The Bet

by Lily Zante

  He walked over to the other end, ignored the babe and spoke to Luke. “Thanks for deserting me,” he drawled, settling himself on the stool.

  “Looked like your parents wanted to spend some time with you. Another bottle?” Right now, he needed one, but he was Tobias’s best man, and he couldn’t risk screwing up tomorrow.

  “No, save it for tomorrow.”

  The woman sitting next to him turned to him, as he knew she would.

  “Have we met before?” he asked, knowing perfectly well that they had, but curious to see how well she remembered him.

  “Yes,” she held out her hand. “I’m Kay, Savannah’s cousin.” It was always so easy to tell when a girl was interested, not because of what she said, but because of what she didn’t say, or the way her sidelong glance might linger a fraction of a second longer than necessary, as Kay’s did now.

  As if to further confirm her interest in him, she flicked her highlighted blonde hair away from her face, drawing his attention to her glossy French Manicure and her long lashes in one fell swoop.

  “Savannah’s cousin,” he said, slowly, as if he had only realized now.

  “I didn’t see you earlier.” There was a hint of a question in her words. Her mouth was a giveaway, the way she started chewing on her lips.

  “And here I am,” he said, his gaze settling on her lips, before lifting to her eyes. “It’s turning out to be a good night.” He knew, as sure as he knew there was air in his lungs, that she was interested and he would bet, if he flirted with her long enough, if he gave her the usual long stare, that she would soon want to take that interest further.

  “It sure is,” she said, leaning forward, her elbow resting on the bar and her hand cupping her jaw.

  She was flirting six ways to Sunday, and had no qualms about being so obvious about it. He liked that—a woman who knew what she was doing, and knew what she wanted—and without all the pretense that usually led up to the mating ritual.

  Because after all the posturing, and preening, and flirting, and staring, it always led to that. He wondered whether he could take her to bed tonight, or wait until the wedding was over, at least.

  “Only for a short while, Jacob.”

  He heard the voice before he noticed the legs—as someone else slowly came into view over Kay’s shoulder. Tanned slim legs in shorts, not as high cut as he liked, but not bad. They had frayed bits hanging from the bottom. His gaze traveled north, and settled on the pert breasts that were encased in a lime-green colored bikini top. And before he had a chance to see her face, to see who those breasts belonged to, she had already turned her back to him.

  “You’re going swimming now?” Kay shouted out after her.

  He leaned forward, eager to find who she was. “Great rack,” he said, the words escaping his mouth before he had a chance to stop them.

  She must have heard because she turned around—a pissed off expression on her face. If looks could kill, he’d be lying stone cold on the floor.

  She took Jacob by the arm and sashayed away, allowing him to admire her rear until she was out of sight.

  “Who the hell was that?” he asked.

  “Izzy,” Kay replied, in a flat voice.

  Izzy? What the fuck kind of a name was that? Where had he seen her, because she seemed familiar, too.

  “Someone Savannah hired to look after Jacob.”

  He sat back, dragging the bottle to his lips again. “Jeez.” She was smokin’ hot. Kay threw him a hard stare, and he pulled out the pack of cards he had in his pocket as a way of changing the topic. “Want to see some tricks?” Card tricks always came in handy and helped break the ice.

  His island vacation was suddenly starting to look interesting.

  ~ ~ ~

  Nice rack?

  She hated assholes like him. Xavier Stone, Tobias’s asshole brother. What did he think she was? A piece of meat? The only reason she hadn’t answered back was because Jacob had been by her side, otherwise she never let sexist putdowns go by without a sharp rebuke.

  “Can we play tag?” Jacob asked.

  “Your mom said only half an hour, Jacob.”

  “Aww.”

  “Half an hour, then a shower, then bed.”

  “Can’t I stay up longer?”

  She would have let him, but she understood Savannah’s wish for Jacob to be fully rested for tomorrow. It was her big day after all.

  “Maybe tomorrow night, I’ll do my best to persuade your mom to let you stay up as late as you want.”

  He gave her a big grin, then jumped into the pool. She was thankful that most of the guests were milling around further along the beach and away from this area.

  Tables, chairs and Chinese lanterns were laid out on one side of the tropical gardens, overlooking the beach, and effectively separating the pool area from the beach front.

  Apparently the wedding would be held here, Savannah had preferred it as it would be easier to walk on grass, than sand. And having the aquamarine ocean as a backdrop was pretty enough.

  Most of the guests hung around on the grassy area, and some spilled out onto the soft sand. She liked the privacy this afforded her. She wasn’t comfortable walking around, even in her shorts and a bikini, or being ogled by guests, some of whom had had a bit too much to drink.

  And while she knew Jacob needed to go to bed soon, it didn’t seem fair to have him go to bed now, when so much was going on outside.

  “Aren’t you coming in?” Jacob asked.

  She peeled off her shorts and padded into the water, watching Jacob as he scooted around with a boogie board. Poor kid. He was bored, being the only child around here. No wonder Savannah had wanted her to come along and keep an eye on him. Keep him company, more like.

  She hated that they had only had the island to themselves for only two days. It wasn’t nice and peaceful anymore. The place was beginning to fill up, and the majority of guests had arrived today.

  Jacob’s fingers skimmed her hand. “You’re it,” he squealed, then swam away, splashing water everywhere.

  “You’re a good swimmer!” she shouted. “But I’m bigger and faster.” She launched after him. It was too easy, almost one-sided. Jacob giggled and squealed as she approached, and he tried desperately to wade away, his movements slow and labored as if he was like wading through a vat of treacle.

  “I think we should make it fair, Jacob.” She was within touching distance.

  He giggled, his expression vigilant, as if he couldn’t work out why she wasn’t tagging him.

  “I think I should only be allowed to walk and tag you.”

  “Okay!” He raced away, the water splashing madly around him. She walked towards him, deliberately taking her time, letting him rush this way and that way, trying to tire him out on purpose in the hope that he would want to go to bed soon.

  The guests would be outside, enjoying the night for a few more hours yet. Savannah had told her to come back to the party, and to enjoy the rest of the evening once Jacob was asleep, but she wasn’t so sure.

  Apart from Savannah and Jacob, the only other people who seemed down to earth and on her wavelength had been a guy called Luke, and a couple of his colleagues.

  The bar area was a good size, and the cocktails were flowing freely. Tobias had spared no expense, just like at the engagement party. He had the best drinks, the best food, the best decor all on his own private island paradise.

  She wished Cara had been here—at least she would have someone to talk to once Jacob was asleep.

  “You can’t get me, you can’t get me,” Jacob sang, mocking her, teasing her, and giving her no choice but to wade towards him. She couldn’t help but smile because his squeals were so infectious.

  “It!” she shrieked, tagging him with her hand and then waded away as fast as she could. In the next second Jacob lunged towards her, a moving waterfall of splashes as he neared her, and then, tagged her in a clever underhanded move where he swam underwater and came out behind her, surprising her with
his prowess.

  “Gotcha!”

  “Jeez, dude.” A man’s voice on the deck behind her made her skin bristle. She turned around.

  “Xavier!” Jacob cried. “Wanna play?”

  She stared at the tall, dark figure before her. With a beer bottle in his hand, he stared back at her.

  She had seen that look many a time, and she didn’t like it. She let out a quiet groan under her breath, and prayed that this letch wasn’t about to join them.

  Jacob swam up to the edge. “Wanna play tag?”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah.”

  Xavier’s gaze passed to Jacob and then met hers again. “I don’t know,” he said, as if he was testing her resolve. “I’m not sure your friend wants me to.”

  Jacob looked at her. “Can he play, Izzy?”

  Hell, no. “It’s time to get out, Jacob.”

  “But we’ve only been here for—”

  “Now, Jacob.” There no negotiating this. She waded closer to Jacob and, lowering her voice, said, “It’s your mom’s big day tomorrow, Jacob. It’s time to go to bed. I promise I’ll ask her if you can stay up late tomorrow night, okay?”

  “You promise to ask her?”

  “You know I will.”

  “Okay.” It wasn’t a sullen, ‘okay,’ either. The kid was gold. Only, she now had the uncomfortable task of getting out of the water without letting the letch stand and stare at her like he’d never seen a woman in a bikini before. It made her wish she’d worn her tankini and shorts in the water.

  “That’s where you are!”

  Her heart leapt with relief to see a woman coming towards the asshole, and command his attention.

  Phew. Close call.

  Chapter 5

  Savannah’s cousin was like a leech. Hard to shake.

  “That’s where you are,” she said.

  “You found me,” he mumbled, dragging his gaze away from Lime Green Bikini, abandoning the kid’s request for him to get into the pool. It wasn’t for the kid that he had considered playing ‘tag’. It was that babysitter of his. It wasn’t often he came across someone who didn’t give him the eye, and he was certain that this girl didn’t know who he was.

  Kay flashed him an I-want-to-get-to-know-you-better smile. It was a tell that most of the girls he met had. A lowering of the head, a looking up at him with an angled head, a smile—not too wide, and definitely not cheesy—but presumably their best impression of sultry. He knew it well.

  He acknowledged her with a simple nod.

  “Are you going in?” she asked, her voice lifting as if the idea of getting into a pool excited her.

  Hell, no. “No.” He turned to see Jacob and his babysitter coming out. The girl had her back turned to him, and was toweling herself dry.

  “What are you doing here?” Kay asked, the tall stem of her champagne flute between her fingers. “The party’s on the beach, and you were in the middle of a card trick.”

  “So I was.” But he had no desire to finish it off. Some time back in the day, he’d learned a couple of card tricks which kept some of the girls entertained. Kay seemed particularly easy to entertain, but he’d soon lost interest and left, intending to find out where Jacob and his babysitter had gone.

  “So,” Kay said, fingering her necklace, and licking her lips. “Savannah says you’re the best man tomorrow.”

  Her cleavage was on full display, and what he could see was round and luscious, and big. The visual was like a powerhouse of electricity straight to his manhood. He followed her as she walked away from the pool and over to the recliners dotted around outside the main villa.

  “You didn’t finish off your card trick,” she said, sitting on one of the recliners. He sat on the recliner next to hers, and they both faced one another as she held out the pack of cards he’d left at the bar. He took the cards and shuffled them. Some girls were so easy to entertain. It wasn’t that the card tricks were particularly interesting, they were just a hook, and even a kid would tire of them eventually. He put away half the pack, and held the rest of them out for her.

  “Pick one,” he said.

  She giggled. Her perfectly manicured fingers hovering over the cards as she made her choice.

  “Okay,” he said, shuffling the pack. “Put it at the bottom.”

  “What if I don’t want to put it at the bottom?”

  Then the fucking trick wasn’t going to work. “You have to.”

  She shrugged, the movement drawing his attention to her breasts. He felt a stirring in his loins.

  “Goodnight.” He turned to see Jacob walk past him, and next to him, his babysitter.

  “You going to bed, kid?”

  “Izzy says I have to.”

  “Spoilsport,” he said, lifting his eyes and looking at his babysitter.

  “Your mommy says you have to, Jacob.”

  They didn’t stop to make conversation. “Goodnight!” he called out after them.

  “An early night for some,” said Kay.

  He turned his attention back to her, and to the card game he was in the middle of. But something didn’t feel right. That chase, that hunger, had disappeared. “Yeah.”

  She jiggled forward in her chair, and if she continued to jiggle like that, he was sure her breasts would pop out of her low-cut, flimsy dress.

  The sound of distant laughter and music from further along the beach rolled gently in the background. He went through the motions of shuffling the cards, and moving them around, and a few moments later, picked out, magically, the card that was hers.

  “How did you do that?” she gushed.

  “If I told you, I’d have to kill you,” he grinned.

  “It’s clever.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And predictable.”

  “Yeah.” He shuffled the cards some more. “Want to see some more?”

  And he spent the next half an hour showing her a couple of other card tricks he’d learned, and then ended up showing her how to do them.

  “I’ll have to remember them for the next party I go to,” she said, when he finally put the cards away. “So that I can impress.”

  “I wouldn’t have thought that someone like you had to try too hard to impress,” he said, staring back at her. She looked at him as if she wasn’t sure what to make of that.

  It was a perfect night, warm and balmy, with the chrrrp-chrrrp of crickets all around, perfect for staying put and talking to this girl who didn’t seem in any hurry to leave, perfect for getting down to business, here, under the stars with nothing but the sound of crickets and music, and laughter.

  Easy times.

  He would have had his tongue down her throat, on an ordinary day, and it was so predictable how the rest of the night would play out. She’d be on her knees in no time, looking up at him with a smile. He looked at her and debated what to do. Sometimes, it was almost too easy.

  “It’s going to be too hot to wear a suit, don’t you think?” she asked, her hand settling on her neck, then sliding down, as if she were wiping the perspiration away.

  “It’s going to be pretty casual.” Tobias wasn’t wearing a suit. He would still look sharp, and crisp, and enough to make the ladies drool, but he wasn’t getting married in a suit and tie.

  “I’m the maid of honor, well, sort of.”

  “Sort of?”

  She shook her head. “There’s no maid of honor. Savannah wants it all to be simple, and I understand. A beach wedding isn’t as formal. It’s all fairly relaxed.”

  “That’s a shame,” he replied, flashing her a smile as his eyes roved over her cleavage. If she was going to have it on display like that, how could he not admire it? “Isn’t there an unspoken rule about the best man and the maid of honor?”

  “I don’t know, is there?” Her voice was husky, tempting, teasing, and he would have a hard-on soon if he wasn’t careful. He licked his lower lip. The blood from his veins gushed south, and he scrubbed his hand over his face. He had to get his shit tog
ether. The last thing he wanted was for his brother to be in a foul mood, and he would be, if he found out he’d taken Savannah’s cousin to bed the night before the wedding.

  After the wedding, was a different matter. But then again … the way she was playing with her necklace was so, so, so sexy. He was getting ideas just sitting there. Would Tobias even know if he took her to bed tonight? It wasn’t as if he had any plans to get back with Gisele. Even when they had been dating, her hectic schedules, and the interviews she was always going for meant that they didn’t see one another much anyway.

  “It’s kind of an unspoken rule,” he murmured, leaning forward. This time, their lips were so close he could feel her hot breath. And that was all it took. His hand slipped lower barely skimming her breast as he lowered it to her arm, and his lips clamped over hers. She tasted of coconut cream, and sweet honey, and he was about to cup her face when Tobias’s laughter rang out from somewhere nearby.

  Xavier sprang away like a shot.

  “Wh—what’s wrong?” she stammered.

  He jumped to his feet. “I need to get some sleep. Best man, and all. Early start.”

  “But we were … in the middle of something … “ Mirroring his movement, she stood up.

  Tobias’s voice made him jump. “Did we interrupt something?” he barked.

  “No, no. I was just going to go to—” Bed. But he saw Lime Green Bikini standing behind Tobias.

  What the hell was she doing with him?

  In a softer voice, and ignoring him, Tobias told her, “I’m going to find Savannah and then we’ll come and tuck Jacob in.”

  “I’ll let him know,” she said. “And thanks for the phone.”

  Had she seen them kissing? Had Tobias even seen them kissing or had Xavier moved apart by then? He tried to think—because the not knowing was killing him—but the moment had been a blur of sensual heat and cold shock.

  Lime Green Bikini threw him a stony look before she turned her back and left. Xavier rubbed some sand he found on his shorts, hoping that his brother would leave quietly.

  “Can’t you go a day without ramming your tongue down someone’s throat?”