Up To Me (Shore Secrets #1)

Chapter Nine

Ella poured a few drops of the sample massage oil into her palms and rubbed. Sniffed. Inhaled the fresh scent of cypress and vetiver and something else. A base note of cedar, maybe? Definitely some tangerine, but that wasn’t what stumped her. Drat. She’d have to cheat and read the label. Good thing Brooke wasn’t around to notice her undeveloped aroma sense. Giving in to impulse, she raised her hands back to her face. Sniffed again, and wondered how it would smell on Gray’s skin. How it would feel to rub it across his chest. To slide slickly through the strip of dark hair that bisected his pecs.

“You must really like that new oil. Your expression’s practically orgasmic,” said Brooke.

Her eyes flew open. When had she even shut them? “It’s got, um, potential.”

“As much potential as a certain dreamboat of a guest?” Brooke teased. “Because this isn’t the first time today I’ve seen that goofy smile on your face. You were wearing it an hour ago when you were loading towels into the dryer. I think your not-yet-a-boyfriend’s the reason.”

“Fine. You got me. Thinking about Gray puts a little spring in my step.”

“A little? You could moonlight as Tigger, you’re so sproingy.”

Out of reflex, Ella smoothed a hand over the turquoise scarf around her ponytail. Her mood might be springy, but her outward appearance needed to reflect nothing but a collected professional. Even with the spa officially closed for the night. “The morning started with a terrific breakfast with him. Every client was on time, and I treated my hands to a paraffin dip over lunch. All things considered, a pretty great day. The only hitch is that the mail isn’t here yet. I’m expecting swatches of some bamboo sheets I’m thinking about using on the massage tables. The company promised I’d get them today.” She glanced down at the clock on her computer screen. At just past six, it was too late to call. “Maybe I should email them and check.”

Brooke caught her at the elbow before she sat down. “Don’t bother. I’ve got the mail. I hid it.”

This ought to be good. Or at least a good excuse to tease her friend. “Why? Start a magazine subscription that embarrasses you? What’s your new obsession—scrapbooking? Recipes from the heartland for gelatin salads?”

“I hid it because I could tell you were having a good day.” From the deep, bottom desk drawer Brooke retrieved a stack of envelopes and catalogues rolled up into a rubber band.

“Geez, you know all the bills are up to date. You’re the one who pays them. So what’s in there that could be so terrible—a notice for jury duty?”

“Worse.” Silently, she handed over a large manila envelope.

Amazing how the sight of that all-too-familiar kelly green logo on a mailing label could send Ella’s day straight into a tailspin. “Fuck.” Good thing their last client of the day hadn’t lingered, or she’d have gotten an earful. Ella found it physically impossible to restrain her language whenever she spotted that logo. “Again? So soon?”

“They sent the last reminder almost two months ago. In fact, Taft, Riggles & Levinson sent this one certified mail. Guess they wanted proof that somebody would actually look at it.”

“I look at everything my lawyers send me. I’m not irresponsible. In fact, there’s a very specific ritual I go through.” She grabbed the letter opener and neatly slit open the top. “I pull out all the papers. Skim them to be sure it’s the same old, same old.” With a precision gleaned by repeating these motions month after month, Ella tapped the papers into perfect alignment at their corners. Then she started with the envelope. Tore off a long, thin vertical strip. Tossed it in the air. Tore another, a little faster. And kept going.

“You realize how immature this is, don’t you?”

“Says the woman who still wears a headband with bunny ears at Easter and puffy hearts on Valentine’s Day.” Rip. Toss. Repeat.

“That’s a low blow. Besides, my holiday headbands are whimsical, not immature.”

“Says you. I say that tearing my way through this stack of papers is cathartic, not immature.”

“You’re making a mess.”

“I’ll clean it up. Or have one of the seventeen maids that work for Mayhew Manor come on in and go wild with a broom and dustpan.” Rip. Toss. Ella moved on to the first page of the letter. Delighted in tearing right through their hated logo.

“What’s going on? Are you singlehandedly prepping for a tickertape parade?” Gray kicked at the growing pile of scraps on the floor.

Okay. She could spare a couple of seconds from this burst of temper to appreciate Gray’s droll take on the situation. Some guys would’ve run the other way at the emotional instability she must be radiating. Yup, Gray could apparently roll with the punches. In gratitude, Ella tossed back the calmest response she could muster. “I’m dealing with today’s mail.”

“Guess I won’t be sending you any postcards. Or even a birthday card.”

Brooke pushed out an exhale long enough to blow up a trio of balloons. “If this is still going on by Ella’s next birthday, there’ll be serious hell to pay.”

“Now I’m really curious.” Gray looked back and forth at both of them. “Is somebody going to explain?”

Rip. Toss. “Nope.”

“Sure,” Brooke said, almost on top of her attempt to shut the topic down.

That was enough to finally still the automatic, repetitive motion of Ella’s hands. She and Brooke crossed the line between friends and colleagues at least a half dozen times a day. In their case, it was much more of a dotted line. The only time Ella asserted her authority as boss was when she bestowed the annual raise. But this—opening up this deep wound to Gray—crossed about two miles over that imaginary line. Mostly because she didn’t want to talk about it with anyone. Not with Brooke, Gray, her therapist, and certainly not with the law firm who sent the darned thing to her in the first place.

In the coldest tone possible, Ella said, “This is a private matter, Brooke.” Coupled with the ice daggers she stared at her friend, there could be no mistaking the command to drop it.

The out-of-the-ordinary command popped Brooke’s eyes super wide. She froze that way for a second. But then she pursed her lips and crinkled her nose, clearly unfazed. “So’s your bra size, but it’s kind of obvious that Gray knows that by now, too.”

Comments like that were exactly why Ella adored Brooke. She could knock the serious out of any situation. Her upbeat spirit always turned around the frowns caused by the grumpiest of clients on the worst of days. Ella just wasn’t used to having that particular superpower aimed at her. Nevertheless, her lips tugged up into a smile.

Gray stepped away, hands up. “No comment. I don’t kiss and tell. Especially with a woman I’m officially not-dating.”

Toying with the oversized buttons on her cropped navy sweater, Brooke opened her mouth. Closed it. Took a deep breath and started again. “Look, the contents of that envelope are no secret. You wrote about it in the journal when you got the first delivery. All seventeen of those maids you so blithely mentioned probably know by now. And this—” she snatched the last paper from Ella’s hands, “—ridiculous coping method Dr. T. gave you isn’t resolving anything.”

True. But it was all she had. It felt wrong to not follow Dr. Takeuchi’s advice until she had a better alternative. “Ripping this paper to shreds is as much real medical advice as taking two aspirin and calling in the morning.” The defense sounded hollow even to Ella’s ears. From the way Brooke rolled her eyes, she didn’t buy it either.

“I’m going home and taking two beers. Gray, she’s all yours.” Brooke grabbed her lime green slicker from the coat tree and slung her purse over her shoulder. “The negligence lawsuit against the guy who killed Ella’s parents netted her a chunk of change. A big one. But she refuses to accept it. Every couple of months the lawyers send out more paperwork. And every couple of months, I’ve got a pile of confetti to clean up the next day. Classic stalemate. If you can get her out of it, I’d be grateful.”

Brooke flipped the sign to closed and locked it behind her. Ella looked at the shredded paper at her feet. Knew that to be a good boss, and a better friend, she should darn well grab the dry mop and clean it up herself.

“Feel any better?”

A mental scan didn’t take long. “No.”

“Your doctor’s a putz.”

That jolted a laugh out of her. “To be fair, he recommended this during a frantic, five-minute phone consultation. And it used to make me feel better. I’d see the envelope and my stomach would twist. I’d cry for hours on end.”

“Why?” Gray’s question was simple. The feelings she got, however, when he put his hand on top of hers were not. A jumbled jolt of sympathy, caring, understanding, peace . Although he said only a single word, his touch conveyed an entire paragraph.

Nobody had asked her a question like that in so long. Nobody wanted to bring it up and awaken the sleeping monster of her grief. So no, Ella still didn’t want to talk about the missive from the lawyers. But Brooke was right. Not talking about it sure wasn’t working. And Gray was a fantastic listener. Not pushy. Just…present.

She flipped over her hand to lace her fingers through his. “Because they were trying to force blood money on me. Here, your parents are dead, so we’ll reward you with a check for one million, five hundred thousand dollars. Like that would make it all better. Like that would make it better at all? Yes, the guy who ran into them technically killed them. But I’ve already told you that I shoulder a boulder-sized load of guilt for their death as well. My stubborn, prideful actions put them in harm’s way.”

“Nope. No way.” Gray sounded surprisingly stern, like he was reprimanding her. “We covered this already. Sure, you’d rather have a toy ring from a cereal box than a big-ass check. Hell, I think you’d rather have kidney stones than accept that check. But you are not so self-centered as to take even a portion of the blame for their death.”

“Self-centered?” Her almost-cooled temper seared back to life. But this time, instead of being aimed at the lawyers, it sparked right at Gray. Ella crouched, scooped up the shredded paper with her hands and dumped it into the white wicker wastebasket. “Quite a judgment for you to make, from your vantage point of being on the outside looking in.”

“You have no idea.”

“And you have no idea what shouldering this blame feels like. A couple of heartfelt conversations don’t give you the right to presume you know what I’m feeling.” Ella glared up at him. Surprisingly, Gray’s eyes were shut, his lips pinched into a thin line. What was he so upset about? She was the one full of righteous annoyance.

“I happen to be an expert on blame and guilt. Years of experience in the topic.” Gray’s eyes reopened, but didn’t fully focus. Whatever he was seeing, it wasn’t in the spa. A deep chord of pain resonated through his words. “Trust me when I say you are not responsible for anyone else’s actions. Every life is a made up of a million different choices every day, big and small. That’s why the Butterfly Effect is such a powerful concept.”

Hmm. Didn’t sound so much like he was pretending to walk in her shoes. More like he was revisiting his own demons. She certainly couldn’t take offense if that was the case. And it was a glimpse at the history he so carefully guarded. Dusting off her hands, Ella stood. “What’s that?”

“A time-travel theory. Ray Bradbury wrote a great short story about it, ‘A Sound of Thunder.’”

“You don’t have the look of a sci-fi aficionado.”

“What do they look like?”

“Pasty. Pale,” she teased. “Unable to sweet-talk a girl into middle-of-the-night kisses the day they meet.”

“Good thing I wore my sexy stud disguise that night.” At her blank look, he added, “The robe you made fun of?”

As if she’d ever forget a moment of that night. Especially how his muscled legs looked coming out the bottom of it. Or that where it gaped open in front, his chest bore a line of dark and sexy hair. But on principle, Ella couldn’t let him believe that his bathrobe alone would ever catch him a woman. “That robe’s a crappy studly disguise, unless you’re trying to seduce someone who’s post-menopausal.”

“Ouch.”

“It was what I saw underneath the robe that…oh, never mind.” He’d pissed her off this evening. So Gray didn’t deserve to know just how well she could still picture his tanned skin. Or that the thought of it kicked up her internal temperature until her cheeks should be the bright crimson of a candied apple. “Tell me about the butterfly thing.”

“Basically, if you went back in time a couple of thousand years and killed a butterfly, or pulled out a weed, it would start a cascade effect. When you came back to the present day, things would be different. Maybe that species would be extinct. Maybe the color blue would be illegal. Maybe Germany would’ve won World War II.”

“It’s an interesting premise. Basically, if my mother had stubbed her toe on the way out the door that night, they would’ve been running forty-five seconds later? Thus avoiding the crash completely?”

“Simplistic, but yes. That’s why you can’t shoulder the blame any more, Ella.”

“I’ve let a lot go.”

“You shouldn’t feel even a tiny bit.”

So he’d dropped his guard and hinted at his own heartache for a whopping two sentences before turning the conversation right back around to her. Ella appreciated that he cared. That he made the effort to reassure her. But the gaping chasm between what she shared and what he hid needed to be filled. She couldn’t take the lopsidedness any more.

“This—” she swung her hand between them, slower than if pushing through deep water, “—this thing between you and me has gotten very real. Very intense. Very fast.”

Gray nodded. “Skipping the usual first-date conversation left us with nothing to do but jump ahead. Feels like we’re having fortieth-date conversations.”

“Well, it feels like I’m doing all the talking, and you’re just listening. I’ve shared enough all by myself. It’s time to turn the tables.”

Gray jerked his thumb toward the door with a weak grin. “I think that’s my cue to leave.”

Pretty much what she’d expected him to say. That just meant Ella had to push harder, delve deeper. Because either he opened up to her tonight, or this…non-dating… thing of theirs was over. She’d dropped her guard from the get-go. Gray still wore about three suits of emotional armor. Ella damn well intended to strip them all off.

“I’m serious. You’re pulling all this soul-searching stuff on me. It’s only fair you reveal something deep and dark to me. Everybody’s got something. And with your vague comments about guilt and blame, I’m pretty sure you’re hiding a doozy of a secret.”

He startled at her words. But still said nothing. Could he be scared? Did he not think she was trustworthy? Or not worth the effort? Why wouldn’t the man freaking talk to her?

Ella grabbed her keys from the desk drawer. “A change of venue should help. Come with me. But talk while we walk. What makes you the expert on handling blame?” She turned off the lights. Jiggled the knob to be sure Brooke had locked the door when she left. Took Gray’s hand to lead him down the pale green hallway past all the treatment rooms. And wondered if she’d pushed too hard. Gray was silent. He came with her, without resistance, but also without words. Finally, he squeezed her hand twice then held on tight.

“I haven’t hidden the fact that I don’t like small towns. My hometown—well, it tainted me against anything smaller than a metropolis with, at the very least, their own baseball and football teams.”

Ella unlocked the door to what looked like a closet. What was in fact not only a closet, but a secret passageway. “Why?”

“My mom and I were persona non grata there for three years. Mom stayed because she had nowhere else to go. I stayed to get my diploma…which got me a full ride to college. Never looked back.”

She lifted the empty shelf third up from the bottom. With a squeak, the back wall swung outward, revealing a steep stone staircase. “Okay, again, I have to ask why. What turned them against you?”

“Holy hell, Ella, what is this place?” Gray stood on the top step, peering down into the darkness.

“The Manor was built at the start of Prohibition. My relatives weren’t fans, to say the least. They’d hide wine barrels and casks of hard spirits down here until transport could be arranged. Hence the secret passageway. Grandpa Mayhew transformed it from a storage room back in the ’50s.”

Ella walked down four steps, reached up and pulled the string to turn on the lights. The sight of the enormous swimming pool in the center of the stone cavern drew an amused chuckle out of Gray.

“Not that I object, but aren’t we breaking some rules sneaking around down here? Because the note on my dresser says the pool’s closed this week.”

“It was. The chemical balance was off. Not that much, but we don’t like to risk our guests’ health. But the pool company gave me the all-clear right before you showed up. It’ll open to everyone tomorrow. Tonight, however, it’s just for us. All the doors to it from the gym are locked. Guaranteed privacy for you to spill your deep, dark secrets.”

Rough-cut stones edged the pool, some big enough to lie upon. More curved up into high lips almost covered in cascading water. Fat stone pillars (exactly seven strokes apart, as Ella knew well) were staggered the length of the pool and the two whirlpools. Brass sconces topped the pillars and threw cool, blue light across the top of the room echoed by the underwater lighting.

“Take off your shoes and socks,” she ordered as they descended. “Nothing relaxes you at the end of the day like cooling your feet in a pool.”

Plus, the low lighting should make it easier for them to continue to spill the shadows on their souls. Ella needed to know what put that haunted look in Gray’s eyes. Sure, a small part of it was about equity. Pretty embarrassing talking about her emotional meltdowns and not getting any equally embarrassing dirt from him. But more than that, she cared about Gray. Truth be told, she cared about him much more than even made sense, given how short a time they’d known each other. And in order to fix whatever made him so unhappy, she had to start by learning the cause.

They settled on a low, smooth boulder. Gray rolled up his jeans. Just the sight of his ankles, dusted with dark hair, sent another pulse of heat into Ella’s belly. Bare feet and ankles immediately transported her mind straight to the bedroom. How those feet would look on top of kicked-off sheets. How they’d look tangled around her own legs. Which was even easier to picture once she tucked her denim skirt under her knees, pulled off her turquoise Converse and dangled her feet in the water next to his.

“Relaxed now?” she asked.

Gray’s right eyebrow shot up into an arrow. “After two seconds? Not so much. How about you check back after I’ve at least blinked a couple of times?”

Okay. So she was a little bit eager to turn the tables and get the goods on Gray. He’d been on a roll, and she didn’t want the quick break to sideline him from continuing. “I’ll ask again once you finish your story.”

“Spoiler alert—it won’t be good.” Even in shadowy profile, Ella could see his lips compress into a thin, tight line. He fisted his hands on the rock, pressing down hard enough to make the tendons on his forearms stand out. “You’ve shared some powerful things with me. Your openness is the only reason I’m about to tell you about my fucked-up life. I don’t go around blabbing this to anyone. Ever. Which I’m sure your ex-shrink would have a field day with.”

“I could swing a friends-and-family discount for you with Dr. T.,” she teased. The words didn’t reveal the double-time kick of her heartbeat. Ella wanted to know his story. Heck, she wanted to know everything about Gray. This sounded like a major revelation, though. The kind that changed everything. And even though it had been her idea, Ella was suddenly unsure about yanking the lid off of Gray’s emotional baggage.

“If I don’t want to tell you my sob story, I sure as hell don’t want to tell a shrink.” He shook his head. Cracked his neck. In other words, stalled. “Regardless, fair is fair. So here goes.”

But he didn’t launch in right away. First, Gray kicked his feet slowly through the just-warm-enough water. Waited until the ripples he’d created drifted past the first stone pillar. “I grew up in a small town. So small that nobody locked their doors. Not until my sophomore year in high school.”

“What changed?”

“A girl in my class, Laura Costello, woke up, middle of the night, to discover a man standing over her. One of his hands held a camera. The other was pulling the sheets down. She screamed. Her brother came running. Pounded the shit out of the man. Probably would’ve killed him if the police hadn’t arrived so quickly.”

Ella slid a hand over to cover his still-tight fist. Maybe to comfort herself as much as to comfort him. “That’s horrible.”

“It gets worse,” he said with a sardonic upswing to his voice. “They haul the guy off. The next day they’ve got a search warrant for his house. In the attic they find a box of pictures. Photos of at least half the women in town. Going back almost twenty years. He’d been sneaking into bedrooms, watching these women at their most vulnerable. Occasionally stealing trophies as well. Little stuff. Trinkets, the odd pair of panties that people wrote off as misplaced or forgotten. But things they recognized once the police brought them to the station, because they were a subject in a photo.”

He told the story as though reciting it from a newspaper article. Like a disinterested third party. Which clued her in to how deeply personal it must be, that he had to distance himself from the telling. Ella didn’t need to ask the obvious question. She was already quite sure of the answer. And it broke her heart. But she thought that Gray needed to say it out loud. “Who was the man?”

“My father. Joseph Locke. Currently a resident of Elmhurst Federal Correctional Facility.”

“Oh.” She breathed in deeply of the chlorine-tinged air. The acrid scent helped cut through the tears choking the back of her throat. “Oh, Gray, that must be awful for you.”

“Which?” Another kick at the water. “A father in prison? Knowing why he went there in the first place? Or essentially losing my father at age fifteen?” He kicked harder after each question, until both of them were soaked to the knees. The splashing echoed loudly as it slapped against the rocks.

“All of the above, I imagine.” Ella didn’t know which facet was worse. She could only imagine the multiple levels of pain and betrayal and loss that the teenaged Gray had faced. Still faced today, probably, given the sharpness of his tone.

Gray waited until all the ripples subsided to speak again. “The town hated us. Froze out me and my mom. Blamed us for whatever had warped in his mind. But we were flat broke after paying Dad’s legal fees. So we stuck it out.”

“ You weren’t to blame.” The lack of caring, the lack of basic human sympathy from his neighbors shocked her. To Ella, a community had a responsibility to pull together and help their own. No matter what. “For crying out loud, you were a child. How could they possibly blame you?”

“Yeah. But the worst part? Dad wouldn’t see me.” Gray crossed one arm tight over his chest. Propped the other on it and stretched his hand across his forehead, holding his temples as though they pounded. Or maybe it was the pain of finally letting all these emotions out.

“From the day they took him to jail, he refused to speak to me. Yeah, I was disgusted by what he did. Wanted to scream at him for how he ruined my life, and my mother’s.” His voice, already low and with a hitch in it, dropped to a raspy rumble. “But this small part of me wanted to tell him, one last time, what a good father he’d been those first fifteen years. Thank him for teaching me how to throw a curve ball. How to whistle. For not laughing when I cried after he pulled out my first tooth.”

Ella couldn’t take it anymore. She crab-walked back until she sat behind Gray, pulling him flush against her body in an embrace. They both needed to be soothed after that story. He grabbed onto her hands, tight. Rolled his head into her shoulder and just breathed, hard and long, for a few minutes. She breathed with him, marveling at the strength it took to rise above such tragedy and isolation to become the thoughtful man he’d shown himself to be with her.

Finally some of the tension drained out of him. Gray reached down to caress her ankle. “Six months ago, he started emailing me.”

His words shocked her. “About what?”

“He wants to see me.”

The nerve of the man. To ignore his child for years and then think he had any right at all to ask for a single thing? Ella had to fight to keep her outrage in check. Gray didn’t need her getting him any more worked up. As calmly as possible, she asked, “After all this time without a word? Why?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t opened any of them. I’ve built up a lot of anger about his sixteen-year radio silence. Too much time has passed.” He twisted around to look at her. “But what if he’s sick? Do I have an obligation to talk to him? The man who didn’t check to see if I was alive or dead all this time? I can’t wrap my brain around whether or not I should feel guilty about not answering him.”

This was a no-brainer. She tightened her hold, as if trying to press the words into him. “You can’t carry guilt about your father, seeing him or not. He made his choices, and has to live with them. How you live with his choices is out of his hands.”

“You mean it’s all up to me?”

Ella bit her lip. How had Gray’s completely different situation ended up mirroring her own? “Yes. You’ve got to protect your heart, first and foremost. Nobody else will look out for it as well as you can.” And that was probably enough heart-wrenching sharing for both of them. Hopefully he’d take her words to heart as easily as she took his. She touched his cheek. Smoothed a finger along the shadows beneath his eyes. “You look stressed.”

“Well, we’re not exactly talking baseball stats here.”

His humor and resiliency amazed her. Gray was a man she could fall hard for—and if she had to be honest with herself, had already started that tumble. Not that it mattered. He’d be gone in just over a week. But Ella could pack a lot of fun into the days they had left together. Over the last six months she’d bounced all the way back to normal. Embracing this time with Gray would seal her leap back into embracing life fully, the way she used to.

“Nevertheless, it’s my job as manager of the spa to make sure my guests leave looking happier and more relaxed than when they arrived. You’re going to be walking bad press. Come do yoga with me tomorrow.”

“I’m a guy. We’re all about being hard and stiff, not soft and bendy.”

Ella blinked rapidly to clear the images of a naked, hard-muscled Gray that popped into her mind. And hardness…other places. “Don’t be so close-minded. Didn’t you end up enjoying the massage I gave you?”

“Yes.” He sounded adorably sulky at being forced to acknowledge it. Why was it that men found it so hard to admit when they were wrong? Definitely a topic of discussion for her next margarita night with the girls.

“See? You can’t dismiss something out of hand without at least trying it.”

Gray wrinkled his nose. “Do I have a choice?”

“No.” Ella brought up her other hand to cup his face. “You deserve to be looked after. It’s not much, I know, but let me help you in the only way I can.”

“I’ll do it—”

Ella bounced a little. “Terrific.”

“—on one condition. I’ve just come up with a good plan for stress release. Let’s try my way first.” Gray wove his fingers through the loose knit of her turquoise sweater. In one swift move, he pulled it off over her head and tossed it into the corner. “Come swimming with me. Right now.”

Was he serious? To stall for time while she processed the preposterous suggestion, Ella stammered, “We…we don’t have suits.”

“You said the pool’s still officially closed. No one will interrupt us.” He toyed with the strap of her matching tank. “You’ve got this thing. I’m wearing boxer briefs. We’ll be more covered up than in suits. Unless you don’t think you can control yourself around me?”

That was it in a nutshell. Not that she’d admit it to Gray. Not when he had that sharp eyebrow arched and a smug quirk to his lips. If he was trying to shock her…well, he had, no denying that. But what better way was there to embrace life fully than to embrace a dripping wet, mostly naked Gray? While she’d never work up the courage to tell him, this was the kind of activity Dr. T. would probably applaud. Or at least give her a gold star. He had asked her to email him with progress reports if anything big happened. Unable to resist, she glanced down at Gray’s crotch. Ella expected something very big, indeed, was about to happen.

“Water’s extremely therapeutic,” she said in her most serious, I’m massaging you but not judging your naked body in any way professional voice. “Swimming is a good counterpart to yoga. They use the same long muscles.”

Yup. Her matter-of-fact delivery dropped his eyebrow back to its usual straight line and wiped the smug from his lips. Ella kept the surprises rolling. She stood, unbuttoned her skirt and let it slide the floor into a big blue puddle. Then she reached out, grabbed his wrist, and yanked him sideways into the pool with her.

The simultaneous body flops slapped noise and water all around the room. Ella recovered first, treading water while waiting for Gray to get his bearings and surface. Keeping her head above water was easy. Breathing, however, was not, as she was laughing her head off at catching him off guard. Finally, with much thrashing and churning of the water, Gray popped up near the middle of the pool.

“What the hell?” he yelled, his voice bouncing off the rocks with a hollow echo. “I’m wearing clothes!”

“So take them off,” she yelled back. Geez, it was his idea. Ella had just implemented it without talking it to death first. She’d thought he’d appreciate her spontaneity.

Gray stared at her for a minute, totally unreadable. Then his head disappeared beneath the water again. In fact, he sank straight to the bottom. It worried her. But just until a heavy, sodden pair of jeans landed like a giant blue spitwad in front of her. Laughing, she tossed them over her shoulder in the general direction of their shoes. Then Gray’s shirt appeared, floating near the filter. Something she’d have to remember to retrieve before morning when maintenance would make their final sweep before reopening the pool.

She felt Gray first. His head brushed against her stomach. Using her body like a swim ladder, he climbed it with his hands until just those brilliant blue eyes broke the surface. Blinked at her once. Then he tilted his head back and arced a stream of water from his lips to the dead center of her forehead. Laughing even harder, Ella reached under his shoulders to pull him the rest of the way up.

That’s when the laughter stopped. When buoyancy slammed his oh my God so hard cock right against her. When it was the most natural thing in the world to wrap her legs tight around him to keep him nestled against all her heat and what felt like every freaking nerve ending in her body. And when she twined her arms around his neck just for the thrill of rubbing her breasts across his chest.

With two powerful kicks, Gray propelled them to the wall. He sandwiched Ella against it and hung on to the rocks to keep them both afloat. “I’m on board with your idea. As you can tell.” He ground against her in a way that absolutely proved not only that he was enthusiastic about stripping, but that there was definitely nothing between them other than two thin, skintight layers of cotton. Gray’s impressive length was no longer just an impression or wishful thinking. It was hard and long and she couldn’t wait to impale herself on him. For now, she locked her ankles together and let the water do most of the work of bobbing her up and down in a rhythmic, full-body caress.

Water glistened at the tips of his lashes. Ella kissed it away, then just kept heading south. Over his early-evening stubble. Down past the Adam’s apple that jerked reflexively. She’d always thought them sexy. So uniquely masculine.

A nibble in the hollow of his collarbone. Down till her lips were just underwater, closed around his nipple. Ella flicked it against her teeth. Gray…growled? Whatever the noise was, it came from deep inside him and turned her core body temperature up by about twenty percent.

“That’s enough,” he said roughly. “Swimming was my idea. I should get a turn.” But to her surprise, Gray gently extricated himself from their embrace. Flipped around and boosted himself out of the water.

Wow. As water sluiced down his chest, down his muscled legs, all that hotness couldn’t keep Ella from honing in on what his boxer briefs most decidedly did nothing to conceal. The wetness of the light grey cotton highlighted every ridge, every hard and throbbing inch of him. Then, with a surge of strength that took her breath away, Gray bent over and lifted her under her arms all the way over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.

They didn’t go far. Before Ella could process anything more than the heat of his large hand splayed across the back of her thighs, he took the three steps into the hot tub. Positioned them just in front of the cascading waterfall and set her down. The steaming water pulsed and frothed around them, setting her every nerve ending to vibrate.

Gray put one hand on the small of her back, the other on her shoulder. Then he pushed her into a back bend, through the waterfall, so her face was behind it. The line of water hit right at the tops of her breasts and roped down her stomach to between her legs. Pounding. Massaging. Sending ripples of sensation throughout her entire body.

“Feel good?” Gray asked as he held her steady.

She tightened her grip on his ass. “Feels amazing.” God knew she’d never be able to walk by this pool again without a sensual flashback to this night.

The hand on her chest reached into her tank top and swept both breasts out. Gray closed his mouth around her nipple and licked in ever decreasing circles. The combination of his tongue and the steady beat of water on her other breast quickly drove Ella into a panting maelstrom of lust. She twined her legs around his until their hips pressed together. Who knew he’d be such an inventive lover? Because there was no longer any doubt in Ella’s mind about the inevitability of them becoming lovers. In fact, why wait? It certainly didn’t seem possible that she could get any more turned on than he was making her right now.

Ella raised her voice to be heard over the waterfall. “I want to have sex with you,” she stated boldly. Unfortunately, her words produced the opposite effect of what she’d hoped. Gray bobbled his grip on her back, and she hinged backwards the rest of the way into the water. Swallowed more than a couple of mouthfuls of what tasted like straight chlorine before she found her footing. It was much darker behind the waterfall. And as the seconds ticked by—many of them—she was alone back there, palms pressed to the rock face.

Just when she was convinced she’d gone too far, too fast with him, Gray pushed through the curtain of water. There was a firm set to his jaw. For such a confined space, he managed to keep his distance.

“Let’s go on a date first,” he said. “A real date. A first date.”

“A first date? You want to backtrack to hand-holding and pecks on the cheek?” A queasy roil in her stomach. Had she not responded well, or been inventive enough for Gray? Is that why he wanted to dial things back? “We just rounded second base here. Or didn’t you notice?”

That brought him flush against her in a heartbeat. “I noticed everything. The way your nipples are the same pink as a Key West sunset. How you smile when you moan. How the way you curve into my touch makes me feel like a freaking god among men.”

Oh. Well, that all sounded good. It sounded so good, in fact, that Ella wished she still kept a diary. Those were phrases she wanted to remember and relive over and over for the next fifty years. “I see.”

“You’re not some hotel bar hook-up. You’re amazing, Ella. Sex with you is going to be beyond amazing. I just think we should do this right.” He hesitated just enough for her to notice and wonder why before continuing. “We should be sure we know each other before taking that step.”

“That’s a very…prudent approach.” Ella really wanted to call it old-fashioned, but it didn’t seem right to apply that term to a man who’d just had his mouth all over her breast.

“I don’t want you to ever regret it. You have to be sure. So go on a date with me. A real date.” And when she opened her mouth, he put a hand across it. “Screw the journal. Screw waiting for your neighbor and your stylist and their cat to weigh in. If you want to be with me, then just do it.”

He was right. For months now, she’d been trying to find a way to extricate herself from the town’s caring yet smothering grip. Sure, everyone used the journal for their big problems. But Ella was the only one expected to use it for everything, big and small. It was time to take a stand. Time to declare her independence. And she couldn’t think of a more worthy line to draw in the sand than Gray Locke, naked and in her bed.

“You’ve got it. I’ll go on a real date with you. Outside the Manor. In public,” Ella said, just to make it crystal clear. “You’ll have to wine me and dine me, you know.”

Gray undid the scarf around her ponytail and threaded his fingers through her hair, tipping her head back. “Don’t worry. I plan to wine and dine the pants right off of you.”

“Good plan,” she whispered, right before his lips captured hers once more.