Depths of Salvation (Love on the Edge) by Molly E. Lee

plenty of rooms on board.” You know better.
    I saw the debate in his eyes, but the battle was long enough to flush my skin with embarrassment. The rejection was clear long before he opened his mouth, and I put a foot of space between us, my hand on my forehead. “You were right. I’ve had too much.”
    Or maybe it was the combination of the rum and the insane connection I had to Connell, which had only amplified since we’d dove together. “Do you get that?” I asked, before realizing I hadn’t voiced my thought.
    He tilted his head.
    “When you dive with someone, as easily as we did today . . . do you ever feel like it’s more informative of compatibility than a month’s worth of conversations?”
    “I do actually. It’s how I knew Ryan was a trustworthy guy. Just like Nemo.”
    I nodded slowly.
    He trailed his finger down my bare arm, sending warm chills across my skin. “Let’s get you home.”
    I held onto him as he pushed the jet ski to full speed. His body felt so warm, my face pressed against his back, and I hovered in that shiny place between sleeping and awake. By the time he pulled up to the ship, I was thirty seconds away from falling completely under.
    He followed me on deck, making sure I made it to my small dorm-like room. I plopped down on the bed to keep from falling over. The awkwardness of him hovering in the doorway, thinking who knew what after my shameless invitation on the docks, filled my stomach with tension.
    “Is it all right if I take the jet ski back to the vessel? I need fresh clothes and—“
    “Absolutely,” I cut him off. He didn’t need to explain. I shouldn’t have made a move on someone I had to work with so closely for two months. Stupid, stupid rum.
    “All right. Get some sleep. I’ll be back in the morning.” He flicked the light off before shutting the door.
    I glanced out my small window when I heard the roar of the jet ski’s engine, and watched as he took off in the direction of Slade’s vessel. That magnetic pull we’d talked about earlier? Yeah, that was present, and aching, and completely wrong. I couldn’t possibly want a man this much. Especially not one who held my future in his hands.
    Fucking rum.

Connell
    SLADE’S VESSEL WAS quiet by the time I made it on site after dropping Sadie off. The moon hung high, coating the wine-dark ocean in a silver glow. I sat on the vessel’s topmost exterior balcony for an hour, getting lost in the sound of the waves and my rum-colored thoughts. Something itched underneath my chest, an uncomfortable pulsing ache I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Maybe it was the fish tacos.
    You know better.
    I sighed and pushed off of the grated railing that left tiny, rectangle imprints on my legs as I’d let them hang over the side. My muscles twisted in protest, overworked from the dive. Sadie had skills I could barely keep up with. Not that I’d ever tell her that. Either way, my body was dying for the tiny twin bed allotted to me in the room I’d called home for five months.
    Finally making it down the six flights of interior stairs, I turned left down the hallway that housed my room. I liked it down here because I could hear the waves crash against the thick pillars holding the vessel just above the ocean’s surface. It crashed against the structure in a constant, rhythmic beat that always opened up my lungs, and helped me sleep. Helped drown out the unwanted voices in my head. Conner’s wasn’t so bad anymore, but Mom’s? Well, in my head she always treated me accordingly—like the son who’d crushed her world in the span of one selfish decision.
    “Where have you been?” Amber—a petite redhead with green eyes who always wore low-cut tank tops if she wasn’t suited up for work as a diver’s assistant—called from where she hovered outside my door. I stopped a few feet away from her because she was blocking my entry.
    I shrugged.
    We’d had a few good times between my sheets when I first was hired on, but