Luke

The day just went from bad to worse. My mom’s plan to distract my brothers with pyramids failed in epic fashion. Now they weren’t just depressed and missing my dad, but they were also hungry, tired, sweaty, and cranky.

So was I.

Mom wasn’t doing so hot herself. All four of us dragged ourselves out of the rental car and the short walk to the hotel felt like miles.

My mom and I tried valiantly to keep things from falling even further into a vat of crap. I promised my brothers ice cold pops when we got back to the bungalow and Mom was reciting all the “fun” things we could do tonight, Christmas Eve. Her list faltered after “watch a Christmas movie.” It was all downhill after that. Sit outside and look at the stars wasn’t exactly a hit with the younger crowd, and sing Christmas carols around a bonfire got quizzical looks from all of us. Looks that clearly said, have you lost your mind?

Our situation got mildly less awful after we all piled into their bungalow and I got a movie going. I let Kevin pick this time.

Back to the Future…again. My brothers had never seen it before this trip and now they were obsessed.

This was all fine and good until Biff came onto the screen. Now, my nerdy new friend hadn’t outright called me Biff. No one had called me that but me, I supposed. But I still hated the sight of him. I’d managed to avoid thinking about certain aspects of my conversations with Maya while we were sightseeing. Granted, I hadn’t stopped thinking about her. If anything the mind-numbing tour guide’s barely audible commentary at the site made the perfect white noise for my runaway daydreams.

So no, I hadn’t stopped thinking about her once as this interminable day went on. That actually made it feel even more insufferable because I knew she was here, at the hotel, doing something without me.

It didn’t matter what she was doing without me, I just wanted to be doing it too.

Why? I didn’t know. I mean, I did know. I liked her. There was no denying it. She was a surprise hottie—I suddenly had a whole new appreciation for the term diamond in the rough. Take the turtleneck and harsh bun away, and the girl was a freakin’ ten.

But more than that, I liked being around her. I liked talking to her and trying to get past that hard shell of hers. Those moments when I teased a smile out of her were addictively satisfying. Better than a runner’s high, better than beer, better than making out with one of the girls I used to hook up with at school.

So yeah, my trek through living hell with my brothers helped me see the full extent of this new fascination.

I liked her. I liked Maya a lot.

And Maya?

Well, apparently she wasn’t so keen on me.

And that was why I didn’t have the patience to sit there and watch Biff be a bastard. I had a horrible feeling that was how she saw me—or how she used to see me, at the very least.

A knock on the door had me sitting upright so quickly my brothers turned to stare. I ignored the looks as my mom went to answer the door.

Was it weird that my heart was pounding? Probably. This had never happened to me before. I’d been with my share of girls, but I could safely say I’d never lost my cool because one knocked on my door.

My mom let Maya in. I never in my life thought I’d compare Maya the super-serious nerd to a ray of sunshine but standing there in a surprisingly casual T-shirt and jeans, with her hair loose around her shoulders and, believe it or not, a small smile on her lips for my brothers—that’s exactly what she was.

She was sunshine and fresh air and so refreshingly uncomplicated. I mean, the girl had a thick shell, but talking to her was black and white. It was all logic and reason and facts and…desire.

So maybe I should rephrase that. Maya was refreshingly uncomplicated—aside from the complicated feelings she brought on. But now I was feeling much clearer on those as well thanks to some enforced downtime with nothing better to do but think about this girl.

“Hey guys,” she said, ignoring me as she sank onto the couch between my brothers. After last night, I think it was safe to say that Kevin and Adam were just as smitten as I was.

She’d gotten into our blood, apparently, because my brothers and I were all staring at her—fawning might be a more appropriate word. She was too busy watching the TV to notice the gawking. “Ooh, my favorite.”

I wanted them gone. My brothers, my mom, her mom, who’d arrived right after her looking just as refreshed with a bigger version of Maya’s smile.

It might be Christmas Eve but I wanted my family temporarily gone so I could have a moment alone with Maya. Now that I was clear on the fact that I liked her—really liked her—I wanted to make her feel the same.

And I could, I just needed time. Alone time. Which…was definitely not in the cards anytime soon.

Maya’s mom took one look at our sorry clan and went into action, ordering my brothers into the bathroom to freshen up for dinner and me to head back to my room to change. I wouldn’t normally have loved having a stranger come into our lives and order us around, but I saw my mom’s relief at not having to be in charge anymore and realized that we all needed someone to take over.

My mom was beat, I was distracted, and my brothers were miserable. Somebody needed to take the reins and someone outside this mess of a family seemed like the obvious choice. I had a feeling my mom would have been happy if Lila offered to adopt the whole family at this point.

I looked to Maya, who was making a calm, rational argument for why Kevin should indeed put on a clean shirt and how he’d be thankful later when he wasn’t wearing shorts and a sleeveless shirt on a windy beach.

Then she casually mentioned that he wouldn’t be able to help her roast marshmallow for s’mores if he wasn’t wearing appropriate bonfire attire.

Maya won that debate hands down.

I headed to my room and took a quick shower before throwing on clean clothes and hurrying back. Yes, it was Christmas Eve, and I wished I could say that I wanted to get back over there so I could be there for my family who needed me. The reality, though, was I wanted to see Maya.

I hated the way we’d left things this morning. When she’d slipped away from me, it had felt…unfinished. Unresolved. I hated that feeling.

I also despised the fact that I’d upset her. And I clearly had. That cold, emotionless wall of hers had visibly shaken and almost tumbled when I’d pushed her on the fact that she didn’t know how to swim.

Maybe it was just that she was embarrassed. I mean, the girl was more than a little confident in her superiority. When it came to book smarts, at least. But judging by the way she shamelessly huffed and puffed during that pathetic jog, I highly doubted she took great pride in her physical prowess.

So no, I didn’t think she’d been rattled by the fact that she was lacking in swimming skills. It was something else. Something deeper. And by now I couldn’t even begin to deny that I’d become addicted to these glimpses of the real Maya. The one she hid from the rest of the world—particularly me, and the majority of Briarwood.

Did her boyfriend see these parts of her? He must have. I had to pause before entering my mom’s suite or risk everyone seeing the murderous rage I couldn’t even begin to hide.

I had no idea who this boyfriend was, but I hated him solely based on the fact that he’d been privy to this Maya I was just starting to discover. The one beneath the uptight exterior.

She’s got the sexy librarian thing going on. Kyle’s words came back to me. That kid hadn’t known what he was talking about. She wasn’t a sexy librarian. She was just sexy. And smart. And interesting. And challenging.

And she had a boyfriend.

I took a deep breath and listened to the sound of Christmas carols coming from the radio on the other side. No, she had an ex-boyfriend, that’s what he was no matter what terms she wanted to put around it.

If you were on a break, you were broken up. Even I knew that.

I cocked my head to one side and then the other, trying to loosen some of this crazy tension.

The ex wasn’t here. I was. I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, a sort of pre-race ritual that helped calm me when my temper threatened to get out of hand. But this time it wasn’t my temper. It was the need to win. The urge to conquer. Whether she’d meant to or not, Maya had thrown down the gauntlet when she’d mentioned this ex-boyfriend, and I knew what I had to do.

I had to win. I had to make her mine. At least for the time being. Once I had a taste of her, then this obsession would leave my system. It was always that way with me and a challenge. Once I conquered it, I moved on—a new swimming competitor, a new race, a new girl. It was all the same.

So yeah, I’d crack Maya’s shell, I’d get her to like me back, and then when this thing ran its course, we could both go our own way—no harm, no foul.

Guilt nagged at me, holding me back when I reached out for the door.

For all her knowledge and her ex-boyfriend and her smokin’ hot body, Maya struck me as an innocent. I might’ve been a cocky alpha male, but like I’d said—I wasn’t Biff. I wasn’t some cold, heartless douchebag.

I heard Maya call out to one of my brothers from inside. She was reminding him that he’d need a jacket in that flat, monotone voice of hers.

I wasn’t a douchebag, but then again, Maya wasn’t some emotional girl, either. She thrived on logic and reason. Hadn’t she been the one to commend me for my non-romantic methods of appeasing my needs?

Hell, she’d been approving of it, and why wouldn’t she be? Non-emotions were her jam. As long as I was up front with her, as long as I explained it in terms she could understand, I had every reason to believe she’d be on board with this plan. After all, emotions aside, she had needs too. She might not act like it, but she was human, and I was almost positive that she wanted my body as much as I wanted hers. She might not be emotive, but she couldn’t hide the desire in her eyes when she’d been ogling my bare chest.

This could be a win-win. A way to salvage the Christmas from hell, and a way for me to get over this weird new obsession.

She was a challenge, and it was one I could win.

I finally inserted the keycard and let myself in. As soon as I opened the door, her gaze met mine. She was unreadable, but God she was so hot.

For the first time all day, I found myself looking forward to Christmas and all this holiday crap. I gave her a smile as I walked over to help her carry a box full of provisions down to the beach.

“Come on,” I said, nodding toward the door. “Let’s get this party started.”

She fell into step beside me as our moms wrangled my brothers.

“What is all this stuff?” I asked.

“It’s Christmas.”

I grinned despite her serious tone. Or maybe because of it. Her humor was definitely an acquired taste, but I was starting to look forward to her rare displays of humanity in all their forms. Just like her smiles, her attempts at jokes were so rare and not-obvious that it made me feel like a rock star when I was the lucky recipient of either.

Did her ex-boyfriend feel that way?

He’d better, the nerdy bastard. Or, at least, I assumed he was a fellow nerd.

“So, tell me about your ex.” I kind of surprised myself with that one. Step one to seducing a girl did not typically involve asking about the ex. But then, Maya wasn’t typical, and I was curious as all hell. Maybe, just maybe, I’d learn something about the mysteries of Maya if I knew more about her relationship.

She glanced over at me. “What do you want to know?”

I shrugged. How did he win over that untouchable heart of yours? “How did you meet?”

“At a math competition.” She was serious and I caught myself before I could laugh.

“So it was a romantic first meeting then,” I said instead.

I caught a flicker of a smile and stopped myself from shouting Score!

“Oh yes, very romantic.” She glanced over again. “I helped him solve his equation.”

I pulled back as if in shock. “Maya Rivero, was that sarcasm?”

She ignored me as she shifted the smaller box in her hands and I took it from her, piling it atop the one I was already carrying. “So, what happened?” I asked. “Your eyes met over a calculator and it was love at first sight?”

She furrowed her brows as she looked at me. There was a full moon overhead as we reached the beach and it made the ocean glow in its light. I could see her just as clearly here as I could back in the bungalow and I watched with amusement and fascination as she clearly studied my face. I guessed she was trying to gauge how serious I was, and how much I was judging her.

“Love at first sight doesn’t exist,” she said.

Her response surprised me, but it shouldn’t have. I grinned down at her. God, I loved talking to this girl. “You’re an odd duck, you know that, right?”

She took a deep breath and let it out with a sigh. “I know that’s the nicest way of putting it I’ve ever heard—especially from you.”

I winced. “You’re really not going to let me live down my past behavior, are you?”

She turned to me with a serious expression. “Only if you insist on bringing up my social oddities.”

I blinked at her. “Social oddity. Is that what you think you are?”

“I don’t know. I suppose so.” She shrugged. “I’m okay with that.”

“You seem to hold a grudge toward me and the others for thinking the same thing, so I’d suggest that perhaps you’re not as okay with it as you think you are.”

Damn. For a guy who was looking to get some action, I was doing a bang-up job over here. So far I’d managed to offend her and now I was challenging her on it. I loved to get under her skin and I couldn’t seem to stop.

I saw a flicker of a smile and felt a surge of triumph in response.

Maybe my instincts were right with her, even if they seemed counterintuitive. I mean, she clearly liked engaging in these little battles so maybe I was onto something here.

Sure enough, I could practically feel a spark between us as she turned to face me fully. “You proudly admit that you’re a star athlete, right?”

“Right.”

One side of her lips hitched up in an almost smile. “But you didn’t love hearing me call you a dumb jock, correct?”

I stopped. The words made me stiffen. Yeah, I got her point. Still, she spelled it out for me. “I am happy with who I am, Luke, but that doesn’t mean I like the way other people see me.”

I nodded. “Yeah, okay. I get that.”

We walked in silence until we reached the setting for a bonfire that Maya and her mom must have built earlier in the day. No one else was on the beach and the setting was too perfect.

“Here, let me help you with that,” I said. We got the fire underway with a surprising ease between us, given the fact that we’d just touched on some sensitive topics. But Maya, unsurprisingly, didn’t seem to hold on to those emotions, and I was too busy trying to figure out how to pitch my proposal.

She crouched in front of the newly flickering flames as she added another log. When she came to stand, dusting off her palms on her jeans, I was standing right next to her. So close we were practically touching.

This was it. My heart raced at the feel of her so close, at the scent of her shampoo mixed in with the smoke and the salty breeze. God, I wanted to kiss this girl more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life.

She tilted her head up and her dark eyes met mine, so dark and so mysterious. There were emotions there, I was sure of it, but they were unreadable. Unfathomable.

I needed to kiss her. But my conscience wouldn’t let me. Not until I’d been straight with her about what this was. Or rather, what it wasn’t.

“Maya, I—”

She stopped me with a kiss. I stood there frozen as her lips crashed against mine, her hands on my chest as she balanced on her tiptoes. Fire shot through me at the feel of her warm, soft lips against mine and my shock was replaced by desire so hot and fierce it put our bonfire to shame.

I pulled her close, my arms wrapping around her waist and crushing her to me as I took over the kiss, slanting my mouth over hers so I could claim her the way I’d been dying to since…oh hell, it felt like since forever, but that couldn’t be true.

She moaned into my mouth and no win had ever felt this satisfying. No race had ever made my heart pound so fiercely. No touch had ever felt so right.

My tongue teased hers as I held her so tight her feet dangled above the sand. Her soft curves molded to me like she was made to be in my arms. Like all these years of working out had been to sculpt my body to meet hers, just like this.

I could have stayed like that for hours…I could have kissed her for the rest of my life and been happy as hell.

But that, of course, wasn’t in the cards. Thank God for my loud little brothers because I heard them coming long before the whole crew reached the beach. Maya heard them too and she bolted out of my arms, backing away so quickly I was worried she’d backpedal all the way to the ocean.

I started to go after her. Not to kiss her—much as I might want to, there was a time and a place and this was neither. Not when our families were about to descend at any moment for some Christmas cheer.

“We need to talk,” I started. But then I heard my voice and I stopped. Ah hell, when did I become the needy chick? Honestly that’s how I’d sounded. And that’s how my inner voice sounded, which was even more disturbing. What did this mean? Where was this going?

What the hell had that kiss done to me?

My brothers’ voices drew closer and I made myself stop advancing on Maya. If I got any closer, I’d kiss her again. I wouldn’t be able to help it. That kiss had done something to me. I felt winded, like I’d just finished a race. My heart was pounding in my ears. I couldn’t stop thinking about the way she tasted, the way she felt in my arms…

She nodded as she kept backing up so the fire was now between us. “We’ll talk,” she said, shoving her hands into the oversized sweatshirt she’d thrown over her T-shirt. An oversized sweatshirt that should not be sexy on anyone, least of all her petite little frame. How she managed to pull it off I’d never know. All I knew was, staring at her through the flickering flames of a burgeoning bonfire, she was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen.

“We’ll talk later,” she said just as my brothers bounded over a small sand dune and careened toward us, wide-eyed and talking a mile a minute.

The whole concept of a fire on a beach was extraordinary to them on the best of days, but on Christmas Eve and with s’mores involved?

I was pretty sure they wouldn’t sleep for a week they were so excited.

Their presence, followed shortly by our mothers’ meant that I couldn’t ask the embarrassingly needy questions that were threatening to spill out. When could we talk? Did she feel it to?

Was she just as affected by that kiss as I was?

Unsurprisingly, it was hard to tell with Maya. I mean, I’d felt her response in my arms. I was almost positive she’d been just as consumed as I’d been.

And that’s how it felt. I’d been consumed by that kiss.

But now I could only watch her from afar as she interacted with my family. As she and her mom led us through their traditional Christmas Eve.

There was nothing “traditional” about it—but I was starting to see why my mom had thought that might be a good thing. Nothing could put our family back together again. Nothing could make it suck any less that we were going to Skype my dad tomorrow morning while we opened presents rather than have him there helping to open packages and adding his color commentary in the form of dad jokes.

But if we’d stayed home we would have felt his absence more keenly. An attempt to have a normal Christmas with all the same traditions but without a key player would have been just plain depressing.

At the very least my brothers were entertained. Between Christmas carols led loudly by Lila, the novelty of feeding the fire, and chasing constellations using an app on Maya’s phone, they were too entertained to stop and dwell on what night it was and how different things were from every other year.

It wasn’t just my brothers who were distracted. My mom was smiling—genuinely smiling—for the first time in a long time. It wasn’t that weird manic smile, but the real deal as she watched my brothers run and shout as they followed Maya with her magic star app.

Distracted didn’t even begin to cover my state of being. I got just as swept up in the novelty of it all. I’d been tasked with roasting hot dogs and then with helping my brothers with their s’mores. I’d sat next to Maya while we ate and listened to her sing along—off key, I might add.

So yeah, I was distracted all right. And mainly the distraction came in the form of a deceptively seductive and dangerously sweet girl who I’d formerly thought was a nerd.

Well, I still thought she was a big dork, but now I knew better. That awkward, uptight, ice queen image was her defense against being different at Briarwood.

The more I got to know her outside of those halls, the clearer it was that I’d read her all wrong. She wasn’t an ice queen, she just hid her emotions. That kiss was living proof that she wasn’t uptight, she was just inexperienced, around guys and around people. Yes, she was different, and there was no doubt she was a bit socially awkward. But that was a result of her intelligence. She processed the world differently than anyone I’d ever met. The way she saw the world around her was unique…fascinating.

Oh hell, she was fascinating.

And she’d kissed me.

I was still trying to wrap my head around that. Maya Rivero had kissed me. She’d beaten me to it. But why? And what did she want from this?

I’d find out. We’d talk. That’s what I told myself all evening. But it wasn’t until late that night that we got our chance. My brothers were yawning and the moms gathered up their stuff and herded them back toward the hotel.

“You coming?” Maya’s mom asked.

Maya was sitting next to me on a picnic blanket and she shifted, about to stand, but I put a hand on her back and she froze at the gentle contact.

“In a minute,” I said. “We’ll be up soon.”

Her mom smiled before turning back to follow the others up. “Don’t stay up too late.”

Maya didn’t respond and she didn’t move, not even after they were gone and we were alone in front of rapidly smoldering embers. When I shifted so I could face her I saw that she had that closed off look on her face and her shoulders were hunched in like she was cold…or scared.

I wrapped an arm around her in case she was cold—she stiffened at my touch.

We sat there in heavy, tense silence as I tried to figure out if I should pull away or if that would just make this worse.

The tense silence grew awkward so I cleared my throat. I decided to be brutally honest. She liked that sort of thing. “Is it weird that I’m touching you?”

She shook her head. “No.” And then, “Well, maybe.”

I dropped my arm and she shivered. “Sorry, I don’t mean to be weird, it’s just…this is new for me.”

“I figured.” Me too. For some reason I couldn’t bring myself to say that. One of us had to at least act like they knew what they were doing. And I’d hooked up with girls, plenty of girls.

I’d just never felt like this.

She rubbed her palms on her jeans before turning to face me. “I know you’re used to the whole hooking up without a relationship thing, but I’ve never kissed anyone but my boyfriend before.”

I stared at her, unable to look away from her beautiful, serious, clear, honest expression, which was cast in flickering shadows thanks to the flames.

She licked her lips and clasped her hands together in her lap. “But I’ve been thinking over what you said about how you handle your…er, your needs.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or groan at that. My needs? She made it sound like some sort of vitamin deficiency and not desire. I couldn’t bring myself to stop her, though. As always, Maya Rivero fascinated me.

“And?” I prompted. I couldn’t resist.

She drew in a deep breath. “And I see the logic of it. Particularly as it pertains to you and me.”

I stared some more. Because really, what was I supposed to say to that? I thought I knew where she was going with this and it felt like the world’s slowest sucker punch.

“I think I can speak for both of us when I say that there is an attraction here.” She gestured between the two of us as if there might be some doubt as to whom she was referring.

“This is true,” I said. Understatement of the century, but it was true. I’d never felt a spark like that in my life.

She nodded, smoothing her jeans once more. “And I think your idea of how to handle attraction without involving emotions holds merit. Perhaps I’ve gone about this all wrong by kissing you before we spoke, but I thought—”

I grabbed her by her shoulders and pulled her against me, covering her mouth with mine. I needed to feel her again, and I didn’t want to hear what she was about to say.

The hypocrisy of my response didn’t escape me. This was my modus operandi, as she put it. I was the one renowned for hooking up with girls and leaving emotions at the door. But I’d felt gutted hearing Maya explain it in those terms, breaking down that kiss into some sort of lab experiment. Talking about the desire between us as though it were data for a drug trial.

Maybe it was just chemistry between us, but I’d started to think that this was more.

I’d thought she’d felt that it was more too.

After her initial shock, she leaned into the kiss. Her arms circled my neck and she kissed me back eagerly, holding nothing back.

In that moment it was impossible to believe that I’d once thought Maya to be cold and reserved, emotionless and an android.

There was nothing mechanical about her response. She was so very human, so vulnerable and soft. So unique and warm.

She pulled back slightly, her breath coming in short gasps. “Shouldn’t we talk about this? Set the parameters or—”

I kissed her again. Not so much because I didn’t want to hear her talk this time, but because I didn’t want to think about my response.

Yes, we probably should spell out the details, so no one got hurt. I should make it clear that this was just a fling, that we’d go our separate ways as soon as we got back to reality.

But Maya had already spelled that out—or she’d been about to when I cut her off.

I should be pleased. That’s the thought that ran through my head as I pulled her against me once more. I should have been ecstatic. She was offering me a guilt-free, no-strings-attached hookup. That was what I always wanted from girls. It was what I wanted with Maya…

Wasn’t it?

Her lips parted sweetly beneath mine and I stopped thinking all together.

There would be time to sort out these new, wayward emotions. We had time to get to know each other better. To talk about what this was between us.

For now?

Well, for now I’d just enjoy the hell out of this perfect Christmas gift.