Lacey sighed. “I only meant it will be a very long class if you two snipe at each other the whole time. So call a truce, okay?” She stared straight at Julianne, who inclined her head.
“Agreed. Let’s start, Eli.”
She raised her head to meet my eyes, and for some reason, my heart skittered a little. Had her eyes always been that green? The conversation I’d had with a thoroughly irritated Harper yesterday flashed through my mind. I’d been bitching about having to certify Julianne and how it should be as much fun as a trip to the dentist when my sister had rounded on me.
“Eli, shut up. Maybe you don’t know Julianne as well as you think.”
I’d huffed. “I think I do. She’s a neurotic miser who only cares about numbers. What else is there to know?”
“Did you know she deferred a new computer she’s been wanting for several years so we don’t have to cut Annie’s hours? Does that sound like a dragon queen?”
I stood there completely speechless, which was new territory for me. Now I stared at this… almost easygoing Julianne, and I had to wonder if maybe there was more to our uptight accountant than met the eye.
Blinking, I handed out the four packets. “Let’s dive in!”
I settled into my element, the familiar rhythm of teaching washing over me like the gentle waves lapping at our shores. “All right, folks, let’s talk about the most crucial aspect of diving—buoyancy control.”
My hands moved animatedly as I explained, my voice carrying the passion I felt for the underwater world. “Think of it as your superpower down there. You control it via your buoyancy compensation device.” I moved to the table at the front of the classroom with a disassembled scuba kit neatly laid out in a row and lifted the vest-likeBCD with its interior air bladders. “Too much air in your BCD, and you’re a cork shooting to the surface. Too little, and you’re sinking like a stone.”
I caught Julianne leaning forward, her eyes focused intently on me. I had emailed all of them an introductory document that listed some of the very basics of diving. Hardly anyone ever read the thing, but it was always a good idea to find out who my real, interested students were. “Now, who can tell me the first rule of scuba diving?”
To my surprise, Julianne’s hand shot up. I nodded, curious.
“Never hold your breath,” she stated confidently.
I blinked, caught off guard. “That’s absolutely correct. Care to elaborate?”
She launched into an animated but concise explanation of lung overexpansion injuries that had me raising an eyebrow.
As the class progressed, I found myself consistently impressed by Julianne’s quick grasp of concepts. She asked insightful questions that even seasoned divers often overlooked. As I went over the material, covering Boyle’s Law and symptoms of decompression sickness, Julianne paid close attention, taking notes in her textbook. I tried to hide my growing admiration behind quips and jokes, but internally, I was begrudgingly impressed.
Damn, she might actually be good at this.
The realization irked me more than it should have. It was easier when I could dismiss her as just a boring number-cruncher out of her depth.
With a wide smile, she high-fived Lacey after a particularly tricky question. Lacey grinned back. “Nice one, Jules! You’re crushing this!”
Julianne stiffened and her happy expression droppedlike a stone, her eyes darting to me for a split second before she pasted a smile back on. “Thanks, Lace. But let’s stick to Julianne, okay? I am at work, after all.”
My eyebrows shot up, a flicker of curiosity running through me. She had a nickname? “Aw, come on,” I teased lightly, unable to resist a playful jab. “Jules has a nice ring to it. Very… casual.”
Julianne’s gaze met mine, her expression frostier than an arctic breeze. “It’s Julianne, Eli. Shall we continue with the class?”
Raising my hands in a mock gesture of surrender, I concealed my racing thoughts behind a mask of nonchalance. There was something about that name, something on the edge of my memory that eluded me at the moment. “As you wish, Ms. Julianne Verne. Now let’s move on to the scintillating mechanics of regulators…”
After they left,I cleaned up the classroom, and all day my mind ran over the nickname.Jules…It repeated over and over inside my head. For some reason it made me think of books, but I didn’t know why.
Fortunately, I knew someone who would.
As soon aswork was over, I made my way out of the dive shop and rode my bike along Main Street. Good thing the tourists were driving well today—one of the reasons I never rode without my helmet. As I rode by Corner Scoop, I waved to Brynn Mercer who was sweeping her front stoop. She was a smashing success as the new owner, and her recent hubby wasn’t doing too shabby with his financial planning business, either.
Stopping before the quaint, cozy Bookshop in Paradise,I leaned my bike against the large glass window. The familiar jingle of the bell greeted me as I entered, mingling with the comforting aroma of old paper and freshly brewed coffee.
“Well, well,” my sister Brenna called out from behind a stack of new arrivals. Her long auburn hair hung like a curtain as she leaned out, and her soft-green eyes held a teasing glint. “To what do I owe the pleasure of my big brother gracing me? Did you get bored lounging around all day?”
I laughed as I weaved through the cozy maze of bookshelves. “Ha-ha. I’ll have you know I’ve been up and productive for hours.”
“Teaching resort guests how to breathe underwater hardly counts as productivity,” her husband, Hunter, chimed in, appearing from the back room with a box of books. He set them down on the check-out counter, the heavy box looking almost comically light in his muscular, tattooed arms. He oozed ex-military—dark short hair and beard, everything neat and clean.
