He stalled his determined stride toward the water and looked down at me with furrowed brows. “Huh?”
I wiggled out of his arms, and to my surprise, he let me go. Straightening my clothes, I took a step back and dared a glance at him.
“It’s your fault. You told me to go back and flirt with him. I must have been amazing at it, by the way, because he asked me out. And then I was so flustered that I said yes, and he’s picking me up tomorrow night.”
After a long moment, Jake said, “Okay. Why are you acting like that’s a bad thing?”
“Doesn’t that go against what you and I are trying to do?”
He laughed, rubbing water droplets from his face. “It’s fine. It’s tomorrow night?”
I nodded.
“Then nobody will find out. It will be good practice. Maybe you and Easton will hit it off, and you’ll keep dating in Boise.”
“Yeah, because that’s happened before.”
Something flashed in Jake’s eyes that caused my stomach to clench. He shook his head slowly before taking a step toward me.
“What did you say?”
There was an edge to his voice that instantly had my guard up. Confused, I began backing up, away from him, matching his pace step for step.
“What?” I asked.
“Were you doubting yourself again? After all our talks?”
“No…” I lied, trying to recall what I had said.
“You were.”
I immediately bolted up the hill, retracing my steps to no avail. His arms wrapped around me, lifting me up in the air, my back at his stomach, as he began slowly walking us both back down to the pond. Sophie’s delighted squeals were only encouraging him.
“Listen,” he began, his voice in my ear causing goosebumps to ripple down my arms. “I would lose sleep at night if I were to mess up your hair. You know that, right?”
“Liar,” I spat as a laugh bubbled out of me. Jake wasn’t slowing down, so I went limp, attempting to free myself from his embrace.
He gripped me tighter, and my fighting definitely became more for show.
“But then I see you’re still spouting off bull crap about thinking people still don’t want to date you. Even after he ASKED YOU OUT. So, unless you can come up with ten nice things to say about yourself right now, I’m throwing you in the pond.”
“Ten?!” I squealed in outrage, but his arms refused to move from their vise grip around my waist. My feet dangled in front of us as he stepped into the water.
“You'd better think fast. You’ve got thirty seconds.”
“Dunk her, Daddy!” came the excited voice of a pint-sized traitor.
“Two against one,” he taunted, my breath catching as the cold water nipped at my legs. “You'd better start talking.”
My mind scrambled through years of self-doubt and never feeling like I measured up to the standards around me. But I did have one thing.
“I like my straight hair!” My hands jerked wildly. “I’m insanely vain about it, and I would be devastated if somebody messed it up right now.”
Jake snorted and moved us farther out. “That’s one.”
We were getting closer; I was going to have to rapid-fire a few things off.
“I like my legs!”