“Jesus shit,” Cole yelled from beside us making us all jump and turn to see Dash humping his side as he tried fighting him off. “Get him off me. I’m getting molested by a fuckin’ dalmatian! Call the pound, fuckin call an exterminator and a priest,” the last word faded at the end as Cole ran back towards the lake with Dash hot on his heels, by which point even Mace had tears running down his face he was laughing so hard. Just as we calmed down he yelled out, “I need the afternoon after pill! And a priest - I want the priest; I feel so dirty and used,” and started scrubbing himself in the water while Dash looked at him from the bank wagging his tail.
I’d been given Dash by my brothers and sister two years ago, and Cole had come up with the name because he said he looked like morse code with dots all over him. Unfortunately, my dog took to his name immediately so I couldn’t change it. Fortunately, he now wound Cole up constantly. My dog never humped anyone besides Cole, and I swear he did it with a doggy grin on his face that wasn’t one of humping satisfaction - more of evil humor.
“Maya, you’ve got to come with me to Sheeve’s on Friday,” Ava said breaking through my thoughts. What the fuck, why would Maya go there? “It’s a club that plays all sorts of music and it's so much fun.”
After ten minutes of discussion with Mace and I biting our tongues, so we didn’t look like unreasonable assholes, it was decided that the girls were hitting Sheeve’s leaving both Mace and I looking like we’d just swallowed acid at the prospect.
We spent the rest of the day having fun in the water and enjoying the sun. I had the bonus of having a wet Maya rubbing against me as often as I could get it to happen, as well as laughing whenever Dash decided to show his affection to his date - Cole.
We were just setting up the fire to cook dinner when Mace growled, “What the fuck?"
Following where he was looking, I saw Ava speaking to a guy by the water and laughing. Looking back at Mace I saw he looked more pissed and tense than I’d ever seen him which made no sense to me because although they’d been sitting together today, they never touched each other and if anything she seemed quieter around him than when he wasn’t around. I wasn’t sure what was going on between them, but I knew that they had a rocky past because of some stuff that Mace had let out when he was drunk, which wasn’t very often. There was no doubting that there were feelings between them so why they never acted on them I’ll never know. I don’t even think that it was because of Gia, Mace’s sister, because she was the queen of trying to set them up but for some reason they refused to give into it.
“S’up man?” I watched the tic in his jaw become more pronounced and the muscles and veins in his arms starting to bulge.
“Is she fucking doing this on purpose?” He ground out.
“Who Ava? Seriously Mace you need to calm down before you pop something. What’s going on with you two? You watch her the whole time, but when she sits or gets too close to you- you move away. You’ve been quiet and miserable for weeks, and I really wanna know if you’re okay and what’s going on man.”
I hated seeing him like this. When we were kids he’d been the happiest and easiest guy; he laughed his ass off at everything, joined in all of the parties, was confident and the best guy to be around. His dad was an asshole who had abandoned him and his sister and left them with their alcoholic mom who was the biggest bitch I’d ever come across in my life to date, and that was saying something. He’d joined the military out of High School and spent six years doing whatever it was that he did. A year before he left the military, we got news that he’d been badly injured and was being medevacked to a hospital thirty minutes away; for days, he was in and out of surgery. Gia and Ava were wrecks, and I remember walking in and seeing her whispering to him and stroking his head before I turned around and walked out again leaving them to it, but when he woke up, she came out of his room in tears and left.
Four months later he was redeployed, and when he came back he was a totally different guy; don't get me wrong he was still the best person to have in your life and the most loyal man I knew, but the happy go lucky guy that I’d grown up with was no more. I don’t know what happened to him or what he went through, but whatever it was it took the real Mace away. He and his sister had spent a majority of their time at our home, and my mom babied both of them and treated them like her own, and I know my mom worried about him too.
“He’s fucking touching her,” Mace hissed and I turned to see what he was talking about. The guy had Ava’s hand and was writing something on it with a sharpie. Where the hell did he get that from? Who carries a god damn Sharpie on them at a lake? Ava didn’t look as if she was comfortable with the guy to be fair, but I had a feeling that Mace was only seeing what his jealousy would allow him. “Fuck this,” he growled and started stomping towards Ava and the jock.
“What did I miss?” I heard Maya ask behind me and turned to face her. Pulling her close to me so that I could feel her body against mine, I wrapped her in my arms and tried to explain what was going on.
“Oh, he’s jealous. Are they together?" I felt like the shittest friend in the world because even with all of this is going on, my attention was on her bikini clad body against mine and how much I wanted to kiss her, so I did. As our tongues brushed against each other, I pulled her even closer to me. Taking the opportunity, I slowly moved my hands over her, skimming the tips of my fingers up her spine before sinking my hand into her thick hair and grabbing a handful at the base of her skull so that I could gently pull her head back to deepen the kiss even more. Capturing her responding moan in my mouth, I swept my other hand down her body to her thigh, making sure not to go so quickly that I scared her off. Thankfully she seemed to be at the same place that I was, and her arms wound around my neck bringing her harder against the worst and most painful erection I’d ever had my life. Blue definitely wasn’t my color, how the fuck do Smurfs survive with this shit?
I almost lost my mind and dropped to the floor when she started to rub against my hard on, but instead I grabbed a handful of her perfect ass and rubbed my torso gently against her. Just as my hand started to move around to cup her the biggest pain in the ass in the world claimed his title yelling, “Yo Ren, Maya - you staying for the campfire BBQ?"
Anyone else would have thought that it was an innocent and genuine question until you saw the shit eating grin desperate to break free on his face.
As always he couldn’t keep up the pretense long, “Or are you just roasting Ren’s weiner tonight?” Feeling Maya shaking against me I swore right then and there that I was gonna kill the little shit, but instead of tears, she was laughing and biting her lip.
“You find that funny do ya baby?” I growled staring at the lip that she was biting and thinking back thirty-seconds to when I was sucking on it.
“A bit,” she whispered back, staring at my mouth and making me groan. Her eyes flashed up to mine, and I saw the cheekiest look on her face. “And I’m thinking that revenge on that ass is gonna be sweet,” making me roar out a laugh. As we both turned around to look at Cole, his grin slowly fell from his face as he looked between us, gulped and then walked quickly back into the lake giving Dash a wide berth.
11
____
Maya
After a fantastic day at the lake yesterday we’d had a ‘campfire BBQ’, as Cole called it, sitting around the fire talking and laughing. Mace was gorgeous, but he was a bit scary; he had this darkness in his eyes and such a serious face that when all of it was directed at you, I’m sure it would make grown men confess to every sin. When he allowed himself to smile or laugh though it took your breath away. He was also clearly in love with Ava, and her with him, so why they weren’t together I don’t know.
Ava was gorgeous and best friends with Mace’s little sister Gia who worked just over three hours away from Piersville who sounded like a hoot from the stories they’d all told me. It was great to finally have a female friend who lived close by now and we’d arranged to meet for lunch through the wee
k to discuss our night out on Friday, I don’t think Ren and Mace were happy about our plans, but girl night sounded like heaven to me.
Cole had been hysterical as always, but he’d been expecting me to get my revenge immediately for what he’d done when Ren and I were kissing, so he’d been wary all evening. Little did he know that the success in retaliation came when the person least expected it, and now that I knew more about his phobia’s, my revenge would be sweet.
Last night when Ren dropped me home, we’d gone into my kitchen and just as I turned to say something to him, he’d kissed me. I hadn’t been expecting it at all and just as it started to heat up he’d pulled away, kissed me on the nose and told me that we were going to take this slowly and that he would see me today. As much as he heated me up, I’d only ever slept with two guys- my high school boyfriend, the boyfriend I’d had during my second year at college. I’d never slept with Andy, which, thinking back on it, was probably telling in itself because I’d never even felt like I wanted to, so Ren giving me that meant a lot to me.
Walking into my office, I remembered that we had a new girl starting today. George had told Luke and I last week about Isla, who had grown up in Piersville and was coming back to work as a lawyer for us. Luke’s reaction to this news had confused me because he almost looked scared, angry and excited at the same time, but I hadn’t had the chance to talk to him about it.
I loved my eldest cousin. Luke was about the same height as Ren but had blonde hair and dark green eyes. He was also very protective of my sister and me and the closest thing I had to a brother, as were my other cousins and I loved them fiercely.
As I sat behind my desk and placed all of the research for Ren and Cole’s house beside my computer, I saw a message from a company called Zingbrini and groaned. They wanted me to make an appointment to meet with their CEO to discuss the refurbishment of their building; it was going to be a busy day.
Luke
I sat at my desk waiting for Isla to walk through the door; I couldn’t believe she was back here. All weekend I’d been reliving what I’d done to her and wondering how to apologize all of these years later. There were other feelings involved that I didn’t want to go near just now; I wasn’t ready to face them, but I’m sure I’ll have to sometime soon.
I started up my computer to deal with all of the emails that would be waiting for me and caught a flash of long dark hair out of the corner of my eye. If I hadn’t seen it, I’d still have known that she was here by the way the hair on my arms stood up.
Getting up from my desk and walking toward the door my jaw almost hit the ground when I got a good look at her. Standing talking to my dad was a gorgeous woman I had ever seen in my life. She had perfect curves, gorgeous legs, and her hair fell to the middle of her back in beautiful dark waves. Isla had been stunning before, but that beauty had magnified over the years. Her hazel eyes were focused on Dad, and she was grinning at something that he said. I could feel the burn starting back up in my chest that had been reduced to a small spark when she left town eight years ago after I’d..I couldn’t go there just now, but what I did know was that I was certain that I was going to do whatever I could to finally make Isla mine.
Isla
Well, I was back. I swore I’d never come back to this place after what had happened, but when my Gran told me she needed help I’d dropped everything and moved back. She meant the world to me and had been the only person ever truly to love and give a shit about me, well aside from my three best friends, and I would do absolutely anything for her; even come back here. When my father had remarried, it had been like I didn’t exist as he focused on his new wife and perfect stepdaughter, so I’d moved in with Gran when I was eleven. To this day, he still only spoke to me when it suited him, and I was lucky if my birthday cheque arrived within eleven months of my actual birthday.
My graduation from school had been hell because he and Jodie had only turned up for Calista’s big moment and had been oblivious when I’d taken to the stage, then they hadn’t even turned up to my College graduation. Instead, Gran and the Montgomery’s had come; minus Luke of course. Both of those hurt, but I was pretty much used to it now and had accepted I meant nothing to Geoffrey Banks. My return to Piersville had been something that I swore I’d never do, but Gran asking for help when she never asked anyone for anything had hit me hard. It hadn’t hurt that George Montgomery had called right after, offering me a job in his legal department either and crossing off one item from my list.
It had been strange packing up my life; it had been weird shipping it all to my father’s old house here, it had been hard walking into that house and being assaulted with all of the bad memories attached to it. It had been fun though walking around the house and planning all of the work that I was going to have done to it, but none of it had been as terrifying as walking through the doors of the Montgomery’s building knowing that I was soon going to be seeing Luke again. The Luke, who had held my hand when I needed it, who had hugged me when I’d cried and when I’d needed a hug the most, who had given me confidence, and the guy who had then stripped me of all of that. It had been eight years, and I’d found myself and was happy with who I was. I wasn't the sniveling little girl that had no one and who had let Luke Montgomery make a fool of anymore; I was Isla Banks and damn it- I could do this.
“Okay sweetheart, your office is next to Luke’s and just over here. It's great having you back Isla,” George said guiding me toward my office. “Now, the rest of the legal team will be coming to meet you at 1.30pm to introduce themselves and lay out the different items and cases that they’re working on. On your desk are the personnel files of your team so that you know levels of experience and can allocate the work properly. If you have any questions, Luke is next door, I’m across the office, and LeAnne will be at her desk; until you have a secretary, feel free to use her.”
I was shocked at his confidence in me and started to wonder if I’d bitten off more than I could chew by taking on this job.
“George, what if I can’t do this? What if I let you down?”
Walking over to me he held my shoulders, “You can do this; that's why I gave you the job. Don't put too much pressure on yourself and give yourself time to learn the company and the ongoing cases; it will all be fine.”
I swear this man was wasted as an architect, even though he designed beautiful buildings. He’d always been able to pep me up, and if he’d been a counselor or therapist, I have no doubt he would have been a billionaire.
“Morning son. Look who’s back,” he crowed turning me around and my eyes hit the object of both my dreams and nightmares who was walking toward me with a look in his eyes that threw me off balance.
“Isla,” he rumbled, then I was in his arms and surrounded by the smell of him with his face was buried in my neck. “I’m glad you’re back,” he whispered in my ear, and I had to remind myself not to groan as the scent of him, being in his arms, having his breath on my neck and him just being Luke hit me.
“Great to see you,” I replied quietly. I needed to be careful; I couldn’t give him any ammunition to rip my life apart again. I had to be immune and vigilant but friendly, so I slowly pulled away and gave him a quick smile that I’m sure didn’t reach my eyes and that he knew was as fake as his last girlfriend's chest. I couldn’t forget who the real Luke was, I’d made that mistake before and would never do it again. From now on, I had to be fake too- fake fake fake, and if life was kind to me, maybe I’d escape with my dignity intact.
“Morning. Luke, I need your advice on something,” a soft voice with an accent I couldn’t place, and belonging to a seriously beautiful woman, sounded from behind George. She gave everyone a beautiful smile including me and then moved to hug George and Luke. “Hi, you must be Isla; I’m Maya Price,” she said walking up to me and hugging me. It was then that something that had been niggling at me hit me full force- she was real, there was no fakery on her.
Luke
Isla looked even better up clos
e than she did from a distance if that was even possible. I hadn’t planned to hold her, but I couldn’t stop myself and God she’d smelt out of this world. When I pulled back and saw the quick smile she’d flashed was tight and false, I knew that I was going to have to work hard for her forgiveness. I’d been about to ask her to lunch or dinner when Maya came in with a stack of papers looking for me.
“Sure, my office?” I tried not to sound disappointed at the missed opportunity to ask Isla out. The odds had been in my favor with dad standing next to us, so she would have almost had to say yes if I’d asked in front of him.
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