Single Dad Seeks Juliet

She snatches it out of my hand, and I have to hide my smile as a fiery heat surfaces to her cheeks. “You know, I’m getting the sense that you’re becoming more annoying by the day. Could you quit that?”

“Me?” I ask innocently. “Annoying? Are you sure?”

“Yes. Both yesterday and today. Very annoying.”

Her irritation makes me chuckle. “Okay. I’ll try to stop.”

She smiles and breathes a sigh of relief. “Thank you.”

Again, I shake the bathing suit.

“I thought you said you were going to stop!” she yells with a stomp of her foot.

“Sure, I am. But not without you going for a swim.”

“I’m going to look like a pregnant woman’s cankle in this thing.”

I snort. “And what a beautiful cankle you’ll be.”

Several curse words leave her lips in a string I can’t make out as she snatches the suit from my extended hand and stomps away toward the public restroom. Little does she know, they keep those locked on every day of the week but Saturday and Sunday, but I don’t think it’s smart for the news to come from me. This is the kind of thing she should figure out for herself.

Of course, given the need to change in her car, there is a possibility she’ll just get in it and drive off. But that’s a chance I’m just going to have to take.

I’ll wait until after our swim to show her the other bathrooms all of us Navy men know are across the street. By then, she’ll be able to laugh about it, I’m sure. She’ll just be glad to have a shower to rinse off all the seawater once we’re done.

But for now, a little annoyance is good. It’ll keep her safe and alert in the water.Holley’s hand in mine, I lead her out into the water at an extremely tentative pace. Her hand is like a vise, and it’s pulling me back toward the sand like an untrained horse on a lead line.

It’s safe to say she’s feeling pretty reluctant about our swim this morning, but I’m confident, once I get her out there, I’ll be able to show her enough techniques to help her relax.

And if not, that’s fine. I can carry her the whole time without much trouble. I’m almost more at home in the water than I am on solid ground.

“Come on,” I coax softly, “It’s all right. I’m not even wearing a wet suit today. That’s how you know we’re not doing anything too intense.”

“Shh,” she says, and immediately a smile curves up both sides of my lips.

“We’re better off getting past the breaking waves. It’s much calmer out there, but we have to—”

“Shh,” she snaps again, and I laugh.

“Do you want to just climb on my back? Hold your breath? I’ll have us out there in under fifteen seconds.”

“What are you, Ocean Uber?” she asks, her voice half amused, half terrified.

“Something like that,” I agree with a grin. “Just trust me, Holley. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

She looks at the waves as they crash ahead of me and then back at me and, without much prodding, agrees. “Okay, fine.”

I don’t give her a chance to second-guess her agreement. Gently, I grab her by the arm and turn around to lift her up.

“Wh-what are you doing?” she asks as I wrap a hand around her thigh.

“Putting you on my back,” I say slowly. “You know, like we just talked about.”

“I’m reconsidering.”

“Holley, just get on.”

She frowns and then steps forward again to put both hands to my shoulders. “I think I can get on myself.”

“Fine. Whatever.” Anything to get this show on the road.

I stoop down with a bend of my knees, and she jumps—it is not graceful.

Rather, her hands slip on the slick of my skin, and she starts to fall, scraping at my neck and throat for some kind of purchase and almost knocking the two of us backward. I don’t wait for permission this time—I just grab her thighs and lift her up the rest of the way, wrapping her legs around me and securing her feet at my waist.

She’s silent while I cough, trying to catch my breath after her attempt to crush my windpipe.

“Um, whoops,” she whispers softly.

I shake my head, but I don’t say anything. I’m afraid to even try at this point.

She giggles as I run through the first wave as it crashes around my hips and clings tightly to my shoulders as I approach the next.

It’s coming fast, getting ready to break, and with the height of this one, it’s liable to break right at our heads.

“Hold your breath,” I instruct, just before diving through the body of it.

She stays with me as I shoot under the barrel and surface on the other side, and she screams a little in exhilaration as we come up.