Page 3 of In Too Deep

Yeah, right.

There was no way I was going to consider myself indebted to her.

I would have been just fine.

I thought about diving back into the pool to prove the point, but my aching calves said that wasn’t a very good idea.

I draped the towel over my head and sulked towards the showers, with Christina’s blue eyes burning into my brain.

CHAPTER THREE

“Do you want to come with us afterwards?” Christina came up to me with that silly smile on her face like we were besties now. “There’s a new Mexican restaurant nearby and they offer unlimited burritos from six till eight. I’m sure you could eat at least five after all that swimming.”

Did she just say I had a big appetite?

“No, thanks,” I told her. “I’m not

hungry.”

Well, I was hungry, starving actually, but I wasn’t about to have dinner with her. There was nothing I could do about the fact that we were team mates, but I could refuse her phony friendship and I fully intended to.

“Are you sure?” she asked, looking a little disappointed.

I nodded, not the least bit fazed. “Positive. I have a date.”

I did have a date. Just not with a guy.

And it wasn’t really a date date.

I was meeting Stacey, one of the dolphin trainers at the marine park where my Dad worked as the manager.

The park closed at six and Stacey fed the dolphins before she went home at seven. She knew I was studying to be a marine biologist, like her, so she usually waited for me so that we could feed the dolphins together.

I didn’t know what it was about dolphins that fascinated me so. Maybe it was their gentleness, their playfulness, their intelligence… or the simple fact that they could swim with such grace, but I had loved them since I was five, when my parents took me to see my first ever dolphin show. I even wanted to have a pet dolphin, but had to settle for a plushie and a goldfish.

When my Dad became the manager of the marine park, I felt as if I was meant to be around dolphins.

I didn’t just want to watch them.

I wanted to swim with them, which was why I took swimming seriously.

I decided I’d become a marine biologist and now that I was in college, I had already taken the first step.

In a few years, my dream would come true.

CHAPTER FOUR

As usual, I found Stacey waiting for me at the dolphin enclosure.

“Hey, you,” I said, genuinely happy to see her friendly face.

“Hey back!” She looked up and smiled. “How was practice?”

“Good,” I lied.

Then again, it wasn’t exactly a lie. It was good in spite of Christina’s presence, and up until the point that I almost drowned.

“I’m actually in a rush today,” Stacey said. “I’m meeting my boyfriend’s parents for the first time.”

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