Michael sighed in obvious contentment. “Seems fitting since we were camp sweethearts as kids.”
He tipped back his water. “You’re a lucky bastard.”
“Yes, yes I am. And hey, who knows? Maybe you’ll meet your match this summer.”
Beckett cocked an eyebrow at his friend. “Come on, now. I expect that kind of crap from Heather. Not from you.”
Michael just grinned. “We’ve got a bulletin board up in Pinecone Lodge with pictures of all the couples who’ve gotten together here. It’s filling up.”
“You, sir, are full of shit.”
Laughing, Michael shoved back from the table. “Just don’t let Heather hear you say that. She’ll try to matchmake you.”
“I do not need the complication of a woman in my life.”
“They’re the only complication that’s worth it.” Spoken like the happily married man he was.
“And on that saccharine note, I believe I’ll take my position at the starting line.” Beckett stripped off his t-shirt and toed off his Chacos, leaving them in a neat pile on the picnic table as he went to join the thickening crowd on the dock.
He found himself next to a long, lean woman bent in a forward fold. He made a valiant effort not to stare at her ass in the snug, racer-back swimsuit and ended up admiring her gorgeously toned legs instead.
“See something you like?” The wry tone had him yanking his eyes away like a teenage boy caught peeping in the girls’ locker room.
Busted.
“Sorry,” Beckett muttered, gaze now firmly on the raft anchored out in Lake Waawaatesi. “You just look—” Was there any way to finish that sentence that didn’t make him come off like a perv? “—like you know what you’re doing.”
“I should. I’ve been swimming competitively practically since birth.” She straightened. “I’m Taylor.”
He interpreted the proffered hand as a sign of forgiveness and turned to take it. His own name died on his tongue as he found himself faced with the biggest doe eyes he’d ever seen.
Well hello, Bambi.
“Hi.”
A corner of Taylor’s mouth quirked as she gave his hand a perfunctory shake. “May the best swimmer win.”
“Win wha—”
The scream of an air horn signaled the start of the test. Taylor dove for the water, as did everyone around Beckett before he could get his brain in gear. She’d already surfaced by the time he dove in. The chill lake water was a shock to his system, clearing the haze of lust from his brain.
“Two minutes!” shouted Heather. “Starting…now!”
His feet and arms automatically began to tread, keeping him afloat. A few feet away, Taylor was already facing the raft, her dark hair slicked back like a seal.
“In a hurry?” he asked.
She glanced over her shoulder. “Eye on the target.”
“You know this isn’t a contest,
right?”
Her lips bowed into a full-on grin that sucker punched him more than the icy lake. “Everything’s a competition.”
Beckett had done everything in his power to get away from competition in his life. But something about that smile pulled at him and invited him to join in the fun. He had a feeling competition with Taylor would be anything but the senseless, boring grind he’d walked away from. So he readied muscles honed as a boy in the surf off Myrtle Beach, and when Heather blew the air horn again, he went for it.
He made it to the head of the pack in four strokes, but Taylor was faster. Her freestyle was a thing of beauty, slicing cleanly through the water as if she’d been born to it. Beckett dug deep, pulling his focus back to his own form. Half a dozen strokes and he’d closed the gap to two lengths. Ahead, Taylor slapped the raft and dove, popping back up and heading toward shore. Beckett tagged the raft himself and switched to butterfly for the return leg. He caught up with her at the halfway point. Seeing what he was about, she shifted smoothly into a butterfly stroke herself, and they both raced for the finish line.