If for Any Reason (Nantucket Love Story #1) - Courtney Walsh Page 0,18
To eat their food and study their ways? It was a dream, but the kind she kept to herself. Telling anyone else felt too risky, and she didn’t want to jinx it.
She stayed in the water long enough to fill her soul, but not so long she’d end up in trouble for missing lunch. She swam toward the shore just as a trio of guys walked out of the beach grass and onto the sand. They wore swim trunks and carried surfboards.
The closer she got, the clearer they became, and that’s when she saw that one of the guys was holding her clothes.
If she showed up back at the house without them, her mother would have a fit.
She reached the shore, aware of three pairs of eyes on her as she emerged from the water. She’d never seen any of the boys before—they weren’t locals, which meant they were probably here for summer work at the golf club or one of the restaurants. That meant they were probably in college, which suddenly made them more attractive than scary.
“These yours?”
She shielded her eyes from the sun, trying not to look like a dorky high schooler and also trying not to look panicked that this guy was about to play some kind of trick that would leave her clothesless.
“Yeah,” she said. “I guess I was pretty happy to see the ocean.”
“Come on, JD,” one of the other guys said. “We’ve only got an hour.”
They raced off toward the water, jumping face-first onto their surfboards, but the guy who had her clothes—JD—didn’t follow.
“You live here?” he asked.
“Only for the summer,” she said. “My family’s cottage is right up there.”
He tossed a glance over his shoulder, but his eyes quickly returned to hers. “I’m staying at my aunt’s place, but it’s not right on the beach like this.”
She nodded, unsure how to respond.
“I’m working at the country club,” he said. “Do you ever go there?”
“My dad does,” she said.
“Maybe I’ll see him, then.”
But he won’t see you.
She hated how pretentious her parents could be. Ever since she’d first noticed it last summer, it had grated on her, how they seemed to believe they were better than other people just because they had money. It had been the cause of several arguments over the last nine months.
“I’m JD,” he said.
“I heard.” She smoothed her hair back, aware that while women in movies came out of the ocean looking hot and sexy, she likely looked awkward and disheveled.
“Are you going to tell me your name?”
She grinned. “If you want to know it badly enough, you’ll have to find out for yourself.”
He laughed. “Is that right?”
She held out her hand. “My clothes?”
He narrowed his gaze as if trying to decide whether or not to give them back to her. “I would say I’d trade you—your clothes in exchange for you telling me your name—but I have a better idea.”
“Oh, really?” She was flirting now. She’d seen her friends do it plenty of times, but truthfully, she’d never met a boy worth flirting with. The boys at school all seemed so juvenile, and while Isabelle didn’t have an overly high opinion of herself, she wasn’t about to waste her time.
“I figure out your name, and you go out with me,” he said, an endearing cockiness coming over him.
It wouldn’t be difficult for him to figure out her name—her parents were well-known in the community—so agreeing to this was essentially agreeing to go out with a perfect stranger.
A perfectly handsome stranger. Unlike his friends, JD looked like he’d seen sunlight in the last month, his skin a deep-bronze shade, his hair sandy-colored and overgrown in a way that made looking good seem effortless.
Finally she reached out and took her clothes from him, holding them in front of her as if that could keep her from feeling self-conscious about her body.
“So it’s a deal, then?” He extended a hand for her to shake.
Slowly, as if making up her mind, she shook his hand and hid her smile. “Deal.”
He held her hand for several seconds and didn’t seem to have any intention of letting it go.
“So do you like seafood, Isabelle?” The expression on his face turned mischievous, and she pulled her hand away.
She eyed him accusingly. “Do you know my parents?”
Maybe he wasn’t summer help—maybe he’d only pretended to be.
“No, your license fell out of the pocket of your shorts when I picked them up.”