Chapter 15

• Beau knew it was a bad idea before he even hit the tree line. Knew it when he heard her laugh bounce off the creek rock, knew it when he caught sight of that bare back, blue bikini strings tied neat and crooked at the same time — like she’d knotted ‘em too fast just to watch him think about untyin’ ‘em.
• The little lake hid at the back edge of the Lawson land — spring-fed, cold even in July, with a trickle of a waterfall that poured off a short mossy ledge. They’d all grown up here — swimming barefoot, draggin’ old tractor tubes down to float until they burned brown under the sun.
• But this — Sadie drifting through water so clear he could see the soft glint of her belly ring underwater, that tiny flicker of silver when she spun slow and tossed him a grin — this was not how he remembered it.