The hotel spa promises serenity and cucumber-infused water. More importantly, it promises a distinct absence of stepbrothers with infuriating smiles and hands that remember things they shouldn't.
I change into my swimsuit with the determination of a woman seeking asylum. Navy one-piece. Modest. Nothing that screams "please look at my body" to anyone who might wander in.
The pool area is blessedly empty when I arrive. Pale blue water reflects soft lighting. Loungers line the edge like soldiers awaiting orders. Steam rises from the heated surface in lazy spirals.
I claim a spot near the far corner, arranging myself on the cushioned lounger with deliberate casualness. The novel I brought—something about murder and intrigue—opens across my lap like a shield against unwanted thoughts.
This is fine. This is relaxation. This is absolutely not hiding from a man who makes my nervous system malfunction.
The words blur together as I pretend to read. Chapter seven becomes chapter eight without any comprehension occurring. My brain refuses to process fictional drama when real drama keeps intruding uninvited.
Twelve minutes pass in approximate peace. I even manage to absorb half a paragraph about the detective questioning suspects.
Then the door opens.
Oliver walks in wearing navy swim trunks and a towel slung over one shoulder like a cologne advertisement come to life. His chest is bare. His abs are visible. His entire existence is a personal attack on my sanity.
He stops when he sees me. Something flickers across his face—surprise, maybe, or an excellent performance of it. With Oliver, authenticity remains impossible to verify.
"Great minds," he says, gesturing at the empty pool. "What chapter?”
I glance at the top of the page (how am I still on the first page of the chapter?). “Eight.”
“Uh-huh. Escaping the relatives?"
"Attempting to."
"Same." He drops his towel on the nearest lounger. "The aunts were discussing my marriage prospects. I developed a sudden urgent need to be anywhere else immediately."
Before I can respond, he dives in. Clean entry. Minimal splash. The kind of athletic grace that suggests years of practice or genetic advantages that should be illegal.
I return my attention to the book with fierce determination. Chapter eight. Something about a detective. A missing heirloom. Words that absolutely do not penetrate my skull no matter how hard I stare.
Oliver swims laps with infuriating efficiency. His arms cut through water in smooth strokes. His body moves with a rhythm that makes my pulse do inconvenient things.
I'm not watching. I'm reading about the detective. Who is detecting. In a detectivey manner. Very compelling stuff.
My eyes drift upward again. The book serves as camouflage while I observe his shoulders breaking the surface. Water streaming down his back. Muscles flexing with each powerful stroke.
Purely academic observation. Research into the physics of swimming. Nothing inappropriate whatsoever about cataloging how light plays across wet skin.
He swims for what feels like hours but is probably minutes. Back and forth. Back and forth. Each lap bringing him past my position in a display of athletic torment designed specifically for my suffering.
Finally, he surfaces at the edge nearest my lounger. His arms fold on the tiles. Water drips from his hair, his face, his unfairly perfect everything. Too close. He’s too close.
"Good book?"
"Excellent."
"What's it called?"
I glance down at the cover. The title has completely evacuated my memory. The author's name might as well be written in Sanskrit for all the recognition it sparks.
"It's a mystery," I manage. "About... murder."
"Riveting. What chapter?"
"Eight."
"You've been on chapter eight since I arrived."
My face burns. "It's a complex chapter."
"Must be." His smile turns knowing. "Especially difficult to concentrate with all that staring you've been doing."
"I haven't been—"
His hand shoots up from the water. Fingers close around my wrist. The world tilts violently as he pulls.
I hit the water without ceremony. The splash is enormous and ungraceful—the opposite of his elegant dive. Cold shock gives way to heated pool warmth as I surface sputtering and furious.
"What the hell?" I shove at his chest with both palms.
This requires touching his chest. My hands press flat against wet skin stretched over muscle. Warm. Solid. Completely, devastatingly real beneath my fingertips.
He doesn't release my wrist. Instead, he backs me toward the pool wall with deliberate steps. My shoulders hit cool tiles. His hand braces beside my head on the pool edge. His other hand still circles my wrist beneath the water.
"Twenty minutes," he says quietly. "You've been watching me for twenty minutes."
"I was reading."
"You were staring."
"Observing. For safety purposes."
"In case I drowned?"
"Optimistically, yes."
His laugh is low, rough. It vibrates through the water between us.
He's close enough that I can count his eyelashes if I wanted to. Which I don't. I'm simply aware they exist. Wet and dark and unfairly long against his cheekbones.
"So what were you planning to do about it?" His voice drops. "All that watching. All that wanting."
"I wasn't—"
"You were."
His thigh presses between mine underwater. The pressure is deliberate. Maddening. My swimsuit provides absolutely no barrier against the sensation of hard muscle against soft flesh.
My breath stutters. Heat floods through my body that has nothing to do with pool temperature. Everything tightens.
"Still pretending you don't want this?"
I should push him away. Should summon the fury I felt last night. Should remember every reason this is catastrophic for everyone involved.
Instead, my hips shift involuntarily against his thigh. A tiny movement. Barely perceptible. But his eyes darken with immediate recognition.
"Let go," I manage. My voice sounds foreign. Breathless.
He releases my wrist immediately. Steps back with his hands raised. The space between us fills with chlorinated water and unfinished tension thick enough to choke on.
"Your call," he says simply. "Always your call."
The absence of his body feels like a wound. My skin screams at the sudden loss of contact. Every nerve ending protests the cold water rushing into spaces he occupied seconds ago.
I climb out of the pool on legs that barely function. Water streams down my body, pooling on warm tiles. My hands shake as I grab my towel, my book, my shattered dignity.
I don't look back. Can't look back. If I see him watching me leave, I'll do something irreversibly stupid.
My wet footprints mark the path to the door like evidence at a crime scene. Each step takes me further from the pool and closer to the safety of my room.
Behind me, I hear the splash of him diving under again. Returning to his laps like nothing happened. Like he didn't just dismantle me completely
My skin burns everywhere he touched me. Wrist. Palms. The insides of my thighs where his leg pressed. Phantom sensations that refuse to fade no matter how far I walk.
The elevator carries me upward while my heart pounds a rhythm I cannot control. Fourth floor. Fifth. The doors open and I practically sprint toward my room.
Inside, I lock the door and lean against it, chest heaving.
I'm in serious trouble.
The kind of trouble that cannot be fixed by distance or denial or reason. The kind that follows you into pools and presses you against walls and asks questions you cannot answer honestly.
Forty-six more hours trapped in this hotel.
I might not survive.