Chapter 7
CHAPTER
SEVEN
TESSA
My head is banging. My mouth feels like it’s an arid desert, and my stomach isn’t feeling much better. I grab the smartwatch that’s charging next to my bed and check the time.
It’s three am. I groan. Mostly because I’m not going to get back to sleep without going to the bathroom.
And going to the bathroom means walking past Linc on the sofa bed.
This is why it’s so much better to be a man in the middle of the night. If he was in this situation he’d almost certainly walk out of the double doors at the far end of the bedroom and pee off the deck.
He’d probably make friends with the damn birds while he did it. For a minute, I picture him as a peeing, male Snow White, singing “With A Smile and A Song”.
Everything starts to spin as I roll over and plant my feet firmly on the floor. I’m too old for hangovers like this. I thought I’d gotten over drinking too much while still in college, but no, apparently I now have a thing for Bahama Mamas.
When I reach the door to the bedroom I hear a noise.
A groan.
It’s deep and low and it makes me freeze. Is that Linc? What’s he doing?
Oh god, he’s not…
He groans again. It’s louder this time. My face heats up and I’m completely torn between walking to the bathroom and running back to bed. I stand at the door for a minute, wondering how long that kind of thing takes him.
Does he take his time? He’s the kind of man who savors life. I don’t think he’d hurry anything. He’d wrap his hand around his big shaft – because let’s face it, I know he’d be big – and slowly and surely tug until he reached the edge.
Why am I thinking about Linc Salinger’s masturbation style?
And then the world twists again as he lets out a scream.
It’s like an ice cold bucket of water over my head. What the hell?
There’s whimpering coming from the other side of the door, and I know this isn’t him touching himself. He’s having a nightmare.
My heart is hammering against my chest as I pull at the door handle, softly enough not to make a noise. I thank the god of oiled hinges as it opens without a creak, then pad into the living area.
Linc is thrashing about on the bed. The sheet he pulled over himself earlier has worked its way down to his ankles, kind of binding them up so he can’t get loose. He’s wearing a pair of shorts and nothing else. And he’s still groaning.
I pad over softly, trying to remember what we used to do with Zoe when she was little and had night terrors. All I can remember was that I wasn’t supposed to wake her.
“Please! ”
My heart almost breaks from his plea. It’s so plaintiff it hits me right in the chest. I drop to my knees next to him. I touch his brow. It’s clammy. His whole body is shining with sweat.
“It’s okay,” I whisper. “Go back to sleep.”
He whimpers as I stroke his hair. Then his hand reaches out toward me and I don’t know what to do.
So I take it. Squeeze it. And somehow that calms him.
“It’s just a bad dream,” I whisper, hoping that somehow my words are making it through to his unconsciousness. “It’s okay. You’re okay.”
His hand grips mine so tightly it hurts. But I don’t try to pull away. He starts to calm, but as he tries to roll over his legs get stuck in the sheets again. So with my free hand, I have to stretch hard to loosen them and my spine does a little crack.
Because he won’t let go of my hand.
Once it’s loose enough to pull away from his ankles, he calms down even more. Once he lets go of me, I’ll cover him up again. Not that it will help much. This sofa clearly isn’t made for a man his size. He dwarves it.
No wonder he got all caught up in the sheets.
I immediately feel bad, because I’m small enough to fit on the sofa without a problem. Sure, it wouldn’t be the most comfortable night’s sleep, but it would be better than the one Linc is having.
He turns onto his side, one leg on the sofa, kind of folded up, the other slung out toward me.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers. And for a moment I think he’s woken up. Startled, my eyes scan his face, but his own are still tightly closed.
“It’s okay,” I tell him again. I reach out to cup his jaw. The roughness of his beard growth tickles my palm. He leans into my touch, his breath warm against my skin.
“Go back to sleep,” I say. “It’s okay.”
It takes another ten minutes before he’s asleep deeply enough for me to untangle our fingers and stand up. There’s a crick in my neck, and my legs feel achy after crouching beside him for so long, but by some kind of miracle the hangover is gone.
I take the sheet and smooth it out over him, leaving it loose so he doesn’t get caught up, before I hurry to the bathroom, because things are getting desperate now.
He’s snoring softly when I come out, and I start to relax. I fill two glasses of water, leaving one on the table next to him before I take a long sip from the other. A wave of exhaustion washes over me, because it’s a stupidly early hour of the morning.
“I’m just going to bed,” I whisper, even though he can’t hear me. And then I walk back to the bedroom, taking one last glance back at him.
He’s still fast asleep. Looking calm, like the last twenty minutes never happened.
It doesn’t stop me from wondering about his nightmare, as I walk through the bedroom and put my glass by the bed. What was his dream about? Does he have nightmares often?
Or was it just induced by too many cocktails followed by having to fold his body on the too-small sofa.
As I climb under the covers and relax into the pillow, I find myself thinking about how strong his grip was. How his chest rose and fell rapidly as he screamed out.
In the day time he’s strong. Laid back. Attractive as hell if you’re into that kind of thing.
But right now he seemed like somebody completely different. Somebody vulnerable. And I hate that it makes me like him more. There’s a chink the sexy Salinger armor. But instead of making him weaker, it just makes him more interesting.
Linc doesn’t mention last night at all as we eat breakfast the next morning. William brought a continental selection down to the cottage, and we sit out on the deck at the little table with a view through the trees to the ocean, sipping on coffee and watching as the waves crash into the shore.
Reaching behind him, he uses his fingers to rub at what I assume is a knot in his shoulders.
“How was the sofa bed?” I finally ask him, desperate to see if he can remember his dream.
“Fine, I think.” He shrugs. “Apart from it being too little and me being too big.”
“You could still have the bed,” I say, shrugging. “I’m little and that’s too big.”
“No thanks, Goldilocks,” he says wryly. “I kind of like waking up and feeling like an old man.”
I rip off a piece of pastry and put it into my mouth. Okay then, neither of us are talking about last night. Which is fine, because I’m not nosy at all.
Okay, only a little bit.
“Do you want to go over the itinerary for the next few days?” I ask him.
He shrugs. “Sure. What’s up first?”
“Today we’re exploring the hotel,” I tell him. “I’ve written down the videos I want to take.”
He picks up the piece of paper I’ve scrawled all over, lifting a brow as he reads it. “Why have you written the clothes I should be wearing on here?”
“Because when I take videos of you in the business suite I need you in a suit,” I tell him. “And when you’re in the gym you’ll need workout clothes. I thought you could bring them all up to the main hotel and that’ll save you having to come back here and change between shots.”
He narrows his eyes at me. “I thought you were just going to give an outline of the kind of videos we’re planning to produce. ”
“If we’re here, I’m pretty sure Gold will expect to see mock ups.” I shrug.
“So why can’t you be the one wearing business clothing?” he asks. “Surely we want to be equal opportunity here.”
“Because I’m taking the footage,” I say. “And I thought we’d already established that you’re our target audience.”
His eyes catch mine as he tops up his coffee. “I am. And I want to see women in the business suite.”
I roll my own eyes at him. “Just put on a sexy suit and shut up, Salinger.”
He shakes his head. “Since you ask me so nicely, I will.”
We spend the first part of the morning taking shots of the exterior of the resort, working our way from the beach, past the cottages, to the main hotel building itself. The white walls reflect the golden light of the sun, and I have to try a few different angles to get the right exposure.
“You’re good at this,” Linc murmurs as I play back some of the video I’ve made. “But why are you using your phone?” He glances over at the digital recorder I’ve set up on a tripod. “Surely that will have better results.”
“I want to make it look authentic.” I shrug. “The kind of video an influencer would make. Portrait style, a little jolty.”
The corner of his lip curls up. “I guess you’re the expert.”
It almost sounds like a compliment.
We spend an hour in the business suite, having to stop regularly as people come in to use the video conferencing office in the corner, or to print out documents with the huge machine that makes way too much noise.
When everybody finally leaves I walk over to Linc. “Lose the jacket,” I tell him. He does as he’s told and then I loosen his tie. He looks at me, those thick lashes sweeping down as I smooth out the creases on his shirt.
“I thought you wanted me to look business like,” he murmurs .
“I want you to look relaxed. Like you can make millions while on vacation.”
He starts to laugh. “You’ve got it all worked out, haven’t you?”
Yes, I have. Gina and I worked on our plans for the last two weeks. Having to refocus the pitch to include location filming was a curveball, but I need to go with it. “Sit in that chair,” I tell him, pointing at a leather swivel chair in front of a desktop computer. “Pick up your phone and look like you’re having a great time talking to somebody on the other end.”
To my shock, he does as I ask him. I lift my phone up and look at him through the screen. He really is very attractive.
I let out a long breath.
“Can you run your hand through your hair?” I ask him.
He tips his head to the side. “Seriously?”
“Yes please.”
“You want me to put the phone down?” He holds it up.
“No, keep pretending to talk. Use the other hand to touch your hair. Think sexy businessman.”
“I’m starting to feel objectified,” he murmurs.
Oh god, that’s not what I was aiming for. “We can stop.”
He starts to laugh. “I’m toying with you, Carmichael. If you can take the heat of me being a sexy businessman, then let’s do it.”
An hour later we make it to the gym. This time he insisted that we both change into workout gear. I pointed out I didn’t have any, so he marched me over to the boutique in the hotel lobby and made me try on a pair of calf length leggings and a crop top. I feel horrendously exposed in them as we walk into the – thankfully empty – gym.
“You go first,” I tell him, pointing at the treadmill.
“How fast do you want me to run?” he asks.
Truth be told, I have no idea. I think I might be allergic to gyms. I certainly haven’t stepped foot inside of one in years. I do a yoga class at our local YMCA on the Saturday mornings when Zoe isn’t home, but apart from that most of my energy goes into renovations.
“How about ten?” I say, sounding uncertain., because I have no idea what a good speed is.
He starts to laugh. And then he gets on the treadmill and presses the start button. Before long, his legs are a blur as he runs faster than I can focus on him.
And the man is barely breaking a sweat.
“Can you run faster?” I ask him.
“Fuck off, Carmichael.”
I start to laugh, which makes the shot go completely shaky.
“Okay, your turn,” he says when I finally tell him he can stop.
“Oh no.” I shake my head. “I’ll just stand here and look pretty.”
He takes the phone from me and marches me over to the treadmill. “Get on.”
“I can’t run,” I tell him honestly.
“Of course you can run. Everybody can run.”
I lift an eyebrow at him as I hit the start button.
Within a minute tears are rolling down his face as I attempt to keep a seven mile an hour pace. My lungs feel like they’re about to explode, my whole body drenched in sweat.
“Did you get it?” I puff out, my throat burning.
“Get what?” Linc asks.
“The shot?”
“Oh. I forgot to tell you, the screen locked.” He holds up the phone to show me the black screen. “Let’s try again.”
“Let’s not.” I hit the stop button on the treadmill, but I don’t expect it to stop so quickly. I nearly end up face down on the belt.
And he still can’t stop laughing .
“I’ll get you back for this,” I tell him, grabbing a towel to mop my sweat ridden face.
“Sure you will.” He grins and passes me back the phone, before grabbing a bottle of water from the refrigerator and throwing it to me. “Drink, Carmichael. Before we end up taking shots of the Grand Exuma Hospital.”
“There’s no Grand Exuma Hospital,” I tell him. “There’s a mini healthcare place and after that you have to go off-island.”
His eyes catch mine again. “Of course you’d know that.”
“I like to research a location thoroughly before I make a pitch,” I say, defensively.
Linc lifts a brow. “I’m beginning to notice.”