“I knew it.” She beamed. “Little Chloe Murphy can’t stand the cold.”
I splashed a little water towards her. “Don’t tease—I’m fine. I’m not letting you win that easily.”
Inés grumbled. We fell into an awkward silence.
“Wow,” I managed, joking through my shivering. “To think, all it took for us to spend two minutes alone with each other was a game of chicken.”
She laughed flatly, mocking me, but I could see that hint of humor in her eyes. “I guess this is what counts for team building when your partner is a bitch.”
“I’m sorry, I’m the bitch?” I said, my mouth wide open in playful shock.
“You took the words from my mouth.” Her grin was playful. I splashed more water towards her in revenge, but she only turned her back to me, pretending to swim away. “I guess we can go back to shore now. Competition over, I’ve won. I got Chloe Murphy to actually apologize.”
On an instinct I didn’t know I had, I reached out under the water, grabbing her arm and pulling her back towards me. I was suddenly all too aware that she was only mere inches from me, stripped down to her underwear. One wrong move and I’d feel the length of her body, the press of her gorgeous skin. “I do really want us to stop fighting.”
Henrik was right. Neither of us wanted to make this relationship easy. But he’d also brought me here to make friends, and I knew from watching her with Scottie and Dylan how good a friend she could be. Maybe she could be mine too.
“I know. We won’t win any trophies the way we’re playing,” Inés said, hesitating as if she was trying to make sure she didn’t agree to something she couldn’t promise. “I need to keep reminding myself that you aren’t an enemy. I can do it with everyone else, but... I don’t know why I can’t switch it off with you.”
I recognized that she was opening up, as if the cold of the ocean had eased the temperature of her anger towards me, and took another risk. “Is it because of the kiss?”
Her expression crumpled, and maybe for the first time, she didn’t get angry or mad. Instead I saw pain and sadness.
“Would you judge me if I said yes?”
“I wouldn’t.”
“I thought...” She trailed off for a moment. “I gave you my number. You said you’d call. It hurt a little, when you didn’t. And then, Henrik.”
I felt horrible. I’d wanted to call, meant to, at least. But everythingmy parents had taught me told me not to. It wasn’t until Henrik that I really started to question what they’d said, and now, this weekend, spending time with the other girls and seeing their genuine friendship, I also realized how isolated I’d become from real connections in this sport.
I shook my head, biting my shivering lip, and said, “I think I should tell you that Henrik and I ended things.”
Her brows pressed together. “What?”
“It wasn’t this big, serious thing to begin with.”
“But if you broke up, then why are you here?”
I smiled, but embarrassment threatened to swallow me whole. “Would you judge me if I said to make friends?”
“No, I wouldn’t,” she said, her tone comforting. “Good friends, people you can rely on, are hard to find. Especially in a competitive environment. But they are worth their weight in gold.”
Despite the freezing cold that I was sure had now reached my bones, I was thankful we had done this together. Borne out of our own arrogance, it had done us a world of good. As if we had realized that if we carried on being the way we were together, we both stood to suffer. Whether it was on the court face-to-face or in the freezing Atlantic, late at night.
“There’s only four rooms. Are you still sharing the bed?” she asked, as if she was testing my confession.
“Bedroom,” I corrected. “He’s sleeping on the floor.”
Her grin was impossibly wide, and I was sure that sharp gasping breath that left her would’ve been a full-bodied laugh if it hadn’t been for our chilled bodies.
“He’s sleeping on the floor?” she finally managed.
My own grin matched her own. “Yeah.”
“Where’s the dog?”
“Wilson sleeps on the bed.” I bit back my own laugh. “She’s a dog with very high standards.”
