“I’d like to put it on before we get out of the water,” she said as pleasantly as she could.

He pulled his gaze from her breasts and started moving again. “It’ll be easier to get you warm on the beach.”

“Stop! Will you just stop!”

He did, but he was looking at her as if she’d sprung a fresh leak in the head.

She took a nibble out of her bottom lip. No good deed went unpunished, and she was going to have to tell him. “I have a slight problem …”

“I’ll say. You don’t have any sense. That Northwestern diploma you’re so proud of should have read ‘summa cum loony.’  ”

“Just give me your T-shirt. Please.”

He made no move to take it off. Instead, he grew suspicious. “What kind of problem?”

“I seem to have … I’m really cold. Aren’t you cold?”

He waited, that stubborn expression clearly indicating he wasn’t going anywhere until she’d ’fessed up. She mustered her dignity. “I seem to have …” She cleared her throat. “Left the bottom half of my swimsuit … on the bottom.”

Naturally, the first thing he did was stare straight down into the murky water.

“Stop that!”

As he gazed back up at her, his eyes looked less like jade daggers and more like happy green jelly beans. “How did you do that?”

“I didn’t do it. You did. When you rescued me.”

“I pulled off your suit?”

“You did.”

He grinned. “I’ve always been damn good with women.”

“Never mind. Just give me your stupid T-shirt!”

Was it accidental that his thigh brushed her hip? He gazed down into the water again, and she was possessed with a sudden crazy wish for all the murkiness to clear away. She heard something husky and seductive in his voice.

“So what you’re telling me is that you’re bare-ass naked under the water.”

“You know exactly what I’m telling you.”

“Now, this makes for an interesting dilemma.”

“There’s no dilemma.”

He stroked the corner of his mouth with his thumb, and his smile was as soft as smoke. “We’re up against the essence of true capitalism right here, right now, you and me, God bless America for the great country it is.”

“What are you—”

“Pure capitalism. I have a commodity that you want—”

“My leg is starting to cramp again.”

“The question is”—he lingered over his words, his eyes grazing her breasts—“what are you going to give me for that commodity?”

“I’ve been giving you my services as a cook,” she said quickly.

“I don’t know. Those sandals yesterday were pretty expensive. I think I’ve already paid for at least three days of cooking.”