Her hands clenched as she faced me. “What?”
“Why do you garden?” I stared at the lake, wondering what in the hell I was really accomplishing by getting to know her, but that question didn’t stop me. “Dee said you do it so you don’t think. What do you want to avoid thinking about?”
She exhaled roughly. “It’s none of your business.”
Well then. “Then let’s go swimming.”
When I glanced at her, she looked like she wanted to strangle me a little. I dipped my chin before she saw the grin, because I doubted that would help. Stepping to the side, I kicked off my sneakers and then reached down, unbuttoning my jeans. I didn’t need to look at her to know she was watching. I could feel her gaze on me as I shed my jeans and then my shirt.
And I knew she was really staring when the only article of clothing that remained were the swim trunks.
I didn’t look back at her as I stepped to the very edge and then dived in. The rush of cool water immediately scattered all my thoughts, washing them away as I swam underwater. I loved the water. Swimming was a lot like flying, and I could move fast enough that it was damn near close to flying.
When I broke the surface, Kat was still standing there, her face the color of a tomato. I started to tease her, but then decided I really didn’t want to have to chase her ass down when she left. “Are you coming in?”
She dragged the toe of her sneaker in the loose soil at the lake’s edge as she nibbled on her lower lip. Uncertainty bled out from her as her gaze met mine and then fleeted away. Cute. That was kind of cute.
“You sure are shy, aren’t you, Kitten?”
Her foot stilled. “Why do you call me that?”
“Because it makes your hair stand up, like a kitten.” Pushing onto my back, I swam a few feet away. “So? Are you coming in?” When she didn’t move, I figured I was going to have to motivate her. “I’m giving you one minute to get in here.”
Kat squinted. “Or what?”
Twisting around, I moved closer to the bank of the lake, no longer on my back. “Or I come and get you.”
Her mouth pinched. “I’d like to see you try that.”
“Forty seconds.”
Did she really think I wouldn’t do it?
“Thirty seconds.” I smiled, hoping she didn’t do it.
Because I totally would toss her ass into the lake and I would thoroughly enjoy myself.
She snapped into action, muttering under her breath as she reached down with a quick, jerky motion and grabbed the hem of her shirt. She yanked it off and then quickly pulled off her shorts. Then she straightened, her hands on her hips. “Happy?”
Holy shit.
She was not wearing a one-piece, and I got my wish. It was a two-piece red bikini, and yeah, holy shit. All I could do was stare. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this.
Under the plain shorts and shapeless shirts I’d seen her in, Kat was hiding a…a magnificent body full of the kind of curves that made me want to do stupid things. Fun things, but damn, things that would be really stupid considering everything.
I wasn’t staring. I didn’t notice how the blood-red bathing suit stretched across her chest, reminding me of the top part of a heart. I didn’t notice how her body was reacting to the way I was staring at her, because neither of us was moving, and there was something tangible in that moment, like a physical caress. And I sure as hell didn’t count the inch and a half, maybe two inches of skin between her navel and the top of her bottoms.
Aw hell.
Now was a good time to drown myself.
Who was I kidding? I was totally checking her out.
For someone who was so short, her legs appeared incredibly long, but that might’ve had something to do with the skimpy cut of her bottoms—a cut that displayed the fullness of her hips and the surprising tininess of her waist. Muscles low in my stomach tightened as I dragged my gaze over her soft-looking stomach and then farther north. How that red top was staying on was beyond me, and I didn’t know if I should be grateful or disappointed by that.
Average? Had I seriously used the words average or plain to describe her? Hell, this girl…
The old saying surfaced in my heated thoughts. Be careful what you wish for. So true. I wouldn’t have wished for this if I had known how intensely my body would’ve reacted to it, and oh, it was reacting all right.
This plan I’d come up with had to be an all-time dumbass one.
My smile slipped from my face. “I’m never happy around you.”
“What did you say?” she demanded, eyes narrowing.
“Nothing. You better get in before that blush reaches your toes.” And before I really started considering all the stupid shit I could do right now.
And that blush deepened. She walked stiffly over to the edge of the lake where the water was shallow, giving me a view of her backside, and that really did nothing to help dampen the purely physical response.