The Wedding Fling

by Meg Maguire

  “That does make me feel special. And surprised. Seven years you’ve worked here, and you’ve never had a fling with a guest? Do you have some kind of ethical code or something?”

  He shook his head. “You’ve bribed me—what do you think? But the kinds of women who stoop to solicit the help, they’re usually either drunk or repressed, or a bit of both. I’m a cad and all, but I won’t sleep with a drunk woman unless she’s my girlfriend. And I won’t chance sleeping with anyone I think will regret it the next day, since they can report me and get me fired. And I like this job. And, you know, I like being able to sleep at night. That’s tough to do when you think a woman’s making a mistake with you.”

  A mistake. Exactly what Leigh had wanted—she’d even told him as much. “So that’s why you, you know...put the brakes on things that night after the cookout? Because you thought I’d complain to the management about you? Do I seem that unbalanced?”

  “Well, no. I won’t pretend it’s just self-preservation. I meant what I said. I just didn’t want you to leave here regretting anything you did with me. Why? Exactly how much did I miss out on?”

  She laughed and stared down at the wine in her glass.

  “Third base?”

  She held her tongue and sipped her drink.

  “Further than third? Something that’d have us finding sand in awkward places for the next week?”

  Leigh grabbed the throw pillow wedged between her hip and the armrest, and whipped it at him. Will laughed, holding his bottle out of harm’s way.

  “Why me, then?” she asked, the wine making her a touch shameless. “How come I managed to get further with you than any of the other hot-blooded resort ladies?”

  “Well, you’re unnaturally good-looking. Let’s not discount that.”

  The comment brought a blush to her chest and neck. It went beyond mere flattery to something she craved deeply—being praised for her looks by someone who’d seen her with no makeup, no styling, no facade. Being told she was pretty just as she was.

  “What else?” She was definitely flirting now, but it felt nice. It felt better than nice—it felt normal.

  “Your hips are rather...persuasive.”

  “Even though I got no ass?” she asked, quoting Oscar and Bethany’s loudmouthed daughter.

  Will faked propriety, his gaze drifting innocently to the ceiling as he sipped his beer. “I haven’t looked, so I couldn’t say.”

  “Sure.”

  “Why? You check mine out yet?”

  She grinned. “Not intentionally. But you do spend a lot of time walking in front of me.”

  “Classy, Bailey. Very classy.”

  She drained her glass and got up to refresh it, bringing Will another beer.

  “You’re trying to get me drunk,” he said as he accepted the bottle. “You slip something in this?”

  “I’m just being a good hostess, Captain.” She paused before brazenly adding, “I promise I’ll never make another move on you. That ball is in your court.”

  Will’s blue eyes stayed glued to her face, but his open mouth made no sound. When he did look away, his gaze settled on the king-size pillow propped at the other end of the couch. “You said your first night here, you slept on the couch.”

  “Yes. And the second and third.”

  “Something wrong with your bed?”

  “It’s too big.”

  “Too empty,” Will added, his sad tone telling her it wasn’t a flirtation.

  “I’ll give it a shot tonight, though. Maybe.”

  “He really did a number on you, didn’t he?”

  The question landed like a slap, but Leigh kept a firm grip on her emotions this time. “I won’t go into it. But it’s hard when any relationship is over, no matter who got dumped or who did the dumping. Whether it’s a romance or a friendship or anything else.”

  “How long were you guys together?”

  Leigh laughed, frustrated. “You really aren’t attracted to me, are you? Because you’re definitely not gunning to make that move I offered you.”

  “No, I’m definitely attracted to you. I’m just hopeless with women.”

  “I believe it. Well, Dan and I were together just over two years, since you asked. What about you? What was your longest relationship?”

  “Year and a half, I think.”

  “Here in Barbados?”

  He nodded, and Leigh wondered what she’d been like, if she still lived in the Caribbean, if she was a local or a transplant or some vacationer he’d seduced into an extended layover.

  “She got bored with me,” Will added with a shrug. “Left me for a boat captain.” He made a face that told her such a thing was tantamount to murder.

  “You don’t sound too brokenhearted.”

  “I value mobility. Romance is great, but it’s a bit of an anchor.”

  Leigh bit her lip.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You’ve got that look that usually tells me I’ve offended somebody, so go ahead, let me have it. I’ve probably earned it.”

  She frowned. “It’s just that I used to think that, too, about my ex. That he was like my anchor. But meaning that he kept me grounded. Not that he held me back.”

  Will seemed to ponder their disparate definitions as he sipped his beer. “Guess I just don’t care much for feeling grounded,” he concluded.

  “Probably a good instinct for a pilot.” Funny how it made her feel inexplicably sad, though. “But I don’t know how to steer myself very well. Without an anchor I feel like I’m just blowing around in the wind, like I could end up any—”

  The doorbell chimed.

  “I better duck behind something.” Will hopped up and headed for the bathroom.

  She answered the door and the delivery woman carried two covered trays to the counter. Leigh bade her a good night. The food smelled heavenly, leaving Leigh instantly ravenous.

  “It’s safe to come out, Captain. Dinner is served.” She set each lid aside with a clank. “The front desk must think I’m a binge eater.”

  Will met her in the kitchen and they gathered cutlery and plates and napkins.

  They ate in near silence, watching the pregame coverage, Leigh joining him on the couch. She marveled again at how comfortable she felt in his company. Perhaps nothing so simple as friendship, but not far off. It felt as it had with Dan, in the early days. Natural. And “natural” was a scarce commodity in Leigh’s world.

  Will made short work of his pasta, while Leigh picked listlessly at her fancy salad. Stupid salads. She must have been issued some requisite Hollywood mind control injection shortly after her move to L.A., one that caused women to only ever consume lettuce when witnesses were present.

  “Not enjoying your dinner?” Will asked.

  She shuttled arugula around with her fork. “It’s fine, but I’m not sure why I ordered it. Wish I’d gotten comfort food.”

  “Like mashed potatoes and stuffing?”

  “Like peanut butter.”

  “Peanut butter?”

  She nodded. “Right out of the jar.”

  He looked amused. Then the game started and Leigh felt Will’s attention leave her. She didn’t mind it in the least; it was relaxing to feel ignored in this casual, companionable way. She glanced at his thigh, half a cushion from hers. She wished she could scoot over a foot and feel his hip pressed to hers, warm and comforting, deepening the evening’s pleasant ambience. She wished other things—things to do with Will’s lap—but pushed the ideas away lest she go feral on him again. She really needed a distraction from this distraction.

  She was fidgeting, tapping her plate with her fork. When the first ad came on, and Will gave her a look. “Peanut butter, huh?”

  “Yup.”
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  “That’s all it takes for you?”

  “I’m easy.”

  He was on his feet a moment later.

  Leigh shifted onto her knees to lean over the back of the couch, watching him trot up the steps to her kitchen. “What are you doing?”

  “Answering your prayers, I hope.” He began rooting around in her cupboards, then her pantry. “Ah, jackpot.” He hauled a white plastic bin from a high shelf and set it on the counter. Leigh jogged over to inspect it.

  “Every suite’s got emergency staples, in case of storms.” The box was full of canned soup, nuts and dried fruit, and a gorgeous sight indeed—peanut butter.

  “Oh, my God, you’re wonderful. I take back all those things I said about your manners when we first met.” She grabbed the jar and a spoon and headed back to the couch, mouth watering.

  Leigh stretched her legs out between them; lounging was essential for proper peanut butter abuse. Her salivary glands tingled as she unscrewed the cap and peeled off the safety seal, stirred to blend in the oil. She breathed it in as another woman might savor fresh lavender.

  Will glanced toward her.

  “Ignore me,” Leigh said, coating the back of the spoon.

  “Smooth or crunchy?”

  “Smooth.”

  “That work for you?”

  “Oh, God, yeah. Smooth is the best. Duh.”

  “Obviously,” Will agreed, watching as she wallowed in the first taste.

  “And this is the good stuff. Not that awful frosting-type peanut butter, with sugar and shortening in it. ‘Ingredients,’” she read off the label. “‘Roasted peanuts, salt.’”

  “You’re quite the connoisseur.”

  “It’s my favorite vice.”

  “You going to eat that whole jar?”

  She shook her head. “Maybe half.”

  Will laughed and turned back to the game. “Whatever works for you.”

  “Beats a drug habit.”

  Another laugh, one that warmed her middle. “I’m going to fly you to Miami and check you into peanut butter rehab.”

  Leigh shot him a horrified look and hugged the jar to her chest. “Never. I’d rather die in a gutter with the spoon still in my mouth. You should have seen me when I first discovered Nutella. Now that was a bender. Can’t be trusted with that stuff.”

  “Here.” Will made a “gimme” motion and Leigh loaded the spoon and handed it over. She tried her level best not to make it sexual, watching him share her utensil, her ridiculous sin. He nodded his approval and handed it back. “I can see the appeal.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Sure. Plus when I was in high school my dad quit smoking, and to replace the cigarettes he took to eating lollipops. He went through a retail-size tub of them every month.”

  Leigh smiled at the thought of a hardened New York cabbie driving around with a Tootsie Pop stem jutting from his lips.

  “Never weaned himself off them, actually,” Will said. “Replaced one unhealthy habit with another. But I’d rather he rot his teeth than his lungs, so no complaints.”

  “I’m glad I never took that up. Smoking.”

  “Me, too. Beer’s enough for me. Booze and sunshine.”

  “You’ll have even more of those once you get your bar going.”

  Will nodded slowly, turning to the TV. He seemed distracted, but not by the action on the screen, Leigh didn’t think. One of the Knicks sank a three-pointer and his expression didn’t change a jot. After an outlandish foul against New York failed to rouse Will from his trance, she began to fear he might be upset about something, maybe caught up in worries about his dad’s medical issues. Then—

  “You feel like a walk?” He looked at her squarely.

  “A walk?”

  “Just along the beach. I’m not really watching this.” He nodded to the television. “Not that I don’t appreciate the invitation. But I could use some air.”

  “Sure.”

  When he stood, Leigh set her jar and spoon aside and followed, feeling nervous. They exited through the bedroom, stepping into the cool evening breeze. They crossed the patio and strolled to the shore, the lapping water sounding intimate and secretive after the color and ruckus of the game. Will cuffed his jeans and waded up to his knees, Leigh to her ankles. She enjoyed the feeling of the current and the fine sand, the suction tugging at her feet with each retreating wave. That comforting sensation of being anchored.

  “You okay?” she finally asked Will.

  He turned, sliding his hands into his pockets. That gesture meant something, she was coming to realize, some imitation of casual calm when he was feeling the opposite. How strange that she could know this about him after only a few days’ acquaintance. How strange and pleasurable.

  “I’m fine.”

  “That means less than nothing in man-language.”

  He smiled at that. “You annoy me, Leigh.”

  She blinked, the remark knocking her off balance. “Oh?”

  “Yeah. I want you to be this one way, and you keep proving yourself to be some other way.”

  “What way do you want me to be?”

  In the low light leaking from the villa, his smile tightened. “I guess I want you to be what I expected—a bit more spoiled. Or shallow.”

  She relaxed. “Sorry. I don’t see why that annoys you, though. Spoiled and shallow sound far more irritating to me.”

  “It’s annoying because I like things in my life to be simple. It makes them complicated when people aren’t what you expect.”

  Dan’s face sprang immediately to mind.

  “It’s annoying because if you weren’t so sweet and charming and weird, I wouldn’t be stuck struggling this hard to not find you attractive.”

  She pursed her lips, the comment making her feel floaty, held down only by the drag of the sand at her ankles. “Oh.”

  Will stared off to the side, at the dark water. “It’s much easier to play two-dimensional pilot to your two-dimensional tourist.”

  “Instead of what? Friends in 3-D?”

  He nodded, still not meeting her eyes. There was a struggle being waged inside him, between his dick and his professional conscience, she guessed, or perhaps between his dick and his aversion to complicated women. In either case, his dick seemed likely to be involved, which had Leigh’s hopes up in an instant, along with her pulse.

  “Have I inflamed your chivalry gland again?”

  A tiny laugh huffed from his nose and Will met her gaze. “Something like that.”

  “Could just be a peanut allergy. Which would be tragic. Though it’d leave more for me, I suppose.”

  His chest rose and fell with a deep breath; his eyes studied the water between them. Whatever his conflict was, it must be intense, to render this shameless man so uncertain.

  “Are you trying to think up reasons not to make a move on me?” she asked quietly.

  “No. I’ve already got a very legitimate reason not to do that.”

  “What? Job safety?”

  “Just my reasons.”

  She frowned. “Have you got a girlfriend?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “Is it because I’m on the rebound?”

  “Not really, no.”

  Leigh took a stab at levity. “I hope it’s nothing to do with my hygiene.”

  At long last, a smile. “Definitely not.”

  “Then can I make a suggestion, Captain Burgess?”

  Will nodded. “Sure.”

  “Don’t overthink it. As long as you’re single, I don’t mind you making a move on me. I don’t have any expectations of you, except when it comes to getting me to the mainland. Everything else that might happen, it’s just between us.”

  “Right.”<
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  “And I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that, unlike me, you’re not especially good at overanalyzing things. You look pretty constipated.”

  He laughed.

  “So do me a favor and quit trying to figure me out. I can’t stand being theorized about any more than you could probably stand being...stuck in a traffic jam.”

  “Try hospital waiting room.”

  “Or that. But whatever we might have, it’d just be a fling, right? Flings aren’t meant to be thought about too deeply. Flings and peanut butter are two of life’s simplest pleasures.” She grinned hopefully at him, though she knew in her heart a so-called fling with Will Burgess wouldn’t be simple. There’d be a fresh, bitter taste of heartbreak when it was over, but it was a price she was willing to pay to explore their connection. A pittance.

  “You’re a very decadent woman,” Will murmured, barely audible over the waves. He slid his hands from his pockets and beckoned to her with a curled finger. “Come here.”

  As Leigh stepped closer, he stepped back. A pace for a pace, and by the time she reached him the water was at his hips, her navel. Strong hands, assured once more, cupped her shoulders, spreading warmth through her entire body.

  “Whatever this is,” he said, “it has nothing to do with anything else we might be to each other, right?”

  Her heart tightened a little at the caveat, but that was okay. She had a crush on him, so it was only natural to feel a little twinge. It would fade soon enough. “I know the score. This is whatever it is.”

  Will nodded, his expression softening. He kneaded her shoulders, lips parting. So strange that he could take her up into the sky without a moment’s hesitation, yet this kiss gave him such obvious pause. Leigh angled her face and he took the hint, lowering his mouth to hers. The water was cool around her legs, Will’s lips hot against hers. Everything about him felt like this place; leisure in the soft scrape of his stubble, luxury in the easy way his mouth took hers. He’d seemed like a man who’d kiss the way he spoke—bluntly and without caution—but he was far more sensual. His kiss felt new, all the excitement of a teenage fling with none of the sloppy inexperience. Leigh’s first kiss had been staged, a scene from her breakout movie, but if she’d had a real first kiss, this should have been it. She wrapped her arms around his neck and surrendered.