Page 37 of Now or Never

Max stood from beside her, causing the boat to shift and pulling her attention away. “Another?” he asked, nodding at the beer in her hand.

“No thanks. It’s a little early for me,” she said. “Which reminds me, why is this festival at noon on a weekday in September? Wouldn’t it make more sense to be on a weekend? In the summer?”

When no one answered, Chelsea looked at Ethan, who was staring at Natalie’s hand engulfed in his on her lap. Antonio waslooking out at the horizon. Max was reading the side of his beer can.

“Who died?” Adam asked, stepping back onto his boat.

Silence.

“What did I miss?” Chelsea asked.

Max rolled his eyes. “Chelsea asked why Float Fest is in the middle of the week in September.”

Adam winced. “Uh, well . . . there are already a lot of festivals in the summer.”

“Okaayy . . .”

Max huffed out a breath. “Adam doesn’t want kids at his festival. Weekends in summer mean kids will come. He hates kids.”

Chelsea stared at Max in disbelief, waiting for him to smile and say “Just kidding!” but he didn’t.

Right.

And all the reasons she wouldn’t be going to that bed downstairs with Adam came roaring back. She couldn’t let herself get sucked in by his larger-than-life personality. He hated kids. She had a kid. Her brain brought up the image of his face at the baseball diamonds looking at Ben for the first time, and she had to shake her head to get rid of it.

The worst part about it was that, for a split second, she wondered whether things would be different if Ben weren’t in the picture. The flood of guilt that followedthatthought made her nauseous.

“Hey,” Adam said, placing a hand on her shoulder. “I don’t hate kids,” he said emphatically. He looked around, as if he was going to drag her somewhere more private to talk, but his friends had already moved to the kitchen area.

“It’s okay, Adam. It’s not like this is news to me.”

Adam shook his head. “I like kids. I really do. I just don’t want to have them.”

Chelsea wanted to ask what his reasons were, but the conversation was making her feel as if she was being rejected. Again. It made her skin crawl. She felt hot. She glanced over the edge at the water and decided she needed to cool off.

“I don’t need an explanation,” she said, taking her shirt off her shoulders. “We’re friends. Right?”

He was running a hand through his wavy, sandy hair, and stopped, still as a statue, when she tossed the shirt on her bag and started unzipping her jean shorts.

“Friends,” he all but breathed out.

“I’m hot. I’m going to swim.” She slid the shorts off, pulled her hair from its elastic, then turned and stepped on the edge of the boat. She had just leaned forward when she heard a commotion behind her.

“Wait!”

“Stop!”

“No!”

There was a split second for her to wonder why everyone was yelling at her, but it was too late. She was already in the air above the water.

Splash.

The warm lake water hit Adam in the face, and his friends started yelling at him, but none of that was working to clear the image of Chelsea’s bare ass from his mind. He stared down at the water, dumbfounded, waiting for her to pop up.

“Why did you let her jump?” Ethan asked, coming up next to him and looking into the lake.

“What’s going on?” Natalie asked.

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