I get up, brush my teeth, fix my face, and notice on the pillow next to mine a note from Trent. It says he’s having breakfast at the main house with everyone and that he’ll meet me at the beach.
I change into my one-piece black swimsuit, wrap a pareo around my waist, and slip into my sandals. I’m heading down the beach path toward the main house when I hear the sound of running water coming from Tahoe’s villa.
I stop to peer through the palm trees. My jaw drops as I stare at the most primal thing I’ve ever seen. Tahoe stands alone in the outdoor shower, muscles glistening with water and sunlight. His head cast up to the shower spray.
He’s pumping his hips, his thick erection in his fist.
He is such a beautiful man I could probably come by just staring at his body. Just by staring at him like this. Oh god. He’s ripped, and cut. As for his beautifully proportionate cock…
He’s uncut. And he’s fully extended. Raw, glorious. My throat feels thick, I have trouble swallowing.
Tahoe Roth.
My guy friend. And THE SEXIEST THING ON THE PLANET.
My body reacts so violently I feel pain at the tips of my nipples, between my legs, in my chest, all across my skin.
My skin that suddenly wants those big hands to be stroking…me.
I think I make a sound, and he turns his head to look at me. For an awkward second we both stare. He leans his free arm on a nearby tree branch that I suppose is meant to shelter him from view.
Which it doesn’t. Not one bit.
And I cannot take my eyes off him.
His eyes are so wild, they look almost unholy. “Join me.”
“You…” I shake my head.
He releases his cock and steps forward. Naked and unashamed. I’m wet between my legs, and my stomach is full of stupid butterflies.
I take a step back. “There’s no way I’m joining you.”
He pauses, and I take in every line of muscle on his chest and his dark nipples. Rivulets of water trail down to the squares of his abs and down the V of muscle on his hips and he’s…so very huge and so very hard!
He’s looking at me so casually, as if he takes showers with his female friends all the time.
I turn around and flee.
The main house is empty, but a huge buffet remains set up for latecomers. I grab a plate with shaky hands, struggling to rid my mind of Tahoe’s body.
When Tahoe appears, I almost drop the plate, flustered as I set it down.
His hair is wet from his shower and a pair of navy swim trunks hang low on his hips, a V of muscle visible just above the drawstring. He heads straight toward me, tugs me behind a thick stone column and smiles. “Hey.”
I’m struggling not to sound breathless. “I didn’t see that.”
“Yeah, you did. You couldn’t get enough.”
“Not true.” I glance downward at my sandals.
He chuckles.
“Hey,” he tips my chin, “nothing wrong with that.”
“I know.”
“So…”
“So I can’t unsee it, that’s what.”
“I don’t want you to unsee it.”
“Tahoe,” I grit, “someone is going to hear you and I don’t want to deal with questions I don’t have the answers to.”
“I like you flustered.”
“You can’t get me flustered. I won’t let you.”
“Why not?”
“Because.”
“You aren’t flustered right now?” he dares, taunting me.
“No. I’m embarrassed because I shouldn’t have seen that.”
“And yet you couldn’t stop looking. I really like how naughty you are.”
“I…” I push him.
He laughs.
I kick his ankles, trying to hide how flustered I am with mock anger.
He kicks me back playfully, dropping onto a nearby lounge seat, stretching back and crossing his arms.
Giving up the act and knowing he’s too smart not to know that he seriously affected me, I sit down next to him and sigh.
He tugs on my ponytail. “I like this. You look cute,” he says.
I pry my ponytail free. “Trent likes my hair down and flat-ironed,” I say.
I think I sound bitter because Tahoe frowns, his eyes becoming stormy in an instant.
“Do you want breakfast?” I ask, distracting him.
He eyes the buffet table with a mischievous glimmer in his eye. “Let’s do it.”
He pats my butt to get me going, and he follows close, standing right behind me as we both help ourselves to the offerings. He starts to playfully take some of my pieces.
“There’s a million croissants in the basket, why do you want mine?” I chide.
“Because it has my name written on it.” He steals another pastry from my plate. So I steal something from his in return.
“That’s my apple, Regina. Do you want a bite of my apple?” His eyes twinkle even when he scowls down at me.
“Only because you stole my croissant.”
We do this all along the length of the buffet until we each end up with basically a plate full of what the other had chosen.
We end up breakfasting on warm croissants, fruit, and sugary churros.
I can’t help the queasy feeling in my stomach as we eat in comfortable silence.
When I say comfortable, I’m of course excluding the queasy feeling in my stomach. And the occasional thoughts of how beautiful he looks and how beautiful he looked just now, my T-Rex in the wild.
We munch on churros and seem to lick our lips far more than usual to get all the specks of sugar outside our mouths.
The queasy feeling is still there as we head to the beach and I drop down to tan next to Trent and Rachel. Tahoe disappears for a few minutes, then comes back wearing a wet suit that hugs every muscle and plane, and hops on one of the WaveRunners.
“Trent? Want to join?” Saint asks. “There’s gear in the shed and a jet ski just for you.”
Trent leaps to his feet and heads out with the guys, leaving us girls to tan. I notice Tahoe actually starts showing Trent how to use the WaveRunner.
He towers over Trent unashamedly, and Trent is obviously a bit awkward with the WaveRunner when he climbs on top, but Tahoe is being patient and easygoing, treating Trent like just one of the guys.
When Tahoe says something that sends Trent into a roar of laughter, the queasy feeling returns full force.
The fact that Tahoe is man enough to show my boyfriend the ropes, even when I sense he doesn’t like him much, makes my admiration for T-Rex grow.
QUEASY FEELING OF RECOGNITION
By the next day, I recognize the queasy feeling in my stomach. The same one I felt when I stood staring at Paul with my toothbrush in my mouth. It’s the sensation of caring too much about a guy and fearing that not only can he hurt you, but he is going to.
That he’s already hurting you.
That he’s standing right in the middle of you and a nice guy who you could have something real with. So when we all sit down for breakfast, I avoid him by sitting in the seat farthest away. Then when everyone heads to the pool, I play a game of staying out of the water whenever he goes in, and taking a dip as soon as he gets out.
Finally he catches me that afternoon in the sunlit library as I sit on a window bench with a book.
“What’s up with you?” He fills the doorway completely and he sounds vaguely puzzled.
“Nothing.”
“Nothing’s up with you, so why aren’t you out with us?” He seems genuinely confused.
“I’m reading.”
He wants to know what I’m reading. The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah. We start arguing over why I thought it was a good idea to read now.
“Are you avoiding me, Regina?”
“Wha—” I sputter and set the book down. “No, absolutely not. In fact, I was going to hit some balls at the tennis court just now.” I leap out of my window seat and take advantage of him having walked
into the room, unblocking the exit, to breeze through the doorway.
He follows me to the mudroom and scoops up a tennis racket after I do, smacking it gently on my rump. “Let’s go.”
CLUBBING
I didn’t beat him in tennis, but the exercise helped release some of the sexual tension that has been building in me since I saw him shower. He didn’t get tired like I did, but he seemed to enjoy teasing me and making me run after the ball—watching me with a half a smirk on his face and thoughtful eyes.
We ended up playing four sets, and then I went back to shower. The thought of him naked in the shower was replaced with thoughts of him smashing the hell out of the tennis ball—which is somehow equally disturbingly sexy. But at least the knot in my stomach lessened some. Because we laughed and teased again—friendly, as usual.
We’re supposed to meet everyone at a club downtown.
As Trent and I arrive and give our names to the bouncer, we’re allowed inside and we both head toward a large VIP area at the back that consists of four booths facing each other.
I instantly spot Tahoe.
Tahoe’s smile freezes when he sees me. His eyes run over me in my red cocktail dress, once, twice, three times, and then a woman taps his shoulder. He takes a quick swig of his beer and turns, ducking his head to listen to something she has to say, scraping a restless hand over his jaw.
I’ve seen him with women a thousand times, so I don’t understand why this time makes me uncomfortable. I especially don’t understand it when Trent is so sweetly holding my hand.
“Roth,” Trent interrupts and greets him.
“Davis.” Tahoe doesn’t look at me as he grabs and shakes Trent’s hand.
His lips curl the barest fraction as he glances in my direction, but his stare is dark and he’s deathly quiet, not speaking a word to me at all.
What’s going on?
Are we not friends anymore?
What did I do wrong?
“Come on, let’s get you something to drink.” Trent leads me to the bar and we watch as the server makes me a cocktail. We sit at the bar with our drinks, avoiding the crowded dance floor, but past my shoulders, I keep looking at Tahoe with an awful feeling in my chest. He didn’t tease me. He didn’t even say hi.
Through the corner of my eye, I watch Tahoe move to join Saint, Callan, and Emmett in their booth. A bottle of beer in his hand, his features scrunched into a thoughtful frown as he stares at the liquid. He alternates between taking a swig of his beer, and staring into the bottle as if it holds the answer to the most pressing mystery.
Tahoe is always the guy who’s laughing. But tonight I notice the absence of his laughter.
Our eyes meet again, and his eyes are dark and stormy and I feel the storms raging inside me too. I remember the Pier.
Until this moment I hadn’t realized how much I missed that with him. How I kind of wish I was over there, just so I could tease him or talk to him. How I kind of want to be sure that we’re still as close as I thought we were yesterday. But there’s this huge feeling of restlessness in me, as if things are changing and I don’t know how to change them back.
Wasn’t this trip supposed to be about me getting closer to Trent? a little voice inside my head asks.
But now all I can think of is why Tahoe isn’t smiling and why he’s not even trying to tease me. He’s so….hard to read. Tahoe can be smiling, but his eyes can be SO dark you could get lost in that gaze. I find myself always thinking of him and the shadows that I see, as well as the smiles he flashes that make the shadows vanish completely.
I’ve often sensed that his public persona is meant to keep anyone from looking too closely. I’m the only one who really looks. No, not true, many people look. He’s this beast of a modern Viking, of course everyone looks. But am I the only one who really sees that behind the smile there is something more?
And yet tonight he’s not even bothering with the smile, he’s not even trying to have fun. It’s as if he’s not interested.
Did I do something wrong?
As if reading my mind, I watch Tahoe studiously take in Trent before he takes me in next, his Nordic-blue eyes looking up and down my red dress again, and beads of sweat form on my neck under his gaze and I run a hand through my hair, self-conscious.
The same girl taps his shoulder once more and they begin to chat, and I see his mouth flip into a smile.
Again I wish I was over there standing with him, listening to whatever it is he’s saying to her that finally made his dimple show. I can still see his profile and a smile linger on his lips, but I wonder if his eyes are a part of that smile or if they remained dark and mysteriously thoughtful, like they just were with me.
I shake the thought away, finish my drink, and ask Trent to dance with me.
I dance all my confusions and frustrations of the night away, never once looking at anyone else, worrying about anyone else, just letting myself get lost in me.
* * *
I’m relieved when we take a break and decide to sit down at the bar, and as if the alcohol has broken whatever barrier stood between us, Tahoe comes to sit beside me while Trent chats up Tahoe’s redhead. The moment Tahoe sits, we’re inundated with waiters, all offering us drinks and anything that we want.
I can tell that Callan’s date is delighted with Tahoe. She tells him he has the smile of a lady-killer and that she likes his dimple.
Tahoe laughs and tells her that his mother dropped him on a rock when he was very young.
I kick his ankles, telling him he’s shameless.
He kicks mine back and says that I love it.
Sandy goes back to Callan, but not before shooting Tahoe an air kiss.
“You totally charmed her,” I say, playfully chiding.
He winks mischievously, which fills me with happiness and relief that everything is fine and perhaps the tension between us was all in my head, then he reclaims his drink from my hands and smiles as he leans back.
When his date comes to his side, I find I can’t stand to watch her cuddle up to him. I mingle all night until my feet start killing me and the alcohol starts messing with my motor skills.
I guess I know that I should stop drinking, but I’m finally starting to relax and I’m too determined to have fun tonight to stop myself.
* * *
I wake up disoriented a couple of hours later and realize that I’m lying on a couch in a room with open windows that allow the moonlight inside. The clock on my cell says 4:14 a.m. I have no idea when I fell asleep, but I quickly realize that someone brought me into the main building of the Carmichael house.
There’s a platinum watch on the coffee table. An eerily familiar cell phone.
I move, and some sort of coverlet rustles over me. Panic seizes me because I don’t know how I got here. I leap off the couch, search for my shoes—which I find nearby—and slip them on. It’s quiet outside so I assume everyone is gone, but as I peer out the windows to the terrace, I realize it’s not in fact completely silent. I hear a female voice, and the low rumble of a man’s voice outside.
It’s Tahoe’s voice, Tahoe and some…girl. His date.
I should’ve known he couldn’t stay away from floozies too long. A woman sits by his side on a long ivory couch. The last thing I want is to see them make out so I guess alerting them to my presence is best.
“Hey,” I say awkwardly.
Tahoe’s head turns at the sound of my voice.
“Hey,” he says, concerned. He unwinds his arms from the back of the couch and slowly rises to full height. “You were pretty wasted back there. You feeling alright?”
I don’t know…
Because his black shirt is partly unbuttoned, revealing a good patch of smooth, tanned muscle. His lips are a little swollen, and for some reason my eyes leap to the woman’s face simply to verify that it’s probably a hint of her lipstick that he’s wearing.
I swallow thickly, wondering if sadness is a side effect of alcohol.
I run my ha
nd over my hair, trying to tame it. I haven’t checked my makeup but since the woman facing me is so perfect, I wish I had.
The woman follows him to his feet, asking curiously, “Are we having a second, Tah?”
“She’s a friend. Her boyfriend asked me to bring her home when she passed out in the booth and he wanted to stay for another round.”
I search my memory to confirm his explanation, but it’s blank. But that same little feeling of rejection that I sometimes get from my parents, as if I’m not good enough to waste time on, drops like a dull little stone in my gut.
“I’m ready to go to my villa,” I whisper.
Tahoe briskly reaches out to the coffee table for his cell phone and watch. “I’ll take you.”
“I’ll go too,” the girl chirps.
The redhead walks with us down the sand, and although I try to hang back, Tahoe won’t let me. He wraps a gentle arm around my waist to keep me steady. I keep looking at his face as he stares down at me too. His blue eyes are clear, so I guess he’s not drunk, but he looks intensely thoughtful. His face is bronzed by the sun, and I can’t stop staring at how the scruff of his beard gives him an even manlier look.
The redhead puts her hand on his other shoulder. “So how did you two meet?” she asks, trying to get his attention.
“Long time ago,” Tahoe says.
“We met through the Saints,” I say.
I unwind myself from his comforting arms and point to my villa. “This is me.”
“I’ll walk you.” He holds my waist again and leads me up to the terrace doors. I check to see that they’re unlocked, and they are. I slide one open only an inch, then whirl around and hear myself slurredly beg him, “Stay. Stay and talk to me.”
He looks at me in the moonlight, studying my face as if I just punched him.
I laugh, then shake my head. “I’m sorry, I’m…drunk. I think.”
He leans me against the window firmly, raising his brows in warning. “Let me let her in the room. I’ll meet you out here, all right?”