Carly took a shower to get the sand out of her hair. She’d read half of the trashy novel and spent longer at the beach than she’d intended. Penelope still hadn’t shown up, and Carly was starting to worry. This was pretty late, even for her somewhat flakey friend.

She dried off, put on a rainbow-colored maxi dress and strappy sandals, and scrunched wet hair in her hands. She might as well just let it be curly—straightening it every day of vacation was going to take way too much time out of her relaxation schedule.

Carly made her way to the kitchen counter and dug in her purse for the cell phone. She pulled it out and checked it, but there were no missed calls or texts. She frowned and checked the time. Seven. Penny was due hours ago. Carly tapped the phone’s contact list and scrolled down to her best friend’s name. She touched it and held the phone to her ear, holding her breath. What if Penny had been in an accident or something?

But the phone only rang twice before her friend answered breathlessly. “I’m so sorry.”

Carly grinned in relief. “Where are you? Are you almost here? This place is amazing.” She crossed the floor to look out the French doors toward the ocean.

“I’m at the airport. Heading to Mexico.”

Carly opened her mouth to respond but closed it again when she couldn’t immediately find appropriate words to say. Penny was always late and there was no one more impulsive, but Carly had never expected her friend to stand her up. This was supposed to be their post-graduation vacation. Their week to absolutely live it up like crazy before they entered the working world for the rest of their lives.

Not that Penny had a job lined up. She had a degree in archaeology and big dreams of traveling the world making fantastic discoveries with her boyfriend, Ty. He’d been her TA in Archaeology 101 her freshman year, and they’d been together ever since. When Ty had graduated the year before and gotten a job at the university, it was a dream come true for both of them. Ty had promised Penny to help her get a job there when she was done with her degree, but it hadn’t materialized so far.

“Are you there?” Penny’s voice sounded tense. “I’m so sorry, girl. I totally forgot to call you.”

“Yeah, I’m here. Why aren’t you coming?”

“Ty got called to the Yucatan peninsula. A group of researchers from the university found a new archaeological site there.” The concern in her voice had melted away into pure excitement. Carly smiled as she imagined Penny bouncing on the balls of her feet while she spoke, setting her glasses to bobbing on her nose. “Ty went and talked to the dean, and she agreed to hire me as a research assistant to go on the trip too! If I do well, she’s going to hire me full-time when we get back.” She gave a little excited squeal.

“That’s awesome, Pen!” Carly felt a twinge of disappointment that their vacation wasn’t going to happen, but her best friend’s enthusiasm was catchy. She couldn’t help but feel happy too.

“Thanks. I’m really sorry about our vacation, though. Don’t worry—my part’s all paid for. Mom said she’d still cover it. So, you get the place to yourself for half the cost.” Penny paused and then spoke again, her voice full of affection. “I hope you have the best time of your life. You deserve it.”

Carly laughed. “I don’t know about the best time of my life, but it’s definitely relaxing here. And I expect to get the best tan of my life anyway.”

They said their goodbyes and hung up, and Carly stood gazing at the ocean for another moment. She sighed and crossed her arms, feeling a little sorry for herself. How would she keep herself busy for the next week without getting totally lonely and bored?

She turned toward the kitchen, suddenly not very interested in going through the trouble of grilling chicken and chopping vegetables for salad. It seemed like too much to do for just herself.

She saw the wine and went and poured herself a glass. Then she wandered over to the entertainment center and fiddled with the stereo until she found some nice classical music. As she took the first sip of wine and swayed a little bit to the music, Carly thought that maybe this wasn’t such a bad thing. Penny would have had her bouncing around between night clubs and shopping sprees, and the time would have flown by. Now she could spend it doing what she wanted when she wanted to do it without having to deal with anyone else’s schedule. She could take baths in the soaking tub, watch sunsets on the beach, cook elaborate meals or warm up a frozen pizza depending on how she felt, and just spend the time totally spoiling herself.

She might have to grab a couple additional sexy romance novels when she went to town to get her through the week, but otherwise, she could be completely selfish and self-indulgent.

Yeah, that sounded kind of perfect.

Once the week was over, Carly would be heading back to her parents’ house and starting a new, hard-won job at a busy online newspaper. She planned to throw herself completely into her work and write the best, most evocative stories possible. She was going to change the world. She knew it would take at least six months of work before she could afford her own place. In the meantime, she’d have very little alone time while living with her folks.

So a nice, solitary beach vacation would be just the thing to recharge her soul, reset her mind from school life to the real world, and get her ready to dive headfirst into the exciting life of a journalist that she longed for.

A knock at the front door pulled her out of her thoughts. She frowned. She was barely five minutes into a solitary vacation and someone was already bothering her. She sighed and moved toward the door. It was probably the home owners making sure she’d arrived and gotten settled.

When Carly opened the door, she stood face to face with a handsome blond man who was smiling at her, displaying a picture-perfect row of straight white teeth. “Hi,” he said in a deep, resonating voice that seemed to rumble up from somewhere in his chest.

“Hi,” she answered. He was pretty attractive, and she hadn’t had a boyfriend in about a year, so Carly’s body was trying to react to him even though her mind told her he looked like a surfer dude she’d have nothing in common with. Still, she had to fight to force her spine to stay put. It wanted to arch and thrust her breasts at the guy.

“I saw your car and thought I’d stop over and say hi. Some of my friends and I are renting the house a couple doors down.” He jerked his jaw to the left. When Carly poked her head out to follow his gesture, she caught a glimpse of movement from the opposite direction. It was the guy who’d driven up in the Ford earlier, getting back in the truck. She tried to drag her eyes back toward the blond guy in front of her, but they revolted. Suddenly, her body was no longer trying to seduce the buff surfer dude on the porch. The dark-haired neighbor in the other direction interested it much more.

“Anyway, my name is Rob. You’re welcome down at our place anytime. We’ll be partying round the clock for the next few days.” He grinned.

Carly forced her attention back to Rob as the Ford backed out of the neighboring driveway. “Thanks. I’m planning on a nice, quiet getaway this week. But I’ll keep it in mind if I get an urge to party.”

She started to close the door, but Rob spoke again. “Alone sounds boring.”

Now that her hormones had settled down, Carly was getting irritated with this guy. He didn’t even know her—how dare he call her boring? But she couldn’t deny that some tiny, totally rebellious and stupid part of her was interested in his offer. She knew she should let loose more. Take some chances. Experience the wilder side of life. But that was what Penny was for—to drag her into crazier situations than she’d willingly head into herself. And Penny wasn’t here.

“I’ll keep it in mind,” she repeated and finally managed to close the door, blocking out his smiling, tan face.

She really hoped the partyers two doors down wouldn’t be too noisy. Carly wanted to sleep, read, sunbathe, and cook in relative quiet. Nothing too crazy. Nothing too noisy.

Her stomach growled, and she decided it was time to cook. Her motivation to cook a nice meal for herself had returned. Maybe the wine had pulled it back out. She topped off her glass, got the chicken and barbecue sauce out of the refrigerator, and headed for the deck. There were speakers on the deck, piping out the stereo’s music. When the sea air hit her, she felt happy. Yeah, this was going to be an amazing week.

Once the grill was hot and she had the chicken going, Carly headed back into the house with her wine to get the salad together.

The next hour passed pleasantly. Carly ate dinner at the chic red and black checked bistro table on the deck and returned there after she’d cleaned up the leftover food and dishes. She brought the glass of wine along and finished her romance novel while the sun set over the ocean.

As she headed to bed, she couldn’t help smiling. This was going to be a nice, quiet, rejuvenating vacation.