by Piper Lennox
“California, huh?”
I look up. Here we are again, a year later: I’m sitting at the edge of the ditch, just a little longer than it was at the start of the last tourist season. “Yeah,” I say, as Luka sits in the same place beside me, “California.” The words I’ve been trying to get out for two months now—ever since Mollie and I found a place on the coast we both liked and put down a deposit—finally surface: “I’m really going to miss you, man.”
He hands me a beer, still icy from the poolside bar, and twists open his own. The bottle cap flicks off into the dirt below. “Me, too,” he says, after a beat. He picks at the label on the bottle. “But it’s only a five-hour flight. I’ll come visit. And you’ll come visit here, right? Like, Christmas, at least.”
“Definitely.” I wait until he looks at me again before going on; I want him to see that I mean this. “It’s not like I hate Kona, you know. In some ways…I can’t imagine leaving.”
My stomach aches, thinking about it again; as excited as I am to move in with Mollie and get off the island, I’m also more scared than I can admit. When I let myself think about it, I know I’m going to miss this place. My family is a given, of course, but the last few weeks, I’ve found myself driving aimlessly around Kona, getting nostalgic. The rocks where Luka chipped a tooth, the hills where the three of us raced our bikes after school. The beach is where I feel it most. I know there’ll be good waves in Cali, but I also know it won’t be the same.
“It’s just— I need to get out, at least for a little while. It feels too small.”
“And yet,” he says, giving me his trademark smartass look, “the business felt too big.”
I flick my beer cap, tucked into my palm until now, at his leg. We both laugh.
“I get it, though,” he continues. “That’s how I used to feel.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I mean, when I was younger. The business was so small and…I don’t know. It felt boring. Plus, I knew Noe was going to take over someday, and you’d be a manager. Didn’t seem like there was a place for me.”
“You know that’s not true, Luk.”
“It is, though. Like, yeah, there would’ve always been a job for me. But there wasn’t anything to really work towards. There wasn’t anything I wanted.” He looks around, as if all of Kona, or even Hawaii itself, is in this stretch of dirt and grass. “Until the resort came along. After that, I felt like I could stay. So point is, you have to go where you can be happy, and I think that’s what makes a place feel ‘too small’—when you can’t see any possibilities for yourself there.”
“Wow. That’s actually really deep.”
“Yeah.” He leans back on his palm. “Business-savvy, intellectual…I’m the whole package.”
“You forgot humble.” I fake him out with a swing to his stomach. He flinches, falling back against the grass and laughing. I lie back, too. We put our hands behind our heads and watch the sky grow dark. Through the glow of the resort, just barely, I can find the stars.
“I really hope Cali’s good to you, man,” he whispers, yawning into his arm.
I smile. “Thanks, Luk.”
I hope it is, too. But if it isn’t, that’s okay—because I know Mollie will be.
Mollie
Our studio apartment is tiny, which is being generous. There’s barely room for a bed and loveseat, and the kitchenette makes cooking together a logistical nightmare. But something about the smallness is nice. On our first night here, after I spent twenty minutes bemoaning the fact I couldn’t possibly fit all my clothes in the closet with his, he said, “I kind of like it, actually.”
“How can you like it? We barely have room to turn around!”
Kai scratched his head, looking a little embarrassed as he admitted, “It reminds me of the cabana, kind of. You know? Small, but...ours.”
After that, it was easy to love this place. It’s been almost a year since we moved in, our two-year anniversary together—distance and all—just weeks away, and I still love it here. Even if a space to study in solitude is almost impossible to find.
“Come on,” he urges, kissing the ticklish spot behind my ear. “You’ve been studying all day. You deserve a break.”
“Maybe surf instructors get breaks,” I say, “but grad students don’t. Why do you think we’re all exhausted 24/7?”
He closes my textbook and scoops me up from the desk chair. “You weren’t so exhausted in the shower this morning.”
I start to argue this, but the low rumble of his voice makes me forget all about my design exam tomorrow, or the fact I’ve still got an entire chapter on spatial planning to study.
All I can focus on is his mouth as it leaves a trail down my chest, like flower petals scattered just so. When he pulls my shirt down and sucks my nipple into his mouth, I surrender.
“We can’t take too long,” I remind him. “I really do have to study.”
“Ten minutes.” He bites down a little. The pain heightens the pleasure, and I already know I’m going to let him take as long as he wants. His fingers toy with the waistband of my sweatpants. “Twenty, tops.”
Naked, I fold my arms across myself, shielding things from the light and from him. He shakes his head.
“None of that.”
“I’ve put on, like, ten pounds this semester.” My ears burn; I know my blush is practically crimson. “Let’s just cut off the lights.”
Gently, he grabs my wrists and pulls my arms off me, then holds them up above my head. I feel his erection slide between my legs and rub against me. “You,” he says quietly, but firmly, “are just as gorgeous now as the day we met. I’ve told you before: I don’t care about the stretch marks. I don’t care if you put on some weight or drop some weight, other than it making you feel better.” He lets go and kisses his way down my body again. His tongue against my stomach makes me extra self-conscious, since it’s my biggest problem area.
But then he looks up at me from under his brow that way I love, and I relax, knowing he’s telling the truth. None of it bothers him. So it’s easy, for a few minutes, to not let it bother me.
The rhythm of his tongue on my sex, when he finally migrates lower, reduces me to nothing but a flood of neurochemicals. By the time he guides his erection into me, I’ve almost orgasmed twice; everything is intensified by the denial.
“Are you keeping time?” He kisses me as he sinks inside, muffling my gasp. “I’m pretty sure it’s been twenty minutes. Like you said, you should study.”
“Studying can wait,” I whisper. He laughs.
Kai rocks his hips like the tide: easy, but unstoppable. I run my nails down his back and lift his shirt off over his head. His muscles flex as he picks up speed, and I can’t help but touch his chest, his arms, all over, feeling the strength for myself.
He drives deep and holds it there, stretching me. I moan his name, cut off as he kisses me again.
I feel the electricity gather inside, starting at my toes. The connection is so familiar by now, but never fails to astonish me. All it takes is one second, a single kiss from him, to pull me under.
“Kai,” I whisper, kissing him back, “I’m close.”
“Me too.” He’s getting breathless now that he knows I’m near the edge. It’s one of about a million things I love about him: turning me on turns him on. “You first.”
His hand slips between us to my sex. The contact is light, but more than enough. I bite my lip as it begins.
His rhythm renders me speechless. I’m not even sure I breathe during it, focused on nothing but the thickness of him inside me, the sweat transferring from his skin to mine, and the white-hot fire tearing through my limbs.
“Mollie....” His voice groaning my name is untamable, just a guttural sound in his throat, as he releases. I push my face into a pillow and realize my body is still shivering, endless aftershocks, even as he pulls out.
“Glad you took a break?”
I close my eyes as he kisses my forehead and pull
s the comforter across us. “God, yes.”
His laugh is just a rush of air in my face: mint and sun, a faint trace of myself in there, under the surface. “Good.”
We fall asleep almost instantly, exhausted. I remember my studying in a dream-like panic, but decide I’ve prepared enough for now. Lying here with him is all I can manage to do.
And really, it’s all I want to do, anyway.
Kai
“Do you think you’ve finally let go of that guilt?”
I look at the pattern in the rug instead of Dr. Bishop. Seeing a shrink was Mollie’s idea, one I resisted as much (and as loudly) as possible when we first moved here.
After just two sessions, though, I had to admit she was right: it’s nice to talk to someone. Even when he asks me questions I don’t know how to answer. Like now.
“Not completely,” I say, after a full minute has passed with nothing but the air conditioner to fill the silence. “I guess it’s like...I’ve accepted that Noe dying wasn’t my fault, but I haven’t accepted that I shouldn’t feel guilty.” I sigh, rubbing my face with my palms. “I know that doesn’t make any sense.”
“It does,” he assures me. “We can change our minds a lot faster than we can change our emotions.”
I feel myself smile. “Tell me about it.”
“Are things any better with your dad?”
“Yeah, I think so. He’s over the resort thing, but now it’s like, ‘I don’t understand why Kona wasn’t good enough for you.’ I mean, he’s never said it like that, but you get the idea. There’s just this distance we still can’t get rid of. Not completely.”
“Maybe you can broach the subject in-person, when you go back for the holidays again.”
“Maybe,” I say, somewhat doubtful. My first Christmas in Kona wasn’t disastrous, but it wasn’t a Hallmark moment, either: Dad made passive-aggressive comments about California, and I gave snarky answers in return. But after dinner, so full we couldn’t muster the strength to argue, he asked about my surfing instructor job, how things were going with Mollie, and how the swells were out there. We spent the rest of the night watching my videos of Rincon Beach. When I left for the airport, he came along and hugged me goodbye.
So things are moving slowly, but at least they’re moving at all. That’s enough.
Outside, the scene is exactly the same as when I went in: teenagers skateboarding down the handicapped ramp, a tipped-over garbage can, insane traffic on the road. I feel different, though. These sessions always leave me a little lighter, like each one is chipping away at the weight I’m still carrying.
Of course, there’s another reason I feel different today.
“Did you do it?”
I shift the phone to my other ear as I start the car. “Not yet,” I tell Luka. “We’re going to dinner tonight. I’ll do it then.” I pause. “You didn’t tell Tanya, right?”
“I know better than that,” he laughs. Whether he means he knows better because Tanya tells Mollie everything, or because he passionately denies they’re anything more than a fling—and therefore, not obligated to tell each other this kind of news—isn’t clear to me. But secrecy is secrecy, so I’m glad.
“You nervous?” he asks.
I start to answer, my “yes” instinctive. At first, when the idea hit me, I was nervous. A wreck, actually. The thought of Mollie telling me no was almost enough to shut the whole thing down.
But then I looked over at her, sleeping with a textbook open on her chest. If she loved me even half as much as I loved her, there was no way she’d turn me down.
“Nah,” I tell Luka. “I know she’ll say yes.”
When I get home, Mollie’s struggling to zip her dress. “Little help?” she asks, and lifts her hair off her shoulders. I zip her up, then grab her hand and spin her around.
“You look so beautiful,” I whisper, pulling her in to kiss her ear, “I might have to take that dress off you before dinner.”
She laughs and pushes me away. “Later.”
Normally, I’d get impatient, work her over until she couldn’t take waiting any more than me. But tonight is special. And when it’s over, we’ll have plenty of time for “later,” all those somedays.
“So tell me,” she says after I’ve changed, the ring box safely tucked into my jacket’s inner pocket, “what’s the big surprise you planned for tonight, anyway?”
I shake my head and hold the door open for her. As she breezes past, I catch a trace of her perfume, vanilla and airy. It reminds me of that night in my bedroom the summer we met, with rain pouring outside and so much at stake between us. When I called her “baby” by accident, but realized, in the moment, it was the right word to use. I’d wanted her to be mine all along. Even when I couldn’t admit it.
“Later,” I promise, watching as she walks ahead of me with a swing of her hips and the sexiest smile I’ve ever seen, out into the sunset.
Also by Piper Lennox
Teach Me
The Road to You
All Mine
It’s Complicated: a Novella
(Subscriber Exclusive)
Turn the page for a preview of Piper’s upcoming
novel,
Crash Around Me
(Love in Kona Series, Book Two)
Sneak Peek
Crash Around Me
Luka
Today, I landed our most elusive affiliate.
I added another five percent to our projected earnings.
I’m in my favorite suit and I’ve got a team of executives literally lining up to shake my hand. And I haven’t even had my morning coffee yet.
So why is her flight schedule the only thing you can think about?
“...never seen numbers like this for a new exec. It’s beyond impressive.” Parker slaps my back. “Corporate’s freaking out.”
I graciously step away from the boardroom. He follows. “They’re just projections. Nothing to get excited over.”
“The affiliate is.”
With this, I can’t argue. We’ve been trying to land Kona Segway Rentals and Tours—abbreviated to “Kona Seg” by locals—for over a year.
Well: corporate has. The minute I stepped into the boardroom, the game changed. They couldn’t sign fast enough.
“I only have clout because of my dad. The Kalanis are friends with him.”
“Selling yourself short, man.” He holds out his fist. I tap it.
My phone buzzes. I excuse myself and duck into the elevator. It’s got to be a text from her, announcing that she just landed. Instead, it’s an email from somebody in corporate. Not congratulating me on the surge of future income or new affiliate, but telling me which potential affiliate they’d like me to speak with next.
It never ends.
I check her social media, which is a waste. She hasn’t posted anything new in over a year. Since the last time she was here.
It’s still her profile picture: the shot I took of her on top of South Point, the last day of her trip. The wind was crazy, that high up. It tangled her hair and lifted it away from her face as she laughed, half-scared and half-amazed at the sight of the glittering ocean underneath us.
“We could fall in!” she screamed. It was a happy, high one.
“Or jump,” I teased, just as I snapped the picture. And that was the look I got: her laughing at me, at my jokes she couldn’t tell were jokes or not. The wild dares we were always giving each other. Seeing who could be the bravest. Or, sometimes, the dumbest.
The elevator opens to the bottom floor. This is one of the employee ones, meant for executives to ride to the top, and maids and servers to discreetly shift from floor to floor. All of us have the same job: stay out of sight as much as possible. When a guest does spot you, smile. Serve. Maintain the illusion.
This isn’t the happiest place on earth, but we come damn close.
“Head’s up.”
I duck out of the way as I enter the main galley, where servers are already in the weeds for midday, sti
ll catching up from brunch. Our restaurant has designated meal windows, but they run together all day. After all, that’s part of the perfect vacation: awesome food, whenever the mood strikes.
It’s doubly true for drinks, so I’m not even fazed when P.J. and Jake cut off my path before I can make it to the deck.
“We’re out of tequila.” Jake runs his bottom teeth along his top lip and holds them there, panting and waiting for my solution. When I promoted him to head bartender in place of my brother, I gave him a two-hour speech about exactly this: handling the bar’s problems on his own.
It sounds shitty, but I really don’t have time for this.
But then again, we’re coming up on two years, and I still handle every issue he brings my way, so I’m partly to blame. The bar was my first big project to show the corporate guys—and my father—that I could handle this job. It’s hard to walk away.
“What’s the Drink of the Day?”
“It was the Melon Margarita. Now it’s nothing.”
I check my watch. “P.J., go see if Seaside will let us buy a case or two of their backstock, just to get us through to the next shipment. Here.” I hand him my car keys and a roll of twenties. He’s gone faster than any server in this place.
Jake pushes his hair off his forehead and sighs. “Two cases are not going to last us tonight.”
“It will if we make the drink of the day something without tequila.” I step around him and beeline for the liquor stockroom. “What do we have the most of?”
“Vodka.”
Sure enough, when I open the heavy metal door, I’m greeted with shelves upon shelves of vodka. “Lot of pineapple juice, too. There’s something there—figure it out.”
I could actually tell him exactly what Drink of the Day he should make. In my head, where there’s a constant carousel of what’s in stock, what’s plentiful, what’s low, and what’s possible, the recipe pops up instantly.
But Jake second-guesses himself way too much. If I show him I have faith he can do this, he will. I know what it’s like to feel limited by everyone else’s expectations. Or lack thereof.
