I would kill myself right now if I was guaranteed to be immediately reincarnated as that towel. “Uh-huh.”
“You get breakfast?”
“I did. Thank you for your concern.”
“You should go for a swim—in half an hour, of course. The water’s amazing.”
“Of course. I intend to.”
“You just gonna stand there like a narc?” she asks while obnoxiously toweling off every inch of her amazing body.
“Actually…” I say as I pull my phone out from my pocket, “I’m going to stand here and listen to this.” I tap the voice memo and point the speaker in her direction. Because this phone and that recording are the only things keeping me from dropping to my knees and begging her to marry me right now.
The expression of shock and horror on her face do nothing to make her look any less gorgeous and sexy, but at least I’m getting some kind of a reaction from her. She covers her mouth. “Shut up.”
“I wish you could have.”
“Oh my God! There must be something wrong with me!”
Not that I can see.
“Turn it off! Turn it off!”
I turn it off.
“Oh no! I’m so sorry. Keaton! Why didn’t you wake me up?”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“You should have woken me up.”
“You would have murdered me.”
“I can’t believe you didn’t try to smother me with a pillow.”
“I don’t think it would have helped. Maybe don’t drink so much alcohol today. See if that changes things.”
She laughs. “I’ll do my best to abstain. Oh my God. Keaton, I’m really sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Actually, it’s so much worse now that she’s actually being nice about it.
She finishes drying herself off, then arranges her towel on top of the chaise lounge, and then arranges herself on top of the towel. She puts her sunglasses on and looks around at Aimee and Bernie, who are snuggling up to their husbands. Finally, she reaches down into her beach bag, pulls out a bottle of sunscreen, and glances up at me. “Um, would you mind getting my back?” she asks almost apologetically.
I take the sunscreen from her. If this is her way of apologizing for last night, then I accept. Ohhhhh, I accept. I can’t form words right now, but yes.
She scooches forward to make room for me on the chaise lounge behind her. I take in a deep breath and situate myself so that I have full access to the backside of her upper body. I sweep the ends of her damp hair over one shoulder. She reaches back to hold her hair up, and our fingers touch for a brief electric moment. I use my fingertip to swipe a few stray hairs away, and I can’t help but note the way she shivers.
She clears her throat. “If you could get to it before the sun goes down, that would be great.”
“You want this done right or not?”
“There’s no wrong way to apply sunscreen to someone’s back.”
“There’s a right way to do it when the right guy is doing it.”
She guffaws. “Okay, let’s not turn this into a thing.”
I squeeze a quarter-size amount of the lotion onto the palm of my hand. It smells like cocoa butter and sex and being slowly castrated by my best friend, who’s watching me from twenty feet away. Fuck him—I would gladly sacrifice both balls for this woman. I place my hand flat on her back between her shoulder blades and stroke slowly in an upward circular motion. Her skin is smooth and warm and alive beneath my hand, and I just need three hours alone with her in our cottage and then I’m done.
I apply more lotion to her shoulders and the back of her neck, almost up to her hairline, and then I drag my fingers down her spine to unhook the bra hook closure, quickly, before she can protest. She gasps and lets her hair drop back down, using her hands to hold the front of her bikini in place.
“No one’s lookin’ but me, darlin’, and I can only see your back.”
She shifts around, stretches her legs out straight in front of her, and I can’t see it, but I know she’s squeezing her thighs together.
There’s a right way to do this, Roxy Carter, and I’m doing it to you right now.
I use both hands to massage the sunscreen into her lower back and hips until she groans quietly, realizes she just groaned, straightens up, and says, “Okay, I think I’m good.” She swallows hard.
“You need me to get the backs of your legs?”
“Nope. Thanks.”
I fasten the clasp on her back, make sure everything’s in place, and wipe my hands on her towel. “You’re welcome.”
I need to get out of here before I start singing “Your Body is a Wonderland” and weeping.
I stand up and remove my shirt, stretch my arms up in the air. I don’t hear anyone applauding, but I just need a good hour or two of sun, and then I’ll be golden. Literally. “Think I’ll go for a walk on the beach.”
“Are you wearing sunscreen?” Because of the sunglasses, I can’t see the hearts in her eyes as she checks out my naked torso, but I’m confident that they’re there.
“No. I’ll be fine.”
“Absolutely not, young man. Get back down here.” She grabs the bottle of sunscreen, bends her knees, and signals for me to take a seat in front of her, but no.
Nope.
Just. No.
I’m getting out of here while I still have the upper hand.
I would rather risk a sunburn than risk trying to kiss her and blurting out “I love you” while she caresses my shoulders.
“I’m good,” I say. “Thanks, though.”
I walk away, down to the beach, leaving her wanting more, leaving myself with a little dignity and a semi that is nobody’s business but my own.
10
Roxy
Idiot.
He’s a fairly adorable idiot, but an idiot, nonetheless.
I told him he needed sunscreen, but he didn’t listen, and now my fake boyfriend is moping at the cottage with bright-pink shoulders.
I’m standing at the bar of the restaurant with Aimee. The four of them are going to have lunch here, but I’m ordering takeout for two. For myself and my idiot fake boyfriend. He’s got good hands and he knows how to use them, but his brain is just not working today. That may be my fault, and I might feel a tiny bit guilty about it.
“We’re going to check out the live band and go dancing after dinner tonight,” Aimee says. “Before Game Night. You’re coming to that, right?”
I wrinkle my nose. “Game Night, sure, but probably not the dancing.”
Aimee gives me a knowing look. “It’s not that kind of dancing.”
“That’s not why I don’t want to go.” I’m not a good dancer, okay? You’d think I would be, because you know—good on the dance floor equals good in bed, right? And I’m good in bed. But for some reason I’ve never progressed beyond that Junior High-Molly Ringwald-in-The Breakfast Club kind of dance move. Aimee saw it in college, and I’ve managed to avoid all potential dance-related situations since then. And I will be avoiding this situation because I do not need to be sharing a bed and dirty dancing with Keaton Bridges.
“Okay,” she says, even though she totally thinks I’m just embarrassed about how I dance, but that is not it. “But you’ll definitely come to Game Night? It should be fun.”
“What is it, Charades or something?”
“I’m not sure exactly. Couples games? Teams?”
“Greeeaaaat.”
“You guys really do look cute together,” she says.
I scoff at that. “Sure we do.”
“You do. For what it’s worth.” She shrugs.
I bite my lower lip and then say, “He ran into Tamara’s brother at the airport yesterday.”
“I know. Chase told me. Poor guy.”
“You think he’s still hung up on her?”
She shakes her head. “No. Definitely not. I just think it’s a blow to his ego. He needs someone else to focus his energy on. He’s really sweet.”
He actuall
y is, isn’t he?
“If you say so.”
Aimee smacks her lips together and says, “So you guys are just going to hang in your room for a while?”
“Yeah, I’m gonna see if they have any aloe vera at the front desk or something.”
“For Keaton?”
“Yeah.”
“Awww, Roxy. That’s sweet.”
“No it isn’t. It’s not anything.”
“Okay.” She grins. “If you say so.”
I carry our picnic basket of takeout food, dishes, and cutlery, going by the front desk on my way back. “Keaton already has a sunburn,” I say, rolling my eyes.
The lady points out all of the aloe vera plants that grow along the sides of the path and in the garden beds around the property. “You are welcome to them. But here, take this for your boyfriend,” she says, handing me a big, plump aloe leaf that has already had the serrated edges and the top skin removed.
I giggle, for no reason other than it’s so funny to hear Keaton referred to as my boyfriend. Giggling is stupid, and I’ve done it so many times since yesterday. I’m not even tipsy right now.
I can hear Keaton moaning from outside the front door, and not in a sexy way.
“I’m back, you big baby.”
He is lying facedown on the bed. He looks up at me and winces. “It hurts when I turn my neck.”
“I brought lunch. And aloe vera.”
“Aloe vera?”
“Yeah, it’s fresh. For your sunburn.”
He grunts. “Thanks,” he says into the mattress. “I’ll do it.”
“Do what?”
“Apply it to my shoulders.”
“You just said it hurts to move your neck.”
“I can do it,” he insists, lying completely still and facedown.
I place the picnic basket on the floor and straddle his back before he even knows what hit him. I hear another muffled grunt, but he doesn’t move. I let the exposed, gooey side of the leaf glide across the skin of his shoulders and upper back. He groans, in the good way. When there’s enough gel on his skin, I gently rub it around with my fingertips.
He’s in better shape than I thought he would be. He isn’t all bulked-up or anything, but he isn’t soft either. He takes care of himself. I wouldn’t exactly say I can’t handle his shirtlessness, but he ain’t bad to look at. Or touch.
“Feel better?”
He lets out a quiet moan. His arms are stretched out straight along his sides, and when I’m moving around to climb off him, his fingers graze my calves. I can’t tell if he did it on purpose or not, but it felt good. I hop off the bed.
“You want to eat, or do you need to sleep?”
“Mmmph” is his answer.
“Okay, well, it’s a sandwich, so you can eat it later.”
I eat my sandwich on the daybed out on the veranda. I could use a nap myself, but I decide to text my parents to ask them if The Card Game they “invented” for me and my brother is actually Spades.
MOM: Who told you?
DAD: Took you long enough to figure it out, hon.
ME: You said you made it up for Paul and me!
MOM:
ME: No one.
MOM: Well, we can’t wait to hear more about him.
ME: I’m in Antigua right now, btw.
DAD: Where?!
ME: The Caribbean. With Aimee and her husband and a few other friends. It’s a group vacation thing. It’s gorgeous here.
MOM: Roxanne, are you there with a boy?!
ME: Nope. Gotta go! Love you!
DAD: He sounds like trouble to me.
MOM: You say that about all the boys.
DAD: And I’m right every time.
MOM: Don’t listen to him! Have fun. Oh hey, Dad, bring me the big red salad bowl from the dining table.
DAD: Where is it?
MOM: On the dining table. In the dining room.
DAD: I don’t see it.
MOM: OMG never mind. I’ll get it.
ME: You guys. Stop.
MOM: Oh sorry, dear! Have fun!
DAD: Not too much fun.
When I wake up from the nap that I didn’t mean to take and the sex dream that I did not mean to have, Keaton is standing nearby, saying my name quietly, over and over again. Just like he did last night and sort of like he was doing in my sex dream just now but without all the heavy breathing.
“Hey.”
“Hi,” I say, rubbing my eyes and trying to look like someone who totally was not just dreaming about getting plowed by him. “Your shoulders feel better?”
“They really do. I can move and everything. That stuff is magic. Thank you.”
“Good. You’re welcome.”
“Everyone’s heading down for dinner now. You wanna go? They’re going dancing after.”
I sit up. “Actually, I still have half a sandwich. I’m not that hungry. Did you want to go? To the restaurant, I mean. I mean, you can go dancing too, if you want. I’m not going to.”
“Why not?”
I shrug. “I hate dancing.”
“Who hates dancing?”
“I do.”
“That’s insane.”
“If you say so.”
“So you just want to hang out with me in the room for a couple of hours before we go to Game Night?”
“No. I want to hang out in the room for a couple of hours, and you can do whatever you want to do.”
He smiles and shakes his head, looking out at the water and probably wishing he’d brought someone else. “Okay,” he says. “I want to get into this plunge pool. Naked.”
“Go nuts,” I say, getting up. “I’ll be inside. Eating a sandwich and not watching you.”
“Whatever you want.”
“That’s what I want.”
“You’re welcome to join me.”
“I won’t, but thanks.”
I don’t close the doors to the veranda when I go inside, but I do close the curtains.
It’s not my fault that the curtains are so lightweight and it’s definitely not my fault that it’s so breezy right now, but I do take full responsibility for staring at Keaton’s naked butt when he jumps into the plunge pool, because—dayum. It is surprisingly fine.
Damn that rich white ass.
11
Keaton
“It’s a paper—that movie about the newspaper! The one with the Catholics! The one that made me cry!”
“You’re supposed to actually name the title of the movie, Bernie,” I remind her.
Matt is very slowly and carefully drawing what looks like a book on the dry erase board, while quickly drawing out his wife’s crazy.
“Oh, it’s a book!” Bernie yells out.
Matt points at her and calmly says, “Yes.”
“The Notebook!”
Matt shakes his head and signals for her to keep going.
“That actress from The Notebook who was in that movie about the newspaper and the Catholics!”
He keeps pointing at the book and signals for her to keep guessing.
“It’s a movie that’s based on a book? Harry Potter!”
Everyone in the hotel lobby is quietly laughing.
“Give me more clues, oh my God!”
Matt just ignores Bernie while he draws another perfect rectangle on the board. Meanwhile, there’s fifteen seconds left on the timer.
“It’s another piece of paper. Draw faster!”
The rectangle slowly becomes an upright box. Matt draws a perfect circle on it and points to it.
“It’s a ball in a box. It’s—a milk carton?”
Matt signals to her to keep going and keeps pointing at the circle.
“It’s—it’s a carton—a carton of orange juice!”
“Yes!” He draws little dots beside the orange and then points to the orange.
“Orange juice—fruit flies. Pulp? Pu
lp Fiction!”
“Time!” the resort manager calls out just as Matt jumps up and punches the air and then high-fives his wife, picks her up, and twirls her around. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him this animated, and also—holy shit—how did they do that? They were a total disaster, and then all of a sudden—bam. It’s like they were reading each other’s minds or Matt just knew that she’d get it eventually.
I exchange a look with Roxy. We’re up after Chase and Aimee, who are up after these guys, but Matt and Bernie get to keep going and switching off until they blow it. We’ve been watching other couples play Couples Pictionary for the past half an hour—or Couples Win, Lose, or Draw, as Don and Debbie prefer to call it. They’re the oldest couple here, and they went five rounds to win ten points before failing when Don couldn’t figure out Taxi Driver. They nearly got into a brawl over it.
It’s fun, but there’s an undercurrent of real competitiveness because the prize is a free couples massage, and who wouldn’t want that?
Bernie thoroughly erases the upright dry erase board, stretches her fingers, and cracks her neck before reaching into the box to pull out an index card with a movie title on it. She looks very excited, narrows her eyes at her husband, and then says, “Got it!” The big timer gets reset to a one-minute countdown, and Bernie starts to draw…or paint. She’s holding the marker like a paintbrush and doing big strokes and shading.
Matt’s just leaning back in the sofa and grinning at his wife, waiting for her to complete her masterpiece. “It’s a mountain.”
“Yes!” She signals for him to keep guessing.
“Cold Mountain.”
She shakes her head and continues drawing something in front of the mountain.
“Brokeback Mountain.”
She shakes her head.
“Cliffhanger.”
She shakes her head and quickly draws what is clearly a woman with her arms outstretched. She points to the woman and then to the mountain and then draws circles and arrows around the woman.
“It’s a woman and a mountain.”
She smiles and signals for him to keep going but then adds more details to the woman and the mountain. She is a professional painter, so she takes this part of the game very seriously. Meanwhile, all of her friends are laughing at her. She keeps drawing circles around the smiling woman.
The Brooklyn Book Boyfriends Page 69
