Page 67 of Her Mercenary

I nodded as I stared at the water, pretending I wasn’t totally clueless.

“Tell me what you see around us.”

I frowned. “You mean ... like ...

“Just tell me what you see. Look around. Take it in.”

“Okay ... I see beautiful white flowers on the shoreline.”

“Those are plumeria trees. They’re all over. White, pink, orange. You’re familiar with Hawaiian leis?”

I nodded.

“Those are the flowers used to make them. Stunning, aren’t they?”

I smirked.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“What?”

“Stunning isn’t a word I expected from you in casual conversation ... or beautiful for that matter.”

He regarded me closely. Intimately. “I call it like I see it, Samantha.”

I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear while blushing like a schoolgirl. Damn this man and his ability to turn me into a puddle of stupidity.

“What else do you see?” he said, returning to the subject.

“I see rocks and rushing water.” I followed the whitecaps. “I see a large boulder over there.” I pointed ahead. “A fallen log and more rocks past that.”

“Right. Exactly. Good job. There are five sections of a river. We’re standing in what’s called the riffle—shallow and rocky with surface movement.” Roman motioned a few feet ahead where the water moved smoothly with the current. “That’s called a run, and to the right of the boulder over there is a pool of deep, calm water. Just past the boulder is called an eddy—this is where the current is disturbed, in this case by the boulder it swirls around. Past the pool and eddy is the tailout, where it gets shallower. Tell me, where do you think is the best place to catch a fish?”

I had absolutely no idea.

“Think, Sam. Tap into your survival instinct.”

I took a deep breath and pointed to the pool. “There, where it’s deep, so they can hide.”

“Incorrect.”

Dammit.

“Remember, we’re fishing with bait, which means we want the fish who are looking for food. See the eddy?”

I squinted, trailing the swirling water with my eyes, seeing tiny specks caught in the current. Bugs—food.

My eyes rounded.

Smiling, he nodded. “That’s right. Those insects are caught in the swirl of the current, therefore attracting fish. There is where we want to focus.”

When a fin suddenly flicked out of the water, I gasped, pointing. “Did you see that?”

He winked. “Yep. Dinner.”

The lesson continued with Roman showing me how to—correctly—use a fishing rod, how to bait, then cast.