Page 2 of A Not-So Holiday Paradise

I have no response to this—not if I don’t want Wes to know that I’m depressingly in love with his best friend. So I simply nod, resigning myself to my splotchy, red fate for the next few hours at least.

Maybe Beckett won’t notice. Maybe the hives will disappear by the time we get to him. Maybe it will just look like a bad sunburn.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

* * *

Don’t askme when I fell in love with Beckett Donovan, because I don’t even know.

It’s not something I’m proud of, being head over heels for my brother’s best friend. Because it’s turned me intothatgirl—the one with a string of unmet dating expectations and standards that are way too high.

Despite the past purple-hair mishap and the current facial rash, I don’t have a horrendous time getting dates. And I’ve tried to go out with other guys. I really have. All kinds of guys, too. Tall and short, introverted and extroverted, cheerful and solemn. I have gone through the dating buffet and tried a little of everything. Some of those guys have been nice. Some of them have been funny.

None of them have been Beckett.

And in the end, that’s all my stubborn heart can focus on: that none of these men have measured up to Beckett Donovan.

Which is absolutely, categorically ridiculous, by the way. It’s not like he’s a god. He has flaws. Not to mention I haven’t seen him in person for years.

Like, actualyears.Roughly nine of them. So it’s a little frustrating that my heart refuses to see sense and move onalready.

But no. I fell in love with him when my young brain was still fragile and impressionable, and like the snippet of a commercial jingle you just can’t forget, he’s been living in my head ever since.

So whenexactlydid I fall for him? I don’t know. Was it during one of the countless driveway basketball games I watched him play with Wes? Maybe. Was it one of the many times he offered to do dishes after having dinner with my family? Also possible. All I know is that it happened. He was always smart, always gracious—if not a little grumpy, even then. He was always around, and I was always paying attention. I paid attention to his flush of embarrassment when my mom sent him home with containers of leftovers, because she knew his mom had left them and his dad worked late. I paid attention to the rare, reluctant smile that never once made his eyes crinkle at the corners. I paid attention to everything he said and did—and even more frequently, the things hedidn’tsay or do.

I paid attention to him, and he never, not once, paid attention to me.

Oh, he wasn’t rude, or anything. He just was three years older than me. I was Baby O’Malley to him, mostly invisible, from the day he first met Wes in elementary school to the day they both graduated from high school when I was fifteen.

But no longer will I be invisible.

No longer, Beckett Donovan.

I just need to take care of this little allergic reaction first, or I’m going to be making an impression in all the wrong ways—and that’s not in the plan. I’ve been preparing for this moment for a long time. I have my favorite swimsuit ready to go, and in the last few years I’ve finally become comfortable with my five-foot-two, very curvy body. I want to impress him with my brain and my (sometimes) winning personality and my possible beauty…just not my skin rash.

I don’t know how Wes is going to explain this delay to Beckett, though, and I don’t ask. I’m not sure I want to know. There’s nothing embarrassing about allergies, but still…hives. So instead of sticking around to hear Wes’s phone conversation, I just nod silently at him, trying not to grimace as I catch sight of myself in the mirror again. I gesture to the door, indicating that I’m heading out. He nods back, his phone already pressed to his ear.

I’m beyond grateful that by the time I get back from the infirmary thirty minutes later, he’s face down on my bed, clearly done talking to Beckett and my parents.

“What did everyone say?” I say anxiously.

“They’re all fine, just like I told you they would be,” he says, his voice muffled. He doesn’t look at me; he just stays with his face buried in my pillow.

“You better not be getting your spit on my bed,” I say, eyeing him. “So everyone was okay?”

Wes finally rolls over, flopping from his front to his side to his back, only narrowly avoiding falling off the bed. “Yep. Mom and Dad are going to go ahead and meet up with Beckett, and we can join them when you’re ready. You wanna wait a bit to see if your hives go away?”

I raise my brows at him, sitting on the foot of the bed. “Don’t you want to see Beckett? He’s been working on a tiny island for the lasteight months.And it’s been several years before that since you’ve seen him, hasn’t it?”

Wes shrugs, sighing contentedly as his eyes flutter closed. “He’s still the same old Beckett. Besides, I know you’re embarrassed about the hives. And this bed is comfortable, and I’m not a morning person.”

“Ah,” I say, grinning. “The ulterior motive appears.”

“Just thirty minutes,” he says, his voice already drifting away as he takes off his glasses and folds them on his chest. “I told Mom we would be there in a little bit, depending on how you felt.”

I shake my head, still smiling. I’d rather just get going, but I guess I can wait. “Thirty minutes, you lazy bum.”

Wes grunts, and then he’s out. This is easily one of his most infuriating qualities, alongside his overprotective nature, his incessant flirtatiousness with every woman he meets, and his inability to think of me as an adult: he can fall asleep absolutely anywhere, and it never takes him longer than thirty seconds. This is wildly frustrating for those of us who lie in bed at night replaying our most embarrassing moments on repeat until the wee hours of the morning.

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