A Summer With Snow (Frosted Seasons #1) by Hallie Swanson Read Free Book Online

her a visit. I scratch the top of my arm. I don’t have feelings for her as such, but there’s something about her; she’s different to all the other women I’ve known and there’s something inside prodding me, telling me I need to know more, and when I get an itch, I have to scratch it.
    I glance into the oval mirror above the wash basin; mine is not the only face I see. I imagine Darcy standing beside me, picturing her long dark hair, her pretty eyes that dance their way into mine. I glance down, feeling myself getting aroused with only these brief thoughts.
    “Fuck!”
    I hit out at the wall tiles, thinking back to what I did, what I said. I told her she was like every other woman I’d had and that I felt absolutely nothing. What was the big deal anyway? She was right, we were never related, she was never my sister, but when you want something as badly as I did, sometimes your mind plays funny tricks; well, it did with me, and for a while I saw her as Summer, my kid sister. It was as if I blinked, and then one day she was all grown up. No, she was never Summer; she was Darcy. I lower my head. What have I done?

 
    I breathe in the warm fragrant air before placing the lemon-coloured kneeling pad down in front of Mum’s oval flower bed. Resting on my knees, I pick up the secateurs and gaze at the dead heads on the roses as they sway in the breeze awaiting their fate. My gaze wanders further down the garden past the vegetable patches and the tall green leylandii, then back to the flower bed, and I can’t help noticing that the flowers don’t look as vibrant as they did this time last year. If it were possible for flowers to look melancholy, I’d say that these ones do, and I can’t help wondering if they miss Mum and Dad too.
    Something brushes past me; I flinch and look down.
    “Hooper!” I grin. “Not yet.”
    My little West Highland terrier looks up at me with his large brown eyes, wagging his tail; I can almost feel his excitement as his grey leather lead hangs from between his teeth. I cut through the first green stem and jump as he paws at my bare leg, leaving four white marks.
    “Okay, okay!”
    Giggling, I get to my feet. Dropping the secateurs, as they land they stab themselves into the overgrown grass. I reach down to grab Hooper’s lead, but he holds onto it and runs off; it is a game we play daily, a tug of war that I always win. I chase him back towards the patio, getting tangled up in my bed sheets that hang from the washing line. I screw up my face; it was either wash them or throw them away, but Mum bought them, so I couldn’t possibly get rid of them, yet I know in my mind they’ll never be clean, no matter how many times I wash them. He’ll always be there, lost in the fibres. What was I thinking? He wasn’t my boyfriend, just a one-night stand, and it certainly wasn’t how I’d pictured losing my virginity.
    I back-hand the flannelette sheet out of my way and run back towards the house, where Hooper sits waiting in the open doorway. He pants, his partially open mouth making him look like he has a smile for me.
    “You’re one little old man who’ll never let me down,” I say as he again tugs at one end of his lead while I tug at the other.
    After a few minutes he gives in, and I’m quick to attach the lead to his collar. Hooper pulls me into the kitchen, and passing the breakfast table I grab my phone. Glancing down at the screen I see that I have three missed calls and one text. I open the message; it’s from Jenny, my adopted sister: Hi Darc, tried to call, have a house viewing at three o’clock, let me know how it goes, jen x
    I have to stop and hold onto the table with shaking hands while rereading the message. Then, breathing deeply, I sink down onto one of the high-backed chairs.
    Couldn’t you have waited a few more weeks? I text back, go to send, but delete it. No, that isn’t fair, my brother in-law has just lost his job at the factory, they have two young kids and a