Chapter 8
JAXON
Lindsay had obviously washed the tears off her face, and she looked even fiercer than she had before. Her eyes tracked my every movement, the blue in them reflecting the darker parts of the horizon she was pretending to stare off into.
Even though she’d agreed to sit with me, it seemed she was averse to making eye contact. She sat in the sand just beyond where the water could reach her but stretched out her legs so the surf touched her toes when it came in.
She was skittish, but I couldn’t blame her. She was obviously still pissed I was sharing her room with her, and she didn’t quite know what to make of me.
Can’t fault her for that either. “Do you really think I’m a serial killer?”
Breaking the ice felt like the right thing to do. I couldn’t really make conversation with the girl if she was convinced I was going to gut her.
She brought her gaze to mine as she folded her arms around her knees. “Are you?”
“No.” A wave crashed into the backs of my knees, but I took a step forward to avoid toppling onto my face just in time. “I’m here for the same reason you are.”
“You got stood up on your wedding day and decided to go on your honeymoon anyway?”
I chuckled. “Maybe not the exact same reason. I’m assuming you wanted to get away from it all. So did I.”
She shrugged. “Everything had already been paid for. It seemed like a waste to not make use of it. I don’t know. Coming here was a spur of the moment decision.”
“You don’t make a lot of those, do you?” It didn’t take a genius to see that she was uncomfortable, and it wasn’t just because I was rooming with her.
She dipped her head in acknowledgment. “I prefer plans as opposed to spontaneity.”
“You can’t plan for everything.” I smirked and pointed a thumb at my chest. “There’s no way you could’ve planned for meeting me, for example.”
“That’s because you might be a psycho. Who goes around hotel lobbies eavesdropping on private conversations and then inserting themselves into that person’s life?”
“Me. I didn’t plan it either, if that makes you feel any better. I just walked in there hoping to get a room, and I ended up standing near the chair you were sitting on. When I heard what you said, I thought maybe we could solve both our problems.”
“How much did you hear?” She planted her hands in the sand behind her and leaned back on her palms.
“Enough.” I walked forward a few steps and saw her gaze trailing down the length of my body before she snapped it back up. She was doing a lot of that—checking me out before she caught herself doing it.
I didn’t mind. I just didn’t know why she felt like she had to stop. I was doing the same thing to her, minus the stopping part.
She tilted her head and lifted a hand to shield her eyes from the sun. “What do you do for a living if you’re not a serial killer?”
“I think even they have day jobs,” I joked. “I’m a pilot. My hobbies do not include homicide, mayhem, or any of the other colorful thoughts you’ve had.”
“What are your hobbies?” she asked.
I shook my head. “You first. What do you do for a living?”
“I’m in Human Resources.” There was a hint of pride in her voice. “Senior consultant.”
I trailed my gaze across her face again. “Senior, huh? You don’t look like you should be a senior anything.”
“I worked hard.” She jutted her chin out. “Youngest in the department to ever get promoted to senior status.”
“How old are you?”
She shook her head and motioned to me. “Your turn.”
“What do you want to know?” I walked the rest of the way out of the water and went to sit next to her.
As much as I enjoyed looking at Lindsay, the way she kept looking at me was getting my blood flowing, and in my wet shorts, there would be no hiding it. The last thing I needed was her thinking that I was going to try to get into her pants.
I very much would’ve liked to get into her pants, but I doubted she would be interested. Despite her thinking I was hot and her undressing me with her eyes, she hardly seemed to be the type to fuck what had happened out of her system.
“My hobbies?” I focused on the question she’d asked me instead of letting my brain wander to speculating over how I might be able to help her if she was interested in fucking it out of her system. “Working on old planes, hiking, scuba diving. A bunch of stuff really. A lot of physical activity.”
She slanted her gaze at me, once again running it over my body even though I was now seated. “Well, at least that’s one thing about you that adds up.”
“Everything about me adds up,” I said. “I haven’t lied once since I met you.”
“You haven’t?” She lifted her brows. “Did you and I get married in some ceremony I don’t remember then?”
“I haven’t lied to you.” I propped my elbows on my knees and admired the view while we talked. Whoever thought the ocean was just the ocean no matter where you went clearly hadn’t been here before. “Don’t pretend like you minded me lying to that manager. It got us the room, didn’t it?”
“Are you ever going to let me forget that?”
“Nope.” I grinned. “It’s true. Now answer the question. You didn’t mind me lying to him about us. I saw you laughing. There’s no point trying to deny it.”
“I was laughing because what you were threatening to do was ridiculous.” She rolled her eyes when I glanced at her. “I still can’t believe he thought you were being serious.”
“Hey, if this was our honeymoon and they didn’t have a room for us, I would’ve done exactly what I threatened him with. In that context, I was being serious. If I thought you’d have been willing to take the act that far, I’d have done it anyway if he’d refused us a room.”
“There’s no way you’d have gotten intimate with that many people around.”
I laughed. “Who said anything about getting intimate? I was talking about fucking. And yes, I would have done it with that many people around. I don’t know them.”
“Maybe not, but they would’ve gotten to know you pretty damn well during the ensuing criminal trial.”
“Do you really think any cop would’ve arrested me for simply wanting to consummate my marriage to my beautiful bride? Lack of self-control isn’t a crime.”
“It is when the failure to control yourself results in you committing a crime. Having sex in the lobby of a hotel is definitely a crime.”
“I’m a man in love. No one would blame me. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’d have been able to spin it against the hotel for not having a room for us.”
“Not being able to get a room at a hotel doesn’t constitute a justifiable excuse to escape criminal charges for sex in public. Can you imagine the consequences if it did? People would be banging all over every lobby of every nice hotel. Especially over holiday weekends. It would be a disaster.”
“Wow. You really don’t like sex in public, do you?”
She shrugged. “I wouldn’t know and we’re not discussing this anymore. I just really can’t believe the manager took you seriously. That’s the point of this conversation.”
“Nah, the point is he was right to take me seriously because if I was married to you and I’d already been forced to keep my hands off you for the entire flight, you better believe I’d have made good on my threat if they didn’t give us a room.”
“The flight is less than fourteen hours long. It’s hardly as punishing as you’re making it out to be.”
“That’s fourteen fucking hours of sitting next to you and keeping my hands to myself. It’s way more punishing than I’m making it out to be.”
She turned her head to give me a look, but our gazes caught and held for longer than either of us intended for them to. There was incredulity in her deep blue depths, but there was some heat there too. It seemed talking about this was turning her on.
I didn’t have to know her well to know she’d never admit it, but I wasn’t about to ask anyway. She wasn’t the only one getting turned on, and I still didn’t want her to know I was attracted to her at all.
If I did, I wouldn’t put it past her to kick my ass out of the bungalow.
Her tongue darted out and she swiped it across her lips before giving her head a little shake. “Not being able to have sex for fourteen hours is hardly anything. Let’s just leave it at that.”
“Fine. As long you know we’re agreeing to disagree on your final statement.”
She rolled her eyes. “How old are you anyway? Aren’t we both a few years past being dominated by our sexual urges?”
“Thirty-eight. I’m not dominated by my sexual urges. I simply dominate my sexual urges.” I wagged my brows at her and grinned. “How old are you? Aren’t you a few years past being so repressed and judgmental about sex?”
“I’m not repressed or judgmental.” She dropped her gaze to the sand and sighed, dipping her head between her shoulders. “Okay, maybe I am a little bit of both of those things, but that’s not any of your business.”
I was burning to delve into that little nugget, but when she kept her eyes down, I realized it was time to let it go. “Tell me about your ex. Who leaves a woman like you at the altar?”
“Why would I talk to you about that? I hardly know you and that’s highly personal.”
“Who better to talk to than a stranger?” I asked. “At least you know you’d get an unbiased opinion.”
She didn’t say anything for a few beats. Then she sighed and pulled her knees up to her chest. Forming a bridge with her arms between them, she laid her chin down in the crook of one elbow and stared out at the azure blue swells rising and falling in the distance.
“Will and I were good friends for a long time. I should’ve seen it coming, but I really didn’t. When I called him and he said he couldn’t do it and that we both knew it was for the best, I was honestly shocked.”
“Shocked but not heartbroken?” Her voice hadn’t wobbled at all as she spoke. She sounded strangely detached, like she was talking about someone else’s wedding falling apart.
“Why would you say that?” she asked.
“Just from the way you said that. It doesn’t sound like you were all too interested in this guy. Unless you’re still in shock?”
She scowled at the horizon before climbing to her feet and dusting the sand off her ass. “You know what? I tried to talk to you, but it’s pointless. I think it’s best for me to just go.”
Storming off without another word, she left me wondering what the fuck had just happened. On the other hand, she’d been stood up mere days ago from what I could tell. It made sense that she’d be a bit volatile.
Her emotions were probably all over the place. She really didn’t seem all that torn up about the breakup, though. But maybe pointing it out was somewhat tactless.
I headed back into the ocean and swam until my muscles felt it before I decided to hit the shower. As I made my way back up to the room, I caught a glimpse of Lindsay sitting alone in the dining room at the end of the row of bungalows.
It was an outdoor dining area with a kitchen under the sky and a simple thatched roof over a concrete floor. Strings of light wrapped around the beams were just starting to blink on, but she didn’t seem to notice any of it as she stared out into the distance again.
I didn’t stop to watch her or to wonder what she was thinking. As far as everyone at this resort was concerned, that was my wife sitting there all by herself. That was not a good way to spend the first night of a honeymoon, and I wouldn’t let it stand.