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“Not everybody is.” He stared up at the moon’s silver light catching the edge of a cloud. “I certainly wasn’t.” Being a shitty father to an amazing daughter was probably his biggest regret. Not that he’d win any awards for any of his other relationships.

He’d been a good husband, once. Turned out he was a terrible widower.

“It’s easier for men.”

He smiled softly. He wished that wasn’t true. “Yeah, it is.”

“What do you want out of life?”

Ryan inhaled. What did he want? He wanted to not remember that he was missing a part of himself.

He wanted to not remember that he’d once had everything and lost it all.

Except, recently, he had started to forget his grief for whole chunks of a day without the aid of sex or whiskey.

The memory of Becky’s long, dark hair and pretty face were fading now.

Maybe it was simply time dulling the edges of his memory like sandpaper against the edge of a blade.

Or maybe it was something else. “You’ll find someone. ”

“Ha. Well, it’s a pity you said no. You’d have saved me a lot of time and effort if you hadn’t. We could have had a no-strings hookup, and no one would have ever known. Neither one of us would have to risk dating a serial killer. What do they call it? Oh, yeah. Friends with benefits .”

The breath ripped from his body, and his heart threatened to beat itself to death against his rib cage. She was joking. She had to be joking.

Didn’t she ?

He was about to strike out for the shore when he spotted something behind Donnelly.

Triangular fin about eight inches tall, slowly sliced through the water behind her. His mouth went completely dry. He watched her flinch away as the shark brushed past her.

Donnelly swore.

“Don’t panic. It’s probably curious rather than hungry, but you and I are gonna swim back to shore so that we don’t become this fish’s next meal.”

He heard her swallow and saw her nod. They set off at a calm, leisurely pace, no thrashing in the water like a wounded beast. Strong, sure strokes.

Ryan skimmed his gaze over the water, looking for the telltale torpedo. The Jaws theme music ran through his mind in tune with the beat of his heart.

They ate up the distance through the water into the shallows, and he thought they’d left the wild creature behind until he felt a telltale brush of abrasive leather against his bare skin.

It swam beneath him, and fear engulfed him as it headed toward Donnelly.

He grabbed the animal by its pectoral fins and thrust it up into the air.

It was shallow enough to stand. And he found himself yelling at Donnelly to run while he staggered through the water, carrying the six-foot-long bull shark that thrashed its tail and gnashed those deadly teeth in a frantic bid to escape.

Donnelly reached the shore, and the water was only at his knees now. He turned around and flung the animal as far as he could before staggering onto the beach.

He and Donnelly stood side-by-side breathing heavily as they stared out to sea.

“Oh my God. Oh my fucking God!” Donnelly’s teeth were chattering as she grabbed her towel from where she’d left it.

His lungs were bellowing. “ That’s why you always swim with a buddy.”

After a moment, she started laughing and bent over at the waist, filled with mirth.

“Ryan.” Aaron Nash came up beside them. “Did you hurt that poor shark?”

“Tried not to.” Ryan shook his head. “The damned thing scared about a decade off my life. I think we’re even.”

Meghan was still laughing. Some sort of delayed shock response?

He sent her a worried look. “Are you okay?”

She nodded and started laughing again.

“What the heck is wrong with you?”

“I’m never going to get the image of a naked Ryan Sullivan wrestling a shark out of my brain.”

“Me neither,” Aaron agreed.

Ryan had forgotten he wasn’t wearing any underwear. “Shit.” He looked around for his clothes and went over and pulled them on.

“Are you sure he didn’t take a bite, Ry?”

Ryan could hear the laughter in Aaron’s voice. “Still more than enough left over.”

“Which I can vouch for.” Donnelly chuckled as Aaron sent Ryan a startled look.

“Dude. I never touched her.”

“You better not have.”

“I swear.” Jesus, he saved her from a shark attack and was now getting that look from his friend and colleague. “The only blood in the water is my reputation being savaged. ”

Meghan started to shiver.

“You have dry clothes to wear?”

“I’m not a child.”

He was well aware.

“You don’t have to mother me.”

The last thing he felt was parental, but at least making her mad was familiar and safer territory.

“You’ll catch your death.”

He heard her grind her teeth as she snatched her things and stalked up the beach. He grinned.

“Playing with fire, Ry?”

He looked at his buddy. “Watching out for my fellow operators.”

Friends with benefits?

She was the one playing with fire. He didn’t intend to get burned.

Thank you for reading Cold Truth .