by Avery Flynn
“Going home after this is going to wreck me,” Aubrey said as she filled her plate. Comfort eating? Her? Absolutely. “There’s no way microwaved seafood lasagna will ever taste the same as the fresh stuff.”
“You don’t cook?”
“Not unless forced.” She followed Carter to a table where there were two open seats at an otherwise crowded table. “Believe me I was the last person anyone ever expected to take over gran’s bakery.”
“Who does the cooking there?”
“Ben, but he’d rather eat his own toes than deal with anything business or front-of-the-house related.” People were definitely not Ben’s thing. Leave him alone to create magic in the kitchen and all was good. Force him to talk to someone and it was like the man forgot every single bit of the manners his mama had taught him. Surly didn’t even begin to cover it.
Carter’s jaw tensed. “So you two make a good team.”
“We make it work.”
“What else is your life like back home?” He reached out, tangling his fingers in hers. “Tell me about Salvation.”
Her senses going all jittery under his touch, it was hard to remember a damn thing about the town where she’d lived almost her entire life.
Pull it together, Aubrey!
“Well it’s a small town but we’re located in a sweet spot close to the cities for visitors yet far enough away that rent isn’t out of reach.” Oh yeah, way to really sell it. “We have the Sweet Salvation Brewery that’s won all sorts of awards, a fantasy baseball camp every summer, and the world’s best pecan pie.”
He smoothed the tension off his face and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “I’ll have to visit.”
She laughed loud enough to gain the attention of everyone at their table and immediately regretted it. Dropping her volume, she leaned in close. “Uh-huh, sure. It seems just the kind of vacation a guy like you would take.” When every other single option in the world had been exhausted.
Carter cocked his head to the side. “A guy like me?”
“Yep, hot, single, and looking for a small town where there is exactly one honky tonk to grab a beer. It’s very exciting.” If it was Opposite Day.
“I hear the woman who runs the shuffleboard table at that bar has a great ass.” He kissed the tips of her fingers one by one. “Anyway, maybe I can sweet talk her into giving me lessons.”
“Oh my Lord, you two,” said the woman next to them who had three empty coconut shells in front of her and the remains of three shredded drink umbrellas surrounding them. “I’m about to melt over here. I don’t suppose you’re looking for a third?”
“Not today,” Carter said.
She sighed and shrugged. “Pity.”
After finishing up with lunch, they made their way over to the touristy shops where they checked out all the offerings. While they stood side by side wearing funny hats, it was hard not to look at Carter and imagine what this would be like if it was just a regular Saturday afternoon back home at the monthly flea market. Just being a couple of goofs together. In all her time spent running the thirst account, it had never been about Carter Hayes the possible partner, but now it was hard to look at him and not imagine that.
Realization landed like a bad joke, it sucked all the air out of the room and left her wanting to crawl into a dark hole. She didn’t just lust after him, he wasn’t just a distraction from the basic drudgery of her life, she liked him, and it would be so easy for it to be more than just that.
She had to tell him about the thirst account, explain that it had all been done in good fun. She had to let him know that she posted about seeing him on board but that she’d deleted it as soon as she could. With any luck he’d see it as just being a silly blip in his life. It wasn’t like he wasn’t used to it and it wasn’t like it changed the way he lived his daily life. Hell, he probably had no idea the account even existed. She’d tell him, feeling like a total fangirl dork. He’d laugh. It would be fine. Fine.
Rationalize much, Aubrey?
Damn. She hated it when her grown up self was right.
That formerly awe-inspiring seafood lasagna swirled uncomfortably in her stomach. “Carter, I gotta tell you something.”
He put back the cruise-ship-shaped hat he was wearing, tugged her behind one of the shop huts, and leaned in close as if they were sharing a secret. “Is it about how you’ve decided we should get matching tattoos?”
Despite the general seasickness she was feeling even though she was on dry land, she had to chuckle at that idea. “Nope. It’s—”
“Is it about how you want to catch the next boat back to the ship because you want to see if we can fit the both of us in that teeny-tiny shower?”
“That is never going to happen. I can barely fit in it by myself.” They were literally built to fit a ten year old and that was it. “I need to tell you something.”
He dipped his head lower so his lips were millimeters from her earlobe. “Is it that you have a boyfriend?”
She shook her head, trying to maintain her sanity while her whole body was buzzing from being so close to him. He laid his hands lightly on her waist, not moving her closer but definitely making her heart rate shoot up.
“A husband?”
Another shake of her head because forming words was getting close to impossible.
He kissed the sensitive spot right behind her earlobe. “You’re part of a monogamous polyamorous relationship and you’ve broken their trust and can’t see me anymore?”
Desire warm and thick pulled at her, making her thinking fuzzy and her need to touch him greater.
“Then let’s wait.” He kissed a spot halfway down her neck. “Serious stuff later.” He toyed with the knot holding her sarong in place. “Let’s just enjoy this because I gotta tell you, I haven’t had this much fun with someone in a long time.”
Aubrey hadn’t either. Fun wasn’t really part of her life anymore. It was like until she’d hooked back up with her best friends from college, she’d forgotten she could. It wasn’t that her life in Salvation was that bad, it was just that it wasn’t how she’d planned for her life to go and some bitter little part of herself had let that fester and grow. What an asshole she’d been. She spent her days surrounded by sugar and family—who she loved—so what if she wasn’t hanging out in cafes in Paris or dancing in penthouses? It was past time she stopped feeling sorry for herself for having a good life that just happened to be different than what she’d expected. It was time to grow up.
“I love it when you get that look on your face,” he said, shooting her a cocky grin. “It means you’ve realized I’m right and that we should head back to the ship and not come out of our room until tomorrow.”
She was holding on to her control by a thread here. “We are going to have to have a talk though.”
“Another day,” he agreed, nuzzling her neck. “Today I have plans for that sweet mouth of yours.”
Then he kissed her and it scattered all of her best intentions to the four winds. Whatever it was about Carter that did this to her, she couldn’t get enough of it and that made giving in so much easier. They’d talk—they would—and she’d tell him everything but not today. Today, she’d pretend that what she was really starting to want could come true and she could be with him as if all of this wasn’t going to end in a few days when they got back to New York. She wasn’t ready for that. She wasn’t sure she ever would be.
Nine
There were worse things than waking up to soft sunlight filtering in through the teeny-tiny stateroom window wrapped in the arms of a man Aubrey was still asleep enough to think she might be falling for.
Who are you bothering to lie for, Aubrey Dean? You are falling. You have done fallen. Past tense. Waaaaaay past tense.
Why did it suck so hard when her inner bitch was right?
Carter tightened his grip while his fingertips danced over the curve of her hip. “Does that groan mean you can’t believe we slept through dinner either?”
“O
h shit.” She planted her hand on his chest and shoved herself up into a sitting position, guilt hitting her like an ice-packed snowball to the face. “Liv’s note said we were supposed to meet everyone for dinner.”
Seriously, hanging out with her best friends since college had been her entire reason for going on this cruise. And instead of doing that, she’d stolen all of Grace’s pants, ditched her friends to hang out with a hot guy—one she was lying to by omission—and she’d missed dinner again.
She crumpled back into bed, plopped the pillow over her head, and let out a groan of pure I’m-the-asshole misery. “I’m the worst friend ever.”
Carter plucked the pillow out of her grasp before she could smother herself and grinned down at her. Damn her mutinous heart, it did a flippity flop thing before settling into a steady rhythm again. What was it about him that made it seem as if it was going to be okay?
He brushed a strand of hair from her face. “I can score tickets to dinner at the captain’s table before the cruise is over for everyone to make up for it.”
“Wouldn’t a special ask like that blow your cover?” Yeah, the one he really needed because of her.
“Not if I do it right—or more correctly, not if I have my brother Byron do it right.” Staying propped up on his forearms, he dipped his head down and gave her a quick kiss. “He can name drop you as an up and coming bakery owner about to hit it big with a Netflix reality TV special.”
“That’s both devious and brilliant.” And way too nice. “I can’t ask you to do that.”
“You’re not asking, I’m offering.” He dropped a trio of kisses along her jawline. “After all, you saving me is the reason why you’re not hanging out with your friends.”
Her gut twisted as she looked up at him. “That’s not the whole story.”
“Then I’m insisting,” he said. “I’m not going to take no for an answer.”
God, she was the worst. “Carter, we need to talk.”
“Tonight, after dinner. Now we need to get moving so we don’t miss out on Nassau completely. I wanna go do the most touristy things possible with you.”
“Definitely tonight.” Girl, you are weak. It was true. She couldn’t even deny it. When it came to Carter, she lost the ability to think clearly. “I just hope dinner with the captain helps make up for me being such a flake so far. No offense, hot guy, but we’re going to be spending a lot of time as we go back up to New York with Benjamin and the girls.”
“We, huh?” He got up, rubbing his hands over his hard abs, and stood at the end of the bed still totally naked from the night before.
Oh, honey. That view could make a girl dumb.
It took her a second, but she finally remembered how to form words as she got up and made her way to the door connecting their rooms. “Yep, you’re stuck with me for the rest of the cruise.”
“And after?” There was something in the rough timbre of his voice that gave it a raw edge.
She didn’t turn around to look at him. She couldn’t. His question had suddenly began to matter too much to her. “What if I’m not exactly who you think I am? That would change things.”
“So you’re really a space alien?”
“Damn.” She laughed, the tension seeping out of her and she finally pivoted to look at him. “You figured out my secret.”
“Hustle up,” he said, grabbing his towel and heading toward his bathroom. “Nassau awaits. We’ll drop off notes for everyone about dinner on our way down to the dock.”
Before jumping into the shower, Aubrey wrote four notes apologizing for missing dinner and promising to show up tonight with some surprise news. Fingers crossed Carter would be able to get them invites to the captain’s table. If not, she’d be hoping whatever souvenirs she found in Nassau would help make up for her disappearing act. Maybe she’d invite everyone down to Salvation for the annual Sweet Salvation Brewery open house and celebration this fall.
By the time they were both ready and had slid the notes under everyone’s doors before walking off the ship, a smattering of people were already making their way back from Nassau. The crew members warned them to watch their time as she and Carter checked out of the ship and walked out into the bright sunshine of Nassau.
“So what do you want to do?” Carter asked as they walked down the dock, already holding hands.
“You want to start with the Queen’s Staircase?” The Smitty-six step historical site was a literal staircase carved directly into the limestone.” Then there are some local art galleries within walking distance we could explore.”
“Sounds good.” They passed through the area filled with cruise ship crew members who had been helping to direct the tourists but were now packing up their pamphlets. “Let’s grab lunch, do the staircase and galleries. Then, maybe, we can fit in the pirate museum too.”
“Aye aye, matey,” she said in her best pirate accent.
Tonight after dinner, she’d duct tape him to a lounge chair if she had to, but she was going to tell him everything about the thirst account and the post she’d made and deleted. Until then, she’d go forward as if there wasn’t a countdown clock starting to echo in her heart.
One Jerk chicken and two cold beers later, Carter still couldn’t motivate himself to get up from the table. Content wasn’t a word that was usually part of his vocabulary but right now, sitting in this restaurant in Nassau with Aubrey sitting across from him telling him a story about the absolute legend of an old woman who ran the local diner in Salvation and kept everyone in line with slices of unbelievably good pecan pie, he was. Sure, it could be because of the island breeze and that away-from-it-all bubble of being on a cruise but it wasn’t. It was all Aubrey.
She stopped in the middle of a story about how Ruby Sue had fairy godmothered the Sweet triplets, who own a brewery in town, into their current relationships and shook her head.
“Sorry,” she said. “I’ve talked your ear off about people you don’t even know.”
He shrugged, taking a sip of beer. “I liked it.”
She blushed as she looked down at her lap, a smile tugging at her lips as if she couldn’t quite believe what he’d said, but he’d meant it. He liked listening to her talk, liked her laugh, liked the way her devious little mind worked when it came to pranks, liked how she was game for anything, and he loved the way she felt underneath him when she came. Now wasn’t the time to tell her, because he didn’t want to sound like a creeper, but there was no way he was walking away from the possibility of being with her when the ship docked. He’d been on too many movie sets and been a part of too many relationships that happened because people were stuck in the same far flung location to not realize it was different with Aubrey.
“Come on,” she said, getting up from her chair. “Let’s go see those steps.”
The walk from the restaurant to the Queen’s Staircase wasn’t far but they got turned around a couple of times and ended up popping into a few souvenir shops and an art gallery. By the time they got to the staircase, it was practically deserted. Arm around Aubrey’s waist, tucking her close to him because not touching her seemed impossible, they listened to the local guide who explained that between 1793 and 1794, slaves carved sixty-six steps out of the limestone to provide direct access to Fort Fincastle. The staircase was renamed in the 1800s for Queen Victoria, who abolished slavery when she ascended to the throne. Looking at the walls, covered in tropical foliage and smoothed by time, the landmark of harsh beauty was as awe inspiring as it was painful to imagine the circumstances of its building.
Once the guide finished, Carter hung back at the bottom of the staircase to make a quick phone call while Aubrey made her way up the steps, pausing to take photos of the palm trees set against the steps and the waterfall about halfway up.
“I need a favor,” he said as soon as his brother answered the phone.
Byron hurumphed. “I need my own private island.”
“You have a private island.” It was a short helicopter ride from where h
e stood right now.
“But I share it with you,” Byron said with an over dramatic sigh playing up the poor-me melodrama that both of them knew he didn’t mean.
“What a hard fucking life you lead,” Carter said, laughing.
“So now that that is out of the way,” Bryon said, going back to his normal business-first fast clip where each word came out quick because time was money. “What’s the favor?”
“Can you somehow without alerting the cruise ship company that I’m who I am, arrange dinner with the captain for ten?” The way Aubrey’s shoulders had fallen and the expression of regret on her face back on the ship had eaten away at him all day. He hadn’t kidnapped her or anything, but she’d upended her plans for the cruise to help him and he needed to make that up to her.
“You making friends?”
“It’s Aubrey’s friends,” Carter said, watching as she leaned close to the staircase wall to capture a detail with her cellphone camera. “So Liv, Grace, Benjamin, and Kendall along with their plus ones—and Aubrey and me, of course.”
“Aubrey?” Byron asked, his tone deceptively calm. “Her last name wouldn’t happen to be Dean would it?”
Unease shot through him like a rocket blast, making him wince. Carter knew that tone. It was the same one his brother had used whenever he went into protective agent mode. The result was usually a lot of groveling and a couple of more million thrown his way by whoever had chosen poorly and crossed Byron Hayes.
“Yeah,” he said and then fought hard not to give into the anxiety squeezing his lungs. “How did you know her last name?”
“Because I’m staring a file containing her photo right now.”
That didn’t make sense. None of this made sense. “What’s going on, Byron?”
“She’s the person behind that damn Instagram account, the one who posted that you were on the cruise and nearly ruined everything—she still could.”