by Amelia Wilde
My heart had thudded against my rib cage at his touch. “Is it important? You could always reschedule…”
He’d sighed a little, rubbing his hands over my shoulders, and then leaned down to kiss me lightly on the lips. “Don’t be mistaken. I want more of what we did on the plane and then some.” Then that look had returned to his eyes. “But yes, I think we should keep to our scheduled plans.”
“Our plans?” I teased. “I don’t even know where we’re going.”
“You didn’t know where you were going when you stepped onto my jet either, and look how that turned out.”
He had a point.
Now we’re gliding across the Caribbean Sea toward massive granite boulders rising from the sparkling water, docks near their base. Gideon wraps his arm around my waist and points. “That’s where we’re going.”
“Those rocks?”
“’Those rocks’ are called the Baths, and they’re one of the most popular sights on the island.”
My heart beats a little faster. Some of them are taller than others, and as we get closer, I can see people climbing over them, disappearing and reappearing as they follow some kind of trail. There aren’t any railings. “You want me to climb those?”
Gideon laughs, planting a kiss on my temple. “We’re both going to climb them. Together. It’s really not that bad.”
At least the shoes make sense now. The last thing Gideon handed me on the way out of the cottage was a pair of water shoes—by far the most comfortable water shoes I’ve ever worn, but not exactly the kind of sexy footwear I’d have expected on a trip like this.
Not that I ever expected a trip like this.
My hands are trembling by the time we arrive at the docks and get off the boat. Soon we are moving toward what Gideon explains is the beginning of the trail. He squeezes my hand, pulling me forward, and it’s not more than a few minutes before we’re actually walking in the water underneath the boulders, a triangle-shaped opening big enough to walk through, the light filtering down from above. The water is warm as it laps against my calves, and a little part of me relaxes enough to soak in all the beauty surrounding me.
Gideon takes full advantage of that moment. As soon as we’re out of sight under the rocks, he sweeps me against the natural wall. This is no kiss on the temple—this is hot, hard, possessive, and passionate, and it wipes the nervousness right out of my mind. My hips rise toward him, and the moan that escapes my mouth echoes in the cavernous space.
“I had to show you this,” he says, between dragging his lips down the side of my neck and crushing his mouth against mine.
“It’s—it’s so beautiful—” I’m drowning in the energizing sensation of his body against mine, my feet still immersed in the soothing crystal-clear water.
“This is where everything starts.”
He kisses me so long and so deeply that I come up gasping for breath, and only then does Gideon take my hand in his again. I walk slowly, still catching my breath, and at first it seems like everything is going to be fine—more than fine—because what could possibly go wrong when I feel like this, lovely and clean and dirty and secure all at the same time, a man like Gideon Hawke by my side?
Then we start to make our way among the boulders, the trail climbing, getting steeper, and my gut starts to roil with all the possibilities of what bad things could potentially happen. One bad fall off of these rocks, and I could be seriously injured. Worse, Gideon could be hurt, and if that happened—if a second person had his life permanently changed because of a decision I made, even if it’s the decision to follow along—oh, God, I don’t know if I could take it.
The anxiety floods my veins, my muscles tensing and my heart thudding painfully against my ribs, but I try my best to keep it in check. Gideon wouldn’t take me somewhere that was truly dangerous. I’m sure of it. So this must be fine, this must be a place he’s been before, where he can be sure of what’s coming next, sure that absolutely nothing is going to happen to us.
“Now comes the fun part,” he says, his voice drawing my attention up from where they’ve been focused on my feet.
We’re at a section of the trail that’s steeper than ever, and Gideon is facing up a giant boulder with ropes hanging down on which to climb. Ropes.
My face floods with heat and I start to panic. “No way. There’s no way I’m going to climb up there. No way, Gideon.”
He looks back at me, his green eyes focused and determined, for a long, breathless moment.
20
Gideon
Kennedy’s face has gone pale, and I glance at the boulders again to see if there’s something I’m missing about them. It’s not a very challenging climb—Kennedy has a look about her that tells me she spends time working out—so there should be no reason for her to panic that she won’t be able to handle it. I’ve gone over this boulder a hundred times before, and the ropes aren’t one hundred percent necessary if you have any leg strength at all. She can handle this. I’m sure of it.
“There is a way,” I tell her. After this morning—that wild fear, a sudden worry that everything was going to collapse around her after we’d already been through the difficult part, which was getting on the plane in the first place—there must be something I can do to show her that taking a chance on a little risk in life is perfectly acceptable.
I’d prefer more risk than this offers, but I’m willing to take my time with Kennedy. This was by far the tamest thing I could think of, and the payoff at the end, at Devil’s Bay, is more than worth the climb.
“I can’t do it.” I hold my hand out to her, but Kennedy shakes her head, a small nervous motion. “It’s way too dangerous. Look at those boulders.” She’s breathing fast and unsteadily. I’m worried she may start hyperventilating.
I turn around to face the rocks again, looking for the looming monster she sees. But there are only the ropes, only the trail. That’s all. “What about them?”
“They’re soaking wet.”
This is the exaggeration of the millennium. Some sea spray has definitely caught on the top of the granite, but there’s no cascade of water running down.
“Your feet are already wet, if that’s the problem—”
“That’s not the problem,” she fires back. “The rocks are wet. One of us could slip, and then—”
“And then what?” It’s starting to dawn on me that it’s not the boulders themselves, not even really the climb, that has Kennedy white as a sheet. It’s the looming possibility that something is going to happen to one of us if we go over the rocks. Something is going to happen to us. We’re going to come to a white sand beach that’s the most stunning sight many people will see in a lifetime. “It’s not a long fall, and it’s into the water. If you fell from those rocks, you would land on your feet.”
“Can you guarantee that?” Her eyes dart from my face to the boulders and back again.
A flash of her in the restaurant, tears glinting in her eyes, avoiding talking about her sister Abby, bursts forth in my mind. I must be seeing an echo of that, but it’s more than an echo—it’s right in front of me again, right now. I close the distance between us and take both of her hands in mine.
“Look at me, Kennedy.” She raises her eyes from my shoes to my face, and in those blues I see a battle raging between wanting to sink into this place—this gorgeous place, the sun warm on our shoulders—and wanting to turn around and flee back to the cottage. “Don’t let this get to you.”
“I’m not letting anything—”
“You are, and at some point, I’d like to know why. But do you know what?”
“What?”
“I saw you dancing in the club that night. I saw the way you moved, like you were totally at home in the world, in your skin. I danced with you.” I straighten up, tracing one of my hands along her cheek. “You were captivating. You made me want to follow you to the ends of the earth.”
“You were the one who convinced me to dance.”
“And I’m the
one convincing you to climb over this trail with me. I’ll be with you the entire time, and I promise you, the end is worth it.”
The hard line of her jaw is softening. “Sometimes it’s not worth it.” Her voice is small.
“This time it is.” I bring the other hand up and draw her face close to mine, looking into her eyes right up until she closes them and our lips meet. She tastes like sweetness and sunshine, and when she pulls back, she’s laughing.
“This is crazy, right?”
I nod, teasing her. “It’s a little crazy, yes. But if you’re really that opposed, we can always—”
Kennedy steels herself. “I flew all the way here with you.”
“You did.”
“I danced with you.”
“That, too.”
“I—” She breaks off, grinning. “It’s all turning out, don’t you think?”
I lean into her ear. “The faster I get to show you this amazing sight, the faster we can get back to the cottage…”
She groans a little, tossing her head back. Her hair is pulled back in a coppery red ponytail, and it sways in the breeze. I want to take the hair tie out of her hair and run my fingers through it while she moans my name, then screams it.
“I’ve been waiting all day for you to say that.”
“We only left an hour ago.”
Kennedy shifts a little to the side, looking past me. “This doesn’t have anything to do with the past,” she says softly, and it seems so personal that I don’t reply. When she looks at me again, there’s fire in her eyes. “I want to know what’s at the end of this rainbow,” she says, her steely glare refocusing on the ropes. “And then I want to get back to that cottage and…”
“And what?”
A teasing, wicked grin spreads across her face, and the breeze plays at her sundress, whipping it up to expose more of her creamy, toned thighs. Then Kennedy’s eyes jump down to the front of my swimsuit. “It’s a surprise. But it looks like you have a few things in mind, too.”
I step toward her, curl both of my hands around her waist, and kiss the side of her neck, letting my breath linger there. “A few things?”
“Maybe more than a few.” She wraps her arms around my neck, presses her sweet lips against mine, and then playfully pushes me away, both hands on my chest. She faces the boulders with both hands on her hips and straightens her back, and it’s like a new woman standing in front of me, all the timidity gone.
Hell, if offering to have sex in a luxury cottage in the British Virgin Islands is all it takes to get her to loosen up, to break free of the nervous energy that rears up within her whenever she thinks something might go wrong, even a little bit, then I’m glad to do it.
I get so lost in the thoughts of where to start when we get back to the cottage that it takes the lilt in Kennedy’s voice to break me out of them.
“Are you coming?”
She’s already halfway up the boulders, reaching for the next rope.
“Hell yes.”
21
Kennedy
Gideon is right. Nothing terrible happens when we climb over that first set of boulders. It feels good, after five hours on the plane and a morning sleep so deep it was a little disorienting, to use my muscles, to climb, to grasp. From the bottom, every incline in the trail looks intimidating, but once I’m moving, once we’re climbing, I feel at ease. I feel powerful.
I’m still testing, still tugging at every rope hold before I put my weight on it, but Gideon keeps his word. He’s with me every step of the way.
Halfway over another set of granite rocks rising from the waves, I stop to look out at the water. It’s absolutely brilliant, blue and turquoise stripes glittering in the sun. “It looks like the brochures,” I tell him as the breeze stirs my hair around my face. “That’s…that’s a hell of a view.” I’m starting to understand what people get out of planning expensive vacations to these places, though I could have been content with a week on the sand, no luxury cottage necessary.
Although I can’t say I don’t love it.
“From here, the view is even better.” His voice dips into that sexy, flirty range, and I reach behind me to swat at him and miss.
“Don’t flirt with me too hard, Gideon. I might not make it back to the cottage.” It’s the most empty, playful threat I’ve ever spoken in my life.
“I’m terrified, you gorgeous thing. Are you going to keep climbing, or do you need a lift?” He runs one hand up from my ankle toward my thighs. We’re toying with each other, that’s all, but every time he touches me the heat between my legs grows. I might have to jump into the water before we leave so the rest of my bathing suit is evenly soaked. The trail has taken us crawling through the shallows at several points, but the droplets dry in the sun as soon as we’re out in it.
“I can’t climb when you’re touching me like that.”
“I’m only helping.”
“You know exactly what you’re doing.”
“So what if I do?”
I laugh to keep the need in my chest from intensifying past the point of control as we navigate the next section of trail. “How many times have you been here?”
Gideon slips his fingers into mine, coming to walk alongside me. It’s impossible not to stare at his body. He’s tan, probably from spending most of his time in places like this, and his green eyes soak up the blue of the sea and turn it into something lovely and unearthly. “I’ve lost track.”
I ask the next question without thinking. “How many women have you brought here?”
He cocks his head to the side, considering. “To the island? Or to this place?”
“Both, I guess.” My skin is starting to turn pink in the sun. I should have brought more sunscreen. It’s an absent thought that’s chased away by the pleasant heat, the sound of the waves.
“I brought one other woman to the island.” Gideon’s mouth is set in a hard line. “Do you think we’re past dessert?”
It takes me a second to realize what he’s referring to, and when I get it, my heart beats harder. Gideon has told me the outlines of his life—an exclusive school in New York City, prestigious internships in college, no siblings—but he’s never mentioned this. I’ve seen pictures of him with plenty of other women on the gossip sites, but you can never tell anything for sure from those. “I think we’re approaching third date territory.” I try to keep my tone easy.
“There’s not very much to the story,” he says, looking out at the water. “Andrea was my one and only serious relationship. We were together through most of college, and when we graduated, I thought everything would continue on like it always had. Andrea had other ideas.”
“I can’t imagine wanting anything out of life other than you.” It sounds lighthearted, but Gideon squeezes my hand.
“I brought her to a different resort on this island on our last vacation together. On the plane ride home, she told me she’d taken a job in Seattle.”
“You didn’t want to go with her?”
Gideon laughs, a bitter sound. “I wasn’t invited.”
My heart aches for him. My perspective on all of it shifts like a kaleidoscope—all the adrenaline-junkie vacations, all the photos of him grinning into the camera from some terrifying vantage point. His heart must have been shattered.
“Her loss.”
Gideon shrugs, putting a smile back on his face, and nods to the next section of trail. “It’s over this last stretch.”
He’s not kidding. A few minutes later, we’re hiking down toward the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen. We’re descending onto pure white sand surrounding a horseshoe-shaped bay, outcroppings of granite rising from its curves. My mouth drops open at the view. “Gideon, this is—”
I turn to him to thank him for bringing me here, for insisting it would be worth it, but Gideon’s eyes aren’t on the view. They’re on me, and they’re burning with lust. I suck in a breath, fire igniting in my core, raging like an inferno, and I’m almost ready for it when
he sweeps me off my feet.
His mouth is on mine, his kisses hard and hot and on the verge of being out of control. My nipples pebble beneath my bathing suit as he backs me up against those rocks, smoothed by centuries of beating waves, nestling us in a semi-hidden space between two of them. His hands are on my sundress, shoving it upward, and I arc toward him, a moan tearing from my lips. I want him so badly. I want him right now. I can’t wait until we get back to the cottage, and he can’t either.
I press myself into him, wrapping my legs around his waist, his cock pressed against my slit, and the only thing separating us is the thin layers of our bathing suits. The hardness of him against me is enough to make my hips buck and roll.
Gideon reaches down for my bathing suit, pressing his lips against my neck, and I let my head fall back, planting one foot on the ground to steady myself.
“God,” he murmurs against my ear. “Kennedy—”
“Don’t make me wait, Gideon. Don’t make me wait.”
After all we’ve done in the past hour, after the intense highs and lows of even making it here, I have no more defenses left, no more reasons to delay this. All I have is a desire so all-consuming that at first I don’t notice them.
And then I do.
Over Gideon’s shoulder, a family is spilling onto the beach: two parents, two teens, and one that looks like he might be eight or nine.
“Shit.” I keep my voice soft, but he turns, following my gaze.
When he looks at me again, his eyes are full of thunder and urgency. “Kennedy, we’d better run.”
22
Gideon
Kennedy doesn’t hesitate for an instant, and she leads the way back along the trail, confidence radiating from her every movement. She’s laser-focused on getting back to that water taxi. I can see in the way she works her muscles, the way she climbs, that she wants—needs—this as much as I do.