Fifteen
Iwent for a swim before lunch and was coming out, ready to eat, when I saw everyone else on the veranda.
They had all missed breakfast and brunch, and now, around twelve thirty, they had risen, painfully, slowly, with much whimpering and whining, from their coffins.
I waved, and Burke was the only one who lifted a hand of greeting.
Walking up the beach from the water, the sand warm but not hot under my feet, I saw Aaron smile at me from behind his oversize sunglasses.
“Hey, princess. How you doin’ this morning?” I teased him.
He flipped me off.
“God, Jory,” Burke sighed at me.
I looked over at him.
“I’d like to wake up to the sight of you coming out of the water every morning.”
It was a nice thing to say.
“Me too,” Aaron sighed.
“You’re lucky Jaden’s still sleeping,” another man who I didn’t know scoffed before groaning. It was too much movement.
“Tell me, Aaron,” Hayes said as he tipped his head, looking at me, “is Jory that pretty color all over?”
My ex said nothing, and I could tell from the clench of the muscles in his jaw that he wasn’t ready yet for banter.
“I bet he is.” Hayes leered at me. “And I, for one, would love to find out.”
And that was it.
“Fuck you, Mr. Fisher,” I muttered, stalking by the table.
“Jory.” Hayes was laughing and groaning at the same time. It hurt to be amused when you were hungover.
I moved fast.
“Jory, fuck! Stop before my head explodes.”
When I rounded on him, Hayes stopped before he hit me, and the motion made him have to clutch at the wall.
“Shit.”
“What?”
“God, it’s like I spend every second that I’m with you apologizing.”
I turned to go, but he grabbed my bicep, holding tight.
“Just wait. I’m sorry, okay? That was stupid and—”
“Demeaning.”
“Yes.”
I waited.
“Jory”—he backed me up against the wall and then leaned close, bracing a hand there and looking at me—“last night, I was drunk and stupid and—”
“Still are,” I told him, levering off the wall.
His hand on my bicep tightened, holding me, and his other hand rose toward my face.
“What the fuck, Hayes?” I barked at him, shoving him off me.
“Jory, just let me talk to you,” he snapped, reaching for me again.
“You can talk to me without putting your hands on me.”
He looked pained, and I understood—again.
Here I was—a nothing, a nobody—telling him what he could and could not do.
And normally, people let him have his way, invited him close because of who he was and what he represented.
And it wasn’t like he had a kept boy like Jaden, not yet, but he bought gifts and dinner and paid for everything, so really, it was the same damn thing.
He just didn’t have anyone living in his house and sleeping in his bed on a day-to-day basis.
“Jory, please, just—”
“If I was some blue-blooded guy you were dating, if I was from some rich family, you’d never think of doing anything but courting me.”
“Courting you? What are you talk—”
“But because I’m not, you think you can do this—treat me like Aaron treats Jaden, like Aaron used to try and treat me, like a possession.”
“No, Jory, I—”
“Aren’t you on an extended date with Burke? Didn’t he invite you here so you both could get laid?”
He shook his head. “No, Jory, Burke and I are both looking for something else.”
“What?”
He cleared his throat. “We went to that party to—”
“Oh.” Things became clear. “It was tryouts.”
“What? No, it wasn’t like that!” He was incredulous.
“It was exactly like that. Fuck everybody, check the fit—I get it.”
“That is an incredibly tasteless thing to—”
“But true.”
“I—”
“You’re looking for your own boy, so you were sampling the goods.”
“Jory—”
“I thought you were looking for love, but you’re not. You’re not looking for the one guy, the love of your life. You’re looking for a trophy, like Aaron’s got.”
“I—”
“You should just have Aaron ask Jaden if he has any friends. If any one of them is half as hot as he is, you’ve got it made.”
He just looked at me.
“No? Not sure what kind you want?”
“Jory”—his eyes looked pained—“I know what I want.”
I squinted at him.
“And what is that shit on your back?”
Oh no … no-no-no.
“Is that a tattoo of––”
“Don’t,” I warned him.
“Did you tattoo your detective’s name on your back?” He laughed in my face. “Turn around and let me see.”
I felt the anger rise so fast.
“That is so Hollywood—to ink somebody’s name on you just because you’re fucking them and then have to have it removed in six months when they dump you.” He snickered. “Jesus, what the hell were you thinking?”
The tattoo of Sam’s name had been on the back of my right shoulder for years, and I had done it because, to me, it was a brand. I loved it, and more importantly, Sam did. But Hayes Fisher didn’t need to know that. What he did need to know was that he’d crossed the line.
I was done, so when I went to leave and he grabbed me tight, trying to force me to stay, I did the move I knew, which Sam had taught me.
I pulled him forward by his collar, pivoted, rolled my left shoulder, and yanked him off his feet.
He was bigger, but he was still a little drunk, and I had been awake a lot longer. Plus, I had leverage on my side.
On the ground, on his back, he gulped for air like a fish out of water.
“Don’t fuck with me. I don’t like it, and I know your mother.”
“Shit,” he barely got out. “You do know my mother.”
I looked down at him.
“Jesus, you know my whole family.”
“Why is this a revelation?”
He didn’t get off the ground. I doubted he could manage it, but he tilted his head to really look at me.
“What?”
“Holy shit.”
He was having some sort of epiphany there on the veranda, but honestly, I didn’t really care. I had some sightseeing I wanted to do, and I needed to get started.
“Jory!”
I looked back over to where Aaron was and saw that Jaden had joined him.
He was the one who had yelled—the new man in my ex’s life—and I noticed instantly that his face was lit up, and he was smiling so wide, so happily.
He looked like a little kid, unguarded and joyful.
He was pointing down the beach, and when I looked to see what had drawn his interest, I saw him.
There, walking toward the veranda, was Sam Kage.
“Oh shit!” I yelled and ran.
Anger forgotten, Hayes forgotten, nothing mattered at all except reaching Sam. All I saw was Sam.
Sam.
He had changed, so he must have found or been directed to my room because he was in a short-sleeved shirt and cargo shorts that I knew well, and had packed for him, and he was barefoot.
Normally, Sam’s skin was a light tan, but in the sun, if we stayed for several days in Hawai’i, he would turn a warm honey brown.
I had seen it when we took a vacation to Florida the year before to visit some old friends of his.
I couldn’t wait to watch him bake on the beach and, even more, just have him close so I could see him.
As it was, him coming toward me, shirt open, fluttering in the breeze, he looked amazing.
His hair was shorn into a military buzz cut, all the fake black hair gone so all you noticed now were the chiseled features, the long and straight nose, full lips, and strong, square jaw.
He looked massive, striding closer, with his broad shoulders, bulging biceps, triceps, the carved chest, and rippling torso.
I loved his fuzzy legs, long and hard with thick muscle.
My mouth watered just looking at the man.
“Come here!” he yelled at me.
I realized I had stopped moving to admire him, and he wanted me there, with him. When I was close, I launched myself into his arms.
He caught me easily, plucked me from the air, and crushed me against him, pressing his face down in my shoulder.
“You’re early.”
“I told them I was out. There was no reason to stay.”
I trembled in his strong arms, loving the feel of him, his warmth, his size.
He carried me around the side of the building, away from prying eyes, and shoved me up against the wall, pinning me there.
I lifted when he bent to kiss me, thrilled as he slanted his mouth down over mine.
Parting my lips, I moaned loudly as our tongues tangled, rubbing, pressing.
The kiss got hot so fast, deep and ravaging, and one of his hands sank into my hair, the other grabbing my ass hard.
I could feel the need in him, and when he lifted me, I wrapped my legs around his hips.
“I came to find you,” he said, his voice husky as his hot breath touched my ear.
He ran his nose down the side of my neck, nibbling, sucking, licking, driving me right out of my mind.
I was shaking, my entire body heating, flushed with arousal, so that when his hand moved between us, under the waistband of my board shorts, I whimpered out his name.
“Already leaking, J,” he said with a chuckle, the rumbling sound so sexy and sultry that I couldn’t help but shove my throbbing dick into his fist.
“Sam,” I gasped, letting my head fall back as he kissed up the column of my throat. “Just spit in your hand and fuck me,” I pleaded, my back bowing as I felt my body start to ignite.
“Yeah, no,” he told me, fisting his hand in my hair, stilling me before he savaged my mouth, kissing me breathless.
When he put me down, I had trouble standing.
“You do the same thing to me,” he said, forearm pressed to the wall, his head leaning into it, taking a breath to calm his body down. “You make my knees go weak.”
“I do?”
“Every time you kiss me.”
He smiled down at me, and I noticed the brown stubble on his upper lip. Everything about the man was gorgeous, and as I touched his face, he closed his eyes.
“You love me.”
“I’m a stupid fuck who knows better than to leave you alone.” He released a deep breath. “It won’t happen again. We were apart for three years, and I hated every fuckin’ minute of it. You’d think I’d learn my lesson.”
“Oh God,” I said, but it wasn’t the good kind. I had just gotten a good look at the bruises on his face and the ugly patches on his chest and torso.