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“I was coming back up. I wastrying. The kayak, it was just heavier than I thought.”
“I told you it would be,” I growl.
“Yes, I see that now. I’m sure I would’ve made it, eventually. I have a life vest... I mean, even if Iwasn’tcoming back up with the boat, I’d have surfaced eventually.”
“Now you see why you don’t laugh off safety lessons,” I snap, though it’s fucking humiliating that I’m reacting like this.
I know she can swim.
I know she probably would’ve swam up eventually.
Still, she was under there for over a minute before I fished her out.
My instinct keeps screamingreact.
To this, toher, I don’t know.
Yet the blood won’t stop roaring in my brain.
“Well, thanks for the help. You were so quick,” she says, treading water. I glance at her, and the first thing I notice is how dark her eyelashes look when they’re wet.
I look away again. “Try not to give me a heart attack again.”
“Hey, I mean it.” Her voice trembles, trying not to laugh. “It was very noble of you to worry...”
“Call me noble again and I’m taking you home,” I bite off.
She coughs and when she recovers, she’s all serious. “It’s nice knowing my safety means something. Especially on the water.”
The water, again.
Why does that mean so much to her? There’s a story in her eyes she’s not ready to share.
“You’re a human being. Also, I don’t want the lawsuit that would come at me if you drowned. Would your father hire a hit man?” I mutter.
“Only for guys who date me,” she laughs. “You’re safe and still totally at my mercy.”
“I’m starting to regret the rescue. I could still hold you under.”
She stares at me and her mouth falls.
“...was that a joke, Foster?Twoin one morning? Who are you?”
“Call me Shepherd.”
Call me Shepherd? What the hell?
Apparently, I really want a lawsuit. Or maybe I’m vying for a bullet from her old man.
I’m definitely coming closer to welcoming harassment charges with every word out of my mouth. Justbegginghistory to repeat itself.
Maybe my ruthless asshole of an uncle was right when he said I had a self-destructive side. Once, I was young and stupid and went driving after smoking my weight in weed.
It wasn’t long after he had my father whacked for the insurance money, and Mom was buried in the bottle and long Sunday dinners with her sister. I only found out the truth years later, long after he was behind bars.
I was barely in the game yet, only dabbling with what he’d let me do, driving trucks with contraband TVs and laptops and kitchen crap they knocked off from corrupt dock workers.
Uncle Aidan seemed honestly concerned when the cops he bribed picked me up.
