Yes, but the way she’s practically rubbing herself against Reid isn’t helping me like her I think, as I force myself to follow Dustin into the belly of the building and leave my stepbrother alone with his hookup.
The tour is really interesting, the regatta that Hudson Marina organizes every year has become huge and has now been included in the circuit of the sailing World Cup. So that puts a massive spotlight on the company and on the team that Dustin has put together to take part in the competition.
The boats mostly get built elsewhere but there’s a huge maintenance department here in Star Cove and a huge showroom with sailboats and yachts.
Chase and Reid follow their father mostly quietly, they saw this place when it first opened and they’ve always been around their father’s offices but Bryce and Parker ask a lot of questions, genuinely interested in everything they see.
Dustin has a work lunch planned with the two department heads that will be directly in charge of Chase and Reid and the brothers are required to join. We get invited too but Parker and Bryce explain that they’re planning to spend the rest of the day on the beach.
“Right then, Kaya is well known at the Star Cove Marina Lido, my yacht club. You guys can have lunch there and we have some reserved sun beds and changing rooms. Have fun and we’ll see you all tonight. I’m grilling, so make sure to build up an appetite.”
I hug Dustin goodbye and I’m not surprised that Chase and Reid don’t even greet me, so it’s a bit of a relief to be left with Parker and Bryce.
The Star Cove Marina Lido is an exclusive yacht and beach club that Dustin opened last year: it covers the best stretch of beach in the center of Star Cove and offers a One Star Michelin restaurant, several snack bars and beach bars, an aquatic sports center and gorgeous cabanas and sun beds that dot the beach like in every first class tropical resort in the world.
Basically Lido, as the locals call it, is like a posh, exclusive country club but it’s on the beach.
Dustin had to win over the mayor and a lot of opposition from the locals when he put in a bid to purchase this stretch of beach because there were fears that only the rich would be able to enjoy Star Cove’s beautiful beach. But my stepfather won everyone over by reserving a portion of his newly acquired property for the locals, offering them free access to a section of the beach where he installed every possible service. Kids especially love it because there are lots of attractions that cater specifically to them.
“Do you surf, Kaya?” Parker asks as we make our way to the changing rooms so we can leave behind all our clothes and any items we don’t want on the beach with us.
I giggle, self-deprecatingly. “Absolutely not. I’m a decent swimmer but I’m afraid that I’m not very sporty. It doesn’t come naturally to me. I’m actually a bit of a klutz, if I have to be honest.”
Chase and Reid had to find out the hard way when they still liked to hang out with me and they used to invite me to all sorts of sport stuff.
I always managed to break something or come home with some minor injury. I feel a pang of melancholic nostalgia when I think of the way Reid hugged me after a game of beach volleyball, tending to all my bruises.
“You know that this was supposed to be volleyball, not dodge ball, right?”
I had managed to be hit by the ball rather than hitting the ball.
But Reid didn’t make fun of me or ignore me like he would probably do now, he had given me some aloe vera gel and the memory of his touch when he helped me with it, makes me feel things that I know I absolutely shouldn’t feel for my stepbrother.
He and Chase had canceled a party they had been invited to that night to stay home with me and watch movies. We’d fallen asleep on the couch of the little rental house Mom and I were staying in and I had never felt so protected and cherished, with my head on Reid’s shoulder and my feet in Chase’s lap.
Now those two would probably incite people to use me as a dodge ball target.
The boys and I enter different changing rooms, I have my own personal one here all made from white wood and Dustin made sure that I have a full length mirror and a mini bookshelf.
I’m ready in seconds as I was wearing my bikini under my dress.
I observe myself in the mirror, adjusting my bikini top over my full breasts. I have way more curves than three years ago, I definitely look more like a woman now and every trace of the bony child I was is completely gone.
I’m not fat in any way but I have a softer figure than I used to have as an early teen. I have hips and definitely a butt, I inherited my mom’s hourglass figure and her petite but curvy body.
I look at my pale pink bikini, suddenly feeling a little self-conscious and debating if I should change into the black one in my bag. This pink one will look much better once I have more of a tan, right now my skin is still pale after a whole school year in New York City.
I’m about to untie the strings of my bikini top when I hear a soft knock on the wooden door and when I say to come in, Bryce steps inside the changing room.
“Hey ...”
“Hey yourself,” I reply not making a mystery of the fact that I’m checking him out.
It’s the first time I see Bryce shirtless and I’m not surprised to see smooth, chiseled muscle everywhere. He has a six pack and that delicious V shaped indentation that I spent a whole summer admiring in Chase and Reid. He’s slightly leaner than the twins but his body is perfect and looks as if it was carved in marble by some kind of Italian Renaissance artist.
When my lips curve in what I hope is an inviting smile, Bryce’s lips are instantly on mine as warm and soft as last night, nibbling and tasting me as if I were the most delicious treat he ever came across.
I let him in, shivering at how good it feels when his tongue enters my mouth, tangling with mine and stroking softly but firmly.
His hands are in my hair and as he takes a step forward, my back meets the wooden door of the changing room and his chest comes into contact with mine.
Last night we were fully clothed, now there’s lots of skin contact that adds to the sensation created by our mouths.
Bryce’s skin is smooth, warm, soft and his scent of coconut is subtle and mixed with something that’s entirely him, something manly and irresistible.
“Fuck Kaya, I’ve been wanting to kiss you since I said goodnight to you. It’s all I can think about.” He says it against my lips, letting his hands come down slowly, tracing the sides of my neck and shoulders, in a delicate and yet heated touch.
“I know, me too,” I pant against his mouth, feeling that low buzz current all over my skin, everywhere he’s touching and where I ache for him to touch. Because this is the thing: I want to feel his hands everywhere, if he stopped touching me or kissing me now, I’d self-combust.
So I crush his lips with mine again, smushed against the wooden door of the changing room, living only in anticipation of his next touch, of the next brush of his tongue against mine.
His lips leave mine and begin following the same trail his hands are, peppering my jaw with light kisses and descending the column of my neck and tracing my collarbone until they pause on the soft skin of the swell of my breasts.
Bryce’s hand is never too far from where his lips are and his fingers close around one of my breasts, squeezing my soft flesh through the thin fabric of my bikini top as his thumb finds my hardened nipple and rubs it in a tantalizing circling motion.
I’ve never let anyone touch me this way, there’s never been any point, since every kiss has always left me indifferent to say the least. I would’ve let mystery guy touch me but that kiss didn’t last long enough to evolve into anything more.
I arch my back, increasing the contact between us and a moan escapes my lips when Bryce pushes his hips closer to me and I feel his hardness press against my bikini clad center. For the first time in my life, I don’t think that the notion of a summer fling is something to laugh about.
I always dismissed Nic’s suggestions as her own loving
but misguided way of trying to help me but right here, right now I’m throbbing with a need that makes it hard to even breathe.
This is why when Bryce’s hands leave my breasts and return up to cup my jaw, I almost cry at the loss of his touch, feeling my heart beating so fast that I fear it will explode in my chest.
I’m also clenching my thigh muscles in search of some kind of relief from the liquid heat that’s ignited a wildfire between my legs.
The noise that I make is needy and breathless and it makes Bryce chuckle softly, with his lips still dangerously close to my own.
“I know, sweet stuff. Trust me, I want nothing more than to lock this door and kiss you until the sun goes down or someone comes to look for us. But I told Parker that I was going to the men’s room and I’d be only a minute. If we don’t show up, he’ll knock on this door very soon.”
I pout a little bit, feeling guilty that I had completely forgotten about Parker. “Ok, you’re right. We’re being rude.”
He tucks a strand of long, brown hair behind my ear and his lips whisper against my ear: “What about getting together tonight? We can wait until everybody is out or asleep and I could come hang out in your room for a bit?”
I agree immediately that I’ll text him when the coast is clear and he winks at me in that sexy way of his, with a bright smile that reaches his green eyes.
“Let’s get out of here, before I decide to ask you for another kiss for the road.”
I tell him that he only has to ask in a flirty tone that I almost don’t recognize as my own but Bryce laughs and smacks me playfully on the butt, causing another wave of lusty heat to spread everywhere in my body.
“That would be a huge mistake, Kaya. If my lips touch yours again, there’s no way we’re ever making it out of this changing room. Come on, we’ll pick up where we left off tonight. It’s a date, right?”
I nod, trying not to read too much into his choice of words: he said that we should keep things casual and not put a label on what we’re doing. I don’t care what we call it if hanging out with him will always be this fun.
10.
Ambush
Kaya
SPENDING TIME WITH Parker and Bryce must be the most fun I’ve had in a long time. In a way it reminds me of those first few amazing weeks when the twins and I were friends.
As we get out of my changing room, we find that Parker has been to rent some surfboards.
“Come on K, Bryce and I will teach you how to surf. By the end of the summer, you’ll be a proper beach babe.”
My eyes dilate in surprise and I shake my head taking a step back from Parker only to find Bryce’s solid chest behind me.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea, as I said earlier, I’m super klutzy. I have virtually no sense of balance.”
The boys chuckle as if they didn’t quite believe me and Bryce promises that it will be fun. “For today we’ll just cover the basics and you won’t even have to enter the water. We’ll just show you what to do on dry land.”
Parker sets the surfboard on the sand behind our private cabana and then points at it with a shit eating grin. “Kaya, that’s a surfboard.”
I narrow my eyes at him, folding my arms over my chest.
“Ha ha. That’s so fucking funny. Why, thank you for telling me that, Parker.”
He laughs, shaking his jet black hair and I notice how the sun creates blue highlights on it and how his grey eyes today look like liquid silver.
Parker is the tallest out of the guys, well over six foot five, he’s as well built as the twins and Bryce but he has way more bulk.
I wasn’t surprised to learn that he plays defense in the football team. “Hey Bryce have you noticed how cute she is when she cusses?”
The traitor joins his bestie in teasing me mercilessly and shakes his head in mock disappointment. “She’s definitely cute but seriously, these fancy East Coast prep schools don’t produce the proper young women they used to. This one swears like a sailor, I’m glad I’m not the only one who noticed.”
“Whatever! That’s such bullshit! I never swear. I only do it when Chase and Reid are being complete dipshits.”
Both boys laugh at my statement and Parker nods, satisfied.
“Yup, that’s exactly my point. Those two are dipshits most of the time, hence you young lady, cuss like there’s no tomorrow.”
I’m about to protest when Bryce nods. “And you’re fucking adorable when you do. Come on now, hop on that surfboard and show us how you’d ride a wave.”
He has an amused little smirk on the lips I was kissing just a moment ago and for a second I wonder if his mind’s gone straight to the gutter like mine has when he said ‘ride’.
Anyway, I make a point of climbing onto the surfboard and I’d be lying if I said that I don’t feel like a total idiot to be standing on it on the sand.
“That’s completely wrong, K,” Parker hops on the board behind me to correct my position. “I’m not surprised that you easily lose your balance. Your feet are too close together, you need to spread them farther apart.”
He’s suddenly very close to me, so close that I can feel his body heat behind me as his chest comes into contact with my back and his hands land on my hips to keep me steady as he uses one of his feet to get me to move mine farther apart.
He smells so good, like rainfall and something earthy and spicy, and I blame it on the way Bryce turned me on just a moment ago in the changing room, but the touch of Parker’s hands makes me feel almost breathless.
“Yeah also, you need to use your arms for balance, you need to open them up. Like this ...” Bryce steps on the board in front of me and instructs me to extend my arms on each side. “Here we go, much better. But there’s still something wrong,” he muses, setting his hands on my hips, just a little lower than Parker’s.
“She needs to bend her knees, like this ...” Parker hits the back of my knees with his own to get me to bend them and I almost fall forward into Bryce’s arms.
So I find myself practically sandwiched between my brothers’ besties and I’ll be honest, it feels fucking fantastic. So good that I don’t even pause to think about how this must look, until a familiar voice startles me to the point that I do tip forward and I fall on Bryce, dragging Parker with me and landing in a heap on the sand.
“Kaya! What the he—” Marc is standing a couple of feet away from us and is glaring at me with an annoyed look on his face that immediately rubs me the wrong way.
He’s looking at me as if I were doing something wrong, with his lips flattened in a displeased line.
“Kaya, how nice to see you,” Marc’s mom is standing behind her son, looking completely out of place on the beach in a pastel pink linen sheath dress, with a matching headband to hold back her long blonde hair and expensive pearl jewelry to adorn her neck, ears and wrists.
I don’t miss the look of astonished disapproval in her eyes, as she looks between me and her son.
“Your mother and I just finished that meeting for the Fourth of July celebration and we decided to have lunch at the yacht club. When Karen said that you were planning to come to the beach, I called Marc and thought that it would be so much fun if you kids joined us. She’s waiting for us at our table. Shall we?”
I met Marc’s mom last summer and I had immediately liked her kind and intelligent conversation but right now something seems to be annoying her because that kindness seems to be completely gone in the way she looks at me and her son.
The yacht club requires shirts and shoes on, so we all go back to change into our clothes and when I show up at the table with Bryce and Parker, Jackie and Marc seem taken aback when seeing that I’m not alone.
Thankfully my mom is happy to see the boys and lunch is a pleasant enough affair. We talk about our tour of Dustin’s offices and the huge Fourth of July celebrations planned by the Star Cove entertainment committee.
There are a few awkward moments, like when both Bryce and Marc reach for the chair by my side
and I’m relieved when Bryce stands his ground and gets to sit next to me.
I try to talk to Marc only when the general conversation requires it, still feeling uncomfortable after last night’s events. And I couldn’t possibly miss the wounded looks he throws my way, looking annoyed whenever Parker or Bryce talk to me or if I laugh at their jokes.
Bryce
WE GET HOME FROM THE beach at the same time as Chase and Reid, so my hopes of sneaking into the shower with Kaya are completely frustrated because there’s no way it would go unnoticed with the house full of people.
Don’t ask me what it is about this girl but since we kissed last night, all I can think about is being with her. And it’s not necessarily just a physical thing, which is the really scary part.
I keep telling myself that Georgia broke my heart and the sort of deal Kaya and I agreed on is probably for the best, because I don’t know if either of us is ready for anything more serious and that after all, I barely know her.
But fuck if what I know about her isn’t making my cock constantly hard and my heart melt every time we talk and she shows me this thoughtful, sweet side to her. Whenever I spend time with her, I like her more I think, smiling at the thought that we have all summer to explore things between us. And since she’ll be at Bridgeport U too in the fall, the end of the summer won’t necessarily mean the end for us.
I’m the first to step into the kitchen after showering and I find Dustin busy skewering some huge shrimp and seasoning some awesome looking steaks.
“I was thinking about surf and turf for tonight. Do you mind starting to light the grill and putting on it some of the applewood wood chips I keep in the cabinet in the grilling area?”
I step outside, happy to help. I love the fact that Dustin and Karen still do some home cooking when they’re home; my parents have always hired a live-in chef and even though the food in my house was always perfectly prepared, I love the way this feels more like a real family. We’ve never really even eaten dinner as a family with my parents, I’ve always felt that each of us lived a separate life, only crossing ways casually.
Forbidden (Perfect for them Book 1) Page 9