by Alexa Davis
Mark tossed his head back and he laughed out a booming sound. I joined in because it seemed like the right thing to do, but I felt a bit weird doing so. I narrowed my eyes at him and tried to see what was going on behind his eyes, but there wasn’t anything there. I wasn’t about to get anything from him. Not tonight, anyway.
“Of course, you haven’t.” He leaned down and kissed me softly on the lips. “Don’t you worry about a thing.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Mark
Thursday
“I do not like being up this early,” Justine grumbled while rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Her crumpled outfit said it all. She wasn’t a happy bunny. “It’s still the middle of the night. Why do we have to fly right now?”
“Because then we’ll be there quicker,” I cooed, recognizing a lot of myself in my daughter. Usually, when I had to go somewhere, I felt exactly the same, but this time I was excited. It was a vacation not work. “And you can sleep on the plane anyway. That’s why I hired a private jet, so you can get some privacy.”
I braced myself waiting for her to make another sarcastic comment about being wealthy, but it seemed that she was too tired today. Either that or she just wanted to be by herself without the hassle of dealing with other people. I totally felt the same way. After all the issues I’d had with TSA, I didn’t want to see another face.
Justine turned to see Olivia staggering from her room looking just as weary as Justine. Her bleary eyes had absolutely no makeup on, and she had scraped her hair on top of her head, and she had her sweatpants on. She looked so fucking beautiful that my heart bled. All I wanted to do was drag her back into my bed, but Hudson and his random engagement had me thrown off my game. The seriousness of his relationship confused me and freaked me out a whole lot. I needed to work out what the hell I wanted from all of this.
“Morning,” Olivia croaked while staggering forwards. “How is everyone doing this morning?”
“I’m not happy,” Justine glowered. “I want to go back to bed.”
“Yeah, so do I.” Oliva patted Justine on the back. “But we’ll be on the plane soon enough.”
I flickered my eyes between the both of them almost laughing at the unimpressed look on both of their faces. Anyone would think that I wasn’t taking them away on vacation. I hoped a bit of sunshine would cheer them both up. Otherwise, it wasn’t going to be the best time. I wanted to work this all out while we were away; I couldn’t come back from Hawaii still feeling as mixed up as I did right now.
“Come on then, gang. Let’s go and get in the car, shall we?”
I grabbed as many bags as I could, leaving only a couple to Olivia, and we jumped into the elevator. On the way down, I couldn’t stop my eyes darting towards her the whole time. Her natural beauty continued to lure me in. As much as all of this was very wrong, I couldn’t help myself. Every single time I caught sight of her, my heart skipped about ten beats. My tummy fluttered with butterflies; I felt all happy inside. So much so that it was almost a relief when the doors opened and I got some fresh air inside again.
I bundled all the bags into the car while Olivia and Justine took their seats. Instantly, my daughter curled herself into a ball, and she started to snore. Olivia and I chucked at the sight of her.
On the way to the airport, I found my fingers itching to move towards hers. There was a genuine magnetism pulling me in, begging me just to hold her hand. It took everything that I had not to follow through. I had to keep my eyes fixed out the window all the way there because the outside calmed me down a little bit.
“Oh, my goodness!” Olivia’s eyes almost bugged out of her head as she saw the plane. “It’s amazing.”
I had to admit that I really agreed with her. I didn’t look too much into it when I placed the booking, I just sorted it, but now I was blown away. It was amazing; so luxurious. I needed to take million of pictures of it to show Hudson to try and convince him again that we needed one of these for the business. I would love traveling if I could go like this all the time. I would be booking trips all the freaking time.
“Yeah, it’s pretty great, isn’t it?” I slid out of the car and stretched out my back while I looked at it. It towered above us, already looking like the life of luxury from outside. “I’m so excited.”
The airline pilot and the driver helped us to get the bags packed into the plane while I carried a sleeping Justine into her seat. I knew that she would love this plane too, but I didn’t want to poke the bear. If she wanted to sleep then so be it! Once she was settled in a reclined large chair, I grabbed my cell phone out of my pocket and I took a bunch of snaps. I almost sent them across to Hudson right away, before I remembered that he was on his way to Tokyo to meet his fiancée’s family. That was still really weird to me; I couldn’t recover. He was getting married to someone that I didn’t even know. He had made that decision without a moment of hesitation.
“This is nice.” Olivia shuffled back in her seat and smiled, finally looking a lot more blissful. I guess the early morning didn’t matter so much when she could get a good night of sleep. “I love this plane, I want one.”
“Oh, so do I.” I let out a belly laugh. “I hope the place in Hawaii is just as nice too.”
I let my eyes slide closed while I wondered what life would be like in Hawaii. Not just for Justine, who I felt certain would have an amazing time, but for me and Olivia too. I knew what I wanted; I had the urge to spend all my free time in bed with her, but I also needed to work out where my head lay.
***
The flight to Hawaii was uneventful. Mostly, we all slept on and off. I had a nice glass of champagne at one point, and I definitely sparked more interest in a private plane for myself, but I was glad to land too. I couldn’t wait to get my vacation started now; it was going to be amazing.
The car was already waiting at the airport to take us to the villa, which was good because it didn’t seem that Justine was quite ready to wake up just yet. I hoped that the sight of the white beach and green-blue ocean would wake her up again. I certainly couldn’t wait to get in it myself.
“Oh, my goodness,” Olivia gushed as she pressed her face up against the window. “I’m so glad I brought all of my bikinis. When I packed, I thought that it was too much, but now I’m so glad. I won’t be in anything else.”
Oh shit. The thought of her in bikinis the whole time made my mouth water with desire. I wasn’t sure that I would be able to control myself under the pressure of it all. How the hell would I keep my feelings private? Even Justine would be able to see how much I felt for Olivia! This would be a challenge… worse than I expected.
“Hmmm.” Justine stirred and pried her eyes open. “Are we nearly there?”
“We’re here,” I replied. “Why don’t you take a look out the window?”
She pushed herself up into a sitting position and gasped with sheer delight. “This is Hawaii? I love it.”
Watching my daughter’s eyes shine with delight pushed any other thoughts out of my brain. This was a good idea; I knew that now. This was certainly something that I need to do more often. My mind was already racing, trying to work out where we could go next. Tokyo, for sure, but other places too. England, Indonesia, Florida… the whole world was available to us and I freaking couldn’t wait to get started.
“Oh look.” I pointed out the front window as I saw the villa. “That’s where we’re staying.”
“It’s right near the beach.” Justine couldn’t sit still. She bounced up and down in her seat and almost screamed. “Can we go to the beach right away? Can we? Can we? Can we? Please?” No longer was she the sullen girl who I once stayed at work to avoid dealing with. The change was incredible. “I want to go in the ocean.”
“Well, the villa has a pool…” I would have preferred to be there than the beach; sand wasn’t my favorite.
“Oh, no,” Olivia jumped in. “It has to be the beach. We can’t be in Hawaii at the pool.”
I felt defeated. I already knew that I wasn’t
going to get my way at all on this vacation, but it wasn’t about me. I was more than willing to do whatever they wanted so Justine had a good time. I might not love the sand as much as them, but I would put up with it for them. I loved the heat of the sun anyway. It wasn’t going to be awful.
“Alright, alright. Whatever.” I rolled my eyes and laughed. “We’ll go to the beach. I can suck it up, I suppose.”
We piled out the car quickly and went to our villa. I tossed my suitcase onto my bed and opened it only to pull out my swimming stuff. I wouldn’t get into the ocean, I would leave that to the girls, but I could sunbathe. Anything to see that shining smile on Justine’s face and the sparkle in Olivia’s eyes.
Unsurprisingly, Justine and Olivia weren’t ready as quickly as me, so I grabbed a drink of something fruity that had been left in our kitchen, which was nice, and possibly a little bit alcoholic. I was going to need that if I was going to deal with this in a sensible way…
Oh… my… God! Holy mother of… fuck!
I was expecting to be blown away by Olivia in her bikini, but not as much as I was. The red of her bikini shone brightly against her pale skin; now she had let her messy hair down and it looked tousled and sexy as hell. Her skin already had a sun-kissed look about it which made me gulp down the thick ball of emotion that lodged itself in my throat. She looked like a wet dream. She made my cock twitch a little bit; it was hard to keep my hands to myself. All I wanted to do was grab her, to hold her, to kiss her, to thrust inside of her…
“Hey, Dad!” And there she was: the reason I needed to behave myself. This wasn’t a sex vacation. I had to push any sexy thoughts out of my brain and focus on letting Justine have fun. “Let’s go to the beach.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the door. “I want to go and play in the waves.”
I glanced back and gave Olivia a pleading look. She probably didn’t know what I meant by it, but I was trying to communicate that I wanted her in my bed tonight. There was no way I could watch her parading around in that sexy number and not have control of her body later. It would be impossible. I already felt itchy for her; I wanted to wrap my fingers around her hips and have her.
I’m in big trouble, I told myself. It felt like I was continually repeating the same warning to myself over and over again, but I had to. I couldn’t stop myself from diving into the trouble head first. Don’t do anything stupid.
But was it stupid? Or was it something that we needed? I guessed that was what I needed to figure out.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Olivia
“Oh, my goodness!” Justine squealed as she jumped over the next set of waves. “This is amazing.”
We had been playing in the ocean for what felt like forever, and while she was having a good time, I felt like I was about to drop. The lack of sleep and the jet lag had gotten to me, and I needed a good old rest. If it wasn’t for Justine, I would be asleep by now, having a nap, getting refreshed for tonight. I also had a funny feeling the factor of my sun cream wasn’t strong enough and my skin was getting a little burned. I didn’t tan easily; I was known for going from pale to red without ever turning brown. Hopefully a shower would help.
“It is.” I glanced over to Mark, who was spread across the sand, relaxing and loving life. At that moment, I hated him for having the chance to just chill out. “But we should get back soon, wake your dad up, don’t you think?” Justine glanced towards him and shrugged. “Oh, come on, don’t you miss him?”
The whole purpose of this trip was for them to spend some alone time together; I would make that happen at some point, but for now I would let it go. I suppose it wasn’t a hardship hanging out with Justine anyway. Now that she’d come out of her shell, she was an utter delight to be around.
As I thought about how much I liked her, it made my heart ache. That was the reason I shouldn’t be falling into bed with her father; it was so damn wrong of me. Why couldn’t I just resist him and keep away? Why, even now as I could think straighter about everything that I could potentially lose, did I still want him? There was such a yearning in my stomach, a tingling in my core, a racing to my pulse. I liked him more than I should.
He’s just sleeping with me because I’m there though; it isn’t the same for him.
Sure, he had apologized for that remark and suggested that he didn’t really mean it, but as it came out rapidly without him having to think about it, so I had to assume that at least elements of that statement were true. He couldn’t actually like me anyway; I wasn’t anywhere near his standards. It was just a fling… at least to him.
But how could I stop myself from falling? That was one thing that I really needed to work out. When I had to see him every single day, and when I didn’t really want to get another job, what else could I do? I had to look at him, to speak to him, to spend a lot of time in his presence, so I needed to work out a way how to control myself.
“Olivia!” Justine snapped loudly, dragging my attention away. I didn’t realize how much I was staring at Mark until that very moment. “I want to do a school report on the wildlife here. What do you think about that?”
Her homework… of course, I had almost forgotten about that. “Oh yeah, that’s a good idea.”
“Can we start now? I could write about the sea creatures, that would be good…”
Oh God, I didn’t like the idea of doing anything serious right now, I was too weary for that. “I think we should have fun today and do it tomorrow. Maybe you and your dad could go on a nature walk.”
“Without you?” Justine looked genuinely hurt. “But I want to be with you too.”
Hmm… this wasn’t going to be easy. I wanted them to have some time together, but Justine kept wanting me there too. I was touched, of course, it felt great to have Justine liking me as much as I did her; it warmed up my chest and made me fall even deeper for her. I guess it was something I needed to speak to Mark about.
“Oh, well, we’ll see.” I moved backward out of the water, and thankfully she followed. “Come on, let’s go.”
We walked through the sand until we got to Mark and as he pushed himself up into a sitting position, his eyes widened in shock. “Oh my God, Olivia, are you okay? You look really…” His eyes ran up and down me, and I shuddered violently under the intensity of his gaze. It was almost as if he was undressing me. “Red.”
Oh! Of course, he wasn’t going to say anything else; what was I even thinking? He couldn’t exactly make a dirty remark now, could he? I winced, feeling it even more as he mentioned it. “I know. I need a shower to work it out.” I moved my shoulders about. “I’m hoping that it just looks worse because I’m still out in the sun.”
“Okay, we should go back then.” Mark stood and grinned at Justine. “Then we can have a nice dinner. There’s a luau party not too far away from the villa that I thought we could go to. A fun way to spend our first night.”
“Looo… ow?” Justine looked confused. Her eyebrows furrowed deeply. “What does that even mean?”
“It’s a Hawaiian party where there are traditional foods and dancing. You’ll love it; it’s very different to anything that you’re used to.” He squeezed Justine’s shoulder. “It’ll be fun, I promise you.”
“Oh, I like dancing!” Justine bounced around, showing off her energy. I wanted just a little bit of that! Being exhausted all the time was starting to really get on my nerves. “Can I dance? It does sound fun.”
While they talked, I wondered if I would make it. With my skin pinching and stinging with every single movement, I wasn’t sure if the burn would be too bad. But I really did want to go to the luau party because it sounded like a whole lot of fun. I knew I would do whatever I could to get there.
***
After a brief shower, which only brought out the redness more, and a twenty-minute power nap, I threw a lightweight, white dress on, almost crying out in sheer pain as it brushed over me. But I was determined to go; I really wanted to know what the night was going to be like. Then, we left, an
d we walked down the beach to get to the luau. As we walked across the sand, Justine’s eyes lit up as she spotted a crab, so she rushed forward to grab it. She became utterly absorbed in the animal for just a second, undoubtedly thinking about the wildlife report that she was so desperate to write while she was here. As she stared at it, Mark slipped his fingers through mine in a shocking, romantic gesture. I wanted to whip around, to stare at him, but I had a funny feeling that would ruin things, so I stayed where I was, enjoying the touch until Justine turned back and he snatched his hand away again. He stuffed it into his pocket, completely shattering any chance of it happening again.
My hand felt lost and lonely without him. It was much better to have his skin next to mine.
What is going on here? I really wanted to know, but it wasn’t the time to ask. How can I keep away?
I tried my hardest to keep my distance for the rest of the walk over and as we reached the loud very colorful party. Luckily, once we were there, I found lots of distractions, mostly Justine who wanted to try everything, eat all that was on offer, and dance a lot too, keeping both Mark and me busy. Thank God. There was no time to be worried about what the future might hold for us when we had so much to do. Keeping busy was clearly the key! I could work with that, especially in Hawaii. There was so much that we could do here, and if it stopped feelings from flooding to the surface, then I would do it. I couldn’t keep losing my head over Mark.
“She’s really changed since you came along,” Mark whispered to me as one of the locals took Justine to get a lei and to show her some dance moves. “She never would have been like this before. She would have been hiding away in the corner, refusing to speak to anyone. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her have fun before.”
His words felt weighted, or maybe that was just me projecting my own emotions across. Now that I could feel myself free falling into love, everything was intensified. I read between the lines and saw, or tried to see, that he wanted me to stick around. My heart thumped against my rib cage; I felt like I was floating; it was nuts. My heart and head argued among themselves, making it very challenging for me to think straight.