Weekend Wife by Carolyn Zane Page B

anything solid she could get her terrified hands on, including his nose, ears and hair. “You’re okay,” he soothed, pulling her weightless, slippery body into his arms and up against the solid wall of his chest.
    Coughing, Emily clung to his neck and nodded, only letting go long enough to push her new, fashionably short bangs out of her eyes.
    “Okay?”
    “Heh—hmm.” She coughed.
    “I guess this means we should hold off on the high-dive lessons for a while,” he joked as he slowly floated her over to the pool’s shallow end. “At least until we master dog paddling.” They’d been in the pool for more than an hour and Emily was no closer to swimming than a concrete block.
    “I’m sorry.” She shook her hair out of her face and stared at him with large, fearful brown eyes.
    Drops of water glistened on her full, sensuous lips in the moonlight, and Ty had to fight the overwhelming urge to kiss her into oblivion. She probably wouldn’t buy the rehearsal excuse this time. The reverberation of his heartbeat echoed in his head over the whine of the pool pump, and he knew that she was beginning to affect him a little more than he was comfortable with.
    Squinting, she shifted to a position where she could more comfortably peer into his face. “I almost drowned once, when I was little,” she admitted, reticent to reveal too much about her past. “And I haven’t been very good around water ever since.”
    Ah-ha! So that’s why she got seasick so easily and couldn’t swim. She was afraid of drowning. “Understandable.” Ty nodded. “But all the more reason for you to learn to swim. Here. Let’s try floating again,” he suggested, anxious to concentrate on something other than the amazingly smooth texture of her slick skin. Rearranging her across his chest, he slid his hands behind her back, and immediately she wound herself tightly around his body.
    Ty smiled wryly down at her. As amazingly enjoyable as he found this to be, he knew that if she was ever going to float—and if he was going to hang on to the last vestiges of his control—she had to chill out.
    “Sweetheart, relax,” he pleaded, as though coaxing a frightened child. “I promise I won’t let go. There is no way on earth you can drown. Honest. It’s only three feet deep at this end.”
    “Th-th-three?”
    “Three.” He grinned. “Come on. Stand up.” When she did, Ty put one hand on her smooth, bare midriff, and the other in the middle of her back. “Let’s try floating on your back. I promise I won’t drop you. Scout’s honor.” He held up three solemn fingers.
    “Okay,” she whispered tentatively, and pinched her nose tightly shut.
    “Just relax,” he instructed, wishing he could follow his own advice. He was strung more tightly than an electric guitar. That neon pink scrap of material she called a swimsuit was doing shameful things to his libido. “And try,” he said, attempting to get her to loosen up a little, “not to pinch your nose off.”
    She stuck her tongue out at him as he swept her into his arms. Slowly, Ty lowered her body into the water, cradling her bottom on his bent knees and supporting her legs and head with his arms.
    “There now.” He smiled down at her. “This isn’t so bad, is it?”
    Quickly shaking her head, Emily concentrated on relaxing. “No...um, not bad, really. Just strange.”
    “Yeah, but that’s true of everything until you get used to it. Here, let’s go over to where the water is a little deeper.”
    She nodded up at him, her wide eyes never leaving his face.
    “Now, look, you’re nearly floating by yourself,” he said proudly, trying not to notice the tiny patches of swimsuit bob and sway as they broke the surface of the water. Holy heart failure, he thought, willing his breathing to slow down. There was no way that Roxanne could ever compete with this at the side of the pool. Emily was perfect. Tightening his grip—to reassure her, he told himself—he led her farther into