Addy slipped past Nikki to slide into the end seat of the booth.

She looked up just in time to see Remington push past Kitt to do the same thing across the table.

In their rush to avoid it, they had wound up sitting opposite each other. Now she would have to stare at him for the entire meal.

There were worse things in life, she supposed.

At least they weren’t pressed together like in the car.

She gave him a friendly smile and tried not to notice the spark of excitement in his blue eyes.

Sorry, big guy.

Honey giggled and slid into the booth next to Remington, and Kitt took the seat beside her.

Nikki sat next to Addy and Indiana scooted in next to her, opposite Kitt.

“Man, I’m hungry,” Addy said, eying up the menu.

During the school year she had to match her appetite to her activity level and her budget, which were both pretty minimal.

But in the summertime, she spent her whole day swimming and ate for free in the dining hall. The result was basically a bacchanal, and she saw no reason to pretend to demure. As Addy saw it, she was one of the lucky people in the world who had access to all the good food she wanted and she was darned well going to enjoy it.

A waitress swung over, looking almost dazed by the sheer volume of hot guys at the table.

“I’m Nina,” she said, turning red all the way to her hairline. “What can I bring you?”

“Hello, Nina,” Kitt said, and proceeded to politely introduce her to every person at the table.

To her credit, Nina nodded at each of them. Then she wrote down their orders and dashed off.

Nikki began to arrange the packets in the sugar container by color, a sure sign that she was nervous. They all were. The camp was in trouble, so by extension, so were they.

Addy patted her knee, and Nikki looked up from her task.

“It’s going to be okay,” Addy told her. “We’ll figure it out.”

“I don’t know,” Nikki said. “If Mr. Travers pulls from the resort, how will the others come up with enough cash to buy him out?”

“How much money are we talking about?” Honey sounded worried too. The senior Travers had threatened to pull his backing after his creep of a son had gone to jail for stalking, arson and attempted assault on Honey. And no matter how many times Addy told her it wasn’t her fault, she knew Honey still felt partly responsible for the mess they were in.

Addy slipped her phone out of her pocket and brought up the site she’d been looking at earlier.

“I guess we could try and figure out how much the place brings in, and multiply it by—” Honey began.

“Eight-two thousand dollars,” Addy announced.

“How on earth could you have figured that out?” Honey demanded. “Did you use the Stanford calculator?”

“Nope,” Addy said. “Social media.”

“What?”

“Birdie Cohen posted last spring when Miles passed away.” Addy said. “She got forty-one thousand for his half-share, used it for her grandson’s freshman year college tuition and a trip to Brussels for herself.”

“Seriously?” Honey rolled her eyes.

“Yeah,” Addy said, “look at the hat.”

She turned her phone to show the pic of Birdie Cohen wearing a huge grin and a hat that said Brussels, with her arm wrapped around the shoulders of a young man who was presumably the grandson. They both looked fantastic.

“Okay, so eighty-two thousand,” Nikki said. “That’s, that’s…”

“That’s a lot of money, isn’t it?” Kitt sounded worried.

“Well, surely there’s something in the capital fund,” Honey suggested.

“Every year another shareholder dies and the family always cashes out,” Addy said. “How much could there be?”

“We need to do a fundraiser,” Nikki said.

“What is a fundraiser?” Indiana asked.

“It’s when people get together to raise the money to do something important,” Nikki explained to him.

“Oh,” he said immediately, “like a car wash.”

Addy tried to hide her smile. Times like these it was so clear the guys had learned all they knew about life on earth from watching scads of ‘80s movies.

“Yes, exactly,” Nikki said earnestly. “Except that a car wash isn’t big enough for this type of money. We’d have to wash like fifteen thousand cars or something.”

Just then their waitress returned with two co-workers. All three women carried heavily laden trays.

“Okay, guys,” Nina said, and began handing out plates.

There were about five minutes of heavenly silence as they all peppered their eggs, buttered their toast, and dug into the feast before them.

“So what would raise eighty-two thousand dollars?” Nikki looked around the table as if someone among them had the answer.

“How about an auction?” Honey volunteered.

“We don’t have anything to auction off,” Nikki said.

“Gambling,” Addy said.

“It’s illegal,” Nikki said immediately.

“True,” Addy nodded.

“Can we not use our pay?” Kitt sounded hopeful.

“Um, we each only earn a couple thousand dollars for the whole summer,” Addy explained, trying to hide her smile.

“What do Earth people want?” Indiana looked thoughtful. “What makes them tick?”

“Alcohol, sex… Addy began to list.

“Illegal, illegal,” Nikki said.

“Fame and adulation,” Honey offered.

“Those are legal,” Nikki said after a pause. “But would be hard to sell.”

“How do we give them fame and adulation?” Addy laughed.

“We can’t,” Nikki said.

“A cotillion,” Honey said.

“That’s an idea,” Nikki said thoughtfully.

“What is a cotillion?” Remington said the word carefully.

“It’s sort of a formal ball,” Honey explained. “In some circles, it’s how powerful families present their grown-up daughters to society.”

“Have they kept their daughters indoors until then?” Kitt sounded a little scandalized.

“No,” Honey laughed. “But I guess they are using the ball to sort of point out that the girls are grown up now, not little kids anymore.”

“What about the boys?” Indiana asked.

“Things are different for boys,” Addy said, hoping they wouldn’t get into a big political discussion.

“Are there enough young women to have this cotillion at the resort?” Remington asked.

“Well, we couldn’t exactly have a cotillion,” Nikki said. “But we could have something like that. It would be a chance for everyone to get dressed up and show off.”

“We need a contest,” Addy said.

“A swimming contest,” Remington suggested, further endearing himself to her.

“Something to do with the lake is a nice idea,” Honey mused.

“What about like a triathlon?” Addy asked.

“Maybe something where they could dress up?” Nikki suggested.

“You know what we need?” Addy could picture the whole thing. “Floats.”

“Like a parade?” Nikki raised an eyebrow.

“No,” Addy said, “like on the lake.”

“Ohhhh,” Honey breathed.

“That’s an amazing idea,” Nikki said. “Like a regular cotillion, but on the lake. A floating cotillion.”

“A float-illion,” Addy said.

“Oh, that’s catchy.” Honey nodded.

Lightning flashed outside the window and rain began to streak the glass.

“Oh, wow,” Honey said.

“A summer storm,” Indiana mused.

“Hopefully it won’t last long,” Addy said, thinking of the road back to the resort. The one-lane section over the bridge tended to flood in the worst storms. Hopefully this wasn’t going to be one of those.

“So how do we get money from what you described?” Remington asked sensibly.

“A couple of ways,” Honey said. “We’ll charge admission, of course. We’ll charge a fee to compete with a float. We can even have guests buy a ticket to vote for their favorite float.”

“How will they make the floats?” Remington asked. “Will they be building actual boats?”

“We can rent out the canoes,” Addy said. “Whatever they build has to fit on the canoe.”

“And each float will have a prince or princess or both,” Honey said. “So that’s the celebrity part. They’ll be dressed to the nines, and rowed across the lake to a cheering crowd.”

“And the winning floats will be the king and queen,” Nikki said.

“This is a fine idea,” Remington decided. “Unless a ruthless leader is elected. How will we determine who is eligible to ride on the floats?”

Addy laughed. “It’s just an honorary title, Remington. They won’t actually be in charge of anything. They just get to say that they were the king and queen of Floatillion.”

“Like the queen of the prom,” Indiana said wisely.

“Yes,” Kitt agreed, “this is excellent.”

Remington looked a little embarrassed.

Addy tapped his foot under the table with her own and grinned at him.

He gave her a slow smile and her heart stuttered.

Damn it.

“It’s going to be a lot of work,” Addy said, trying not to think about the way her body was reacting to Remington’s smile. “We don’t normally have that many people on the water and I’m guessing they’ll be out there practicing.”

“I will help you, Addy,” Remington told her.

That hadn’t been what she’d meant. She needed to avoid him.

But she couldn’t stop the excited beat of her heart at the idea of extra time with him. And she was sure she could handle herself. She was an adult.

“It’s really coming down out there,” Nikki worried.

Addy glanced out the window.

Shit.

This was worse than the usual summer storm.

“We should go,” she said, grabbing one more piece of bacon for the road.

“I hate driving in this type of weather,” Honey said. “Can’t we wait it out?”

“The bridge could flood and then we’d be stuck,” Addy said.

Honey bit her lip.

“I’ll drive, Honey,” Addy offered.

Honey brightened. “Thanks, Addy.”

“I’ll go grab the car now and pull it around,” Addy said, slapping a twenty on the tabletop.

“I’ll come with you,” Remington offered, sliding his own money onto the table.

Before she could stop him, Nikki and Indiana were moving to let him out of the booth.

Honey handed over the keys and Addy dashed for the front door.

Remington held it open for her. He was fast for a big guy.

They dashed out into the pouring rain together.