Chapter 7
LINDSAY
The mattress I lay on was firm, the sheets were as soft as silk, and the comforter was quite fluffy. I’d only switched on the air conditioning minutes ago when I entered, but I had an idea of why the bedding was so plush despite the heat outside.
“He moved in with you?” Ember laughed.
I lifted the phone away from my ear until the cackling stopped. “Are you done? It’s not funny.”
“You’re right. It’s not funny. It’s hilarious.”
I rolled over on the bed and watched the waves lapping at the shore while listening to my best friend’s attempts at making light of the situation.
“What’s not funny about it? A smoking-hot guy gets you a suite at one of the nicest hotels in Fiji, pretends to be your husband, and then decides to shack up with you? It’s the stuff movies are made of.”
“Horror movies maybe,” I said. “His name is Jaxon. If anyone finds my body carved up like pieces on a sushi buffet, point the authorities in his direction.”
“Did you get a funny vibe off him?”
“Did any of Jeffry Dahmer’s victim’s get a funny vibe off him until it was too late?”
I could practically hear her eyes rolling all the way from home.
“Don’t assume the worst in him. This could be the best thing that could’ve happened to you.
You were worried about being alone and having people pity you.
Now you won’t be and they’ll be envious if he’s as good looking as you say he is.
You didn’t happen to snap a picture, did you? ”
“No.” I sat up and stared at the door, trying to develop X-ray vision.
Not because he’d been well on his way to getting naked when I’d left, but because I wanted to see what he was unpacking from that massive black duffel bag of his.
“Maybe I should try to later, though. It might help when you have to send the cops after him.”
“I’m pretty sure that hotel has cameras everywhere. They’ll be sure to have a good shot of his face. I don’t want a picture so they can track him. I want to see what your new roomie looks like.”
“He’s not my roomie.” Theoretically, he was my bungalowie, but he wasn’t stepping a single foot in my room. “I didn’t come here to deal with the what-ifs of a guy I don’t even know, Em. I came to relax and enjoy my me-moon.”
“Maybe your me is in for a new moon,” she joked, and I scoffed at her.
“That doesn’t even make any sense.”
“It makes sense to me,” she sang. “Go out there and get to know this Jaxon. He sounds like quite a character.”
“He could be a serial killer for all we know. Aren’t they known to be charming and good looking?”
“I’m going to the beach if you want to join me,” he called from the other side of the door.
I froze, mortified while trying to figure out if he could’ve been listening in on my conversation.
“I’m not going to find any opportune victims for my serial killing,” he said. “I’m just going for a light swim.”
Blood rushed to my cheeks when I realized he’d probably heard every word.
Ember cracked up over the phone, obviously having heard him too. “Dude, he has a sense of humor. You have to go to the beach with him.”
I groaned into my pillow, thrashing about on my bed and wondering how exactly I was supposed to get over this latest embarrassment. She wouldn’t let me stew, though.
“Can you see the beach from your window? Has he left?”
“I think so.” My voice was muffled by the pillow I still held over my face, but then I got genuinely curious about whether I would be able to see him.
Slowly dropping the pillow to the side, I got off the bed and moved stealthily, as if he had that X-ray vision I’d tried to develop and would be watching my every move. “Hang on. I’m going to the window. I’ll tell you in a second.”
“Why are you whispering?” She kept her own voice low, though I could hear the laughter threatening to break free.
“Because he was listening to us a minute ago,” I hissed. “He might still be there.”
“Nothing you say now will be as humiliating as what he’s already heard.” She giggled. “Hurry your ass up and check if you can see him. Then describe what you see in fine, fine detail.”
“I’m not about to check him out and report back to you, you perve. The only reason I even agreed to let him stay is because without him, we’d both have been without a room for the night. Possibly even the week.”
“You say potato. I say potahto.” There was a definite shrug present in her voice. “I know you’re not planning on having hot rebound sex with him, but would it hurt to get to know the guy and spend some time with him this week? You’re fake married to him, remember?”
“Don’t remind me. I’m already regretting playing along with his charade.
” I wasn’t really, though. The sound of the waves against the sand and the magnificent view of the ocean from my bedroom window were enough to convince me that he’d done us both a favor.
“I know I have to try and make the best of this whole situation. I just don’t know how. ”
Guys like Will were the only ones I’d ever been friends with. They played video games for fun, argued about philosophy over Pinot Noir on nights out, and still thought of the gym as the place where the jocks who beat them up at school hung out.
They were my kind of people. Hence why I was only friends with people like them.
Ember was an exception. She was the epitome of the bad-ass girl with all her tattoos and piercings, devil-may-care attitude, and lack of faith in humanity. The gym was her hunting ground and the men who thought they were the predators, her prey.
We hit it off because we were opposites. She was the yin to my yang, and it worked that way. I didn’t need another yang. No one needed two yangs to their yin.
She exhaled into the receiver. “You don’t need to know how, my dearest friend. He invited you to the beach, so you go. Didn’t you say he completely took charge in the lobby?”
“I did say that.” Much to my chagrin right then.
“Then let him take charge,” she said like it was obvious. “If you end up having cocktails on the beach with him instead of alone, who cares? You sure as hell shouldn’t.”
“I’m not exactly the kind of girl who lets a guy take charge.” I very much preferred to be in control of my own life. “Who even does that anymore? You know women are allowed to vote now, right?”
She made a gagging noise. “Spare me the feminist speech. There’s a big difference between letting him befriend you and show you a good time, and him dominating every aspect of your life while expecting you to have dinner cooked and on the table at seven.”
“Point taken.” I scrunched up my nose as I walked to the window. “That wasn’t really what I meant anyway. I just… I feel so lost.”
“I get that, babe.” Her voice turned gentle. “It’s completely understandable. Your world turned upside down a few days ago. Will tossed your precious planner out the window and now it’s time to make new plans. All I’m suggesting is rolling with what fate has pushed into your path.”
“So what am I supposed to do?” I pushed my face almost all the way up to the glass, craning my neck to be able to see the beach in front of our bungalow.
Jaxon was standing up to his knees in the water, his wide back muscular and all inked up. I was too far away to make out any details of the artwork covering his skin, but it was etched from hip to hip, extending all the way up to and across his shoulder blades.
There were splotches of ink on his upper arms too, which I’d missed before when I’d barely caught a glimpse of his bare skin before retreating into my room. He did a half turn when a wave rolled at him, displaying more color on his chest as well.
None of it would show when he was wearing clothes, but it’d obviously been well positioned. Almost every inch of skin that would be hidden beneath a shirt was tattooed.
Although the lines beside his eyes and on his forehead made him appear older than I was, it was obvious he kept his body in great shape. Distance again hampered the details, but the V between his hips and the definition of his shoulders, arms, and torso would’ve been visible from outer space.
A wave smacked into his back, and he turned a second later and dragged both hands through his hair to slick it back. He grinned when he turned back, like he was having the time of his life and was just soaking it in.
That grin made me feel slightly jealous of him. He seemed to have everything in life perfectly under control, content with every fucking thing that happened to him. Like he knew the universe would cater to his every whim and he simply trusted it to do so.
My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. What would it be like to live like him?
“What do you do?” Ember repeated my question through the phone. “You be yourself and you—” She stopped talking, sighed, and changed direction. “Actually, you don’t be yourself. You be someone else. Just for this week. You live someone else’s life and you see where it takes you.”
“That sounds like a horrible idea,” I said, but I nodded my agreement with her plan anyway. “I’ll let you know how it goes.”
“You do that.”
We ended the call shortly after that, and I thought about what she’d said. Jaxon didn’t know me and neither did anyone else on this island.
If there was ever a time to cut loose and just go with it, this was it. My one and only opportunity.
Ember was right about the resort having cameras. If I suddenly disappeared, they would know to start with him. He hadn’t been wearing a cap or anything, so he should be easy to identify.
Besides, going out to the beach with him seemed like a minuscule thing in comparison to agreeing to share a room. Since I didn’t have a suitcase or any other clothes than what I was wearing, I went to splash some water on my face before making my way out to the beach.
Jaxon broke into a huge grin as I padded onto the soft, warm sand. “Come hang out with me, roomie. It’ll be fun.”
I ground my teeth but sat down at the edge of the water, praying that this time I was actually making the right decision.