Istanbul
“What are we going to do?” Leah asked me, her voice pitching higher with every word.
My brain raced. It wasn’t like we could land a helicopter on the ship…or could we?
“Whatever you’re thinking, try bringing a little reality into it,” she suggested, her eyes wide. “We’re not strapping ourselves to the backs of dolphins or trying out a jet pack—”
I covered her mouth with mine, quieting her the only way I knew how—the only way I wanted to. I kissed her breathless, losing myself, groaning at the way she responded to every stroke of my tongue, every soft bite at her lower lip. I kissed her to put a Band-Aid over the gaping wound we’d ripped open in that market.
The cab lurched forward as traffic moved, and I broke the kiss. “It’s going to be okay,” I promised her. “No matter what just happened, we’re going to be okay. Trust me, Firecracker.” I meant more than being left behind, and by the timid smile she gave me, she knew it.
“Okay,” she said.
Never had one word meant so damn much to me.
I tucked her under my arm and leaned toward the cabbie. “Can you change directions?”
“Where to?” he asked.
We needed a hotel for the night, and there was no way I was taking Leah anywhere that wasn’t 100 percent safe. “The Ritz-Carlton,” I answered.
“Pax, I don’t have that much money on me,” Leah whispered.
“Lucky for us, I do,” I answered. She looked down, so I tipped her chin up to look into her eyes. “The money is nothing. Let me take care of you.”
She nodded, and I kissed her puckered forehead.
…
An hour later, we were checked in to a terrace suite at the Ritz-Carlton, and I had never been so thankful that I’d brought my credit card. We’d devoured some room service and calmed down enough to think rationally.
“Okay, let’s see what we have,” Leah said, leaning toward the coffee table and emptying the contents of her travel wallet thing. “I have our passports—”
“Wait. You what?” I picked mine up and verified the goofy smile picture. “Why?”
“Because we’re required to have them in Turkey. I knew you’d probably jump into the river or get yourself blown up, so Hugo gave me yours before we disembarked, thank God. And what kind of middle name is Iskander?”
“Greek,” I answered. “Have you been snooping, Firecracker?”
Her cheeks flushed pink. “It’s only fair. I bet you have an entire file on me, right?”
“Actually, Penna does,” I answered honestly, then tossed the contents of my pocket into her pile. “And she won’t tell me a damn thing that’s in it.”
She sighed in relief, piquing my curiosity.
“Okay, let’s see.” She picked through our pile, then included the teapot she’d stored in her little backpack with a tube of sunscreen. We had two passports, enough Turkish lira for lunch, breath mints, lip balm, a folded itinerary for today’s plans, my credit card, our empty wallets, and a condom.
“Seriously?” She raised her eyebrows at me.
“I keep it in my wallet,” I answered with a shrug. “I guess it’s a good thing since we got fucked over by the ship.”
She rolled her eyes. “We knew the rules. This is our fault.”
“Okay, let’s make a plan,” I suggested, trying to focus my frustration.
“Right. Okay, we have to meet up with the ship by the next port or we’re kicked out of the program.” She opened the laptop I’d had the hotel deliver and slid it between us on the coffee table. As she logged on to the internet, she leaned forward, showing a strip of delicious skin right above her— Holy shit. She was wearing a thong. A pink one. A tiny pink string that led from the little triangle peeking above her jeans to slip between the globes of her perfect ass.
“Paxton?”
I snapped forward. “Sorry. I was shamelessly checking out your ass.”
Her mouth opened and shut a couple times, but she didn’t pull her shirt down in the back, just shook her head and half smiled in a way I couldn’t interpret.
“Okay. Well, the next actual port is Athens, and that’s in five days. Well, five days from tomorrow.”
Perfection. I had five days with her to work this shit out between us, figure out what the hell we were doing before we got slammed with cameras again. And I knew just the place to take her.
She sighed.
“What’s wrong?” I asked. “Other than the obvious?”
Her shoulders dropped. “We’re going to miss Mykonos. This is the week with the optional shore excursions.” She clicked through the ship’s itinerary. “Damn it.”
Out of this entire experience, Mykonos was the one thing she’d wanted. “What day is the Mykonos one?”
“Thursday.”
I could work with that. I put the computer on my lap and started to make arrangements.
Four days with her. Four days to show her who I really was, why I did the things I did. Fate had given me one opportunity, and I was taking it.
“What are you doing?” She looked over my shoulder.
“Buying plane tickets.”
If I turned my head, I could kiss her again. I could set the computer down, flip her to her back, slide over her, and find out what my name sounded like when she was screaming it.
My fingers flew faster, booking us on the nine thirty a.m. flight.
“Mykonos?” she asked, looking at the screen.
“I figured we could spend four days there, then hop back with the shore excursion on the fifth day. We wouldn’t even have to wait until Athens.”
“You’re…you’re taking me to Mykonos?” Her eyes were huge pools of disbelief and wonder.
I clicked the purchase button before I gave her my full attention. “I promised you I would. I know a great house we can stay in, and I know we’re missing classes, but it will give you a chance to re—”
This time she stopped me with a kiss. She didn’t push it further, just a simple press of our lips, but when I felt her smile, it went down in my book as the third best kiss of my life.
And she already owned the top two.
“Thank you,” she said.
This girl was tying me in some serious knots. “I had them bring up pajamas for you, if you wanted to hop in the shower.”
“Thank you. That sounds like heaven.” She pushed off the couch and stood, her stretch revealing another tantalizing strip of skin, this time of her stomach. “I’ll take the couch tonight. Your ribs need that bed.”
Hell no. “Absolutely not. My ribs are fine. You’re in the bed.” When she cocked her head at me, I almost laughed. “I never said chivalry was dead. I’ll sleep on the floor before you’re out here on the couch.” After the day we’d had, the last thing I was going to do was put her to bed on the couch.
The few feet that separated us felt like a mile, the words we’d thrown at each other in the market coming back to wedge their way between us.
She nervously chewed on her lower lip before meeting my eyes. “You know what? We’re adults. We’ll both take the bed.”
My mouth went dry, every possible scenario running through my oversexed brain. Could I sleep next to her and keep my hands to myself? Yes, because you’re not a fucking animal. Don’t be an ass. “Okay.”
Her smile was tentative. “Okay. Then I’ll be right back.”
She disappeared into the bathroom, and my eyes locked onto the door like I was suddenly going to develop X-ray vision. She was getting naked. Twenty feet away from me. I groaned, rubbing one hand over my eyes and the other adjusting the growing issue in my pants.
The draw I felt toward her was incredible, indescribable. Stronger than magnets, than chemistry, it was a primal, clawing need in me—not necessarily for her to be mine, but for me to be hers. To be worthy of being hers after all the shit I’d done, the fuckups of epic proportions that never went away.
And once she realized what I’d done…why I’d really chosen her…
I was so fucked.
This wasn’t how I planned it.
She was nothing like I assumed she would be. She was strong yet unsure, smart yet naïve. Innocent, yet so sexy that my hands literally tingled whenever I thought of getting them on her skin.
Skin she wouldn’t show anyone.
She turned on the water. Now she was naked and wet.
“Knock it off. It’s not like she invited us,” I said to my overly excited dick.
I fired off an email to Penna and Landon to explain our current situation, making sure they knew we were fine, had funds and a plan. The last thing I needed was them calling in the cavalry. I had zero doubt that if I wanted to, I could get us onto the Athena tomorrow. But then I would lose out on the private time I had with Leah, this precious chance to simply be with her. No school. No cameras. No distractions.
I left them with instructions not to rescue us and hit send.
Now I had to find a way to get us on the same page, to take down whatever walls she’d constructed.
The shower still ran. I debated all of five seconds and fired up Google.
This is wrong. Don’t do it.
I brushed the angel off my shoulder. If I didn’t know what had happened to her, I couldn’t help her, and obviously she wasn’t opening that door on her own. I didn’t need to throw it wide open, just enough to get a peek.
Eleanor Baxter, California.
I typed three words into the search engine and sold my soul to the devil as I hit enter.
The screen filled with links, and I clicked the first one, my heart sinking at the title of the article. “Granada Hills Senior Survives Fatal Canyon Car Accident.”
The article loaded, and the picture of a crumpled car at the bottom of a ravine came into focus. Holy shit.
How the hell did she walk away from that?
Maybe she didn’t.
I devoured the article.
eighteen-year-old eleanor baxter was found late last night, severely injured, clinging to the topanga canyon wall, over one hundred feet above where the car she had been a passenger in burned into the morning. the driver, identified as nineteen-year-old brian newcomb, was killed in the crash.
reports indicate that newcomb lost control of the vehicle, a late-model honda civic, which went off highway 23 a little over twenty-four hours before santa monica fire and rescue discovered the scene, using a helicopter rescue team to bring ms. baxter from the ravine.
initially, the vehicle had rested along the canyon wall, but eventually fell to the bottom of the ravine.
“i don’t know how she hung there so long,” captain delmonico, with smfd told us. “it looks like she was in the car almost eighteen hours before she managed to get out. with the condition she was in, it’s a miracle she held on for another six hours. strong young lady, that one is.”
strong indeed. what is even more miraculous is that she wasn’t killed during the initial crash, as the driver was.
“eleanor told us that brian died instantly. she said he went quickly and without pain, and that’s all we could ask for our sweet boy,” claudia newcomb, the deceased driver’s mother, told us. “we know he would have done anything to keep her safe, and we’re so thankful that she made it out.”
ms. baxter has declined to comment.
My chest tightened, my vision swimming, until I remembered to suck in a breath. I’d held it the entire time I’d read the article. I closed out all the windows on the laptop and slammed the lid shut, wishing I didn’t know. Wishing I hadn’t invaded her privacy.
Wishing she’d told me herself.
My fingers raked down my face, and I rocked forward, bracing my elbows on my knees.
I’d made her zip-line.
I’d made her parasail.
She’d hung over a hundred feet in the air for twenty-four hours, and I’d made her strap up and face her devil while I laughingly told her it would be okay.
I was a fucking, flaming asshole.
We both had rough freshman years. That’s what she’d told me about her and Rachel. She’d been recovering. God, how bad had it been? I thought back to Bermuda, the way she’d gripped the railing going into the caves. Hell, even boarding the ship, she kept both hands on the banister and barely spoke until we were off the ramp.
No wonder she’d passed out when she fell down the ramp.
And the guy she was with…Newcomb…the way his mom had spoken, they had to have been dating, right? Had she loved him? Did she still love him?
Was I competing with a ghost?
I closed my eyes, but I couldn’t get the crumpled car out of my mind, the pile of mangled metal still smoking like a tiny piece of hell.
I don’t do heights. That’s what she’d said at the zip-line…and I’d forced her hand.
The fight in the market started to make sense—when she told me that she was more acquainted with the concept of death than I ever would be.
How much more could I have possibly fucked up with her?
Just don’t let me fall.
Her words crashed through me, shredding every last defense I’d had against her. She trusted me. Despite whatever nightmare she’d lived through, she’d put her hand in mine and trusted me with her life. That instant connection I’d felt with her, first on the balcony and then when I found her in my suite—it hadn’t been one-sided. She’d felt it, too, enough to trust me less than an hour later.
I was the luckiest and the stupidest bastard on the planet.
“Pax? You ready?” Leah asked, startling me.
I’d been so lost in my thoughts that I hadn’t noticed she’d turned off the shower, let alone had time to get dressed. She stood in the doorway to the bedroom, wearing a tank top and pajama pants, her hair still wet and hanging to frame her breasts.
I stood and walked over to her, cradling her face between my hands. “You look beautiful.”
She snorted. “Whatever makeup I had with me went down the shower drain.”
Her eyes were still wide, the color like the tiger’s-eye bracelet my mother loved, her skin flushed and soft. “You’re all the more beautiful for it.” I meant it. She wasn’t a high-maintenance girl who took an hour to get ready to go to the store.
I kissed her gently, sipping at her lips. “Look, about the marketplace…”
She shook her head slightly, sliding her eyes shut. “Don’t. We both said things. Maybe they were things that needed to be said, but we probably could have been a little nicer about it.”
“Just a little,” I agreed. “I’m going to hop in the shower.”
She nodded, and I stole one more kiss before leaving her.
I washed quickly, steadying my nerves and doing my best to fortify my self-control to spend the night next to Leah and not make a move.
By the time I got to the bed, she was curled on her side, facing away from me. “I sleep in boxers; I hope you don’t mind,” I told her.
When she didn’t respond, I watched the even rise of her rib cage, realizing she’d fallen asleep. Well, that made tonight a shit-ton easier.
I slid between the sheets and faced her, but kept my hands to myself. The king-size monstrosity we slept in left me plenty of room. The moonlight played off her skin, and she looked so damn touchable.
Problem was, I didn’t only want to touch her. Scratch that, I spent more than a decent amount of time fantasizing about her under me, her soft thighs wrapped around my hips, back arching, lips screaming my name as I stroked us both to phenomenal orgasms. Hell, I didn’t think I’d ever be able to look at her without that being on my brain somewhere.
But I wanted to touch her mind, too, to know what made her strong enough to put the harness on. To know what had kept her holding on to that canyon wall long after the car had fallen. And that wasn’t even the scary part.
I wanted to touch her heart, to claim a piece for my own, and that was something I’d never wanted from another woman. I’d never wanted to stake a real claim or to feel something more than affectionate responsibility. But Leah? I wanted to strip away her defenses like she’d obliterated mine. It wasn’t enough to take the piece, to own it by force. No, I wanted it freely given, wanted her to look at me, see me, and then deem me worthy.
Considering I hadn’t asked for anyone’s validation in the last decade, that was fucking terrifying.
She was more complicated than any woman I’d ever been with, or around, for that matter. But if I could win five gold medals at the X Games, I could sure as hell set my mind to winning Leah.
You commit, or you quit, but half-assed gets you hurt. My father’s words slammed through my brain.
When I headed for a stunt, there was a moment where I pushed the throttle, committed to the ramp, threw my body into the flip, and that’s exactly what this felt like as I stared at the curl that stretched across her pillow toward me.
I had to treat our relationship like I did everything else: with full dedication and concentration. As of this moment, I was committed, and I’d never failed at something I worked for.
Eleanor Baxter wouldn’t know what hit her.
