Chapter 20 Trespassing in a CEO’s Vacation Home
Trespassing in a CEO’s Vacation Home
Eric
By now, my vision is mostly back to normal, but my head is throbbing. Two choices—I can try to find a nearby hotel with availability or go back to my parents’ house.
Neither option sounds very easy.
As soon as Darcy has her key card, she trots over to collect me. “Come on, Eric. Let’s go.”
I look up at her, but the movement makes me wince. “Where?”
“Upstairs. You’re coming with me. I have Advil.”
“Oh.” A wave of gratitude runs through me. “I’d love a couple of those. Then I’ll get out of your hair.”
I rise and follow her onto the elevator, where she hits the button for the top floor.
Maybe it’s the motion of the car, but the pressure behind my eyes intensifies as the elevator doors slide open. I follow Darcy down a plush carpeted hallway, each step sending a fresh pulse of pain through my skull.
“The Destiny Suite,” she murmurs, sliding the key card into the door and keeping her voice mercifully low. “How pretentious.”
I step into the suite and blink slowly, trying to process what I’m seeing through the haze of my migraine.
The space opens before me like something from a travel magazine.
Directly ahead, floor-to-ceiling windows frame a panoramic view of the Atlantic, steel blue and vast under the afternoon sun.
The brightness sends a sharp jab through my temples, but I can’t look away from the hypnotic roll of waves against the distant shoreline.
“Jesus,” I mutter, dropping my suitcase by a flower arrangement that’s three feet tall. “They really did upgrade you.”
The living area stretches to my right, dominated by an enormous L-shaped sofa in a soft cream fabric that faces both the ocean view and a sleek television mounted on the wall.
A few tasteful nautical-themed accents—a model ship and rope-like silk loops on the curtains—tie the room to its coastal setting without being kitschy.
Near the window, an elegant coffee station sits atop a sideboard, complete with what looks like a high-end espresso machine and an array of porcelain cups.
And to our left, a doorway shows me an oblique view of a big bedroom, with more of the ocean view.
“I feel like I’m trespassing in some CEO’s vacation home,” I say, then wince as my own voice reverberates painfully in my skull.
Darcy notices immediately. “Sit down before you fall down. I’ll get you that Advil.”
I sink onto the edge of the sofa as she disappears with her suitcase. The cushions are even more comfortable than they look, molding around me as I lean back and close my eyes against the relentless throb.
I can hear Darcy filling a glass with water in the bathroom. The suite is so quiet I can make out the soft patter of water against glass, the subtle click of her setting something on the counter. In the distance, barely audible, comes the rhythmic sound of waves breaking against the shore.
And somehow, despite the migraine hammering behind my eyes, there’s something soothing about being here, about Darcy moving around with quiet consideration.
“Here,” she says softly, swooping in to set the glass down. She grasps my hand and drops the pills into my palm.
“Thank you.” Darcy has been taking care of me in small ways ever since I met her. She does this for all the Legends, of course. But I’m sure nobody ever appreciated it as much as I do right this second.
Then? She walks over to those beautiful windows and draws the curtains over them until the room dims. When she does, I exhale. And then I take the tablets and chase them with a gulp of water.
“All right, E-Train.” She stands beside the sofa. “Tell me where it hurts.”
“Uh, my head.”
She rolls her eyes. “I got that. But where on your fool head?”
Oh. “Here.” I grab the base of my skull. “And other places. Why?”
She pats the empty corner cushion. “Put your head right here.”
In too much pain to argue, I kick off my shoes and swing my legs up onto the sofa, away from Darcy. Then I recline my head at the other end.
Her hands dig into my shoulder muscles a second later, and I groan.
“Too much?”
“No. You’re perfect,” I say through gritted teeth. My head feels like there’s an iron clamp around it. “Everything else is too much.”
“Preach,” she says quietly.
“Don’t you have your class?” I worry.
“Shh,” she says, and the gentle sound is accompanied by more of her skillful touch. “I’ve got a few minutes until I log in. Just relax.”
I try, while her brilliant fingers dig into the tense muscles of my neck. And after a minute or two, her hands venture onto my scalp, pressing and rubbing. It’s more effective than I ever would have guessed.
“Lift up,” she says, tugging gently on my shoulder.
“Hmm?”
Darcy shows me what she means by lifting my head just enough to slide onto the sofa cushion and drop my head in her lap. Then she carries on with her massage.
I’m startled for about half a second. But then her fingers work their magic again, pressing against all the achy places on my cranium.
“There you go,” she whispers.
“And they say weddings are fun,” I mumble.
“Do they?” she whispers back. “Have they met our families?”
I open my eyes, and I’m immediately greeted by Darcy’s blue ones at close range. “I guess not,” I whisper.
She gives her head a little shake and continues to rub my head. “Here’s what I’ve learned about parents like ours,” she says quietly. “You can’t change them, and it hurts a lot to try. But you can change your reaction to them.”
I think that over for a second. “Huh. I never thought about it like that.”
“It helps me to frame it that way,” she says.
“And that’s why I have a migraine, and you don’t?”
She chuckles. “Maybe. Or maybe you’re just unlucky.”
Funny, but I don’t feel quite as unlucky as I did a half hour ago. And there’s only one reason why. I reach up, catching her smooth cheek in my palm. “Hey. Thank you. For everything you do.”
She blinks down at me, startled. But then she smiles. “You’re welcome. Now close your eyes and relax. Stop worrying about other people for, like, five minutes.”
If that’s what it takes to get rid of this headache, I guess I’ll try it. I close my eyes as Darcy’s fingers return to their magic. The room is so quiet that I can hear the waves hitting the beach nearby. So I make myself focus only on that.
A while later, I’m briefly aware of a pillow replacing Darcy’s thigh beneath my head. And then the soft click of the bedroom door as she retreats to log in to her class. But the switcheroo only relaxes me further, because it means that she’s not missing her lecture on my account.
I listen to the distant surf, and nothing else registers for a nice long time.
Muffled footsteps in the hallway.
Ocean.
Quiet.
But then, like fingernails on a chalkboard, I hear Tessa’s chirpy voice. “Darcy? Is this really your room? I didn’t believe it when I read it on the manifest.”
My eyes spring open, but when I look around, I’m still alone.
“Yep,” says Darcy from the hallway. “I got upgraded. Why do you need to know?”
“Everybody gets a gift basket. So open the door already? My arms are kind of full here.”
“Oh.” A pause. “That’s very nice. I can just take…”
“No, show me your room.”
Another silence. “Eric is napping. He has a headache.”
“I’m up!” I slur, rolling over onto my side.
I hear the beep of the key card mechanism, and then the door opens a few inches as Darcy peeks inside. “Hey! How’s your head?”
“Better.” It’s probably even true. “And yours?”
“Fantastic!” She gives me a conspiratorial wink and opens the door all the way. “I brought you a cappuccino.”
“You’re my favorite.”
She gives me a bright smile and carries a cup holder over to the coffee table.
Tessa follows her into the room, uninvited. She’s weighed down by four or so baskets, wrapped in some kind of shimmery gauze. “Eric! I brought you guys a gift basket. Just some little treats to enjoy during the Wedding Experience.”
“Oh, thanks.” I swing my legs off the couch and force myself into a sitting position. Although there’s nothing less interesting to me than a gift basket from Tessa. Unless it contains a pair of earplugs for whenever she opens her mouth.
Tessa marches over to the coffee table and hefts a basket onto its surface.
Then she sets the extra ones down on the rug and commences snooping around the suite.
“Damn, this room,” she says, walking over to the curtain and yanking it open.
My head gives a stab as the sunlight slices into the room.
“Wow, the view! My room looks out at the parking lot. How did you score this room? Eric must have some pull.”
“Oh, he does,” Darcy says, not bothering to set the record straight. “So much pull.” She winks at me again and then walks into the bedroom.
Her evil stepsister, the queen of boundary stomping, follows her in there and shuts the door.