“What do you think?” He turned around and wiggled his butt—also not helping. But she laughed when she realized his white trunks had a giant red maple leaf on the ass. “I didn’t bring my swimsuit, so when you said you wanted to use the pool, I ran to the gift shop. They were having a massive blowout on their Canada Day stuff.”

“Well, I have my suit on under my clothes, so I’m ready when you are.”

Soon she was standing on the steps in the shallow end of the pool, holding the railing in a death grip.

“This is your first time in a pool?” Sawyer asked gently, coming to stand next to her.

She shook her head. “I don’t know what my problem is. This is a tiny pool. You can see the bottom. Way less scary than that enormous lake.”

“Want me to hold you?”

Yep. Yep, she did. For many reasons, only one of which was the whole fear-of-swimming thing. “Nope. I got it.”

In order to make herself feel like less of a liar, she let go of the railing and started walking. At the edge of the shallow end, she paused and put her hands out, like she used to do in the lake when she was just standing there, willing herself to float.

“Oh no you don’t. Wishing doesn’t make it happen.”

Damn him. He knew her too well.

He was coming toward her. As much as she wanted him to touch her, she couldn’t let it happen. So she gave a little shrieky war cry, lifted her feet off the ground, tilted her body forward, and started paddling.

“All right!” He was leisurely breaststroking alongside her as she huffed and flailed inelegantly.

She stared intently at the far edge and kept moving. Visualizing herself at the end.

And then she was there.

“All right!” he said again. He lifted his hand for a high five, and she slapped it.

And then they did it again—back to the shallow end.

And again back to the deep end. She was rewarded with a display of seemingly genuine delight from Sawyer at the end of every lap.

Could she ever have imagined this, back on the roof of the Mermaid? That she’d be swimming? With Sawyer?

Life had been pretty damn twisty lately.

When Eve came out of Sawyer’s bathroom half an hour later, she was so exhausted, she felt like she’d swum the English Channel. And hungry—she was starving.

As if he could read her mind, Sawyer tossed her a bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos.

“You remembered.”

“Of course.” He winked. “I’ll be right back—just gonna change quick.”