Chapter Ten #3
I’ve learned that Blake was a competitive swimmer and teaches lessons part-time, but Asher was a semiprofessional surfer and offers courses at his shop.
Calypso winks at her. “Girl power, babe.”
Stella giggles but it dies quickly. “Dad always holds my hand.”
Over her shoulder, Calypso looks at me with a silent question in her eyes. Smiling because I love this soft side she only shares with a select few, I nod toward the water, telling her I’ll be okay on my own.
Calypso stands and wipes sand off her ass, making it jiggle a little.
Fuck me.
She holds her hand out to Stella. “Let’s go.”
Stella stands and eyes her suspiciously. “You don’t like the ocean.”
“Says who?”
“I’ve never seen you get in the water,” Stella argues but there’s no fight in her words.
Calypso waves her hand until Stella slips hers inside. “I spent my summers out here too—hell, I even know how to surf.”
“Really?” I ask from my spot on the ground.
Looking down at me, she scrunches her nose and admits, “I can stand up.”
My head tips back on a laugh. “Fair enough.”
I watch the two of them walk into the shallow water, Stella holding tightly onto Calypso the entire time. As promised, Calypso never lets go. Not even when all the other kids scream in excitement at her arrival and start splashing each other.
Lucas and Blake try to wrangle them in but to no avail. Calypso shakes her head, assumingly telling them it’s fine, because neither try again.
For about ten minutes, I watch the sun drop over the horizon as Calypso stands knee deep in the water. She’s like Aphrodite coming out of the seafoam—certainly my idea of beauty.
Two bodies drop onto the sand next to me. Looking to my left, I catch Hudson’s exasperated, almost apologetic expression before turning to Asher who looks mischievous.
“What’s up?” I ask, but my attention is pulled back to Calypso when she lets out a surprised squeal.
Jake is splashing water at Stella but mostly hitting Calypso in the attack. She teams up with Stella, playing more with the kids. If you consider waterboarding as playing with them.
“I’ll give you a hundred bucks if you dunk her,” Asher says with all the seriousness of a scheming brother.
With an entertained smirk, I slowly look back at him.
“The cost of sewing my dick back on is way more than a hundred bucks,” I retort.
As soon as I say it, the joke feels a lot cruder than I meant for it to be. I’d be pissed if someone brought up their dick in relation to my sisters but that’s not how I meant it.
Hudson snorts and my muscles unwind.
“It’s a test to see how much she actually likes you,” Asher says. “Because I have to admit, I’m not convinced something else isn’t going on here. Calypso would never introduce some dude to our entire family after dating him for, what? Two weeks?”
My brows raise, surprised at how easily Asher figured her out.
“A week,” I correct him. He gives me a dry look as if that proves his point. “My cousin invited me. We didn’t really have a choice on the timeline.”
“So,” Hudson starts, “you didn’t want to meet her family?”
I hold back an eye roll. Double attack from the twins, something I’m familiar with.
“That’s not what I said—just that it was out of our control.
We decided to roll with it instead of lying about it.
” The words taste sour on my tongue. We are lying to her family and everyone else.
Even my mom called me two nights ago to ask about my new girlfriend who “Aunt Willa and Mia haven’t stopped talking about. ”
Asher shrugs. “Well, this will sway us in your favor.”
“Or get rid of me,” I quip.
“Whatever’s meant to be, I guess,” he retorts but there’s no malice.
I don’t have brothers, but even my sisters have had their own forms of initiations for our partners. Their ways lean toward mental warfare whereas Asher’s request feels like the nuisance of a little brother.
“I’m not going to do that while she’s with Stella,” I say.
Even if I have to throw her over my shoulder later tonight and run into the water with her, I will. It’s not about the money nearly as much as it is about the camaraderie.
Looking behind him, Asher finds Grady and calls him over. Quickly, he explains the situation and Grady’s head tips back on a laugh. They’ve brought in the closest thing to a third brother that Calypso has. Of course he’s down for the show.
“Stella!” Grady calls. She and Calypso turn to listen. “Come here! Just for a second—sunscreen!” He waves the bottle in the air.
She nods at her dad and turns to Calypso. From her gestures, she’s telling Calypso to wait there for her.
“You’re up,” Asher directs me.
Hudson gives me a pitiful look. “Godspeed.”
Grady’s laugh is the last thing I hear as I walk into the water, trying to be as quiet as possible.
Calypso was worried about her brothers hating me, which is fair. It was a possibility, but there’s no fucking way I could be worse than Stefan in their eyes. What she really should have been worried about was what happens if her brothers like me.
It’ll be way harder to get away from me now.