I tell myself that I’m going with him because I’m drunk, and I need a place to change into dry clothes, and I don’t want to do it in the lobby bathroom or the locker room near the swimming pool. I tell myself that Charles Cash is the ticket to the kind of time I deserve to have here. I tell myself I don’t care that a tree fell on my bungalow and could have crushed me to death.

None of it’s true.

Well, it’s true that I’m drunk. That is the God’s honest truth. But more than that, I want to look at his face.

His gorgeous, sculpted face.

I’m not about to fall in love with anyone, but standing near the swim-up bar by myself didn’t excite me. Three drinks later, I let myself admit—silently—that the reason I wasn’t having fun was because Charlie wasn’t there. I was surrounded by assholes, drunk ones, just like me, but for the first time, it made me nervous to be sipping from a glass in front of them.

He carries my suitcase to the elevator, presses the call button, and steps in when the elevator car arrives.

I step in after him.

He considers me, his blue eyes steady, as the doors shut and the car rises.

“What?”

He cracks a little smile. “I thought you’d put up more of a fight.”

“What do I have to fight about?”

“You didn’t take me up on my offer earlier. I thought that meant you never would.”

“I never pass up a good solo date.” The drinks—mixed ones of indeterminate composition, something fruity and wonderful—are making my tongue feel loose. I’m ready to have fun. Fuck salvaging my life. A disaster could happen any time. And look! One happened today. I almost didn’t miss it. “Or a free room, when I don’t have one.”

“Who said the room was free?” 

I feel my mouth drop open, because here’s the flirty Charlie Cash, come out to play again. Maybe he’s decided to have a good time after all, instead of embarking on an endless debate about what could possibly be the right thing to do.

There’s a darkness in the center of my chest that whispers, it doesn’t matter if you do the right thing. It doesn’t matter at all. 

At the door to his room, he takes a flat key card from his pocket and waves it over the scanner on the door. The lock clicks. He pushes the door open with one shoulder and hefts my suitcase inside, then stands back to let me through first.

This suite looks even classier now that I’m not hustling out to do my own personal walk of shame across the resort.

“Nice,” I say under my breath, and turn to face him. “So, what are we going to do now?”

He navigates my suitcase on its wheels into a small alcove, then straightens up, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re soaking wet.”

I give him a wicked grin. Why the hell not? “You’re right about that.”

He smiles back, a half-smile that makes desire crack like an egg at the base of my neck and race all the way down my spine. I can’t make up my mind about whether Charlie hates me or wants me more than anything. It could be both, for all I know. “I thought you might like a hot shower.”

“I might like more than a shower…” I let the suggestion linger in the air. We’ve had sex twice already, but Charlie is reticent.

“That’s entirely up to you, Josephine. If you’re still on your solo—”

I stride across the room to where he’s standing and throw my arms around his neck, yanking him down into a kiss. He doesn’t hesitate. He wraps his arms around my waist and pulls me in, kissing me back like I’m setting him free.

I am setting him free, whether he knows it or not. 

I gasp for a breath when we come up for air, the energy between us arcing right to my toes. “Stop being so fucking careful,” I hiss, planting hot kisses down the side of his neck. “Stop being so serious. You’re going to kill yourself, all this work and seriousness, and it doesn’t matter in the end. Don’t you know that? Don’t you know that?”

“You’re such a brat,” he growls, and then he’s backing us both toward the bathroom, my clothes being torn off as we go, and when he kicks the door shut behind us, I discover there’s no need for words.