“What? No! I . . .” Shit. Did she?
“Hmm, I’m going to take that as a maybe.”
“It’s not voyeurism, it was just . . . I know I shouldn’t have. I’m really sorry.” Abject misery filled her. What must he think of her?
Shoulders slumped, she turned away. Why couldn’t she just ignore her attraction to him? It would make her life so much simpler. He was her employer. He was letting her live in his home. She needed to stop thinking of him as anything more, because it was messing with her judgement.
“Aspen. Stop.”
She froze. Idiot.
“I’ll get out of this pool if I have to, but your butt is going to pay the price.”
She turned, heart racing. “You’re threatening to spank me? Because I was watching you swim? Well, I guess that’s fair enough. I suppose I deserve it.”
“Jesus, I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to punish a little sub less. Pet, I’m starting to believe you’re harder on yourself than anyone else could ever be. Come here. I’m not mad about the spying. I promise.”
He held out his hand to her, his green eyes watching her so intently with no hint of anger or impatience. Just confidence. And warmth. Maybe she imagined that, but she found herself stepping through the gate and walking over to the side of the pool. She stopped about a foot away from his hand.
“You’re not mad?”
He grinned. “About the fact that you find me so irresistible you can’t help yourself grabbing a peek at my half-naked body each night I come out to swim?”
“You’ve known? All along?”
“Yep. Best part of my day. I’ll miss it when I have to go to work tomorrow night.”
At the club, with lots of beautiful submissives vying for his attention. Jealousy filled her. Maybe she should . . . water splashed her.
“Hey!” she stepped back, looking down at the splotches of water on her top. “What was that for?”
“Just bringing you back to the here and now. I don’t like when your mind wanders. Get in the pool with me.”
“What? No.” She took another step back.
His gaze narrowed. Saw too much. Shit.
“You’re scared of water.”
“No. Well, not quite.”
“Not quite? You’ve had a bad experience?”
“More like I’ve never had much experience at all,” she admitted.
His eyebrows rose. “You don’t know how to swim?”
She shook her head. “Believe it or not, learning how to swim wasn’t a high priority in my household.”
“If I ever see your mother again . . .” he growled in a low voice that had her tummy dancing with happiness. He cared about her. “Well, we need to remedy that. Not just for you but for the boys.”
Remedy it? “Uh, no, we don’t.”
“You cannot live next to a swimming pool without knowing how to swim. It’s dangerous.”
“I think I can steer clear of the pool. I’ll stay on the other side of the fence.” Like she had been before she’d been rudely summoned over. And she wouldn’t be living here forever and she was pretty certain that any accommodation she could afford wouldn’t come with a swimming pool.
“And what about when the boys get older and want you to swim with them? What then?”