the water, our faces down and the air flowing through the pipes we were using to breathe. And just when I was starting to get comfortable with it, we got to the rocks that made up the small reef attached to Nikos’ island.
And in that moment, I understood exactly why he’d been so excited about the whole thing.
It was an entirely different world, made up of the shimmering light coming through the water, and the push and pull of the waves around us. And in that push and pull, the seaweed from the bottom of the ocean drifted to and fro, exposing and then hiding the rocks again. Fish of every color of the rainbow darted through the rocks and into the safety of the seaweed, stopping to nibble at the plants around them and then disappearing into the darkness between the rocks.
On the ground below us, I saw the shadows of the waves and our own shadows moving along the rippled sand, disrupted every so often by some bottom-dwelling creature. And then we were surrounded by turtles, bumping gently against us as they went toward the rocks for their daily snack.
Modern-day dinosaurs, I thought, fascinated. They were incredibly graceful in the water, gliding through the liquid like they were flying, their bodies perfectly shaped for the slow, easy motions.
They were breathtaking.
And with every new creature, Nikos and I were poking each other and pointing, getting more and more excited with each encounter like children who had never seen an aquarium before, but were now swimming through one.
I could feel my blood humming in my veins at this new underwater world. Feel myself caught in a time that didn’t have anything to do with the world above us. And I felt incredibly, deliriously happy.
Chapter 14
Nikos
The next morning, we were sitting at the breakfast table finishing our pastries and coffee when Trish said she wanted to go snorkeling again. She almost demanded it, in fact, which made me chuckle.
For a girl who had never been snorkeling before, she’d certainly taken to it. And though I was sorely tempted—it had, after all, been the first time I’d been out there in five years, and I’d enjoyed every second of it—I suggested something different.
“You came to Greece,” I told her. “Surely you were expecting to see some ruins as part of your vacation.”
She cocked her head and looked at me like I was actually speaking Greek. “Well, yeah,” she said. “That’s got to be in the top five reasons for coming to Greece, right? Of course I thought about it. It wasn’t the main reason I booked the trip—that was the ocean itself—but it was on my list of things I might do. Still, I…”
She paused and looked at me like she was actually embarrassed about what she was about to say, and I nudged her foot carefully with mine.
“What?” I asked quietly.
It wasn’t like Trish to catch herself before she said something; she wasn’t exactly a person without a filter, but she definitely had no problem speaking her mind. For her to pause like that… well, I wasn’t sure what could have done it. But I desperately wanted to know.
She shrugged and dropped her gaze, a flush creeping up her fair, freckled skin. “I don’t exactly want to go back to the mainland. Not yet.”
I frowned, confused. “And that relates to ruins… how exactly?”
Her gaze came back up to mine, a matching frown of confusion on her face. “Aren’t the ruins all on the mainland? I don’t want to go back there yet. I mean surely I can see them when I… When this…”
She started stuttering again and I felt my heart actually skipping beats. God, she was adorable. Like a little doll that you just wanted to take under your wing and protect with everything you had in you. A doll that might actually smack you for taking liberties like that, but still.
I took the thought, folded it up, and put it into my pocket, not quite willing to look at it… but also not willing to forget about it entirely. Because this woman…
This woman was bringing something out in me that I had thought was dead. And it wasn’t just because she was adorable or blushed a bright pink every time something embarrassing happened. It wasn’t just her dimples or her wild blond hair. It wasn’t just the Texan accent, or the brain that was constantly ticking away behind those bright blue eyes. It was those enormous eyes that looked