She laughed again. “Since the age of eight. So? Your name?”
“Caleb.” He flopped onto his back beside her and slung his arm over his eyes, breathing heavily. He shook his head, rubbing the upper half of his face against his arm. “Fuck. I’m too stoned to think. I don’t even know how I managed to rescue you without killing us both.”
The way he said it, all serious yet resigned, flushed out the humor in her. “Gee, thanks,” she said, annoyed. “I will repeat it as many times as you like. I didn’t need saving.”
In her periphery, Caleb returned his arm to his side and turned his head so he faced her. “What’s your deal? Did some rich guy break your heart or something?”
The tsk left her lungs before she could stop it. “Sure, because I seem like the type to jump off a cliff because someone broke my heart.”
A beat of silence, then, “Is that why?”
Disbelief at his assumption forced her to face him. Both their cheeks touched the wood, the grain rough against the softness of hers. Inches separated their faces. She felt his breath against her lips. Could he feel hers too?
“I’m not weak. If I was going to kill myself, it wouldn’t be because someone broke my heart.”
“So you admit to the attempt.” His features turned serious again. “What would have happened if I weren’t here, huh?”
She rolled her eyes. This was even more absurd than her actual decision to jump. And he’d asked her what her deal was? “I’m starting to think you have some sort of unhealthy obsession.”
In a flash, he was on top of her, securing her wrists with his hands above her head and trapping her with his weight. That fire she had seen in his eyes earlier reignited. “Didi, promise me, that for whatever reason, you won’t do that again.”
Her eyebrows met. “You’re not making sense.”
He sighed. “Attempting to take your life.”
“It’s called suicide.”
“Didi,” he said between his teeth. “Fuck.”
“Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?”
As if she had struck him, Caleb let go of her wrists and returned to his prone position beside her. “My mother’s dead.”
This time it was Didi who shifted her weight so her face hovered above his. She looked into his eyes and found the pain she had been searching for. “Suicide?”
His nod was so curt she barely noticed it.
Ah, that explained it. No wonder he wasn’t willing to let go of the idea that she was trying to off herself. She was about to speak her sympathy for his admission when he reached up and touched her cheek. His hand was so warm against her skin. It took all of her strength not to lean into the touch. Like being in the water, she felt comfort from the contact. He ran his thumb beneath her eye. If she had turned her head slightly her lips would have touched the center of his palm.
“I know we just met,” he said. “I know I’m no one in your life, but as a favor to someone who saved your life, please . . . Diana . . . Didi . . .”
She closed her eyes and told herself the shiver running down her spine came from the chill caused by her soaked clothes. Yet in the back of her mind she knew the shiver was because her body reacted to the sound of her name in that smooth, steady voice of his.
“Has anyone ever told you you’re demanding after being heroic?”
He chuckled. “You’re the first girl I’ve ever saved, so I wouldn’t know.” He paused. He liked doing that. “Promise me you’ll ask for help instead of taking matters into your own hands. You may not think so, but your life is important not only to you but to those you leave behind.”
Having had enough, she moved away from his touch and sat cross-legged beside him. How to put this into words he would understand without giving him backstory? She tilted her head, then said, “Caleb, you were there. I wasn’t having the best day. Spilling on your girlfriend—”
“Ex,” he interrupted.
“Oh, sorry. The waterworks should have tipped me off. Ex,” she emphasized. “Soaking her and having her scream at me just drove me over the edge. I lost it.” She gave herself a mental high five. People lost it all the time. “Maybe working at the club wasn’t the best job for me.” She curled her fingers around her ankles and shrugged.
Caleb rose to his elbows. “You’re saying you got fired.”
“I’d like to think of it as quitting without pay.”
What she had been telling him all along finally dawned in his eyes. “So you really weren’t trying to kill yourself. . . .”
“Ding! Ding! Ding!” She glanced left, then right as if addressing a gathered crowd before she began slow clapping. “By George, I think he’s got it.”
His lips pursed like he was trying his best not to smile. “You were having a bad day.”
“Getting smarter by the minute, ladies and gentlemen.” She crossed her arms over her chest and winked.
“I overreacted.”