The Allure of Dean Harper (The Allure #2)(26)

She stretched her left leg out over the rail and then twisted her body as if she were hopping over the top of a fence. I lifted her and kept her steady, and when she was on the opposite side, both feet on the platform, she glanced up at me. I could feel the adrenaline pumping through her veins. Our pulses were blending and for two seconds, I thought we’d kiss. Right there with everyone watching.

“You can let go now,” she said, shifting her gaze from my lips up to my eyes.

I snapped back to reality like a rubber band, let go of her waist, and took two steps back. One step wouldn’t have been enough. One step meant I could still lean forward and kiss her. Two steps gave me back my control.

“C’mon Dean! I’m jumping with or without you!” Zoe yelled.

I laughed and hopped the railing in one clean jump.

“Okay, jump on one,” Julian yelled.

“Three.”

I leveraged my body over the blueish green water and took a breath.

“Two!”

“Oh Jesus, this is stupid,” Lily whispered next to me.

My heart raced as if it were trying to fight its way from my chest.

“One!” Julian yelled.

I bent my knees, reached out for Lily’s hand, and pulled her off the ledge with me.

She let out a wild scream as we flew through the air. The water rushed to meet us and I held my breath just before we crashed through the surface. The cold water overtook us and I let go of Lily’s hand so I could kick back to the surface. Endorphins spiked my blood, mixing with the adrenaline from the few seconds of flight. I’d taken that jump hundreds of times, but never while connected to someone else.

I broke the surface and inhaled a deep breath. Julian and Josephine were already kicking back to the dive ladders, and Zoe was climbing onto the swim platform. Lily was nowhere to be found.

I spun in a circle, cursing the fact that we were swimming off the shore of New York and not in the Caribbean. The water was too dark to see below the surface, and for two seconds I feared I wouldn’t be able to find her if she’d hurt herself during the jump. I sucked in a deep breath, preparing to go back down to search for her, just as her blonde hair broke the surface. She coughed up water and pushed her hair back out of her face, out of sorts, but seemingly uninjured.

“Are you okay?” I asked, paddling closer.

Her wide eyes turned to me and she held out one hand, using the other to tread water.

“Do. Not. Come. Any. Closer.” She enunciated each word as if she’d chop my head off if I didn’t heed her warning.

“What’s wrong?”

I paddled closer and her eyes flared with warning.

“DEAN. Do not come any closer.”

That’s when I noticed what she was trying desperately to hide.

Oh shit.

“My top came off when I hit the water.”

She scanned the water around her, frantic. And me?

I tried my damnedest to keep the smirk off my face.





Chapter Twenty


Lily





“EVERYONE TURN AROUND!” I yelled. “SO HELP ME GOD!”

Julian helped pull Jo up out of the water and she collapsed into a fit of laughter on the swim platform. Julian covered his eyes with one hand and bent down to pull her up with the other.

“I can’t see anything! I swear. I’m just going to go back into the galley.”

Josephine kept howling with laughter, unable to even catch her breath. I’d kill her as soon as I found my bathing suit top. Hell, maybe I’d just strangle her with it.

Zoe was currently the only person on my good side. As far as I was concerned, Jo was dead to me. Her and Dean, both. When I turned back around, he was still treading water a few feet away from me, completely unfazed by my death threats.

“I hate you.”

He tilted his head and a little smirk stretched across his lips. “I can’t see anything.”

“You’re lying,” I said, glancing down to confirm my boobs were below the surface. Every time the ocean current bobbed me up and down, I feared one would pop out, much to Dean’s delight.

He shook his head. “There’s no use looking for your top. You’re going to drown trying to find it.”

I groaned and glanced back to the boat. “Josephine! Jo! Will you stop laughing for two seconds and help me?”

She was absolutely no use. “Lily.” She breathed through laughter. “I’ll help, just let me—” She couldn’t even get the sentence out without erupting into another fit of cackling.

The burning sensation in my arms was becoming harder to ignore; I couldn’t tread water for much longer.

“Josephine! This isn’t funny! Some shark is probably smelling my bikini top and deciding he wants to eat me for lunch!”

Dean groaned. “For the last time, there are no sharks.”

I turned back around and…GOD DAMN HIM. He was closer than ever. I didn’t have a choice. I had to swim to the boat and get out without my bikini top. Josephine wasn’t going to get off her bony butt and help me. Either I succumbed to my fate and drowned, or I got out and let Dean see my life-changing rack, thus ruining him for all future women from there on out. (Okay, maybe I was hyping myself up a little bit.)

I started paddling back to the boat, already breathing heavily from having to tread water for so long. Dean swam right past me, reached the ladder, and pulled himself up and out, all before I even got close to the boat. Show off. His tan, smooth chest glistened in the sun as he bent back down for my hand.