by Leela Ash
“Yeah, they probably think we’re Cinderella’s step-sisters without the step-mother,” Eden grumbled under her breath.
“I bet they think Step-mother is locked in here with you to make certain you stay put,” Beth tossed in.
It was too much, Sage burst into laughter, releasing the tension that had been binding her chest as she laughed and laughed and laughed. Beth was a jewel! She was really Elizabeth Adams, but everyone called her Beth. Sage had known her for just five years, but in all that time, she had seen Beth get angry only once; when someone had insisted on calling her Elizabeth despite her stated preference for Beth.
Beth’s platinum blond hair and big blue eyes, as well as her petite frame and tiny voice, often made people assume she could be pushed around; she usually corrected anyone foolish enough to assume that in her own inimitable style. She also had a dry sense of humor that showed itself at the most unexpected moments; like now.
Even Eden was convulsed with laughter, her heavy red hair swaying around her face as she doubled over with hilarity; tears of mirth standing in her liquid green eyes.
As their laughter died, Sage rose to a sitting position, drawing her knees up to her chest as she looked up at her friends. Her blond hair fell around her face in lumpy strings, some of it falling into her big brown eyes.
“You’re right, guys. I haven’t been much fun, have I?” Sage asked, looking from one to the other.
“No, you haven’t,” Eden said honestly. “You’ve bawled your eyes out and memorized the ceiling for six days straight. Tonight is our last night here, since our flight back to the States is for tomorrow night. Why don’t we make it fun?”
Sage nodded, throwing off the duvet. She had dreamed of being in Spain for as long as she could remember, and now that she was, she had wasted the entire vacation. Anger roiled through her as she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror. She was pretty with a heart-shaped face, big brown doe eyes, long blond hair that hung to her waist, the cutest set of dimples, and huge breasts that had always driven men wild. Her eyes sparkled as she examined her figure. She was very chubby, especially with the extra flesh on her hips, thighs and arms, but she loved her figure and she wouldn’t trade it for anything. She was voluptuous and perhaps slightly over-weight for her height of five foot seven, but she had a perfect hour-glass figure and an amazing carriage, and she was damned if she was going to let any man make her question her own femininity and attractiveness. She only had to walk into a bar sometimes and half the guys went crazy; Eden called her the ‘guy magnet.’
“Brent Davies was a jerk!” she declared suddenly.
She saw her friends exchange glances in the mirror.
“Well, he was,” she insisted. “He broke up with me in the middle of the damn Christmas party, with my boss standing right at my elbow and listening to every word!”
“And with Jessamine clinging to Brent’s arm!” Eden chipped in.
Sage’s cheeks darkened with anger. Jessamine was Brent’s best friend who had never made any bones of the fact that she thought she was a better fit for Brent. She had been after the man for all the three years Sage had known him, even though Brent was too wrapped up in his research to notice. When Brent had proposed to Sage a year ago, Jessamine had almost choked on the insincere congratulations she had managed to force out of her throat.
Then she had slowly gone to work on Brent, planting seeds of doubt and dissatisfaction until nothing Sage did could ever please him anymore. He had begun to find faults with everything; her generous curves, which had driven him crazy in the past, were suddenly ‘excess fat that needed to come off in the gym’; her cooking, which he had always loved, was suddenly ‘too spicy’; her hair was suddenly too blond.
Sage’s fists clenched, now, in anger as she recalled how Brent had had the temerity to tell her at that Christmas party that her weight was a turn-off for him, with Jess and her perfect size zero hanging on his arm at the time.
It had taken all of Sage’s strength of character and maturity to keep from collapsing in an ignoble heap at his feet after he spoke those unkind words to her. She had simply kept smiling as though they were discussing the weather, offered him a distracted nod, and then excused herself to her boss before disappearing into the ladies’ room. She had remained there until everyone had left and then she had slowly crept out and staggered to the curb for a taxi to take her home, knowing she would never be able to drive in that state. The tears she had fought so hard to hold in check had immediately started falling when she’d gotten outside and seen Eden and Beth waiting patiently for her on the curb as though they had nowhere else to be. It was four hours after everyone else had left and yet, they had waited. She had been so devastated that night, she just knew she would never have gotten through it if they had not been there.
They really were the best friends in the whole wide world and she really couldn’t bear to be the reason their vacation was anything but amazing. Eden was a divorce attorney and she rarely got any time off; Beth was a psychologist and the story was much the same. She had to shake off the blues for their sake, she thought.
“If Brent can move on, so can I,” she whispered softly to her reflection.
Eden nodded approvingly and whipped out a list, waving it happily in the air.
“What’s that?” Sage asked, eyeing the paper suspiciously.
“A list of things to do before the end of the vacation,” Beth laughed, her blue eyes twinkling.
Sage shut her eyes in despair; she’d been had!
“What’s on the list?” she asked, reaching for it.
“No, no, no,” Eden sang, thrusting the paper out of her reach. “First things first, you need to take a shower and then we’ll play it by ear.”
Two hours later, she was waxed, plucked, and dressed in a leopard print, backless dress her friends had picked out. The dress clung sinfully to every last line of her body and made her feel very much like a femme fatale.
Eden’s list had fifteen crazy things to do on it and since her friends insisted they had already done all fifteen themselves without her, tonight was her night. She groaned when she saw the first item on the list; great!
Flash a handsome stranger in the lobby... then make a run for it.
CHAPTER TWO
“Okay, you’re both crazy,” Sage laughed, almost doubling over with hilarity as they stood just outside the hotel, waiting for their limousine.
She had already done six of the fifteen things on the damn list, including ordering for a limousine, drinking an entire bottle of chardonnay before dinner, going without any underwear, flirting with a bell boy, flashing the cameras in the lift, and hiding her shoes in her bag and coming downstairs barefoot.
She hadn’t done the first thing, though, and Eden insisted they would not leave the hotel until she had flashed some handsome stranger. So far, all the men she had seen had been with their wives or girlfriends, and while she was here to have fun, she didn’t want to cause trouble for some hapless man. If there was one thing she knew, her breasts were show-stoppers. They were large and round, and men tended to stare at the girls even when they were covered up, never mind when they were exposed. Why, one time, she had gone to the beach with Brent and he had gotten so jealous of all the glances men kept stealing her way that he had whipped out his sweatshirt and demanded she wear it. That was the first and last time he had ever taken her to the beach, even though he knew she loved swimming. If she flashed some man now, and he stopped to stare, she didn’t think his lady would be particularly amused.
“Don’t be a wuss, Sage. Come on, flash that elderly man and his wife,” Eden suggested, pointing at a pious-looking elderly couple sitting a few feet away.
Sage shook her head, dimples flashing as she smiled at her friends. “And what would happen if they keel over from the sheer shock of it? I can’t have that on my conscience.”
Beth laughed throatily, flinging back her blond head as she did so. “Okay, flash that super model’s boyfriend,�
� she suggested mischievously, pointing at a tattooed couple necking in the lobby of the hotel. They were trying so hard to appear romantic and in love, it was almost painful to watch.
“No, her breasts are the size of mosquito bites; I don’t want her to develop a complex,” Sage overruled. “Two years from now, she’d be telling Oprah how she developed a drug use problem because some blond woman flashed her guy in a hotel lobby in Spain.”
Beth snorted with laughter at that one, but Eden sighed and began to complain about the passing time. Sage rolled her eyes, opened her mouth and started to tell Eden that this had all been her idea so she could well wait until she saw whoever she was supposed to shock with her breasts and that was when she saw him.
He was tall, very tall, with a height of at least six-two; his hair was coal-black and in artful disarray around his head. It was sexily mussed, as though he had just gotten out of bed after rolling around for hours in said bed. His brows were dark, bushy and defined the sheer masculinity of his face, and even from this distance, she could see his eyes were also black as night. He had a pair of firmly chiseled lips, a firm masculine jaw, high cheekbones that strangely defined his masculinity, and a long aristocratic nose that gave his face character. His shoulders were so wide they tempted a woman to just lay her head on them and his chest strained with the promise of raw strength with every step he took.
He was so handsome he looked like a Greek god in the flesh, Sage thought dazedly as she stared openly at him. He was striding towards the hotel from the parking lot, his eyes glued to the smart-phone in his right hand while his left carried a backpack. He was dressed casually, in jeans and a shirt, but somehow, an invisible aura of power clung to him; he exuded confidence and authority. Barely restrained physical strength was also apparent in every line of movement his body made.
Eden and Beth had identical shocked expressions on their lovely faces as they stared at him, their mouths open. Sage licked her lips to keep her mouth from falling open. The man was truly delicious!
The man looked up just then as he came up to them, and his eyes met and held hers. Unable to stop herself, and without giving it a second thought, Sage reached up and slowly, very slowly, let the left sleeve of her dress fall, barring the creamy, silky skin of her full, thrusting, left breast all the way to the nipple and the fleshy, soft undersides of her breast.
The man’s eyes dropped to her large, naked breast, caressed the breast, feasted on it, before rising slowly to hers. Sage waited triumphantly to see the inevitable spark of desire in his eyes no man ever saw her breasts and didn’t go a little crazy. They were large, firm, fleshy and just begged to be caressed.
The naked revulsion and distaste that looked back at her from his black eyes were a surprise and it hit her like a splash of cold water. His lip curled in a sneer of distaste, making her feel lower than an insect.
Hastily, she scrambled to drag the sleeve of her dress into place and opened her mouth intending to apologize, but the man had already walked around her and her friends, giving them a wide berth, before disappearing into the hotel without a word or a backward glance.
“Who does he think he is?” Sage grumbled hours later as she sucked the lime from her drink.
She hadn’t been able to get the handsome stranger out of her mind, and not because of his looks, either. He had shaken her confidence in herself, which was something that had not happened since her teenage years; why, even Brent hadn’t managed that with all his unkind words. Yet, this man, with just one look, had managed to strip her of every last shred of confidence in a nanosecond. She had actually been on the verge of apologizing to the creep!
“He’s a boorish party popper, that’s who! He should have kissed the ground in gratitude that you picked him to show your jugs to,” Beth declared loyally.
“Forget him. It’s a vacation memory,” Eden said breezily. “You need to make out with a waiter,” she added in the next breath.
“What?” Sage gasped.
“Yeah, it’s the next item on the list,” Eden said earnestly, one long, manicured finger tapping the paper like it was the law of the universe itself.
“That damn list! I wanna see it!” Sage demanded, snatching it out of Eden’s hand over her friends’ protests.
Her eyes quickly scanned the rest of the list and she looked up and glared at her friends. “I may make out with the waiter in front of everyone, but that’s it. I am certainly not going to sleep with a stranger and snatch his wallet after that!”
“We’ll get there. Now make out with that waiter, he’s cute. You need to also go flirt with a group of guys when you’re done.”
“This is beginning to feel more like torture than fun,” Sage moaned, leaning her head against her hands. “I’m drunk!”
“Which makes it easier,” Beth cajoled.
“What the hell does that mean?” Sage wondered.
“Dutch courage,” Eden informed her. “Here he comes now,” she sang.
Sage looked up blearily at the waiter. He was cute, if her type ran to twelve-year-olds barely out of the schoolroom. She was just twenty-six, and yet, somehow, she felt as though she would be violating him if she planted one on him.
“Can I get you Senoras anything else?” he asked in thickly accented English.
“How old are you?” she croaked before she could think better of it.
“Twenty-two,” he said without as much as a flicker of surprise.
“Oh, you’re legal,” she breathed.
She rose to her feet in one fluid motion and before he could as much as draw another breath, she planted her lips firmly against his, drawing his lips in for a deep, deep, tongue-tangling kiss.
He gasped against her mouth and then his hands tightened around her waist.
“In your dreams, sailor,” she breathed as she pulled out of his arms.
The kid blushed, and then turned and fled towards the kitchen, his handkerchief flapping in his hands.
Beth and Eden dissolved into giggles.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing? Why did you have to use your tongue?” Beth whispered.
“How do you mean?” Sage whispered back.
“Come on, he’s a good-looking guy in an exotic tourist country with girls trooping in by the thousands daily; who knows where that mouth has been? He could have herpes!” Eden said.
Sage paled. “Why didn’t you tell me that earlier?” she asked, her heart hammering with fear.
Eden whooped with laughter and Beth actually slid off her seat in the booth onto the floor overcome with laughter. By now, everyone in the restaurant was looking their way and either grinning or shaking their heads.
Sage frowned suspiciously at her laughing friends, “What?”
“Did Did you see her face?” Eden laughed, one hand clenching Beth’s shoulder as they both convulsed in laughter, breathlessly struggling to regain control.
Sage glared at them. They had been kidding around, frightening her with thoughts of herpes. A sneaking suspicion entered her mind and she yanked the collar of Beth’s dress, hauling her off the floor and back onto the booth.
“Who did you kiss, Beth, during your own list thingy?” she demanded.
“Same guy. What gave me away?” Beth asked, grinning widely.
Sage shook her head in exasperation. Her friends had to be the most annoying people she had ever clapped eyes on!
She looked away angrily.
“Sage? Are you mad at us?” Beth asked, her laughter fading.
That was Beth; for all her occasional carefree attitude, she never wanted to hurt anyone. She was always the first of all three of them to apologize. Sage immediately felt like a heel when she saw the contrite expression on Beth’s pretty face.
She opened her mouth to assure Beth that she wasn’t angry but Eden forestalled her with a breezy, “Angry or not, you still have to do the next item on the list.”
Beth and Sage rolled their eyes in unison.
Sage looked at the li
st. Flirt with a group of guys and get them eating out of your palms.
Easy; or at least it should be. They were presently sitting in a restaurant cum bar and it was positively teeming with guys of all ages. Sage looked around, and for the first time, realized she was getting bored again; the men all looked alike for some reason. She really didn’t feel like flirting with a bunch of strangers; besides, flashing lobby guy hadn’t worked out so well. He had stared at her as though she were a bug that had crawled out from beneath his expensive loafers and strode away, perhaps to nurse his offended sensibilities.
Oh, what had she been thinking? A man like that definitely had a girlfriend. Now maybe he was laughing at her with his girlfriend.
“Earth to Sage,” Eden cried, clicking her fingers in front of Sage’s face.
“Sorry.”
“Get on with it then,” Beth said, nodding in the direction of a group of three men, sitting and laughing at a table for six. “And don’t forget the fourteenth item on the list; you can take any of them home tonight and snatch his wallet before morning,” she reminded her, eyes sparkling with mischief.
Sage leaned forward, “I am not going to bed with any of those guys!”
“Fine! All you have to do is take him into a room and drug him silly, then grab his wallet and run for it,” Eden said exasperatedly.
Sage stared at her friend’s red head as though she had grown an additional head. This was beginning to sound like something straight out of Most Wanted.
With a shake of her blond head, Sage slowly rose to her feet before striding to join the men at their table, her eyes trained on them with a deliberately predatory air that seemed to be fail-proof with guys these days.