Page 10 of Leaping Into Love

One of his endearing croaks slips out, and he clears his throat, as usual, even though I’ve told him repeatedly not to be embarrassed by the sound. “Perhaps it is a local saying.”

It wouldn’t surprise me if Rita’s Hollow had its own lingo. Even though I’ve grown more comfortable when I’ve popped downtown a couple of times recently, there’s still an oddness about the people in the shops. About the whole town.

With the next step, the water deepens to the point that the bottom disappears from beneath my feet. I do the breaststroke until I’m within arm’s reach of him, then tread water adequately but not gracefully.

Henry, on the other hand, maintains his position effortlessly, as if being in the water is his natural habitat. In this close proximity, I’m able to see the blurred movement of his legs underwater. I know it’s just a trick of the eye because of the reflection of the plant life in and around the pond, but his legs look green. Not just a little green. Green, green. Frog green.

“Would you like that for yourself?”

“Green legs?” Even the cool water surrounding the majority of my body doesn’t prevent my face from heating.

The easy smile on his face falls away, but it’s not an expression of confusion. He looks…worried. Maybe it’s my sanity he’s concerned about after my bizarre comment.

“Sorry, I know that made no sense.” Attempting to laugh at myself comes out more like struggling for breath. Not entirely inaccurate since I’m furiously sculling my arms and kicking my legs to keep my head above water. I’ve always been a pretty solid swimmer, but in this moment, I feel more like an overboard victim.

My next attempt at a deep breath results in taking a mouthful of water instead. Choking, I sink beneath the surface, eyes wide open but seeing nothing through the flurry of bubbles leaving my mouth and nose, flailing wildly while attempting to get my head above water again.

Then, Henry’s arm is around me, his chest pressed against mine as he brings me up. “You’re okay,” he says, holding me securely while I sputter and gasp. “I won’t let you go.”

“I’m—sorry,” I say between raw coughs. “I—” More coughing cuts off my ability to speak properly.

“Shh, try to relax and calm your breathing. Put your arms around me and rest your head on my shoulder if you want to.”

Not the circumstances I wanted for us to be this close, but I take the offer, clinging to him. His skin is cool from the water, but holding him tightly like this, I feel the effect of his internal heat. The length of his hard cock presses against me, and I gasp, my hips tilting forward instinctively.

“Tiana,” he croaks, “I apologize for my inappropriate⁠—”

“Don’t,” I say, lifting my head from his shoulder and looking into his worry-filled eyes. “It’s not inappropriate if I feel the same way about you, and I do. I really like you, and not in a ‘my boss is nice, I like the guy’ kind of way. I never think of you like that, as an employer, and I think about you a lot.”

His wide eyes search my face, then he leans in, close enough to feel his warm breath ghost over my lips.

Automatically my eyelids close, my head tilts, and my lips part ever so slightly.

But the kiss I’m waiting for, the kiss I’m sure he wants to give me, doesn’t come. Instead, he clears his throat, and with what seems like instinctive fluidity, takes us to shallower water, his arm unwrapping from my waist as soon as my feet touch bottom and my shoulders are above the surface.

For a few seconds, I don’t let go of him. Then I do, because when I open my eyes, the pained expression on his face says more than enough to get the message across. Releasing him, I put an arm’s length between us. “I’m so sorry. When I felt your…you know,” I tilt my head to the side rather than say the word that I’m pretty sure would embarrass the heck out of him, “I thought it meant you’re attracted to me, but I understand it was just a physiological response to a nearly naked woman being plastered against you.”

“Tiana…”

I wave him off before he finds the words to give me another apology. “It’s fine, really. Because of my feelings about you, I misread an anatomical reaction to stimuli as something more, and I’m mature enough to accept it and forget it. I hope you can do the same about my admission, because I’d hate for my one-sided feelings to be the reason we can’t continue to be—” Boss and employee doesn’t seem adequate, but I don’t want to misjudge another thing by saying friends. “I’d hate for my feelings to change the way things were before I said what I said.”

His already strained expression intensifies as he watches me swim out to the deeper water. Having just saved me from going under, it makes sense that he’s worried. He probably doesn’t want to have to touch me again.

“Don’t worry, I’m actually a good swimmer,” I say while doing a gentle backstroke. “I’m just going to enjoy the water for a few minutes, but you don’t have to hang around. I’ll be fine on my own.”

For a moment, he just stands there, watching. Thinking so hard, I can almost see the wheels turning in his head. Duty bound, no doubt.

“I promise I won’t need rescuing again,” I say, letting him off the hook again, then I switch to a breaststroke and swim away, in the direction of my cottage.

In what feels like a blink, he’s beside me. Silently swimming, matching my speed exactly, barely causing a ripple with his effortless strokes. Tempting as it is to look at him, I don’t lose focus this time, and in a couple of minutes I can see my cottage beyond the reeds at the periphery. I veer toward them, shifting to walking through the chest-deep water after my toes connect with the squishy bottom in shallower water.

“What are you doing?” he asks as I part the bulrushes and poke my head into the foliage.

“Looking for frogs.” I pull back and look at him over my shoulder. “One frog, actually, though I’m sure I wouldn’t recognize him if I saw him.”

“Him?”

I nod. “The posting for this job said knowledge of amphibians is preferred, so as soon as I submitted my resume, I did a bunch of reading on species common in this area, and frogs in general, so I know the calling I’ve been hearing at night is from a male frog.” When his response is just a wide-eyed blink, I wink while taking the conversation in a different direction, since impressing him with my newly acquired knowledge clearly isn’t working. “And then you didn’t ask me anything about frogs in the interview.”