I let my eyes roam her curves. Droplets ease their way down her throat and into the valley between her br**sts. Her stomach contracts with each breath. Her thighs move rhythmically through the swirling water as she walks toward me.
When I raise my gaze back to her face, I see that her eyes are fixed on mine. She holds me there until she reaches me and stops again.
She tilts her face up toward mine. Other than that, she doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak. She’s close enough that I can feel her body heat despite the cool water bathing my skin.
I see her reach out. I feel her warm hands when she grips my sides. I watch her pull herself up onto her tiptoes. I hold my breath as her lips get closer and closer.
And then they’re touching mine.
The kiss is soft and innocent and fleeting. And when she leans back, I see that there is, in fact, a woman behind the guileless eyes that I see every time I close mine. There’s a woman in there, and she knows what she wants. Maybe I’ve not given her enough credit. Maybe I missed seeing it at first, when I got lost in her sweet smile and blushing cheeks. Maybe she’s more like the women I’ve known than what I suspected.
Yes, this girl knows what she wants. And, while she may not be as deliberate in getting it as the others I’ve bedded, she still knows how to use what she’s got.
And she’s using it.
Right now.
On me.
When she leans into me again, I go into the kiss with the intention of leading Sloane out into the deeper water and showing her just what she’s asking of me. And showing her a little taste of just what she’ll get.
But before any of that can happen, she flinches, pulling away from me with a gasp.
“Ouch!” At first it seems like she stepped on something. But then I hear the air hiss between her teeth again and she cries out. “Oh shit! Something just bit me.”
She darts away from me, swishing the water around her like she’s trying to scare something away. She screeches and grabs her right leg.
“Ohmigod, Hemi, something bit me!”
I can see that she’s not kidding. And that she’s getting more upset by the second. I kick into action.
Moving as quickly as I can through the churning water, I sweep Sloane up into my arms and I run her to the shore. I drop to my knees in the wet sand, laying her gently in front of me. I see the cringe marring her beautiful features, her expression one of pain. She’s paler than usual, too.
“Show me where,” I command.
Sloane indicates the outside of her right thigh. That’s when I see the angry red slashes filled with angry red dots.
A jellyfish sting.
“You’ve been stung by a jellyfish,” I say by way of explanation. “Hold still.”
I check her skin to make sure there are no tentacles attached. When I confirm that there aren’t, I stand.
“You’re not gonna pee on me, are you?” she asks, her eyes slightly horrified despite the pain she’s in.
I can’t help but grin. “No, I just need to go get something. Stay put. I’ll be right back.”
I run up the beach to where our stuff is. Luckily we’d almost made our way back to where we started. I grab the tube of sunscreen from Sloane’s bag and retrace my steps. It only takes me a few seconds to get back to her.
Holding the tube by the fat part, I scrape the sharply folded end over Sloane’s skin.
She yelps in pain. “Don’t do that!”
She flinches away from me.
“Hold still. I have to get the stingers out.” Once more, I carefully scrape the site with the flat edge of the lotion tube until I’m fairly confident there are no remaining stingers. I can tell she’s in pain, but Sloane doesn’t make another sound. Finally, I scoop her back up again and take her into the surf.
“What are you doing?” she asks, clinging to my neck and curling her body tighter against mine so that I don’t put her into the water.
I set her down in the shallows, in just enough depth that I can bathe her leg. “Here, this will help. Just trust me. I need to wash it out with salt water. It’ll help it to not burn as bad.”
I cup my hands and ladle water onto her thigh, gently rubbing the area. Over and over, I force water onto the sting, hopefully rinsing away any residual stingers and neutralizing the toxins.
“Is it feeling any better?” I ask, checking her color again. She still looks pale, but she doesn’t look like her distress is as acute.
“A little.”
“You’re not feeling short of breath or anything, are you?”
She pauses to assess herself then she shakes her head and answers, “No. I feel fine otherwise.”
“Come on. Let’s find an emergency room or an urgent care to get you to.”
I bend to pick her up again, but she struggles a little. “No! That’s not necessary, is it? Just for a jellyfish sting?”
I glance down at her face. She looks alarmed.
“Well, it’s not mandatory, but I’d feel better if you got some medical attention.” I see her worrying her lip. “Why? Do you have an aversion to hospitals or something?”
“It’s not that. It’s just that…that…”
“What? Spit it out.”
She leans her head against my chest for a second, as if her instinct is to hide her face.
“It’s just that I’d hate for my family to find out about this.”
“Why? It’s not like you did it on purpose.”
“I know that. They’re just…it’s just…it’s complicated.”
“Complicated,” I repeat.
“Yeah. Complicated.” I slow my walk as we approach Sloane’s towel. I set her down on it and crouch at her side.
“Do they not know you’re here?”
“Uhhh,” she hedges, “not so much.”
“Is it because of last night? Because I’m not afraid of your brother, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“No, no, it’s not that. It’s just that…”
“You can tell me. Whatever it is. I don’t judge. And I won’t get mad, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
She makes a growling sound. “Grrr, it’s not that. It’s just…it’s embarrassing.”
I sit over onto my hip beside her. “All right, tell me what’s going on.”
“Look, my family is just very…protective. It’s been a big struggle for me to make them see that I’m all grown up, that they need to let me live my life. Turning twenty-one was huge for me. They’ll go into orbit if they find out I took off to the beach with some random guy, got stung by a jellyfish and then ended up in the hospital. They’ll give me shit every time I want to leave the house for months if they find out.”