by Rye Hart
“How have you been, Brooke?” I asked.
Her eyes met mine and I could see a flash of pain move across them before it fluttered away.
“I’ve been good,” she said. “What about you?”
“Life has been good to me, despite some disruptions,” I said.
“I can tell by this house,” Morgan said. “Are you renting?”
“Morgan, it’s really—” Brooke said.
“It’s okay. Really. Actually, I own it, Morgan. I bought it a few weeks ago.”
“You just—saw it and wanted it so you bought it,” Morgan said.
“Isn’t that how it works?” I asked.
“If you’ve got money, sure,” Morgan said.
Brooke looked like she wished the floor would open up and swallow her whole. “Jesus Morgan,” she mumbled.
I shook my head. “Well, she’s right. I guess you could say I do okay. I’ve been very fortunate,” I said. “So, what are you doing here in Nassau, Brooke?” I asked.
“She’s trying to get over a shitty ex,” Morgan blurted out.
“Morgan!” Brooke exclaimed. “Language.”
Morgan looked over at my kids, who’s own eyes were wide as saucers, and her cheeks flushed. “Oops. I’m really sorry,” she said sheepishly.
“What’s a x?” Sydney asked.
I tried to think of a way to answer that question in a way they would understand, but Brooke started talking before I could.
“It’s kind of like someone you aren’t friends with anymore,” she said.
“Were they mean to you?” Daniel asked.
“Yeah, kind of,” Brooke answered.
“Daddy says we should be nice to everyone,” Sydney piped up.
I shifted uncomfortably on my feet when Brooke’s eyes lifted to meet mine.
“He’s right,” she said.
“I’ll be nice to you,” Sydney said.
“Mee too!” Daniel added.
Brooke giggled at the kids before she reached over and ruffled Daniel’s hair.
“You guys are really sweet. Thank you,” she said. “But I’m fine. I promise.”
Dessert with the gang was actually a pretty good time. Brooke told me that she had graduated with her English degree and that she was currently working on a book.
The evening gave me time to study Brooke, to take in her beauty and enjoy being around her again, watching how easy it was for her to interact with my children.
They even wanted her to tuck them into bed after dessert.
“She really liked you, you know,” Morgan said quietly so only I could hear.
I watched Brooke help my daughter into her pajamas.
“I liked her, too,” I said.
“Then why did you forget about her, Kevin? I don’t get it.”
“I never forgot about her. I just… got caught up.”
“You can spin it however you want, but all I know is I spent more time picking her up from restaurants where she waited alone than I ever did hearing about the hot times she had getting laid,” she said. “I dried more tears than I ever should have, and somehow she still found it hard to let you go.”
“It was just really bad timing,” I said.
I watched as Brooke tucked Sydney in, kissing her forehead and smiling down at her.
Fuck. Sydney’s own mother had never even looked at her like that.
“I was twenty-six and too wrapped up in my own success. What happened between us was my fault. I screwed it up. I’ll never deny that,” I said.
“All I know is Brooke is here nursing one broken heart, and I don’t intend to let her get another one along the way,” Morgan said.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Not my story to tell. But don’t fuck this up for her. She needs this vacation. For her book and for herself.”
I watched Brooke’s hips sway as she walked out of the bedroom.
“All done,” she said.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I said.
“Oh, it’s fine. They were really easy to put down. Daniel wanted a book and Sydney wanted a kiss,” she said.
“You’re really good with them.”
“They’re good kids, Kevin. You’ve done well with them,” she said.
She didn’t even question the fact that there wasn’t a woman in the picture. She probably just assumed that I’d fucked up that relationship too.
“I’ll walk you guys out,” I said.
I escorted the girls to the door, but I was reluctant to let them go. I wanted to see Brooke again. My kids seemed to enjoy her, and so did I. The Caribbean night sky hung heavily above and cast a romantic glow over everything. The sand was tinted a beautiful white by the full moon and the whole of the small town seemed illuminated with passion. I reached my hand out and grabbed onto Brooke’s, and her fingers reflexively clamped down around mine.
Her palm was soft and warm, and still fit delicately into my hand.
She turned toward me, her beautiful eyes staring up at mine. I could see Morgan at the end of the driveway, staring at us and watching it all unfold. I allowed my thumb to trace circles on the top of her skin before I dropped her hand, and said her name.
Brooke never looked more beautiful than when she was bathed in moonlight.
“Yes?” she asked.
I drew in a deep breath and decided to jump right into the deep end.
“I know you’re writing a book, and that sometimes inspiration can strike at different moments,” I said.
“Sometimes, yeah.”
“You know where to find me if inspiration strikes. You can use the porch, or one of the rooms, or hide away in the loft.”
“That’s very kind of you, Kevin. Thanks,” she said.
“And if I had your number, I could get in touch with you. Like if the kids and I decided to go to another scenic part of the island. It might help get the creative juices flowing.”
“My number.”
“Mhm.”
“You want my number?”
“I do,” I said.
I watched her mull over the offer as I held my breath.
I was a confident man.
A strong man.
Dominant, even.
I ran my company with efficiency and never took ‘no’ for an answer.
But standing in front of Brooke and waiting for her answer made me feel like a kid trying to make amends for breaking a priceless family heirloom.
“Okay,” Brooke said. “Give me your phone.”
I handed her my phone and she quickly tapped her number into it. I grinned down at her, watching as she walked back to her best friend. The two of them linked arms before they started walking down the beach.
I watched until they disappeared from sight, then I looked down at my phone.
I had Brooke’s number.
And I fully intended to use it.
Her heart was clearly still broken from what I did, and her recent ex.
Now, it was my mission to mend it back together.
CHAPTER 4
BROOKE
I always relished the stillness of the morning.
Though, as I sat at my laptop, a sense of dread came over me while I stared at the blinking cursor.
The coffee pot in my room was filling the hut with its glorious perfume as the sun slowly rose up over the water. The crystal-clear mirror of the ocean was unwavering.
It was early, too early for anyone else on vacation to be up, which made it the perfect time of day to try and get some writing in. I wanted nothing more than to finish a book and get it published. It was the perfect story: a woman seeking love in all the wrong places, who finally comes to find that the only person she really needed to love was herself.
Something witty and fun, but also relatable, tugging at the heartstrings of readers.
Leaning forward, I managed to pound out another paragraph before the coffee pot beeped.
I got up to make a cup as I leaned against the wall. Nassau Isl
and was picturesque, and the perfect place to write my first novel to publish. I wanted something that would introduce me to the market in the light I wanted to be painted. I wanted to write books that people could relate to, books with characters they could understand and lessons they could carry with them. I wanted to give advice they could take for whenever they needed it.
I didn’t want to write for the money or the fame. I wanted to write to pull people from their lives and delve with them into truths we don’t always want to admit to ourselves.
And in the process, what I wanted most was to discover more about myself.
After finishing my cup of coffee, I sat back down and stared at the page. An opening line and one paragraph, and I didn’t know how to continue from there. Why in the world was this so hard? In college, I could rattle three hundred pages away in a month.
No problem.
Writer’s block had never been an issue, but now it seemed to be a major struggle. The one thing keeping me from writing what my fingers wanted desperately to communicate.
I leaned back into my chair as the sun rose above the water. People were beginning to stir and now the mirrored reflection of the ocean was muddled with vacationers diving in. The island was coming alive with children and families, and it forced my mind back to the other night.
Back to Kevin and his kids and that mouth-watering dessert.
I’d had so much fun. Even though that wasn’t the purpose of the outing, I did enjoy my time with Kevin. I’d forgotten how easy it was to talk with him, how safe I felt whenever I was around him. The conversation was light-hearted and easy, and his children were little carbon copies of him. Sydney, with that confident sass and Daniel with his sincere expressions.
Despite what I chose to focus on, my time with Kevin hadn’t been all bad.
I closed my eyes and slipped back in time to college, to the first time I’d seen Kevin in that bar. His chiseled jaw and high cheekbones showcased his dominance, but it was his large hand that caught my eye. It dwarfed the glass he was drinking from and made me painfully aware of other things that could dwarf me if I had the chance to get underneath his clothes. His chest pulled at the shirt he was wearing, and his shoulders were swollen with muscles.
Even as I sat in my chair in my bedroom, heat surged between my legs.
I’d fallen for him quickly in the three months we’d known one another, which was new territory for me and something I’d never done before. I’d had my share of flings as a wild college girl, but I’d never allowed myself to fall for any of them.
But I did with Kevin.
It was hard not to.
He was hot, he was driven, and he was an older man and capable of showing a twenty-year-old wild child how a real man treated a woman. You know, except for standing her up for multiple dinners.
But what had really drawn me to him was his intelligence. Once I peeled away the cocky layers and the incessant need to throw his money around, I found an intelligent man who was self-made, confident, and well-spoken. His body was something for my eyes to behold, but his mind was something for my heart to behold. Whenever he was around, our conversations never ceased. He was genuinely interested in my college career and I was genuinely interested in his business.
That was the paradox of Kevin. When he’d been good, he’d been very, very good. But when he’d been preoccupied with work, it had seemed like I didn’t exist. After being stood up one too many times, I’d broken it off, and what had really hurt, was that he hadn’t fought me on it one bit. He had simply said nothing as I walked away. Then six months later, a wedding announcement popped up in the local newspaper. Kevin was engaged to a woman named Sarah, and that was that. I had been nothing but a fun last fling before he had found a suitable wife for a billionaire entrepreneur.
I wondered where his wife was, since he and the kids appeared to be alone on the island.
Were they history?
Did he screw that up the same way he screwed us up?
“You got any more of that coffee?”
I turned my gaze to Morgan and was shocked to find her dressed in her bathing suit.
“Going somewhere?” I asked.
“Yep. To the beach, once I’m caffeinated,” she said. “Heard from lover boy yet?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Cut the shit. I know you gave him your number last night.”
I grinned as I took a sip of my coffee.
“No. I haven’t heard from him,” I said.
“Just guard yourself, Brooke. He already broke your heart once.”
“I know. I was there,” I said.
“You enjoyed spending time with him last night, didn’t you?” she asked.
“I did. It was a crash-course in reminding me exactly why I enjoyed being around him.”
“I’ll admit, I can see what you saw in him. He seems like a good guy deep down, not to mention great with his kids. But, we’re here to get over bad boyfriends. Just keep that in mind.”
“Don’t worry. I haven’t forgotten,” I said.
Morgan took a seat next to me and, like clockwork, my phone began to ring. I looked at the unregistered number calling me, and Morgan threw me a haphazard grin. She watched me, waiting to see what decision I would make.
She rolled her eyes when I reached for my phone.
“Hello?” I asked.
“Brooke. It’s Kevin.”
“Good morning,” I said.
“Wasn’t sure you’d be up.”
“So you decided to call anyway? What if I had been sleeping?”
“You sleep like a log. You wouldn’t have picked up.”
“You don’t know that. I might be a light sleeper now.”
Morgan started laughing as I shot her a look.
“I called to see what you guys were up to today,” Kevin said.
Silence fell on the phone call as Morgan looked at me with a curious eye.
“Um—we’re going swimming,” I said.
“Where at?” Kevin asked.
“Just off the pier,” I said. “Why?”
“Well, maybe the kids and I will see you guys out there.”
“Maybe,” I said.
I hung up the phone and dodged all of Morgan’s questions. My mind was still spinning the sound of his voice around like a song. I peeled off my pajamas and slipped into my bathing suit, then slathered sunblock onto my skin.
“Ready?” she asked.
“Ready,” I said with a nod.
The two of us dove into the water from the small porch of our hut and swam out into the ocean. I looked over and saw Kevin’s vacation home in the distance. I saw him bobbing up and down in the water while Daniel and Sydney were having a blast sliding down the waterslide. Soon the current was pushing us over to their side of the beach.
“Hey there, stranger!” Morgan said.
I shot her a look as Kevin whipped around.
“Fancy seeing you out here,” he said, with a grin.
“The kids look like they’re having fun,” I said.
“They love that waterslide. I knew they would when I found the house.”
“I wish I had a waterslide like that growing up,” Morgan said.
“You can go down it, if you’d like,” Kevin said.
“Oh, hell yes,” Morgan said. “See you losers later!”
I shook my head as my friend swam off to go indulge her inner child.
A cheeky grin slid across Kevin’s face as he looked me over. It was all I could do not to blush from head to toe under the weight of his gaze.
I utterly hated how he could do that to me.
“Did you catch the sunrise this morning?” he asked.
“I did. It inspired me to write a whole new paragraph in a book that’s going nowhere.”
“One paragraph is better than nothing.”
“But it isn’t nearly the kind of pace I’m used to. I haven’t been blocked like this since my freshman year of college.”
“What did you do then to get rid of it?” he asked. “Maybe it’ll work this time.”
“I don’t think drinking and fucking is really something I can afford to indulge right now.”
I turned my eyes up toward his and saw him staring down at me. His eyes were darkening, shadowed with the thoughts running through his head. I knew that look. I’d seen it many times during the three months we spent together.
The blood was rushing through my ears, drowning out any sounds as his eyes danced between mine. I had to get out of his trance. I had to pull myself away from him. I couldn’t allow myself to fall for him again.
If he didn’t have time for me before, two kids weren’t going to make it any easier.
I cleared my throat and pulled my gaze away, breaking the moment. I watched Morgan come down the slide with her hands in the air, followed quickly by the two kids. They were splashing around and dunking her, and Morgan was going along with it, faking like she couldn’t get away as the kids roared with laughter.
“She’s always been good with kids,” I said.
I saw Kevin’s eyes whip over to the shoreline. He started waving at someone and began walking toward the shore, leaving me behind to bob with the waves.
Guess some things never changed.
I swam up to Morgan coming down the slide again. The kids latched onto me this time, swimming around me and splashing me with their tiny little hands. The four of us played in the clear waters while Kevin talked with someone on the shore, then I heard my name being called out.
I turned and saw Kevin motioning to me before he yelled at me to bring the kids.
Who does he think I am?
His fucking nanny?
Morgan’s eyebrows hiked all the way to her head as I took the hands of his children. I swam to shore with them and we came out of the water.
At this point, I was painfully aware of how Kevin was looking at me. I was trying not to look at him. Trying not to stare at the lines of muscles that disappeared underneath his swim shorts. I tried not to stare at the small line of hair that traveled from his belly button and disappeared under the waistband.
I tried not to take in the sculpted muscles of his back as I approached.