The shorts slide off. My gaze travels involuntarily along the smooth bronzed skin of her toned thighs, and up, up up to the curve of the perkiest ass I’ve ever laid eyes on. White bikini bottoms tied with string. A single tug and she could be freed from them.
She then pulls off her hat. Her hair spills down while she pulls the t-shirt over her head, revealing a bikini top that barely contains her curves. She is lush and soft, and before I can stop myself, I’m imagining her under me and wanting it so fiercely I think I’d give up anything to make it happen.
I have to drop a book in my lap to hide the fact that my cock is reacting to her like I’m new to puberty.
I squeeze my eyes shut, but the image of her is still seared in my brain.
I’m worried it’s going to stay there.
8
DREW
January 23rd
I manage to sleep a little later the next day, but it’s still dark when I head out to begin my run. Josh’s bedroom door clicks shut as I approach the elevator. I’m no lawyer, but I’m fairly certain he’s meeting the legal criteria for stalking.
He leans against the back wall of the elevator and closes his eyes.
“Why are you so tired?” I ask. “Please tell me you were murdering Sloane and hiding the body all night.”
He opens one eye. “What makes you think it would take all night?”
Joshua Bailey, making a second joke in twenty-four hours. I laugh at the unexpectedness of it more than anything else.
“It must take a lot of time,” I continue. “Movies make it seem easy, but, like, sawing through all that bone takes some upper body strength.”
“Jesus Christ,” he says, stepping off the elevator and walking ahead. “The way your mind works frightens me.”
It’s absolutely black outside; no noise but the crickets and the fountains and our soft steps falling into line with each other’s. We reach the road and start to run. This time I don’t bother trying to stay ahead of him or falling behind. I clearly can’t outrun him anyway, and I’ve had worse company. Davis, for instance, ran with me once and spent the whole time talking about the importance of keeping my weight down.
“I get it. I’ve thought about murdering Sloane too,” I tell him, picking up where we left off. “Although just an FYI, wanting to murder someone is not a legally justifiable defense. I checked into it after we met for the first time.”
He scowls. “You talk about murder a lot. You might want to lay off the crime dramas for a bit.”
“I don’t need to watch crime dramas,” I reply. “My mother and my stepfather practice criminal law.”
His gaze jerks toward me. “Your mother?”
I sigh. Everyone assumes simply because I sing about sex on occasion that I must be the product of foster care or a single mom who supported the family via prostitution.
“It’s flattering, how shocked you are by that.”
He shrugs. “I just figured you were raised by someone…a little more shallow. Like, an aging model or a pageant winner, someone who’d have you out there auditioning at age five to model swimwear for sexy toddlers in the newspaper.”
“Ads for sexy toddlers,” I muse. “Is that what you use for porn in Somalia?”
“Only when the internet’s slow,” he says, and I give another startled laugh. I just made the world’s most distasteful joke and he doubled down on it. I respect that.
“Wow,” I say.
He smirks. “I think I even grossed myself out with that one.”
We pass the banyan tree. There are surfers out this morning, pulling boards off the large rack in the sand and heading into the dark water. “I can think of nothing more terrifying,” I say as we pass, “than surfing when it’s pitch-black outside.”
“I can’t imagine waking up this early by choice,” he replies, which has me wondering, once more, what kept him up last night. I’m fairly certain Sloane does not stay up all night for sex. She’d want it rigorously scheduled, with as little touching as possible and a wet towel at the ready to promptly clean up the mess.
Was it satisfactory, she’d ask at the end. He won’t ask her the same, because her release is not critical to the continuation of the species.
“I’m trying to imagine you and Sloane having sex,” I reply, mostly because I know it will make him uncomfortable.
He stumbles and catches himself. “What?”
“Don’t worry, it’s not sexy. I picture more of a Ken doll, Barbie doll situation, with you two rubbing your smooth parts against each other. Or two robots fucking, in some kind of simulation set up for scientists to observe. I’m not entirely clear on why scientists would need to observe robots fucking…still working that part out.”
“Please stop talking,” he begs, but I see that twitch to his lips.
I can’t imagine why, but that smile he’s repressing is the first thing about this trip that’s really made me happy I came.
By the time we approach the hotel, daylight is starting to break and I’m utterly destroyed. He thought he was running slow on my behalf and I was too proud to admit we were running at least a minute per mile faster than I have ever run.
We reach the gardens and he turns toward the pool. “I’m heading this way. I like watching the light come up over Diamond Head.”
“Can’t you watch it from your balcony?”
Something passes over his face, a hint of trouble he doesn’t want to share. “Sloane’s a light sleeper.”
He isn’t exactly inviting me along, but I follow him to the lounge chairs facing Diamond Head and the bay anyway. He glances at me, undoubtedly irritated I’m crashing his sunrise party, and that irritation only encourages me.
The light is just creeping out from behind the volcano as we take our seats, but I’m already starting to shiver in the early morning air. My soaking wet sports bra is now pressed to my skin, growing icier by the moment. If there were no witnesses, I’d just remove it. Instead, I wrap my arms around myself. He glances over and frowns.
“Why do you never bring sufficient clothing?” he asks. “You were cold the other night too.”
My eyes roll. I should have known that even the viewing of a sunrise would involve a little criticism. “Was I supposed to run carrying a sweater and change of clothes?”
He unfolds himself from the chair, lean and graceful for his size. I’m not sure how he’s in such good shape, living where he does. I doubt there’s a SoulCycle. “You could have left a sweatshirt at the front desk,” he gripes. “Hang on.”
Once he’s gone, I slide my wet bra off underneath my shirt—a complicated maneuver, and one for which I feel not enough credit is given—but he returns just as I’m pulling it through the top of my tank.
His gaze flickers below my neck before it comes back up.
“I was cold,” I argue.
His gaze drops to my chest and jerks away nearly as fast. “Yes. I noticed.”
“Maybe you should look at my breasts a little less.”
He blows out a breath, staring at Diamond Head. “Asking a man not to look at your breasts is like asking him not to watch volcanoes explode. The human race would die off if we were capable of ignoring that kind of thing.”
The feminist in me wants to tell him how wrong that statement is, but I feel a tiny fist in my core clench with the kind of desire I’d almost forgotten existed. I should be uncomfortable with the idea of Josh looking at my chest, but strangely, it’s the opposite. I could create a lot of fantasies about this weird exchange if I were going to allow myself to do it. Part of it is his size—I picture feeling overwhelmed by him in bed, overcome. And part of it is just him, and that thing boiling inside him, just below the surface. I’d like to see what happens when the lid is removed at last.
A waitress approaches with a tray and a pile of towels. She hands Josh the towels, which he then hands to me. While I cover myself up, head to toe, like a mummy, she sets two cappuccinos on the table between us. I thank her and wrap my hands around
one, savoring the warmth while he signs the check.
I’m now perfectly happy and toasty and the sun is finally breaking through the clouds to the east. “This is perfect,” I say with a sigh. “Even the stupid sunrise part.”
“So glad the pop princess is finally impressed. I was scared I’d disappoint you.”
I grin at him. “Are you sure it’s not too much happiness? Too much American excess? Shouldn’t you suffer a little more to better serve all your starving Somalians?”
He sighs wearily. “You really hold a grudge, don’t you?”
I laugh unhappily. He doesn’t know the half of it.
The Baileys are going golfing today, and then on to Pearl Harbor. The only way they could make this sound less appealing is if they were throwing a trip to church or a seminar on microfinance in the middle, so I politely bow out to get a hot stone massage and lie out by the pool.
I’ve just reclined in a lounge chair when my phone rings and I see Six’s name, calling by video. He must finally be out of jail.
“Babe,” he groans, running a hand over his handsome and deeply-in-need-of-a-shave face. “I’m so sorry.”
Bringing drugs almost anywhere in Asia is a rookie error and he should have known better, but it’s hard to get mad at him when he’s just spent over a day in jail, is missing the trip, and looks so miserable. “I’ll probably forgive you,” I reply, pushing my sunglasses on top of my head. “Was it bad?”
He shrugs. “Mostly it was boring. So what am I missing?”
I turn the camera, showing him the pool with the sea behind it. “It’s amazing.”
“Cool. Now let me see the better view,” he says. “Let me look at you.”
I smile reluctantly, turning the camera back to face me.
“You’re wearing an awful lot of clothes,” he suggests.
I roll my eyes. “I’m only in a bikini. I’m also in public.”
“Go to the room and remove it for me,” he says. “I just spent a day in foreign prison. Don’t I deserve a reward?”
I wait until the waiter passes before I answer. “A reward for ditching me on a trip with your family? No. And as I recall, we had a deal about this trip: no sex, remember?”
It’s the one rule I made while giving in so easily otherwise. And I’m not sure if that extends to phone sex, but it seems like a slippery slope.
He shakes his head. “Lower the camera, at least. Let me see my second favorite things in the world.”
“What’s the first?” I reply. “I assume it’s my brain.”
“Of course not,” he says, smirking. “Not until I figure out how to get my penis in there, anyway.”
I snort laugh. That’s always been the issue with Six. He’s too damn charming to stay mad at, even when he’s, you know, awaiting trial.
And this is why he’s perfect for me: he’s just enough fun without ever being someone I might let myself trust.
9
JOSH
January 24th
I wake the next morning on the couch, realizing I’ve just heard the slam of her door. She’s so loud normally I can’t imagine how she made it that far without waking me. There’s always a thud or a squeak or a muted Oh, fuck from her room if she’s up, which I find both amusing and irritating. I dress and brush my teeth, planning to catch up with her on the road, which isn’t exactly difficult. She’s ridiculously slow.
I get downstairs and find, to my surprise, that she’s still here, stretching against a pillar near the lobby.
“Were you waiting for me?” I ask.
She jumps in shock and I place a palm on her bicep to steady her.
“Of course I wasn’t waiting,” she sniffs. She turns back to the pillar and continues to stretch. “Sometimes I like to warm up.”
She’s full of shit. She was totally waiting for me. I hate that I’m pleased by that. I’m doing this out of duty and nothing more, and she’s putting up with it because I won’t give her another option. It’s not as if we are going to be friends when this trip is over.
We run the same route as before, down past the shops and the park and on toward Diamond Head. I know she ran farther and faster the first day just to spite me, but she’s got to be the only female I know who would just keep doing it, day after day.
When we’re done, we go to the chairs by the pool again. I have no idea why she’s coming along, but hopefully she can refrain from discussing sex robots, which I’d never heard of and now can’t stop picturing.
I get her warm towels because she’s incapable of remembering to bring a sweatshirt, and soon she’s wrapped up, sipping a cappuccino and watching the sunrise beside me.
“Do you think anyone lives up there?” she asks, nodding at Diamond Head. “There’s probably palms, a pineapple tree. You could build yourself some kind of hut, live off fruit.”
I glance over at her. “Why you’d want to is the bigger question.”
She frowns before she turns back to stare at the mountain. “It would just be nice to have no one talking about you,” she says. “I get tired of having to be nice all the time.”
“All the time?” I ask. “Is that what we’re going with?”
She laughs. “Almost all the time. Just not to you. Trolls don’t deserve kindness.”
I follow her gaze to the hills, thinking of the unhappy woman who waits in my room, the issues with my mom. “I guess I can see the appeal,” I admit quietly. “Probably not a lot of Sour Patch Kids up there.” I still can’t believe she brought candy on that hike instead of water.
She makes a face at me. “Of course there are. Those hills are full of Sour Patch Trees. It’s like you know nothing about Hawaiian agriculture. You’ll see.”
And just like that, she’s included me in her imagined life, living in the hills. I don’t know if she even realized she did it, but I wish the idea appealed to me a little less than it does.
When I return to the room, Sloane is up and dressed.
“You were gone for a long time,” she says. I can’t tell if she’s insinuating something or if I just feel guilty for avoiding her.
“I was worried I’d wake you if I came back too early.”
She doesn’t react at all, emotionless as ever. Her seeming apathy is what led me to think the fling in Somalia was meaningless, and I’m still not sure it wasn’t. Her interest in me seems driven more by my lack of interest than anything else.
“Do you know when your brother’s going to be here?” she asks.
In theory, he should get his passport back any day now, though the truth is you never know with Joel. It would not surprise me to discover he wasn’t in Japan at all, that he’d actually been on a bender, one hotel over, the entire time. “Possibly tomorrow.”
“Good,” she says, and then she brushes her hands against each other, as if she’s successfully solved a thorny problem.
I’m pretty sure the problem is me, and I’m pretty sure having Joel here isn’t going to fix a goddamn thing.
10
DREW
I wonder how little I would actually do on this trip if I wasn’t competing with someone.
My morning run? It would be three miles long at most, were it not for Josh. My breakfasts? Half their current size if I weren’t trying to be as excessively American as possible for Sloane’s benefit. And when Beth says she’s arranged for us all to surf—she’s rented a board for Josh, gotten an instructor for me and Sloane—the only thing that has me agreeing is Sloane saying I think I’ll pass in that snooty way of hers.
To be honest, I can kind of understand Sloane’s apprehension over this whole surfing thing. The ocean is mostly something you attempt to survive, not master, and here, where the surf break appears to be a mile from shore, it feels almost suicidal. I only want to be that far from dry land if there’s a champagne-stocked yacht involved. But I hate the way Beth deflates a little when Sloane says no, and I want to feel cooler than Sloane, though it’s hardly a competition. She’s currently wearing a shin-length
linen dress and heels for breakfast on vacation. If she has a stylist, her only instructions must be “boring” and “no, more boring than that.”
At the appointed time, Josh and I wander to the beach. He’s clad only in a pair of black swim trunks, still damp from the pool and clinging to his thighs. They’ve slipped to the top of his narrow hips, low enough to show off that perfect v of his abdomen, which I swear to God is pure muscle, not an ounce of fat anywhere to be found. He tucks the rental board under his arm and moves toward the water, leaving me to wait for the instructor, who arrives late and clearly has no fucks to give. Normally, I’d appreciate the fact that he’s treating me like everyone else, but I’d prefer someone who seems at least vaguely invested in keeping me alive.
He shows me how to pop up on the board. I practice twice, he yawns and says, “Whatever, it’s easy,” and then we are off. Josh is now a tiny speck on the horizon, approaching other tiny specks.
“We’re not going that far, right?” I whisper.
The dude, whose name is Stan, all but rolls his eyes. “Yeah, unless you’ve discovered a new way to surf that doesn’t involve waves.”
Gosh, I sure hope Stan wasn’t expecting a tip.
We paddle, and paddle—requiring more upper body strength than I probably have.
If he were nicer, I’d tell him I find the ocean slightly terrifying, and that I find things that live in the ocean similarly terrifying—the movie about the surfer who got her arm bit off took place in Hawaii, after all. I’d also like to mention that I want to keep all my limbs, which doesn’t feel like the sort of thing I should have to mention, but bears repeating.
A wave crashes over my head for what feels like the hundredth time, knocking the board out from under me and dumping me in the ocean. It seems as if we’re making no progress, and I want to weep from the ache in my arms when Stan heaves a sigh and pinches my board between his toes. “I’ll tow you,” he says, not hiding how tiresome he finds the fact that I cannot propel myself with ease, using only my upper body, for extended periods of time.
The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea Page 4