he had made over the last year as he’d trekked through Everglades National Park logging tree snail data. He glanced at the calendar and calculated the remaining time he had left. He had virtually no time between this project and the next. He knew his father was disappointed that he hadn’t remained working on Everglades projects for the university. But that wasn’t what called to him. Would he ever find the one thing that kept his interest indefinitely?
The blower noise had grown louder since he’d been in the house, though he couldn’t see Stacy on her roof anymore. Focus on the tree snails, he told himself. If he kept his focus, he could probably complete his project on time. The papers were laid out so he could gather the data he needed from each sheet in order. He got into a rhythm for a while.
Elmo’s head came up a second before the papers on the table spiraled into the air and drifted gently down around and into the pool. The noise stopped abruptly, and he turned and looked up to see Stacy on his roof with her hand over her mouth.
“I’m so sorry!” She set the blower down, stood too fast and lost her balance.
He scrambled to position himself beneath her. She tumbled over the edge of the roof but hung onto the gutter. Without thinking, he wrapped his arms around her to help ease her to the ground. Only he didn’t want to let her go.
She was warm and soft and firm all at the same time, and she smelled delicious, coconuty and sun-warmed. His arms were anchored around her stomach, and his hands brushed her bare waist. A catchy tune pounded from the headphones that were dangling around her neck. He thought about dancing with her, but that would be sillier than…than holding her for much longer than was strictly necessary.
“Okay, I’ve got it,” she said.
For someone who had studied time, who knew the measurement of time remained constant and absolute, those moments felt longer than usual. She turned to look at him. “Barrett, we’ve got to get your notes out of the pool!”
The notes. Of course, how could he have forgotten? She slid down his body to her feet, tossed the radio headphones on the table and pivoted toward the pool. Twenty or more pages floated at the surface, the ink dissolving before their eyes. Stacy slid into the pool and started retrieving them.
“I’m so sorry. You must think I’m a klutz.”
He grabbed the papers he could reach from the edge. “What were you doing up there, anyway?”
“Gene asked me to do their gutters the next time I did mine. I wasn’t going to do the gutter above you, because I was afraid this would happen.” She was plucking papers as she spoke. “I glanced down to see where you were, you know, to make sure I didn’t bother you, and…lost my balance. I never lose my balance. Granny said I had the balance of a monkey.”
The word monkey came out all garbled. The water was up to her mouth as she walked toward the deep end where most of the papers ended up. She wasn’t going to be able to reach them. So he did something impulsive, maybe for the first time he could remember. He got into the pool with her.
The water was cool as it enveloped him. “Here, I’ll get these.”
“You didn’t have to come in here. I’m the one who scattered them into the pool.” She sounded breathless as she treaded water.
He wrapped his arm around her waist and held her up, facing him. “It’s…” He forgot about the cold water, the papers and whatever he’d been about to say. Like when he’d held her as she’d hung from the roof, his body awakened as her body brushed against his. Her skin was cool beneath his hands.
“It’s what?” she asked in a breathless voice.
“Hmm?”
“You said, ‘It’s.’ You never…finished.”
Their faces were inches apart as he pulled her flush against him. Beads of water dotted the pink lip gloss she wore. Why did he have the insane urge to lick them off? He wanted to kiss her, wanted it with every molecule in his body. He felt an intense desire to take her mouth and see if it tasted as good as it looked.
Her brown eyes were large as she watched him. Her breath was coming in short puffs, soft and barely audible. If he didn’t consult his logic here, he was going to be in big trouble.
Logic.
“Tree snails,” he said, and moved her toward the edge of the pool.
She grabbed onto the edge when he abruptly moved to retrieve the rest of the papers. “Pardon?”
He started reciting snail names with each piece of paper he snatched out of the water. “Delicatus. Elegans. Floridanus. Lucidovarius.” He had exactly four days, four hours and twenty-nine minutes to complete this project. All right, he was focused again, his mind firmly on deadlines and Stacy’s bottom as she pulled herself out of the pool…“Septentrionalis.” He took a deep breath when he grabbed the last piece of paper and turned around. “Nipples.”
At first he wasn’t aware of what he’d said, only that she was sitting on the edge of the pool, and her white tank top was close to transparent. She glanced down and jerked her arms across her chest. Only then did he realize exactly what had come out of his mouth.
Not a snail name.
Not even close.
She jumped to her feet and set the wet papers on the edge of the table. “I’d better go before I die of embarrassment altogether,” she said, her arms still fastened to her chest.
“I’m sorry—”
“No, I’m sorry. I’m an idiot. I’m going now.”
Barrett had reached the side of the pool, where Elmo was waiting for him. They both watched her stalk around the hedge and heard her door slam shut.
He was completely baffled. First that she’d affected him in such a profound way. And second that she’d blamed herself for his faux pas. It made no sense.
It made even less sense than his having gone in the pool fully clothed, shoes and all.
STACY LOOKED at herself in the bathroom mirror. Yep, there they were, showing right through the white material like brown beacons. No wonder the word had slipped out of his mouth! Gawd, could she be more embarrassed? Probably not. First sending his notes afloat and then this. He must think she was something else. He probably had some technical word for her, some fifty-cent word she wouldn’t understand.
The only redeeming factor in the whole pool incident was when he was reciting those snail names. She had to be the only person in the world to be turned on by snail names. That probably made her a disturbed woman, but she could handle that. Of course, it more than likely had something to do with the fact that Barrett was reciting them, though why he’d been doing it just then was a mystery.
She peeled off the tank top and tossed it in the hamper. Okay, the other redeeming factor was when he’d held her against him in the pool. The water sure wasn’t cold anymore after that. No, sirree. And if she’d been in her right mind, she wouldn’t have thought for a minute that he was going to kiss her. She wouldn’t have imagined the hunger she saw in his eyes. He was only holding her up in deep water, being nice. What he was probably thinking was that he’d like to throttle her for distracting him from his project yet again, and worse, for waterlogging his notes.
