Page 31 of Impossible Thrills

The water from the waterfall somewhat shielded them from Jagger and Hays.

He glanced out to where their buddies were treading water and trying not to look at them. Great guys.

Then Nick wrapped her up tight, his arms sliding around her lower back as he treaded water with only his legs. She wrapped her arms around his neck and her legs around his lower back. The position was as thrilling as it was intimate.

“Can you keep us afloat like this?” she asked.

“For hours.” He grinned cockily, but then his gaze dropped to her lips.

Her heartbeat sped up, and she was warm despite the cool water.

“Darcy.” Her name came out as a soft moan, filled with yearning. She’d never heard her name said so enticingly.

She arched up toward him. Their lips brushed and joy filled her.

Nick pulled back, staring at her, concern in his gaze. She’d shut him down last night. How could she explain she was ready to make a leap?

“Darcy, I … We shouldn’t.”

The pool was suddenly freezing. They shouldn’t kiss. He was right. Their paths were too different. He’d walk away from her in a couple of days, and she’d be devastated. She’d let herself get caught up in the sensations of trusting him skydiving today, trusting him off the cliff.

She loosened her grip on him.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and he looked as if he meant it. He looked torn apart. “This is confusing.”

She nodded. He was right. She didn’t know why he was holding back, but she knew she should hold back.

Pushing away from him, she beat at the water with her arms and legs but sank under the waterfall.

Nick grasped her under the arm again and tugged her through the spray and out into the pool.

“Is alone time over?” Jagger teased.

Darcy wanted to cry. Alone time was most definitely over.

Two more days. Then she’d be back with her babies and toddlers and where she was meant to be. She wasn’t meant for a relationship with a man. Her failed marriage and knowing she wasn’t enough for her own father or her husband should tell her that.

Pasting on a smile, she vowed to keep things light and not let Nick know that he’d already hurt her. She would’ve let down her guard, kissed him, trusted him. She’d rejected him last night, and now he was rejecting her. He was right. It was confusing.

“Time for me to jump off my little cliff again,” Darcy announced.

She looked at Nick and he grinned, as if he hadn’t just rejected her, as if things were fine between them.

“By myself this time,” she announced.

Nick’s eyes flickered with a hurt as if she’d punched him. It was there and gone quick and she was certain she imagined it. He helped her swim to the edge of the pool, and she climbed out, determined to show she could climb and jump on her own. She didn’t need a man. She’d never been able to rely on one. Why should that change because she’d met the most appealing man of the century who cared for her but couldn’t kiss her and definitely couldn’t be with her after this week?

Struggling over the boulders with her slick clothes, hands, and feet, her face was flushed from exertion and embarrassment as she slowly ascended, progressing up the side of the waterfall, grasping roots and rocks. Her hands and arms quivered with the exertion of hauling herself up a second time. She’d assumed she was strong, carrying around twenty-to-thirty-pound toddlers. Apparently not.

Definitely not anywhere near the category of Nick, Jagger, or Hays. The men didn’t say anything, which she appreciated. Any coaching or teasing would just annoy her right now. They all could’ve scrambled up these twenty feet in twenty seconds, looking like the perfect specimens they were. It took her probably longer than a minute and she worried what her backside looked like to the men down below. How awkward. Why hadn’t she thought of that before taking off?

Finally, she was perched on the small ledge. Alone. She glanced down. Nick’s deep-brown eyes instantly captured hers and held her attention. She could see it in his eyes. He felt deeply for her. Whatever was keeping them apart might not even be his fault.

She didn’t want to stew about it, and she had no answers. If only she was brave enough to ask for some, but she’d learned well throughout the ten years she lived with her step-grandmother after her grandpa died and the four years she’d lived with Johnny that it was better not to ask hard questions. She never liked the answers.

“Go Darcy!” Hays cheered.

“Three-sixty and a back flip,” Jagger teased.

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