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“Okay.So it’s just leftover feelings.It’s still feelings.Believe me, I get it.I don’t want to still have feelings for Emily, but I do.And sometimes the best way to get over them is just to accept them.Does Sweetie have feelings for you too?”
If their kiss was any indication, she did.There was only one problem.“She was Jace’s girlfriend, Rome.And not just a girlfriend, but the girl he planned to marry.”
Rome hesitated before he spoke.“Look, Deck, Jace is a great guy and he was a damn good cousin to you and one helluva quarterback.But I went to school with Jace and played football with him and I never got the feeling he was madly in love with Sweetie.He cared about her.But he didn’t care about her as much as he cared about football.If he had a choice between weight training and watching game film or being with Sweetie, he always chose training and game film.To be honest, I didn’t blame Sweetie for breaking up with him.”
Rome wasn’t telling Decker anything he hadn’t witnessed with his own two eyes.But a part of him had always believed his perception of Sweetie and Jace’s relationship was skewed by his feelings for Sweetie.He had wanted Jace to be a bad boyfriend because he so desperately wanted to be the good boyfriend.And maybe it wasn’t that Jace was a bad boyfriend.Maybe it had more to do with him being a teenage kid who wasn’t ready to make a lifelong commitment.Just like Sweetie hadn’t been ready.If that was the case, then the only person making Jace and Sweetie’s relationship into something more than what it was ...was Decker.
As he stood there and allowed that thought to sink in, a female scream rent the night air, causing both him and Rome to startle.
“What the hell was that?”Rome asked as he glanced around.
Another high-pitched scream had Decker taking off at a dead run in the direction it had come from.He’d thought it was hard running on the dirt road in boots.It was even harder running across a pasture of wild grass and gopher holes.He stumbled more than a few times, but picked up his speed when there was another scream.
“Cooper Springs,” he yelled back at Rome.
When he came to the copse of thick mesquite and oaks that surrounded the springs, he had to slow his pace to push the low-hanging branches out of the way.Another scream had him barreling through the trees so quickly he lost his footing in the soft soil that surrounded the springs and ended up stumbling down the incline and headfirst into the water.
Damn, it was cold.He surfaced with a gasp, then scraped his hair out of his eyes so he could spot the woman who needed help.
It turned out it wasn’t just one woman.
It was six.
You would think picking Sweetie out of a group of women at night would be difficult, but he had never had a problem finding Sweetie in a crowd.His gaze zeroed in on her not more than a few feet away from where he stood chest-deep in water.Her hair was wet and slicked back and her bare shoulders were speckled with water droplets that sparkled in the moonlight like diamonds.Unless she was wearing a strapless bathing suit—that had inched low enough to show the tops of two soft breasts every time her treading brought her farther out of the water—she wasn’t just swimming with her sisters.She was skinny-dipping.
“Just what in the heck do you think you’re doing, Decker Carson?”she asked.
He swallowed hard and tried to keep his gaze above her neck.“I heard screams and assumed someone was in trouble.”
She tipped her head.“And you thought you needed to come to the rescue?”
“You can rescue me, Deck.”
He wasn’t sure which sister had spoken and he was too damned embarrassed to try to figure it out.“I’ll just let y’all get back to your ...swim.”He started to turn to shore when Rome came crashing through the trees and did the same thing Decker had done.He slid down the incline and fell into the creek.Decker reached out and pulled Sweetie out of the way.He only intended to move her so she wouldn’t get hurt, but the waves Rome made when he entered the water pushed her flush against Decker.
And yep, she was naked.
He didn’t think he could get an erection in ice-cold water.He proved that theory wrong.If he felt all her soft curves, she had to feel all his hard ones.He couldn’t help the heat that flooded his cheeks any more than he could help his reaction to having a naked Sweetie in his arms.Probably because he’d spent many a night as a teenager jacking off to this exact scenario.And if he were honest, not just as a teenager.
Her eyebrows hiked up before a soft smile spread over her mouth.“Shouldn’t I be the one blushing, Deckster?I mean I’m the one naked while you’re fully clothed.”
He didn’t need the reminder.
Rome’s “Oh, shit” pulled him from Sweetie’s twinkling green eyes and he released her and turned to see his friend surrounded by bobbing Holiday sisters.
“God must be on Mimi’s side,” one sister said.The sassy tone had him guessing it was Hallie.“She wished we’d get to know the Remingtons better and one just fell right into our skinny-dipping party.”
“Skinny-dipping?”Rome sounded as stunned as Decker had been, but he recovered much quicker.“Beg pardon, ladies.Decker and I just heard screams and got concerned.”
Hallie spoke again.“That was just Liberty and Noelle being wussies about jumping into cold water.”
“We’re not wussies.”Decker was pretty sure it was Liberty who spoke.She’d never had a problem voicing her thoughts.Even if they were inappropriate.“This water is too damn cold.I move that the Holiday Secret Sisterhood’s full-moon swims be done only when temps are above seventy.I’m so cold, my nipples could cut glass.”
“Libby!”
“It’s the truth, Cloe.And I don’t care if Rome and Decker get an eyeful, I’m getting out.”Liberty started swimming toward the shore.
Decker kept his gaze on Sweetie.“The Holiday Secret Sisterhood?”
