So I’m going to stop living in the past and harping over past hurts. I’m going to accept things as they are, and look forward to the future.
It’s strangely freeing.
For the first time, it feels like I have a future again. Not only is Clay paying off our debts and giving me room to breathe, but I might actually have a future with someone. Strange how I never realized how lonely I was until just now. I’ve always been a bit of a lonely person, and I don’t make a lot of friends. I’ve been fine with that—but being around Clay makes me want something more.
I enjoy the day. Gosh, do I enjoy the day. After I have the big “talk” with Clay, it feels like all the tension between us has evaporated. I’m able to relax and have fun tubing. Clay and I go down the river for about an hour, then get out at the designated spot and take a shuttle back to the picnic area. There, Ivy and Boone are busy serving up hamburgers and hot dogs. More beer is passed around, along with bottles of water. Ivy’s too pregnant to go tubing, so there’s a constant crew at the picnic spot, and people swap out to go tubing in pairs or groups. Clay’s brothers are funny and rowdy, always clowning around and teasing each other. They give him shit for shaving his face, and then when Knox steals someone’s towel, the brothers pile onto him in their teasing. It seems that Knox likes to steal things just to see if people notice. Ivy chats with me for a while, telling me about how she and Boone met, and about the baby she’s carrying, and she’s incredibly sweet and friendly. I like her a lot. Actually, I like everyone that I meet today.
Lexi spends most of the day harassing Clay’s brothers, who harass her back as if she’s the weird friend they never had. She even shows Ivy how to do a few yoga pregnancy poses, and Seth and Knox also attempt to do the poses, much to everyone’s amusement.
I pick at the food back and forth, drink a few beers, and Clay drags me off to go tubing regularly, I think so we can get away from the others. He holds my hand or keeps a possessive arm around my waist at all times, and it really does feel like I’m his girlfriend and not just his “paid assistant.”
And we kiss. A lot. Oh gosh, do we kiss.
As night falls, no one seems in a hurry to leave. We take one last twilight ride down the river, and then return our tubes. Boone sets up a bonfire, and then everyone hangs around it, talking and laughing. Lexi plops down next to me with a bar of chocolate and marshmallows, and we set to making s’mores. The younger Prices keep trying to steal Lexi’s s’mores the moment she makes them, but I offer mine to Clay, mostly because I like watching him lick his fingers.
If that’s wrong, I don’t want to be right.
Eventually, though, I start to yawn, and when Clay puts his arm around my waist I lean in and rest my head on his shoulder.
“We should probably head out soon,” Clay murmurs, his hand going to my knee. His skin feels deliciously cool against mine. “You look like you’re about to fall over.”
I start to protest, but what comes out is a yawn.
“Yeah,” Clay drawls. “That’s our cue. Come on.” He pats my butt. “Time to go.”
“Excuse me,” Lexi says, and puts on a weird British accent. “Have you been drinking, good sir? I can’t allow you to drive us home if you’ve partaken of the spirits.”
“What did she just say?” Seth murmurs.
“No drinking,” Clay promises. “I left that to Nat. I’m the designated driver, and now I’m going to take my girl back to our room.”
“Oh goody, can I come along?” Lexi deadpans. “I don’t feel like a third wheel at all.”
And then I feel a little stab of guilt, because I do worry that Lexi has felt like an extra all day and I didn’t notice.
“I’ll take Lexi home,” Knox says, getting out his phone. “I’m calling my driver right now.”
I hesitate, but Lexi gives me a sly wink that tells me she’s fine with Knox giving her a ride. Ooookay, then. “If you’re sure,” I say, waiting for someone to speak up.
No one does. Lexi points at Knox’s phone, reading over his shoulder. “Tell him he needs to bring us Happy Meals.”
Knox nods and starts typing.
“Yeah, she’s fine. Come on,” Clay murmurs.
“I’ll call you later,” Lexi yells out as we leave. I feel a little guilty, but I can’t make her come, and I know she’s sober. She’s not a drinker. Maybe she’s interested in Knox? I make a mental note to grill her tomorrow via text.
Clay holds my hand and carries my bag as we head back to his truck, and he opens the door for me so I can slide in. The moment I do, his eyes widen.
“What is it?” I ask, worried about that look on his face.
“Did you use sunblock?”
“I did earlier.” Now that he mentions it, though, I do feel warm. Really warm. I flip down the visor and peer at my reflection.
I’m tomato red. Oh god. My face is bright pink from chin to hairline, and I’m pretty sure my scalp is even sunburned. How is that possible? I lift my suit strap, and the line of pale skin that was covered looks bright enough to be a stripe on the flag. Oh boy. This is going to hurt tomorrow.
“It must not have worked very well,” I say feebly, pressing my fingertips to my skin. “Guess that’s what I get for grabbing the first one I saw at the drugstore.”
“We’ll get you fixed up, baby,” Clay promises.
I guess at some point I started being okay with him calling me baby again.
He begins driving and at some point I guess I nod off. I wake up and see we’re stopping at a pharmacy. “Wait here,” he tells me. Clay returns a few minutes later with a bag and puts it on the floorboard, then tucks me against his side. “Go back to sleep. I’ll wake you up when we get home.”
I nod and snuggle against his shoulder. “Didn’t realize I was this tired,” I tell him, yawning.
“It’s okay,” he says with a chuckle. “I got you.”
“It’s a long drive back to the hotel,” I tell him, rubbing my face against his warm, delicious arm. “Let me know if you want me to drive for a bit.”
“We’re good,” he promises me. “You sleep.”
I do. I doze off and when I wake up, the truck has stopped and Clay’s opening my door. “Come on, sweetheart,” he murmurs, and hefts me into his arms.
That wakes me up. “Clay,” I protest. “You can’t carry me. I can walk!”
“I’ve got you,” he tells me. “Just put your arms around my neck.”
Since I have no other choice, I do, and I’m surprised to see we’re not at the hotel. We’re in front of . . . a trailer, of all things. Oh. “Is this where you live?”
“Yeah, it’s a lot closer than the hotel. It’s not much to look at, though. Sorry about that. I never bring anyone over.” He goes up the steps and pushes the door open, then flips on the light. Inside, it’s surprisingly clean and neat, with an old, beat-up sofa, a large flat-screen TV mounted to the wall, and blankets tossed over a nearby chair. Even his kitchen is tidy. The place is small and looks a little worn, but it’s charming to see Clay’s personality in the sparse furnishings. There’s a Houston Texans jersey on the wall, and a framed family photograph across from it. He sets me down and then lightly presses a kiss on my nose. “You need to take a cold shower to cool your skin off.”
“I feel fine,” I protest. “I’d rather look around.”
“You’re fine, huh?”
“Absolutely.”
He pokes my shoulder with a finger.
“Ow.” I swipe his hand away.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. Go get in the shower or I’m gonna spank you.” He wiggles his eyebrows at me. “Unless you’d like that.”
“Maybe I would and maybe I wouldn’t,” I say loftily. “Is it in our contract?”
He only snorts. “Just get your sassy butt in the shower. A cold shower,” he points out. “And then you’re gon
na come out here and drink some water, because I want you to stay hydrated.”
“Nag, nag, nag,” I tease, and then ruin it by yawning. “Are we sleeping in your bed tonight?”
“Yup, we are. We’ll go back to the hotel in the morning.” He moves past me farther into the trailer, and opens a door. Inside are neatly stacked linens, and he pulls a towel out and hands it to me.
“I’m going, I’m going,” I mutter. I take the towel from him and head for the door he’s pointing at. The bathroom’s neat as a pin—neater than I expected, given Clay’s rough and tumble exterior—and the body wash in the shower caddy smells like he does. I sniff it for a long, heavenly moment before undressing and then turning the shower on.
The cold water hits me like a log. I bite back the yelp that threatens and cling to the tile, shocked at how freezing cold it is. It takes a moment for me to fiddle with the knobs and figure out how to change the water to slightly warmer, and I end up shivering under the spray for as long as I can bear it.
A quick look in the mirror when I get out tells me that I’m going to be feeling this in the morning. Really, really feeling this. My skin is a deep, angry red, and pale white where my swimsuit covered it. Ugh. In addition to painful, it looks completely unsexy as well.
“Come on out,” Clay calls to me.
I wrap the towel around my body and follow his voice. The sunburn’s starting to hit me now, and I feel exhausted and achy. Clay’s waiting in his bedroom—a tiny, neat room with a nightstand full of hunting and business magazines, and a full-size bed that’s had the blankets stripped off of it, revealing a cool white sheet.
“Lie down,” Clay tells me, and pats the bed. “I’ll rub aloe vera on your burns.”
“I should be waiting on you,” I tell him miserably. “Pretty sure the reversal isn’t part of the deal.”
“Fuck the deal,” he says. “Get in this bed already, baby.”
Well, okay, him demanding I get into bed does sound a bit like our deal. I do, and I carefully lie down on my belly, exposing my back to him. My movements cause the towel to shift and I whimper when it brushes against my reddened skin.
“You’re killin’ me, Nat,” Clay says in a frustrated voice. “Hate seein’ you in pain.”
“If it makes you feel any better, I don’t like being in pain.”
He chuckles and pulls the towel down my back. “No, that don’t help much.”
I grab the towel from his hand and hike it back up before he can expose my butt. “You can just do my shoulders.”
“Like I ain’t seen every inch of you already,” he teases, pulling the towel back down. “Quit bein’ so shy.”
“It’s one thing to be sexy naked,” I grump. “Another to be ailing naked. Ailing naked isn’t a good naked.”
“Any time you’re naked, I think it’s a good naked.” I hear the cap flip, and in the next moment, something screamingly cold splatters on my back. At my yelp of protest, Clay laughs again. “Sorry. Guess it’s cold.”
“You’re a terrible nursemaid.”
His hand smooths onto my back a moment later, spreading that cold, soothing lotion around, and I groan at how good it suddenly feels. “I’m not used to takin’ care of no one,” Clay admits. “So I might not be the sweetest nurse, but I’ll be the most enthusiastic.”
“Enthusiasm’s good.” I close my eyes and rest my head on my folded hands, relaxing as he rubs the aloe onto my burn. “I really appreciate this.”
“I don’t mind in the slightest. Lets me touch you for a bit longer, and I’m greedy that way.”
I smile to myself. “You touched me all day long.”
“Doesn’t mean I’m tired of it.” He puts another dollop of aloe on my back and begins to rub it in as well. “Your dad . . . you said he’s really sick, huh? You take care of him?”
“I do,” I say softly. It feels strange to be talking about my dad to Clay, especially after the realization that Dad did so much to keep us apart from each other. “It’s hard to be angry with him, because I know what’s happened to him. After his stroke, he hasn’t been the same. It took him months and months to recover, and by the time he could get around again, Johanna had filed for divorce and his accountants had let me know that he didn’t have any money left. I thought it couldn’t get any worse . . . and then he started mistaking me for my mother, who died when I was five.”
His hands gently caress my shoulders. “Ouch. That had to have been painful.”
I nod. “At first I thought it was just a spell. That maybe he was struggling a little after the stroke. But then it kept happening more and more. He’d wake up and think he was late for a movie. Or he’d sometimes have no idea where he was at all, and just scream and scream at me like I was torturing him. And sometimes when he’s having a bad spell, he remembers Mom’s death and he just cries and cries. Those are the worst days.” I swallow hard. “He should probably be in a home, but I can’t afford any but the barest-bones ones, and I don’t want the world knowing that Chap Weston is being tossed into a cheap home by his mean daughter.”
“So you started runnin’ a museum for him instead?”
“It seemed like the only thing to do. When he was still coherent, I suggested selling some of his memorabilia from the movies. He’s got tons of it, you know. Says he used to hit up all the studio lot auctions with Debbie Reynolds. Didn’t want to sell any of it, either. He refused, and it’s his stuff so I can’t go around him. And doing that would be cruel, anyhow. So I tried for a while to sell autographs and signed pictures on eBay and things. It didn’t make much money, but then we had a fan show up out of the blue one day and she wanted pictures of Dad, and he was just so delighted to show her around and give a tour of his collection. And that’s kind of how the museum started.”
“Mmm.” His hands slide down my back in the most delicious way. “You never did make it to Stanford, did you.”
“Never even left town,” I admit. “Dad was one medical emergency after another, and by the time he stabilized, the money was gone and so was everyone else. We went from constantly having maids, assistants, and valets to having no one. I was all Dad had. So . . . I stayed and tried to make things work.”
“You’re the most loyal person I’ve ever met, Nat.” His voice is husky.
For some reason, hearing that from him makes me feel like crying. “Loyal to everyone but the one person that mattered the most, it seems.”
“We were both stupid kids,” he says, and his hands slide down to my ass and begin to knead it. It’s not exactly sunburned, but I can’t find it in me to protest. It feels too good. “Maybe we needed a few years apart to smarten up. Let the world deal us a few licks before we could get back together.”
“Maybe.”
“Still doesn’t mean I don’t want to punch your dad in the face.”
“I doubt he’d remember who you are,” I say with a little sigh. “And I don’t even know that he realizes what he did. Dad’s always been . . .”
“Selfish?” Clay volunteers.
It seems like the wrong word for it. “It’s hard to explain. People in Hollywood are different than you and me. He had people surrounding him for sixty years telling him how amazing he was. I think stuff like that eventually goes to your head. Plus, he was paid to pretend to be other people on screen. Off screen, I don’t think he knew how to turn it off. My dad just puts on a show, no matter who he’s around. I think that’s why he’s been divorced so many times. You peel back all the acting layers, and there’s not much left underneath.”
“Kinda sad if you ask me.”
And that’s the right word for it. Sad. Sad that my dad’s ailing and he’s got no one left but a too-young daughter. Sad that he’s had such heights of fame and he’s going to spend his last days forgotten and alone. Sad that he’s never really built real bonds with anyone . . . even me. Sad that I care and still wish
he was the dad I always wanted as a little girl. “Yeah. Sad.”
Clay’s hands stroke my butt again, and then his fingers slide down the insides of my thighs. It sends hot little prickles through my body. “Um . . .”
“You ain’t sunburned here, but I can’t resist,” he murmurs. “Wanna put my mouth all over this skin of yours so badly but you’re sunburned. Don’t wanna hurt you.”
“And you probably don’t want a mouthful of aloe,” I tease, though I’m getting all breathless and turned on. “Let’s not talk about my dad anymore, okay? It ruins the mood.”
“I completely agree. Why don’t you turn over and I can rub your front for you?”
I roll onto my back and put my hands over my breasts, feeling shy. My burned skin feels as if it scrapes against the sheets and I wince. “Maybe I should stay on my stomach. I think my back’s twice as bad as the front.”
“Yeah, but the view is amazing like this,” Clay tells me, grinning wickedly down at me. For a moment, he looks so much like the boy I fell in love with seven years ago that I lose my breath. With his beard gone, he does look a little younger—but he’s still Clay. Still ruggedly handsome, still chiseled and tanned and delicious. His smile fades and he groans. “The way you look at me, Nat—”
“Sorry,” I say meekly.
“Don’t you fuckin’ apologize. Love the way you devour me with your eyes.” His gaze is heated, and he grabs one of my hands, prying it off my breast. “Don’t want you hidin’ these from me, either. They’re mine. All of you belongs to me.”
“Because you bought me?” I tease.
The look in his eyes is serious. Hungry. Possessive. “No. Because you’ve always been mine and always will be.”
I shiver at those words. God, I feel so needy around him. So hungry for more. “I’m sorry I had to go and get sunburned,” I say softly. “I guess I ruined any hopes for sex tonight. And here I keep hearing how amazing reunion sex is.”
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