‘Sorry,’ I say, sighing. ‘I didn’t mean it.’ I perch my sunglasses on top of my head and turn my back on him to push my feet into my flip-flops. ‘I didn’t sleep well last night. I’m testy.’
Oliver is quiet, so rare an occurrence I’m terrified to look down in case I still have my Rabbit in my hand or I forgot to re-don my bikini bottoms. I tense, my back aflame with the thought of his eyes on me, exactly the scenario I wanted when I purchased this teeny tiny excuse for a bikini.
I spin in a tentative arc to face him.
He’s still laid out on my bed like a sacrificial lamb, still propped up on his elbows like some male pin-up, only now he’s looking at me with a puzzled expression. Only Oliver could pull off that face and still look entirely fuckable.
‘What?’ I demand, in no mood for the usual teasing banter we share.
‘Nothing,’ he says, his jaw slack. ‘It’s just...’
His eyes stay on mine, but I look down anyway in case one nipple has made a bid for freedom. But no, I’m good.
‘Why are you staring?’ Perhaps the sexual frustration is pasted all over my hot face.
‘I’m not. I mean...it’s nothing. It’s just that...you look good in red, that’s all.’
That’s all? I deflate. I want to cry and laugh in the same breath. I want him to scour every inch of my body with his sexy stare. I want him helpless to look away. Helpless against the transformation into my daydream Oliver, who would have stripped me naked and been rattling the headboard by now.
I snort. Move towards the mirror, where I pretend to tweak my messy hair that’s caught up in a topknot, while my body tingles with awareness that I’m scantily clad, alone in a room with the object of my every adult desire.
‘Thanks,’ I say in my best unruffled tone, forcing my muscles to relax. My head spins and I talk my overactive imagination back from the ledge. Olly—despite his infamous reputation with women—is a gentleman. He’s always complimenting me when I dress up, or cheering me on when I crack a tricky case at work. Just as I listen to his work woes about his tech company, even though I don’t understand a word. But that’s what friends do. Support one another. He doesn’t mean anything by his comment. Certainly not what I’d like him to mean.
‘Are you wearing sunscreen?’ I ask to cover my full-body meltdown because, where I turn lobster-pink before returning to pasty, Oliver tans to a deep bronze almost overnight. So not fair.
‘Yes, Mum.’ He grins.
I toss my tube of factor fifty at him, sighing when he sits up and catches it in one hand with lightning reflexes. See? Good at everything...
‘Ha ha,’ I quip. ‘You can do my back.’
No! Fuck...why did I ask him to do that? His hands on me...touching...with my aroused state heightened and my orgasm interrupted. Not a good idea.
‘I will.’ He drops the tube onto the bed and leans back on his hands, arms straight. ‘First tell me why you’re testy. You’re on holiday too. You’re supposed to be relaxing.’
How can I relax when I’m on high alert for any sign he might’ve noticed me in a sexual way, or when I’m just waiting for him to hook up with one of the wedding guests right in front of me? It’s happened before. He wasn’t a dick about it, giving said woman enough breadcrumbs to keep her keen while also attending to me, the friend he brought along as his plus one. But the next morning the smug look on his face told me she’d miraculously found her way to his room once we’d said goodnight.
‘I am relaxed,’ I say, grimacing past my clenched jaw.
‘You don’t seem relaxed.’ Amusement tinges his tone. ‘You’ve put lip gloss on three times. Without wearing your glasses.’
Sometimes it sucks that friends know you so well... I cast him a glare, something so rare it seems to shock both of us.
‘I’m fine,’ I bite out, desperately trying to blank out the pact I made with Brooke and Grace—to orchestrate a holiday fling with Oliver. I should just embrace a bloody dating app. At least then I could vet prospective boyfriends from the comfort of my pyjamas. Instead I’m standing here dithering over the merits of actually confessing my feelings of lust to Oliver versus spending the rest of my life always wondering.
At my lame assurance, Oliver flops back down onto the bed in disgust. I ignore him. Continue with my rant, because it’s his fault I’m in this state.
‘I just...needed a few minutes to myself,’ I say, huffing. ‘I told you I’d meet you by the pool. Plus my bikini seems to have shrunk since I tried it on in the shop, and I wanted to make sure I didn’t have any tan lines showing.’ I pace to my suitcase and find my sarong, then knot it around my waist. Makeshift body armour.
‘It’s all right for you guys,’ I continue. ‘You can just throw on a pair of shorts and parade around in all your manly, hairy glory, attracting stares of appreciation from the opposite sex...’
He’s fidgeting, another of his annoying habits I find attractive. Damn, everything he does appeals to my libido, but now I’ve started it’s as if my sexual frustration has discovered an oral pressure valve.
‘But us women, we have to wax shit and plump stuff and squeeze our bodies into ridiculous, minute fashion statements...’ I grab my mascara and slick a layer over my stubby upper lashes. I locate my glasses, push them on and check my mascara. I’m happy with me. Mostly. I’m an attractive, smart, bordering on a proud nerd with my own forensic-accounting business.
But I’m not done venting.
‘And you know how challenging it is running your own company,’ I say, wiping a smudge of black from my cheek. ‘I’ve had a very stressful week, with three new clients and meeting deadlines in order to have this week off. So forgive me if I can’t simply switch on the party girl just to keep you entertained.’
I can sense without turning around for confirmation that he’s stopped listening. But, instead of riling me further, his inattention deflates me. I’m being unfair. I’m not really angry with him. I’m frustrated with myself, at my continued inertia where he’s concerned, because maybe Brooke and Grace are right. Maybe I should have told him I fancied him the night we met. Maybe it’s time to tell him how I’ve felt about him all these years... At least then we could laugh about it, clear the air and move on.
My blood runs cold at the very idea. No. A swim in the ocean is what I need. Douse my hormones and reboot my mind-set to fun, holiday Neve.
‘Neve...? What’s this?’ he asks, with the rustle of a plastic bag.
‘Hmm?’ I mumble as I tackle my lower lashes with the mascara wand, a feat that requires a bizarre facial contortion while my glasses are perched on the end of my nose.
‘I said, what’s this?’ His voice has dropped several octaves to that smoky quality of all my filthiest fantasies.
But there’s no time to enjoy the sound.
I freeze.
The mascara wand hovers near my eyeball, ready to blind me with one false move.
No, no, no... Please, no.
I turn, horror a tight ball cramping my stomach.
Dangling from Oliver’s long, elegant and tanned index finger is my bag of sex toys.
Copyright © 2020 by JC Harroway
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ISBN-13: 9781488062247
Tempt Me
Copyright © 2020 by Caitlin Crews
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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Tempt Me Page 17
