Briggs
When we got out of the water about a half an hour later, I couldn’t help noticing the way that Sage’s white shirt clung to her breasts. It had become see-through, and it took all of my willpower to keep my hands to myself. I wanted to trace her curves again, to taste that sweetness between her legs, and not on my fingers this time. But we were too exposed here.
What we did on the golf course was one thing—I was able to hold myself back then. But now, just a day later, I wasn’t so sure that I’d have enough self-control. I needed to get her naked, damn it, but if someone happened to come along—one of the locals that came to this spot to swim, for instance—they’d see her. I couldn’t have that. It was better to keep my hands to myself for now.
The two of us laid out on the grass beside the water, letting the sun warm us up and dry our skin. Our clothes were still damp, but it was comfortable. I folded my hands behind my head and Sage did the thing beside me. The blue sky above us was full of white clouds and we stared up at them while we talked about our lives and got to know one another better.
“So, have you always wanted to be a cop?” she asked.
“Yeah. I made that decision when I was ten years old. My mom was a big fan of those movies with Mel Gibson from the eighties and nineties—”
“—Lethal Weapon?” she said with a big, cheesy grin.
I chuckled. “Yeah, those. Anyway, I decided that I wanted to be just like those guys.”
“And when you realized that those movies are completely unrealistic?” she asked, humor lacing her voice.
“I decided to stick with the plan anyway,” I said. “The job’s not exactly full of shootouts with bad guys and kicking ass like what you see in the movies, but I like it anyway. I feel like it gives me a chance to do some good.”
“Wow. You’ve known since you were ten?” She glanced back up at the blue sky. “I had no idea where I would end up at that age. I even started out at college studying business before I realized how much I wanted to pursue the culinary arts.”
“So, you like being a pastry chef?”
“I love it,” she said enthusiastically, then frowned a bit. “But I have to admit that the environment I’m currently in is a little intense for me sometimes.”
“What do you mean?”
She turned her head and met my gaze, her face slightly pink from the sun. “It’s a fine-dining restaurant, so there’s a ton of pressure on everyone to make the experience for the customer top-notch. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but tempers can run high in the kitchen. My boss is demanding, the atmosphere is competitive, and there’s always a lot of heat and noise.” She sighed. “I don’t know, maybe I should just be happy to have a decent paying job, but I’ve always had this dream of opening a little place of my own.”
“A restaurant?”
“No, a pastry shop.” Her smile was much brighter now. “I could make fresh bread and pastries and desserts every day, working alone in my kitchen, and put them for sale in big glass cases.”
“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out,” I said, thinking how gorgeous she looked with the sunlight on her face.
“Almost. I’ve been saving up for a long time, and I’m nearly there. I really think I can do it soon.”
I liked that she was ambitious and had goals, and had passionate dreams for her future. She clearly wasn’t the type of woman who needed a man to take care of her, and that was appealing to me, too, after everything that I’d been through with my ex.
As we continued to talk about our lives, I thought about the possibility of continuing to see her when we left the island. Would she be open to dating me in real life? We had chemistry, that much was clear, but I knew that my life was a complete mess right now. It would be asking a lot for any woman to accept my baggage.
Now that Sage knew about my troubles with Alyssa, I wasn’t sure what she was thinking. This was an island getaway, and it was hard to tell if Sage wanted to be with me for real, or if I was just a fun way to pass the time until returning to the real world—and nothing more than a fake boyfriend to keep her mother at bay.
Pushing all those unsettling thoughts aside, I stood and held out my hand to Sage to help her to her feet, too.
“We should probably head back,” I said. We both had parties to attend tonight, bachelor and bachelorette, but I wanted to take advantage of our time alone together before then. That meant we needed to get back to the hotel.
We went back up to the cliff, collecting our phones and putting our shoes on. Then, we made our way down the path until we reached the car. I had thrown a couple of towels into the SUV this morning before I even texted Sage, already hoping that she’d agree to go along with this impromptu date. I put them on the seats before we got in and drove us back to the hotel. We were riding up to the eighth floor in the elevator when Sage turned to me with a wicked smile.
“Do you want to come see my room?” she asked.
There was no doubt about what she was implying, because I was certain that every room in this hotel was the same.
Instead of answering with words, I pulled her close to me, pressing a kiss to her lips. My hands trailed down her back, cupping her ass. She moaned and leaned her body into mine, but before we could get too caught up in our make-out session, the elevator stopped and the doors slid open.
“Wow,” I heard a voice say as we abruptly pulled away from each other.
I turned to see that it was Michael’s sister, Summer. She was standing in the hall, looking at us with wide, shocked eyes. We were both panting and my erection was throbbing as it pressed against the zipper of my shorts.