"They're super smart," I said. "That's part of their charm. They do know things."
Jenny shivered dramatically. "You can swim with them. I'll stay on dry land or just wade on the beach. I can do that, right Lincoln?"
"You don't want to snorkel?" Lincoln sounded surprised.
"Nope." Jenny crossed her arms, and I shrugged. There was no arguing when she made up her mind.
"Okay," he said. "I was going to let the two of you go on your own. I guess it'll just be you, Selena."
"Wait, what? There will be other people, though, right?" I sat up straighter.
"It's a private tour," Lincoln said. "It was just the two of you."
"Jenny," I said, turning to her. "Come on, it'll be amazing."
She shivered dramatically and shook her head. "Nope."
I didn't know why it bothered me to think of going alone with the guide. Maybe I wanted to share the experience with someone.
"I could go with you," Lincoln said. "If you want." He looked hesitant, his words coming out slowly.
"Yes please," I said eagerly, and then I tried not to think too much about how nice it would be to share the experience with him after years of telling him how much I wanted it. This was not a continuation of where we'd left off, I reminded myself. This wasn't even related to that. "That'd be nice," I said, holding my voice steady. Professional.
We arrived at a little dirt lot at the end of an almost hidden road, at the edge of a sparkling cove. To my surprise, there we no other cars, and no people meandering the spotless beach. There was a low building, painted a shade of yellow that had likely been bright at one time, and another small building sat behind it, this one clearly a house.
Lincoln disappeared into the yellow building, returning in a few minutes wearing swim trunks and carrying two sets of snorkels, masks, and fins. The fins he handed me were an attention-getting shade of neon pink, but nothing could have distracted me from the fact that Lincoln wasn't wearing a shirt.
Jenny turned around just in time to see me turn a shade of pink to match my fins, and she dug an elbow into my ribs. "Well, hello," she said, whispering low under her breath.
Lincoln was magnificent. There was really no other way to put it. I wasn't sure if there was a well-outfitted gym on board the ship or if he was genetically blessed—though I did remember him being blessed in other ways...ahem—but the man could have been an underwear model. Or in this case, a swimsuit model. His smooth chest was tan and broad, each muscle standing out in relief as if someone had sketched in some shadow to help the effect. His abs were what I supposed people referred to as washboard, but I could only think of what it would feel like to run my hands over each of those hard ridges of muscle, exploring the little valleys between them.
I'd always found Lincoln attractive physically. But the post-college exterior had firmed, expanded, and improved over what my memory told me he'd looked like six years ago.
"Selena." Lincoln's voice came to me almost through a fog, and the tone told me it wasn't the first time he'd said my name.
"Oh. Sorry." I reached for the fins and mask he was extending to me, and set them down next to my feet in the fine sand. Then I swallowed hard and slipped off the sundress I'd been wearing, dropping it into a little pile next to my shoes and Jenny's. As I scooped my mask and fins back up, I dared another glance at Lincoln.
His aviator shades covered his eyes, but they didn't hide the fact he was staring at me, and I sent up a silent word of thanks to my own gym. I put in long hours at work, but in an activity-focused industry, it was important to be fit and capable, so I worked equally hard at maintaining my fitness. Which came with benefits in terms of how I looked, evidently, since Lincoln seemed every bit as distracted by me as I was by him.
Thankfully, our guide appeared from the low building where Lincoln had changed, and his boisterous mood didn't leave room for any uncomfortable gawking between us.
"Dolphins!" The small grey-haired man cried out, laughing as if he'd just shared a joke with us. "This cove is private," he told us. Then he poked Lincoln in the chest. "This tough guy knows, don't ya, mon?" The Jamaican accent was so strong I wondered if the man was putting it on a bit, exaggerating it for my benefit. "Fewer tourists means more dolphins."
I glanced out at the smooth turquoise water, wondering if I would see any dolphins from where I stood, but the cove looked calm and vacant.
"When we swim," the man said. "The dolphins are in charge. They might be curious, right? Maybe come right up to you and see what you're all about. Or they might stay back. Maybe they just swim by. We don't decide. These dolphins are wild and they run the show. You want to ride one or make them pose for a photo, you gotta go somewhere else."
I felt my excitement fade a little bit. Wasn't that the point? I thought of all the photos I'd seen of people touching the mammals and posing with them. Lincoln must've noticed my disappointment, because he stepped nearer.
"They've actually shown that forced tourist interaction in some places is causing dolphin populations to decline," he said. "Arthur manages a responsible operation, and doesn't make promises—which is the reason Oceanic supports his business. He understands that preserving wildlife means not forcing them to adapt to our expectations. But I've never been out here with Arthur and not seen dolphins. It'll be great," he promised.
That made sense.
"Let's go!" Arthur pulled a mask and snorkel over his bushy white hair and motioned for us to follow him into the water down the little beach. He carried his fins in his hand, so I did the same. Once we were in waist-deep water, we all put our fins on and swam out toward the mouth of the cove.
Underwater, I let myself stare a little bit at Lincoln, who swam just slightly ahead of me. His body was athletic and lean, and in the water he looked like some kind of merman with the long black fins on his feet. My stomach flipped and I willed it to steady. The feelings I was beginning to have for my old flame had no place in my current situation.
After a few minutes, we were out in the mouth of the cove, wide open clear water all around us. There were fish darting by beneath us, and I could see a reef not far from where we'd stopped, where more creatures would surely be swimming. But Arthur had said the reef would be our second focus. He'd promised that if they wanted to play, the dolphins would come out when we did.
And he didn't lie.
We swam around in the middle of the cove for a few seconds, and I gazed around me, staring off into the expanse of open sea. It was the opposite of claustrophobic. It felt like the water went on forever, and I had an odd feeling of being watched, as if there could be just about anything lurking out here. I'd never been afraid of the water, but I understood how people could be. As I thought about this, Lincoln touched my arm, pulling my attention, and my heart nearly stopped as two bulky shapes slipped past us quickly and then swam out until they become hard to see, tail fins bobbing. I popped my head up, breaking the surface, and Lincoln did the same, as did Arthur.
"Was that?" I managed, with my snorkel still in my mouth.
"Yes!" Arthur said, ducking his head back down.
I dropped my face back into the water in time to see the pair coming back. They circled us, wide and distant at first, and then moving nearer. The grin on my face was going to be a problem, I realized. Every time I smiled, water leaked into my facemask, and I had to repeatedly pop my head up to drain it. I'd need to swim with dolphins, but keep a straight face.
Easier said than done.
They were incredible. Once they'd investigated us a bit, they slid through the water around us, rolling and waving their fins. One of them slipped along the length of my thigh, sending shivers through me as the leathery skin touched mine.
Lincoln's eyes were wide when, after a few minutes, one of the creatures moved in close to him, parallel to the way he was laid out on the surface of the water, and rolled into him a bit so they were side by side. The dolphin's face seemed to be laughing as we watched, and I had the distinct impression it
was playing with us purposefully.
The dolphins circled and spun, and at one point, I reached my hand out. After Arthur nodded that this was all right, I held it there as one of the dolphin pair swam up close and pushed its side beneath my palm, and then slid away. I couldn't have told you exactly why, but it brought tears to my eyes and I felt like my heart might burst.
The creatures stayed with us for about fifteen minutes, almost as if they were putting on a mini-show for us to enjoy, and then they swam off together, disappearing into the endless blue of the sea.
I lifted my head up and pulled the mask to my forehead, tears flowing shamelessly from my eyes as Lincoln smiled at me.
Arthur swam around us a bit, giving us a bit of privacy.
"That was amazing," I said, my voice holding every bit of the wonder I felt at having one of my dreams fulfilled.
In the crystalline water, it was easier to move, and when Lincoln's arms came around my waist, pulling me closer as he laughed, it felt natural and right. His deep voice rolled low as he gazed down at me with dancing dark eyes. "I'm so glad I could give you that. That I could do that for you."
"That was a dream come true," I told him, my own arms circling his neck before I could think better of it. "I've wanted to do that my whole life." My voice was soft and low, and I was still flooded with a sense of sheer amazement, though it was mixing now with something else, a feeling that was building as Lincoln's warm skin touched mine beneath the cool surface of the Caribbean water.
"I know," he said softly, his gaze moving from my eyes to my lips.
I can't tell you if it was the sheer amazement of the moment, if it was Lincoln's proximity and solidity, or if it was maybe some mixed up muscle memory, but being in his arms felt so right and so familiar, I almost didn't question what came next. When Lincoln pulled me nearer still, when I pulled myself closer to his mouth, when our lips touched—softly at first and then harder—it felt like the perfect finale to a perfect day.
Lincoln and I kissed for a long moment in the sparkling cove with dolphins dancing somewhere not far away, and it felt like the culmination of years of wishing for things to fall into place.
"God, I missed you," he whispered as his mouth left mine. "Selena, I've missed you every day since—"
Right. Since he left me with no explanation whatsoever.
I dropped my arms from his neck and let myself float away, needing to put distance between us.
"Sorry," I said. "I got carried away." I managed a nonchalant shrug. "Dolphins," I said, lamely, and then I put my mask and snorkel back on and swam back to shore, where Jenny was wading through the water. Her expression when I came up told me she hadn't seen the kiss. That was a good thing. I had enough to think about without her constant questions.
Whatever that was—a resurfacing memory, a little bit of being carried away by the day—it had nothing to do with my current life. It wasn't real. It wasn't the present.
"You have time for tea?" Arthur's friendly voice broke my bout of self-recrimination. We stood on the sandy beach, and Arthur was smiling at the three of us, a hopeful gleam in his eyes.
Lincoln checked his watch, then glanced at us, an eyebrow raised in question.
"Sure," Jenny said.
I probably would have opted to go straight back to the boat so I could stew in my confusion a bit. First—dolphins! A highlight of my life. And then—that kiss. What had I been thinking? And why did I want so much to do it again?
Arthur led us up the front steps of the second little building, which turned out to be his house. He settled us on the front porch after we had dried off, and went inside to fetch the tea.
"Arthur is an old friend," Lincoln explained when the old man had gone inside. "He gets lonely out here, I think."
Jenny looked around. "He could have a million tourists here if he wanted. Then he wouldn't be lonely."
She was right. I wasn't sure what Arthur's setup was, but he had a pristine spot of shoreline and an incredible cove. If he wanted to build a moneymaking operation, besides the dolphin tours, I thought he could do so easily.
"He did that before," Lincoln said. He stopped and smiled at Arthur reappeared with a tray. "He'll tell you, I'm sure."
Arthur set the tray down and joined us. After pouring tea, he looked at each of us and smiled broadly, white teeth flashing along with his golden eyes. "You are the first friends to visit in a few weeks. I get lonely out here sometimes."
I accepted the mug he offered and sipped at it, looking around.
"I don't understand, Arthur," Jenny said, setting her mug down on the little table between us. "Why don't you advertise? You'd have a million tourists out here to swim, use your beach. You could sell ice cream or something, give tours."
"Nah, nah," he shook his head, waving all this away. "We did all that already. My wife and I, when my son was young."
The words were sad, and Arthur's eyes misted a bit when he said this. "But she’s gone, and my son? He lives where you live. America."
"Arthur's son ran a very lucrative dolphin swim adventure here for a few years."
"College money," Arthur agreed, nodding. "But what is good for us is not good for the dolphins."
I shook my head. "I don't understand."
Lincoln smiled, leaning back to let Arthur explain.
"We had a lot of people. Boats, kids. People in the water, on the beach. Food. Like every other beach, right?" He looked between me and Jenny. "It took a lot of work, and I'm too old for it now. But it made a lot of trash too, and I hated that part. And the dolphins stopped coming into the cove—too many people, and some people weren't good with the rules. Like I told you, the dolphins are in charge, right?"
I tilted my head to one side, looking around us. I could see his point. "So it was just too much?"
He lifted a shoulder, made a clicking noise with his mouth. "I'm an old man," he said, as if that explained everything. "My son is gone now. My wife? Gone. It's quiet and that's nice. And the dolphins keep me company now that the tourists and mess and noise aren't here."
"So this is all yours?" Jenny asked, waving a hand to indicate everything we could see.
"All mine. There are twenty acres. A mile of beach. Keeps it quiet."
It was impressive to hear that Arthur was more concerned with the health of his land and water than with money, but it was also clear he wasn't young. That would be a lot to maintain by himself.
"Sometimes, I think I should go," he said now. "To America. With my son. But then what would Lincoln here do? He would be lonely."
Lincoln laughed. "I would miss you," he said.
Arthur looked at me. "Lincoln has been visiting me for years. Sometimes he brings me things from the ship. I have the nicest towels and soaps, and I always have the best meals." He grinned broadly, and something in my chest loosened a little bit at Arthur's praise for Lincoln's kindness.
Jenny frowned. "You steal things from the ship?" she asked, leaning toward Lincoln.
He chuckled. "No. I buy things from the employee shop and bring them over. And whenever we dock, I put in an order at the kitchen. In fact, that should be coming pretty soon," he told Arthur. "One of the kitchen staff promised to deliver this afternoon."
We sipped tea and appreciated the quiet beauty of Arthur's cove. When we finally thanked him and piled back into the car, I watched Arthur and Lincoln embrace, and then saw Lincoln hand the man a few bills, which Arthur clearly tried to refuse, but eventually took.
"Maybe Lincoln's not such a jerk after all," Jenny said, watching too.
"Maybe not," I said. But wouldn't everything be easier if he was?
Chapter Seven
Lincoln delivered us back to our cabin, baked from a long day in the sun, and tired from our adventures. Jenny went immediately inside to nap before dinner, and I lingered a moment in the doorway, trying to make sense of everything.
"I wanted to talk to you a second about what happened today," I said as Lincoln stood in the hallway. "The
kiss."
A tick appeared in the side of his jaw, and a little flush crept into his cheeks. "Yeah," he said, acknowledging it. "Impulse, I guess. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have..."
"Well, right. Obviously. I mean, in a way we work together. If nothing else, we're colleagues now, so that kind of thing—"
"Unprofessional." Lincoln scrubbed his jaw with a big hand.
"Right." I sighed, relieved he agreed, even as my heart did a little stutter in my chest like it was trying to get my attention. "But also, I mean...it's probably just not a good idea. With our history, and everything."
"Of course," he said, his eyes holding mine now, the heat in our matched gaze intensifying with each second.
My heart hammered as I stared at him, and even though we'd just spoken all the right words, I could feel the pull between us, the inevitability of something else happening. I stepped back, pulling the door almost closed between us to break the connection. "Okay, then!" I said.
Lincoln sighed in what sounded like relief. "Right. So, tomorrow we see the property on Grand Cayman."
"Right."
"You guys okay for dinner tonight? I have some duties I need to attend to."
"Of course." I kept most of my body inside the cabin, the open door still a shield between us. Those dark eyes were on mine again, and the heat was threatening to reignite.
"I'll meet you tomorrow morning then? Ten?"
"Perfect. Night." I pushed the door shut before I accidentally threw myself into his arms instead. But then remembered I hadn't said thank you. I pulled it back open to find him still standing there. "Thank you, Lincoln. For today."
He looked at me, something sad running across his face, and then said, "Of course," and turned, walking away down the long hallway.
I went inside and collapsed on the bed.
"You're so screwed," my sister said helpfully from her own reclined position.
"I'm not screwed. I'm a responsible adult."
"I saw that kiss. You're screwed." So she had seen it.
I sighed, throwing an arm over my eyes and wishing my body didn't reignite every time I thought about that kiss. It was every bit as good as my memory of kissing Lincoln from my youth... plus six years of grown-man experience and about twenty-five pounds of what appeared to be solid muscle. "How does a person even get that fit when they live on a boat?"
Take a Chance on Me: The Oceanic Dreams Series Book Six Page 4
