Right . . . I can do this.

Fuck . . .

“Turn around,” I call.

“What?” He laughs. “I’ve seen you in your underwear a million times.”

“Just turn around.”

He turns and faces out to sea, and I grab the hem of my dress and lift it over my head. I look down at myself. I have a black matching bra-and-panties set on.

Thank fucking god.

I wade into the water as I look around. “If I get eaten by a shark,” I call.

“I’ll save you.” He swims toward me.

“You’re supposed to be looking the other way,” I call.

“Da na . . . da na . . . da na . . .” He begins to sing the Jaws music as he swims toward me.

“Stop it,” I cry.

He picks me up and hurls me into the air, and I land in the water and go under deep. “Ahh,” I cry as I come up. “You idiot.” I look around in a panic. “You’re waking up the sharks.”

He picks me up again and hurls us both into the water with his arms tightly around me.

We surface, still arm in arm.

The air between us changes, and he stares down at me. Body to body, alone in the darkness.

His brow furrows as if confused as we stare at each other. In slow motion he lifts his thumb and dusts it over my bottom lip.

“Kiss me,” he whispers.

I want to.

“Chris . . .”

“I just . . .” He takes my face in his hands as he stares down at me. Our bodies are so close I can feel his erection as it grows up against my stomach.

“We can’t,” I murmur.

“Why not?”

“Because I value what we have.”

“It won’t change a thing.”

“It will change everything.”

He stares at me, his chest rising and falling in the darkness. “Why?”

“Because I will end up with a broken heart, and you will end up feeling like shit about it.”

He stares at me, and I know that he knows that I’m right.

“You don’t want something permanent, and I don’t want something casual.” I smile up at him as I cup his face in my hand. “But that’s okay . . .” I pull him into a hug. “I like what we have already.”

“Blue balls?”

I giggle. “Go find someone else to take care of your balls.”

“Or I could just drown you for knocking me back.” He grabs for me, and I squeal as I try to get away from him. He picks me up and throws me high into the air again. “Come and get her, sharks,” he yells. “Teach her a lesson.”

I laugh out loud as I cough and splutter.

He swims to me and takes my hands in his as we stand facing each other. “Promise me something,” he says.

“Okay.”

“In ten years, on this day, no matter where we are in the world, no matter who we are married to, we will meet on this beach at this time and take a swim together in the dark.”

My eyes well with tears, because damn it, that’s romantic for a goodbye.

“I promise.”

He pulls me into a hug, and we stand in the water in each other’s arms.

Regretful but grateful for the honesty between us.

I smile as a thought comes to me. “My husband won’t like you, though.”

He laughs out loud and throws me into the air again. “That’s ’cause I’m going to steal you off him.”

Chapter 10

We walk up the stairs to our hostel in Barcelona. “I fucking love that place,” Bodie sighs.

“Me too,” everyone chimes in. San Sebastián was incredible. We had the time of our lives, but now we’re back to reality. Well, not really. We are still backpacking in Spain, but what I mean is we’ve returned to work over the weekend before we take off again on Monday.

It’s Friday night, and once again, we are heading out. The party is never ending: always somewhere to go and something to see.

We go back to our room and get ready for the night and go down to the bar to see Eduardo.

“Hey.” Christopher smiles.

“Hi there,” says Basil.

“Hello, Mr. Basil, Mr. Christo.” Eddie smiles excitedly. “I did good.”

I slide into my chair. “Hello.”

“Hello, Hazen.”

I smile at his inability to say my name. So freaking cute.

“I got you all jobs.” He smiles proudly.

“You did?” Christopher laughs. “I knew you would.”

Someone stands at the other end of the bar, and he takes off down there to serve them. We watch him drift in and out of languages as he serves different people.

“He’s so intelligent,” Christopher says as he watches him. “He could be an accountant for the mob or some shit.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Basil agrees.

I get the giggles as I imagine Eduardo working as an accountant for the mob.

He finally comes back to us. “Miss Hazen, you work in a hotel.” He slides me over a card with the address and time I start tomorrow. A split shift, morning and night.

“Eddie, really?” I smile as I stare at the card. “Thank you so much.”

“Mr. Basil, you work on a boat.”

Basil takes the card from Eddie and stares at it. “A boat?”

“Yes, yes. Very good job.”

He slides a brochure over the counter to Christopher, and we all frown as we stare at it. There are pictures of slippery slides and fake mountains on it. “What’s this?” Christopher asks.

“You working at the fun park,” Eddie replies.

“The what?”

“The fun park, with all the children.”

Christopher screws up his face in disgust. “I fucking hate kids, man . . . blah.” He fakes a shiver.

I look at him deadpan. “Aren’t you a teacher?”

“Yes.” He rolls his lips. “Yes, I am.”

Basil studies the brochure intently. “Glad I’m on the boat.”

I smile as I imagine Basil on a boat in the sun all day. “So this is the time I start?” I ask Eddie as I point to a time written down on the back of the card.

“Yes.” He turns to Christopher. “You have twelve-hour shift tomorrow. You start at eleven.”

“Twelve hours?” Christopher gasps. “Isn’t that illegal?”

“You’re lazy,” Eddie replies as he wipes the bar.

“I am not lazy . . . twelve hours is just a very long time.”

Another person walks up to the bar, and Eddie serves them, once again drifting in and out of languages.

Christopher stares at the brochure in front of him. “What the hell would I be doing here for twelve hours straight?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe you’re in the gift shop or something?”

He nods as he thinks about it. “That would be okay, I guess. Sitting down in the air-conditioning for twelve hours, I could totally do that.”

Kimberly bounces in. “Come on, Hazy.”

“Where are we going?” I ask her.

“Bernadette is meeting some guy, and we’re her wingmen.” She pulls me out of the chair. “Catch you boys later?” she says as she pulls me from the bar.

“Bye,” the boys call.

It’s 3:00 a.m. when the girls and I are walking home. Turns out Bernadette’s new friends from Sweden are funny as all hell. It was a great night.

“Hey, you,” Kimberly calls to a group of guys walking in the opposite direction across the street. I glance up to see Basil and Bodie talking and laughing with a group of men I haven’t seen before.

Christopher is in the middle of the group. He has a girl sitting up on his shoulders as they walk along.

She’s wearing light-blue skimpy denim shorts and a tiny black bralette top. She has a baseball cap on and two long dark braids in her hair. She’s gorgeous and sitting on his shoulders with her legs spread around his head like the queen of fucking Sheba. His two big hands are on her calves as he holds her tight.

My stomach twists at the sight. He’s taken a visible step back from me this week since we nearly kissed in the ocean . . . and I hate it.