by Jae
Then her gaze fell on the card taped to the inside of the lid. She recognized Sasha’s bold handwriting from her wedding-planning notes.
Ash,
I heard what you did for Holly and Leo. Wow. I can imagine that must have been hard for you. I googled the meaning of flowers online, and the website said red carnations mean pride and admiration.
They also symbolized love, but apparently, the website hadn’t mentioned that. Ash gave the sugar carnation another look, then continued reading the card.
You certainly have mine. Well done! Enjoy your cupcake.
Sasha
For the second time in as many days, Ash had to blink back tears. To have Sasha be proud of her meant a lot and warmed her like a mug of hot chocolate on a cold winter day.
She carefully pulled off the tape, removed the card from the box, and put it into a drawer with the sugar carnation so she could reread it later. With a grin, she lifted the cupcake, removed the paper liner, and took a big bite.
Chapter 15
The next Friday, after days of not sleeping much and constantly thinking about how they would manage to share a room, it was finally time for the bachelorette weekend.
Ashley leaned out across the railing of the boat that was taking them to a private island and watched Key West grow smaller behind them. Her blonde hair blew with the ocean breeze, drawing Sasha’s gaze.
“Careful.” She stepped next to Ashley and wrapped one arm around her. “I don’t think Leo and Holly want to lose anyone overboard on their bachelorette weekend.”
Ashley pulled back from the railing, but not from her embrace, so Sasha lightly kept her arm around her. They were in Florida, far from home and most people they knew, and Ashley already seemed much more relaxed.
“This is so beautiful, it’s almost unreal, isn’t it?” Ashley stared out across the turquoise water.
Sasha looked at her instead, charmed by the wide-eyed wonder on her face. “Yeah, it is. I take it this is your first time in Florida?”
Ashley tore her gaze away from the water to glance left and right. Holly, Leo, and their other guests were on the other side of the boat, where the tiny island off Key West was now appearing. Ashley leaned closer, as if not wanting anyone else to overhear. “It’s actually my first time to see the ocean.”
Now it was Sasha’s turn to stare with wide eyes. “Any ocean?”
A hint of red dusted Ashley’s cheeks. She nodded and averted her gaze.
“Hey, nothing to be ashamed of. I know your parents couldn’t leave the farm to go on long vacations, and with you now running your own business, it’s hard to get away. Honestly, it’s not often that I get any time away from the bakery either, so this is quite a treat for me too.” She gently bumped Ashley’s hip with her own, still keeping her arm around her so Ash wouldn’t be thrown against the railing. “Plus this way, you’re kind of losing your ocean virginity to me.”
“God, you’re so bad.” Ashley slapped at her shoulder, but she was laughing. “If anything, I’m losing my ocean virginity to Holly and Leo since they’re paying for the trip.”
“Who’s losing their virginity to us?” Leo asked as the rest of the group joined them.
Ashley’s earlier blush deepened to a dark pink. “No one.”
“Um, since the sex talk is already starting, I’ve got one favor to ask,” Holly said.
Ashley groaned. “We weren’t talking about…that. Really.” She nudged Sasha. “Tell them.”
“We weren’t talking about sex,” Sasha said dutifully.
“Guys, I know this is a bachelorette party, but can we agree on no sex jokes, no strippers, no nipple-topped cupcakes, and no cocktail straws that are shaped like genitals?” Holly looked at each of her friends in turn, and Leo wrapped one arm around her in silent support. “I’ve attended enough bachelorette parties that made me uncomfortable. I don’t want my own to be one of them.”
“Damn, there go my weekend plans,” Holly’s cousin Nicole muttered with a teasing grin.
Sasha gave Holly an admiring glance, proud of her friend for standing up for what she needed. “We can do that, right, guys? No sex this weekend. Uh, I mean, no sex talk.” Shit. Maybe she’d had one too many of those no-sex pep talks with her libido in the week leading up to this weekend.
“No problem for me,” Holly’s friend Meg said with a chuckle.
Her quiet queerplatonic partner nodded. Sasha hadn’t heard her say more than “hello” since they had met at the airport.
The others murmured their agreement.
The boat came to a stop at the wooden dock. Sasha could understand Ashley’s wide-eyed staring as they followed Leo and Holly off the boat. She felt as if she’d been transported to a tropical paradise. Coconut palm trees swayed in the warm breeze, the sun gleamed on the crystal clear water, and a white, sandy beach beckoned. No cars were allowed on the island, so nothing but the sound of the moored boats creaking and tinkling in the wind interrupted the peaceful sound of the waves.
“Ooh!” Jenny clapped her hands. “Let’s go to the house and get changed. I can’t wait to get to the beach.”
They followed a path along the beach until Leo stopped and pointed. “This is it.”
Despite knowing they would be twelve people once Lauren and Grace arrived, Sasha had somehow expected a cozy little cottage. Instead, a two-story house rose behind a white picket fence. The blue and white paint looked as if it had been freshly applied just for their visit. A wide porch seemed to wrap around the house, and another one stretched along the second floor.
Leo led them through the gate and up a short, palm-tree-flanked path.
When the front door swung open, Sasha caught sight of a wooden staircase that curved up to the second floor. Behind it, a fully equipped kitchen with blue cabinets ran almost the entire length of the house, ending in a sunlit dining room. French doors led out onto a huge patio with a large pool surrounded by tropical shrubbery and luxurious lounge chairs.
“Wow.” Ashley twirled in a circle like Cinderella who’d been allowed to go to the ball for the first time. “I might not want to leave on Sunday.”
“Wait till you see the view from the upstairs porch.” Leo pointed at the stairs. “If you want to get settled and changed, go ahead. The master bedroom is ours, but other than that, pick whatever room you want.”
That started a stampede to the stairs, with Cait and Lisa charging ahead of everyone else.
Sasha wasn’t in a hurry. In a house this beautiful, she doubted there were any bad rooms. “Want me to take that upstairs for you?” she asked Ashley, pointing at her small suitcase.
“No, thanks. I’m coming up too.” Ashley walked up the stairs ahead of her.
Sasha slid her hand along the intricately carved handrail. What an amazing house. She didn’t want to think about how much staying for the weekend must be costing Leo and Holly.
By the time they made it upstairs, Jenny and Nicole, Lisa and Cait, and Meg and Jo had already picked rooms, leaving the two rooms at the end of the hall for Ashley and Sasha to choose from.
Ashley glanced into both rooms, then pointed to one of them. “This one is a bit smaller. I think we should take it and leave the other one for Grace and Lauren when they get here. They’re probably used to big hotel suites.”
In the past, Sasha had assumed that Ashley’s consideration for others was just something she did to impress, but now she knew better. “Sure. I doubt we’ll spend much time in our room anyway.”
Their room was as beautiful as the rest of the house. It was painted in creamy white and soft blue, continuing the nautical theme from downstairs. The Florida sun shining in through the skylight made the polished hardwood floor gleam. French doors opened onto the porch, from which a white spiral staircase led down to the amazing pool Sasha had caught a glimpse of earlier, complete with rock waterfalls on both en
ds.
Then her gaze fell on the bed that sat with the headboard against the wall so they could see the ocean before they went to sleep. It was the only bed in the room.
Ashley stared at it too. “It’s a king size. We can share, right?”
“Of course. No problem. We’ll be fine. Pick whatever side you want, and I’ll stay on mine.” Sasha flashed a grin. “Unless, of course, you invite me over.”
“Hey, no sex jokes this weekend, remember?”
“That wasn’t a sex joke.” Sasha gave her reply a teasing note, but deep down, she knew it really hadn’t been much of a joke. If Ashley invited her over to her side of the bed, all her good intentions would fly right out the window; she knew that.
“I’ll go get changed.” Ashley unzipped her suitcase, selected a change of clothes, and walked past her toward the attached bathroom.
Sasha opened the French doors and enjoyed the view of the ocean for a moment, then dropped onto the bed and bounced up and down a few times. God, she would share not just a room, but a bed with Ashley tonight.
“Wow,” came Ashley’s voice through the closed bathroom door. “There’s a huge walk-in shower in here. There’s room enough for two! Can you imagine what Leo and Holly’s master bathroom must look like?”
But Sasha’s imagination was busy picturing Ashley and her in the shower together, the warm spray raining down on their naked bodies. “Stop. Just stop.”
“Stop what?” Ashley walked out of the bathroom.
Jeez, she was fast. Definitely not a high-maintenance woman who needed hours in the bathroom.
Ashley rounded the bed, clad in cute, pink shorts and a white T-shirt with capped sleeves. Her waist-length hair was still falling onto her back, as if she had decided to let her hair down this weekend—literally.
“Um, bouncing on the bed,” Sasha said. “Wouldn’t want anyone downstairs to think there’s an activity of another kind going on up here.”
Ashley tossed the pair of jeans she had worn at her. “God, is that all you think of all day?”
“No.” Sasha’s teasing grin disappeared. While she definitely found Ashley attractive that way, it wasn’t all she thought of. She found her appealing in a lot of ways that had nothing to do with sex—and that was part of the problem. Purely sexual attraction was so much easier to ignore than the emotional bond that was growing between them.
Ashley sat on the edge of the bed and looked down at Sasha, who was still stretched out spread eagle. “You okay?”
“Yeah. Just taking it all in.” She swirled her finger around in a way that indicated the house and the island beyond.
Ashley slid farther up the bed, rolled onto her side, and propped up her head on one slender arm until she was facing Sasha. She looked like an excited teenager. “It’s a lot to take in, isn’t it?” She laughed. “I feel like I’m on my honeymoon or something.”
“Nah. We’re not the marrying kind, remember? So it can’t be a honeymoon.”
“Yeah. Right.” Ashley looked at her for a moment longer, then gave her a light pat on the belly and climbed off the bed. “Come on. Get changed. The beach is calling.”
As Sasha slipped off her long-sleeved shirt in the bathroom, she rested her fingertips on her belly, where Ashley had touched her, and looked at herself in the long mirror that took up half the wall above the sink. Was Ashley more touchy-feely here in Florida, or was she getting more comfortable touching her in general, instead of always fearfully holding herself back? God help her if it was the latter…not that the former would be easier to handle.
“You coming?” Ashley called through the door.
Sasha wrenched her gaze from the mirror and put on a pair of shorts and her Keep calm and eat cupcakes T-shirt over her swimsuit. An afternoon of exploring paradise with Ashley awaited her. Figuring out if things between them were changing could wait until later.
Just as they were about to leave the house for the beach, a knock sounded on the front door.
Leo went to open the door and returned with two women.
Ash would have known the shorter one anywhere. When Ash had been growing up, her mother had been a big fan of Everything That Counts, the sitcom that Grace Durand had starred in as a teenager, so that curvy figure and those famous cheekbones were unmistakable.
“Holy fucking unicorn,” Meg whispered to Holly. “So it’s true? You’re really friends with Grace Durand?”
“She’s just Grace this weekend, okay?” Holly whispered back. “So please don’t ask her for an autograph or the latest Hollywood gossip.”
Ash could imagine that Grace needed a break from the limelight and the constant acting—just as she did, only that her kind of acting wouldn’t earn her any awards.
Grace and her wife exchanged warm hugs with Leo and Holly. Then, still smiling, Grace embraced everyone else too.
Wow. Ash squeezed her back, instantly taken by the actress’s down-to-earth charm…and the heavenly scent of her perfume. Okay, maybe Sasha wasn’t the only one with a bit of a teenage crush.
Sasha was the last one to be hugged. Grace’s head tucked neatly beneath her chin, so Ash could see the expression on Sasha’s face. She looked so much like a starstruck teenager with wobbly knees that Ash had to laugh.
She met the gaze of Grace’s wife, who watched them through horn-rimmed glasses, an affectionate smile curling up her lips. “Hi.” She stuck out her hand. “I’m Lauren.”
Ash shook her hand, returning the pleasantly firm grip with equal pressure.
“I thought you’d already be here by the time we arrived,” Leo said.
Lauren groaned. “Our flight was a little late, and getting through the airport was hell.”
“Really?” Ash asked. When their plane had landed, the airport hadn’t seemed all that crowded.
“There’s always people who recognize that beautiful face, even with a hat and sunglasses, especially now that it has barely been a month since she won her Oscar.” Lauren beamed with pride. “It took a while before we could make our escape.”
Holly nudged her fiancée. “Why didn’t you get ambushed by fans?”
Leo shrugged. “I hid behind Sasha whenever someone looked my way. Plus I’ve been mostly out of the limelight, with just a handful of concerts and no world tours for the past year and a half. There are more interesting celebrities to follow than a semi-retired pop singer.”
“I beg to differ.” Holly softly kissed her, and Ash realized that it was no longer weird to see the only two women she’d ever kissed be affectionate with each other.
Nicole pinched her cousin. “Hey, I thought you said no sexual stuff this weekend?”
Grace made good use of her acting skills to give them a horrified look. “No sex? Leo failed to mention that when she invited us.”
Everyone laughed.
Sasha remembered only one family vacation with both of her parents before her mother had left them. It had been a weekend in Key West, so strolling along the beach now brought up some half-forgotten memories. To her surprise, most of them were good ones.
She remembered walking through the shallow waves at the shoreline to find seashells, the way Ashley was doing now, and getting more and more disappointed when she couldn’t find any—until her mother had secretly sprinkled some she had bought at a shop along the beach for her to find.
Now she understood why her mother had done it.
Ashley waded through the water several steps ahead. Sometimes, she walked farther out until she was knee-deep in water, apparently not minding that some of the incoming waves were drenching the very bottom of her shorts. Then she came back to shore, bent over, and peered through the crystal clear water, but every time she reached down, she came up with nothing but a broken sea urchin or a piece of sea glass, never a shell.
“You won’t find a lot of shells here,” Sasha called to her. “A
t least not intact ones. Most of them break up over the reef before they make it to shore.”
Ashley sent her a smile before continuing her search. “I’ll find one.”
Grace and Lauren, walking hand in hand, caught up with Sasha.
“You should take her snorkeling,” Lauren said. “She’ll find a lot more. Maybe even see a sea turtle.”
Yeah, maybe she should. Sasha could easily imagine the wonder on Ashley’s face as she swam through a school of colorful fish.
Ashley let out a cry that sent Sasha’s pulse racing.
Water splashing everywhere, Sasha rushed over to her. “What is it? Did you step on something? Are you bleeding? Show me!”
But Ashley wasn’t clutching her foot or her hand—she was holding out a seashell. “I found one! Look. It looks like a tiny wedding cake, don’t you think?”
Sasha took it from her and examined it. The shell was round and about an inch in diameter. With a bit of imagination, it did indeed resemble a multi-tiered wedding cake with icing decorations.
“Yeah, it kind of does. Just don’t try to take a bite.” She handed it back, and Ashley resumed her search for shells, while Sasha walked back to Grace and Lauren. “What do you know? Ash found a shell, and now she’s on a mission to find more. We’ll probably have to drag her away from the beach at nightfall.”
Grace chuckled. “She’s cute.”
Sasha had been watching Ashley, fascinated by the beads of water glittering on her bare arms. “Huh?”
“Your girlfriend.” Grace nodded toward Ashley. “She’s cute. First time at the beach?”
Sasha turned toward her. “No. I mean, yes, it is, but she’s not my girlfriend.”
“Oh. Sorry. Lauren always tells me I have no gaydar whatsoever.” Grace lightly bumped her wife’s shoulder. “I should know better than to assume everyone’s gay, just because we’re at a bachelorette weekend for two women.”