Holding hands with Brody shouldn't have been that big of a deal, but I just couldn't shake the idea that he really wasn't the kind of guy who held hands with just anyone. It made it special... made me feel special, which was dangerous, but I was done fighting for a little while. We would part ways after we slept together, I had no doubt. I wanted to hang on until then and enjoy the intensity of the physical attraction that sat between us.
"Why are we going to hang out with everyone else?" He glanced over at me, pulling me back as we stopped at the red light.
I glanced down the road to see a bus flying toward us and backed up. "What's with me lately?"
"You're just relaxed. Enjoy it. I'll be your knight in shining armor and keep you from getting hit by the next bus coming toward us."
"Yeah, and you'll expect something in return." I smiled over at him before we moved across the road.
"Just a kiss, and from the way things have been going the last day or so, I'm thinking you might enjoy it more than me." He wagged his eyebrows.
"So cocky." I pulled my hand from his and slipped my hands back into my pockets. "How much longer are you out here at the lake?"
"Probably another month or so?" He moved a little to his right, away from me, before cupping his hand over his eyes. "Really? Shit."
"What?" I jogged behind him as he took off across the street and raced toward the water. A kayak sat just off the shoreline upside down. I couldn't help but wonder what he was up to. Whatever it was, it seemed serious. Surely, there wasn't someone in the kayak. I stopped short of reaching the water as horror rushed over me. Brody's frantic movements said that he believed someone to be in it.
He flipped it over and worked to get the small boy out of the thing before wading through the water. "Come here and help me."
I ran toward him, dropping on my knees and tugging at the little guy’s life vest and t-shirt as Brody laid him down. His skin was pasty, and he wasn't breathing.
"Holy shit." I glanced up at Brody.
"You know CPR?" He tilted the little guy’s head up. "Just get ready to breathe in his mouth. Long puffs of air. Ready?"
"Yeah, I know it." I bent over and worked alongside him, listening to his commands. The fact that he was so incredibly calm left me a nervous wreck. The little boy started to cough a few long seconds later, and I moved back and watched Brody pick him up and turn him over.
"That's it. You got it, buddy. Get it all out." He rubbed the little boy's back, completely attentive to the child.
A warmth rushed through me that left my eyes filling with tears. My tough facade in front of my friends was no different than him pretending to be the alpha asshole. I needed to run fast and hard away from him because I wasn't the kind of girl that fell for someone easily, but once I did... I wanted forever. It had only happened once in my life, and I was still recovering from the mess Brandon made of things. Would Brody be any different? Could he?
It's been a week or so. Slow your roll.
But thanks to Emily needing me to stay behind
a few weeks, and my mom and dad wanting me to leave a few weeks early, I only had a short time left.
A short time to relax and have fun. To meet new people. Not to fall for some random guy.
Definitely not this guy.
"Oh my God," a girl yelled from across the street as she jogged toward us. It was the blonde from the day before that Brody had in his lap in the boat. "Is he..."
"He's okay. He was in the kayak again." Brody turned the boy over to the blonde and moved over toward me. I rose to my feet and reached out, wrapping him in a hug from the side before I could think too much about it.
"Shit. Thank you so much, Brody. I shouldn't have left him." The poor girl was shaking, but we all were.
"It's no problem, but I wouldn't leave him alone in the lake again. He doesn't weigh enough to keep that thing upright when the wind blows as hard as it does out here." He wrapped his arms around me, but continued to focus on her.
"Okay. Thanks." She didn't comment on the two of us or really even look my way, which was a little strange, but the trauma of almost losing her brother was most likely too much as it were.
"You okay?" He rubbed my back and pressed his lips to the top of my head.
"Yeah. Damn, that was scary." I pulled back a little to look up at him. "You totally saved that kid's life."
"For the second time in a weekend, actually." He rolled his eyes. "That's why Veronica was with me on the boat. I saved the kid yesterday morning and she wanted a ride out to the island after that."
"What kind of ride?" I gave him a cheeky grin, trying my best to pull us from thinking about the horror of the kid almost dying.