Page 46 of Enemies to Lovers

‘I’ve got it,’ Jamie grumbles, and Adonis steps back.

‘Okay,’ declares Kate. ‘Let’s do some dive games. Laurie, can you get those sinking pool toys from the kitchen table?’

Laurie gives her a salute and runs off to find them, with Kate explaining that there are four sinking toys that will sit on the pool bottom, and each person in the team has to collect all four before they’re thrown back in for the next person.

‘Easy,’ I tell Adonis. ‘I can collect all four in one breath – I’m good at diving.’

‘She’s almost as good as me,’ stage-whispers Alex, and I shake my head like he’s nuts.

‘Have you always been like this?’ Adonis asks. ‘Doing competitions all the time?’

Laurie, Alex, Kate and I all answer at once. ‘Yes!’ we say and then laugh, because you either love it or need to get out of our way.

Adonis looks afraid.

‘You okay?’ I ask him. I’ve never hung out with a boy in a family setting before, never had somebody who is ‘mine’ (for lack of a better word) be in this situation. I quite like it. Alex has occasional boyfriends, but they don’t tend to last long, and of course Laurie and Kate have been a pair for years. As the little sister, I’ve always been bottom of the pecking order, but havingAdonis here gives me status – a gravitas that is messing with what my brothers must think is the natural order of things. Even Jamie seems surprised at whatever new dynamic is coming into play right now.

Laurie re-emerges with the goods and proceeds to lob four toys at one end of the pool and four at the other.

‘It doesn’t matter which you get,’ instructs Kate. ‘You just need four. Go!’

I launch in, breezily grabbing my loot and emerging victorious. Kate throws them back in and sends in Adonis, as Laurie comes up with his.

‘Dammit,’ he says, as he realises we’re already beating him.

Adonis goes in, followed by Jamie. I see Adonis get one, but then Jamie swims really near him and gets the toys closest to him, making it harder for Adonis. As tactics go, I get the general idea: Adonis now has to swim further to get his. But Jamie is wasting time by blocking him. Adonis comes up for air as Jamie does, and Jamie blocks him again as he tries to go down.

‘Hey,’ I say. ‘Cheat!’

‘He cheated first,’ Jamie yells back, but then Adonis has the four toys he needs and it’s time for me to go again.

I have no idea what happens when I’m in the water, but by the time I get back up, I’m the only one who cares about my record-breaking and natural talent for underwater-toy accumulation, because everyone else is focused on Adonis and Jamie.

‘You can’t do that, man,’ Jamie is yelling, and Adonis is half laughing, half scared-looking as he says, ‘I apologise. I thought this was supposed to be fun. That’s all.’

‘Yeah, well …’ Jamie huffs, without finishing the sentence.

I swim to the edge and look up at them all. ‘What’s going on?’ I ask.

Nobody speaks; they all just look at each other as if they don’t know where to start.

‘Okay,’ I say. I climb out and drop my collected toys onto a nearby sun-lounger. ‘So who won?’

‘Urm …’ Kate murmurs, like she’s scared to say, in case we cause a riot over it. ‘It was a tie,’ she settles on. ‘Two points to each team.’

I have no idea what’s going on – everyone seems super-weird.

‘You good?’ I ask Adonis, because he’s the guest, after all.

‘Of course,’ he replies, giving me his adorable smile. ‘Although I do have to go soon. I have massages booked.’

‘Okay,’ I say to him, and then to the group at large, ‘This will have to be our last game, because I’m down to being a one-man team in a minute.’

‘Oh, Adonis, you can’t stay for something to eat?’ Mum asks, over the edge of her magazine.

Adonis shakes his head. ‘I must work,’ he says in his accented English, and Mum replies, ‘What a shame.’ To me he asks, ‘Can I see you later? Or tomorrow?’

I nod. ‘Sure,’ I say. ‘Just text me?’

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