Once I shut the door to the bathroom, I put my hair up into a messy bun. Then I changed into my high-neck blue-and-white striped swimsuit. I tied the strings behind my neck and gave my reflection an inspection.

Deciding that I looked all right, I grabbed my towel out of my bag and then went back to the boys.

Jace was already in the pool when I came out. Logan was sitting on the edge with his feet in the water, like he was waiting for me. I'd always known that the Carmichael twins had won the genetic lottery, but I had to work hard to keep from gasping as I ogled Logan without his shirt on. His chest and arms were tanned, probably from surfing the North Carolina coast all summer. And his body was definitely not the same as it had been when they'd lived here before. He was no longer a gangly teen too long for his body. Logan was full grown now in a man's body. A very nice-looking man's body with abs and muscled arms.

I set my towel on the lounge chair next to the pool before walking over and lowering myself to sit beside him.

"Hi," I said.

"Hi." He leaned closer so our shoulders brushed against each other, and when he seemed to take in my appearance, I held my breath. His gaze ran the length of my body before his eyes stopped on my face. A slow smile lifted his lips. "Great swimsuit," he said.

I looked down at my tankini. I'd gotten it last summer when my family went on vacation to the Hamptons to stay at my rich cousin's beach house. I usually bought bikinis, but this one had fit me too perfectly to pass up.

"Thanks."

"Are you ready to get in?" he asked, eyeing the water before looking back at me.

"I think I'll wait for Alyssa." Usually, pools were colder than I liked, but the water felt nice on my legs. Which made sense—fancy people could afford a good heating system.

"Suit yourself." Logan slipped into the water, going all the way in. And when he stood up and ran his hands through his hair to push it out of his eyes, I couldn't help but stare at the way it emphasized his biceps. Logan had been lifting weights since the last time I'd seen him at a pool.

Alyssa came out a minute later, but instead of wearing her swimsuit like I expected, she was wearing her regular clothes and holding up a very scraggly piece of fabric.

"What's that?" I called to her across the pool.

She shook her head. "Apparently, this is my brother's revenge."

And now I could see that it was her swimsuit, except there were a bunch of slits all around it. "Did he attack it with scissors?"

She pursed her lips into a frown. "Yep. I'm officially going to kill him."

Jace had stopped swimming his laps and swam to the end closest to Alyssa. "Caleb did that?"

"Yup. Gotta love that little tormentor of mine." Alyssa sighed. "Anyway, I might as well go home since I can't swim in this."

"Unless you wanted to grab a snack with me. I'm actually hungrier than I thought," Jace said, quickly.

She gave him a confused expression but said, "Okay?"

Jace lifted himself out of the pool in one smooth move, and when he stood a few feet from Alyssa, I didn't miss the way she looked at his dripping wet body.

Should Trey be worried?

"How about you guys make us something while you're at it?" Logan called to them.

Jace toweled off and looked back at us. "Sure." And before I knew it, Logan and I were alone again.

"So are you coming in anytime soon?" Logan asked after I continued to sit on the edge of the pool. "The water's nice."

"I don't know. I kind of think the view might be nicer from here." I winked.

A smirk lifted his lips. "The view's not so bad from here, either."

I let my legs swish in the water. "I think I want to just get in the hot tub."

He raised his eyebrow. "And why's that?"

Because I've always wanted to kiss a guy in a hot tub.

But I couldn't say that now, could I?

He swam closer. "Well, we have this rule that you have to get cold first before you can get in the hot tub. That way you can really appreciate it."

"Really?" I looked around to see if they had any rules posted on the walls like public pools usually did. "I don't see this so-called rule anywhere."

"That's because it's a secret rule."

I laughed. "Oh, a secret rule."

He nodded. "Only special people get to know about the secret rules."

I grinned. "So, if I get in the pool first, then I can go into the hot tub?"

"Yes." Then he seemed to think of something else. "Unless you want to join the super elite group of awesome people and prove that you are really deserving of the hot tub by completing the top-secret challenge."

"The top-secret challenge?"

His smile broadened. "You have to be pretty amazing to complete this challenge, though."

I felt my competitive nature beginning to rise within me. "I'm up for it."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

He looked behind him, and it was then that I noticed a glass door that led to their backyard. Was he going to make me stand outside in the cold for a minute before I could get in the hot tub?

He gave me a sneaky smile. "I dare you to go out there and make a snow angel for five seconds before getting in the hot tub."

"What?" My jaw dropped. "You can't be serious. It's, like, fifteen degrees outside."

He held his hands up at his sides. "If you're not up to the challenge, I get it."

"Oh, I'm up to it." I crossed my arms, feeling myself get all riled up. "The question is if you are."

He laughed. "I most definitely am."

I stood and beckoned for him to join me out of the pool. "Then let's go."

He swam to where I'd been seated a second before, and soon he was towering over me, with droplets of water clinging to his skin and eyelashes.

I decided not to mention that it was going to be way worse for him outside since he was already wet.

He led me toward the back door and put his hand on the knob, glancing back to me before he could turn it. "See that patch of snow right there?" He touched the glass, pointing to a slight hill just a few feet from the door. "That's where we're going."

"Okay." I sighed, my skin already anticipating how cold this was going to be.

"We'll both go out together and you have to lie down in the snow for the full five seconds."

"Got it." My heart was already racing. This was possibly one of the stupidest things I’d ever done, but for some reason, I was excited. Probably because I was doing this with Logan and he made everything more fun.

He drew in a deep breath. "As soon as I open this door, we're going."

I nodded.

And then he opened it. The cool, late December air blew through the open doorway and I immediately ran out into it. I tiptoed onto the snow-covered ground and raced Logan to the hill.

"And down," Logan said, and from the sound in his voice, I could tell how cold he already was.

My skin was already shocked from the brisk wind, the last thing I wanted to do was lie down in the snow. But there was no turning back now.

I plunked down on my butt and yelped.

"Five seconds." Logan called out beside me and we both lay on our backs at the same time. Everything in me told me to jump up and run inside. The snow wasn't supposed to be touching my bare arms, legs, and back like this. I immediately started moving my arms up and down and my legs out and in as Logan counted, "One. Two…"

My body started shivering uncontrollably, but I forced myself to finish.

"Three. Four. Five."

Logan bolted up faster than I'd seen anyone move before, and I chased after him, shaking so badly that I worried I might collapse on the floor. I shut the door behind me and then walked as quickly as I could to the edge of the hot tub.

Normally, I liked to slip into a hot tub slowly, to let my body acclimate to the hot water. But not this time. I practically jumped in the hot tub, head under the water and all.

"You're crazy," I said to Logan when he resurfaced beside me, my teeth chattering as the hot water pulsed around me.

He grinned and wrapped his arms around me, pulling me close to his chest with my arms folded between us. "We did it," he said, his teeth chattering as badly as mine as we stood there together with just our heads above the water.

I continued to shake uncontrollably, my head resting against his neck as I tried to get warm again. "H-have you done that before?"

He rubbed his hands up and down my back. "No."

"Then why did you dare me to do it? I could have gotten hypothermia." I smacked his chest gently.

He chuckled, a low rumble against my ear. "You can't get hypothermia from five seconds in the snow."

I wanted to argue but decided not to. My shivering eventually stopped as we stood there huddled together. And once we were both still and I wasn't so focused on how bad I was shaking anymore, I was suddenly aware of just how close we were—I was huddled up to Logan's bare chest in a hot tub. His very nice masculine chest.

I let my fingers trace the water droplets clinging to his clavicle. Let my fingers run over the muscles in his shoulders and upper arms.

I'd never been this close to a guy who wasn't wearing a shirt before.

I was just looking at his shoulders in a distracted and awed sort of way when he cleared his throat, bringing me back to my senses.

And when I looked up to him, there was something in his eyes that made my stomach muscles tighten.

"Hi," he said.

“Hey,” I said.

And before I could think of anything else to say, his lips were on mine. There was nothing tentative about it, either—he just full-on kissed me. We’d only kissed each other once before, but the instant our lips touched, it was like they picked right up from where they’d left off under the mistletoe. His arms tightened around my waist, and he gently pulled me with him as he took a seat along the hot tub’s wall, setting me down beside him.

“Is this okay?” Logan broke away for a second, sounding as out of breath as I felt.

My shoulders heaved as I tried to catch my breath. “More than okay.” And then I pressed my lips against his again, this time deepening the kiss. I let my hands move from where they rested behind his neck and slipped them into his wet hair, pulling myself even closer.

His hands slid up my back and pressed me tight against his chest so there was no space between our bodies anymore.

“Remember how I said legendary might be too big of a word to describe your kissing skills?” Logan mumbled after a while.

“Yeah?” I asked, my mind not really all there as our lips locked.

“I don’t think legendary was the right word.”

I froze. “It’s not?”

He shook his head. “I think you need a bigger word.”

My heart did a cartwheel in my chest. “Do you have a new word in mind?”

He shook his head. “I can’t—” He trailed kisses along my jaw, making a path of fire follow everywhere his lips touched. “—really—” His lips traveled back toward my mouth. “—think right now.” And when our mouths touched again, I had the feeling that we just might ignite if we weren’t already doused in water.

His hands smoothed their way up my back and down again until they tightened against my waist and he pulled me onto his lap. I gasped in surprise, but then I relaxed against him a moment later, letting my hands slide out of his hair and rest behind his neck to steady myself against him.

We kissed for a while longer before I heard the door behind us open.

I pulled away—needing the moment to catch my breath, anyway—and then turned to look, just in time to see the glass door closing again and Jace walking away.

“My brother is really good at catching us really close together,” Logan said, his voice huskier than usual.

I turned back to him with a smile on my lips. “He probably came to tell us our snack was ready.”

Logan stared at my lips then met my eyes again, his pupils bigger than usual. “Little does he know I just tasted something better than he and Alyssa could ever whip up in the kitchen.”

I pressed my swollen lips together. “Me, too.”

“We should probably go, though.” His fingertips ran across the small of my back where my tankini had slipped up a little. “If my mom finds out I was kissing you in the hot tub, I’ll be banned.”

My heart pounded. “Why?” I pushed myself off his lap and straightened my swimsuit at the mention of his mom finding us.

“One of our pool rules. No kissing gorgeous girls in the pool or hot tub.”

I grinned. “Is that another one of your secret rules?”

“I wish.” He leaned closer, making my stomach muscles tighten again with anticipation. “’Cuz I wouldn’t hesitate breaking it again if it was.” He looked at my lips one more time, and I thought for a moment that he was going to kiss me again until he stood. “But I’m going to be a good boy now.”

My heart sank a little. Was it bad that I really wanted him to have a streak of bad boy left in him?

He stepped out of the hot tub a moment later, and I followed him. We both toweled off, and I tried not to stare too long at his chest muscles as he ran his towel along his arms. Had I really just been kissing him in the hot tub?

It almost didn’t seem real.

“Ready?” he asked once we were dried off and I’d put my coverup over my swimsuit.

“Sure.”