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“You still certain you don’t want to bolt? I won’t hold it against you.”
She was certain she’d never wanted to bolt less in her life.
Glancing around at the sea of bodies taking over the narrow strip of sand, the only thing she wanted to get away from was the jam-packed hum of the bar.
“I swear I don’t mean this the way it’s going to sound, but do you want to go back to my hotel?” She couldn’t remember the last time she’d really cared whether a woman said yes or no. She blathered on. “I can make us dinner. I’m a decent cook.”
Without hesitation, Kameryn got to her feet, digging a twenty out of her wallet. “It sounded more fun,” she teased, dropping the bill on the table, “when it sounded the way you didn’t mean it to sound.”
Dillon sat for a second, trying to decide how one person could be so many things. Forward, reticent. Knock-out-pretty, self-effacing. And somehow, she imagined, she’d barely scratched the surface.
Pulling her hat back on her head, she stood. The one thing she knew—for the first time since Kelsey—she didn’t want to screw this up.
“Cart before the horse, Kam-Kameryn,” she smiled, glad when Kam took her hand, weaving their way toward the street. “It may be you who wants to bolt once you’ve tried my cooking.”
Scene 11
Dillon wasn’t a decent cook.
She was a chef.
And not the run-of-the-mill, garden variety, slap-a-sauce-on-a-pasta-and-call-it-gourmet kind. I’m talking haute cuisine, premium ingredients, artistry on a plate. I didn’t know anyone could whip up a pan-seared sea bass with a chive velouté sauce and roasted kohlrabi from the kitchenette of a hotel suite, but I supposed, if anyone could do it, Dillon was the perfect candidate. I doubted there was much she couldn’t do, if she put her mind to it. She just seemed like that type of person. Driven. Focused. Talented.
When she brought out the meal to where I was sitting on her private lanai, I’d been in the process of demolishing the polish on my left thumbnail. Until I saw the flakes of paint scattered on my lap, I hadn’t even been aware I’d resorted to the nervous habit.
It had been one thing while we were out, crammed amidst the crowds of vacationing beachgoers, to talk big, to gasconade, to flirt like it was the Name of the Game. Like I had any clue what the hell I was doing or how to proceed. But now that we were alone, departed from the downtown bar scene, I felt like an overstrung bow—my synapses wound too tight, with no space for the neurons in between.
I know Dillon must have noticed. One would have to be insentient to not feel the tension radiating from me. But it never changed her languid demeanor.
“It’s not Gordon Ramsay,” she said, settling into the wicker patio chair overlooking the private beach, “but it’s better than pub grub.”
I took a bite of the sea bass—tender on the inside, perfectly seared on the exterior—and temporarily forgot my threadbare nerves. “Wow.” I glanced at her. It was probably the best fish I’d ever had.
She smiled. “See, I told you I was decent.”
“I didn’t peg you as a humblebragger.”
The admonishment brought her lopsided smile. “Alright,” she conceded. “My dad had a thing for the kitchen. He was an engineer, but his passion revolved around everything culinary. I guess a bit of it rubbed off on me.”
“So I see.”
We ate in silence—I think both of us were hungrier than we realized—and when we finished, she scooped up our plates, and returned a few minutes later with a pair of frosted bottles. I was a little surprised as she popped the metal caps—though she’d ordered a beer in Hana, I noticed she never actually drank it, and at the bar tonight she’d had a seltzer. My interest must have been apparent, because she raised her eyebrows in inquiry as she handed me the bottle.
“What?”
On the spot, I didn’t have time to think of a better response. “For some reason, I didn’t think you drank.”
“I don’t, typically. I like to be the best at everything I do. Drinking was no different. I got a little too good at it a while back, but found I race better without a hangover.” She took a sip. “Still, sometimes it’s worth it to make an exception. How else am I going to get you drunk enough to sleep with me?”
I’d barely set the bottle to my lips, realizing too late it was nothing more than a non-alcoholic ginger beer, but her jesting comment caught me off guard. I immediately swallowed the pungent drink down the wrong pipe, and was overcome by a racking cough as I cleared the fizzy water.
“I’m sorry,” I managed, gasping as my choking drew to a minimum. I don’t know if my ears actually turned red with embarrassment, or if it was only my imagination.
“Easy there. I’m just winding you up.”
Tears continued to stream down my cheeks as I shook my head, mortified she felt the need to clarify. Of course I knew she was teasing.
“I’m sorry,” I said again, “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”
