by J. L. Berg
“No,” she agreed. “But I don’t need to. I can hear it in your voice, Lani. You’re in love with this guy. Or you’re well on your way.”
The very idea scared me.
“But I barely know him, and I’m only here for five more weeks,” I said.
And, again, when she smiled, I could hear it in her voice just as loudly as the love she supposedly heard in mine.
“Then, make the most of it,” she encouraged. “Isn’t that what your mom would have done?”
“Enjoy every moment,” I whispered, remembering the words she’d said to me over and over throughout my childhood. It’s something I’d shared with Piper many times in our long reminiscent talks. “But what if he doesn’t—”
She didn’t even let me finish the sentence. “Then, at least you’ll know you tried.”
I’d come here to experience something new.
Something different from the ordinary.
Maybe what I had been looking for all along was him.
“Get out of the car, Lani,” I said to myself for the fifth time.
I’d been sitting in this borrowed car, just outside of Taylor’s house, for what seemed like a century, trying to get up the nerve to walk up to his front door.
After practically no sleep following my lengthy conversation with Piper the night before and basically not a bit of work done during the day because I couldn’t keep myself away from the hotel windows in hopes that I’d catch a glimpse of him working at his desk, or heaven forbid, even chatting it up with a gorgeous tourist, I had known I had to do something.
Yes, I had it bad.
So bad in fact, that by the time I’d made it back to the inn, I’d driven myself so mad with indecision that I basically spilled my secrets to the first bystander who walked by.
Poor Molly didn’t know what had hit her.
Luckily, the young mother had been more than eager to help me in my hour of need.
She, like Piper, had believed I should seize the moment.
So, here I was, seizing the moment.
Yep, definitely seizing it.
I stared out at his front door again.
If I stayed in this parked car much longer, someone might report me for suspicious activity, and wouldn’t that be lovely?
Oh, no, Taylor, I wasn’t stalking you. I was actually just gathering up the courage to knock on your door—you know, to see if you wanted to break some of those rules and get naked with me?
My head fell to the top of the steering wheel. “Come on, Lani. This is ridiculous. Get up.”
I blew out a breath and reached for the handle.
This was why I’d wanted this job in the first place.
I thought of Taylor on that first morning, bare-chested on the boat dock.
Okay, maybe not this exact reason.
But I’d wanted this promotion, this freedom, so I could finally do all the things I’d only dreamed of.
I’d been living inside for far too long.
Hell, I’d barely been living at all up until now.
It was time for all that to change.
It was time for this life of mine to begin.
Finally finding the confidence I needed, I pushed open the car door and went for it. I walked toward that front door, thankful for Molly and her meddling. She’d not only supplied me with an ample pep talk, complete with homemade baked goods that I’d totally devoured and the car that had gotten me here, but she’d also supplied me with Taylor’s address, something I hadn’t known until tonight.
Standing at his doorway now, I could see him everywhere—from the well-kept entryway that boasted several potted plants to the weathered plaque on the door that proudly displayed his last name.
Smiling, I wondered if it, too, came with its own history lesson.
There was only one way to find out.
So, I knocked on the door.
And I waited and waited.
And, finally, when that front door creaked open, I found myself face-to-face with someone I hadn’t expected.
“Sierra,” I said, trying to sound pleasant even though my spirit was being crushed by her very presence.
The smile on her face, the carefree one she’d answered the door with, faltered. “Lani,” she replied.
How did she know that nickname?
“Who’s at the door?” Taylor’s voice made my body freeze in place when all I wanted to do was run.
“This isn’t what it looks like,” Sierra said.
And, for a moment, I believed her. For a moment, I thought I felt a connection, a brief flash of something that felt like friendship—or at least, the beginning of it—but then my gaze flickered past hers, and I saw Taylor standing at the foot of the stairs, his eyes telling me everything I needed to know.
“It was stupid of me to assume you weren’t busy,” I said, my words fumbling over one another like dominoes. Kind of ironic because that was exactly how my life felt right that second.
My foot took a step back, and I saw Taylor’s take one step forward.
“Leilani.”
I waited for him to finish, to beg me not to go, but his wide eyes and silence seemed to drag on endlessly.
I guessed there was nothing else to say.
I’d misinterpreted the signs.
I’d turned harmless flirting into something it wasn’t, and now, here I was, ready to open my heart to someone who was clearly interested in someone else.
I was a fool.
A fool who was about to cry.
So before that happened, I willed my body into motion and turned back down that walkway, back to the car that had seemed so difficult to get out of just moments earlier, and then I drove away.
I drove away from Taylor and the girl he’d called nothing more than a friend, and I drove to the only safe place on the island.
My crappy hotel.
But it wasn’t mine, now, was it? It was my father’s. Just like everything in my life.
Stepping out of the borrowed car that I’d been gifted until morning, I decided this was as good of a place as any to stay for the night. I really didn’t want to return to the inn less than an hour after I’d left. Molly would find out soon enough about my fallout with Taylor, I was sure.
Until then, I really could use these precious hours to wallow.
A crack of thunder above my head made me jump, and I hurried toward the entrance.
“Leilani!”
It didn’t take a genius to guess who that was. I turned around and saw Taylor jogging up to me from the parking lot.
“Whose car is that?” he asked, his breath heavy as he reached me.
“Did you come all this way to ask me that?”
“No, of course not.”
My less than chipper greeting must have thrown him, but I wasn’t budging. I just stood and waited for him to explain his presence.
The blank stare should have been familiar. He’d perfected it not fifteen minutes earlier.
I could tell he was about to say something. He reached out for me, and his lips parted, but just as the words were forming, the sky opened, and it began to rain.
Hard.
So, I made a run for it.
Grabbing my keys, thankful I’d finally mastered the tricky lock, I got the front door unlocked as the rain fell around me and pushed my way inside. Dropping my soaking wet purse on the ground, I pulled off my coat and let it fall into a heap on the floor as well.
I might have huffed a bit in the process.
“You’re cute when you’re mad.”
I might have also forgotten to shut the door.
Turning, I saw an equally soaked Taylor standing just inside the entryway. Thanks to the wet shirt currently sticking to his body, I could see each defined muscle of his stomach like there was nothing there.
It was like my own personal wet T-shirt contest, and Taylor was my obvious winner.
Focus, Lani.
Remember knocking at his door? Remember Sierra?
&nb
sp; “I’m not mad,” I said, my chin held firm as my arms folded across my own soggy T-shirt.
The movement didn’t go unnoticed by him, and I saw a definite grin pass across his face.
“Okay. Then, you’re cute when you’re jealous,” he said, amending his previous statement, which only made my mouth gape open.
“I am not jealous!” I exclaimed.
“No?” He took a couple of steps forward.
“No,” I answered. “I don’t care what you do with your free time. Or whom you do it with.”
His grin widened. “Now, that sounds a bit like jealousy to me.”
A couple more steps were taken in my direction. I took several back.
“Why were you at my house tonight, Lani?”
It was the first time he’d ever called me by that name. I liked the way it sounded on his tongue.
But it didn’t change the fact that he’d been with someone else tonight.
“I wanted to run some things by you. You know, for the hotel.”
His eyes followed the curve of the ceiling before finding mine once again. A knowing smile spread across his face as he took another step or two. It was like being stalked by a lion.
“You wanted to run some things by me? At nearly eight o’clock in the evening?”
I shrugged, trying to play it off. “Sure. Why not?”
“How did you get my address?”
I swallowed down the lump in my throat. “Molly.”
“And the car?” he asked. “You never answered who it belongs to.”
I took a few more steps back until my butt hit the corner of the desk I’d set up. “Also Molly’s,” I said. “Shouldn’t you know that? You seem to know everything about everyone.”
He grinned, ignoring my question entirely. Of course he knew who’s car it was.
Jerk.
“And you just came over to…how did you put it? Run some things by me?”
“Yes,” I answered. “Exactly.”
He took one last step forward, his body pressing against mine. I should push him away, but I didn’t.
I should hate him, but I couldn’t.
He leaned in close, so close that I could feel his breath against my skin. “I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again. Sierra is just a friend; a friend who is getting over a hard breakup and needed a night away from her grandparents’.”
I didn’t believe him. “Then why did you look so guilty when you saw me?”
His face blanched. “It wasn’t guilt you saw, Leilani. It was fear.”
“Fear?”
“I thought I could follow the rules with you because you pushed me away. You didn’t want this. You didn’t want me. I was a distraction, and you were only asking for friendship. But when I saw you standing at my doorstep, I knew this thing between us, it was real and—”
“And?”
“It scared me.”
“It scared me, too,” I confessed.
“But you know what scared me more?” he whispered, his voice so smooth that my heart did a somersault in my chest.
“What?” I breathed out.
“Watching you walk away.”
His words made my breath catch in my throat, and looking up at him, I felt the air suddenly change between us. Just like the storm raging on outside, something was building between us.
Something big.
“Lani, we have less than five weeks. I can’t offer you anything past—”
“I like it when you call me Lani.” I smiled lazily.
“Concentrate!” He laughed, his arms wrapping around my waist.
“Look,” I said, “I know we have only a finite amount of time, but I’m okay with that.”
“You’re okay with the fact that you live over four thousand miles away from here?”
“No,” I answered. “But can’t we choose to just not think about it?”
He looked conflicted, but his grip on my waist tightened. “It’s either that or we go back to being friends.”
“You were a horrible friend anyway,” I said.
He smirked but didn’t seem convinced.
“We both said the other day, that we felt like we were waiting for our lives to start. Maybe we just need to learn how to take leaps when the universe offers them,” I offered.
He cupped my face, sincerity written all over his. “I just don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then don’t,” I simply said.
He stared down at me, the resolve in his dark green eyes becoming clearer with each passing second as he pulled me closer. “I’m going to kiss you now, Lani,” he said, sending a thrill of anticipation down to my very core. “And when I do, you can just consider that friendship of ours null and void, because after I’m done thoroughly kissing you, we’re going to spend the rest of the night breaking every other stupid rule we made.”
His lips found mine before I even got the chance for a rebuttal.
Not that I’d had one.
Because, holy hell, this man could kiss.
His fingers wove into my hair, pushing me back onto the desk. It wasn’t the sturdiest piece of furniture, but it held as I sat back and let him devour me.
It was as if he was in a frenzy one minute and taking his time the next. As if he couldn’t wait to see what was next. He lifted my still-wet T-shirt for the bare skin that lay beneath but then stopped short to pull me closer, so he could kiss me a while longer.
It drove me mad.
It made me wild with need, and by the time he finally reached up and tugged at the top of my shirt, pulling the deep v-neck down so that he could drag his lips past my collarbone and toward the valley between my breasts, I thought I might combust from the raging inferno he’d ignited between us.
“I’ve wanted to do this,” he said, his hot breath against my skin as his fingers danced along the edge of lace bra, peeling back the delicate fabric inch by inch “this and so much more, since the moment you entered my office that first day.”
His mouth closed around my nipple and I jumped, the feeling of his tongue circling around my sensitive flesh so intense that I couldn’t keep still.
And I didn’t want to.
I wanted to move with him.
Against him.
Underneath him.
And with all those thoughts swirling in my head, suddenly, my hands had a mind of their own. Finding the hem of his very wet shirt, I began to pull it upward, wanting to feel all those delicious muscles I’d been dreaming of.
“If you start undressing me now, this show is going to be over a lot quicker than I anticipated.”
His eyes met mine, his sexy grin making my belly swarm with butterflies. He swiped his thumb across his jawline as my hands were frozen across his bare waist.
“There are just things—” I said, trying to explain.
“Things?”
“Yeah. Fantasies?”
His brow rose.
“Do you remember that day you stomped over here, all jackass-like?”
He laughed, tiny creases forming around his eyes, making his smile that much more adorable. “Not quite how I remember it, but go on.”
“You’d just finished doing something with the boats. Giving them a bath maybe? I don’t know.”
“Right,” he said with a chuckle. “We’ll go with bath.”
“Anyway, you were wet.” I bit down on my bottom lip as my gaze fell to his T-shirt. “Kind of like you are now. Only then, you didn’t have a shirt on, and I could see tiny droplets of water cascading down your chest. It took every ounce of willpower I had not to leap forward and lick each one right off your—”
His shirt went up and over his head in one fell swoop, and he dropped it to the floor without a second thought. “Show me,” he demanded.
A shudder went through me at the deep command in his voice as I took him all in. He truly was magnificent.
And he was about to make all my fantasies come to life.
But, first, I needed to level the playing field
a little.
Reaching for the bottom of my own shirt, I pulled it up and over my head, my bra quickly following.
Taylor growled in appreciation, his eyes taking in every inch of the new view as I bent down and got to work. His shirt had done a good job of soaking up a decent amount of water from his skin, but I made do, running my tongue along the waistband of his jeans where that sexy V near his hip bone started. His breath hitched as I worked my way up, kissing the well-defined planes of his abdomen. Soon, his hands were in my hair, and his body shook from obvious restraint.
“Lani,” he groaned, grabbing my chin and tilting it upward. He looked desperate.
Desperate for me.
“I know I said a lot of things earlier, but if you don’t want to, if you’re not ready”—he swallowed hard and cupped my cheek—“we can stop.”
If I hadn’t started falling for him before, this right here, this would have done it.
“Can I trust you?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
“Yes.” He smiled, looking deep into my eyes.
“Then, let’s break some more rules, Taylor Sutherland.”
“Thank God,” he breathed out before kissing me once more. “We need a bed.”
“What?” I asked, looking around, so consumed with lust that I thought this was as good a place as any. “Why?”
An amused smile spread across his face as his hand slid underneath me and grabbed ahold of both butt cheeks. “Because”—he gave the table a hard lean, and it creaked in response—“what I have planned for tonight is going to require something a lot sturdier than this.”
My heart fluttered. “Well, the rooms aren’t exactly in great condition.”
He gave me a look, one that basically said he’d fuck me anywhere, just point him in the right direction.
It wasn’t my heart that fluttered that time.
“But,” I replied, making his eyebrow rise, “I was playing around in one of the rooms with fabrics and such, and—”
“Where?”
“Top of the—”
I was airborne before I even got the chance to finish my sentence.
“Taylor!” I squealed. My legs wrapped around his waist as we hastily made our way toward the room.
“You’ve been busy,” he said, a hint of wonderment in his tone the moment we crossed the threshold.
“Oh,” I said, suddenly feeling embarrassed as he took in all the work I’d done.
