Page 60 of The Prodigal

I shake off my thoughts and face Mr. Rude Ass. “What am I doing to make things uncomfortable?”

He picks up a rock and tosses it from his hip into the water. “You’re smiling at a river.”

Was I?

“You think smiling is awkward?” I step toward him as he leans down and picks up another stone.

“I think smiling at inanimate things is weird, yes.”

Grabbing my own stone, I pick it up and balance it in my palm. “What about stones? Do you find them awkward?”

Just last night, I found him asleep with one in his hand. Stones must hold some sort of significance to him. The question is, will he tell me what that is?

Chuckling, Remington casts the stone into the river, watching as it skips once over the surface. “I don’t find stones awkward. I find them especially useless.”

He’s lying. I know it.

“Then why were you holding one last night?”

The muscles in his neck go taut before he relaxes, plastering on his mask of indifference. “I forgot my teddy bear.”

I don’t know what comes over me. Maybe it’s the pent-up tension between us or the fact that I am just sick and tired of his shit, but before I can think it through, I shove Remington.

And he stumbles.

It’s not pretty.

Especially when his mouth falls open and he loses his balance. He reaches out for something to keep him on shore, and he finds…me.

Cold water catches us in its rough embrace, ripping our tangled bodies apart with one rush of its powerful current. My legs flail over my body as I try to find my footing, but I only end up inhaling a crap-ton of water as I panic and scream out.

It’s not that I can’t swim—I just never swam against a current in the country’s second-longest river. What if I end up in the Gulf or, worse, drowning in water that actually does smell like bad tuna? That would be awful, especially if—

Remington!

What if the reason he didn’t want to see the river is because he can’t swim?

Oh, no.

I’ll never be able to live with myself if something happens to him.

I just wanted to see the river, not kill the only person who’s ever been semi-nice to me. He might be fuck hot and a vindictive little shit, but deep down, he has a good heart—I know it.

Remington is my antihero. He doesn’t deserve a death by drowning in tuna water he hates so much.

A few tumbles and ninety-five years later, I finally find my footing and break the surface of the water, looking incredibly sexy with tangled hair as I heave with violent man coughs, attempting to clear what is likely fish guts and bacteria from my lungs.

“Remington,” I yell with a rasp I don’t recognize.

God, please don’t let him have drowned. Maybe just a little water in the lungs because he could stand a little humbling. But don’t kill him. He has potential.

“101! Stop playing. I’m not in the mood for any more of your theatrics.”

Panic roars in the pit of my stomach as I take a few steps upstream to where Remington and I fell in, but the current sends me onto my ass again before I make any progress.

Choking, I fight to the surface again and again, until I find calmer waters and can stand.

“Remington!” I scream at my first inhale as my hands search wildly for something to hold on to so I don’t drift farther downstream.

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