Nathan chuckled. “So much for being adventurous. How do you think to find adventure if you won’t even get onto a boat?”
Sara bristled at that. “I hardly think that can be equated with adventure. As you pointed out, adventure can come in many forms. Such as trying new things.”
He leaned toward her. “And wouldn’t swimming and then later getting on a boat be new things?”
She had no answer for that.
“So swimming this afternoon?”
Sara stared at him. Nathan had that boyish look on his face. She couldn’t resist.
Sara took two steps in and immediately stepped back out. “Oh good heavens, that is cold!”
Nathan grabbed her wrist and pulled her in. “The best way to overcome it is to run in.”
She resisted. “No, I can’t, it’s too cold.”
“No second thoughts, Nymph.” He scooped her up and strode into the water.
Her arms clung around his neck. “No, Nathan, don’t!” she shrieked.
He didn’t answer, just kept walking until the water was over his waist. She strained against his arms, simultaneously trying to lift herself higher to stay out of the water and to prevent him from dropping her in. “Don’t do this, stop Nathan, please don’t let me go!”
“Close your mouth now,” he instructed in a matter of fact voice.
“Wha—”
Nathan fell backward and submerged both of them, the water cutting off Sara’s shriek. He held firm to the squirming body in his arms, her feet kicking out of instinct while her arms tightened around his neck, threatening to break it. Her red hair swirled around his face, obscuring his vision in a decadent floating swirl. The cold water was invigorating and if he had been alone, he would have stayed under longer. Planting his feet on the sandy bottom, he dug his heels in and pushed them once more above the surface.
Sara took a gulp of air, choking on the water that had been in her mouth. She coughed, trying to clear her lungs. Her body calmed from the shock, the June sun kissing her skin and warming it. She brushed her wet, tangled hair off from her face.
“You are a horrid man,” she accused, her teeth chattering.
Nathan chuckled. “I believe that fact was already well established.”
“I could have drowned.”
“There was not even a remote possibility. I had you the whole time. Do you honestly think I would put you into danger?”
Sara didn’t answer, knowing that he was right. She pushed more hair off her face.
“I’m going to put you down now,” he said. “You will be able to touch the bottom; it is not a deep lake.”
“What will the bottom feel like?” she asked, apprehensive.
He smiled. “It is manmade lake. Nothing to be squeamish about.”
She nodded, the conversation forgotten as she stared at his naked chest. She had seen it before, of course she had. And she had admired it before, the defined muscles under the golden, coarse hair providing a more-comfortable-than-expected pillow. Looking at it now, water glistening on his skin as it traveled down his body in rivulets, accenting those small ridges between his muscles, had Sara’s mouth aching to lick the water off him. It mesmerized her, beckoning her, and she shivered with desire this time.
Nathan pulled her close and Sara rested her cheek against his chest, closing her eyes and inhaling his clean scent. He rubbed his arms along her back and arms, warming her. She became acutely aware of her shift plastered to her body, hiding nothing from his eyes. Her nipples, erect from the cold and desire, poked into him.
She was just about to turn her head to lick his chest when he pulled away. He smiled down at her, the corners of his mouth tilting in just that way to make her stomach flutter. “Feeling better?”
She nodded, her throat dry with disappointment. She didn’t understand how her mind and body could want such different things. It unsettled her to realize how much she was listening to one more than the other.
“Good. The first thing you should learn is how to float. If you know how, you can do anything in the water. Even knowing only this, it will keep you safe. If a boat you are in capsizes, float until you are rescued.”
“If I do ever get into a boat.”