Chapter 11
MILES
I can’t get out of Abby’s room fast enough. Not because I want to leave her, but because I have never been so turned on in my goddamn life and my dick is aching so bad I’m in pain.
The shower takes no time at all to heat up, and I step in, letting the hot water blast my back as I take my cock in my hand with a firm grip, groaning at the first slow pump down the shaft.
I knew I was a goner when she walked up to the hot tub tonight.
It would have been nothing short of a miracle for us to leave the jacuzzi without something passing between us.
Abby has always had the kind of body that I find attractive, mostly because it’s hers.
Time hasn’t changed that fact one bit. The curve of her hips, thighs I could sink my teeth into, her perfect breasts and those perfect nipples…
“Fuck,” I groan and stroke myself, hoping to ease the craving my body has for hers.
I lean my head back, the water soaking my hair and splashing onto my face. I’m cooked if I think I can go another six days without doing that again. The noises she made, the way she unraveled at my touch. My god, what I wouldn’t give to march back over to her room and beg her to let me do it again.
I slow my movements, pumping my hand over the full length of my cock, all the way to the tip, where I squeeze the head and let out a groan, turning to face the stream of water before I stroke my hand back down to the base.
I lean a hand against the back of the shower wall, letting the water pelt me, the bathroom steaming up as I think about repeating the last half-hour.
Putting my mouth all over her gorgeous body, the sound of my name on her lips in ecstasy.
I move my hand faster, working myself to the end.
It won’t take much. I can still feel the way she tightened around my fingers, dug her nails into my shoulder as she came.
And as I’m thinking about her climax, my own happens—an animalistic grunt paired with an intense, blinding release that leaves me shaking, my chest heaving.
I lean my forehead against the wall of the shower, the stream of water still pelting my back, and try to cool down for a second.
I haven’t finished that fast or hard in a long time.
This is what Abby does to me, though. It was always like this with her in college, whether we were together or I was flying solo—the intensity of my physical relationship with her is woven in with my feelings for her, which may not be as strong as they used to be, but I can’t deny my regenerating interest in her.
Abby isn’t just sexy and fun; she’s patient and more forgiving than I deserve.
That she gave me the time of day at all to apologize to her, much less accepted my apology and has since hung out with me by choice twice, says way more about her capacity for forgiveness and letting go than it does about how interesting or charming I am.
She’s all the things she was over a decade ago when we dated, and I know there’s so much I missed. I want to know her again, find out all the things I missed and learn who she is now.
Last night, I believed there was no way she would even want to spend time with me—not as friends and definitely not as anything else—but tonight I’m rethinking all of that.
It’s all I think about as I towel off, don my boxer-briefs, and climb into bed. My mind spins with the possibilities.
Is she interested in me?
Or was she just horny?
Was it just a one-time thing?
I can’t be at the same resort as her for the next five days and not touch her again. I think it would kill me. I feel like I’m coming out of my skin already. I drum my fingers against my chest, needing to move some of this energy out of my body.
What if she seeks me out tomorrow to tell me it was mistake and that she regrets it?
Abby knows how strongly I feel about consent, and she had multiple opportunities to say no to me. She has said no to me in the past, when she wasn’t feeling well. She knows it’s safe to say no.
And she didn’t.
But that doesn’t mean she doesn’t regret it after the fact.
But she kissed me. Twice. In the hot tub, it was Abby who leaned into me for the kiss, and when I stood at her door baring my soul, it was Abby who came to me.
She wanted this. Even just one time, she wanted me.
And it shouldn’t, but it gives me the kind of hope that would motivate me to go to war.
What if she wants to spend more time with me?
What if she wants to hook up again?
My chest aches with wanting and my heart beats a little faster, a little harder.
I prop my hands behind my head, and then move them back to my chest. I turn on my side, fluffing the pillow, but it’s not comfortable enough and I switch to the other side, making so many micro-adjustments that eventually I punch the pillow and chuck it across the room.
Fuck it. I need to go on a run. I can’t keep sitting here with my thoughts whirling like a fucking prize wheel.
I want to bang on Abby’s door and beg her to put me out of my misery. Does she want me? Does she regret this? Does she feel as desperate to be near me as I do her?
I’m not going to wake her up for my mental chaos. A run will make me feel better; it always does.
Shoes tied, headlamp on, I take to the beach for a late-night run.
Normally, I work a run in at the end of my day, but I stayed late at the house today and gave the painters a hand so we could finish painting the upstairs.
By the time I got back to the resort, I was wiped.
I didn’t need to go on a run, and frankly all I wanted was to have a beer and soak in the hot tub.
I got more than I bargained for, and after an evening with Abby, I’ve got a second wind and more energy than I know what to do with.
I stay on firmer sand to protect my knee, but as I ease into the run, the steady rhythm of my feet hitting the sand becomes meditative, and once my heart rate is up, all those excess thoughts finally have somewhere to go.
I sweat them out. I breathe them out. I force them out through the movement of my body.
A half-hour is all I need before I feel steady again. I can think clearly about Abby and how to move around her.
The version of me Abby knew back in college was closed off. I hated having difficult conversations, because I had no capacity for them. I was consumed by the emotional toll my recently broken family had taken on me.
But I’m not that guy anymore, and I want her to see that. Maybe if she sees that I’m different than I was when we dated in college, she’ll want to spend time with me. She wanted something tonight, I have no doubt about that, and I wanted it too.
But I don’t want it to end here. I don’t just want chance conversations at beach parties or run-ins at the hot tub. I want quality, intentional time with her. Half her time here is already gone, and I don’t want to waste another second of it.
I’m not the kind of man who wants something and lets it float by. I have always found a way to get what I want. And I want Abby. If all I get is five more days at the White Sands Resort with her, then by god, I am going to make it fucking count.
“How did it go at the investor meeting?”
My brother texted me seconds ago, letting me know his Saturday morning meeting was done and asking if I could call.
I was on another run, since my workout didn’t feel like enough this morning.
Destiny wasn’t there to push me, and while I’ve tried to relax all day, sit by the pool, soak up some sun, have a few beers, my mind wouldn’t let me.
Eventually, I gave in and laced up for another beach run.
I haven’t seen Abby yet, which means we haven’t talked today, and it’s got me all kinds of messed up.
It’s hot as fuck out—the afternoon sun in Mexico is no joke—and I can feel my back burning from where I’ve sweat off all my sunscreen, but it’s good. It feels like it’s burning away all my excess energy.
“Well, hello to you too,” Gray says. He’s trying to be upbeat, but I can hear the strain in his voice. If he notices my heavy breathing, he doesn’t say anything. I pause, leaning over to clutch my knees and catch my breath.
“So?”
He sighs.
Fuck.
“It was the same as the last two,” he says, all the optimism gone now.
“Fuck, Gray, I’m so sorry.”
After the first rejection, Gray assumed that the design of the app was too simple and didn’t fully embody the functionality of the app, so he hired a different developer to help him overhaul things. The second time around, he felt way more confident, yet was shot down once again.
I thought he’d quit after that. He was down bad after that rejection, but I convinced him to keep going. And since I’m his sole investor, he has to listen to me.
He did. He took my third infusion of cash and made the app even better. He did more research on the investors. Chose people who have invested in other travel apps before. Both of us thought the third time would be the charm.
“I don’t know what to do, Miles. You’ve spent so much money on—”
“Don’t worry about the money. I can always make more money,” I insist.
“But watching me fail like this…”