Exploring the Rules: The Dating Playbook, Book: 4

by Dietz, Mariah

  “I’m done,” Vanessa announces as someone in our tour group starts sharing a picture of a blur she believes is a ghost.

  A cat darts out from behind one of the tombs. A cacaphony of screams echo through the cemetery as it sprints away. Chloe wraps her arms around my waist, moving even closer. “Done. Done. Done,” she chants.

  I read the reluctance on Cooper’s face, the perverse way he’s enjoying this moment having Vanessa so close, but he glances around, trying to retrace our steps. “All right, let’s get out of here.”

  Chloe’s grip loosens, and she moves so she’s walking beside me, relieved by just the realization this is about to be over.

  “What do they mean, vampires live here?” Vanessa asks. “Like people here drink each other’s blood?” That’s all it takes before Chloe slips her arm back through mine.

  I pull out my phone to text Natasha to send a car.

  “I’m sure it’s just to scare people and add to the experience,” Cooper says.

  “What did you think, Ty?” Vanessa asks.

  “You never want to go to the Czech Republic,” I warn her. “It’s supposed to be the most haunted country in the world.”

  “Noted,” Chloe says.

  “Hey, Chloe, truth or dare?” Cooper asks.

  “No. No. No.” She shakes her head.

  Cooper laughs so hard he nearly trips. “I wasn’t going to. I mean, you did this to yourself. You knew you were going to hate it and still did it. That’s either really brave or really stupid.”

  “Being fun is so overrated,” Chloe says.

  As we get back to the hotel suite, my phone rings.

  Dad.

  Shit.

  It’s late there—or very early—which means there’s a problem.

  “You ready?” Coop asks from where we’re gathered in the living room, plans of the pool on a brief hiatus as the girls exchange their experiences with the ghosts. Chloe’s sitting in a single chair—the farthest seat from where I’d sat down—the past few hours forgotten.

  “Yeah, I’ve got to take this really fast. It’s my dad. I’ll meet you down at the pool.”

  Coop gives a tight nod of understanding. We’ve exchanged enough stories about our fathers and their shared drive to always to be the best that sometimes left us forgotten.

  I step out onto the balcony, closing the door behind me. “Hello?”

  “What’s going on in New Orleans?” Dad asks, cutting out pleasantries. That’s okay, most will say I’m not pleasant, either.

  I work to recall some of the data and figures I’d requested this morning after sitting in a conference room for over fourteen hours yesterday to understand how the New Orleans site has lost money in the past nine months when it was once one of our most profitable hotels. “We’re spending too much,” I begin to explain my thoughts, and then stop. I haven’t shared anything with him thus far. This is my project, and we’re supposed to discuss my findings and recommendations next month when he and Lewis return from Europe. “Are you checking in on me?”

  “Natasha called and said you checked in with three guests. I thought you were taking this seriously? Tell me they’re not prostitutes. And why were you late for your meeting yesterday? And why didn’t you invite Avery to fly over?”

  I laugh. “That’s rich, Dad, especially coming from you. This is the first hotel, and you’re already having your minions spy on me? And no, I didn’t invite Avery. I don’t want the management company’s opinions.”

  “They’re not spying. They work for me.”

  “Three people are traveling with me. All of them attend Brighton. All of them have been professional, and none of them are prostitutes. One is Cooper, and the other two are sisters.” It’s better to give him facts, so he stops spying.

  “They reflect on you, Tyler. Every decision you make, every person you call a friend—it all reflects on you, Son.”

  “I’m perfectly aware of that.”

  “Don’t embarrass our family name.” He hangs up.

  I clench the phone in my fist, and for a second, I consider how it would feel to chuck it off the balcony and break my contact with the outside world for just a single day.

  Anger prickles at my skin as I recount what the girls wore last night when we went out and the night before when we arrived. Did they say or do something that made them come across as opportunistic or inappropriate? It shouldn’t matter—it doesn’t matter.

  With anger still thrumming through my veins, I go back inside. The girls are gone, only Cooper is here. I head straight for the mini bar, grab a filled bottle, and bring it to the kitchen where I use a steak knife to break the seal.

  “Didn’t go well?” Coop asks, leaning against the fridge in his bathing suit with one shoulder, arms crossed over his chest.

  “I need to fire someone.”

  Coop’s eyebrows jump. “Post drink?”

  I swallow two fingers and set the glass and bottle on the counter. “Yeah, it’s a phone call.”

  “He asked you to do it?”

  I shake my head.

  “Who is it?” he asks.

  “The GM here.”

  “Natasha? The hot one?”

  I nod.

  “No wonder you’re drinking. Perk: once she isn’t your employee…”

  He’s trying to make me laugh, not encourage me to add another poor decision to my already long list of bad decisions, but the exhaustion of this moment and the betrayal it’s packed with prevent the idea from being even remotely funny.

  “You guys go down to the pool. I’m going to make this call, and I’ll be down shortly.” I start to turn toward the staircase and stop. Chloe is making her way down the stairs in a one-piece bathing suit that is sexier than any bikini I’ve ever seen. It’s green, and the top dips between her breasts to nearly her navel, the two pieces laced together with a matching piece of fabric below her breasts.

  She stops, her eyes lifting to mine, greener and brighter with the bathing suit. A shy smile teases her lips. “Sorry,” she says quietly, before continuing down the steps with her bare feet that reveal multiple tan lines from summer.

  I consider moving so she can’t pass me and forcing a conversation. Try to draw out some apology for last night and remind her that I’m an arse, and that’s the one part about me she can always count on.

  She slips past me without even a glance, and I hear Cooper talking about what truth or dare question he’s going to ask Vanessa, and Chloe laughing in return.

  Firing Natasha wasn’t half as rewarding as I’d hoped. She’s damn good at her job, but it was a necessary decision. I knew she’d keep my father apprised of everything—expected it in fact—but her lies crossed too many lines. I would never be able to trust her, and if she was willing to cross me so quickly just to earn the praise of my father, who else would she willingly stab in the back? She wasn’t upset in the least, which I quickly realized meant she’d be calling my father in the morning to appeal the decision, and I’m not fully sure he’d support my choice, which means I’ll need to reach out to him first. The idea of asking him to stand by me on this—of having to defend myself when he should have been the one who fired her when she contacted him—ratchets up my anger. My thoughts splinter into the realm of what-if? when I think about the possibility of my father choosing Lewis as the incoming CEO, and I pour myself another drink.

  I consider what would happen if I invested in Cooper and his business ventures—living on the island the three of them have painted numerous times while discussing their future. The four of us with our feet in the sand and not caring about budgets or bottom lines or trends. The idea leads me to my wardrobe, where I rifle through my clothes that the hotel’s staff hung and laid out for me, finding a pair of swim shorts that I quickly change into and tossing my phone on the bed on my way out.

  I take the elevator down to the outdoor patio, finding the others gathered around the table as thunder rumbles in the distance.

  “We’re debating if it�
��s worth getting in. The girls think they’ve already pushed their luck with the ghost tour and that if they get in, the storm will start.” Another roll of thunder cracks as he finishes telling me this.

  The pool is small but deep, not made for much aside from to impress. Still, the privacy is welcomed.

  “Hey, Ty,” Coop says as I look across the brightly lit city.

  “Yeah?” I say, instantly hating the jarring smile he flashes.

  “Truth or dare.”

  “Bloody hell.”

  Chloe and Vanessa laugh, waiting to hear what I choose.

  “Dare.”

  Cooper rubs his finger against his chin like he does whenever he deserves a kick to the gonads. “I dare you to lose your shorts and jump in.”

  “No way,” Chloe says. “There have to be some boundaries. I made you order a drink. These dares are starting to—”

  Her words come to an abrupt stop as I throw my shorts at her and jump into the pool.

  Laughter greets me when I surface, and then there’s a squeal and a splash as Cooper tosses Chloe into the pool after me.

  “Cooper Ronald Sutton, we’re no longer friends,” she warns him, brushing the water from her face.

  “Ronald? Your middle name’s Ronald?” I ask.

  Coop flips me off. “You said you wanted to go swimming. You needed a little push.”

  Vanessa howls with laughter.

  “The water’s nice, yeah?” I ask Chloe when she looks at me.

  She glances away, her cheeks tinted with embarrassment.

  “Are you embarrassed?” I ask her, knowing full well that she is.

  Vanessa throws my swim shorts into the pool. They fall a couple of feet away and float along the surface.

  “That’s okay. It actually feels pretty nice,” I say, stretching to my back and kicking my feet up to glide backward.

  “Oh, God,” Cooper grumbles.

  “If you’ve got it, flaunt it, right?” I say.

  Chloe has her back turned to me. I’d bet this hotel that her eyes are closed.

  “I thought we were swimming?” I yell to the others.

  “Put your fucking shorts on,” Cooper says.

  “You dared me to take them off.”

  “I need a drink,” Coop grumbles.

  “Ditto,” Vanessa pops up from her chair.

  “Get dressed by the time we come back, or I’m posting this all over your social media,” Cooper warns.

  The two disappear into the elevator, leaving Chloe and me alone in the pool.

  “Will you put your shorts on?” she asks, chancing a look at me.

  “Does my being naked make you uncomfortable?”

  “It makes everyone uncomfortable, hence the alcohol.”

  “You’re talking to me again,” I point out.

  She sighs, turning to face me as she treads water.

  “See?” I say. “You can’t even see anything.”

  “You’re still naked.”

  “Can you see my cock?”

  “There’s a principle here.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “There are laws about decency.”

  “I’m on private property,” I counter.

  She shakes her head. “Do you always argue this much?”

  “You’d know if you didn’t avoid me all the time.”

  “I don’t avoid you.”

  “No?”

  “I pretend you don’t exist.”

  I don’t mean to laugh, but she has a pirate smile, working to either goad me or ensure my ego is completely shattered. “Why do you pretend I don’t exist?”

  Her smile slips, but then her eyebrows rise as she continues to tread water. “Does it matter?”

  “It depends.”

  Her smile resumes. “On?”

  “If it’s true or not.”

  “It is.”

  “You don’t know me.”

  “I know enough.”

  I swim closer, catching the uneasy glint in her eyes that only fuels my confidence like a textbook sadist. “What’s that?”

  “Why are you trying to make me nervous?”

  “Do I make you nervous?”

  She remains still, only turning to watch me as I circle her. “In the same way swimming beside an alligator would.”

  I move closer, knowing the water is clear and lit well enough that she could see every part of me if she looked. “You don’t trust me.”

  “You have a reputation.”

  I flash a shark smile—predatory and intentional. “The rumors are all true.”

  “They’re nothing to be proud of.”

  I shrug. “Debatable.” I move closer, noting the way the tip of her nose and cheeks are red from getting too much sun yesterday, and that the faint indent above her lip can be traced to her chin with a shallow dimple there. “Just ask,” I tell her. “Ask me to kiss you.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Was I not clear enough last night?”

  I lean closer still as a particularly loud crack of thunder followed by a burst of lightning highlights the sky. Her foot brushes my leg as she continues to tread water, and I run my tongue over a drop of water along her jaw.

  Chloe raises her hands, pushing away from me. “I don’t know why you’re doing this, but you need to stop. I’m not playing some game with you.” Anger and hurt flash in her eyes before she turns and swims to the edge of the pool and gets out.

  “Are you guys crazy? Did you see the lightning?” Cooper asks as the elevator doors open. “Let’s go upstairs and celebrate our last night in New Orleans.”

  Chloe grabs a towel, wrapping it around herself. “I’m tired. I think I’m going to bed.”

  Cooper turns his attention to me. “Tell me you put some shorts on.”

  “You might want to close your eyes if you don’t want feelings of inadequacy to haunt you.”

  The last thing I hear before the elevator doors close is Cooper chuckling.

  10

  Chloe

  “I don’t think I’ll ever find a bed this comfortable again,” Nessie says, spreading her arms over it like she’s making a snow angel.

  “They probably have the same beds at all the locations,” I tell her. “But I’m bummed to leave as well. I never had jambalaya, and I really want more beignets.”

  “I bet Tyler could arrange it so you could get both before we leave.”

  I shove the last of my makeup into my overnight bag and move to pack it in my suitcase. I didn’t tell her about the club or the pool. I can’t even figure out why. Maybe it’s because I think she’ll tell me he was teasing or joking? Or because it might create a point of contention that would make the next fifteen days painful and awkward? “That’s okay. Austin is supposed to have good food, right?”

  She laughs. “That’s something I’d be asking you. You looked this stuff up. I barely looked anything up for Austin because I knew we were staying just one night.”

  We turn as Cooper knocks on the door. “They’re here to grab the bags. You guys ready?”

  I look across our bags and empty room. “Yeah.”

  He nods. “We can meet Tyler in the lobby. He said he’d be ready by ten so we could head for Texas.”

  Nessie woke me up and dragged me out of bed at six this morning to go for a jog with her, saying I owed her after the ghost tour. I would have complained more if it hadn’t allowed me to get a longer look at the Garden District.

  “He’s not back yet?” Nessie asks.

  Cooper shakes his head. “Maybe he had a meeting or something?”

  I shrug, giving a final glance at the room. “I want to see the atrium down in the lobby. Let’s go see if we feel any cool breezes followed by a warm gust.”

  Nessie shudders. “Still not funny.”

  I grab my purse, and we move slowly through the hotel suite, parting ways with the beautiful space.

  “Should we try calling him?” Vanessa asks, tossing her empty coffee cup in the recycle bin.

&n
bsp; Cooper glances at his cell phone that confirms we’ve been down in the lobby for three hours. We’ve seen the entire thing, twice. We saw the shops where I bought a T-shirt and a postcard to send to Mom and Dad, the full atrium filled with exotic plants and a small waterfall, and even the crocodiles. When it hit noon, Cooper texted him, but when he didn’t hear back, we crossed the street and had lunch at a small restaurant. Lunch ended up being a silver lining because I finally got my shrimp jambalaya, and it was definitely worth the wait. We ate in a hurry so that we’d be back to the hotel, not wanting to delay the seven hours and change we have to drive to reach Austin.

  “I’ll send him another text. He said ten, right?” He looks at Nessie because I held to my word last night, though they both teased me about being a party pooper, and went to bed where I read until I fell asleep.

  My ego still feels bruised, certain Tyler’s playing some kind of head game with me. And I hate the fact I can still smell him and recall the warmth and strangely erotic feeling of his tongue against my skin. I brush my fingers across the same expanse of skin in an attempt to rid the memory.

  “There he is,” Vanessa says, pointing back toward the steakhouse we ate at the night before last. He’s wearing a pair of jeans and black tee that reveals some of the ink I’d seen last night when he came down to go swimming—before everything got ruined by that stupid dare. His dark blond hair is finger-combed to one side, but these details quickly fade as he raises a hand and places it on the waist of a short brunette who is all hair, boobs, and ass, wearing a skin-tight red dress and black heels that spell s-e-x.

  He waves at us, and for a second, I think he’s going to bring her over here and make this moment even more awkward, but instead, he faces her and says something that makes her laugh. Then he bends, kissing her mouth and burying his hands in her hair.

  “He seriously ghosted us to hook up with some chick?” Nessie asks.

  “They were in the restaurant. I doubt they hooked up,” Cooper says.

  “It doesn’t open until five,” I point out, my attention still on Tyler, watching his hand slide down her back to cup her ass.