Page 127 of Until August

I looked out at the moonlit water. It seemed deceptively calm. But it was dark, and there would be an undertow. I knew she could swim. We’d gone to the cove a couple weeks ago and spent the day at the beach.

But I had no idea why she wanted to dive into the ocean this late at night. “Why?”

She pulled her hands out of my grip and wrapped them around the back of my neck, pushing her tits against my chest and peppered kisses on my jaw and neck. “To remind us that we’re alive.”

I tried to read her face in the light of the half-moon, but I couldn’t get a good read on it. “So you want to risk your life to prove that you’re alive?”

She pulled away, a smile playing on her lips. “I thought you liked living dangerously.”

“I’m not eighteen anymore, baby.”

“Pretend you are,baby.” I watched her undress, not a slow striptease, but like her hands couldn’t work fast enough to get her clothes off. She dropped them onto the sand and ran toward the ocean in her bra and underwear. “Catch me if you can,” she called over her shoulder.

I laughed under my breath. She knew damn well I’d never let her go in without me, so I stripped down to my boxer briefs, and like a fool, I chased after her. The water was up to her shins when I caught up to her and pulled her into my arms.

“You’re crazy.”

She threw back her head and laughed. “I know,” she said. “And I love it.”

So did I. I couldn’t think of anything Ididn’tlove about Nicola.

Who was I to stop her if she wanted to risk life and limb by swimming in the Pacific Ocean at midnight? If she was in, so was I.

“Let’s do this.” I grabbed her hand, and we ran into the water. When it got too deep and the current too strong, we dove under the waves and met up again after swimming beyond the breakers.

I spun her around, wrapped my arms around her from behind, and pulled her on top of me while I floated on my back.

Like Sage had said, the ocean could carry even the heaviest load.

But the ocean could also sneak up on you if you weren’t paying close enough attention. A wave crashed over our heads, and we both ended up with a mouthful of water and a coughing fit.

That’s what I got for letting down my guard.

I reached for Nicola and tugged her closer after we caught our breath again. “Are you okay?”

She coughed a little and then bobbed her head, pushing her wet hair off her face. “I’m good.” She wrapped her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist. So trusting. So confident that I would keep us both afloat.

She peered at my face. “But how are you?”

I didn’t think she was talking about the aftermath of the wave that had just crashed over our heads.

I could tell her a thousand and one things that I was feeling right now.

Fear. Worry.

A sinking feeling in my stomach like a boulder had settled there.

Panic over losing my son again and never achieving that closeness we’d been working toward before he left.

Instead, I summed it up in one word. “Alive.”

She understood without my having to say more and pressed her cool, sweet lips against mine. My tongue swept into her warm mouth. She tasted salty, like the sea and all the tears I’d never shed.

I wanted to stay here like this, in this moment, with her arms and legs wrapped around me, lost at sea with Nicola, buoyed up by the salt water. I wanted to let the ocean carry us. To feel weightless and unencumbered by life’s burdens.

“I’m glad,” Nicola said. “The world is better with you in it, August Harper.”

“Right back at you, baby.” I looked over just as another wave crashed over our heads. Jesus.