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I’ve just decided I could stay here all night when Kal says, “Time to go in.”
“No,” I protest, though a shiver runs through my limbs even as I speak the word.
“We better. Sharks swim closer to the shore at night.”
Did he just say sharks?
My hands flail, slapping at the water like it just tried to peek down the front of this stupid strapless suit. I grapple and flail until I’m holding onto Kal’s hand. My feet just touch the sandy floor when something cool and slimy brushes my ankle. I leap and tug on Kal’s hand until I’m speed-gliding through the water toward him. I wrap one leg around his waist. One arm clings around his neck, while the other continues to slap at the water below us.
A low, growly laugh hums from Kal’s chest and throat. “Maybe even Spontaneous Meg has her limits.”
I give him a sardonic glare. “I’m looking for fun, not loss of life.”
“Fair enough,” he says. He starts to move, slow and steady steps toward the shoreline—slow, because I still have one arm and leg firmly wrapped around his middle. He got us into this, I have no problem sacrificing him to any hungry sharks passing by.
Something cold and solid brushes my hopping calf—my one leg not locked around Kal.
“Yeek!” I yelp and swing my other leg around Kal’s waist, my arms hugging around his neck. Who needs space? Nope, not me. He is officially carrying me like a small toddler.
“This is date number one. You know that, right? I’m not that kind of guy, Meg Miller.”
“I’m not that kind of girl, and you know it,” I say but nothing he can say is going to make me loosen my hold on him. “Something touched me…it touched me.”
“Are you afraid of the ocean, Meg?”
“I wasn’t! Not until you mentioned nighttime and sharks and me.”
“I see.” He keeps walking, I keep clinging. “Sorry about that.”
A cool breeze hits my back as we trudge farther out of the water. Still, I hold to Kal as if he were my personal life preserver.
“I didn’t completely douse Spontaneous Meg’s fire, did I? I’d never be able to live with myself.” He wraps one arm around my back.
My heart pounds and I’ve no doubt he can feel it. “No,” I tell him, my cheek next to his—this way I don’t have to make that pesky eye contact. “She’s still alive and well. But if a shark swims by ready for a meal, he’ll snag you by the legs and not me. I can’t be spontaneous if I’m dead.”
Maybe I imagine it, or maybe I’m just really heavy now that my body is out of the water, but I think he hugs me a little tighter. The ocean is no longer carrying me with him. He must feel the weight of me. But he doesn’t act as if I’m making a difference. I rest my head on his shoulder and peer out at the water, waiting for my heart to slow, waiting for him to come to a stop.
My legs are still wrapped around the man as if I were a three-year-old child. So, once the water is behind us, I loosen my hold, and he does the same, sliding me to the sandy floor.
The moon is rising, and the music from his cousin’s reception has grown louder now that we’re out of the water.
I stand in front of this man, my long legs chilled to the bone. I shiver, crossing my arms and staying close to the warmth of his body. I don’t want to move. And apparently, I don’t need to. Kal bends, picking up my lavalava on the ground and wrapping it around my shoulders like a towel.
“I think I’m ready to go home now,” I say.
“Okay.” Kal slips into his shirt, not bothering to button the thing. What is this, a cologne commercial? He throws his pants over one arm—no doubt with plans to burn them once he gets home.
We walk side by side to the edge of the open tent. I watch from the sidelines. I have no desire to go back in there as he says goodbye to his family and the happy couple. Only his mother looks past him, on the outskirts, for me. Alana blows me a kiss and sends me a little wave.
What a weird day.
We don’t talk during the ten-minute drive back to my hotel. Kal pulls up to the side of my backdoor gate.
“Do you have your key?”
“I do,” I say. I slide a glance his way and open my passenger-side door. I swallow, and then I scrounge up all my spontaneity and courage. “You’ll be back tomorrow, right?”
Kal’s lips turn up in the smallest of grins. “As long as we’re breaking the rules, we might as well break them all, right?”
