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  But somehow, I knew he wasn’t going to hurt me.

  When we finally got off the train and emerged onto the street, we were near the Boston Harbor. I could smell the ocean.

  “I love that smell,” I said, inhaling the summer night air.

  “Really?” Justin smiled. “That bodes well for me.”

  He led me down to the Boston Harbor Hotel, a huge grand building that was so impressive it almost took my breath away. I was sure there were other, more spectacular buildings in cities throughout the U.S., but up until this point in my life, this was the one of the best ones I had seen.

  “Please tell me we’re not crashing a party,” I said.

  He laughed. “No. Better.”

  He led me down to the water, and we stood on the dock.

  “We’re going swimming.”

  I gaped at him. “Are you crazy?”

  “It’s hot out.”

  “So?”

  “So when it’s hot out, you go swimming.” He grinned and then, like it was nothing, he reached down and pulled off his shirt. His arms were tan and cut, his chest chiseled and smooth. His six-pack flexed as he tossed his shirt onto the dock, and I started to feel a little dizzy.

  “I’m not going in the water.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it’s illegal!”

  He grinned. “You’ve never done anything illegal before?”

  “Not really.”

  “Well, let me tell you a secret about doing things that are illegal.” He motioned me toward him, and I took a tiny step. I didn’t trust myself to be close to him. There was an air of excitement and anticipation thrumming below the surface of our interactions, and I didn’t know what he was going to do – kiss me? Throw me in the water? It was scary and wonderful at the same time.

  “Closer,” he said, teasing.

  I moved closer.

  He rolled his eyes, then closed the gap between us, leaning down so he could whisper in my ear. “Ready for the secret?” he whispered. His breath tickled the skin of my neck, and it was so warm it made the summer night air feel cold. A shiver skittered down my spine.

  “Ready,” I breathed.

  “Things are only illegal if you get caught. And I never get caught.”

  He stepped back and kicked off his sneakers. He sat down on the dock and looked at me. “Come on,” he said. “At least put your feet in.”

  I glanced behind me. The immediate area seemed to be deserted. All of the hotel guests must have been out at fancy dinners or parties. I kicked off my flip-flops and slid my feet into the water.

  “It’s freezing!” I gasped.

  “You’ll get used to it.” He moved closer to me. His leg touched mine, and my whole body, all the way down to my freezing toes, immediately warmed. This was nothing like last night when I was touching Adam’s leg. This was like nothing I’d ever felt before, ever.

  “So, now that your feet are in, you get to ask me one question.”

  I smiled. “Okay.” I thought about it. I wasn’t sure how much more of this whole swimming thing I was willing to do, so I wanted to use my question wisely. At the same time, I didn’t want to scare him off. “Any brothers and sisters?”

  He shook his head. “No. Only child.”

  “Oh.” I was disappointed. I wanted to learn more about his life, and now I felt as if my question had been wasted.

  “You?”

  “One sister. She’s a lot older than me. She lives in Ohio with her husband and my niece, Emily.”

  He nodded. “Do you get along?”

  “We’re close, sort of. I mean, she’s ten years older than me, so there’s always been a little bit of an age thing.” I slid my feet through the water. Justin was right. I was getting used to it.

  “Where do your parents live?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “Nope. No more questions until you do the next thing I want.”

  “Go in the water?” I shook my head. “No way.”

  He moved a little closer to me. “Well, I understand you’re kind of a nervous swimmer,” he said. “And luckily, I used to be a swim instructor.”

  I couldn’t tell if he was teasing me. “Are you serious?”

  “As a heart attack. And I know all about how to help nervous swimmers.”

  “How’s that?”

  “You have to ease them into it,” he said. “Let them get used to the idea before they go in.”

  “How?” I looked down. The ocean was right there, right off the dock. There were no pool steps to walk down, no sandy beach to help ease you into the water.

  “Well, first we have to get you properly dressed.” He reached out, his finger grazing my collar bone, then moving down to trace the top of my tank top.

  “I don’t have a bathing suit,” I said. But I already knew what he meant.

  “I know.” The side of his mouth pulled up into that mischievous grin, and then his hands slid down my arms until they got to the bottom of my shirt. “Arm’s up,” he instructed.

  I was under his spell. I knew I shouldn’t be doing it, but I was powerless to stop. I raised my arms, saying a silent prayer of thanks that I was wearing a lacey black bra. He pulled my tank top over my head and tossed it onto the dock next to his t-shirt.

  Every cell of my body wanted to kiss him, and for a moment, I was sure he was going to kiss me. But then he turned away. “Next question.”

  I’d completely forgotten we were playing that game. “Okay. “ I cocked my head, determined to make this one count. “How did you really break your stitches open?”

  “I told you, I was sparring.”

  “No.” I shook my head. “I want the real story.”

  He sighed. “I got into a fight.”

  “At the gym?”

  He shook his head. “Outside the gym.”

  “Why?”

  He hesitated, like he didn’t know if he should tell me the truth. “Over something stupid.”

  “Like?” I prodded. I could tell it was hard for him, but I wanted to know. If he was going to be taking my clothes off, then I had a right to push him a little bit.

  “Like a jerk said some stuff that pissed me off. So I had to take his ass down.”

  “Are you supposed to be doing that?” I asked. “Fighting outside the gym?”

  “No.”

  I reached up and gingerly touched underneath the line of his stitches. “Does it hurt?”

  “Nah.”

  But I knew it was a lie.

  He turned to me. “Now your turn. Stand up.”

  “How is getting me out of the water getting me ready for getting in the water?”

  “Stand up,” he repeated.

  I did.

  He stood up too, then reached down and unbuttoned his shorts, kicking them off into a pile of khaki. He was wearing navy blue boxers, and his legs were strong and muscular.

  He reached out and grabbed the waistband of my jeans. “You can’t go swimming in these,” he breathed into my neck.

  I didn’t know what to say. I wanted to protest, but I was afraid that if I did, he would listen.

  He unbuttoned and unzipped my jeans, then pulled them down my legs, kneeling on the dock. “Lift your foot,” he told me. “Now the other one.” He pulled them off until I was standing there in just my bra and panties.

  I shivered.

  I wasn’t cold.

  In fact, I had never been so hot in my life.

  “Don’t worry,” Justin said, moving close. “You’ll warm up.” He put his arms around me, until the bare skin of his chest was against mine. I felt like maybe I was going to explode.

  “I’m not cold,” I whispered.

  “Good.”

  My head was against his shoulder, and so I couldn’t see his face.

  “One more question,” he said. “And then we jump in.”

  I thought about it. “Why did you come to my room tonight?” I asked. I held my breath. I wasn’t sure what I wanted him to say.

 
“Because I wanted to see you.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s two questions.”

  “Please.”

  “Because I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

  I nodded, my head against his chest. He wrapped his arms around me tighter.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “I’ll be right there with you.”

  “It’ll be cold.”

  “I’ll keep you warm.”

  He pulled his body away from mine, and held onto my hand. “One… two… three.”

  We jumped. The water was shockingly cold, and when I resurfaced a second later, I was gasping.

  “See?” Justin grinned, splashing me. “I told you it would be refreshing.”

  He swam over to me and pulled me close to him. I wrapped my legs around his waist. “Better?” he asked.

  I nodded. It would have been the perfect time for him to kiss me, and for one amazing moment, I thought he was going to. But instead, he pushed me away and then swam a few strokes. “Come and get me,” he teased.

  We splashed and played in the water for a while, chasing each other, ducking each other, our bodies twirling and moving in unison.

  Eventually, my teeth were chattering so hard, that we had to get out.

  We hoisted ourselves back onto the dock.

  “We don’t have any towels,” I said.

  “Be right back.”

  He headed in the general direction of the hotel, and when he came back, he was holding two fluffy white towels. I looked at him incredulously.

  “What?” he said defensively. “They said we could borrow them.”

  “Right.”

  He wrapped one of the towels around me, rubbing it on my shoulders until I started to warm up.

  Then he reached down and picked up his t-shirt. “You can wear this,” he said.

  “What will you wear?”

  He shrugged and pulled on his shorts. “Don’t worry about me.”

  I put on the t-shirt. It smelled like him. Why hadn’t he kissed me?

  I pulled on my jeans, and they stuck to my wet skin.

  “We need to eat,” he said.

  “Good idea.” I was relieved he wasn’t going to try to end the night. I wasn’t ready to leave him yet. “Where should we go?”

  “My place.”

  “Your apartment?”

  “We’ll order in.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “Come on,” he said. “You said you didn’t know anything about me. I’ll show you where I live.”

  I thought about the paper I still had to write for Dr. Klaxton the next day. I thought about how it was a bad idea to go back to someone’s apartment who I didn’t know. I thought about how gorgeous Justin looked with his shirt off, and what might happen if we were alone, together, in a place with a bed. I thought of about a million other reasons I should say no.

  “Okay,” I said. “Let’s go.”

  JUSTIN

  I opened the door to my apartment, trying to remember if I’d left the place a mess.

  Lucky for me, my roommate Wyatt was a pretty tidy person and the common areas were generally very clean, thanks to him.

  “It’s small, but it’s home,” I said softly, as Lindsay came inside.

  “Yeah, it’s nice.” But she looked hesitant to enter.

  “Don’t worry, Charles Manson doesn’t live here anymore,” I told her. “He moved out last month.”

  She laughed, a sweet sound. I realized that she had just about the prettiest smile and laugh that I’d ever seen.

  Lindsay was shivering a little, still wet from our dip in the ocean.

  “You cold?” I asked.

  “No, I’m fine,” she said, as she hugged herself tightly.

  “Let me turn the heat on,” I said, going to the thermostat.

  “Thanks, Justin.”

  “I like that you call me Justin,” I told her, smiling as I turned up the heat. Wyatt was going to have a bitch fit about the gas bill, but I didn’t give a shit. “It was weird at first, but now I like it. I don’t want you to treat me like everyone else does.”

  “How does everyone else treat you?” she asked, looking at me with those gorgeous blue eyes.

  I wasn’t sure how to answer. Suddenly, my cell phone was ringing, so I had a moment to come up with an answer. I pulled my cell out and looked, only to see a number I didn’t recognize. “I’m not going to answer it,” I said.

  “It’s okay, I don’t mind if you do,” Lindsay said.

  “I don’t want anything to distract me from spending time with you right now.”

  “That’s sweet,” she said, blushing a little.

  “Are you hungry? Thirsty? Do you want some water…or…I don’t know.

  Anything.” I knew we’d talked about ordering food, but now that I had her here, in my apartment, food was the last thing on my mind.

  “I’m fine. Just cold and wet.”

  “Come with me,” I said, taking her hand in mine. Her hand was like a block of ice.

  I led her down the hall to the bathroom. “You take a hot bath and I’ll find you something dry and clean to change into.”

  “No way,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m not getting in your tub.”

  “Why not? You can lock the door and everything.” I showed her the lock.

  “Because it’s weird. And besides, you probably haven’t cleaned that bathtub in years.”

  “I haven’t. Heck, no.”

  “I knew it.”

  “But Wyatt is a regular Mary Poppins up in here, whistling and working and cleaning. I guarantee he’s cleaned our tub like ten times this month.” I showed her the sparkling white bathtub.

  “It does look clean,” she admitted.

  I bent down and turned on the hot water. “Good, it’s decided then.” I walked out to the hall and opened the closet, grabbed her a clean towel. “You just go and have a nice soak and warm up. Okay?”

  Sighing, she nodded, taking the towel from me. Her eyes met mine and I felt another wave of excitement pass over me. I wanted to kiss her so badly, but I also knew now that she really was as pure and sweet as I’d first thought. The fact was, I couldn’t start something with Lindsay and then mess up her life.

  It wouldn’t be fair.

  She deserves better than you.

  Thinking it hurt, but I knew that it was true. Lindsay needed to be with the kind of dude who would end up being a judge someday, not the kind of guy who would end up in front of a judge someday.

  So I left her in the bathroom, trying my hardest not to imagine her peeling off those last few layers of clothing, revealing her creamy, soft skin…trying my best not to remember what it had felt like when I’d touched her body in the ocean and how her eyes looked when the water reflected off of them, how they beckoned me to fall into them forever.

  I went into my room while she took her bath. I changed into a pair of clean shorts and a plain white t-shirt. Then I took a few minutes to straighten up, grabbing the four or five empty beer cans and running them into the kitchen, where I threw them in the trash under the sink.

  “What’s going on?” Wyatt asked, from the front hallway.

  I spun, like I was guilty of some crime. I hadn’t realized he was home. “Huh?

  Nothing. Just cleaning up my room.”

  He frowned. “Since when do you clean your room at, like, eleven o’clock at night?”

  “Look, I have a guest.”

  “Oh.” Wyatt nodded like he understood everything. “Hey, I thought I should tell you, Gil came by earlier while you were out.”

  “Gil?” For a moment, I almost forgot about how dirty or clean my room was.

  “What did he say?”

  Wyatt shook his head and his expression was one of confusion. “He wasn’t making a whole lot of sense. He said he wanted to talk to you about something, and I told him he could hang here and wait for you, but he couldn’t sit still.”


  My guts started to churn. “Was he high?”

  “I don’t—”

  I stepped towards him. “Dude, was he fucked up or not?”

  “I told you, I don’t know, JB. Don’t get pissed off at me, I’m just telling you what happened.”

  I calmed down immediately, feeling guilty for my outburst. “Sorry, I just get worried about him.”

  “I know you do. We’re all worried about Gil. Not just you.”

  And then he walked out of the kitchen and a few moments later, I heard the door to his room close again.

  I thought about Gilbert. I was worried and annoyed and then, finally, angry at him.

  This was his pattern. He’d come back to town after being away in jail and cause me to worry and throw my life into chaos. He’d done it before. At any moment, he might do something so crazy that he’d be dead or in jail again. He was my best friend, more than a brother to me, and there wasn’t a thing I could do to stop him.

  “Hello? Justin?” I heard Lindsay call out from the bathroom.

  Quickly, I walked down the hall. “Hey, I’m here.”

  “I’m done my bath. Did you have something for me to change into?”

  “Oh, yeah.” I ran back to my room and got some sweatpants and another t-shirt. I was expecting to pass them to her through the bathroom door, but when I turned around, Lindsay was standing there in her towel.

  My breath was nearly knocked out of me, she was so beautiful. I could see the swell of her breasts, and the towel only came down to the tops of her thighs. It didn’t leave all that much to the imagination. She looked confidently at me, clearly wanting something.

  This was my moment.

  But once again, I hesitated. To do this now would change everything, and I was certain I would only screw Lindsay up if I took advantage of her interest in me. She didn’t know the half of how fucked up my life was.

  Instead of throwing her on the bed and ravishing her the way I wanted to, I just gave her the clothes instead. “You stay here and change,” I said, looking away. “I’ll wait outside.”

  “Okay.”

  I sensed confusion and disappointment in her voice, but I ignored it.

  Stay with the game plan. Don’t drag her into your world.

  I waited outside for a while and then she called me back in. “Is everything okay?”

  she asked. She could sense something, but how could I explain to her that I wanted to touch her and kiss her and I was fighting it with every ounce of strength in my body?