Chapter 15
Thirty minutes later, Traci stood in the shower, trying to rinse the stink of cigarette smoke and beer out of her hair, and still fuming about the encounter with Shannon.
It was all so unfair. They’d grown up together, graduated from high school, gotten in and out of trouble together. They were both Ain’ts, from working-class families, living in the shadow of a five-star resort their families never could have afforded.
Traci stepped out of the shower, toweled off, and pulled on her nightgown. When she opened the bathroom door, Lola was crouched in front of it, waiting for her to emerge. She gave a short, happy bark, wagging her whole body in ecstasy. Traci scooped her up and deposited her onto the bed. Lola was a rescue, an anxious senior dog nobody wanted, part dachshund, part Velcro, sticking to her side for every waking hour she was at home.
She glanced at the clock on her nightstand. It would have been laughable, if it hadn’t been so pathetic—she and Shannon, meeting tonight at their old hangout, then home and in bed, alone, before ten o’clock.
Two decades later—oh, how the times had changed.
She and Shannon had planned that summer of ’02 in minute detail. Job one was to move away from home. They were both nineteen, with a year of community college under their belts. Job two was to land one of the prized lifeguard positions at the Saint and start saving money for their own apartments. Job three was to meet a cute, rich guy. There was never a shortage of those sons of families who “summered” at the resort.
Things went according to the plan. At first. Traci and Shannon hadn’t just shared a room at the staff dorm, they’d shared everything, from clothes to confidences. Saint employees were specifically forbidden to consort with guests, but both of them had managed short-lived, furtive flings early in the summer.
But then everything changed, almost overnight on a Friday night. Armed with newly minted fake IDs, they’d gone to Pour Willy’s together, but Shannon had hooked up with a guy almost as soon as they’d entered the bar, leaving Traci to fend for herself.
She’d just come out of the bathroom and wasn’t looking where she was going; in fact, she was trying to zip up her Daisy Dukes—technically, they were Shannon’s shorts, which was why the zipper seemed to be stuck.
The next thing Traci knew, she’d run straight into a guy who was, unfortunately, holding two flimsy plastic cups of beer, which collapsed and splashed all over her. And him.
“Oh, geez, my bad,” he’d said, taking a step backward. He was four inches taller than her. He was wearing geeky Clark Kent–style horn-rimmed glasses, and dressed all wrong for a dive bar: khakis, navy blazer, an unknotted striped repp tie, and a button-down dress shirt that was now soaked in beer.
He’d stammered out an apology as he was gingerly mopping the beer off her boobs with an honest-to-Gawd handkerchief, and she’d started giggling, uncontrollably. “Oh man. I’m sorry. I, uh…”
Traci felt bad for the guy. Had he wandered in here from an undertakers’ convention?
“It’s okay. I think it was my fault ’cuz I wasn’t looking where I was going because I was trying to zip up my shorts.” She couldn’t help herself, she looked up at him and brazenly batted her eyelashes. “Maybe you could help me out?”
He blushed violently. “Uh, well, I’m not sure. I mean, now my hands are all sticky with beer, and I wouldn’t want…”
“Never mind,” she’d said sharply, abruptly turning her back on him and returning to the barstool she’d abandoned earlier. She’d made an outrageous play for the guy and he’d fumbled badly, and she felt totally humiliated.
Ten minutes later, she felt a light tap on her shoulder. It was Clark Kent again. He’d ditched the blazer, and the necktie.
“Hey. I think I kinda blew my shot back there.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Ya think?”
“I’m terrible at this kind of stuff,” he confessed. “I don’t have a single good pickup line, and zero smooth moves.”
“Sad but true,” Traci agreed.
“Give me a do-over? Let me buy you a drink, or a burger or something?”
“They don’t have burgers here,” Traci informed him. “Just greasy nachos, which I don’t recommend.” She tilted her head and appraised him. He had too-short dark hair with a silver streak, and a strong jawline. There was something about him—he was appealingly vulnerable. Not her usual type at all, and definitely not a regular at Pour Willy’s.
“Maybe we could go somewhere else to get a drink, and maybe some food too?”
“Like where? They roll up the sidewalks in this dumpy town right about now.”
He nodded thoughtfully. “Right. Of course. What about the Saint? The Verandah doesn’t close for another hour yet, from what I hear.”
Her spirits perked up. “So… you’re a member there?”
“Yeah. I am. What do you think?”
“I’d love to, but they’ve got really strict rules out there—about the staff consorting with guests. And it’d be just my luck to get caught.”
“Oh. You work at the Saint? What do you do there?”
“Lifeguard,” Traci said.
“That’s cool,” he said. “Well, I wouldn’t want to get you fired, but I think there’s a way around the rules. What about… if we go to my bungalow? I can call ahead and order dinner to go. You can stay in the car, and nobody has to be any the wiser.”
“Your bungalow? You own a house out there?”
“It’s been in the family for a while,” he said, sounding apologetic.
He blushed again. Traci’d never been with a guy who blushed before, and she had to admit it was kind of a turn-on. That, combined with the fact that he owned a house? At the Saint? Wait until she told Shannon.
“Let’s go.”
“Just like that? What about your friend? Won’t she be worried about you?”
She narrowed her eyes. “How’d you know about my friend? Have you been stalking me all night?”
“What? No! I mean, I saw you with that other girl, earlier, is all. I’m really not a pervert.”
“Which explains why you were lurking outside the bathroom at a bar. Textbook perv move. Next thing I know, you’ll offer me some candy if I’ll get in your car, and next month, my picture will be on milk cartons and billboards. HAVE YOU SEEN THIS GIRL?”
His face turned an even brighter shade of crimson. “Oh my God! I keep making things worse. Never mind. I’m leaving now, before you report me to the police.”
He turned to go, but Traci reached out and caught his hand. “Hey, wait up.”
“You still want to leave with me? After all that?”
Traci laughed and linked her arm through his. “You’re not smooth enough to be a pervert. My name’s Traci, by the way. What’s yours?”
“Hoke.”
She willingly climbed into his Jeep, which was parked outside, and it wasn’t until they pulled up to the gate at the resort, and the security guard stepped outside and snapped to attention with a respectful “Evening, Mr. Eddings,” that Traci realized she’d accidentally managed to get herself picked up by Hoke Eddings, whose family owned the whole damn place.
Wait ’til she told Shannon.