Chapter 195
Summer's POV
Inside Shake Shack, the lunch crowd buzzed around us in a wall of noise—orders being called, blenders whirring, the clatter of trays and scrape of chairs. Lily immediately pressed closer to Kieran's side, her hand finding his. The hearing aid could only do so much in this kind of chaos, and I saw her eyes start to track movement more than sound, relying on visual cues to navigate the crowd.
"Go find a table," Kieran said to her, making sure she was looking at him. "Somewhere quiet if you can. We'll bring the food."
She nodded and slipped away toward the back corner, where the noise might be slightly less overwhelming.
I planted myself in line next to Kieran. "I'm buying."
His jaw tightened. "Summer."
"Kieran." I kept my voice light, reasonable. "The tutoring money is for Lily. This is lunch. They're not the same thing."
"They're both—"
"Not the same thing," I repeated firmly. "You're teaching me physics. That's work. This is us getting burgers because I want to spend time with you and your sister. Completely different budget categories."
We stared at each other. He hated anyone paying for him—with a ferocity that had nothing to do with pride and everything to do with things he'd never said out loud. The tutoring arrangement had been hard enough for him to accept, even with the fiction of "work" wrapped around it. But this was different. This was just... us.
I held his gaze and didn't budge.
"Are you guys doing the thing again?" Lily had circled back, apparently unable to find a table yet, watching us with the weary expression of someone who'd witnessed this argument too many times.
"We're not doing a thing," we said in unison.
"You're definitely doing the thing." She tugged Kieran's hand, making sure he looked down at her before she continued. "Just let her pay. She's going to win anyway. She always wins."
Kieran exhaled through his nose. "Traitor."
"I'm paying next time," he said to me, low and firm.
"Deal." I kissed his cheek—quick, just a brush—and turned to the counter before he could see how red my face was.
I ordered: a Kids' Meal for Lily with apple juice, a Double ShackBurger with cheese fries and a chocolate shake for Kieran, a 'Shroom Burger and lemonade for myself. When I set the tray down at the corner booth Lily had finally claimed—the quietest spot in the restaurant, tucked away from the main traffic flow—Kieran looked at the massive burger like I'd performed a magic trick.
"You think I can eat all that?"
"Please. You inhaled an entire pizza last month and then asked what was for dessert." I slid into the booth next to him. "Eat. You've been teaching for two hours, and I know you skipped breakfast."
He went still. "How do you know I skipped breakfast?"
"Because you always skip breakfast when you're stressed." I unwrapped my burger, keeping my voice light. "Also I looked it up—you need at least 3000 calories a day. You're still growing. So eat the whole thing or I'm ordering you another one."
Something shifted in his expression—not surprise exactly, but that look he got when I cracked through whatever armor he wore. Tender. Almost unbearably soft.
Then he picked up the burger and took a bite. His eyes closed. He made a sound that was borderline obscene for a Shake Shack at noon on a Saturday.
"Good?" I asked, already knowing.
"Shut up," he said, mouth full, and took another enormous bite.
I grinned and stole three of his cheese fries.
He caught my wrist—not to stop me, just to hold it. His thumb swept across my pulse point. "Thief."
"Your thief," I corrected, popping the fries in my mouth.
"Yeah," he said, quiet enough that only I could hear. "Mine."
Lily had already demolished half her chicken nuggets and was now deeply invested in her chocolate milk, but she paused to tap the table to get Kieran's attention. When he looked over, she launched into a breathless recap of her art class—apparently a boy had drawn himself as a dinosaur, which was technically against the rules but also kind of genius. Kieran listened like it mattered, asking questions, nodding in the right places, making sure she could always see his face when he responded. Under the table, his hand rested on my knee. I covered it with mine.
The fight was still there, somewhere in the background, a conversation we'd need to have eventually. But right now was burgers and stolen fries and Lily's laugh and the steady belief that whatever was broken between us, we could fix it.
Then the door opened, and my past walked in.
Mason Pierce hadn't changed since middle school. Same artfully tousled hair, same sharp jaw, same outfit that probably cost more than most people's rent—a linen shirt unbuttoned one too many, sleeves rolled to show off tanned forearms, styled to look careless in a way that took ridiculous effort. He strolled in with two guys flanking him like an entourage, laughing at something on his phone with the easy confidence of someone who'd never once worried about being watched.
Then he saw me.
His eyes lit up—not warmly, but the way a cat's do when it spots something to play with. He changed course, that slow, deliberate stride eating up the distance between us, and stopped at our table. He braced one hand on the back of our booth and leaned in, cologne and trouble.
"No way." That grin—wide and boyish and rotten underneath. "Summer Hayes. At a Shake Shack." His gaze swept over me, lingering just long enough to make a point. "I thought you were more of a Per Se girl."