“You don’t strike me as the dramatic-costume type.”

“It was Cody’s idea.”

“Why doesn’t that surprise me?” I glance back at Cody, who’s currently gaping at Nick, who has taken his shirt off for no apparent reason.

“If you come to the party, I can show you around my house,” Jay says eagerly.

“Fine, twist my arm.” I nudge his elbow with mine. “I’ll see if Jordan wants to come, too.”

“If she’s feeling up to it,” he says, and then bites his lip and turns away as if he’s said something he shouldn’t.

His discomfort unsettles me, and I pluck nervously at the clasp of my bracelet. “Why wouldn’t she feel up to it? Is she sick?”

“Not yet, but she might be soon. You know, big parties, lots of germs…circulating…um…”

“Shit!” I exclaim as the bracelet finally gives way to my fiddling, snaps open, and drops from my wrist.

“I’ll get it!” Jay sounds almost excited, or relieved. He shucks off his shirt, hoists himself over the railing, and plunges into the lake.

I squeal in shock, and Cody halts the boat.

“Jay Gatsby, you idiot!” I yell at the rippling surface.

Pretty sure this isn’t just about the bracelet. Something I said made him so uncomfortable he’d rather jump into a lake than stay on the boat another second. I’m tempted to try to figure out what it was, but I’m distracted because the ripples are fading, the water going still where it closed over Jay’s head.

A long minute passes. Then another.

“Maybe he hit his head.” I glance back at Nick and Cody. “Should one of us go in after him?”

“He’s fine,” Cody says carelessly.

Another minute passes.

Nick is looking very worried, but Cody only seems concerned about tucking every part of himself under the scant awning, the only scrap of shade on the boat. I guess I’ll have to do the honors. I’m not about to lose my best friend right after getting him back.

Frantically I strip my sandals off, swing my legs over the railing, and launch myself into the water.

The surface shatters under me, then wraps itself over my head, burying me in lake water much deeper and murkier than I expected. I can’t see Jay anywhere, not with the cloudy detritus stinging my eyes. He’s been under for three minutes. How could he hold his breath that long? What if he drowns down here while I’m muddling through the dark?

Fingers dance up my spine, and I jerk, releasing a flood of bubbles. Jay grabs my wrist and tows me up until we break the surface. He’s laughing so hard he can barely breathe.

“Jerk.” I shove his head underwater briefly. “You scared me, you dork.”

“Success!” He raises a wet fist, grinning. The bracelet gleams in his hand.

The crinkle at the corners of his eyes, the width of his smile—they’re heartbreakingly familiar, warming every inch of me.

This is the Jay I remember. Less polished, more reckless.

“You absolute idiot.” I shake my head, moving closer, my hair trailing through the lake behind me.

“I know, I’m the worst,” he says, softer now. His leg brushes mine as we tread water.

I extend my wrist so he can quickly clasp the bracelet into place. “Thanks,” I murmur, but more words weigh on my heart, hover on my tongue.

The boat has drifted away a bit, and I’m not mad about the semi-privacy. It gives me the chance I need to say what’s on my mind.

“You should have called me.” I keep treading water, letting each slow sweep of my arms narrow the distance between us. “Sometime in the last eight years, you should have called.”

“I know.” His breath is warm on my upturned face. “I’m sorry.”

“I missed you, dummy.”

“I thought of you every day, Daisy.” His hand brushes my waist as we float together in the chilly lake, legs sliding against each other beneath the water. “Every damn day.”

Droplets glitter in his lashes, on his shoulders, and across his collarbones. I always thought he was cute, but he’s goddamn glorious now.

Jay runs his tongue over his lips, clearing the drops of lake water, and I inhale sharply. Just a small hitch of breath, but he notices. A seductive heat pools in his eyes.

I shouldn’t encourage this.

I want to.

“You look so different.” I let myself drift against the length of his body and shiver at the heat that unfurls low in my gut. How does he keep doing this to me?

“And you.” His gaze drops to my wet halter top, which clings to every curve of my breasts. My nipples go tight.

A burst of laughter from the boat startles me, briefly pulling us apart. Clearly Nick and Cody have moved past worrying about us and are engrossed in each other again.

With a tight sigh, Jay pulls his focus back up to my face. He’s trying so hard to be good…which makes me very much want to be bad. If Nick can find a boy to have fun with, no second thoughts, no doubts, then why can’t I? Even if that boy is Jay Gatsby, he’s also a beautiful stranger, and the combination of those two things is messing with my head, making me want to take risks.

To be wild.

“You can look,” I murmur, moving my arms through the water to propel myself a little nearer again. “And you can…touch, if you want.”

His eyes widen.

But he doesn’t hesitate, as if he’s been waiting years for permission.

I feel his palm at my waist first, sliding up to my ribs. Pausing under my arm, his thumb stroking the side of my breast. And then shifting over, until his hand is entirely covering my breast. Strong fingers splayed, the thumb stroking over my nipple again and again. He knows what he’s doing. Fuck.

Jay bends toward me, angling his head a little. His breath whispers into my parted mouth. My entire self is waking up, coming online, and the power source is the steady glow of Jay’s eyes on mine. Eyes like sun-warmed earth, like pinecones in a spice-scented evergreen forest. I want to crawl into those eyes and curl up, safe.

I need to keep treading water, but I also need to touch him. I need to feel his new skin, this grown-up body of his.

Tentative, I reach through the water until my palm presses flat against his chest. He huffs out a breath, soft against my lips, almost kissing me but not quite. Not yet.

Alarms are ringing in the back of my mind—questions that need answers, warnings that I’m moving too fast with him, that I don’t fully understand who he is now, or why he’s here. I ignore them for a few more seconds while my fingers slide over the contours of his pectorals. They are, in a word, magnificent. Someone’s been working out.