She glanced at her friends. Kat was busy letting Zach suck ice cream from her finger while Andie and Curt were debating who’d taken out more opponents during the game. They wouldn’t miss her.

“Why not.” She kicked off her shoes, then handed Luke her cone so she could slip off her socks. Tucking them inside her shoes, she scooted them under one of the chairs.

“Ready?” he asked, handing back her ice cream.

Julia took a taste, savoring the first swipe across her tongue, cold and rich and sweet. Like the sun breaking through the clouds, her mood brightened. It would be nice to spend more time with Luke, especially if they would be alone.

“Ready.” She stepped past him and moved toward the water. “Just promise to walk forward this time,” she instructed playfully. “And remember to keep your eyes open.”

He caught the reference at the same moment he caught up with her, laughing sheepishly. “I only do that when I’m trying to work through a problem.”

His adorable self-deprecating smirk made her heart wiggle like one of the resort owner’s fluffy-butted corgis. Made her want to lick his face instead of her ice cream. Good Lord, she was ridiculous. Julia shook herself. “You can’t walk and think at the same time?”

He bristled. “I was walking.”

“Not very well, if I recall,” she said, provoking his prickly side on purpose.

“I would have been fine if someone hadn’t been standing in my way,” he harrumphed.

“Someone you would have seen if your eyes had been open,” she insisted, taking another lazy lick of her ice cream and relishing his reaction. It was so deliciously fun to see him get all spiky and out of sorts.

His only response was a smirk that looked both annoyed and amused. But then his gaze dropped to her mouth and his expression froze.

Julia paused midlick, the intensity of those gray eyes stopping her in her tracks. With effort, she forced herself to swallow around the sudden lump in her throat.

Meanwhile, Luke hadn’t moved. He stood frozen in place, eyes still on her mouth, while his own cone listed sideways. Then slowly, as slowly as the melting chocolate dripped onto the sand, he bent toward her.

It was just like that first day on the beach, when there’d been this magnetic pull. This feeling drawing her to him. With her shoes off and his still on he seemed even taller, the distance between them stretching and then shrinking as she dug her bare toes into the sand and arched toward him, his lips coming closer … closer …

A piercing cry from above shattered the moment. Julia fell back on her heels, dropping her ice cream in surprise as a flash of white sped toward her. “Ack!” she screamed, jumping back just as the ivory terror swooped in, snatching up her cone.