her head out of the water, stopping in the middle of her lane, midstroke. The abruptness made me wonder if she was ill or something, then she spun around, twisted to face me, and she stared at me.
And I stared back.
My body went into meltdown, unsure whether it was aroused or terrified, as I just stood there, watching her watch me.
She broke the moment by diving underwater, her back arching, her feet pirouetting as she moved beneath the surface, and the next thing I knew, she was at the shallows once more, peering up at me with her feet on the pool floor.
Her speed was insane.
She tipped her head to the side, studying me like I was the one with all the answers. “Why are you here?”
I could have lied. Maybe I should have. “You.”
She swallowed and pried off her goggles. Around her eyes, there were little indents, and I wanted to rub my thumbs over them, ease the itch I knew came with that maneuver.
“I’m training,” she replied, but her huskiness hit me hard. She was just as affected by me as I was by her.
“So am I.” I slipped into the water in the lane beside hers. “No reason we can’t train together, is there?”
I didn’t wait for an answer, just dropped under the water and pushed off from the wall, falling into a freestyle that made me feel like I was flying too.
Knowing she was there, next to me? The same water uniting us? Exhilarating.
I didn’t let up on my training—I couldn’t. Cain would mock me if I did, and I’d be off the swim team quicker than he could flip me off. But after an hour’s solid swimming, I let up, and when I did, I noticed she was sitting on the side of the pool like I had yesterday.
During my training, I’d noticed the place getting busier, but I’d ignored the other patrons, focusing on what I was here for.
Now I could relax, and I ducked under the bobbing lane lines and moved so I was in front of her.
I longed to push my chest to her legs, to move closer, but instead I lay back, tucking my feet into the side of the wall where the drains were.
“You’re fast.”
I shrugged at her remark. “So are you.” And that was an understatement. Though she turned me on something fierce, I eyed her slim limbs, the strength in them, the breadth of her shoulders that only swimming could create, not as a man, but as a fellow athlete. She was power condensed into one small package. “You’re probably the fastest swimmer I’ve ever seen.”
My admission was true. I’d been to the Olympics, for God’s sake. I’d seen athletes win gold, but none of them swam like her.
“My times are good,” was all she said.
“You don’t sound that concerned.” And she didn’t.
“The times are a means to an end.”
Her cryptic comment had me frowning at her. “Why?”
“It means I get to be in the water. It’s my home.”
Well, that was weird, but then, I guessed, Theodosia was odd. At least, faintly.
Not that I was complaining.
I’d decided last night that she pretty much walked on fucking water for seeing Cain for the ass he was.
“Why is it your home?”
“Isn’t it for you?”
I shook my head. “It’s a means to an end—to borrow your words.”
“Tell me yours and I’ll tell you mine.”
The teasing smile gracing her lips made my stomach churn. Not in a way that said, ‘get to the toilet, you need to puke.’ In a way that was like before a test I hadn’t studied for.
Okay, neither were great, but I just felt all twisted inside. Like she was doing that to me, like it was out of my control, but also, I didn’t give a shit.
If she’d keep looking at me like that, keep talking to me—
I sucked in a breath, trying not to get in over my head here. I had to play it cool.
“Mom and Dad have made it pretty clear that we can’t rely on them for college.”
Her brows rose. “How come? Isn’t your dad wealthy?”
That was a curious turn of phrase, and it made me smirk at her. “My dad? Not my mom? Did someone Google me last night?”
Her cheeks pinkened, giving me my answer, but grumpily, she muttered, “Shut up.”
My smirk morphed into a grin, which turned into a laugh. “Yeah. My dad is wealthy. Mom is too now though.”