One Wright Stand

“That’s unfortunate. I didn’t even get to show you around Lubbock. What have you done while you’ve been here?”

“Nothing,” he said. “Or it feels like nothing. I went to Wright Construction, met my cousins, both sets.” He shrugged noncommittally. “And I got coffee, obviously.”

“Well, that just will not do.”

“What is there even to do around here?” he asked, sounding dubious.

“Probably not as much as Vancouver, but we have our gems. Lakes and canyons and wineries and Texas Tech football. You’re missing out.”

Jordan was cut off by a cry from the pool. We whipped around at the same time to see a woman I didn’t recognize push a guy into the pool.

“Julian,” Jordan said, stepping forward as if he could stop it. I realized this must be his brother. So, was that also his mom?

Bu there was nothing any of us could do. Julian lost his balance and crashed forward into the watery depths. He fell nearly on top of Jennifer with a huge splash.

“Mom,” Jordan said with a sigh.

But his mom just laughed at the joke. She shrugged.

Julian burst out of the water, sputtering. His hands were on Jennifer’s waist, helping her to her feet as he apologized profusely. He pulled his hands back and then put them back on her wet, naked body. I could hear his string of I’m sorrys from here.

“Jen! Are you okay?” I called.

Jennifer turned as red as a tomato and took a step back from him. She glanced up at me with worry on her face. “Can you check my camera?”

“You okay?”

She nodded. “Just…camera.”

Right. The only thing that mattered to her. Not the hot guy who had just fallen on her.

I strode over to the lounge chair where she’d left the expensive camera wrapped in a towel. The water had gotten on the chair and part of the towel but not the camera. It had been a close call. She should have never left it out here, unattended. Thankfully, the camera was fine.

“All good,” I told her, giving a thumbs up.

Her shoulders visibly relaxed. “Oh, thank god.”

Then she realized that Julian was still worriedly hovering over her.

“I’ll take it inside, so it won’t get splashed,” I told her.

“Thanks,” she said, backing a step from Julian.

I headed back to Jordan. “I have to take this inside for Jennifer. It’s practically irreplaceable.”

“I’ll go with,” he said. He nodded his head to the side as if to say he’d follow me. “She’s a photographer?”

We fell into step as we crossed the lawn up to the house. “I wish she were. More hobby than professional. One day, I hope she takes the plunge.”

“And you? What do you like to do for fun?”

I pulled open the back door, and we entered. “Well…you saw me having fun.”

“True,” he said, his gaze dropping to my lips before pulling back up to my eyes.

We stepped into the guest bedroom, where everyone’s stuff had been deposited. The room was suddenly heated as he took another step closer to me. All the air had been sucked out of the room. I swallowed, feeling off-kilter. Something had shifted with that one step into the room. I’d been the aggressor, pursuing him at the bar and asking him out. Then approaching him here at the pool party in front of his entire family.

But the dynamic had done a one-eighty. He was in charge here, and I could feel the undercurrent pulsing between us. The way he held himself, the curve of those lips, and those eyes drinking me in.

“Are you still going out tonight?” he asked, his hand moving to my hair.

I shivered as he twirled it around his finger and then released it, brushing my shoulder.

“Yes.” I reached for that effortless, flirtatious Annie that I used like a weapon. I sank into a hip and smiled. “Are you coming with me?”

“I think I will.”

The way he’d said that made me tremble. I had a feeling we weren’t talking about going to a bar any longer. And I was totally into it. It’d been a long time since a guy had been able to make me feel like this.

At first, I’d been glad that he was only here for one more night. My final summer fling before I started medical school. But now, looking at that face and feeling the way my stomach did flip-flops, I wasn’t sure it would be that easy.

Jordan Wright might actually be a match for me.

5

Jordan

“Hey, Jordan. Have you seen my cell phone? I don’t know how I always lose the goddamn thing,” Julian said as he entered my room of the hotel suite we’d gotten for the week we were in Lubbock.

“I haven’t seen it.”

I really didn’t understand how he lost everything. As if he just couldn’t fathom the responsibility. This was his third phone this year. If he lost this one, I was going to get him something that would attach to his skin.