Chapter 2
2
T he wind howled as it brought the first few raindrops that pelted the fiberglass yacht. It never rained long in Florida during the summer months, but when it did, it came down hard, fast, and with loud claps of thunder. The cruiser rocked with the waves of the Intracoastal Waterways.
Rex lay on the king-size bed that took up most of the single bedroom, staring up at the portal on the boat's bow. His stomach growled, but he didn’t feel like getting out of bed. It had been over an hour since he’d left Tilly sitting on the deck. He assumed she was long gone by now, considering the coming storm. He ran his fingers across his lips. Kissing her had been stupid, and he had no idea why he’d done it other than he wanted to know if she still tasted like honey.
Which she did.
He blinked, pulling up an image of his mother when he’d been a small boy. Her dark hair touched her shoulders. He had his mother’s whiskey-colored eyes. When he was a kid, he thought his mother was the most beautiful woman ever, always full of life. He couldn’t imagine what battling stage-four ovarian cancer was doing to her body.
The evening sky lit up with multiple lightning strikes. Thunder pounded as the rain came down in a continuous stream.
“Rex! Let me in, please.”
He sprang from the bed, racing from the room through the main cabin, eating area, and the galley, finally reaching the door. He unlocked the latch. “What the hell are you still doing here?” He stepped back, helping a drenched Tilly down the steps.
“Waiting for hell to freeze over.”
“Didn’t you see the storm coming?”
She nodded. “I thought you’d let me in when it started to rain.”
“I thought you’d leave,” he said, holding up his hand. “Stay there. I’ll get you a towel.”
He left her standing at the threshold, looking like a drowned rat. He should have known. The woman rarely took no for an answer. She had to be one of the most stubborn, pigheaded women he’d ever met. Glancing out the window, he searched for a break in the clouds, but all he found was more darkness.
After getting a towel, he ducked into his room and snagged a pair of shorts and a T-shirt. She’d swim in them, but it was better than the wet dress she currently had on.
“You can change into these.” He tossed her the towel and the clothes, ensuring he kept a safe distance. His heart pounded against his chest, reminding him of how she’d destroyed it.
“Thank you,” she said, ruffling her tangled blond locks with the towel as she breezed by, leaving a scented trail of honey and fresh pineapple. She’d been the hottest and most popular girl in high school, and it wasn’t because she was rich.
It was because she was as sweet as home-baked cookies and had a big heart. He’d known her his entire life, having grown up at the same country club. As children, they took swimming lessons and played paddle tennis against one another. For the majority of their lives, they’d been friends. Not close friends, since they didn’t really hang out together outside of the club, but close enough.
His stomach rumbled. “Tilly, have you eaten dinner?” he yelled toward the bedroom.
“No, but I wouldn’t want you to go to any trouble. I mean, you would have let me drown.”
He chuckled. “Trust me, I’m not bending over backward for you. But I have to eat.” He told himself he’d feed her while they waited for the storm to pass, and then he’d send her packing. He’d just have to make her understand there was nothing left for him at home.
He pulled out all the ingredients he needed to make a pan-seared grouper with asparagus, which she hated and that made him smile. God, he was an asshole. He took the knife and started chopping the garlic when she stepped into the galley wearing his T-shirt and shorts. They hid her perfect body with their bagginess, but she was still the sexiest woman on the planet.
Razor-sharp pain tinged his finger.
“Fuck,” he muttered, dropping the knife. He stared at his hand. A few drops of blood trickled from his index finger.
“Let me do that. You always put too much garlic in anyway.” She moved him to the side with her warm, sexy hands. Memories of them roaming his body pelted his brain.
He should have been a real prick and not let her in. He cleaned up his wound, put a Band-Aid on it, and heated up the skillet.
She stood next to him, slicing and dicing before reaching across him and dumping the onions, garlic, and other seasonings in the pan with a dash of olive oil. Her hair brushed his shoulder. In college, when they had lived together, they enjoyed cooking together. They moved in the kitchen, much like synchronized swimmers cutting through the water with precision.
“I’ll finish up. Why don’t you go sit down at the table?” He needed to put some distance between their bodies and clear the teenage hormones from his mind. Over the years, he’d run through various potential conversations he might have with her, none of which included cooking fish together.
“Do you have any white wine?” she asked.
“There’s a bottle open in the fridge and more in the cooler.” Wine was a mistake, and he knew it, but he decided to check his prick personality at the door and enjoy a good meal. “Glasses are in that cabinet to the right of the sink.”
A loud clap of thunder boomed through the night as more lightning brightened the inside of the boat.
“I love a good thunderstorm,” she said, placing a wineglass next to the stove.
He ignored the tightening in his muscles and the tingling sensation crawling across his fingertips, itching to dig into her soft curves. The fish sizzled as he flipped it. He focused on his growling stomach and sipped his wine, not wanting to go sit at the table and continue to pretend this wasn’t the most awkward situation either one of them had ever been in.
“My father really asked you to come?”
“He said you hadn’t returned his phone calls, except for a few random text messages that work was too hectic for you to get away.”
He placed a plate of food before her and joined her at the table.
“Imagine my surprise when I get here and find out you’re on a few days’ vacation from the fire station and have no assignments with the Aegis Network for at least a week.” She looked to the ceiling, pressing her forefinger to her temple. “And today was the first day.”
“Spying on me?”
She shook her head, letting out a sarcastic laugh. “I called the station when I landed. It took being transferred to a few different people before I was informed about both situations.”
“You’re lucky I’m still here. But you still wasted your time.”
“I had to try,” she said, lowering her gaze. “Your mom is in bad shape.”
“My dad texted me yesterday and said Mom had maybe a month left and that at this point, she refused all treatment except for pain medication.” He gulped his wine. He’d actually bought a plane ticket to go back to Kent Island, Maryland, leaving tomorrow morning at seven, but he’d decided not to go. It wasn’t just that he had struggled to forgive his mother or that he’d become estranged from his siblings and father, but there were certain things he couldn’t get out of his mind.
No one could deny how much he’d been hurt or what it had done to see his mother adjusting her clothing as she and Mr. Bettencourt stepped from the master bedroom. Rex might have been an adult, but that would fuck up any young man.
“It’s not just your mom who wants to see you,” Tilly said.
Rex picked at the food on his plate. The first few years after he’d left home had been fueled by anger. He dealt with it by becoming the best fire protection specialist the Air Force had ever seen and ignored his past, including his money, but then he wanted this yacht after he’d left the military, so he tapped into his trust fund and that’s what triggered an onslaught of messages from his father.
His sister, Emily, had sent him a nasty gram a few years ago, telling him to get his head out of his ass. His brother constantly sent him pictures of family gatherings. He knew more about them than they did about him.
Not that there was anything to know. He worked. He fished. He worked.
“I don’t know about that. My little correspondence with Emily and Miles has been tainted with resentment.” A sentiment he understood and had held on to for years. They hadn’t been the ones to catch their mother nor the ones who had to break the news to their father, but they both seemed to blame Rex. Not for the breakup of their parents’ marriage but for hurting their mother.
He chugged his wine before pouring another hearty glass.
“I’d go easy on that.”
“I’d mind your own business,” he said, wishing he could take back the harsh tone.
She leaned back, folding her arms under her breasts.
This was so not the right time to consider her naked body under his T-shirt, though it was a very nice distraction from pondering if he should grant his mother her dying wish or hold on to anger for the rest of his life. He’d wrapped himself in a bubble of resentment, which protected his heart but walled him off from having any meaningful relationships, even with his brothers-in-arms.
He swallowed that revelation.
“You’re a piece of work,” she said, shaking her head. “All you have to do is show up, say hello, and then you can go back to hiding out on your boat, pretending you have a life, when really, all you have is a lot of nothing.”
“You know jack shit about my life,” he said with a snarl. “I have a great career and fantastic friends. Friends who won’t fuck me over like my own family. Or my girlfriend.”
“Seriously? You’re going to sit there and tell me I screwed you over? Do you hear yourself? You’re so goddamn angry over something that happened ten years ago. You’ve never moved past it. No. You’ve chosen to make it the bane of your existence.”
“Tilly, you don’t have a fucking clue about my life.”
“Please. You live on a boat.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” He took his glass and stood, leaning against the counter. “I love this yacht. I love being on the water, and you know that.”
“All right. Then tell me why you left the military. You weren’t in all that long. Seems like you’re jumping from one thing to the next. That doesn’t sound like a happy, content person to me.”
He turned, lifting up his shirt, showing off a few of his scars. “One really bad mission that went sideways was enough for me and my team to decide there were other ways to serve.” He tugged at the fabric. “That group of men you passed on the dock. We were all fire protection specialists in the Air Force together. A buddy of ours offered us a job with the Aegis Network while we were recovering from various injuries. We all looked at each other and decided as a group to leave. We all now work at the same station and for Aegis. We’re a family.” He cocked a brow. “So don’t go telling me shit about my life when you haven’t a clue.”
She sat up a little taller. “That’s fair, but you also don’t know what your family or the rest of us have been through. While you’re out here doing whatever, they have been suffering. Would it be so fucking difficult to get on a plane, go to Maryland, and spend one day with a dying woman? Not everything has to be about you. Or even the past. No one is asking you to cut off your damn arm or to swallow your pride. Just spend a little time with your blood. After that, you can return to your awesome life and forget about the rest of us. Again.”
He slowly sipped his wine. Her words chipped at his anger. He’d held on to it like a badge of honor. How would he ever know if he could get over it if he never returned? “All right, you win. I’ll go home.”
Tilly fluffed the pillow Rex had given her and tried to get comfortable on the sofa. She had no idea why she’d insisted on taking the couch when he’d offered her a nice, plush king-size bed, but she was brutally stubborn.
A trait that got her in trouble.
Often.
The first year he’d been gone, she tracked his whereabouts and booked airline tickets to see him half a dozen times. But every time she got to the airport, her stubbornness prevented her from taking the trip. She cringed, remembering the amount of money she’d spent that year all because she thought he should be the one to come to her since he’d called things off.
She pulled the soft 600-thread-count sheets to her chin. The wind and rain had died down, but the boat rocked gently in the water. She’d had a crush on Rex for as long as she could remember. At school, he barely gave her the time of day, but she had his full attention at the club, except when he was on the golf course. The first time he’d made the cut for the club championship, at the ripe old age of fifteen, she’d offered to be his caddy. The only time she ever golfed had been with him. He’d always told her she should take up the game, but it was only fun if she played with him.
It wasn’t until after he’d won the club championship that year that she told him she liked him as more than a friend.
She smiled, remembering the stunned look on his face after she’d kissed him. He’d blinked a half dozen times and opened and closed his mouth a dozen more until he wrapped his arms around her and bruised her lips with a burning kiss.
Those days were long gone, and they were both very different people.
The light from his room seeped out into the main cabin. “This is ridiculous. That sofa is the most uncomfortable thing in the world. It’s the only thing about this boat that sucks.”
“I’m not going to ask you to give up your bed. Besides, I lived in a third-world country on a foam bed topper for three years. This is like the Ritz, comparatively.”
“You did what?” He stepped into the room wearing nothing but boxers and muscles. Damn. He’d always been a fine specimen of a man, and the thirty-two-year-old version wasn’t any different.
“You didn’t know I was in the Peace Corps after college?”
“No, but I was either in basic training, fire school, or deployed for the first four years after I left. I did hear you worked for the Peace Corps, though. I just figured it was in the office. You were always good at managing things that helped people.” He scratched the back of his head.
“How on earth did you know I worked for the Peace Corps, but not know I was a volunteer and lived in South America for three years.”
“In one of my sister’s random emails where she berates me for not coming home, she mentioned something about your career.”
Wow. He’d really gotten over her.
Quickly.
Of course, she dealt with her grief over their breakup by disconnecting as much as possible.
But it hadn’t helped to erase her love for him.
“South America? I spent some time there in the military. We came in contact with some Peace Corps Volunteers,” he said. “Some of them lived in incredibly remote areas. I’m struggling with Little Miss Designer Everything doing that.”
“Well, believe it. I did it. And I survived.” She smiled.
“Come on.” Standing at the side of the sofa, he held out a hand.
“I’m not kicking you out of your room.”
“It’s a king-size bed. We’ve slept in smaller.”
She raised a brow as her heart hammered in her chest. “I’m not going to sleep with you.”
“Yeah, you are. And the key word is sleep. Not sex. We used to sleep in that double bed we had all the time and not have sex.”
“We’d wake up and have sex.”
“That’s true.” He leaned over, taking her by the hand. “But I won’t be able to sleep knowing you’re out here on this. I can promise I won’t even think about sex, much less touch you.”
“That’s exactly what every woman wants to hear when a man is wooing her to bed.” She stood, sliding her hands from his, snagging the pillow.
He raised his arms. “I’m trying to be nice and respectful here, but I also want to make sure we both get some sleep.”
“I get the right side,” she said. Good grief, what the hell was she doing agreeing to share his bed? Did she have some sadomasochistic tendencies she didn’t know about?
Or had she just lost her mind?
“You’re still particular about that?”
“Aren’t you?” She held the hem of his shirt down, making sure it covered her ass. She should have kept his shorts on.
“About what side I sleep on? God, no. Then again, I generally don’t have women in my bed so what difference does it make.”
She stopped at the doorway.
“Umph.” He bumped into her.
“Generally? What does that mean?”
He pressed his hand into the small of her back, nudging her forward. “It means I’m not seeing anyone and haven’t in a while and don’t like women on my boat. Cramps my style. Now stop talking and get into bed before I change my mind.”
That statement sent her insides on a roller-coaster ride. The downhill turns were filled with jealousy over any woman who’d had him after her. The uphill twists were all about the fact he hadn’t been with anyone in a while.
The only question was, what constituted a while, and did he stay at their places instead?
She mentally smacked herself as she pulled back the sheets and slipped onto the soft but firm mattress.
The bed shifted as he sat down, his back to her. The pitter-patter of light raindrops echoed off the boat. As he twisted, the outside light gleamed through the porthole like a ray of sunshine on the heart tattoo. Without thinking, she reached out and traced the letters inside the heart. “I can’t believe you didn’t change this.”
He rolled to his side, propping himself on his elbow. “I honestly never thought to change it. Besides, I like it.”
“Your father was so pissed when you got that.” Mindlessly, she continued to run her fingers on his shoulders.
“I remember being upset with you for not getting a matching one.”
“Back then, it scared me too much.”
“Does that mean you have one now?”
“I’ve got a couple of them,” she admitted, jerking her hand away. “We should get some sleep.” As if she could relax enough to doze even for a short period. As soon as he drifted off, she planned on sneaking out, which was stupid. She didn’t have to stay in his bed, and she certainly didn’t care if he thought her rude for not taking him up on his chivalrous act.
“Where?” he asked, rolling to his back.
“Back of my neck and lower back.”
“Of what?”
She tucked her hands under her cheek and closed her eyes. “On my lower back is a set of butterflies.”
“You always did love those insects.” His chest rose and fell in a rhythmic pattern. “And the other one?”
“It’s late. I’m tired.” No way. She didn’t dare to tell him. And it didn’t matter.
“Come on, just tell me.”
She squeezed her eyes closed and let out a long sigh. “The same one you have on your biceps.”