Ha. Well, I wasn’t exactly living in Skidsville. I could post my own pic of my fabulous vacation here in this tropical paradise. I looked around for something that would show off my beautiful surroundings. There was my plate of fries… Yeah, that wasn’t going to work. Maybe a selfie? I held the phone up and flipped the camera so I could see myself. My face was pink from today’s sun, and without an ounce of makeup, my eyebrows were practically invisible. Hard pass. Maybe I could—
“Your friends had to leave?”
Mike’s voice startled me and I let out a little scream. “Sorry. Uh, yeah.” I set my phone down.
I hadn’t exactly forgotten that the guy was here, having noticed him take a seat along with a couple of guys wearing the resort’s pink shirt, where he proceeded to pound down a full plate of salad and beef as he chatted with three different women who’d approached their table. Had I not been momentarily distracted by Tracey’s Instagram, I would have seen his approach and forged an escape route.
“Why don’t I join you,” he said, already setting his plate down and taking a seat where Penny had been. “Want me to take your pic?” I must have looked confused as he nodded to my phone, the camera still on when I’d set it down. “You were about to take a selfie. I can take it for you.”
“Nope, no selfie for me. Especially right now,” I muttered under my breath, recalling my lobster-red face.
He shook his head. “You women. So particular. You look great, really. In fact, I kind of prefer you like this, not all fussed up and trying so hard to get some douchebag’s attention.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said, figuring denial was the best response here. “I wasn’t trying to get anyone’s attention.”
He raised a brow. “Now who’s feeding who a line? You know you’re not exactly the first person to throw themselves in the way of a billionaire. You’re just the first I’ve seen who literally threw themselves into a pool while doing so.”
“Hardy-har-har.” I really should not be talking to him. I was on dangerous ground. As a person with a history of falling for the cute guy with a toe-curling smile, like Eddie, and before him, Cade the lifeguard, and Jake the car valet before him, all guys who inevitably turned out to be the wrong guy—i.e., not faithful, goal-oriented, or responsible—I should be running, not walking, back to Penny’s. And yet, here I stayed. Well, I couldn’t be rude, now, could I? “You know very well that my plunge into the pool was an accident.”
“Oh, of that I have no doubt. It was the action before the plunge that was in question.”
I picked up a fry and nibbled at a corner as I pondered whether to ask him what I was really dying to know. “You know, earlier at the pool? You, uh, didn’t see anything else too embarrassing by chance? Anything post-plunge?”
He smiled so slowly and sensually, his eyelids lowering in a look that could only be described as bedroom eyes, that my lady parts squeezed in tortured happiness. “Of course not.”
Oh, he most certainly had. But it was probably best that we go along with his lie so I could save a little face.
He grabbed two of my fries before I could slap his hand away. “You’ve got to tell me. Why on earth would you want to end up with a guy like that anyway?” he asked. By guy I was assuming he meant Brennan. “Do you have a thing for ménage-a-trois? Or quatre or cinq?” he continued to count upwards. “If I’m completely honest, you’re totally out of his league.”
My mouth dropped open at the insult and I was ready to let him have it when he added, “You could do far better.”
Ego soothed, I tried not to smile at the compliment as I skewered some of the beef strips on my fork. “I don’t know about leagues, but I will agree that Brennan Thornock is definitely not the one for me.” Which now left me moving on to bachelor number two, the elusive Grayson Thomas.
“Wow, that was easier than I thought. Does that mean you’ll go out with me? I could take you and your friends on a tour around the island.”
A day looking into those dreamy eyes would be tempting indeed. But out of the question. I had a plan and that didn’t include spending the day with a guy who, as tempting as he was, met none of the parameters of the wish list I’d put together. “Sorry. Can’t. I already have plans.”
Plans that included tracking down an elusive billionaire who would be sitting in the middle of the ocean with no way of getting his attention unless…
An idea came to me. One that was going to require some space to think and plan. I shoved a few more of the fries in my mouth and washed them down with water. The lava cakes were going to have to wait for another day.
“Thanks for keeping me company, but I probably should get going. Holly wasn’t feeling great, so I should go check on her.”
“I’ll walk you back.”
“Not necessary,” I said quickly, already on my feet. “I promise, I know perfectly well how to get back.”
I only made it about ten feet when his voice stopped me.
“Janie. The other way.”
I looked at the path and up to the sign. Oh, right.
Without daring to look back at him, I reversed direction. It wasn’t my fault that all the trees and paths looked the same.
I only took two more wrong turns before I found Penny’s place, plenty of time to replay my brief conversation with the bartender and remember how just hearing him say my name made my pulse beat a little quicker.
Yeah, being around that guy was dangerous. The last thing I needed was to get mixed up with a guy like that. A guy who seemed as lost and messed up as me.
No distractions. That was my one mantra.
And Mike was definitely a distraction.
6
“Are you sure this is one-hundred-percent safe?” I asked the guy who was strapping me into the contraption that was going to fly me a million feet above the shark-infested ocean the next day.
“Absolutely,” Lars said to me and smiled.
He wasn’t a very good liar. But then I couldn’t be too picky since not only was the guy half the price as the other places I’d looked up, but he’d also agreed to deviate from his usual route and deliver me to this location for our parasailing adventure. A location that was, as far as I could tell, closer to Grayson Thomas than I’d ever been, with his yacht not far from where I was about to be floated high above the water.
“It’s completely, one-hundred-percent safe,” the guy repeated. This time his attention seemed trained on my boobs.
For today’s outing, I’d gone with another bikini, but this time I’d combined it with a crocheted cream-colored cover-up that was more like a dress with the added twist of offering a little glimpse of the skin underneath. Tasteful yet sexy. At least when someone wasn’t standing six inches away and staring down at my breasts.
His eyes were a little glassy and I had to clear my throat to get his attention. I couldn’t believe I was leaving my life in the hands of this guy.
Well, go big or go home, right?
One minute I was standing at the back of the boat, gripping the bars of the parasail; the next I was being pulled up into the sky at a million miles a minute.