Page 84 of Hidden

“Luke!” I spluttered, coming back up for air. But he was already gone. I followed his direction and then…

“Oh no,” I whispered. “Oh, God, no…”

Luke had found his next victim.

Humming the tune toJaws,he bobbed up and down in the water, heading towards a woman and her young children.

“Luke!” I hissed, quickly following after him, but he had already sunk further under the water. The next thing I knew, the woman was shrieking, and Luke was coming up for air.

“Stand back, lady. There’s a shark,” he told her, looking the picture of innocence.

“Did you just bite me?!” she hissed at him. Luke paused and winked at her children, silently reassuring them this was all in jest, and then looked back at their mum.

“How could I bite you? I was underwater. I am a talented man, m’lady, but alas, I have not evolved to having gills.”

“Well, you nipped me then!”

“It was a shark. If you could make your way down to the beach, all will be well.”

“Mum, it was a shark. I saw it!” the tallest of her boys giggled. Luke went underwater instantly, nipping at the boys’ legs, making them roar with laughter.

“Are you in the habit of approaching women on their own and harassing them?”

“Sharks don’t discriminate, I’m afraid. They see bare legs, they get to chomping. You could have been a hairy, sixty-year-old man, and he still would have bitten.”

“Sharks also don’t fucking talk!” she snapped back.

“Don’t be ableist. Sharks can do whatever they put their minds to.”

“Just fuck off, you weirdo, leave us alone.”

She turned her back on him, and he followed along, keeping just his eyes out of the water, nipping at her legs the entire time.

“Grow the fuck up!” she barked, but she was speaking to herself. Luke was in the moment, her kids were loving every second, and I was clutching my sides, laughing so hard I thought I might pee.

“You’re a twat!” she hissed at him, climbing out of the sea and onto the sand. “Come on, boys!” she yelled, almost tugging them out of the water.

“You have a lovely day now, you hear?” he called back, waving at her. Her response was to stick her middle finger up at him.

He swam back towards me as I tread the water and came up right between my arms, his face a mere inch away from mine.

“This is precisely why we can’t have friends whenever we visit a new city,” I grinned at him. “They all think you’re unhinged.”

“Maybe I am. It worked, though, didn’t it?”

“What worked?”

“We’re all alone.”

I looked around, seeing he was right.

It wasn’t the hottest of days, and there had been few people in the water to begin with. But everyone was now giving us a very wide berth, or climbing out of the water entirely.

“You’re a menace,” I chuckled, wrapping my arms around his neck.

“I was teaching her basic survival skills. I told you—”

“Yeah, yeah,” I muttered, playfully rolling my eyes. “You’re a trained professional. I heard you the first time.”