LITMIR.BIZ

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choices in the past, but I was a bit younger then, you know. And we’ve already talked about being young and stupid. So that argument doesn’t hold water, and you’re doing me a disservice when you act like I need to be protected from you or that it’s your job or Nick’s job to do it.”

      “Got it. You don’t need to be protected from me. But, to be clear, I would try and protect Nick from making a bad decision too if I knew in advance he was trying to make one. So I can’t get mad at him for doing the same thing with me.”

      “Because you’re about to make a bad decision with me?”

      “That’s what it looks like to Nick. I did make a bad decision in the limo.”

      “My point is, I would regret it more if I didn’t try to finish this than if we go to bed once and you never speak to me again. I’m pretty sure that you’re never going to speak to me again anyway when this is all said and done. So what would you regret more?”

      He stopped once more at the edge and gestured toward the shallow end again.

      She nodded. “One more and then maybe we’ll stay there for a couple of passes. This one worked your ankle a bit.”

      “This isn’t too bad.”

      “It sounds like you’re in pain, though.” In pain and angry. Maybe she should just let this alone. She’d made her point. She’d put herself out there, and at least she’d done it with who she was this time.

      “A little.” At least he admitted to the physical feelings, and moved another foot down and shaved another few inches off the water depth. “And all that stuff I told you about my limits because of your family and our history?”

      “I’m not going to announce it to Nick or Mom and Dad, Liam.” She kept pace with him, letting him set the speed now. “I’m not going to go whining when it ends. I know I don’t fit into your world. It’s going to be over between us when you’re recovered, one way or another. You’re going off to some film location and, sure, you might send greetings through Nick in the future or ask how I’m doing, but we’re not friends.” She touched his arm, stopping him in the middle, forcing him to look at her.

      “We’re not friends anymore, Liam. Right now, we’re pretending to be friends because if this attraction wasn’t between us, we would be friends. I genuinely like you, and I know you like me. I know you care about me, and you care about my family, and our history... But it’s never going to be what it was when we were kids. If it ever was that anyway. I can’t be friends with you without all this between us.”

      Liam watched her in a way that said her words had been in his mind before she’d said them, and she watched as he reached up to rub the back of his neck. The man shouldn’t have told her that body language tell. He felt emotionally in danger, that’s what he’d said men did when they felt that.

      “So it’s going to end because of all the reasons we’ve talked about. Why is that going to be easier than if we’ve made one amazing memory together first?” She stepped back, one step, then another, her courage abandoning her at the end of her forward, angry confession. Now she had no choice but to flee if she wanted to keep breathing or keep from protecting her jugular notch.

      Every time he said he wanted her honesty, it went like this, with his words drying up and her left trying to fill the gap.

      “I want you to do another three passes here, back and forth. And then swim. Gently, not like you’re being chased by sharks. Kick and flex your feet separately or together like a fish, but don’t frog-kick your legs. Use your feet better, and don’t overdo it. Do the same thing three times tomorrow. Morning, afternoon, and evening.”

      “Are you leaving?” he said finally, stopping in the center of the pool where she’d left him, the water lapping at his hips.

      “Yes.” If there was any fairness in the universe, he wouldn’t hear her voice wobbling. “I’ll see you in two days at the clinic. Text me what time you want to come. Morning, I’m guessing. Which would be fine. Or night. I can come back or stay late from work. If you want to meet at night, then do the exercises that day before you come, and we’ll switch things when you get there.”

      He nodded, apparently not disagreeing with any of it.

      She turned and headed for the side of the pool where her towel was, and kicked out of it.

      The bikini business had to stop.

      If anything were going to happen between them now, it had to be his move. Her cards were on the table. So many cards. God, what was she thinking?

      Shaking the towel out, she wrapped it under her arms and clutched it there to head for the changing area.

      Dry off. Get out. Go home.

      Find some way to stop her words from playing on repeat all night. No rewind fantasies this time.

      She couldn’t take it if he once more failed to live up to them.

       CHAPTER NINE

      TIME TICKED ON. Grace met with Liam daily to check on him, changed his exercise regimen and measured his progress every other day. The days that she didn’t see him he still came in to use the pool. Exercise in only his hotel’s pool limited his ability to exercise several times a day so lately he’d spent more time there than the twenty minutes she prescribed three times a day.

      And not once in all that time had Liam’s poker face slipped an inch. She had no idea whether or not her words to him had made a difference, all she knew was that she was out of gumption to chase things.

      Three days ago she’d added dry-ground exercises to his program, in addition to the pool strengthening techniques. They’d see him through to the start of his first project, and he’d reached the point that he didn’t need monitoring. That meant today he was being discharged from supervised rehabilitation.

      Grace stepped out of her office, clipboard in hand with the discharge paperwork snapped in, and headed to the pool therapy room, hoping to catch him before he got into the water.

      “Liam?” She called him out of the locker room.

      Hearing a splash, she turned back to the pool in time to see him rising above the closest edge, every muscle in the man’s arms and chest flexed, the tattoos he bore on his shoulder rippling in some breath-catching combination of strength and water running off tanned skin.

      The clipboard in her hand felt as heavy as her tongue.

      This was it. This moment was the end of whatever insanity they’d been cycling through for the past three weeks. She’d talked to him before about the papers, now she just had to find some way to remind him. Some words to say.

      She had nothing.

      He was going to let it go without a backward glance. She was probably already in his rearview mirror.

      Spinning the clipboard paper side out, she gave it a little shake and then laid it on a nearby bench with the pen.

      There. Message delivered.

      She showed him her keys too as farewell, then turned and hurried out.

      Someone else would lock up. They stayed late. She needed to go.

      At least this time it wasn’t humiliation eating a hole in her, even if he clearly didn’t want her as badly as she wanted him.

      Whatever it was could just remain undefined. She didn’t have any energy left to roll it around in her mind. Not when there was wine chilling in her fridge and yoga pants waiting for her.

      * * *

      A knock on the door interrupted Grace’s night of sulking and drinking.

      She flopped back against the plush pillows on her couch and stared at the ceiling.

      It was probably Nick. Yesterday,

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