“Wait,” Sawyer’s hand shot out and grabbed my arm to stop me before I jumped down out of the truck.
Sighing, I turned back around to look into his sympathetic eyes but found that they weren’t exactly full of sympathy or astonishment. Instead, he looked... frustrated. Well, that’s interesting.
“Do you like Ethan?”
Yes, I liked Ethan. He was nice, thoughtful, funny, sweet, and he was attracted to me. There was no ex-girlfriend he was hung up on standing in my way. But he wasn’t Sawyer.
Nodding, I didn’t say anymore. Instead, I waited.
Sawyer opened his mouth to say something then shut it and closed his eyes tightly before shaking his head and letting go of my arm. “Never mind. Come on, let’s go.”
He opened his door and stepped out. I’d give anything to get him to say what it was he stopped himself from saying just now. But the conversation was over. His curiosity had been cured and I had an entire day to dwell on the fact that I may have just killed any chance I had with him. Ethan was his friend and after the mess with Beau, I doubted Sawyer would ever make a move on a girl that had dated his friend first.
Chapter Eight
Sawyer
If Ethan whispered in her ear one more time, I was going to throw his ass off the damn boat. The only reason he’d managed to stay on it this long was because Lana didn’t look all that happy about his attempt at flirting. She wasn’t laughing and smiling at him like she had been at the restaurant. Instead, she appeared a little uptight about something. Had she decided in the light of day that Ethan wasn’t all that interesting? God, I hoped so. I didn’t want her for the right reasons and that was making it very hard to be selfish and calculating. Lana was so freaking sweet and in no way did I want to hurt her. If Ethan made her happy, I wasn’t sure I could stand in the way just to get Ash all worked up.
“Should I warn E to step back?” Jake’s voice broke into my thoughts and I jerked my gaze off Lana and Ethan and focused on driving the boat.
“From what?” I asked in a bored voice.
Jake let out a snort, “From the murderous glare you’re shooting his way.”
Since when did Jake decide to start paying attention to the world around him? Shaking my head, I turned back and checked on Kayla and Toby. They’d been out there trying to out-do each other for over twenty minutes. If I didn’t make a sharp unexpected turn they’d both stay up for another twenty minutes. I needed a distraction.
“Hold on, I’m about to sling them,” I called out loudly. My eyes immediately found Lana and she had a tight grip on the side of the boat watching Kayla and Toby with a worried frown.
Jerking the wheel hard to the left sent Kayla and Toby flying through the air. I could hear her squeal and Toby yell out something very close to “Motherfu—” before they hit the water with a loud slap.
“OHMYGOD! Are they okay?” Lana asked, gaping back at me with a horrified expression. They were fine. I knew the correct way and place to sling someone off their wakeboard. We’d all been doing this since we were kids. Those two knew how to safely land after a good slinging.
I pointed out at the water where Kayla and Toby had landed. Lana spun back around in her seat to see they had both resurfaced and were fine. Kayla was holding her board and Toby was kissing her as she giggled loudly.
I saw Lana’s shoulders relax.
“That’s the way Saw likes to tell someone their time is up,” Ethan said, smiling at her with a ridiculous googly-eyed expression on his face. I would be doing the boy a favor taking her away from him. He was making an ass of himself.
Lana turned to look back at me with those big green eyes. I had to swallow hard because her eyes were so much like Ashton’s. “I don’t think I want a turn.”
Chuckling, I nudged Jake, “Take it.”
“I’m not going to drive you. I’m going to go out there with you,” I informed her.
Lana shifted her fearful gaze from me to Jake who was now at the wheel. She didn’t trust him any more than she did me.
“Um, I don’t know. Maybe... maybe Ethan could drive,” she suggested.
The frustrated frown he was wearing because I was the one about to go out with Lana was replaced with a pleased grin. She trusted him and he liked it—of course, he did.
“Whatever,” Jake said, grabbing his drink and plopping back down on the bench where he’d been sprawled out before I’d given him the wheel.
Ethan went over, took the wheel, and cut the engine so that Toby and Kayla could climb back on.
I reached over and grabbed the wakeboard Toby was handing me. “You could’ve just motioned for us to let go,” Toby grumbled as he reached for Kayla and helped her crawl up on the dive board.
“But that was so much more fun to watch,” I replied, taking Kayla’s life vest and handing it to Lana. “This one is the only one that’ll fit you. The rest are all too big.”
Lana took it and shivered as the cold water dripped off the jacket and onto her warm skin.
“Actually, that’s not true. He has a much better one tucked away under the seats but it’s Ash’s. He gave it to her for her birthday one year along with the better wakeboard, at least for girls. But he won’t let anyone else use it, even though—”
“Don’t, babe,” Toby interrupted as he gently pushed Kayla toward the back of the boat.
I couldn’t bring myself to look back at Lana. I’d really rather she didn’t know about Ash’s stuff. I did still have it tucked away under the bench seat. I wasn’t ready to let someone else use it. Seeing someone else put it on would be another door closed. This had been something Ash and I did together. She’d been so excited when I got her the new board. We’d even laid out on the water and floated on it that night while she rained kisses over my face and told me how wonderful I was. Back when she’d still been mine.
“Here’s your vest,” Jake called out as he threw my nice dry life vest at me. Catching it as it slammed into my chest, I quickly put it on and threw my board out into the water.
“Do I just jump in?” Lana asked from the dive board, staring down at me with a worried frown.
I swam over to her, “Sit down,” I said. She did so quickly, not taking her eyes off me. I reached for her waist and eased her into the water.
“Eeeep, it’s cold,” she squealed and her hands squeezed my arms tightly. Her full bottom lip quivered a little and I couldn’t stop myself. I’d made her wear a cold wet life vest because I was too much of a baby to pull out Ashton’s. The least I could do was warm her lips up.