Single Dad Seeks Juliet

I had to swim away—to put some distance between us—for the sake of my survival. I mean, Jesus. From what I know about space stuff, black holes, like, suck stuff in forever, never to be seen again. With the way my hormones were raging, I would have been in the same predicament, for sure.

No turning back.

I shake my head to clear it and grab my belongings from the sink top. The longer I stare at myself in the mirror, the more uncomfortable thoughts start to surface, and I’m not ready to face them.

I make my way along the stalls, up to the front entrance of the bathroom, while shoving my deodorant back down in my bag. I round the corner of the wall at the exit and slam right into a hard body.

“I’m sorry!” I squeak, but firm hands settle at my hips before I can say any more. I’d be lying if I said I could say any more. The truth is, looking up into startling aqua eyes and feeling the sensation of his hands on me again have robbed the voice box right from my throat.

Call the cops, baby. I’m a victim of a crime.

Holy moly, I think I’m losing it.

Jake smiles at me like he can hear all of the thoughts running through my mind. Like he’s acutely attuned to every stupid thing I can’t seem to stop myself from wondering about.

I reach out to grab his tattooed arm—purportedly to push myself back and away—but when a fresh droplet of water sinks into my palm from the skin of his forearm, my vision tunnels and my actions slow. My God…is that droplet of water from his shower? And if so, what other parts of his body might it have touched?

Someone call a doctor. I’m a sick, sick woman.

Slowly, carefully, I extricate myself from his body and try my best to smile without looking like I’ve just been fantasizing about him. It seems like a better option than pretending to be mad again because that means coming up with things to argue about. And he’s funny. It’s not easy pretending like the jokes he makes are annoying.

I have no idea if I succeed in my endeavor to look innocent or not, and I hope I never find out. Because with my track record, the statistics on that one, friends, would not be in my favor.

“You ready to go to breakfast?” he asks casually, like we spend the day together all the time. It’s startling how natural it sounds.

“Yep.” I reach back to the suit hanging over my bag and hold it up for him. “I rinsed out Chloe’s bathing suit, but I can take it home and wash it if you’d like.”

He shakes his head, grabbing it from me. “No problem.”

I watch with startling fascination as he throws it over his shoulder and tucks it close to his throat.

That was just on me—in fact, the crotch of the suit that’s closest to his mouth is still warm from my flesh.

Danger! Danger!

I shake my head to clear it again. What is wrong with me this morning? Who even thinks of something like that? Like, how horny am I?

I point in the direction of my car over my shoulder. “I can drive myself. Probably a good idea.”

He smiles, but he stops himself from laughing at me by biting into the flesh of his bottom lip. “No need. We can walk to breakfast.”

“Walk?” I ask, almost sounding horrified. “How far is it?”

He laughs now. “Just under a block. Don’t worry, you’ll make it without collapsing.” I glare, but he keeps going. “And if you don’t, I’ll pick you up and carry you.”

All attitude and sass, I step around him to start walking, but I’m not paying enough attention to my footing and accidentally step off the sidewalk and into the sand.

It took a full three minutes to get these sandals all done up again—don’t ask me to explain why I chose them—and now one foot is full of sand.

I try to ignore it, even try to discreetly shake the sand out, but it’s beyond annoying. The grains are in all the bad spots, rubbing the skin off my foot with quick precision. I’m going to have to stop and fix it, but that’s going to make it really hard to continue to save face.

Desperate, I transform my gait into a limp. Maybe if I don’t put full pressure on that foot, it’ll survive the walk to the restaurant without needing to be amputated.

“Holley,” Jake remarks behind me, watching me do my best impression of a peg-legged pirate. “Did you step on a scorpion or something? What are you doing?”

“I have sand in my shoe,” I say with a roll of my eyes, finally stopping and bending down to try to get it out.