Home > Single Dad Seeks Juliet(11)

Single Dad Seeks Juliet(11)
Author: Max Monroe

“What kind of person goes underwater and holds their breath for that long! There’s no way—”

“A former Navy SEAL,” I cut her off. I don’t mean to be impolite, but so far, this conversation isn’t going anywhere. The only thing that’s going to help it along is clarity.

That closes her mouth—in fact, it goes so far as to make her suck her lips in over her teeth.

For the first time, it’s silent, and both of us look down to realize I’m lying half on top of her, my hand at the bare, exposed skin of her waist.

Goose bumps form under my fingertips just before I pull them away and push back to my knees in the sand. I put my ass to my heels and roll up to my feet.

She watches the movement avidly but doesn’t venture to make any of her own.

“Are you going to be okay?” I ask again from my position above her. The sun is bright in my eyes, but I can’t seem to turn away from her.

She nods, biting into the flesh of her bottom lip and laughing a little. Mascara runs down her cheeks and settles into her dimples, and her sandy, wet hair clings to the sides of her face.

She looks like a wet rat. Somehow, though, I can still tell she’s extraordinarily pretty.

I reach down and offer a hand. She accepts it readily, and I pull her up to standing.

“Thanks for trying to save me,” I say, a teasing smile playing at the corner of my lips.

She laughs outright at herself and sinks her head into her hands. “Oh yeah. This’ll be a story for the grandkids, for sure. Assuming I ever have any, that is.”

Her comments are self-deprecating but laced heavily with humor. I can’t help but laugh and stick out a hand. “I’m Jake, by the way.”

“Hold on…” She stares down at my hand like it might catch on fire. “What did you say your name was?”

“Jake,” I repeat.

Her face freezes briefly, and then she breaks out into full-blown cackles.

Okaaay. This is one of the weirdest mornings of my life.

 

 

Holley

 

The guy who was drowning—more like, the guy you thought was drowning, even tried to save from drowning, but who, in all actuality, saved you from drowning—is him, Jake flipping Brent.

The exact man I came here to find.

“Of course you are,” I blurt out through another round of laughter.

Of all the people on the planet—of all the people on this beach this morning!—and I had to make a fool of myself with the actual guy I’m supposed to meet. There’s no running. There’s no hiding. There’s no Don’t worry about it, Holley, you’ll never see this guy again. This is Grade A, prime choice embarrassment, and it’s going to give me horrible indigestion for the next several weeks.

Oh my God! I cannot believe myself.

“What? Is Jake a bad name?” he asks through a raspy chuckle, completely behind the curve of our fate. “I can go by something else if that’ll make you feel better.”

Oh, so he’s incredibly handsome and charming? Sounds about right at this point.

My eyes don’t miss—can’t miss—the way his fingers move the zipper of his wet suit down, down, down, from his neck to just slightly below his belly button. With the kind of ease I do not possess, he slips his arms out of the sleeves and lets the material hang loose at his waist. His nearly full sleeve of tattoos on one arm is unbelievably vibrant against his tanned skin. And the rest of him?

Biceps and pecs and a six-pack, oh my!

This guy is forty? Good grief, his body looks twenty-five, tops…

Get it together, you little floozy! Stop staring at your assignment like he’s lunch!

I shake myself out of my beefy-muscles-induced trance and clear my throat. “No, no,” I backtrack, trying to figure out how to save face when I’m pretty sure it melted off in the ocean. Or, at the very least, when his fingers played tug-of-war with his freaking wet suit. “Jake is a fine name. It’s just…well… I’m Holley,” I reveal. “Holley Fields.”

I giggle to try to soften the awkward news, but he doesn’t react at all how I expect. Instead, his eyebrows draw together. A smile still highlights his perfect cheekbones and insanely blue eyes, and my God, why does he have to be so attractive?

“Holley,” he says then, acknowledging that he did, in fact, hear me say my name correctly, but taking it no further.

“Right,” I confirm. “Holley Fields.”

He shrugs and settles his hands on his hips, calling my attention to the line of muscle that scoops down on both sides and points to the glorious world under his bathing suit.

“I work for the SoCal Tribune,” I say, elucidating even further.

He nods as if it’s all the same to him. “And I have a construction company.”

I start to open my mouth when it finally fucking dawns on me. He has no freaking clue about me. He doesn’t know that he’s meeting me here or that he’s been selected for Bachelor Anonymous or anything. He probably never paid attention to my name on the submissions, and his daughter obviously didn’t relay the message. She wrote it down on some notepad and moved on with her life. I know how teenage girls work—I was one once.

Oh, hell’s bells, he must think I’m insane.

“Uh, I’m just now realizing that maybe we’re miscommunicating a little bit. I spoke with your daughter last night—Chloe. About your Bachelor Anonymous submission. You were selected, and she assured me she’d let you know and that I should meet you here this morning, but I’m guessing you didn’t get the message…?”

“What?” he says, his tone unmistakable. It’s the tone every dad in the natural world invokes when they’ve just found out their kids have done something like taken their autographed sports memorabilia and flushed it down the toilet. I suddenly feel very protective of the unknown Chloe. I don’t want to be the reason she gets in trouble.

“Honestly, we probably got our wires crossed. Or maybe she didn’t get a chance to get the message to you. It’s no big deal—”

“Sorry, Holley, but it is a big deal,” he insists. “For you and me. Because I don’t have a single clue what Bachelor Anonymous is, and I can assure you, if I did, I’d never sign myself up for it.”

“Oh shit.”

He nods. “Oh shit, indeed.”

I follow closely behind him as he turns on his heel and heads for a pile of stuff about twenty feet away. I have to assume it’s his. Either that, or the news of his involvement in the contest has inspired a robbery of some kind.

Still, I prefer to bank on the latter.

Sand sticks to my feet and nags on the back half of my body as I trudge behind him. He’s focused, though, and doesn’t seem to notice me—the sand yeti—at all.

He digs in the front pocket of his bag and comes out with a phone. His fingers move over the screen.

“What are you doing?” I ask, a boldness I’m not entitled to somehow taking me over.

“I’m calling my daughter,” he answers matter-of-factly. “She has some explaining to do.”

“Maybe she didn’t have anything to do with this? Maybe someone else submitted a personal ad for you?” I offer, and he targets an incredulous yet stern look directly at me.

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