Aaron snickered and I found myself smiling more at him sounding like himself than anything. I flicked my gaze to the side, finding him with his arms planted behind him, eyes on me. I looked back at the water. “Nessie isn’t going to get you,” he claimed.

I side-eyed him with a smirk. “You’re on a first-name basis with her?”

“Yeah, what of it?” He nudged me again, and again I kept my attention forward. “Get in the water. Nothing will get you.”

“No.”

“Ruby.”

“Aaron.”

“Get in the water. You say you’re scared, and I know you’re braver than that, so do it.”

I couldn’t help but turn my head to look at him with a crazy expression on my face. “That’s easy for you to say.”

“Why?”

I blinked. “Because you’re probably not really scared of anything.”

Aaron’s head jerked back and he frowned. “I’m scared of enough things.”

It was my turn to raise an eyebrow. “Like?”

“I told you. Things I can’t control. Being a failure,” he said.

“You’ll never be a failure, and I can’t control if a giant sea creature swims up to me.”

He sighed again and chose to ignore my first statement. “She’s on the other side of the ocean, and Jaws is way up along the coast. You’ll be fine.”

I scoffed, but Aaron didn’t make a sound. He was too busy looking at me expectantly, like he was waiting for me to see reason and decide that yes I would go in water so dark no one could see anything beneath the surface, because that was logical. But he just kept on staring.

And staring.

And staring a little more.

“Aaron,” I mumbled, tipping my head back to look up at the sky because I couldn’t handle his gaze anymore.

It wasn’t until he swiftly got to his feet and stood up straight that I finally glanced up at him, finding that long body standing over me, his hands going to the hem of his shirt for a moment before he pulled it up over his head and dropped it to the sand without ceremony.

I jerked back, sputtered and glanced at his abs for all of one second before moving my eyeballs to his face. “What are you doing?”

He was watching me as his hands went to the front zipper of his shorts, and he was still watching me as he unbuttoned and unzipped them, tugging them down his legs with a shake of those narrow hips I’d been discreetly eyeing every time he’d been in a bathing suit around me. And just like the first time, and every time, his body was immaculate, even in the moonlight as he stood there in boxers that inadvertently highlighted his long, muscular legs and that spot right at the center of his body that made me feel like too much of a perv if I did more than glance at it quickly.

“Taking off my clothes so I don’t get them wet,” he replied casually, stepping out of his shorts before bending over to pick them up.

“Why would they get wet?” I asked him in a voice even I could tell sounded hysterical, something in me already telling me that I’d dug this grave for myself and knew exactly where he was going with this crap. I was beginning to have second thoughts about wanting to cheer him up if it was at this cost.

“Because I’m going in the water.” He folded his shorts in half and dropped them on top of his T-shirt. “You coming?”

My heart was beating, beating, beating. “No.”

Aaron winked. “Yes.”

My throat clammed up. “Aaron—”

“Come on. We don’t have to go in deep. You can hold my hand.”

I coughed. Sputtered some more. Maybe even gagged a little. “I’d want to hold something more than your hand going into the water—”

Aaron choked. Literally choked. Gasping out, “Jesus, Ru.”

Oh no.

The blood drained from my face. “You know that’s not what I meant!”

His laugh was so rough and loud and happy it made something in me click. “Do I?”

“Yes!”

I didn’t know it was possible for him to laugh louder, but he did.

“I’m going back to the house,” I muttered, not moving.

He dropped his head back and kept on laughing, a hand coming up to rest on the six-pack I was not going to look at. “All right, all right. I’m just messing with you,” he said, chuckling and sounding pretty much delighted, with a long sigh afterward. I narrowed my eyes when he reached up to swipe under his eye. “Come in the water with me and I’ll never bring it up again. Promise.”

I groaned.

“Ruby.”

“Aaron.”

“Come in the water with me,” he insisted, sounding totally back to normal.

I stared at him. “I don’t think so.”

He stared back at me. “You’re going to regret it later when you think about it,” he egged on.

How could I have forgotten how well he knew me?

I scoffed again, ignoring the truth to his words.

“Come on, will you? Just you and me,” he said gently. “Ruron forever.”

Of all the things he could have said, he went with the one that I loved and wanted to hate at the same time. Ruron. Ugh.

What had to be his toes pressed to the side of my foot. “Ruby Cube. You can hold on to whatever you want if we go in. I won’t let anything happen to you.”