The Wrong Brother for Brooke (Hot Tide Book 3)

by Michele De Winton

She rolled her eyes rather than saying anything, and they kept walking until the lush green forest opened out in front of them. “Wow.”

  “Pretty much.”

  The waterfall wasn’t wide but the cliff it fell down towered high above them: black rocks slicked with glistening water. And whether it was the height of the cliffs, or the angle, or the way the wind moved through the trees, the spray from the falling water held a constant rainbow.

  She pulled her arm out of the sling and let the fabric fall onto the ground. Slowly rotating her shoulder, Brooke let out a relaxed sigh. “Last one in buys drinks tonight.” And she’d shucked her t-shirt and shorts before he’d had time to register what she was doing. The water was cold, but refreshing after their sticky trek through the jungle. Kai let the sensation of it be his only focus for a moment. Let himself live entirely in the moment of the cold overtaking the hot. He dived down deep, opening his eyes and finding the water remarkably clear. It was deep further out. The rocks underneath him had been worn down by the constant pounding of the water from above. Kai held his breath a bit longer and focused on floating, just below the surface. An eel made a lazy path away from him into the darker shadows of the rocks. Kai smiled. Bursting up to the surface, he dragged in air and felt refreshed, renewed, refocused.

  “Don’t you look pleased with yourself,” Brooke said from the shallower part of the pool.

  “What’s not to be pleased about? You can see all the way down to the bottom out here. And you can’t tell me this water doesn’t feel a hundred times better than a chlorinated swimming pool.”

  She smirked. “You love to be right, don’t you?”

  He laughed. “Only when I’m right.”

  “Okay, okay, yes the water feels amazing. Like I’m lighter somehow. How is that even possible?”

  “Minerals,” he said simply. “This is a sacred spot. The locals figure the water has healing properties and they might be right. The water has been filtered over so much volcanic rocks it’s bound to have picked up trace elements that enrich it. What you’re swimming in here is the result of thousands of kilometers of ancient stone. Magnesium, iron, zinc, all things that your body is probably craving.”

  She shrugged. “You’re the expert so I’ll take your word for it. Sounds good to me though. Swim, absorb some rocks, job done.”

  His laugh was richer this time. She was teasing him, he knew it, and he was enjoying it every bit as much as she was.

  “Come over here.”

  She cocked her head to the side. “How deep is it?”

  “Deep.”

  “Then no. Unless you’re wanting me to use my arm hard out. I can’t paddle properly.”

  “I know.”

  “Right. So you want me to.” He watched her face struggle with trusting him, and saw the moment she decided to. Not wanting it to be too much of a challenge straight up, he swam a few strokes towards her so that he could touch his feet on the ground.

  The water bobbed around her shoulders and he watched her holding herself tight. Nervous about creating any pain. “Try lying on your back.”

  She did and he watched her center duck beneath the water. “Push your hips up. Think about where your core is. Solidify it.”

  Her stomach tensed and her hips drew up, further out of the water. Satisfied that she had a solid framework to start from, Kai put his hands under her waist. A quick flash of feeling her skin under his hands in the hot tub moved through him but he just felt it and then let it go. Brooke must have had a similar sensation. But unlike him, she tensed, her whole body rigid under his hands. “Relax. I promised I wouldn’t do anything during treatment.”

  “If you can call this treatment. Floating on my back like a little kid.” But she didn’t put her feet down and as she stayed there, floating, she started to let go. Kai waited. Kept his hands in the same place until he felt her releasing into them. “Good. Now I’m going to move you. Let me do all the work.” He guided her across the surface of the water. The further he went, the more she relaxed, until he could see that her neck and shoulders had finally stopped fighting the urge to pull themselves out of the water.

  “Soon I’m going to let go. You might float out of your depth but it’ll be fine. I’ll be right here to guide you back again. I want you to concentrate on what the water feels like on your muscles.”

  She nodded. Kai took his hands away and she immediately tensed and her center ducked below the water. Having lost her focus, she struggled, and it only made her more uneven in the water. Then, fighting a losing battle, she lost all balance and her head went under. Kai rushed over to help and guided her back to shallow water, but not before she’d struck out with her arms to try and get back to the surface. It had hurt, he could tell by her face. When she’d stopped spluttering, she stood in the shallows and he felt awful at the pain on her face.

  “I thought you were supposed to be helping! That hurt.” Apparently, she felt less awful and more angry.

  He nodded. “Sorry. I thought you’d found your center already. I should have kept hold of you for longer.”

  “You don’t say.” She touched her shoulder and grimaced.

  “Is it bad?”

  “It’s not good.”

  He reached over and touched her and yes, everything had tightened. “Sorry again. But it was bound to happen. There are going to be more failures before we get big wins. We just have to use this as a lesson and work with it.”

  She rolled her eyes at him. “Use this as a lesson? What, that I can’t even float? I’ve always been able to float, that’s kid stuff. If my shoulder is screwing with me on this sort of level what the heck kind of chance do I have getting back on my board any time soon.” She was pleading partly with him, partly with herself. He said nothing, let her get it all out. Then perhaps as a reaction to him just standing there, something changed in her and her whole manner altered. Her nostrils flared. “What kind of crap lesson is that for me to take on when all I want is to get back on top of the water anyway? What the hell are we doing out here in the middle of nowhere?”

  He smiled then. Finally, she was asking the right questions. “We’re here to try and help you let go of making yourself better.”

  The eye rolling transferred across her entire body and he had to hold back his laughter at the extreme physicality of her disdain. She was almost a caricature of frustration. “I’m serious. But I understand that this is big for you. Your whole life has been spent throwing yourself at stuff to get by. At the ocean, at the waves, at other competitors, at the patronizing crap that still makes it hard for women to do well financially in surfing. But to heal you, I need you to start listening to your body. To not do what you think is best, but what you feel works.”

  She paused, considering him. Deciding, he understood, whether she was going to trust him again. “And you’re going to teach me how to do that?” Her voice was small. Quiet. He was speaking the truth and they both knew it, and for once, Brooke didn’t argue back.

  He nodded. “If you’ll let me in.”

  She took a deep breath.

  “It’s hard for you to trust me. I get that. And I haven’t earned it completely yet. I get that too. But I’d like to keep working on it. Starting with getting you back in the water.” He put a hand on her injured shoulder and she flinched. “Do you think we can manage that?”

  “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but you won’t let go this time?”

  “I’ll let go. But I’ll make sure you’re ready. I want your shoulder better as much as you do.” He took a step out into the deeper water and Brooke followed. He marveled at her. Even in pain and nervous about hurting her injury further, she was willing to push through it. She trusts me. The revelation was strong and sharp. No matter that he’d just failed to see that she wasn’t quite ready for him to let go. No matter that what he was asking was unorthodox and difficult. She trusted him. The thought warmed him and made him even gentler with her. He encouraged her to float on her back again. Then he held her up
until she was in a state of complete relaxation. Her arms floated evenly, any tension in her shoulder held by the water.

  “I’m going to let you go.” He said it calmly and made sure that she understood. “I’ll let go of one hand first so you can feel the change in your weight in the water.

  Her center ducked below the water for a moment and then she remembered what he’d said and tightened her core.

  Kai took a step back and watched. In a simple blue bikini, floating on the surface of the water, her long dark hair strewn out behind her, she really did look like a mermaid. He made himself focus. With the water buoying her up he could see where she held her tension. Could see that in the stiffness in her neck she was holding her left side slightly higher than her right. He made a mental note to dig into that in the afternoon’s massage session.

  When she started shifting, he judged that she’d done as much floating as she was able to cope with and swam out to her. “Relax,” he said as he gently guided her back to the shallows. Rather than stiffening when he touched her, she settled into his touch.

  He started to manipulate her arms, one by one. Encouraging her to release and tense them in different positions. Moving between being on her back, on her front and standing up to her neck in the water.

  Having his hands on her practically naked body moved him more than he’d counted on. But he was careful not to show it. A promise was a promise. He wanted her better, that was his priority. At the end of the session however, his body was tight with holding himself back. When he was just about to call it a day he heard a sharp gasp from behind him. Turning he spotted the little girl from behind their hotel.

  “I thought you were making things up. But she is, isn’t she? She’s descended from Nyai Roro Kidul?”

  Kai laughed but Brooke just looked at him blankly. “Nyai Roro Kidul is the goddess of the south seas. Real life mermaid,” he said. He tipped his head to the side. “Maybe that will be your next tattoo.”

  She smiled at the little girl and beckoned her into the water. Kai stood back, watching the two chat. Brooke was kind, her face open, and the girl swam around and around with questions about the ocean. Brooke told her what had brought her here, about the injury, about life on the WSL circuit, and the little girl’s eyes widened further, asking more questions, this time about surfing. Instead of holding her arm tightly against her side like she had when they had first arrived at the waterfall, Kai noticed that Brooke was freer with it. She didn’t use it to paddle in the water, she’d learned that lesson the hard way, but she let it float beside her. This was good, she was listening, and learning. And maybe trusting him. Maybe trusting him enough to let him show her just how free she could be with her body. Ideally, in his bed.

  Chapter Nine

  After another delicious massage that afternoon, Brooke lay back on the table and couldn’t believe she’d only met Kai a couple of days ago. His hands seemed to already know her and everything he did to her shoulder he explained in a way that she understood immediately.

  True to his word, he kept himself entirely professional when she was at her most vulnerable: laid out on his table. But it didn’t stop her daydreaming about his hands straying further across her body and taking her to places she hadn’t been for a looong time.

  Oiled, relaxed and completely at ease, Brooke sighed in satisfaction. Kai put a hand on her thigh. “Feels good to let go sometimes, doesn’t it?”

  He left his hand there and Brooke looked down at it. He noticed and dropped it away immediately. “That wasn’t me making a move. I was just checking in.”

  “I know,” she said. But every part of her wished that he had. That he had left his hand there for longer and that he’d moved his thumb deeper into the inside of her thigh. But there was no way she was going to admit that. Not to him, and not to anyone.

  Instead she swung herself up from the table using her uninjured arm and changed the subject. “You’re going to tell me there’s some sort of parable in this morning’s trek aren’t you?”

  He laughed. “Possibly. What do you think it is?”

  “Is this going to be your new thing? You’re going to stop lecturing me and make me tell you whatever spiritual lesson I think you’ve been trying to get me to grasp?” The shrug was non-committal but the glint in his eyes told her she was right on the money. “Man. Any more transparent and you would be see-through, you know that?”

  “I don’t see the point in trying to hide things.”

  That was a fair comment. And a true one, Brooke realized. He’d never hidden anything from her. Not from the moment she’d stepped into the hot tub. “Hey sorry for going nuclear at you when we first met. I just felt so stupid. I had to let my rage out somehow and you happened to be in the firing line. You did check that I was okay.”

  “Thank you.”

  There was a pause, then Kai tipped his head. “So, are you going to tell me what you got out of today?”

  “Sheesh, you sound like you’re Obi-Wan Kenobi or something. What is today’s lesson my child? ” She put on an old man’s voice, not very successfully then she heard the disdain in her voice and stopped herself. “Sorry. I’m just not very used to this.”

  “To what?” he said gently.

  “To walking through stuff. To working it out. I’m the one you can only take to a restaurant twice, once to mess it up and the second time to apologize. Honestly, I’m always shooting my mouth off before I’ve thought through what I should be saying.”

  Kai didn’t say anything and Brooke had to fight every urge in her body to not fill the silence with noise.

  And then it hit her. “That’s it isn’t it?”

  Kai’s smile stretched across his face and it lit a match to the amber of his eyes. But he still didn’t say anything.

  “I’m loud and noisy and throw myself at stuff. You’re going to say there’s some lesson in there for me about surfing. So, come on, tell me. I’m listening.”

  “Yes, I think you really are.”

  The silence stretched and Brooke looked at him, really looked at him. Standing there, all tall and broad and tan and smiling. And the longer she looked at him, the more she wanted to touch him. To pull those strong arms around her. To weave her fingers through his thick black hair. To find his full lips with her own. She looked into his eyes and saw it there; his lust, the way his pupils were big and dark, the way his lips were pursed as if he was already kissing her.

  Then he cleared his throat and she was brought crashing back to earth. “When we were walking out to the waterfall, what happened?”

  “It took forever and I thought we were both going to die of dehydration?” “Ha ha.”

  She smirked. “I thought we were lost.”

  “Because you were only looking at what was right in front of you. You were looking for what you expected to appear. And when it didn’t, you couldn’t see a way through.”

  “The path was blocked. The whole tree had come down.”

  “Yep.”

  Her smirk widened. “Okay, okay, smart guy. If I’d looked a bit harder I might have seen that the path was there before I decided to give up. But that’s not really a great metaphor for surfing. I don’t give up. I push through stuff. Through pain, through cold, through not really being able to afford plane tickets. I push and I push and then I end up on top. Or at least close to the top.”

  “Exactly.”

  “What?”

  “That’s exactly what you do. You look ahead. Only ahead. It’s worked well for you all these years. Kept you focused, made you someone to beat. But when you reach the top, things have to change. You can’t just keep forging forward because everyone around you is doing the same. And they’re good at what they do too. If they’re all surging forward in the same way that you are, you’re going to crash into each other. More importantly, you’re going to crash into problems you didn’t even see coming. Holo was just like you for the longest time. It’s only in the past year that he’s really started to understand what
it means to go with his curiosity rather than pushing hard into his passion.”

  Brooke felt herself tense at the mention of Holo, especially when she’d been lusting after Kai only minutes earlier. But Holo had upped his performance this year, there was no denying that. And it seemed to have come out of nowhere. One moment he’d been just a good looking guy at the edges of the surf circuit, and then he was right in the thick of it. Surfing like he owned every wave. She wasn’t about to admit that to Kai though. “What does all that even mean?” she asked.

  “There’s so much talk about following your passion. But it leads you to do exactly what you’re doing: charge at the thing you love. And then often, not always, but often, the thing you’re charging towards gets broken in the process. If you give yourself space to be curious about it, then you get to look at all sides of it. To follow the strands, the breadcrumbs of the thing that got you so excited in the first place. With surfing, you can look at the whole ocean instead of the one wave.”

  “I’m not sure I got all of that.”

  “You don’t need to. Just know that I’m asking you to slow down. To go around your problems sometimes instead of charging through them.” He took a step towards her and took the hand of her injured arm. “That’s what we’re doing here. We’re working around this problem so we can strengthen the ligaments and muscles that hold it together.”

  The heat of his hand on hers seeped through her skin. Strong fingers, broad palms; Kai’s hands were the core of his business so it made sense that they were nice to hold. But it didn’t necessarily follow that she would immediately want them on other parts of her body. Calm down, woman. “How do you know all this?” she asked to distract herself.

  “Kahuna training. I know it might sound spiritual, overly so, but it’s a solid place to build a practice from. A solid base to build a lifestyle on actually. And you can take from it what you need. Just think about trying not to push so hard. That’s all I’m suggesting for now.” He dropped her hand and she reached out to grab his back again. She pressed her thumb into his palm and leaned closer. Wanting to keep hold of this man who somehow seemed to look inside her and answer questions she hadn’t realized she’d even asked.