Brett and Hannah (Soul Mates 101 Series) (3 page)

“Hannah, wake up. It’
s one o’clock,” Chelsea said as she nudged Hannah’s shoulder with her hand. Chelsea had two queen size beds in her room, and the girls often slept there.

Hannah
finally opened her eyes and grabbed her stomach.

“Ugh,
I feel like shit.”

“I bet. Sit up and take this pain reliever, and drink this whole glass of water,
” Chelsea said, holding the pills in her open hand.

“What happened to me? I barely remember anything from last night
.” She looked down and saw that she was still wearing her dress.

“You won’t
believe us when we tell you,” Morgan said.

Hannah
finally sat up, worried about what her friends would say next. Racing through her mind, she recalled her parents reminding her to remember who she was.

Chelsea
started telling her the story. “OK, we were all upstairs just hanging out when Olivia Franklin came and found us. She said that you were in the basement in trouble with some guys but that her friend was bringing you upstairs.”

“Oh n
o, tell me it doesn’t get worse than this,” Hannah pleaded.

“Oh girl,
it gets so much better,” Chelsea said before she continued. “Anyway, the next thing we knew, people were clearing a path for this tall, gorgeous, blonde guy who was carrying you toward us. Then there was this other gorgeous guy right behind him. They looked like they were friends.”

“Yeah, and he starte
d asking us if we were with you. He was being an ass, like he was mad we left you alone, but he could be an ass to me all day long if I could keep staring at him. Then he told us six guys were taking pictures with you, and he insinuated they were going to take advantage of you if he hadn’t come to your rescue,” Jasmine said.

“Oh no
, the pictures will be in every magazine, and my parents will want to kill me.” Hannah buried her face into her hands.

“We were told
he made the guy stand there and delete every single picture,” Morgan said.

“Oh, thank goodness
. Did he carry me to the car?”

Chelsea glanced
to Jasmine and Morgan.

“A
bout that … um, he carried you outside, but we had to wait thirty minutes before Gregory got there, so the guy sat in a big chair on the porch and held you. He seemed pissed at us, so we didn’t get too close. We watched him though, and he was being really sweet with you,” Chelsea said.

“
I’m going to throw up.” Hannah got up and ran to the bathroom.

“I was afraid that would
be her reaction,” Morgan said.

Chelsea went in
to the bathroom and wet a washcloth with cold water. She held the cool cloth to Hannah’s forehead. Hugging the toilet, Hannah began vomiting.

“
People will forget about it over summer break. It was so crazy there that hardly anyone noticed.”

Hannah lifted her head after throwing up.

“You’re lying. When will you learn that I can always tell when you lie to me? OK, I can take it, who was this guy?”

“We have no idea. Olivia wal
ked off, and we asked some people that were standing around, but nobody knew who he was. He was definitely older.”

Hannah got up and splashed water on her face at the sink. “Chelsea, I have to know
who it was. I need to thank him. What if he sees me on campus next year, and I don’t even acknowledge him?”

“Trust me
. He would understand. You were out cold.”

Hannah covered her face with her hands.

“Thank God the semester just ended.” She caught a whiff of something and lifted her dress up to her nose. “I can smell his cologne. I don’t even know his name, and his cologne is all over me.”

“
He acted overly concerned about us keeping an eye on you, too.”

“I have to find out who it was and thank him,” Hannah
said.

Brett was off work for a few days while some of his coworkers brought equipment in to cultivate the yard. It was too big of an area to dig up by hand.

He pulled up to the gate at nine o’clock in the morning on Thursday to start work at the Masons’. He was still mesmerized by the property as he drove around to the back. He didn’t think that would change no matter how many times he went there.

After an hour of working, Brett saw a man approaching him.

“Hi, I’m Hudson. I’m the driver for the Masons, and I’m in charge of security.”

“Hi, sir. My name’s Brett.” He took off his gloves and shook Hudson’s hand.

“I heard you’re going to be spending a lot of time here, so I thought I’d introduce myself. I like to get to know people who are on the property. I’m pretty protective over the family.”

“I have no intentions
of bothering anyone, sir. I do my work and go home.”

“Good to know, Brett. I’ll let you get back to your job. Let me know if you need anything or have any problems.”

As Hudson walked away, Brett felt his heart rate increase. He thought about what had already happened with Hannah and could only imagine what Hudson would think about it. Figuring she’d find out what he did for her, Brett couldn’t help but worry about how she’d react.

After an hour, he
was sweating pretty heavily and kept getting water from the cooler he’d packed. It was unseasonably warm for mid-May.

Hannah got up at ten o’clock and looked out her bedroom window. She’d checked every day to see if Brett was back and found herself excited to see him. She left her hair down and put on a dark purple bikini under a short, see-through cover.

Her mom a
nd dad were at the table looking at the paper and eating breakfast when she entered the kitchen.

“Good morning. When do you all leave
again?” Hannah asked.

“Good morning
, sweetheart. We leave in a few weeks. I’m not looking forward to being away from you, so maybe you could come visit at one of the stops on the tour for a week or two,” Lorna said.

“
That sounds great, Mom. Do we have more tea?” Hannah asked as she opened the refrigerator.

“Yes.
I think Gloria made some yesterday,” Lorna answered.

Hann
ah fixed two glasses.

Todd glanced at his daughter.

“Sweetheart, who’s the tea for? Do you have company?”

“No. I’m
going to take a glass out to the landscaper since it’s really hot today.”

Lorna looked
at Todd and smiled.

Hannah walked toward Brett and felt butterflies in her stomach. He was facing her
, and she saw him glance her way. “Hi, Brett, right?”

“Yep,” he
replied while taking off his work gloves.

Hannah was relieved to have
sunglasses on. She couldn’t help but admire his hot, sweaty body.

“I brought you more tea. It’
s ridiculously hot today.”

Shit, there I go talking about the weather again.

Brett took the glass from her and walked over to his truck. He came back carrying the empty glass from the time before.

“I’
ll trade you,” he said with a smile as he handed it to her. He wiped the sweat again from his forehead.

“You’re right, i
t’s really hot today. I hope this isn’t going to be the trend this summer.”

He took a long drink of tea. She pictured him in some kind of music vi
deo with the glass tilted back while sweat dripped from his gloriously tanned body.

“I appreciate the tea, but I bring a cooler of wa
ter with me. I don’t think you’re going to want to bring me a drink every day for the next few months.”

“That’s a lot of time to make the yard look good. I’
m about the only one who’ll get to enjoy this. I mean the yard, of course.” Hannah glanced down for a second.

I’m an idiot. I
might as well have told him I plan to drool over his hot body all summer!

Brett smiled at her
. “I better get back to work.”

“Um,
I wanted to let you know there are bathrooms right over there next to the pool in that brick building.” Hannah pointed toward it. “I know it’s annoying having to get buzzed back in every time you leave, so please feel free to use them.”

“Thanks, I’ll
take you up on that one. It’s been a pain having to leave each time and go to a gas station.”

“OK, see you around.”
Hannah walked back toward the house.

Brett
worked at the Masons’ on Friday. After being outside for five hours, he needed to use the restroom. He decided to take Hannah up on her offer of using the pool house restrooms. Glancing toward the house, he saw her friends and her sitting in chairs by the pool.

Knowing Hannah
was going to eventually find out that he rescued her at the party, he decided he would get it over with, so he started walking toward the pool. The suspense was killing him. Since he couldn’t stay anonymous, he wanted to know if she would be upset with him.

All four
women were stretched out in their lounge chairs. Hannah leaned up a little and tilted her shades.

“Well, girls, it appears you’
re going to get to meet the hot landscaper. I told him yesterday he could use the restrooms. I figured it would give us some eye candy for the summer.”

They all giggled.

Br
ett was nervous as he approached the pool, and it was making him angry. They were barely out of their freshman year, so he didn’t like that they were intimidating him. Determined to regain control of the situation, he planted a big smile across his face and acted as if nothing ever happened.

He saw Chelsea make the realization first. He wanted to laugh when he saw her lift her shades and smack her
friend’s arm. When he was almost to them, he saw all three of Hannah’s friends with their shades up and mouths hanging open.

Hannah looked at them
.

“God, can
you all at least make your drooling less obvious?” she asked, whispering.

“Hannah,
if you don’t mind, I’m going to take you up on that offer to use the restroom.”

“No problem.
I’d like to introduce you to my friends. They practically live here, so you’ll see them a lot this summer. Brett, this is Chelsea, Morgan and then Jasmine,” she said, pointing to each of them.

He
stood towering over them with his large hands on his hips. He couldn’t help but notice their firm bodies in bikinis, but he didn’t find them as attractive as Hannah.

“I’ve met Chelsea already, but it’s
nice to meet you, Morgan and Jasmine.”

Chelsea’s eyes grew large
.

“You
better watch not to burn today. The sun’s intense,” he said with a sly grin before he walked to the restrooms.

“How do you know
him, Chels?” Hannah asked quietly.

Chelsea looked at Morgan and Jasmine
before she turned back to Hannah.

“Um
... um, can we talk about it after he goes back to work?”

Hannah yanked down her shades as she reclined back in her chair.
“I swear I don’t get you all sometimes.”

Brett
went back to work knowing what Hannah’s friends were about to unleash on her. He couldn’t help but find it amusing. He glanced back and saw the girls sitting up in their chairs.

Chelsea grabbed hold of Hannah’s hand.
“Hannah, baby, I have to tell you something, and I need you to not freak out.”

Hannah lifted her shades
and pulled herself up in her chair. “What?”

“Ok, umm
... your landscaper, well, he’s the guy that carried you out of the party last weekend.”

Hannah jumped out of her chair, t
ipping it over and almost falling on the ground with it.

Brett heard the loud noise and glanced back
to see Hannah standing over her friends. He burst out laughing.

“Oh
God no! Please tell me you’re playing a prank on me.”

“Sorry, chick, i
t’s him. He’s your knight in shining armor
,
”
Jasmine said.

“Yeah, it’
s most definitely him,” Morgan added.

Hannah sat her chair bac
k up. “I feel like the biggest fool ever. I talked to him yesterday, and he never said a word.

“
He should’ve said something instead of letting me stand there like an idiot!”

“Don
’t get mad at him. He probably didn’t want to embarrass you by bringing it up,” Morgan said.

“
How am I ever going to face him? Now it’s going to be so weird out here this summer.”

Chelsea looked up at Hannah from her chair.
“It’ll blow over. Just thank him next time you talk to him and move on. I’m sure he won’t bring it up after that.”

“
He’s freakin’ hot, in college, and obviously a good guy. Hannah, you need to find a way to get with him. He’s the total package, and I bet he has a nice package, too,” Jasmine said, giggling.

“
Like that would ever happen now. He probably just sees me as an immature,
easy
freshman girl who gets hammered.”

“No
, he seemed genuinely worried about you. He cradled you in his damn arms,” Chelsea said.

“I’
m sorry, girls. I just want to go in and be alone.”

“OK.
Are we still on for tomorrow night at The Stables?” Chelsea asked.

“Sure. I’
ll have Hudson drive us.”

Bre
tt felt bad after he looked up and saw the girls were gone. He loved watching her friends squirm, but he felt bad thinking of how embarrassed Hannah probably was.