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I’m exhausted by the time night falls, but I can’t sleep. I lie on top of my blankets with the window open, the soft autumn breeze rustling the drapes.
My grandmother went to bed ages ago, and when I stand up and go over to listen at the door, I hear the sound of her soft snoring.
This room gives me the odd feeling of being trapped, just like my room in Boston. Only here, I have no balcony. I can barely pace. From wall to wall, it’s only a few strides.
I move over to the window and stare down at the twinkling lights in the distance, at the serene water, and at the lone figure sitting on the edge of the pier.
Emmett.
I’m wearing a pale pink slip as a nightgown, but I worry if I take the time to change, he’ll already be gone.
I don’t even bother with shoes.
I rush over and take the doorknob in hand, carefully turning until I feel the latch give way. A faint creak spikes my blood with panic, but my grandmother sleeps on, undisturbed.
On tiptoe, I sneak past. It’s exhilarating and silly. I shouldn’t be made to feel like a deviant teenager just because I want to go out for a nighttime stroll, and yet I can’t shake the feeling. I peer over at my grandmother’s sleeping figure once more before I carefully open the door that leads out into the hall, and then I slip out.
Not everyone is sleeping. Voices carry from downstairs; the night’s festivities haven’t ended. I race down the central staircase, holding on to the banister as I scurry along the cold marble floor, and then I make a break for the door that leads to the backyard.
I’m aware that I could be watched. Quite a few of the villa’s bedrooms have views of the lake and pier and gardens, but I suspect everyone who isn’t drinking down in the sitting room is already sleep. Except for Emmett.
My bare feet are quiet on the grass as I curve around the topiaries and the gravel path, then I follow the slope of the yard down toward the pier. He’s sitting in his bathing suit, one knee bent up so he can rest his elbow on top of it.
“If you’re trying to scare me, it won’t work. I heard you coming a mile away.”
I freeze.
He turns slowly over his shoulder, lazily dragging his gaze down my short nightgown and bare legs.
“How’d you know it was me?”
“No one else would dare to bother me at this time of night.”
“If it’s a bother, I can go…”
His sincere gaze captures mine.
“Don’t make me ask you to stay. I will, and it won’t make either of us feel good.”
He turns back to the water. I hesitate for only a moment before I pad on bare feet until I make it to the end of the pier, right beside him. I bend down and take a seat, draping my legs over the edge of the wood so my feet dip into the cold water, barely up to my ankles.
“So you stay away all day just to visit me at night?” he asks, knocking his foot against mine under the water’s surface.
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“I never can.”
I kick my feet back and forth in the water, watching the ripples.
“Were you going to go for a swim?”
“I was thinking about it. I’ve been doing laps in the pool this week, but I can never resist the temptation of swimming in open water.”
“You’re not trying to cross the whole thing, are you?”
He laughs softly. “You don’t need to worry about that. It’s too far. Though I did used to swim across the lake back at St. John’s.”
I know, I want to say.
Instead, I merely nod.
Then he pushes to stand. “Get in with me.”
An incredulous laugh spills out of me. “Absolutely not. It’s freezing.”
“Hardly.”
“This is a deep glacial lake.”
He looks unimpressed, but I don’t care.
“Have your swim. I’ll stay right here.”
“What an appropriate metaphor, you always sitting right on the edge of life, never quite brave enough to enjoy it.”
I bristle at his assessment, aware of how close he is to hitting the bull’s-eye.
“Save the reverse psychology. It won’t work on me.”
“Have you ever gone swimming at night?”
“No, and I’m doing perfectly fine, thank you.”
“What about skinny-dipping?”
My eyes widen. “No! Because unlike you, I don’t succumb to peer pressure.”
“You’re such a bad actress, you really shouldn’t bother trying. I see you, remember? The quiet girl who sneaked out into the woods to spy on my friends and me. You want to misbehave so badly…why don’t you give it a try?”
A dark blooming need starts to build inside me, but I resist with everything I have, trying to lighten the mood with my reply.
“Because I know how skinny-dipping would end. You’d take one look at my naked body and pass out from the sheer pleasure of it. It’d be a pain trying to call for an ambulance out here in the middle of nowhere.”
