by Wanda Edmond
The tote Kristina had she filled with a small brochure she took outside the hotel next to her Jackie Collins novel. Kristina was eager to get out and about and see many different kinds of architectural styles and sights of the city.
Kristina got about as far as the coffee shop. The Tango Tango café was perched over a boardwalk that led to an inlet near the shore. The shop’s colorful green, orange, and pink storefront caught Kristina’s eye. The bold fuchsias and ambers reminded Kristina of the art courses she took during college. She would have pursued art like her brother Ian had, but the supplies and gallery tours were more than her measly school discounts could handle.
Kristina hopped inside the coffee shop and she saw giant landscapes of Miami and portraits that were made by some of the locals. She was surprised her brochure said that some of the locals were from NYC, her birth town. Kristina looked at the entrance around the coffee shop. Every seat was filled to capacity. Yep, the café was a definite win.
A server greeted Kristina and Kristina asked for a caramel espresso latte. She noticed the server had a strange look on her face. The server rushed up to a barista and she pointed at Kristina.
The barista rounded the coffee bar and he joined the server. They approached Kristina and they had huge smiles on their faces.
“Welcome to Tango Tango!”
Kristina took a step back, clutching her tote close to her. “Did I do something?” Kristina asked softly.
“You certainly have!” The lady server took Kristina and she led her outside the coffee shop.
Kristina went with her, wondering what she had done wrong.
The barista followed and he pointed to a large sign above an awning. “Miss, you are our very important guest.”
Kristina looked up at the signage. “Tango, Tango, 1,000,000,000 Winner!”
“Si,” the older barista said. “You are our lucky one millionth customer!”
A camera crew surrounded the Tango Tango coffee shop. Oodles of passersby and people from the shop huddled at the café windows and around Kristina.
Kristina found herself staring into the wind cover of a microphone.
“This is Gabby Wendez, from Chanel 11 News. How does it feel to be the one millionth winner of free coffee for life?”
Kristina was overwhelmed.
“I, I don’t know what to say—.”
The barista shook Kristina’s hand. “I am Nacho Richards, owner of Tango Tango!”
Nacho took Kristina’s hands and he and the lady server loaded Kristina’s hands with bags of his specialty coffees. Kristina gave her name to the newswoman when she was prompted.
“Kristina Layne-Knight, how does it feel to be the instant winner of the luxury life?” Gabby asked.
“Well, amazing!” Kristina was bowled over by the escapade.
“That is not all—.” Nacho handed Kristina a giant rectangular poster.
Kristina fought to keep her balance holding the poster board and the coffees in her arms.
Cameras from photographers flashed and the TV camera rolled.
“We have another gift for you.” Nacho tried to hand Kristina a business-sized envelope but Kristina’s hands were full.
Nacho propped the envelope under Kristina’s chin.
“You have won a complementary spa and massage at the posh Sur Elegante! You will stay two weekends, and have food and spa treatments, courtesy of Tango Tango and yours truly. Nacho Richards, owner of Tango Tango!”
Nacho looked at Kristina, his eyes wide. The server began to clap and everyone started to cheer.
Kristina blinked her eyes, trying to smile cutesy for the photographers and the TV camera.
“Another outside townie gets a dream come true in the bright lights of Miami. This is Gabby Wendez, for Chanel 11, Miami—.”
*****
Ian Hastings-Knight saw the news on the web. A beautiful promotions assistant from out of town won the local coffee splurge. Ian had just finished his meeting with the city council. His company Knightware had agreed to feature at the city’s TimeSoft convention. Software creators and businesses from around Miami and the coast were scheduled to attend.
His productivity suite improved people’s performance whether they worked or played. His software ’Knightarmor’ was entering its fifth iteration.
When Ian had started his programmer specs, he’d never expected his creation would do so wonderfully. Ian had added programming to his painting and sculpture work so he could pay the bills. Three years later, and Ian’s software had been touted by his peers as a runaway success.
Ian sat in her handcrafted black leather chair and he set his saddle oxfords on his window ledge. The online news he read on his laptop had his unbridled attention. He read the Tango Tango winner was from Georgia.
Ian straightened, his long legs stretched around his desk in the penthouse floor of a luxury hotel as he reread the news item.
Could it be her? Ian picked up his phone and he dialed an airline.
“This is Ian Knight. Put me through to Jeb Ryan. That’s right, the airline CEO.”
“Jeb, ‘Hi’. This is Ian.
Ian scrolled through the news covering Tango Tango. He found the news clip of the winning girl.
“Jeb can you get me the list of the passengers arriving in Miami over the past two days? Great. Yep. I’ve got your tickets to the Opera and to the Convention at Will Call. My pleasure. See you at both digs.”
An hour later Ian scanned the itinerary of the passenger lists that usually were only privy to the airline.
Ian sat back in his chair, his dark brown hair clipped at his nape, and his large, artist hands, trembling. He had spent the past few years molding himself into a powerful businessman and innovator. Yet none of his money could help him find the woman he had been searching for until he’d watched a local Miami news roll.
Ian played the clip by the Chanel 11 reporter and he cranked up the volume on his laptop.
‘Kristina Layne-Knight, how does it feel to be the instant winner of the luxury life?’
Ian looked at the young woman he hadn’t seen in a lifetime.
Ian paced his top floor office, his lanky six-four body coiled, and ready to act. He slumped into his leather chair and he rubbed his hands over her eyes.
He had found her. Ian had seen his stepsister, Kristina, and she was more beautiful than Ian remembered.
Chapter 7
The way Ian had to leave Kristina, was as cold and calculated as the businessman he had become.
Ian had left when Kristina’s mother Lynne had heard Ian confess his affections for Kristina. He had been talking out loud to himself, when she insisted he stay away from Kristina, and Ian had tried. He had tried truly.
His and Kristina’s connection had simply been too strong. Too much of a catalyst, a spark, that fanned to flame each time they were near one another.
Kristina’s mother Lynne had tried to convince Ian that the feelings he felt for Kristina were temporary. She said they were nothing more than a ‘crush’.
Ian replayed the online footage of his stepsister, his love.
Ian couldn’t forget the fateful night he and Kristina had shared.
That night changed Ian’s life and his very soul—and he’d hoped Kristina’s life had changed magically too, forever.
*****
The waves along the coast at Sur Elegante soothed Kristina aching soul. She had let herself feel too deeply about her life. Sometimes life overwhelmed; or maybe she wanted too much from all of it.
Kristina opened the blue and white box her friend Jasmine had given her. Jasmine told Kristina not to open the box until she was in Miami. Kristina meant to do what Jasmine said. She had been so wound up from work, she had forgotten all about the tiny package.
When Kristina took her plane seat and buckled in, the plane rose, and Kristina could see the world below as she sailed through the sky. She couldn’t remember when she felt so at peace, and so free.
Kristina let her head
rest against the plane seat and she went out like a light. A stewardess had to wake her window seat so she could tell her they were in Miami.
Kristina sat at the outside lounge seats at the spa. She had checked in, and she was told her complementary stay was not for two weekends. Kristina learned she had won two whole weeks.
The thought of her spending her vacation at a spa and not a low-end hotel that doubled as a hostel was bliss.
*****
Kristina had picked up her things, jaunted to Sur Elegante, and was given a corner bungalow that had a side view of the coast. Being outside was what Kristina truly wanted. She was indoors for the better parts of her work days.
Suddenly felt like a debutante, sulking in at a resort, like she didn’t have a friend in the world. She had just won two weeks of indulgence, dammit. What was wrong with her?
The blue and white box was tied with blue and white ribbon.
Kristina untied the ribbon, wanting to turn it into a keepsake. The wind gusted and it lifted the ribbon into the air. Kristina grabbed at the ribbon and the air pushed it high and over the sand where it drifted onto the sea.
“There must really be something good in this box.” Kristina lifted the flap tucking the contents inside of the box.
Kristina held the necklace to the light. A long silver dolphin hung from a silver-platinum chain. The dolphin had a tiny rhinestone where it should have had an eye.
“Oh, how beautiful.”
Kristina had told Jasmine how much she loved dolphins. They were one of the few mammals Kristina knew about who mated for life; but after the terrible thing she did, how could she believe she had the right to be happy?
Kristina unclasped the necklace, thinking she wanted to wear with her stepfather’s pendant with a “K”.
She changed her mind.
Kristina bent in her stone washed hand-me-down jeans and she wrapped the chain twice around her left ankle. She clasped the necklace so the pendant with the dolphin hung near her dainty foot. Kristina sat in the balmy air, admiring the gift her friends Jasmine, Suki, and her coworkers had given her. The pendant they’d bought couldn’t have been cheap. From what Kristina could guess, the necklace probably cost them a pretty penny.
Kristina’s hand-me-down jeans she wore still fit her like a glove. Kristina hadn’t realized she had grabbed the pair in her mad rush to catch her flight. When she unpacked, she found them and she wasn’t surprised they wore perfectly. Kristina had trouble putting on weight. It was probably the reason why she hadn’t been able to think about getting pregnant.
The warm air lifted Kristina’s hair. She looked out at sea, wondering if she would ever be able to have a child. Right now, she didn’t know if she wanted the responsibility. Or telling a loved one that true love was strictly for fairy tales.
Chapter 8
The massage Kristina won was a nightmare.
The masseuse didn’t know anything about pressure points, and he slathered oil into Kristina’s hair and between her buttocks, like she was a piece of chicken about to be fricasseed.
Kristina had told the spa direction what had happened.
“I apologize for any discomfiture,” the tiny spa diva Chemise said.
Chemise related the masseuse was new and that he was actually the son of her sister.
“You do what you can to help family. He had to pass an exam before I’d let him near any pretty women like you,” Chemise whispered.
Kristina laughed. “That’s okay. I can say without a doubt a massage was never on my lists of chores in any of my foster homes.”
Chemise pulled out a set of card keys. “You are a doll, thanks. These cards are to our premier suites. Your room is on the corner. I’ve got a bird’s-eye view of the beach and the water. I can have your belongings changed to the suite, and you can try one of our coconut freezes, on the house”
“Coconut freeze?”
“Yes. A pineapple and coconut blend made with coconut milk, and frozen into ice shavings. I’ve had one. Tastes like an ICEE with Almond Joy candy. I’d have them every day if I didn’t teach yoga weekends on the shore. You should come to one of my classes.”
“Thanks, maybe I will,” Kristina smiled.
“I can’t believe some young man hasn’t scooped you up like he is Tarzan, and you’re his Jane.”
Kristina took her card key and she grinned. “When you see Tarzan, tell him he is three years late.”
“This is Miami honey, love is part of the air.” Chemise said with an impish grin.
*****
Kristina’s body felt like it was turned into a thousand knots.
The masseuse had kneaded her skin into more kinks than Kristina had before she left Georgia for the gorgeous sun of Miami.
The roar from the sea lured Kristina to the shore. Kristina thought about Ian. She hated how her mother had told Ian to stay away.
Kristina was the one who had told her she had feelings for Ian. Her mother had no right to tell her how to live her life or what to do.
Frustrated by her past, Kristina shrugged off her skinny jeans. The white bikini top and bottom she wore glinted softly in the setting sun. She left her hotel card key with her jeans and she raced to meet the waves.
The water felt warm over her achy flesh. Kristina could see her new room from the shoreline. She was at private beach at a private spa. She was also alone and no one was around that she could see.
Kristina reached around her back. She slipped her bikini top over her head and she threw it onto the wet sand near the water undertow. The sea water tickled her nipples as she bobbed up and down in the surf. She wondered if anyone could see she was behaving naughtily.
Kristina closed her eyes and she tried to image her secret lover. She’d always wanted one. When she’d tried to conjure images of a faceless man, he was always tall and dark-haired. He would take her by her long mane and he’d force her to have wild and unbidden sex with him. Kristina dipped under the water. She swirled around in the waves, hoping the salty brine of the water would help to clear her head from the guilt and titillation she continued to feel.
“You should be more careful in front of whom you undress—.”
Kristina popped her head up from beneath her waves. She thought her vision was blurred from the seawater. The tall man standing in khakis wearing a white Alligator shirt looked too familiar. The only people she knew other than the spa manager-owner Chemise, and Nacho, from Tango Tango, would have been—. Kristina shook her head.
Kristina dived into the waves swimming a little further out into the ocean. She had swum out far enough so the man couldn’t see she was naked.
“Oh yeah? Why is that?” Kristina called, bouncing bare-breasted in the waves.
The man she thought she saw couldn’t be who she thought. Kristina told herself to never have another coconut ICEE with liquor, ever.
“Because somebody might have to come in and get you—.”
Kristina watched the fantastically tall and good-looking man undo his pants. She watched him step out of his slacks and her eyes widened. He was dark-haired and tanned from his head to toes, except for a small patch of light skin around his lean hips. He stood with his hands on his hips in the sand barefoot, looking like some kind of ancient sun god. Kristina could see from the distance he was massively endowed.
She didn’t know why she did it, but suddenly Kristina felt bold. She was in Miami, lounging at a spa, and doing things she’d normally never consider. Her body felt loads better after soaking in the early evening sun. The pale from dusk cast a warm glow over her surprise rescuer.
“What are you, some sort of lifeguard?” Kristina gulped a mouthful of seawater and she made a fountain of water in the air.
“I’m the only one you’ll ever need.”
The tall man rushed the breakwater and he dipped his long muscled body into the sea.
Chapter 9
Kristina panicked. The man was swimming towards her, and he was nude. She had torn off her bikini top,
thinking she had privacy. The man had appear from nowhere, and now he was swimming towards her, and he would reach her in a minute.
Kristina swam for the shore. Her long blonde hair trailed after her like a shimmering golden fleece only an Argonaut would dare to claim.
“Hey, where are you going?”
Kristina swam past her rescuer and she picked up her bikini top near the water, slogging through the west sand, trying to make her way toward the private beach.
