by Romy Sommer
And there it was, the hurt plain to see.
He wasn’t a bad boy. He never had been. He was a complicated, careful man who buried his hurt deep. And that was so much worse, because that made him a man she could truly fall in love with. A man she wanted to heal.
She resisted the urge to reach out and comfort him.
Who was she kidding? She’d learned a long time ago you couldn’t heal someone else’s heartbreak.
“And your biological father – do you know anything about him?”
Rik shrugged. “My mother told me his name. Robert Ellis … he was some sort of fashion photographer. Fashion! Of all the meaningless professions in the world.”
She forced herself to breathe deeply, to make her tone light. “Yeah, films are pretty meaningless too, but we all have to make a living somehow, you know. Or maybe you don’t. We don’t all have trust funds to finance our lifestyles.”
He straightened his shoulders, indignant. “I told you when we met that I’m not some spoilt rich kid living it up on inherited money. I was raised to make a difference in the world.”
“So make a difference in the world. You have money, you have influence, use both. You could do anything you wanted. You could climb Everest or run charities for orphans, or become a spokesperson for the sea turtles. You’re a celebrity, so use it.”
She’d never thought she’d be giving anyone advice to court the press, but since she wasn’t going to be around when it happened, she felt safe. Do as I say, not as I do.
“What if this is what you were meant to do?” she continued. “You have contacts and skills that could be useful to the islands. The Los Pajaros archipelago is the poor cousin to the rest of the Caribbean, virtually closed to the outside world. With good marketing and someone to manage it, it could become as popular and as profitable as the better known island groups.”
He smiled and his shoulders relaxed. “You make a good argument.”
She was grateful for that smile, grateful that the brooding darkness had been averted. She rose from the bed. This was all too heavy for an island fling. Too many memories stirred beneath the surface. She needed to get away.
“Everything always works out in the end.” She headed for the door. She prayed it was true.
***
They crossed the vast space of the entrance hall, heading back to the terrace.
“Back in the sixties my grandparents often had parties here,” Rik said. “And their Christmas party for the under-privileged children of the islands is the stuff of legend.” He sighed and stuck his hands in the pockets of his chinos. “Life was simpler then. By the time we came along, there wasn’t time for parties. Life just got too busy, my father always said. He taught us to sail, but he spent as much time locked away in his office as he did with us.”
She tried to imagine growing up as the child of a head of state, and failed dismally. The family bakery, though it had been in the Cole family for four generations, and large as it had grown, paled into insignificance beside Rik’s family business.
“It must have been hard on you, growing up like that.”
He shook his head. “It’s strange, but I don’t think my father really liked it here. Back home in Westerwald he was very different. He always made time for us. We were very close. He taught me to sail, and to play polo.” He swallowed. “We were so much alike. Everyone said so. I still can’t believe I’m not his son.”
“He was your father for thirty five years in every way that matters. So what if he wasn’t your biological father?”
“Blood is the only thing that matters.”
“Bullshit.”
When they reached the terrace, Marjorie was laying out a table for lunch beneath a trellis of magenta bougainvillea. Roast beef with all the trimmings, followed by fresh strawberries and cream. And rum punch.
How she’d managed such a feast for unexpected guests, Kenzie had no idea. If she and Lee had unexpected guests the best they could hope for was peanut butter sandwiches or Coco Pops.
She looked at the two place settings on the table. “Aren’t you joining us?”
“Not today.” The older woman’s expression held amusement. “It doesn’t take a mind reader to know you two want to be alone. But maybe next time you come back … ”
Kenzie looked away. There wasn’t going to be a next time. The countdown was already on. In twenty-four hours she’d be on a plane and leaving Los Pajaros, probably forever.
She didn’t know why that thought made her want to cry. A few days ago she’d hated everything about this place.
Marjorie left them alone, and they ate, making nothing but small talk, the heaviness of their earlier conversation banished.
Good, because she didn’t want to waste her last hours here in talk.
As they ate, their gazes lingered, their fingers brushed, setting her body humming again, like one of those wires that crossed vast expanses of wilderness. If the wire pulled any tauter, it would snap, and the spark would set fire to everything it touched.
She took her glass of rum punch and moved to lean on the balustrade overlooking the neat croquet lawn at the side of the house. She closed her eyes and breathed in the scent of freshly cut grass. In her mind’s eye she could see the lawn, golden in the afternoon light, filled with men in dinner jackets and women in big hats milling around as waist-coated waiters walked between them with silver trays of champagne.
She opened her eyes, banishing the vision. “This place must take an army of people to keep it maintained. Where is everyone?”
Rik moved to stand beside her. “Most of the staff go to Arelat on Sundays, to church and to spend the day with their families.” He removed the glass of punch from her fingers and set it aside. “We’re as good as alone here.”
She straightened, her stomach doing little leaps. Now this was what their fling was all about … not talk, but action. “And there’s that magnificent big bed upstairs … ”
“Who needs a bed?” He lifted her off her feet and sat her down on the sun-warmed balustrade, moving between her legs. His fingers slid over her crotch, teasing her through her jeans. She squirmed.
His eyes were so dark they were black holes, sucking her in.
“Not here, Rik. What if Marjorie were to come back out?”
He grinned. “Let’s hope she doesn’t.”
She moaned in pleasure, unable to hold back the sound or the impending climax. Just like that, she was so tantalising close she wanted to scream. She bit down on her lip, drawing blood, as the waves swept through her and she fell limp against his shoulder.
“You are a very bad man, Prince Fredrik.”
He laughed. “Just Rik. And don’t tell me you don’t love it.”
***
@KenzieCole101: In most fairy tales the bad boy turns into a prince. Just once I’d like to kiss a prince and have him turn into a steady dependable boy.
After lunch they said their goodbyes to Marjorie, promising to visit again, and Rik sailed them back to Los Pajaros, to his friend’s ultra-modern villa overlooking the sea like a god looking down from Olympus. No tin-roofed shack for the exiled prince. If this was just the guest villa, then Kenzie couldn’t imagine what the main house looked like.
He secured the yacht in the villa’s boathouse, then they walked hand-in-hand up the stairs hewn out of the rock face.
There were more stairs than she could count and the only way she’d made it up them last night was because Rik had promised her a bed at the end of it. The bed, and everything in it, had been worth the climb.
Halfway up, the stairs branched. Instead of leading her up to the villa this time, Rik led her down to a private beach, a narrow strip of dark sand, still wet from the outgoing tide and hemmed in by large boulders. They undressed and ran into the sea, laughing and splashing each other like children released from a day of school.
Kenzie had never swum naked in the sea before. Warm water caressed her bare skin, teasing unfamiliar places. She stood with her legs
apart, enjoying the sensuous way the waves pummelled at her. She lifted her face to the sun’s kiss, past caring what it did to her skin, loving its sensual touch.
Rik moved to stand behind her, pressing against her bare bottom. His hands stroked over her breasts which were heavy and ached with need. She laid her head back on his shoulder as her limbs turned liquid.
He bent his head to kiss her, and he tasted of rum and coconut and sea salt. Her stomach tightened. He feathered kisses down her neck and along her collarbone, and she turned into him, wrapping her hands around the stunning strength of his erection.
He removed her hands. “If you keep that up, I might not be accountable for my actions. And sea water and sand are not conducive to what I’d want to do to you.”
“We managed yesterday.”
“I was desperate yesterday.”
“And you’re not desperate now?” She rubbed herself against him.
He growled low in his throat. “Don’t play with fire unless you want to get burned.”
She grinned. “Oh, I want to get burned.” She slipped away, splashing through the waves, glancing back over her shoulder to make sure he followed.
He caught her up in the shallows, grabbing her from behind as she squealed and tried to wriggle away, but he held her fast, picking her up and carrying her out of the water to the enormous rocks that sheltered the little cove.
He deposited her on her hands and knees on a rock. She tried to face him, but he held her still. “Don’t move,” he commanded, laying a firm hand on her back.
She didn’t.
The sun dried her skin, and the light sea breeze stung a pleasurable awareness to her exposed parts as he moved away to search through the clothes they’d strewn on the beach. She heard the familiar rip of foil and her stomach muscles clenched in anticipation. Then he was behind her, his hands on her hips.
She gasped as he entered her, gasped again as he pulled out and the breeze caressed her in his place. She arched her back, bracing herself against the hard rock as he set a steady rhythm and she gave herself over to the sensation, closing her eyes so that every sense was focussed on this moment, on this joining of two bodies, on the intense waves of pleasure roiling through her.
Her orgasm ripped through her, purifying as fire. She felt like a new person indeed. It was impossible to remember past mistakes when in the grip of making a beautiful new one.
***
As the sunlight faded, they climbed the stairs to the villa and sat on a swing chair on the frangipani-scented patio, limbs entwined, to watch the sun set across the sea. Behind the villa, the hills turned a red-gold in the dying light, and lights began to flicker on in the shacks hidden between the trees in the valley beyond. From the distance, the soft, compelling sound of a steel band drifted up to them on the breeze.
Darkness swallowed them, but neither wanted to break this moment to get up and switch on the lights. So they rocked gently, and watched the moonlight falling on the beach far below, and held each other.
The music of the steel drums faded into the darkness leaving only the sound of the ocean, the song of night insects, and the distant call of a bat. The waves moved in on the offensive, then retreated, much like her and Rik, an endless backwards and forwards, in and out like the tide, neither gaining ground. Making no progress. Going nowhere.
High up in the cloudless sky a shooting star shot across the heavens. She closed her eyes to make a wish.
“What is it you want, Mackenzie Cole?” Rik asked.
She wanted the same as every woman. She wanted more than a temporary island romance. She wanted a man who’d stick by her side no matter what. And she wanted a home and a family and respect.
She opened her eyes. “If you were on Twitter, you’d know that already.”
Chapter Eleven
When Kenzie woke, the first thing she saw was the sky. Not the crystal clear, cerulean sky she’d grown accustomed to, but a heavy sky the colour of charcoal, filled with roiling crowds.
Rik had predicted a storm. How fitting that it should cast a pall over her final day.
She rolled against him and cuddled into his side. She could practically hear the distant wall clock ticking out the seconds, counting down the time she had left with him.
Counting down the time she had left on Los Pajaros. Who would have thought, merely days ago when she’d hit nothing but road block after road block, that she’d fall in love with the place?
Or with a man she’d only just met.
She slipped from the bed and padded through to the kitchen to switch the coffee machine on. By the time Rik joined her, wearing nothing but drawstring jogging bottoms low on his hips, she had breakfast and fresh coffee ready.
Though the air had turned chilly, making it too cool to eat outside on the patio, she still opened all the doors, and the sweet, heavy scent of frangipani blossoms wafted in, mingling with the bitter coffee aroma. But all she could taste in her mouth was bitterness.
“I have to go.” She broke apart the flaky croissant with her fingers. “I need to pick the team up at the airport and then we have meetings scheduled with the mayor and the harbour master.”
“What happens when your meetings are over?”
“I fly back to London.”
He steepled his fingers and leaned back in his chair, and for a moment she caught a glimpse of the kind of ruler he would have been: serious, focussed, and just a little intimidating.
“So your work on this particular project is done and you’re back to unemployment?”
She frowned. “You sound like my mother.”
“Stay with me.”
“What?”
“If you don’t have any reason to hurry back to London, stay here in Los Pajaros for a few more days. A week, perhaps.”
“My flight’s already booked.”
Rik leaned forward. “I’ll book you another.”
“I have to check out of the resort and return my rental car this morning.”
“You won’t need either of them.”
She kept her eyes down. Staying here in Los Pajaros would mean loads more phenomenal sex. Her body was already saying ‘yes please!’ to that. But staying would also mean she could no longer pretend this was a simple one-night stand. Staying would mean getting involved. Or at least more involved than she already was.
“Let me just get through this meeting, okay?”
“You’ll think about it?”
“I’ll think about it.” How to stop thinking about it enough to concentrate in the meeting was going to be more an issue.
He rose. “I’ll drive you back to the resort so you can check out and fetch your rental. After your meeting at the harbour master’s we can meet at the end of Pier Four, and you can tell me your decision.”
She nodded.
The drive to the resort flashed by too quickly. Kenzie stared out the window, absorbing every sight and sound, every memory, every moment. The car jolted through ruts and deep, stagnant puddles, past wooden shacks behind low slatted fences where dark-eyed children grinned and waved as they drove past. They passed a lone store, tiny and thatch-roofed with the ubiquitous Coca-Cola sign hanging from the eaves, faded by the sun.
She didn’t want to leave. She wanted to explore every corner of these islands, wanted to drink cocktails beneath the setting sun and swim in the ocean again, and hear the monkeys chatter in the trees on Tortuga.
But if she stayed …
Rik wouldn’t understand. He’d never been in love. How convenient was that? If he’d never been in love, then he’d never been hurt. He didn’t know how the end of a relationship could tear you apart. And with a man like Rik the end would be inevitable.
He’d only asked her to stay for a week at most.
He pulled up beneath the portico at the hotel entrance. “I’ll see you at one.” He leaned across and tucked a fresh frangipani flower behind her ear.
She nodded, unable to speak, and stepped out of the car. Without a backward glance
she hurried inside to pack her bags.
***
It was hard to concentrate. Voices droned on around her and the air felt heavy. Kenzie swigged from her coffee cup and forced her focus back into the boardroom where the production designer and the ship’s master craftsman debated the finer points of pirate ship design. She stifled a yawn.
She hadn’t had her full eight hours last night, but then it had also been her last night with Rik. She hadn’t wanted to miss a moment.
Perhaps it didn’t have to be the end …
The harbour master’s boardroom was surprisingly modern, with trendy furnishings and damask wallpaper patterned in black and white. The wide first floor windows looked out into the leafy trees beyond, their colour vivid against the overcast sky.
In the muggy tropical heat, her production team were sweating in spite of their short sleeves. After the chill of autumnal London this closeness must be a massive shock.
Thunder rolled, deep and ominous, in the distance.
When the meeting finally adjourned, Kenzie stuffed her notebook and pen into her rucksack. It was already one o’clock and Rik would be waiting for her at Pier Four. She needed to see him with a desperation that bordered on pain, a physical itch so intense it needed the emotional equivalent of calamine lotion.
“Well done, Kenzie.” Neil shuffled his papers together, not looking up. “I’ll call the other scouts off and let them know we’ll be shooting the entire Caribbean section of the film here.”
Her heart thumped loudly against her ribs. She’d done it!
He looked up from his papers. “Do you have any plans for the next week?”
Stay on Los Pajaros to indulge in more hot sex? She shook her head. “No. No plans.”
“Great. We’ve had scouts out searching for a baroque palace for the European scenes, and they’ve not had much luck. Can you believe one actually brought me pictures of Blenheim? Like I hadn’t thought of that!” He tucked his file under his arm. “You want to have a crack at it?”
