Billionaires Dollar Series

“Come on, Rapunzel,” she teases. “Let down your hair.”

That does it. “How can I resist, with an invitation like that?”

Ten minutes later she opens the gate for me, now in my swim trunks, a towel over my shoulder. She’s slipped out of her skirt-greeting me clad in nothing but her dark-blue bikini and the fall of her long hair.

“Lifesaver,” I tell her, my hand opening and closing at my side. The taste of her bursts forth on my tongue again, a reminder of our kiss-of having someone to hold in my arms again.

“I’m just glad for the company,” she says, shooting me a look under her bangs. It’s impossible to decipher. “I never realized quite how far Greenwood is from the center of Seattle. My friends complain about the drive.”

“It’s not even twenty minutes.”

“They’re lazy.” She heads to the shallow end of the pool, stepping carefully into the water. The sunlight across the water sends rippling reflections over her fair skin.

It’s damn near impossible to look away from the curves of her body. My mind catalogues it all on instinct, filing it away without my agreement. Round, firm breasts that would fit perfectly in my palm. A waist that’s begging for my arm around it. Soft thighs and curved hips.

“Are you coming?” Bella asks, shading her eyes again. Her smile is wide.From NôvelDrama.Org.

I toss the towel on a nearby chair and join her in the water, wading into the depths. “I should have installed one of these ages ago.”

She dips her head back, rising up like a seal, hair slick around her face. “Why haven’t you?”

“The kids. Evie needs to be older before I feel comfortable with a death trap in the yard,” I say, looking away from her to the treehouse beyond. The kids, who are my priority, even though I want nothing more than to sweep this woman off her feet.

“Mhm,” she says. “I bet there are a ton of decisions you’ve made over the past few years that haven’t been for you. You do a lot for them, don’t you?”

“Sure. That’s what it means to be a parent,” I say. “I can’t remember when I’ve had a day like this to myself, without the kids or work. It’s been forever.”

I turn on my back and float in the water. The sky above is a deep, cerulean blue. Here with her, it’s easy to ignore all the responsibilities that beckon.

“Freedom,” she says.

“Yeah.”

“I feel like that too, sometimes. And I don’t even have kids.”

I snort. “I thought so too, before they arrived.”

“In between my thesis, networking for jobs, applying for fellowships, trying to create a plan for the future… It’s all so much.”

“I remember that.”

“You do?”

“Feeling like you’re falling behind with every passing day? Yeah.”

She snorts, turning around and swimming past me. I follow her, both of us drifting into the deep end. “Somehow I doubt that,” she says. “You must have been running laps around your fellow classmates.”

“What, because of my later success?”

“Want to know a secret?”

Bella swims closer, droplets glittering in her long eyelashes. “Tell me.”

“I was late to practically every lecture. Had average grades, nothing spectacular. Barely got accepted into graduate school.”

“You’re not serious.”

“I am,” I say, smiling. “So I’m guessing you’re already way ahead of twenty-five-year-old me on that score.”

She bites her lip. “Ah.”

“What?”

“I’m twenty-four.”

I groan. “Of course you are.”

“Is that a problem?”

“You’re making me feel even more of a cradle-robber than I already do.” The words slip out-no taking them back.

“A cradle-robber?” She swims closer, flicking her hand and blasting me with water. It’s cool, washing over my head. “I’m a grown woman!”

“Oh, I know that,” I say. “But it was still wrong of me to come on to you in the kitchen.”

Bella shakes her head, swimming away from me toward the shallower end. I follow her languidly, my arms cutting through the water.

“Yeah?”

“When was the last time you had a relationship with a woman?”

I tread water, watching as she reaches a place where her feet touch the bottom. She steadies herself against the edge of the pool.

“A while,” I say.

Her eyes are level on mine. “How long?”

I swim toward her, the words dragged out of me. I’m finding it harder and harder to keep up my usual easygoing, charming personality around Bella, at least when she asks me questions like this. “Well, my marriage was the last one.”

Her eyes widen and I hate what’s there, what she’s no doubt thinking. So I look away instead. The last thing I want is to be pitied.

“And that ended…?”

“Right after Evie was born,” I say. “So three years ago.”

“So let me get this straight. The reason you said we couldn’t keep… well, kissing, was because you don’t feel you have the time for any form of commitment.”

I drift closer to her. Jesus, but it’s hard to think with her this close. “Yes, that’s pretty much it.”