Chapter 16 A Little Bit Stupid
A Little Bit Stupid
Eric
The sun beats down on me and DeLuca as we run a quick six miles on the beach. “Quick” is a relative term here, because running on sand—even packed, wet sand—is hard work. I’m panting like a racehorse when my teammates’ rental house comes back into view.
“Swim?” I gasp as we lengthen our strides toward the finish.
“You know it.”
We barely pause long enough to kick off our shoes and socks and toss our phones onto the wooden deck chairs before jogging into the ocean.
The contrast in temperature between my overheated body and the water makes me suck in my breath. The only thing to do is dive under immediately. The cool ocean swallows me, and the world goes blissfully silent.
This is exactly what I needed—a short vacation away from everything. Especially all the noise in my head.
When I pop up again, DeLuca is shaking off his wet head like a dog and grinning. “Almost makes the cardio worth it, amirite?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. He lunges instead.
But I have fast reflexes, too. So I manage to dodge his palm—the one on its way to dunking my head under the waves. I grab him instead and smush him into the surf.
He comes up choking with laughter. “It’s on.”
We spend the next ten minutes trying to drown each other, until we stagger back onto the sand, exhausted and waterlogged. We collapse on the hot sand, not even bothering to grab our towels off the chairs.
“You’re a beast, Captain. Didn’t even let me get the first dunk in.”
I snort. “I grew up at the beach with an older brother who liked to roughhouse. You never had a chance.”
DeLuca grins up at the deep blue sky. “Fair. How was your trip home, anyway? You never said. How’s your mom doing?”
“Eh. Not much to say. Parents are depressed about the wedding.” DeLuca knows my family situation. “I knew they would be. So I only stayed one night. Going back in a couple weeks, though.”
“For the wedding,” he says.
“Yeah. And…” I sigh. “I did something a little bit stupid.”
“You, Captain? That’s impossible. Unless it involves a woman, and then it’s totally on-brand.”
I reach over and give him a shove.
“Oh boy. Called it! What did you do? Did you take up Darcy on her offer?”
“Shh,” I say automatically. But there’s nobody nearby, and the noise from the surf would drown out anything we’re saying. “That didn’t happen. It’s even dumber than that.” I tell him what I overheard from Darcy’s sister, and how I pretended we were a couple.
He finds this hilarious, of course.
“I didn’t think it through. And then Maribel called my mother a few days later to check up on her. And Maribel said, ‘Why didn’t you tell me Eric had a new girlfriend?’ So now my mother is all aflutter. She wants to meet Darcy before the wedding.”
DeLuca laughs so hard that he has to sit up to breathe. “You really stepped in it now, dumbass.”
“Unhelpful,” I grumble.
“How did you not see that coming?”
“I don’t know, okay? It was impulsive. Like the time that goon from Buffalo tripped Larkin, and I threw my gloves down without a plan.”
“Five stitches later…” He laughs.
“Yeah, yeah. I just…” I close my eyes against the sunshine. “It was a reflex. I don’t like people messing with my teammates.”
“Teammates,” DeLuca says slowly, as if he’s amused by my choice of words. “I don’t think it’s like that.”
“Of course it is,” I insist.
“You forget how well I know you. And I’m willing to bet you’re still thinking about that message Darcy sent you.”
Get out of my brain. “In my defense, she gave me a very detailed outline. It’s hard to forget.”
DeLuca gives me a sideways glance. “Well, yeah. And that part about the bow tie, right?”
I cover my face with my hands.
He laughs. “Maybe you should just take her up on it.”
“That’s not on the table,” I insist. “It would just be really fucking helpful if she were less sexy.” Every time I close my eyes, I see Darcy in that dress, gazing at me as we cha-cha. Makes me want to reenact that entire scene from Dirty Dancing. Or, like, the whole film.
Plus a few extra scenes with light bondage and a little spanking.
“Whatever you say, bro. But then you’re going to spend the whole evening averting your eyes, because she’s right over there.”
I assume he’s messing with me, so I don’t even look. But then he follows it up with, “Nice bikini, too,” and a low whistle.
That’s all it takes. I sit up like I’ve been cattle-prodded and then wait for his laughter. But there she is. Unless I’m hallucinating, she’s walking up the beach with Zoe. “Oh shit.”
“You should see your face right now,” DeLuca says. “Your tongue is practically hanging out.”
I groan. Darcy’s bikini is emerald green and no tinier than the rest of the bathing suits on the beach.
But it doesn’t matter. My thirst has just reached a new peak, because now I know the precise shape of the waist I want to wrap my hands around, and the exact sway of her hips as she moves closer. I can’t look away.
She doesn’t notice, though. She doesn’t turn this way, which is probably for the best. I need a moment to get over my surprise. Although the rental house was Merritt’s idea, and his girlfriend, Zoe, is Darcy’s best friend, so I should have seen this coming.
“Oh, buddy.” DeLuca chuckles. “You’ve got it bad. Maybe the two of you can bang it out of your systems.”
I lie back down onto the sand and groan. “No fucking way. We work together. It could all go wrong, and we’d end up like…”
“Like you and Mona?” he scoffs. And the sound of my ex-hookup’s name is a buzzkill.
“Yeah, like that.” Mona wanted a relationship, and I didn’t. The problem was that I kept removing all her clothes whenever we both got horny.
“Buddy, Darcy is nothing like Mona. In the first place, she has too much self-respect to keep chasing you if you’re not interested.”
“Well, sure. But it could still be awkward as fuck.”
“Are you sure about that? I think you really like her. That’s why you came up with this goofball, fake boyfriend shit in the first place. Your subconscious tricked you into asking for what you need.”
“Which is what? An awkward four-day wedding?”
“No. Some naked attention from a woman you already respect, who just happens to enjoy being tied up.”
I lie back on the sand and throw an arm over my eyes. “I think you’re overestimating my subconscious. Most of the time it just craves potato chips.”
“Maybe,” he concedes. “But you still have a problem. You’re either going to that wedding as her boyfriend or not. So what’s it going to be? You’d better talk to her, don’t you think?”
“Yeah.” I sigh. And then I picture her in that green bikini and realize how challenging it will be to keep my eyes to myself.
“Let’s go inside,” he says, slapping my arm. “I need a sandwich after that run, anyway.”
It’s a beautiful, sunny afternoon at the beach house. The place Merritt found has five bedrooms, a hot tub, and tennis courts. I brought a car full of groceries, too, including steaks for dinner.
It should have been easy to get Darcy alone for a chat, but I keep hitting snags. When we all go outside to play some tennis, she partners with Zoe, which puts her on the wrong side of the net to talk much, but the right side to distract me.
In her bikini top and a pair of shorts, she and Zoe wallop DeLuca and me in straight sets.
“Captain,” DeLuca says afterward, when we’re drinking the first light beer of the day. “I say this with love, but how could you possibly miss so many serves?”
“Hello? Zoe was an Olympic athlete?”
He rolls his eyes.
“Fine. It was the bikini. As soon as they defeat Merritt and Petrov, I need to talk to her.”
Except it doesn’t work like that, because Darcy is very difficult to catch alone.
She and Zoe take another long walk together, and then I get roped into running out to buy limes, because DeLuca has got himself a date somehow.
A pretty woman with shiny hair has materialized out of the ether to hang off his arm.
So I do what a captain does, and I buy the damn limes.
But as the evening shapes up and I still can’t pull Darcy aside, I realize she’s avoiding me.
Every time I cross the room to speak to her, she seems to find somewhere else she needs to be—like on the opposite side of the patio during dinnertime, where I can only admire her through the warm glow of the fire pit.
She doesn’t even look in my direction. And I hate it so much.
(Why’s that? asks DeLuca’s voice in my head, and I tell him to shut up.)
Eventually, as the light fades, I see her gathering up empty glasses and heading for the kitchen. And I know an open net when I see it. So I grab some dirty plates and hustle in there at the same time.
“Darcy,” I say, coming up beside her at the sink. “Hey. You okay?”
“Just fine,” she says, turning on the sink. “Pass those over here. I’ve got it.”
But I’ve had enough of this, so I turn the faucet off instead.
She turns to me with a look of shocked irritation. “What the hell, Captain? I’m working here.”
“Not right now, you’re not. Come on. Take a walk with me.”
She frowns. “No. I don’t think so.”
Then her hand makes another trip toward the faucet, and I catch it in the air and hold on. “Darcy. Are you avoiding me?”
Her eyes flare. They turn pointedly down at our joined hands. “Maybe. But are you restraining me?”
“Do you want me to? ’Cause I could do that.”
She makes a hot gasp.
And whoops. That’s not what I came into the kitchen to say. So I drop her hand and take a half step away. “Listen, let’s back up. I just want to know why you’re ducking me. I’ve had an entire day to think of ideas, and some of them are doozies.”
She crosses her arms over her chest. The bikini has disappeared, but its replacement is a tiny little ruffled top that I’ve already memorized. “Like what?”
I sigh. “Well, maybe I said something stupid. But you’re going to have to tell me what it was. Because my other idea is worse. Did the cardiologist tell you something awful? And can you please put me out of my misery?”
Her mouth opens with surprise, and for the first time all day, she looks me right in the eye. “I haven’t been to the cardiologist yet. My appointment is next week.”
“Oh.” My shoulders drop in relief. “Thank fuck.”
She tilts her head and considers me. “Thank you again for sending me that info, though. That was considerate.”
“It was nothing.”
“I disagree.” She refolds the dishtowel on the counter. “I was pretty clenched up about it, and you made it easier for me to get that taken care of.”
“Good. I’m glad. But then… what’s up with the cold shoulder thing? I mean, I’m a fan of your shoulders but…”
She gives me a confused glance. “Well, when I called the cardiologist, they put me on musical hold for, like, half an hour.”
“Ouch. Like… Elton John performed by an orchestra?”
She shakes her head. “Hall and Oates on a plinky piano. But it gave me a lot of time to think about you and that stupid party.”
Hell, I’ve been thinking about the party, too, but it sure didn’t make me sad. “What about the party?”
She leans against the counter and lifts a cool gaze to mine. “Tell me this—when my sister hit on you at the party? What did she say, exactly?”
Oh.
Oh shit.
My mind reels, because I’d given Darcy this little white lie without even thinking. It was a kindness, right? Who wants to hear the shitty things your own family says about you?
But if I make something up, she’ll probably see right through me. I’m not that good an actor. And Darcy’s laser gaze is asking for the truth. “She, uh, didn’t hit on me, exactly. Not in so many words.”
Her eyes narrow, and I’m suddenly unsure if I made the right call. “So why did you tell me she did?”
I give her a deer in the headlights look, and keep my mouth firmly shut. Then I shrug, like a kindergartner who’s just been caught stealing toys.
“Let me guess—Tessa was talking smack about me. Did she do this to your face?”
“No.” I try to shove my hands in my pockets, but I don’t have pockets. So I fold my arms instead.
That’s when Chase and Zoe suddenly enter the kitchen, interrupting our conversation. But I welcome the distraction. Or I would, if Chase or Zoe felt like talking to us. Instead, Zoe opens the refrigerator, and Chase leans in. He grabs…
Is that the Hershey’s syrup I brought for making sundaes? “Um, dude? What are you…”
Zoe shoots me a shut up look, and Chase smirks at me. Then he scoops an arm around Zoe, his hand landing possessively on her ass, and they waltz out of the kitchen together.
“Hold up,” I say. “Did they just steal the chocolate syrup and head upstairs? Is that really a good idea? It sounds… sticky.”
“Don’t change the subject,” Darcy says tartly. “In fact, follow me. You’re going to explain yourself.”
Oh shit.
She marches outside, and I follow her like a puppy.
She leads me around to the quiet side of the house, where there’s nothing but the hot tub gurgling to itself.
Darcy sits down on the stonework ledge and dangles her bare feet into the tub.
“Sit. And tell me why you suddenly decided we should be a couple at that party. I want the truth.”
Yikes. Usually, when a guy makes a woman mad, he’s actually dating her. But I guess I’m just that talented.
I proceed with caution. “Tessa was acting like a snot,” I say slowly. “It was her and a friend. They were both being assholes, and I happened to overhear.”
“Assholes about what? About me and you showing up to the party together?”
“Well, yeah.” I shrug awkwardly. “It was very… seventh grade. If middle schoolers wore Prada and had better tits.”
Maybe it’s the waning light, but I think I see the corners of her mouth twitch. “That’s Tessa—forever stuck in the seventh grade. Or I guess it was eighth grade when I ruined her life.”
“Except you didn’t,” I argue. “She’s got some baggage, and she seems to take it out on anyone who’s handy. It panicked me a little, honestly. That’s who Maribel is getting for a sister-in-law—a petty bitch who’s willing to stab another woman in the back just for being prettier than she is.”
Darcy looks up at me suddenly, and I’m not sure why until I play that sentence back in my head. I called her pretty. But, so what? It’s not exactly news. She probably owns a mirror.
So why does she still look angry?