Page 160 of Tangled with the Tight End

His face lights up. “It’s like someone dumped an aquarium in the clearest water you’ve ever seen. So many colors and eccentric-looking fish. The place I go is a coral reef. There are electric-blue angelfish. Yellow goatfish. Bright orange flame fish. The porcupine fish blows itself up like a spiky tan beach ball. The iridescent parrotfish looks like it has teeth …”

I barely noticed that I had closed my eyes, imagining every fish as Declan described it, until he said teeth. My eyes pop open.

“Here,” Declan says, tugging his cell out of his pocket. “I’ve got an underwater video from last year.”

He opens his photos app and types in Caribbean. The screen fills with photos of island life. Sunsets. Boat rides. He swipes quickly to the video he wants to show me. Then he hands me his phone and I watch, my eyes wide and a smile on my face.

“This is real?” I ask. “And we’re waiting for bye week because … ?”

Declan laughs. “Okay. Maybe we should bump up these plans.”

When I hand him his cell, he pockets it and steps back, pivoting toward the living room. “I should put my leg up.”

“I didn’t even have to tell you. Good job,” I say. “Are you feeling okay?”

“Yeah. I’m good.”

I follow him out of the kitchen, flicking the light switch and joining him in the front room.

Declan reclines on the couch, so I take the chair Jaxon was sitting in.

“There’s this boat I like to charter in St. Thomas,” he says. “The guys and I took it out one year and I’ve been chartering it ever since.”

“Do you fish?”

“Sometimes. Mostly I just like going out on the ocean for the day.” He smiles as if he’s picturing it right now. Then he says, “I have a place there.” He turns his head to look at me and adds, “It’s not much.”

“You have a place. In St. Thomas. And this is just coming up?”

“It’s my getaway. A vacation home.”

“A whole extra house?”

“Yes. It’s not huge.”

“You don’t have to talk it down, Declan. I’d have an extra house in the Caribbean if I could. Maybe one in some winter wonderland too.”

“Well …”

“Staaaahhhp!” I shout, bursting into laughter. “You have a third house?”

“Condo. In Vail.”

“Declan O’Connell.” I shake my head.

“Too much?”

I stand and walk over to the couch, snuggling in beside him. He wraps his arm around me.

“No. It’s not too much. It’s crazy. But you’ve earned it. You put your body on the line and you work hard. Buy as many houses as you like.”

He leans in and places a soft kiss on my lips. “Thanks.”

“For what?”

“Just for being you.”

“I don’t know how to be anyone else.”