“Tessa.”
She turned at the sound of my voice, and I caught a flash of something—hope? fear?—across her face before she schooled her expression into careful neutrality.
“Braden.” Her voice was steady, but tension was clear in her tight shoulders. “What are you doing here?”
I stepped onto her boat without invitation, the familiar motion of adjusting to the gentle sway second nature. “We need to talk.”
She nodded, setting down the dive computer she’d been checking. “About yesterday.”
“About the kiss,” I said bluntly as her cheeks flushed. “And about what happens next.”
My directness caught her off guard. Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. She’d probably expected me to dance around that meeting of lips, to pretend it hadn’t happened or dismiss it as temporary insanity. Not gonna happen.
“Okay,” she said quietly. “What happens next?”
This was it. The moment where I either protected myself or walked straight into the fire. I chose protection.
“You’re here for three months.” I was pleased when my words came out deliberately calm and measured. “Twelve weeks or so. Then you go back to your life in California, and I stay here with mine. That’s the reality we’re working with.”
Disappointment or maybe hurt flashed in her eyes. But she nodded. “That’s the reality. So what exactly happened yesterday?”
The question hung between us, loaded with possibility and danger. I could feel the pull of her, the magnetic force that had always existed between us. It would be so easy to close the distance, to kiss her again. But that was exactly the kind of thinking that would destroy me.
“I don’t know,” I admitted, my composure cracking slightly. “All I know is that yesterday, kissing you felt like the most natural thing in the world. It felt like coming home and losing my mind at the same time. And I can’t stop thinking about doing it again.”
Her breath caught. “Braden?—”
“But I also know you’re going to leave,” I interrupted, forcing myself to stay on track. “Your whole life is in California. Your career, your future—it’s all there. Dove Key is just a research assignment for you. A temporary stop.”
“You don’t know that,” she said, but her voice lacked conviction.
“Don’t I? Tell me you haven’t already started thinking about your next project, your next paper, your next step up the academic ladder.”
Her head dropped for a moment before she met my gaze again. “Fair enough. I wasn’t expecting you to kiss me. But I can’t pretend I didn’t... that being with you again hasn’t been...” She trailed off, searching for words. “You’renot the same person I left behind. Seeing who you’ve become—it’s been good.” She raised her gaze to meet mine. “I want to spend more time with you, and I hope you help with the project.”
I refused to give into the hope that wanted to take flight within me. “Okay. Both of us agree that we enjoyed being together again. I was mad as hell at Eli for roping me into this, but I’m not anymore. I want to keep working with you.” I swept my gaze around, a wave of wistfulness rising despite my trying to prevent it. “I’ve missed this. Driving a boat. Diving.”
“Your help would be invaluable. And I liked yesterday too. So what now?”
I met her green eyes and squared my shoulders, ruthlessly stomping on the nostalgia. “Here’s what I’m proposing. We acknowledge what’s between us. We don’t deny the chemistry, but we also don’t pretend it’s something it’s not.”
“Which is what, exactly?”
“Temporary,” I said again, the word a shield and a weapon all at once. “Whatever is between us has an expiration date. In a few months, you get on a plane back to California, and we both move on with our lives. No drama, no broken promises.”
Tessa stared at me for a long moment, and I could practically see the wheels turning in her head. She was weighing options, calculating risks, approaching this like the scientist she was. Finally, she spoke. “And in the meantime?”
“In the meantime, we see where this goes. But we’re both clear about the boundaries.”
“Boundaries. Such as?”
I hadn’t thought this far ahead, but I improvised. “Such as... we don’t make this more complicated than it needs to be.”
“Simple.” A faint smile raised her lips. “You want to keep a relationship with your ex-girlfriend simple in Dove Key.”
“I want to keep whatever this is from destroying both of us when it ends,” I corrected, determined to stay in charge. “Because it will end, Tessa. The only question is whether we’re going to spend those twelve weeks pretending we don’t want each other, or whether we’re going to be honest.”
She was close enough now that I could feel the warmth radiating from her skin. “Braden, what are you really asking me for?”
