16. Jude
JUDE
Knocking on Woody’s workshop door, I pause, making sure he’s not inside before I enter.
Everything is too still and quiet without him inside. I inhale the scent of salty driftwood that’s heavy in the air.
I wander around with my arms folded, not wanting to touch anything, figuring that if I only snoop with my eyes, then it doesn’t really count as breaching his trust. I haven’t seen him since yesterday when I followed him to the beach showers.
I knew something was different about him the night he went down on me, but I didn’t know what.
Yesterday, it came to me.
He had blue eyes. He held mine the entire time he had his head between my thighs, so I know I wasn’t imagining it.
At the showers, they were brown.
He lied to me about it, and I intend to find out why.
He said he wants us to be nothing to each other, a fact I was fine with before. But I’ve been lied to too much recently. I’m not sitting by and being made to feel like a fool again.
I have to know.
I tilt my head, reading a piece of paper sitting on top of a small stack. It’s an order form. Thirty thousand rand for a glass and driftwood coffee table. That’s over fifteen hundred dollars. His finished pieces must be good if he can charge so much.
Beside the pile of invoices is a diary, open on a double-paged calendar for the month. I squint at his writing. It’s not messy, but there’s so much of it. Order after order written down, details about commissioned pieces—some large, some small.
When the hell does he sleep?
And where does he sleep?
I still haven’t figured out where he goes each night once the lights in our camp go out.
Even Emmy, the yoga instructor, who’s known him for a couple of years didn’t know.
She started looking at me funny this morning when I was asking questions about him, so I had to quit.
If they’re friends, then I don’t want to risk her telling him I’ve been asking after him.
Although I’m not sure I can see the grumpy cowboy having many friends besides Declan.
A small case on a shelf catches my eye, and I break my no touching rule in my excitement as I swoop on it.
“Knew it,” I murmur, unscrewing the small contact lenses case and finding it empty. “But which is the real you? Blue or brown?”
The door closes, and I jump, dropping the case to the floor where it scatters, coming to rest at a pair of leather sandaled feet with bright pink toenails.
“Here you go, bokkie.”
I stare at the elderly lady as she bends to pick up the case, pressing a handkerchief to her mouth and letting out a wheezy cough before she holds out the case to me.
“Thank you.” I take it, quickly putting it back where I found it. “Um, if you’re looking for Woody, I’m not sure where he is.”
The lady stuffs her handkerchief into the pocket of her housekeeping uniform and waves a hand in the air.
“He’ll be around. Probably better he isn’t here, anyway, he’ll only try arguing with me, stubborn boy.” She chuckles.
She shuffles over to the workbench, scanning the surface like she’s looking for something.
“This’ll do.” She picks up something, before turning back to me. “If you see that boy before I do, you tell him Nandi’s not happy with him. He needs this just as much as I do.”
She shakes her head with a smile and pulls a wad of cash out of her pocket, placing it on the workbench.
“He thinks because I’m old, I won’t know what he’s up to. But you don’t get to my age without recognizing a trick or two. Not a bad bone in his body, despite what he might think about himself,” she mumbles.
She places a tool on top of the cash to weigh it down, and my cheeks heat. It’s the chisel Woody used to destroy my panties.
“What’s your name, bokkie?” she asks, turning to me with kind, curious eyes.
“Jude,” I offer. “It’s nice to meet you. I’m staying here on the retreat.”
“Hm.” She looks me up and down. “And you’re friends with Woody?”
“Um.” I tilt my head, not wanting to lie to her, but Nandi’s already shuffling toward the bungalow door.
She stops when she gets there and turns to me.
“Word of advice from an old woman? The color of a man’s eyes doesn’t matter. It’s the color of his soul. And that boy’s? His is golden.”
Her face creases with a warm smile, then she’s gone.
I glance around the workshop again, my eyes landing on the pile of money she just left. Guilt claws at me.
He may not want to tell me anything about himself. But he can’t stop me from talking. And maybe his reaction is all I’ll need to sort the truth from the lies.
It’s after dinner by the time I see him again, walking up one of the paths that leads from where his workshop is. Maybe he’s been there all day, working on his long list of orders. But whatever he’s been up to, I swear he’s avoiding me.
“Back in a minute,” I whisper to Mel.
She looks up from the firepit where we’re sitting chatting with Declan, the two British girls, and the married couple. The husband has taken his time, but he’s finally starting to ease into the routine here, and his wife hasn’t stopped smiling since seeing him slowly relax.
“Okay.” She gives me a knowing smile as she spots Woody in the distance. “Have fun.”
He sees me approaching but doesn’t slow down. I have to jog to catch up with him as he strides along the path that leads to the beach.
“Nandi was looking for you earlier,” I say, falling into step alongside him.
“I know.”
“She’s nice,” I add.
“You going to try and make small talk with me, New York City? Or are you going to tell me the real reason you came chasing after me?”
“Ugh, please.” I scoff. “I’m not chasing you anywhere.”
His eyes slide to mine as we step out onto the beach. I could return to the group to prove a point. But then I wouldn’t get any answers.
He walks over to where the snorkeling equipment is hanging and grabs a dry T-shirt that’s hanging up on a makeshift laundry line.
“Who are you?” I say to his back.
The muscles in his shoulders ripple beneath the fabric of the light blue T-shirt he has on, which is covered in patches of fine sawdust.
“I’m no one.”
“So you’re a ghost?”
He pauses for a second before tossing the clean T-shirt down onto a sun lounger beside him.
“Maybe if you’re lucky, you’ll see me disappear through a wall next,” he mutters, annoyed.
“You’re a jackass,” I huff, folding my arms.
“Yeah?” He glances at me over his shoulder.
“Yeah.” I widen my eyes at him, driving home my words.
“You won’t be climbing into my lap wanting to fuck me again then, will you?”
“You’re deflecting,” I fire back, suspecting he’d try this tactic.
But I was prepared for this. And I’ll push him as hard as necessary to get what I need.
I glare at his broad shoulders.
“You’re still here?” He arches a dark brow at me before tearing the T-shirt off over his head and tossing it on the lounger and swiping up the clean one.
I wait, hoping I’ll see his chest. And the asshole must secretly be unable to resist the stroke to his ego of getting eye-fucked by me, because he turns, giving me a full-frontal chest view, taking his time feeding his arms into the sleeves of his T-shirt.
I zero in on his left pec and the tattoo there. It looks like extra detailing was added to disguise what was originally there. But what I’m searching for isn’t gone, merely camouflaged, like he couldn’t bring himself to cover it up.
The letter B.
Stepping closer, I lift my eyes to his as he pulls the clean T-shirt over his head and yanks it down.
“Went for brown again today, huh?”
His eyes narrow, and he pins me under a dark glare. But I match it, staring back with as much menace.
“Shame. I like the blue. It suits you.”
“What do you want, New York City?” he snipes, leaning closer.
Excitement bubbles in my gut. He’s pissed. It means I’m getting somewhere. I’m right about the contact lenses. And I’d bet anything from his reaction the blue is his real color.
Just like the photo inside Mel’s magazine.
“You call me that like it’s an insult. But I love New York,” I say with mock sweetness.
His jaw tenses like he’s grinding his teeth.
“How did you know that guy was from there?” I ask, feigning innocence so I don’t give my reasons for asking away too early.
“What guy?”
I stare into his brown eyes, searching for a visible edge of a lens as evidence, even though I know I’m right.
“The one you look like.”
He tries to appear clueless, but I catch a flash of something in his eyes before he blinks it away.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” he grits out.
“Yesterday, at the showers, I told you I’d read an article about a billionaire called Sullivan Beaufort. You look like him. A rougher, less groomed version,” I add with a condescending smile. “And if you had blue eyes, of course.”
His nostrils flare.
“You said you didn’t know who he was. But then you asked if I wanted to fuck or talk about some guy from New York. Only, I never said where he was from. So you lied. You know who he is.”
He puffs out a low breath with an unamused laugh. “So what? You think I’m some secret billionaire from New York who just happens to be here? This isn’t an undercover boss TV show, or some shit like that. Sorry to disappoint you.”
He turns and strides across the sand.
“Why do you have their family crest tattooed on your chest?” I call, my words hitting his back.
He freezes.
“I Googled the Beauforts. Read all about them,” I add, swallowing down the sudden burst of nerves that are lumping together and threatening to clog my throat.
I wanted to confront him. In my head, it sounded plausible. But now that I’m saying it out loud, I sound like a wild conspiracy theorist. There’s no way it’s true. He bears a resemblance, that’s all. Plenty of people look like other people. Professional lookalikes have entire careers built on it.
He inclines his head over his shoulder, giving me a look that could freeze hell. “You want a fucking award for sticking your nose into other people’s business or something?”