Page 139
I look at the water. “No visible snakes.”
Ezra looks at me.
Theo looks between us. “Don’t.”
Ezra grins. “She’s thinking about it.”
“I’m a woman of adventure.”
Theo sets down his plate. “You just ate.”
Ezra kicks off the dock first. He hits the water with a splash big enough to make me shriek, then comes up laughing, hair plastered to his face. He looks so alive, my chest aches.
“Water’s perfect,” he calls.
Theo points at him. “Show-off.”
Ezra splashes him.
Theo goes very still.
I whisper, “Oh, poor decision.”
Ezra’s smile turns wicked. “What are you going to do about it?”
Theo stands.
I don’t wait to be caught, so I jump. The water closes over me, warm from the day and cool underneath, and when I surface, I’m laughing so hard I swallow half the river.
Ezra grabs my hand and pulls me away as Theo hits the water behind us with enough force to send a wave over both our heads.
“Unfair,” I sputter.
“You started it,” Theo says.
“Ezra started it.”
“I improved the evening,” Ezra says.
Theo lunges for him, and Ezra darts away, fast and slippery and delighted. I go after Theo, but he catches me around the waist and spins me through the water before I can betray him properly. I laugh until my stomach hurts.
We play tag like children and kiss like people who have survived too much to waste a sunset being dignified.
Theo catches me near the dock ladder, one arm around my waist. I kiss him with my hands in his wet hair while Ezra presses in behind me, mouth finding the side of my neck. Theo reaches past me and catches Ezra’s chin. Their kiss is slow, water-slick, and beautiful enough to make my knees useless. I kiss Ezra next, tasting lake water and lime and happiness.
Nobody hurries. Hands slide over wet shoulders, backs, waists. Mouths linger. Theo’s purr moves through the water against my chest. Ezra laughs into my kiss when I try to pull both men closer at once.
“Think of all the ways we can team up,” Ezra murmurs.
“I am,” I say.
Theo’s eyes darken. “Later.”
The promise in that one word follows me out of the water.
We stretch out on towels across the dock, damp and loose and smelling like lake water. The sky turns purple, then deep blue. Stars prick through one by one. Ezra lies between us, one hand on my stomach, one shoulder pressed to Theo’s.
“When we were kids,” he says, “Theo used to bring me gas station tacos and call it nutrition.”