Sinful Paradise (Kimani Hotties)

by Christopher, Ann

  “And what’s that?” asked Becky.

  “Life’s short,” Talia said. “Anyone can get sick at any time. So there’s no time to let emotional bullshit keep you from being happy.”

  Chapter 13

  Bora-Bora, Gloria decided two days later, was the most beautiful paradise God ever created, and well worth the hellish sixteen-hour flight plus the additional flight from Tahiti it took to get there. True, she had no idea what day it was, much less the current time, and she was both wired and exhausted, but she’d find a way to cope. It was far better to be wired and exhausted with a turquoise lagoon in front of you and lushly green Mount Otemanu rising in the distance behind you than it was to be wired and exhausted as she usually was, coming off a long day in the operating room.

  She, Talia, Tony and most of the Davies relatives had arrived a little while ago and checked into the high-end resort. Since they had several hours until the rehearsal dinner, she’d showered and unpacked. Now, with time to kill, she stepped out of her bungalow and rested her elbows on the porch rail, breathing in the tangy sea air laced with the fragrance of frangipani, jasmine and dozens of other flowers whose names she would never know. The sun shone, the breeze ruffled her hair, and—honest to God—there was even a rainbow arching down from the mountain to the leafy valley below.

  And the lagoon...

  The bungalows, welcoming and quaint with their thatched roofs and wooden walkways in between, sat on stilts atop the bluest ocean she’d ever seen. Actually, blue didn’t begin to describe it. Patches of the sparkling water were turquoise, but others were indigo...sapphire...aquamarine... She didn’t know the names for all the colors of blue that extended for as far as her squinting eyes could see, but she could happily stand there forever trying to figure it out. True, the tropical sun would roast her bare shoulders like the rehearsal-dinner pig currently turning on the spit back at the resort’s main house, but that would be a small price to pay for getting to spend time in this kind of natural beauty.

  Breathing deep, she sighed and wondered how her poor lungs would ever readjust to smoggy Manhattan air after this.

  Cooper hadn’t been on her flight, which meant that if he’d arrived already, she hadn’t seen him yet. Which was probably just as well, because she hadn’t figured out what she’d say to him when she saw him again.

  The whole thing with Talia, Becky and Helga at the fitting had really thrown her for a loop, and she hadn’t recovered yet. That was the problem with the truth: too often, she knew it when she heard it. And, man, had she heard it or what?

  So what were her lessons?

  She gave that some hard thought, brushing her fluttering hair out of her eyes and trying to arrange her thoughts into some semblance of order.

  The biggest one, she supposed, was that she reacted to men based upon her experiences with her father. Most recently, she’d hooked up with Aaron because he was like her father. A charming and successful doctor, darkly handsome with an easy smile for any pretty woman and a voice as smooth and deep as bittersweet chocolate. And if that was true, didn’t it also mean that she’d pushed Cooper away because he wasn’t like her father? In addition to the obvious physical differences, he was giving and open, with, as far as she could tell, no hidden agendas, games or tricks up his sleeves.

  He showed up when he was supposed to, which meant he wanted to be with her. There’d been no disappearing acts with Cooper, no tortured explanations that began with, See, baby, what had happened was... He listened to her and was responsive to her wishes, even when they didn’t coincide with his. He laughed with her; he comforted her; he scorched her with a single blue-eyed look. He’d introduced her to his parents.

  He...scared her.

  That was really the bottom line, wasn’t it?

  The truly good guys in the world had thus far made it a practice to stay far away from her. Why would this one—who knew everything about her—actually want her?

  Didn’t that have to be a trick?

  Wasn’t there an April Fool’s! lurking out there in her immediate future if she went back to Cooper?

  “Gloria? Is that you?”

  Startled, she straightened and wheeled around to discover a couple coming down the walkway nearest hers, but she didn’t recognize the woman’s voice and the sun was behind them, obscuring their features. Shielding her eyes with her hand, she looked again and discovered—

  Oh, God. It was Mr. and Mrs. Davies.

  Cooper’s parents! She froze, her mouth drying out.

  “Gloria!” Mrs. Davies hurried forward and folded her into a bear hug. “I was hoping we’d see you today! How was your flight?”

  “Umm...”

  Gloria’s brain stalled out. She’d known she’d see all the Davies clan here for the wedding, but she’d expected a cooler greeting from these two—something along the lines of a narrow-eyed glare or a cold shoulder. She had not expected this open delight, as though Gloria had brought the party with her.

  And then, a long beat or two into the hug, it occurred to her that Mrs. Davies, a very special woman who’d raised a very special son, was going out of her way to make Gloria feel comfortable and welcome. And there was only one appropriate response to that.

  Gloria burst into tears.

  And hugged her back.

  “Look what you did,” Mr. Davies told his wife. “You made the woman cry. Why don’t you let her go before you drive her to jump off the walkway and drown herself in the water? Come here, Gloria. It’s okay.”

  “I’m sorry.” Laughing now, Gloria gave Mr. Davies a quick hug and dabbed her eyes with the linen handkerchief he fished out of his back pocket for her. “I didn’t mean to cry on you. And I’m so sorry for the whole scene at the restaurant. You must think I’m a—”

  “We don’t think anything.” Mrs. Davies held Gloria’s forearms in her firm grip. She looked over her shoulder at her husband. “Do we think anything?”

  “No,” Mr. Davies said flatly. “Now that I’m retired, I never think when I can help it.”

  “Cooper’s a grown man,” Mrs. Davies told her. “He knows how to judge people without us telling him what to do. If he likes you, then there’s a reason. If Cooper has a reason, then that’s reason enough for us. End of story.”

  Gloria laughed and cried again, ducking her head and dabbing at her eyes, which were probably a tarry black mess by now. “You’re such good people. I can see why Cooper turned out so well.”

  “Cooper’s not doing too well at the moment, Glo,” Mr. Davies said, a frown marring his forehead. “He’s in a world of hurt. Like a bear that’s got his paw stuck in a trap. Are you going to put him out of his misery anytime soon?”

  “That’s his bungalow right there.” Mrs. Davies pointed to the one on the other side of theirs. “He’s unpacking before the rehearsal dinner.”

  Gloria hesitated, pressing a hand to her heart, which had gone haywire with the news that Cooper was so close. This was all too much to hope for. She had to force herself to remember to breathe. It was one thing for them not to hold the restaurant scene against her. It was something else again for them to conclude that she was a woman worthy of their precious son.

  “Unless...” Mrs. Davies’s face darkened “...you don’t love him after all...?”

  There it was, on the table for all the world to see.

  Even Gloria.

  “I love him,” she admitted, the sudden certainty a sweet ache in her heart. “What kind of fool wouldn’t?”

  “Whew.” Mrs. Davies wiped a hand over her forehead. “Okay, then. Now, remember—wounded bear. They snarl. They bite. They slash with their paws. You’ve got to wait all that out. Got it?”

  “Got it. Sounds like you’ve had some experience with wounded bears over the years, Mrs. Davies.”

  Mrs. Davies nodded, but Mr. Davies pulled a
frown.

  “Who else do you know that acts like a wounded bear?” he asked his wife seriously.

  * * *

  When Gloria raised her hand to knock on the door of Cooper’s bungalow a few minutes later, she discovered that her hands were shaking. Which only made sense. Her happiness was on the line here, and she had no strategy, no idea what to say and no escape plan if things went south. With her luck, Cooper would tell her to go to hell, and she’d still have to spend most of the next few days in close contact with him.

  And wouldn’t that be fun?

  No answer at the door.

  She knocked again, harder this time.

  Still no answer.

  Maybe he’d slipped out without his parents noticing, she thought, staring down the path to the main lodge. Or he could’ve gone to the pool. Maybe she could catch him there.

  Without warning, the door swung open, and there he was.

  Her throat tightened down as she tilted her head back to meet his gaze. It was a jolt, seeing him again. A painful jolt and, simultaneously, the best thing that could possibly happen to her. She’d forgotten how tall he was...how big...how bright his blue eyes were, as though they’d been scooped from the lagoon’s tranquil waters.

  Expressionless, he stared at her, his breath audibly catching in his throat.

  She opened her mouth, eager to cross the divide between them. Too bad she had no idea what words to string together to get her to the other side.

  He looked different. His cheeks had hollowed out, giving him a surly look that was all harsh angles and unforgiving lines. Beneath his eyes, dark smudges had appeared, as though he hadn’t slept any better than she had recently.

  It was as though he’d captured her misery and smeared it across his own face so he could reflect it back to her. Why had she pushed him away? To punish herself? What a masochistic idiot she was. For her, she now knew, there was no worse fate than cutting Cooper, the other, better half of herself, out of her life.

  Yeah.

  She definitely loved him.

  His eyes narrowed, glinting now, and she knew the divide between them wasn’t getting any smaller the longer she stood here.

  Start talking, girl.

  “Hi,” she said, her voice breathy. God, she was a mess. Realizing that her raw nerves were making her link and unlink her fingers, she pulled her hands apart and stuck them in her pockets. “It’s so good to see you.”

  No reaction other than his hard stare.

  And then, without warning, his face contracted into a snarl of rage.

  “Cooper,” she began, alarmed.

  Stepping back, he slammed the door in her face.

  For one stunned and stupid second, she stared at the spot where he’d just been, wondering if he’d rip her limb from limb if she so much as tried to knock on his door again. But then she decided, Screw it. What was he going to do? Yell at her? Have security escort her out? Throw her into the lagoon?

  Any of those possible fates were no worse than the hell of loneliness she’d been through in their time apart. She was a big girl. She could endure yelling. She had it coming.

  Taking a fortifying breath, she opened the door and strode into his bungalow.

  He was on her in an instant, a hulking figure emerging from the shadows cast by the plantation blinds, vibrating with suppressed fury.

  “I’m trying to stay calm.” Leaning down in her face, he spoke in a low rumble that was like the approaching roar of a tornado. “But I want you out of here. Now.”

  “We need to talk,” she said, standing her ground, just as calm.

  “There’s nothing to say.”

  She shrugged. “I disagree.”

  For one arrested second, he gaped at her as though he couldn’t believe his ears.

  Then he lost it.

  “Get out!” His bellowing fury broke over her like a seventy-foot wave obliterating everything in its path. The Cooper she’d known disappeared inside flashing eyes, a sneering mouth and waving hands. “You think you get to show up here and look at me with those eyes and everything’s okay? Is that what you think? Huh?”

  She watched him, knowing he’d never hit her but thinking anything would be better than the seething hatred in his eyes right now. But he didn’t really hate her, she reminded herself, putting all her energy into not running away or, worse, cowering before him. He loved her, and he was a wounded bear right now. It was her job to stay calm and get through to him.

  “I think that pushing you away was the most self-destructive thing I’ve ever done,” she said softly. “And that’s saying a lot. And I’m hoping you’ll give me another chance.”

  This baring of her naked heart had absolutely no effect on him whatsoever.

  Making a derisive sound that was a million times worse than a disbelieving snort, he grabbed her upper arm in his grip and frog-marched her back to the door.

  “Get out,” he said, opening it for her with his free hand. “Leave.”

  Jerking free, she decided to take the offensive. Getting up in his face and staring down his flashing gaze, she planted her feet and squared her shoulders. “If you want me out of here, you’ll have to throw me in the lagoon.”

  He stilled, his breath a harsh rasp in the silence.

  “And once I climb out of the water and dry myself off, I’ll be right back here, asking you for another chance, and you’ll have to deal with me then.”

  He looked away, his face twisting with some emotion she couldn’t read.

  “So let me know what you want to do. If it’s the lagoon, I need to take off my shoes first because they were pretty expensive.”

  His gaze flickered back to her, and there was a lot less anger in it this time and a lot more turbulent uncertainty.

  Swinging the door shut again, he stalked away toward the bed. “You have ten seconds,” he said without bothering to face her. “Start talking.”

  Chapter 14

  Predictably, all her racing thoughts chose that moment to leave her head. And there was no way she could think when he had his shoulders squared against her.

  “Are you going to look at me?” she asked.

  For a while it seemed as if his stony silence was the only answer she was going to get, but then he surprised her. Turning around, he ducked his head and touched his thumb and forefinger to the inside corners of his eyes. She waited, every beat of her heart a painful thud against her breastbone. Finally, he looked up, nostrils flaring and lips curling, but his focus latched on to some fixed point above her head and showed no signs of lowering.

  “Five seconds,” he said.

  “Fine,” she snapped. “You scare me.”

  His bloodshot gaze snapped to her face. “What?”

  She hesitated, trying to get the words to match up with the way her heart swelled when she looked at him. “The way you make me feel...the way you look at me like I’m the most important person in the universe...the kind of man you are, a really good person, it just—”

  “I’m a real person!” he roared. She winced, startled by this second explosion. “I’m not some idealized version of a Boy Scout you saw in a picture. I’m not a saint. I will disappoint you sooner or later—”

  “You think I don’t know that?”

  “I’m not sure what you know. You haven’t stuck around long enough to find out much about me, one way or the other. Have you?”

  That stung. “I know you’re an impatient neat freak and workaholic who watches way too much Doctor Who and has a competitive streak a mile wide,” she said defensively. “I know you’re a hopeless optimist even when the world isn’t giving you much to be optimistic about. I know you believe in second chances, and you get all moody and sulky when you’re thinking too hard. You don’t say much when silence will do, but when you do tal
k, it’s always worth listening to. I know you’re a devoted brother and son. How’m I doing so far?”

  She’d been looking down at her hands, counting off her points on her fingers, so it was a big surprise to look up and see that his face had gone the livid red of a lobster and his eyes were glazed with tears. His chin quivered.

  “Cooper,” she began, moving toward him, needing to touch him when he was in this kind of pain.

  But he was beyond listening. “I gave you my heart,” he shouted, balling up his fist and thumping his chest for emphasis. “Do you think I do that every day to whatever woman rolls up in a pair of heels and a little black dress? I gave you my heart, and you couldn’t walk away from me fast enough! I gave you my heart—”

  Galvanized by some primal instinct buried inside her, she hurried forward, reached up and cupped his hard, bristly cheeks between her hands. He stiffened, trying to jerk away, but she held him tight, sinking her fingers into his silky curls until she felt the warmth of his scalp underneath.

  “Shhh.” She pressed her face to the side of his, tasting the salty wetness of his tears as she spoke and reveling in the way his big body radiated heat. “Shhh,” she murmured again, massaging his head, and some of the tension began to ease out of his muscles. “I’m not letting you go, so you need to stop fighting me.”

  Calmer now, his breath an uneven rasp, he planted his hands on her hips and brought her closer, anchoring her against him. His long-lashed gaze flicked up to hers, filling her entire field of vision with eyes that were now the deep indigo of the waters outside.

  “Tell me what you want.” They were so close and his voice was so low that it was as if the sound vibrated into her body. “I need to hear it.”

  In answer she took one of his hands and pressed it between her breasts, directly over the spot where her heart was trying to pound its way through her chest wall.

  “I’m giving you my heart,” she told him, unblinking. “So you’d better take good care of it.”