Chapter 11
stella
Itry to swallow, but my mouth is the only part of my body that remains dry after my encounter with Jonas this morning. I finally have to look away from where his cocky little smirk and all eight of his rippling abs lie beside me in the cabana.
Maybe I’m not used to the heat, and the Dominican sun is made of something different, because ever since I landed, I’ve been unable to think straight. I want to believe it’s because of my breakup with Aiden and not the fucking Greek God I’m sharing a bed with this week, but I’m also not an idiot.
Maya and Ella’s delighted squeals hit me, and I catch the tail end of their dad launching Ella into the air.
She pops up from the water, and Maya climbs into her dad’s arms. She starts with her arms wrapped tightly around her legs like a mini cannonball, but about three feet in the air, her little limbs are flailing around.
I laugh, looking a few chairs over to where Lilianna is lying in her own cabanna, except she’s not reading the book in her hands, or laughing at her children.
She’s eyeing me. She thinks she’s being slick because she’s wearing her little Meredith Blake sunglasses like I can’t tell she’s watching me, but I know her big lawyer brain is working to piece together what’s going on over here. Whatever that may be.
She goes back to reading her book, but I can still feel her doubt lingering, and if it’s time to step up the fauxmance, then here goes nothing, I guess.
“Hey, can you get my back?” I smile, handing Jonas my sunscreen oil. “Make me shine like your favorite Christmas ornament.”
He moves to scoot in closer behind me, shaking the bottle in his hand. “Is that code for ‘put sunscreen on’ or are we getting freaky at the pool?”
I gather my hair, pull it over my shoulder, and offer a flirty glance behind me.
“I guess it depends.” I pause when the cool oil hits the tops of my shoulders, and it slowly begins to drip down my back.
“Go on.”
I could just laugh it off. Fuck, I should just laugh it off.
It’s one thing to flirt with a stranger, but it’s an entirely different thing to flirt with the guy you’re fake dating and potentially starting to have less-than-fake feelings for.
But when his hands run through the oil and his thumbs press into the muscles at the base of my neck, I hear myself whisper, “What kind of freaky stuff are you into?”
I melt into his touch as his palms spread slowly over my shoulder blades. He’s deliberate with his movements, taking his time, covering every inch of my skin, and leaving a burning trail in his wake.
“With you? It feels like the possibilities could be endless.”
My breath hitches both at his words and the way he’s trailing his fingers down my spine.
“Is…is that something you’ve thought about?”
“Only since the moment I met you.” His voice is warm like honey pouring down my back, and heat blooms from under his touch. It feels like I’ve forgotten how to breathe as I replay those words over again.
Somehow, his hands move further down still, until he pauses at the waistband of my bikini bottoms, either waiting for me to react or, better yet, having trouble holding onto his own restraint.
When Jonas got back to the room this morning, I blamed the intense physical reaction I was having on him standing in front of me in nothing but his running shorts.
The way his eyes boldly and unabashedly raked over my body sent the most delicious shivers down my spine, and when he rubbed his calloused palm against the back of my hand, it made my knees weak.
That touch had lingered. But this. This touch is claiming me. His hands resting at my waist have awakened a response I didn’t even know I was capable of.
“Stella, these dimples...” He blows out a breath, resting his thumbs at my lower back while the rest of his large hand wraps around the curve of my waist. “They’re the perfect spot for my thumbs to hold on to.
” I feel the cushion shift beneath me, and suddenly his mouth is whispering against the shell of my ear, “Like they were made for me.”
I’m already powerless to resist his touch, but goddamn, his words.
My body relaxes back into him, and I close my eyes, dropping the back of my head to his shoulder, exposing my neck to him.
The thin fabric of my bathing suit does nothing to hide my pebbled nipples that only grow harder as Jonas drags his nose along the column of my neck.
His lips press to that spot on my throat that beats so wildly it feels like my heart has traveled upward, and then his mouth is gone.
It was so soft and brief, I wonder if I made the whole thing up.
I know that I need to pull myself away. I’ve taken this too far, unable to tell what’s real anymore—starting with his touch and ending with my feelings.
“How’s that?”
“G-Good,” I stutter, coming out of my trance.
Jonas scoots back, and I immediately miss his warmth behind me. He stands from the poolside bed and faces me.
My jaw falls, but he doesn’t bother hiding his smirk as he adjusts the massive erection in his swim trunks.
I try to look away, to clear my throat, to do anything but stare.
“Yeah, Stell. That was all you.” He reaches his hand out to me, and I slide mine into his. “Let’s go cool down.”
JONAS
Thank fuck for a swim-up bar.
I order us two Presidentes and carry the plastic cups over to the side of the pool where Stella is waiting.
“Darling,” I say, handing her the drink, and she takes it with a laugh.
“I have a question.”
“Hit me.”
“How is a guy like you still single?” Her sunglasses might cover her eyes, but I still catch the gleam.
“What’s a guy like me?”
“You know,” she lifts a hand in my direction while taking a sip of her beer, “you’re funny, successful, unbelievably hot and kind. So frickin’ kind.”
“You think I’m hot?” I ask, sinking down into the water.
“Is it because no one knows your real name?” she asks, ignoring me.
“Yes.”
“I’m serious.” She playfully swats at my shoulder, and I drop my head back as a deep laugh bubbles from me.
“Yeah, no, of course. You seriously think I’m hot.”
“Alright, enough, squirrel boy.” She levels her gaze, but there’s no way of telling someone you’re the rebound guy.
Once was a funny story, twice was a coincidence, but after the fifth time…
It was no longer a weird stroke of luck.
I only attract women who are looking for a distraction.
I’m the guy who can provide a good time without a long-term commitment.
In the beginning, I thought I was lucking out.
It wasn’t until later that I realized that even if I wanted more, that might not be in the cards for me.
“Okay, if you’re not going to tell me your name or your dating history, at least tell me why you’re here.”
“You know why I’m here,” I say before taking a sip of my drink. “I’ve got business to take care of.”
“What kind of business requires lying about being married?”
“This resort, and others, are owned by the Grosso family. The son, Diego, has recently taken over, and my firm believes that he’s going to be letting go of their current lawyers.”
“So you’re here to have a meeting with him?”
“No. I’m here to happen to run into him, and pick up the pieces, offering Smith, Mitchell, and Cameron after I’ve charmed my way into his heart.”
I watch her teeth strum on her bottom lip as she tries to make sense of it all.
“I lied to get the honeymoon suite, and after they told me they were fully booked for a wedding, I had to go along with it. At the time, I wasn’t expecting it to turn into what it has now.”
“Do you regret it?”
“If you’re asking if I regret lying to keep the suite? No.”
Her lips form a straight line, and she tips her head slightly. I set my drink down, scoop her body up, and wrap her legs around my waist. “If you’re asking if I regret getting into this situation with you…” I dip my mouth to the shell of her ear and kiss the delicate spot on her neck. “Also no.”
Her breath stutters, and I press my lips to her skin again. “Do you?”
“I—” Her words die on her tongue when I lift her hips just enough to move her over to where I’m straining against my swim trunks.
“You were saying?”
“It’s hard to think when you’re doing…that,” she moans, and I smile against her.
“Doing what?” I tease, palming her ass and rubbing her over my full erection again.
I pull back just enough that our noses are touching. Her lips hover so close, yet somehow, even an inch between us feels too far. I could play off wanting to kiss her as keeping up appearances or just part of the act, but something tells me neither of us would believe that lie anymore.
“Are you doing this because my sister is watching?” she whispers.
My brows pinch together as I drag a hand over my chin, concerned with how long that’s been a thought for her. Gently, I reach up and tuck a strand of wet hair behind her ear. “I gotta be honest, Stell, I didn’t even know she was here.”
A quiet smile curves at her mouth and her arm tightens around my neck.
I hold her as she pulls herself closer, gliding her hips side to side.
The heat from her pussy rubbing over my cock makes me want to slide the thin piece of fabric covering her to the side and bury myself so deep inside her that she not only knows for absolute certainty that I want this, but completely forgets that anything about this has been fake.
My gaze drops to her mouth. I cup the side of her face, tracing the curve beneath her lip. My fingers splayed around the back of her neck tighten as I guide her face to mine. The hum of electricity roars between us as every millimeter closes between our lips.
“Stella!”
She doesn’t startle, but her face pinches, and her eyes shut in disappointment before she looks up to where Lily is standing at the edge of the pool.
“We’re going to head back. We’ll meet you at the restaurant at seven.”
She drops from my lap, placing a hand above her eyes when she looks up at Lily and says goodbye.
I catch the way Lily’s suspicious eyes regard me before pressing her sunglasses back up her nose.
She’s been the hardest one to get through to—aside from Isabelle’s husband, whose face has been buried in his phone the whole time.
Lilianna continues to have her guard up around me.
At first, I thought maybe she wasn’t buying this relationship, and she saw it for what it was.
But at least from my end, every time Stella and I are together, every touch and every glance has been genuine.
“Lily’s a lawyer, yeah?”
Stella nods and swims over to the side of the pool. “Estate planning.”
“And Isabelle?”
“She works for a pharmaceutical company,” she says, resting her forearms on the warm ledge of the pool.
Isabelle has been very receptive to Stella and me. All three sisters have very diverse personalities, and Isabelle’s seems to be a little more gentle of the three, but she’s still watching, and I respect that.
“Are you judging me?”
My head snaps to Stella’s. I’ve been one of the top lawyers at my firm for almost a decade now. I wouldn’t say I’m surprised easily, but that question leaves me reeling.
“Why would I be judging you?”
“Because both of my sisters are married with impressive jobs and have their lives totally together, and I’m—”
“Stop.”
I prop her sunglasses on top of her head so I can see directly into her eyes. “I’m not going to let you compare your life to theirs.”
Her eyes soften, and maybe it’s just the water reflecting, but there is a slight sheen to them as well, and at the sight, her words from the other day filter through my thoughts. I just wanted to feel normal for once.
“They’ve just always had everything so together.
They went to college, made careers within a year, met their now husbands, and Lily has two beautiful girls…
” she trails off. “I’ve just spent a lot of time listening to my parents gush over how proud they are of them.
Meanwhile, I’m a high school art teacher who went two years without a boyfriend, and then when I finally settled on one, we had a mediocre at best six-month relationship before, well, you know the end. ”
I try not to harp on the word ‘settle’, but a selfish part of me is glad that she feels this way about her ex.
“Do you like your job?”
She looks at me, stunned, like either she’s offended I would ask or I’m ridiculous for thinking that part was important. “I love it.”
“Then you’re successful.”
“Easy for you to say. You’re a big, fancy, hotshot lawyer, too.”
“And here I am trying to convince a man to hire my firm while also hiding that this run-in was all part of an elaborate scheme and not written in the cosmos. I might argue that you’re doing better than some of us, Stell.”
She tilts her head and looks at me now. Really looks at me like she’s trying to understand what’s going on behind my closed doors, and because I love getting to see beyond hers and can no longer ignore the feelings that have been building for her… I tell her.
“I might be a hotshot lawyer, but I didn’t choose this life.
My parents were lawyers my entire life. I never saw them.
Even now, both my parents are in their sixties—professors at Stanford Law, and I’m here in the Dominican Republic during Christmas instead of home with them.
” I make sure the sarcasm is heavy on the word home.
“So you followed in their footsteps. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.”
“There’s not. But for the rest of my life, I’ll never know if I got into school, or even at my current firm, based on merit or based on my last name.
I envy you for being fearless enough to go against the grain and do what you wanted.
Living a life you sought out, that you wanted and made happen, is always going to be better than doing it because you’re doing something someone else expects of you. ”
I can see her contemplating the words I’m saying. Her lips twist, and her teeth gnaw on the corner. I’ve said my piece, but we’re here on vacation, so I switch gears. “Besides, for all you know, they might not even have sex anymore.”
Stella slips, taking in a mouthful of water before she starts choking and spraying water everywhere. An elderly couple close enough to be offended by Stella’s choking but too far to hear what I said, shoot us a dirty look.
“Sorry.” I wave a hand in their direction. “It’s her first time in a pool.”
She slaps my chest and I bark a laugh, trapping her hand against me.
“All I’m saying is, they’re not perfect. Maybe in their relationship or to each other they are, but just because they have a job that you deem more successful doesn’t mean they’re better than you.”