Bachelor Games (Tropical Temptation)

by Daire St. Denis

  “Are you meeting up with your lover?” Grace asked, smiling coyly.

  “No. It’s over. It was only a holiday fling.”

  “Well, at least you were getting some.” Grace rifled through the room service menu. “God, I’m starving.”

  “Glad to hear you’re back to your old self.” Becca packed her sunscreen, sunglasses, hat, and book in her beach bag and headed for the door. One more day at the resort before the flight home tomorrow. Only thirty-six more hours that she’d be forced to be in close proximity to Calum Price. She could handle that.

  While he chooses another woman to go to Paris with him, possibly my very own sister.

  Oh yeah, no problem. She was that well-adjusted…

  Right. Becca kicked a wall and then hopped around on one foot, squeezing her toe. She had to stop kicking things while wearing flip-flops.

  Not in the mood for the large buffet, Becca opted to grab an espresso and muffin from the espresso bar adjacent to the main lobby. With book in hand, she went to find a quiet nook to read and eat her breakfast before having to face whatever the day had in store.

  She had only been there for about five minutes before she felt the presence of others hovering around her.

  “Who are you?” Three women squeezed into the nook where she sat beside a flowering tropical plant.

  Becca marked her page and closed her book. “Excuse me?” Becca stood. It was Cindy, Margo, and Tiffany, three of the remaining contestants.

  “There are pictures of you and Calum Price popping up all over.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Cindy shoved her phone in front of Becca’s face. It was a series of grainy pictures of her and Cal on the beach on the day they arrived. Walking and laughing. Kissing.

  “Keep scrolling,” the woman said in a snarky, singsongy voice.

  The next image was of her and Cal talking outside of the barrier after the mud-wrestling competition. The next was a series of them talking and then kissing outside of his villa.

  A headline read “Who is the Mystery Woman Who’s Captured the Attention of Men’s Magazine’s Most Eligible Bachelor?”

  Becca had seen enough.

  Instead of having a massive breakdown, a cool numbness stole over her, making her see everything and everyone exactly as they were. It was like the emotional center of her brain had temporarily shut down to prevent an overload.

  She handed the phone back to the other woman. “So what?”

  “So, I don’t know who you think you are, but you had better back off.”

  “You’re not even a contestant,” Tiffany said. “And, you’re so…” She waved her hand at Becca. “Not pretty.”

  “Fuck you.” Becca pulled her shoulders back and lifted her chin.

  “Excuse me?” Cindy stepped closer, angling her head toward Becca in a threatening way before nudging Becca with her shoulder.

  Oooh. Becca was not in the mood for pushy, skinny, Barbie-doll bitches. She didn’t give a flip that she was outnumbered, and though she had to look up at the three women because they wore three-inch heels, Becca put her hands on her hips and said calmly, “I’m sorry. Why are you threatened by me?”

  “I’m not,” Cindy said.

  “Me, neither,” Tiffany said in a haughty voice.

  Margo scowled.

  “Good, because I’m not threatened by you three, either.” Becca stooped to collect her things before pushing her way between the women. “Good talk, ladies. Good talk.”

  The snide remarks followed her down the path, but Becca walked on, though she could feel the niggling of her emotional center coming to life. It wasn’t until she had turned the corner that things began to sink in. It was high school all over again. Only instead of a few hundred people seeing her in a compromising position, there were a few hundred million…

  Out of nowhere, her stomach rebelled, and she ran for the trees, losing her breakfast in amongst the sweet-smelling hibiscus flowers by the side of the path.

  There was only one man capable of humiliating her to this degree. Kevyn-fucking-Wasinski. Only this time, Becca was afraid he’d truly won.

  …

  Calum rapped firmly on Becca’s door. His erect stature belied the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. When the door swung open, he sucked in a breath, drawing himself even more upright in preparation for facing Becca.

  “Hey, Calum.” Grace smiled broadly, patting her hair into place. “This is an unexpected surprise.”

  “Is Becca here?”

  “Becca?” Grace’s brows drew together in confusion.

  “I need to speak with her, immediately.”

  “She’s not here.”

  “Do you know where she is?”

  “Hmm…the beach, maybe. Or was she going for breakfast first? I can’t remember. Why do you want to talk to her?”

  “You don’t know?”

  “Know what?” Grace asked slowly.

  Oh, shit.

  “Can I come in for a minute?”

  “Sure.” Her voice was too chipper.

  “You’d better sit down.”

  “Calum…?” Grace smiled sweetly. “Are you about to ask me out?”

  Oh God. Cal shook his head. He still didn’t have his phone, so he pointed to the computer that was sitting on the table beside the leftover breakfast dishes. “Turn that on.”

  “Okay.” Grace flipped the top and tapped a password into the computer. The first screen that came up was the last one that had been in use. A spyware app, showing a fuzzy image of the room, and Grace hurriedly shut it down.

  “Don’t worry, Grace. I know.”

  “You know what?”

  “Doesn’t matter. Type my name into a search engine.”

  Her manicured nails clacked on the keyboard, and there it was. Articles, pictures, tweets, memes…the sheer volume of material was growing exponentially.

  Grace surfed through a bunch of it, spending more time looking at the pictures than at the articles. The only sounds she made were soft noises at the back of her throat.

  “So,” she said, pushing the laptop away. “It was you all along. You were her secret holiday fling.”

  “Yes.”

  “And now the whole world knows about you two. And everyone thinks—” She put a hand to her mouth and twisted in her chair toward him. Tears welled up in her eyes and spilled out over her cheeks. “You asshole,” she said, pushing herself to her feet. Then she wound up and slapped him soundly across the cheek.

  Okay. He deserved that. But when Grace went to storm out of the room, he stopped her. He couldn’t let her leave like this. “Wait,” he called, catching her hand and holding on. “Please, Grace. This isn’t over, and I need your help.”

  “And why would I help you?”

  “Because if you don’t, they’re going to ruin your sister.”

  “She’s already ruined.”

  “Oh, no. This isn’t the worst of it.”

  Calum told Grace about the other images that hadn’t been leaked yet, of Becca against the window. “And…there could be others I don’t know about.” Fuck. What if someone had followed them to the hot springs last night?

  “This is bad,” Grace said. “It’s high school all over again.”

  Cal placed a hand on Grace’s shoulder. “I know this must be bringing up a lot of bad memories for you. Becca told me about what happened to you in high school.”

  “To me?” Grace shook her head. “Nothing happened to me—” She paused. “Oh, except I may have dated a couple of losers…but nothing like what happened to Becca.”

  An icy finger touched the back of his neck, spreading frost both up and down his spine. “What do you mean?” he asked slowly.

  “I mean, Becca was big-time pranked by Kevyn in high school. More like cyberbullied. Anyway, he posted sick pictures of her on the internet, and then she created this virus—”

  “Wait.” A chill ran up Cal’s spine. “That happened to Becca? Not to you?�
�

  “Yeah. She was devastated.”

  Holy fuck.

  “And who’s Kevyn?”

  “Wasinski. Though now he’s Kevyn Kahn. Becca’s been terrified he’d recognize her.”

  Holy. Fucking. Shit.

  “So…you’re telling me that the guy who ruined Becca’s life in high school is here and basically doing it all over again.”

  “You think he’s behind this?”

  “Oh, I know he is.”

  “Asshole!”

  “So, will you help me? Please? I really need you onside.”

  “Close enough.”

  “What?”

  “What you said was almost a direct Star Wars quote. So, yeah, I’ll help.” She picked up a letter from the dresser. “But, there’s something I need to do first. And you?” She jabbed him in the chest. “You need to go find Becca.”

  …

  There was only one thing to do. She and Grace had to get the hell off this island. Now. They’d pack their bags, change their flights, and skulk away, and if they were lucky, without anyone noticing. She could only hope that one day, her sister would forgive her for what she’d done.

  Becca’s hand shook as she opened the door to the villa. She called Grace’s name, but no one answered. The breakfast dishes had been left on the table beside the computer, which was open, though sleeping.

  First things first. She had to change their tickets to get them on the first available flight off the island. Becca touched the mouse and then signed in. The images that greeted her took her breath away.

  Grace knew.

  Her head banged the keyboard, and she stayed there, just breathing, while her forehead must have been pressing on the spacebar because something kept dinging.

  Oh. That was her phone.

  She padded to the door where she’d left her beach bag and pulled out her cell. Grace had tried her three times.

  Becca, where are you?

  In the room. You? Becca’s finger shook as she typed.

  Oh, you’re back. You need to meet me. Now. It’s super important.

  Grace, I know you know…

  I know you think you know what I know, but I actually know more.

  What?

  Exactly! Just come. Hurry up. Wear a wig.

  Her sister dropped a pin of her location, and Becca zoomed in. The marina? What the hell was her sister doing at the marina? This day was the absolute worst, her very worst nightmare come to life. No. It was worse than that, because she could never have imagined this scenario, being at the center of the scandal of the century…or at least of the week.

  Oh, she’d had a bad feeling about this trip from the start. She really needed to learn to trust her gut more. Becca found a short blond wig draped over a table lamp, plopped it on her head, fixed her sunglasses over her eyes, and ran for the door.

  Ten minutes later, she was approaching the marina on the south side of the resort. There were mostly fishing boats tied up and a few catamarans. Only one yacht.

  That had to be where her sister was. What the hell was she doing on a yacht? She wasn’t having a secret rendezvous of her own, was she? Maybe it was that Jeffrey Reid, the owner of the resort. Becca sighed. The last thing she needed to worry about was her sister getting whisked off her feet by a sweet-talking, fifty-something playboy.

  Seriously, when it rained, it poured.

  A man in a white nautical uniform walked past and Becca called, “Excuse me, I’m looking for Grace Evans. She’s in a meeting here, I think.”

  “Becca!” Grace hung over a rail on the second level. “I thought I heard you. I’m up here.” She waved for Becca to come up. “Hurry. You’re never going to believe this!”

  The man in the uniform guided her through the main floor of the yacht and up a set of stairs to the upper deck where Grace was indeed being wined and dined by the owner of the resort. By the spread, the location—a multimillion-dollar yacht?—and the way the man gazed at Grace as if she were a rare bird in a private collection, Becca knew her fears were confirmed. This was no “meeting.” This was seduction, pure and simple. Once again, her sister was falling for it.

  With everything going on, Becca did not have time to be saving Grace from another man intent on exploitation.

  “Becca. I’m so glad you’re here.”

  Before Grace had a chance to tell her what an amazing man this Jeffrey Reid was, Becca interrupted her. “Look, Grace, I am so sorry about what happened between me and Cal. I don’t know how or why it happened, but it just did. I never meant to hurt you, and I need you to know that it’s over now. But this”—Becca indicated the man seated across from Grace with a flick her of wrist—“this is not the answer.”

  “Bec—”

  “Grace, he’s old enough to be your father.”

  “You’re right—”

  “You can’t just fall into another man’s arms because you’re hurt. That’s not going to help.”

  Jeffrey Reid stood. “Becca.” His voice was soft and nonconfrontational, which had more of an effect on her than if he’d raised his voice. “I am Grace’s father.”

  “What?”

  “He’s my dad,” Grace said, clapping. “My long-lost dad!”

  Becca collapsed onto the sofa beside Grace. She sat there, mute, as Jeffrey shared the story he’d probably just told Grace. How he hadn’t known their mother was pregnant with Grace when he’d left and had only found out a year ago. How he’d followed Grace on social media and had been desperate to meet her, so he had made sure she was a contestant in the pageant. He’d even upgraded her seat, and since their arrival had been trying to find the right time to tell her who he was.

  “Does our mother know?” Becca asked.

  “I don’t know. I found out about Grace through a mutual friend. I assume your mother had her reasons for never telling me, one of which was probably the fact I left her and never looked back.” He glanced apologetically at Grace. “I was young, looking for adventure. Your mother was looking to settle down.” He shook his head. “Please believe that if I had known, I would have done things differently. Or at least, I’d like to believe I would have.”

  “I believe you,” Grace gushed. “Oh. And it doesn’t matter. You’re here now, and I’ve wondered about who you were and if I’d ever meet you.” She covered her face. “I can’t believe it’s finally happening!”

  “I hope it’s not just a meeting, Grace. I hope we can have a relationship.”

  Suddenly all of Becca’s own problems faded into the distance as she witnessed the tearful poignancy of a father/daughter reunion. Her heart soared for her sister, even while it shattered into a million pieces because of her own situation. She squeezed Grace’s arm before standing. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Reid.”

  “Please, call me Jeffrey.”

  She nodded and smiled before turning to her sister. “I’m going to head back to the room. We need to pack.”

  “Pack? We don’t leave until tomorrow.”

  Glancing at Grace’s father, Becca said in a lower voice, “I can’t stay here, Grace. I just can’t.”

  Grace stood up and pulled Becca in for a hug. “Yes, you can. Find Cal. He’s got a plan.”

  Becca shook her head. “No. I’m leaving on the next flight out. You stay. Do whatever—”

  “Bec, listen to me. You need to talk to Cal, okay? Promise me.” She pulled back and winked. “You owe me after the monumental lie you’ve been keeping from me all week.”

  “Okay.” Becca agreed only so her sister would let her go. She bid farewell to Jeffrey and then, making sure her disguise was still in place, made her way back to the villa, her thoughts in turmoil. On one hand, she was reminded once again why she felt the need to protect her sister. Grace was all goodness. All forgiveness. All love. The excitement with which she met with her biological father, and the total forgiveness she had for him, proved it.

  If only everyone could be as good.

  Becca rounded the corner to the v
illa to find Calum waiting outside, leaning against the wall in the shade.

  “Becca.” He came forward the moment he saw her, hands outstretched. “You need to know I had nothing to do with those photos.”

  “Cal,” she said. “It doesn’t matter. It’s over. Kevyn won this time.” She unlocked the door to the villa and stood in the entrance way. “I’m leaving, Cal, on the next plane out of here.”

  “Really?” He pushed his way past her into the villa. Once the door was closed, he said, “See, the Becca I know doesn’t run from her problems. She doesn’t hide, and she certainly doesn’t walk away without a little payback.”

  “Cal.” She was too tired for this. “What are you talking about?”

  He came toward her, tugged the wig off her head, and carefully removed her sunglasses.

  “The Becca I know stands up for herself. She writes computer viruses on the fly to infect people’s computers if they dare to download pictures of her in compromising positions.”

  She forgot how to breathe. White noise filled her ears as she stared blankly up at Cal.

  “Yes, Bec. I know it was you in high school, and I know it was Kevyn who did it then, and that he’s doing it again now.”

  Her lips quivered. Her chin joined in. It was hard to focus on Cal because he was suddenly in a fishbowl, his face distorted and blurry.

  “Oh, honey.” He pulled her into his arms and held her tight. “But this time, you’re not alone. I’m here.”

  Suddenly, Becca couldn’t take any more. It all came out. All the anguish, the humiliation, the sense of responsibility…the fear of being hurt again.

  “Hey,” Cal pulled back, his gaze so incredibly tender and sweet it made the tears flow even faster. “Listen to me. It’s payback time.”

  Slowly, Becca began to nod.

  “We’re not letting this bastard get away with it again.”

  “No,” she said, sniffing. “But…how?”

  “I’ve got an idea. And Grace is going to help.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  It was the last day at the resort and time for the final challenge. Yet, everything had changed. Cal sat on the stage, waiting for everything to begin. Eddie walked by and gave him a subtle nod. After Cal had told him the whole story, he was only too eager to help with the scheme. Kevyn’s actions could have ruined the whole production.