“I think the red will be fine. Sure, three.”
“Fantastic. It’ll be ready for you by nine in the morning. You said you wanted to pick the bouquet up, not have it delivered, right?”
Yes to picking the bouquet up. Yes to the exorbitant price. Yes to seeing Amanda again, even if she tossed the bouquet and kneed him in the balls before slamming the door in his face.
Dammit. Note to self: do not think about Amanda in conjunction with balls.
Fortunately the florist’s was only a stop on his afternoon jog. He’d already spent the morning in the gym, because being on vacation was no reason to change his habits of the past year. Every time he remembered Amanda and started to get hard, he worked out to take his mind off it. At least during the day. He still jacked off in the evenings, because he wasn’t a masochist and he thought about Amanda a lot.
It was a silver lining, Jeremy thought as he picked up his pace, heading out of the main hotel complex toward his beachside-cottage room. True, he had somehow lost the only woman he’d ever loved, and despite his business successes, the past year had been pretty hellish emotionally. He was spending a small fortune on what was almost certainly a futile bid to win her back, and he had no solution to the problem that had split them up in the first place—her job remained in San Jose, his company was putting down roots in Seattle since he’d moved it there nine months earlier, neither of them wanted to live in the other’s town, and none of that was likely to change.
But he was definitely in the best shape of his life.
* * *
The moment Amanda walked out of the resort’s incredibly well-appointed lobby, her headache started to ebb. One massive ear-pop, the sliding sensation of something loosening in her sinuses, and the keen ache faded to a barely perceptible throb. The attendant nausea waned to a minor background annoyance. The worst was over.
She knew it was coincidence, but it was almost as though exposure to such concentrated beauty vanquished the pain. The walk from the resort hotel’s swanky lobby was like entering Shangri-La, or stepping into Willy Wonka’s giant chocolate room. Amanda couldn’t help appreciating the tropical splendors and classy amenities despite the pain lingering behind her eyes and lurking at the base of her skull.
The semidetached cabin suite had a private lanai with a nearly clear view across a lawn and the beach down to the water, with only a few strategic hedges and coconut palms to add privacy and frame the image. Life inside a “Wish you were here” postcard would look like this, all pale golden sand and turquoise water in surfer-perfect waves, tanned bodies frolicking along the wide, deep strip of beach that curved along the sheltered bay. The view in the other direction was nearly as amazing; the room was gorgeous, a sleekly high-end display of modern design. Highly polished wood, fresh tropical flowers and a general air of expensiveness permeated the place. Amanda immediately wanted to stay there forever.
When she and Julie celebrated their room’s awesomeness, jumping up and down and squealing, Amanda began to feel like she was finally on vacation. Sadly, she also knew she’d have some work to do. The combination of stress, the headache and her usual ineptitude with small talk had resulted in a certain amount of bitchiness on the plane and in the limo on the way over. If she wanted to woo Alan, she was off to a terrible start.
But they had time. Not a lot, but enough. Amanda’s determination to take affirmative getting-over-Jeremy steps returned when she realized she was still seeing him in passing strangers. Like the hottie who jogged past their cottage’s lanai when they sat outside to enjoy the view.
Amanda enjoyed the view very much indeed, even if the guy made her think of Jeremy. Not just Jeremy, though. He looked like a damn movie star from the back, but she couldn’t think which one. Shirtless, in only a pair of navy-and-white board shorts and running shoes, he looked a little pale for the tropical setting, but other than that, too perfect for real life. Broad shoulders, lean muscles shifting across his back as he ran. His short sandy hair was damp, possibly from sweat, and she was struck with a craving to know what it felt like. Soft or stiff, prickly or like thick wet velvet? Had he been swimming, was he wet all over?
God. He might not be all that wet, but now she sort of was.
She and Julie both stared in silent admiration as the guy crossed the patch of lawn and disappeared between the hibiscus-laden bushes that separated their cottage row from the next. When his toned back and delectable thighs were finally out of sight, the girls released a sigh in tandem.
“Whoa. Is it just me, or did he look familiar?”
Julie nodded. “Not just you. I didn’t see his face, but he still looked like James Bond. One of the awesome Bonds, too. He totally looked capable of kicking someone’s ass while making a tux look good. I wonder how long he’s staying. I didn’t see a wedding ring....”
That’s who he looked like. Daniel Craig. Not Jeremy at all.
“You took the time to look at his finger? Wow. I didn’t even think of that. I was mesmerized by the ass and his ability to carry off a crew cut. For me, a guy like that is completely theoretical, anyway, so why worry about whether he’s actually with someone? It could only hinder the fantasizing.” After all, even if she did plan to make a move on Alan, she was still perfectly free to look elsewhere.
“It matters. He’s a different person if he’s with somebody. And what if you fantasize now, then have to watch him mack on some other girl every night at dinner? Or some guy, or whatever. That shit gets painful. Better to be forewarned. But hey, why should he only be theoretical to you? You’re adorable. If he’s single you should go for it.”
Stranger danger. And even if the guy had looked a little like Jeremy, he also looked as though he could actually be dangerous. He was made of muscle. He could probably bench-press a mild-mannered software genius like her ex. Amanda wouldn’t stand a chance. Alan was a safe bet for a lot of reasons, and being a known quantity was a big one.
“I’m a stocky elf. You’re gorgeous, and you’ve seen all the James Bond movies. You’re like Adventure Girl. You should go after him yourself.” Thereby freeing up Alan’s time.
“Are you bailing out on the frisky vacation-hookup high jinks?”
Dear God no. “No, I’m still one hundred percent on board with that. I need to get laid like whoa. I’m going insane.”
“It hasn’t been that long.”
They had discussed their plans to pursue some sweet, sweet vacation sexytimes, but hadn’t gotten into specifics. Amanda certainly hadn’t declared her intentions toward Alan, and Julie had only a vague notion of finding somebody in a bar or on the beach. She’d seemed to take the whole thing lightly, so Amanda had matched that tone. She hadn’t admitted how desperate she was for contact, but she let it slip now.
“It has been ten months, ten days, and I lost track of the hours at daylight savings time, but it’s a lot of hours. It has been a long time.” Saying it out loud made it seem even longer. Hopelessly so. “I have run through way too many batteries. Jeremy may have been an asshole, but he’s a tough act to follow.”
Julie slipped into a horrified silence, then shrugged sheepishly before she finally responded. “You should definitely get up to some vacation naughtiness, then.”
It was dumb, because she knew there was nothing between Julie and Alan, but Amanda was still loath to get into too much detail about her intended naughtiness. “I plan to. I mean, I already have kind of a specific plan. Probably a really bad one, if history tells me anything, but at least it’s something. You should find somebody, too, though.”
“I’ll think about it. Right now I’m mostly thinking about getting my bikini on and finding a fancy umbrella drink before dinner. You in?”
She’d been looking forward to her first fancy umbrella drink since shortly after she’d told Julie she’d