Page 59 of Shifting Gears

When the video comes back, Kayla is looking at the camera with an air of complete seriousness. “How much money do I need to pay you to let me take your place?”

Nora snorts. Truly, the amount is inconceivable; she came a total of five times yesterday, and Dani gave her a massage before bed. “In your dreams.”

“You’re damn right, in my dreams!” Kayla says. Even Ash nods his head in solemn agreement. “You’re being eaten out by a Cheeto-dusted goddess with the hands of a craftsman, and you haven’t been bragging to us about it? I thought we were friends!”

“I hate you both,” Nora sighs affectionately, but she resigns herself to spending the rest of the afternoon being mercilessly teased.

“Does she at least have a sister?”

“She has a cousin. And she’s actually kind of your type,” Nora says, thinking back to the last few people Kayla has dated. She does tend to favour short women with quick tempers. “But Sarah is caught up in someone else.”

“Damn,” Kayla mutters.

“What about me?” Ash says, poking his head into frame.

“They’re both lesbians, Ash.”

“I meant those cute boys you told us about!” Ash says flippantly. “The couple. Are they looking for a third? Do they like Indian guys?”

Ash is delighted to hear that while Nora is pretty sure they are not looking to open their ten-year relationship, he can take a wild swing at a throuple with Ryan and Owen if he so chooses.

It’s not like they’d ever come to Riverwalk themselves to take her up on it.

Chapter 14

“Have you ever gone swimmingoff your dock?”

Nora frowns, adjusting her sunglasses and slipping a bookmark between the pages she’d been reading. Dani has been sleeping over more and more lately—mostly because Nora is getting more and more reticent to not wake up next to her—and they’re at the tail end of a four-day stay.

Dani is lying in a lounge chair in the sun, one foot sticking out so that she can wedge it under Nora’s back where she sits in the shade of her deck umbrella. It’s sweet how Dani always seems to find a way to touch her when they aren’t directly sitting together, even if it’s only with a foot. She’s probably going to have a hilarious tan line by the end of the day.

Nora should probably think a little bit harder about how easy it is just existing with Dani nearby, sitting in companionable quiet while they each do their own activities. It’s something she’s never really had before, even with Kayla and Ash. She’s always lived alone. Worked alone. Now she’s dividing her attention between a book about forest management and Dani’s glowing skin, and it’s perfectly comfortable.

“No. I’ve never thought about it,” Nora says.

“Do you want to?”

Nora blinks, looking out at the slab of wood that juts into the water near the boathouse. She’s never really been down there—she gets enough fresh air and sun up here on the deck. The water does look tempting—cool and clear blue in the heat of the late afternoon. “Sure, it’d be nice to do it sometime.”

“Then we should,” Dani says decisively.

“Right now?”

“Yeah! You should get the things you want. Let’s have a beach day.”

“There’s no beach,” Nora points out, gesturing at the rocky shoreline. “And you don’t have a bathing suit.”

Dani is already standing, heading inside the house, and Nora follows somewhat perplexedly. Dani ducks into the hallway, her bare feet padding on the hardwood. Before she disappears, Nora sees that she does, in fact, have a funny tan line on her right leg from having one foot in the shade.

“You have a private dock! Nobody else lives out here,” Dani says. Nora pokes her head around the corner to see Dani rummaging through the closet next to the washroom. She emerges with two fluffy, red towels and tosses one over. “Come on!”

Nora doesn’t have time to so much as change into her own suit before Dani is taking her hand and leading her back onto the deck, heading down the stairs that lead to a dock Nora has never set foot on.

The wood planks creak when Dani waltzes onto them, and Nora is reminded ominously of the rickety tree house, but it seems to hold. Dani lays the towels down, but doesn’t sit.

“You’re going to get your clothes wet—oh, and you’re already stripping,” Nora says, her voice going high and a little squeaky as Dani pulls her shirt up and over her head. “Okay!”

Dani’s shorts follow suit. Rather than jumping into the water when she’s stripped to her underwear, like Nora expects her to, Dani reaches behind her back and starts to fiddle with the clasp of her bra.

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