he got a scholarship and went to Indiana for college.”

“Really? What college?” He doesn’t strike me as a city boy.

“Notre Dame.”

“Oh, wow! For what?”

“Structural engineering. And he played for their football team, at least for the first couple of years. He never finished his degree as far as I know. Dropped out in his last semester.”

“Why? Was he struggling to keep up or something?”

“I don’t know. I was in Chicago at the time, going to school and then working, but when he dropped out and came back to Pearl Lake, my dad hired him, and he’s been working for him ever since.”

“Wow, that’s an expensive education to walk away from in the last semester of your degree.”

“Agreed. I don’t know what happened, and I’ve never asked. And no one seems to know. It’s a bit of a closed subject. He’s always happy to give his input on project designs and layouts, but his résumé doesn’t even have his education on it.” Dillion chews her bottom lip for a second. “I always wondered if maybe it had something to do with his mom.”

“She works at Harry’s. She’s the one who hired me. Does she live in town?” I don’t know why I’m so intrigued by these little facts about him.

“Just outside, actually. She moved when Aaron went to college. And she raised him on her own.”

I’m trying to paint a picture of the man I’ve met so far. Went to school out of state but never finished. Has most of a structural engineering degree but chooses to work with his hands for the only contractor in town. Loves apple fritters and muffins and apparently has an epic smolder that he uses to get things he wants—like apple fritters. “What happened to his dad?”

Dillion shrugs. “From what I know, his mom got pregnant and decided she wanted to keep the baby. I think there was a scandal there.”

“Scandal how?”

“The town’s gossip is that Aaron’s father was renting one of the houses on the nice side of the lake and Aaron’s mom got involved with him. Like a fling maybe? Apparently he was married, though, so that’s where the scandal is. Like I said, it’s all rumors. I don’t have the whole story, so don’t take anything I’m telling you as gospel.” Dillion isn’t big on gossip, which makes sense, seeing what her family and Van have been through. “Anyway, Aaron’s been known to ride more than the lawn mower on the other side of the lake. He’s a compulsive flirt. Charming, always has the right line. Except with you, anyway. He was all flirty at the office when you brought the fritters and then awkward when he helped move the furniture.”

“He was probably only flirty because of the fritters.” I run my finger along the edge of the window, gathering dust on the tip.

“I guess it’s possible, but why would he have agreed to come help move the furniture? He easily could have said he was busy.”

We arrive at the house, which is pretty much a mansion on a lake, putting an end to the Aaron inquisition.

I tamp down the envy as we make our way up the front steps of the lake house. It’s beyond beautiful. It’s a tough pill to swallow, being this close to a way of life that used to be mine and is no longer. I remind myself that it was all an illusion. None of it was ever truly ours. We were cash poor, lines of credit stretched thin, a facade of wealth when we were scraping the bottom of the barrel.

And even when I didn’t know that it was all a farce, I was never actually happy. Always trying to meet the expectations people laid out for me. Wanting to be perfect, be the ideal. It was never enough; no matter how hard I tried, I could never achieve the perfection I was desperate for.

The homeowner, who is the wife of an NHL player, is a woman named Stevie. She’s incredibly gracious, showing us around the house, offering us refreshments. We walk through the pool house, which is half the size of the house my dad currently lives in, and as I take in the space—huge windows looking out onto the lake, white walls and unfinished surfaces, a beautiful blank canvas—I can see it all coming together.