He grins down at me. We both know I’m stalling.
With his belt unfastened, he bends and places his hands on his knees, bringing his eyes almost level with mine. He looks pointedly at my clothes. “They’ll dry.”
He holds out a hand.
Moments pass during which I contemplate all the ways this could end badly, before I think, But how badly, exactly? Someone sees us having a good time and swimming in our clothes? Is that really so terrible?
I take his hand—it’s really warm—and let him help me to my feet.
“Maybe take this off, though.” He points to my denim jacket, buttoned all the way to the top. I know it’s ridiculous, but I’m instantly anxious about being able to unfasten the buttons in front of him.
As if reading my mind, he takes a step closer. “Can I help?”
I nod, too flustered to insist that I can do it myself.
First of all, he knows this. Second … I just really want him to.
With steady fingers he reaches for the bottom button and coaxes it through the material. It’s so quiet I can actually hear the sound of the fabric sliding over metal, the water where it laps against the side of the pool. The way I’m holding my breath.
Breathe, Carey. You will definitely ruin the moment if you pass out, fall, and have to be dragged unconscious from the water.
He moves slowly but surely, from my waist, over my breasts, and to my neck. His eyes never stray from where his hands are working, but even in the dark I can see the way his cheeks are flushed. Does he notice how hard I’m breathing? I’m doing everything I can to not dwell on the fact that he’s shirtless and essentially helping undress me.
When he’s done, our eyes meet only briefly before he steps back, arms falling loosely at his sides.
“Thanks.” I don’t think I’ve ever been this turned on, and he only helped me unbutton a jacket. Lord help me when I see him wet.
Lost in this image, I startle when he finally pulls his belt free with a distracting snap. He sets it with his watch on one of the lounge chairs. I take mine off, too.
“You ready?” he says, recovered and grinning in a way I know I’ve never seen before, not even when I was teasing him about a tie he wore one day, and then my chair immediately broke in hilarious karmic retribution.
I nod my head. “No.”
He laughs and his Adam’s apple bobs in his throat and I’m reminded that there is bare skin below—
He unbuttons his pants and steps out of them, leaving him in only a pair of black boxers.
“On the count of three,” he says, and I’m rendered momentarily mute, unable to drag my eyes away from his legs and his hip bones and the small stretch of fabric in between. “One. Two—”
He never gets to three. I think of the afternoons on the river, the sun scorching in the sky but the feeling of glacial water on my skin. I remember the rush of gripping the rope and the freedom of letting go, trusting that the water would be deep enough, even though there was every chance in the world that it wouldn’t.
I race toward the edge and jump. My heart is in my throat as I’m swallowed by darkness, beating a hundred times a minute when I surface again.
I tread water, using my hands and feet to turn just as James’s shout cuts through the air. His cannonball creates a giant splash, and I laugh as he bursts up again.
“Cold!”
“You had your feet in it, this shouldn’t be a surprise,” I say, cracking up and scooping a handful of water to throw at him.
He chases me around and I swim away, squealing. He dives beneath the surface, his hand gently finding my ankle and skimming up my calf. I kick and flail, the filmy layers of my skirt billowing up around my legs in a pink cloud. I think I kick him in the face. When we finally come up for air we’re still laughing.
“I can’t believe I agreed to this,” I say. “You’re a bad influence.”
He reaches up to push back his hair. “Me? I’m the goody-goody here. I’ve never skinny-dipped in my life.”
“And you still haven’t,” I say, splashing him again and then screeching as I try to get away. He dives beneath the water, and it feels like I’m looking into a shimmering fun-house mirror, trying to figure out where he’ll pop up again.
I never find out because his arms loop around my waist and I’m pulled under and spun around; a grinning James appears right in front of me. Bubbles escape his mouth as he laughs, but his eyes go wide when I turn the tables and lunge for him. I chase him around the pool, but my hands only skim his legs. And then he stops, surprising me with how close we are, and my palms slide up his stomach and chest.
When we break the surface, I realize we’re right at the side of the pool. He spins me so I’m against the wall and his arms gently cage me in. I’ve never been this close to James McCann before.
I absolutely don’t mind.
We’re both breathless. Water clings to his lashes in little spikes, his cheeks are pink with exertion—or from my foot—and I have that weird disorienting feeling that we’ve never really seen each other before tonight.
His eyes are brown and twinkly; his grin is enormous. He licks his lips, and then bites the lower one. A surge of goose bumps slithers along my skin, and it has nothing to do with the temperature of the water.
I know the moment he really notices our position because the giddy smile slips from his mouth and melts into something serious. His eyes flicker across my face and down to my mouth, and he blinks once, twice.
“Sorry,” he whispers, and I feel his breath as it mixes with mine; the heat ghosts across my lips. He moves back, and on instinct I reach for his hips.
Seconds tick by, and the water laps against the side of the pool, jostling us together and apart. Together. I look at his mouth, wondering how I never noticed the bow of his top lip, the fullness of his bottom. His boxers sink low on his hips under the weight of the water and my thumbs press against the bare skin there, able to discern bone and muscle. My nipples are hard beneath the fabric of my shirt; my lace bra is useless against the temperature of the water. If I leaned in, even an inch, would he let me kiss him? Would he want me to? Do I?
I lick away a drop of water, and his eyes follow the movement before meeting mine again. He gives me a nod—so imperceptible I’d’ve missed it if we weren’t so close, chest to chest and breathing the same air. I have a room upstairs, a bed. So does he. It would be so simple to kiss him. There are barely inches between us.
But I’ve been single so long, I’m not sure how this is done anymore. I falter. Did he really nod? Is his expression more sympathy, less sexual intent?
My heart pounds inside my ribs, and I don’t know which of us decided to move first but then he’s there, and his mouth slides over mine, once, then again. He pulls away with a tiny kiss to the corner of my mouth, and we look at each other. We’re still at the point where the kiss could be blamed on the movement of the water, maybe. Or, ha ha, such a weird, exhausting night.
But then he leans forward again with a smile, and in the space of a gasp we’re kissing like we need to: lips and tongue and the occasional dirty drag of teeth. His hands move down to my waist, holding me to him, and when he presses forward, I lift my legs, weightless, wrapping them around him.
It’s been so long, but even still I don’t think anything has felt as good as Ja—