In the front, Emma kept time, slowly beating the drum as they paddled out to the imaginary starting line.
Eight rows in front of him, Raina, with her long hair in a braid down her back, paddled in beat. He wanted to run his hand down that thick braid, pull her into his arms, see her smile—
“Casper! Are you planning on hitting that sailboat?” Darek turned in his seat, two places in front of him, his expression a growl.
Casper steered them away from the skiff. “Let’s sing a paddling song,” he said to Emma.
She started them in a chant. “Hey, Captain, can you hear it? Listen to our dragon spirit!”
He smiled, hearing Raina’s voice rise above the shouts.
He wasn’t sure how she’d gotten so far into his heart so fast, but he wasn’t arguing.
Still, he had to focus on this race if he wanted to win. As they maneuvered toward the starting line, he raised his voice with the rest of his team. “Gonna set a record pace. Gonna paddle to first place!”
He turned the boat so they were heading back to the docks. Emma slowed the drum until they were floating. “Bring us to a stop,” Casper said, and a few paddlers slowed them in the water.
“Okay, give me twenty-five hard strokes, as fast as you can; then Emma will set the pace. Ready?”
Paddles came up.
In the race, they’d take off to a gun, but he started the stopwatch around his neck and simply shouted, his voice carrying across the water. “Go!”
The boat lurched forward, nearly knocking him backward. They counted off together. “One, two, three—”
He could admit that having Darek back on board made for extra power. They motored through the water, a slick, fierce dragon skimming the surface as they dug in. “Twenty-five!”
They’d started to settle into their standard pace, still as one, a motorized team of paddlers with beautiful form, strong strokes. The water peeled back from the keel, cool and dark, and he angled them toward the finish line.
Onshore, he caught sight of Seb Brewster, the captain of the town team. You’re going down, Mr. Mayor.
They surged over the halfway point. “Keep it strong, team!” He glanced at the watch—they’d shaved sixteen seconds off their previous time.
In front, he saw Annalise Decker start to slow. “Annalise—take your paddle out of the water if you can’t keep up!”
She put it on her lap, and the aft side kept rhythm. He glanced at the clock. Still under their best time.
In the middle of the boat, he heard Nathan, his father, and even his brother groaning.
“Push it!”
They sailed across the imaginary finish line—drawn from the end of the long pier and the corner of the trading post onshore—and he clocked their time. “Fourteen seconds faster than our best time!”
The crew leaned over their paddles, breathing hard, drifting now toward the dock.
“Probably too soon to suggest we go again?”
Kyle Hueston looked back like he might arrest him and Casper grinned. “Just kidding. Great job today. I think we’re ready for competition.”
They floated to the dock and the crew disembarked. He gathered up the paddles, the life jackets. Then he, Darek, Kyle, and Jensen hoisted the boat from the water, together carrying it to the trailer.
“I’ll park it in the shed,” Darek said, and Casper wondered if he just wanted to spend time with his beloved boat.
Casper cast a look at Raina, who was drinking from one of the water bottles Ingrid had passed out. She wore nylon athletic pants and a green sports tunic today, along with her Keens.
He left Darek alone and sidled up to her. “Can I interest you in dinner?”
She looked at him, nodded.
Something had changed for her since he’d caught her talking to his father. She’d seemed to relax. Laugh more easily. Last night she’d even played a game of speed Scrabble with him and his parents. Like it was just another normal Wednesday night at the homestead, one she so easily fit into.
She climbed into the passenger side of his truck. “Do you mind if I run home and change clothes? I’m a little sweaty.”
“No problem. I’ll drop you off, go home and shower, and pick you back up.”
“Where are we going?”
He lifted a shoulder.
“I have an idea,” she said, her eyes twinkling. As they neared her aunt’s house, she turned to him. “And bring the motorcycle.”
The motorcycle? Uh—
But she got out before he had a chance to follow up, and shoot, if he couldn’t see them riding off into the sunset.
His parents had beaten him home, so when he arrived, he found his father in the family room, surfing the Internet for car repair manuals.
“Still can’t get the Chevy running?”