Page 7 of Just My Luck

Looking bemused, he nodded. A trickle of blood slid down his neck.

“You look like you got bitten by a vampire. Can you take care of that yourself, or do you need a hand?”

“I got it.” He touched his neck, seemingly surprised to see blood. “I’ll clear out now. Thanks for getting me out. I promise I won’t forget it.”

So serious. “You’ll put me in your will, is that it?” she teased.

It took him a moment to see that she was joking. Did that mean he actually had a will? Why would a gardener who looked to be in his thirties have a will? There was definitely something odd about this particular groundskeeper.

“Don’t worry about it.” She waved off his thanks, then followed him out of the kitchen. “Us plebes have to stick together, right?”

She didn’t understand the expression that crossed his face. Was he insulted that she’d called him a plebe? She hadn’t meant it that way. In her experience, the most uncongenial people were the ones at the top of the ladder. But that might be a side effect of her job.

At least he wasn’t swaying anymore as he strode out of the hale and into the bright sunshine. She wondered if she’d run into him again somewhere on the property. Maybe it would be like learning a new word and then seeing it everywhere.

Since he was kind of hot—she always did go for scruff and rough edges—she hoped their paths would cross again. She still wanted to know why he’d stuck his head under the sink of hale twelve, and then managed to avoid offering any explanation at all.

4

“What do you know about Zara?” Lincoln asked Benito, the gardener he was paired up with for the day.

They’d been assigned the task of scrubbing a retaining wall made from lava rock. The mortar holding the rocks together tended to accumulate dirt, which ruined its crisp look. Since this particular wall was part of the resort’s entrance, the black rock contrasting with the vibrant purple of bougainvillea vines, it had to be cleaned on a regular basis.

He sincerely hoped this would be his last round of mortar scrubbing. It was hard work out here in the hot sun. Sweat ran down his face under the straw hat Benito had lent him.

Us plebes have to stick together.

Why did he keep running back everything Zara had said during that fairly mortifying encounter? She was even more captivating up close, with honey-gold eyes and an aura of laughter and freedom. He could still feel her body pressed against his, still smell the fresh coconut scent of her hair. She’d smelled like the beach, like running across a lawn flying a kite, or diving for the ball during a game of touch football.

“Zara, the girl at the desk?” Benito changed his position so he was squatting. There was no comfortable stance from which to scrub mortar, Lincoln had discovered. You just had to keep changing it up.

“Yes.”

“Been working here for about six months. Every single guy took a shot, even a couple of married ones. They all want to be her sugar daddy. Got slapped down one by one. Not me, man,” he added quickly.

Of course not—Benito was recently married and expecting a baby. His wife packed a lunch for him every day and he always brought flowers home with him. Sometimes he spent the day making up love poems for her.

“Sugar daddy?”

“Yeah, cause of the situation with her family.” Benito rinsed off his scrub brush and shook the excess water onto the grass.

“You mean, her brother and sister?”

“Yeah. She’s their guardian now. Father got in trouble with the law. They say he tried to flee from the cops in a sailboat. Wasn’t too hard to catch up to him.”

The man sounded like a dim bulb to Lincoln, which didn’t fit with what he’d seen of his children.

“So Zara’s taking care of her siblings now?”

“That’s it. Don’t know where Mama is. Heard she’s in a cult.”

He said it so casually that Lincoln gave a double-take. “I’m sorry, a cult?”

“Sure, probably over in Puna. More cults than coconut trees over there. They say she fell for the cult leader and left the family to go live off the land and eat seaweed.”

So both of Zara’s parents had flaked out and left Zara in charge. Amazing that she still had that carefree quality to her, which he’d noticed even in the storage closet as she grabbed a pillow.

“So Zara’s a local?”