“I don’t know you well enough to shower with you,” she teased with a tiny smile.
“We’ll save that for tomorrow then,” I teased back. “Can I buy you lunch? I owe you after the way I hit you with my car. And pushed you through a door.”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. How about we meet at the dining room in an hour? I heard they have outdoor seating, and I wouldn’t mind getting some sunshine.”
I started to tell her that I’d pick her up but decided not to press my luck.
“See you then.”
I was waiting at a table on the veranda when Erika came in, dressed in a dark red bathing suit, one of those flowered skirts women liked to wear over bathing suits, flip flops, and a big, floppy straw sunhat. She looked beautiful.
I waived to get her attention, and she made her way over to me. Our eyes met and held until she bumped into a chair, knocking it over and almost falling on top of someone’s table before stopping herself with her hand. I rushed over as she righted the chair and apologized to the people at the table.
“I’m starting to think you’re accident prone,” I said, taking her elbow to lead her back to the table. My fingers burned where I touched her.
“I’m starting to think you’re bad luck,” she rejoined.
She took off her hat as we sat down, shaking out her hair, then looked down at her menu. The waitress hurried over with coffee. Erika took a long drink, her eyes closing in pleasure. I noticed she drank it black, same as me.
“Do you know what you want to eat?” the young waitress asked, looking at Erika.
“I’ll take an order of scrambled eggs and a bowl of fresh fruit please, with a cup of cottage cheese if you have it.”
“Toast? Bacon? Sausage?” the waitress asked.
“No thank you.”
I ordered an omelet with bacon and toast. When the waitress left, I looked at my companion.
“How’d you get into running?” I asked.
“I started running when I was in treatment,” she said after a slight pause. “It was a good way to take my mind off...everything and lose some weight.”
“You don’t need to lose weight,” I told her, my eyes falling to her shapely breasts before snapping back up.
“I did then,” she said quietly. “I was at least fifty pounds heavier when I went into treatment, plus it’s pretty common to gain weight in the early days of recovery. How about you? Do you do a lot of running?”
I had the distinct sense that she wasn’t comfortable talking about herself.
“Yeah, I started years ago. My job is pretty demanding, and the good thing about running is you can do it any time and you don’t have to buy a bunch of equipment.”
“Except good running shoes,” she said. “Do you run races?”
I shook my head. “I’ve never done a race, but I religiously run three to five miles most days unless I’m doing something else active.” I patted my still-flat stomach. “Like you said, it’s a good way to burn calories, and I don’t want to let myself go.”
“You don’t need to lose weight,” she repeated my words from earlier and I gave her a smile.
Conversation flowed between us more easily than I expected. After talking about running and hobbies, we asked each other about our jobs. It was clear that Erika loved her job and got a sense of purpose from it, more than I got from mine, that was for sure. I liked it, was good at it, and made an obscene amount of money, most of which I’d invested to make even more money. But money wasn’t everything.
After lunch we headed over to the pool. After getting beach towels from the attendant, we spread out on side by side chaise loungers. Erika removed her skirt thing, and I checked out her slim body out of the corner of my eye. Her ass was a work of art – round but muscled. I had an image of pounding into her from behind, my hands gripping those cheeks, and pulled off my shirt and spread it across my lap just in case. I was already half hard and this was a family resort.
Erika turned, giving my naked chest an appreciative look. Her eyes turned dark, and she licked her lips before she caught herself and turned away. We lay side-by-side, lost in our thoughts, until my family caught up with us.