WHEN CARTER AND Snoopy rushed back down the stairs, both Ethan and I burst into uncontrollable laughter.
Carter had donned a Thunderbirds sweater that fell to his knees and had sleeves so long he might trip on them, a bright orange toy hardhat that nearly covered his eyes, a pair of school-bus-yellow scuba fins, neon blue goggles, and lime-green swim trunks we could barely make out beneath the sweater. The clashing colors were almost blinding, and he had a fake peacock feather sticking up from the hardhat. No telling where he’d found that last bit, but it certainly added a touch of flair to the ensemble. He’d tied a Batman cape around Snoopy’s neck, which was draped across his back like a doggie poncho. The only thing missing was a hat of some sort for the dog.
“What’s all that for?” Ethan asked once he’d regained his composure.
Carter rolled his eyes. “I already told you. I’m gonna do a rain dance.” There was so much duh in his tone he was practically dripping with it. Clearly, we were silly grownups who didn’t know anything about rain dances.
“Got it,” Ethan said, still laughing. “Since you’re in your swim trunks, how about we see if we can go visit Drew and Ravyn? Then you two can get in the pool.”
That sounded dangerous to me. “If there’s lightning…”
“We’ll keep an eye on things,” Ethan said. But he was already taking out his phone and shooting off a text to his teammate. “You have anything you can swim in? It’s plenty hot enough still. Or do you have to keep the tattoo dry?”
“I bet Ravyn and I can figure something out,” I said. To be honest, I wouldn’t mind getting back in the pool for a while, as long as I didn’t get electrocuted. And whether I could get in the pool or not, at least Ravyn would be there to remind me about the rules.
Drew responded to Ethan’s text almost immediately, inviting us all over. In no time, the four of us were piling into Ethan’s car and on our way to his teammate’s house.
They only lived about five minutes away, and there wasn’t any traffic to speak of tonight. Maybe everyone else in Tulsa had the same idea we did—sit around and pray for a good storm with plenty of rain.
Carter rushed up to the front door before Ethan had even shut off the engine. Snoopy raced behind him, barking, which alerted Drew and Ravyn of our arrival even before Carter had managed to ring the bell. They opened the door and let the boy and his dog rush through the house and straight out back without even slowing down to say hello. Ethan and I followed a bit more slowly, me carefully walking and using the crutches for balance, Ethan behind me as if to catch me in case I fell.
“No getting in the pool for two weeks,” Ravyn said when we reached the porch. “Not unless you cover that sucker so well none of the chlorine can possibly get through it.” Apparently, I didn’t even need to bother asking—she’d anticipated my question and had her answer ready to go. “At least not if you want to keep your tattoo looking good. But you can sit by the water and dip your toes in, or else I can put a hardcore bandage on it for you—something that’ll keep all the chlorine out, no matter how deep you go.”
“Trust me, dipping my toes in is more than good enough for me right now.”
“Dip your toes in?” Ethan said quietly, so no one else would hear. “So I guess your tattoo isn’t on your foot.”
I laughed. “I still haven’t shown you, have I?” But of course, I knew I hadn’t shown him yet. I wanted the moment to be right. It felt like such a part of me already, something very personal and private.
Ethan winked and slipped past me, probably in a hurry to get out back so he could keep an eye on Carter and Snoopy. Drew followed them, leaving Ravyn and me alone.
“No problems with it?” she asked as we trailed behind them at my pace.
“Nothing but crazy itching.”
“Remember what I told you. Don’t scratch it. Just put more lotion or cream on it.”
“Regular lotion isn’t enough.”
“Maybe use some bag balm, then.”
“Bag balm?” I’d never heard of it before.
“They use it on lactating cows. It’s seriously the best stuff out there. I’ve got some I can send home with you. It’ll get better soon.” She stopped in the middle of the living room. “Want to change into something to sit out there? Drew’s getting burgers ready to go on the grill. I told him he’s crazy, because they’re going to get rained out. Either that or we still won’t get any rain, and a spark from the grill will light the grass on fire, and then the whole neighborhood will go up in flames. But he’s willfully ignoring me.”
I’d never heard her speak so much at once before, but I was glad she was the one doing the talking. It saved me the effort of sifting through the surprises of the day to come up with small talk. In all honesty, I didn’t think I was capable of it right now. Not after everything Ethan had told me. I was doing well just to be standing upright and not cowering somewhere, waiting for the sky to fall.
Since it’d been so hot all day, I was already wearing a tank top and a pair of shorts. That seemed plenty good enough for this, so I shook my head. “I’m fine like this. I’ll just dip my toes in, like you said. No reason to change, and that won’t put my tattoo at risk from the chlorine.”
“Well, I’m putting on a swimsuit because it’s hot as Hades out there. If this storm doesn’t bring us some rain, the least it could do is bring in a cold front. I’m tired of ninety-degree-plus weather!”
I laughed, and she scurried off to change clothes.
By the time I made it outside to join the guys, Carter and Snoopy were already doing their rain dance. That little boy was jumping around in circles, whooping and hollering a war chant the fans sometimes shouted at T-Birds home games, only he’d changed the words. The only thing I could make out was, “We need more rain, lots of wet rain, soaking wet rain. Give us all your rain!” Snoopy kept barking and jumping with him, excited to be joining in the fun even if he had no idea what was going on.
“If that doesn’t work, nothing will,” Drew said, shaking his head. He walked over to the grill and threw the burgers on it.
I joined Ravyn at the table beneath the umbrella and helped her prepare the burger fixings, and Ethan stood with his teammate by the grill, seemingly keeping one eye on the rain dancers and the other on the sky.
I took a look at the sky, as well. Those clouds rolling in from the west looked ominous and promising, all at once. But if we had another electrical storm in store for us, sitting out by the pool might not be the brightest idea. And getting in the water would be even stupider.
“Do you think we’ll get thunder and lightning?” I asked Ravyn as I reached for another tomato to slice. I hadn’t been in Oklahoma all that long, so I still hadn’t adjusted to the change in weather patterns. I just knew it was a lot different than things up in Michigan.
“No telling, this time of year. But if we do, we’ll have to drag everyone away from the pool.”
“Exactly what I was thinking.”
“Weatherman’s calling for rain,” Drew called loud enough we could hear it. “Didn’t say anything about storms.”
“How much rain, though?” Ravyn asked.
“No matter how much we get, it won’t be enough,” Ethan put in. He stripped his shirt over his head, and my belly fluttered at the sight of the muscles flexing in his back and shoulders. He tossed the shirt onto the ground near my feet.
I tried not to gawk, but honestly, Ethan was one impeccable specimen. With his back to me so he could keep an eye on Carter and Snoopy, I had an excellent view of broad shoulders leading down to a narrow waist.
“Just you wait,” Ravyn said. She winked at me when I turned my head. She must have seen me gawking. “Once it really gets going, we’re going to need an ark to get anywhere.”
“Only because the ground’s so hard it can’t sink in fast enough,” Drew said. “They had rain like that down in parts of Texas last fall. That was why they had so many floods around Houston and whatnot.”
“Oh, like the one that killed that whole family?” Ravyn asked. “Their whole house floated away in the floods, and they were trapped inside.”
“We’re not going to float away,” Drew reassured her.
“I just hope we get enough to get my hair wet,” Ethan said.
Drew snort-laughed. “You’ve got a better chance of that than the rest of us, Bear. Since you’re closer to the sky.” But at the same moment as he flipped the burgers, something in the air changed.
It was the scent.
The air smelled wet and fresh, like rain, even though nothing was falling yet.
“I think we might actually get some,” I said. “Do you guys smell that?”
“All I smell is burgers,” Drew said.
But Ravyn turned her head away from the grill and sniffed. “Natalie’s right. It smells like rain.”
“Don’t jinx it,” her husband said, brandishing his burger flipper in our direction, and we both held up our hands to show we weren’t doing anything. Not that there was anything we could do, other than pray.
Carter was spinning in circles so fast and chanting his rain-dance song so thoroughly that he wasn’t paying attention to where his feet landed. One second, he was dancing at the edge of the pool; the next, he had fallen into the water with a massive belly flop.
Snoopy barked and followed him into the water.
And then, the heavens opened up with an almost torrential downpour of glorious, cool rain, falling in sheets. It was like nothing I’d never seen before.
We got plenty of rain back home in Michigan. We even got a good thunderstorm from time to time. But we’d never gotten anything like this before, not in as long as I could remember.
“It worked!” Carter spluttered, trying to stay afloat despite the components of his costume dragging him down, followed by the dog flailing all over him in the water.
Like the SuperDad he was, Ethan was at the edge of the pool in a flash. He didn’t even need to get in—he just stretched out a long arm and plucked both the boy and the dog free from the water, setting them on the edge of the pool. “You’d better take most of that off if you’re going to swim.”
“But I can swim? Even though it’s raining?”
“As long as we don’t hear any thunder or see any lightning,” Ethan agreed.
Drew quickly shut the cover over the grill while all of that was going on, to shelter the burgers from the downpour. And Ravyn and I rushed to be sure all the food we’d been prepping was protected from the deluge.
But then we’d done all we could for our food.
I shucked off my brace to keep the liner from getting wet, and then we were out in it, all of us, letting the water soak us to the bone. I kept most of my weight on my crutches and my good leg since I wasn’t wearing my protective boot, and surprisingly, I did all right that way.
Nothing could have kept me from going out in this rain, though, not even if it hurt.
The water felt amazing, cool and slick over my skin, like satin sheets on a hot summer night.
Ethan took a seat at the edge of the pool, letting his feet fall into the water, probably so he’d be close enough to make another quick rescue or to haul an uncooperative child or dog out in case of thunder or lightning.
But Ravyn and Drew were still trying to salvage dinner, and I felt guilty standing out in the rain while they were working, so I moved back under the umbrella to help.
Ravyn narrowed her eyes at me, then jerked her head in Ethan’s direction.
“What?” I asked.
“Go. We’ve got this under control. If anyone deserves to enjoy a night sitting out in the rain with a man like that one, it’s you.”
The temptation combined with Ravyn’s permission—or rather, encouragement—was all it took. Once I was behind Ethan, I lowered my crutches to the ground before lowering myself to my knees behind him, using his shoulders for support in case I slipped on the way down.
He tensed beneath my touch, his muscles all taut and ready to spring into action, and I could feel his heart hammering through his ribs.
“Ethan?”
He didn’t answer.
He didn’t need to.
Instead, he turned his head to the side, just as I slid my hands forward and brought my mouth to his, my chest pressed to his back. It only lasted a moment, soft as butterfly wings and light as a marshmallow, but it lit a fire inside me that no amount of rain would be able to quench.
When I backed away and looked in his eyes again, that fire became an inferno.
I’d never seen a man look at me in that way before, so full of heat and need and longing. But now I was ready for him to take over, to show me what he wanted, to tell me what he needed from me. I expected him to take control.
He didn’t move a muscle.
“Was that okay?” I asked, suddenly unsure of myself.
“Fuck, yes,” he ground out.
“You’re not— I’m just— I don’t know what you want.”
He was still looking at me with the same hunger as before, which only confused me more. But he never removed his gaze from mine, holding steady despite the buckets of rain falling over us. “I want you,” he finally said, and those butterfly wings started fluttering their way down somewhere near the vicinity of my heart. “I want anything you want to do. Anything you’re ready for. Anything you can give me. Anything you need me to give to you. I want it all.”
I was crying again, but the rain washed away my tears, so maybe he didn’t see them before I leaned in and pressed my lips to his again. But there was no way he missed the sob that tore through me. He swallowed it with his kiss, somehow taking away a bit of the pain from my heart, leaving behind only those fluttery butterfly wings as evidence it had ever been there at all.