Page 31 of The Love Lie
They’re off.
“Fucking hell,” Cooper grumbles as he recloses his fists around the handles and presses his legs firmly against her thighs to hold them both in place.
This time, she doesn’t let it distract her.
She keeps her eyes on the water, her mind clear of everything but the wind and the waves and the electric rush.
The guide surges ahead, taking the lead. Nina shoots closer with a wide grin and revs her engine in challenge. With a sudden laugh, Sam meets it. They race, practically flying as they bump across the sea. Cooper hollers wildly, a pure burst of joy, sounding just the way she imagines a cowboy should. It’s easy to picture him galloping across a field on the back of his horse, kicking his spurs, hands on the reins, a feral gleam in his eyes—too easy. She blinks the image away and goes faster, all of her concentration on controlling the machine beneath her as a turquoise world rushes by.
Twenty minutes in, a school of dolphins joins the fun, leaping alongside their jet skis, darting and diving and flipping through the waves. Forty-five minutes in, the guide cuts his engine out of nowhere and points toward a dark shadow under the surface.
“Whale shark!” he calls before leaping into the water and diving deep.
Sam doesn’t even think. In a blink, she follows him in. Cooper splashes behind her. A minute later, a white-speckled mouth emerges from the endless blue, wide open, but not threatening. The gentle giant glides effortlessly by, paying them no mind. It’s got to be thirty feet long. Her heart lurches into her throat as she blindly grabs for Cooper’s hand. Their fingers clasp in part awe, part fear, partI can’t believe this is real!
At the halfway mark, he takes over driving. They stop a few more times to see turtles and rays and giant schools of fish. She presses her cheek flush against his spine and wraps her arms firmly around his waist. It’s all too easy to pretend the ring gleaming on her finger is real. She tells herself it’s this place. The Maldives are made for romance. Bathing suits. Heat. Beauty all around. She could feign an affair with a cardboard cutout here. But deep down, she knows it’s partially Cooper too. His looks, yes, but more the way he drinks life in as if it’s the most satisfying cocktail he’s ever been lucky enough to consume. Laughter spills freely from his lips. Joy seeps off him like the sweetest sweat. An infectious glow lives inside his eyes. He’s not jaded. He’s not thinking ten steps ahead. He’s not dragging a deadweight. He’s just…happy. Happy to be here. Happy to be present. Happy to soak it all in. It makes her want to be closer to him, as though she could get high off the residual fumes, as though maybe around him she could just be breezily, easily happy, too.
The way she used to be.
The way she wishes she could be again.
Out on the open ocean, with blue skies above and blue seas below, adrift and unmoored, no sense of place or time, it’s easy for Sam to slip into this dream. But the sight of swaying palm trees and sandy shores is a harsh return to reality, a rough hand rousing her from sleep. The resort looms like a parent with watchful eyes, able to read every mischievous thought in her mind, silently demanding she behave. She suddenly realizes her hands did indeed sneak beneath the edges of Cooper’s life jacket. Her fingers are spread wide over hard, hot skin, feeling muscles shift and flex as he cuts the engine. She reluctantly drops her arms.
“Wow, that was great!” Nina calls over. “Thanks for letting me tag along.”
The note of farewell in the producer’s voice causes a sudden ache in Sam’s chest. It seems almost cruel to go from the speed and the thrill and the fun back to the room where she knows her computer is waiting with calls and spreadsheets and endless grunt work she can’t afford to ignore. It’s too much. She’s not ready to go back yet.
“How about a drink?” Sam blurts.
Cooper swivels to look at her. His gaze touches every part of her face, seeing too much before the edges of his lips quirk. “I’m in.”
“Nina?” She extends the invite not because she particularly likes the woman’s company, but because in it, she has an excuse to keep touching him.
“I’m always down for a piña colada.”
“I pegged you as more of a whiskey soda kind of girl.”
The producer rubs a palm over the left side of her head where her black hair is cut almost to the scalp and grins. “Don’t let this fool you. I’m not nearly as edgy as I seem. And piña coladas are fucking delicious, like frozen pineapple coconut crack. I make no promises you won’t have to carry me back to my room.”
Sam pats Cooper’s bicep. “I think he can handle it.”
“Rock on.”
With a thanks to the guide, they ditch the jet skis and head to the beach bar. It’s too easy, the way Cooper slides his arm around the back of her chair and casually runs his fingers over her shoulder and down her arm. Too natural, how quickly her own hand snakes over his lower thigh to hook under the back side of his knee. They drink and chat and joke and laugh. An hour passes in a blink. Nina begs off, walking in a zigzag back toward the bungalow, leaving the two of them in a buzzed haze.
Sam zeroes in on the shape his lips take as he wraps them around his beer bottle. The way his Adam’s apple bobs ashe swallows. How his red hair curls over his ears, practically begging to be pushed back.
She takes a sip of her drink.
His eyes flash as he drops his gaze to her mouth on the straw. She inhales sharply, acutely aware of her breasts and how they rise and how his attention shifts a little lower.
The heat spikes, suddenly oppressive.
“We should probably get back,” she murmurs, wanting to do anything but leave this moment. The suggestion sounds weak, hollow. She clears her throat. “I have some work I need to do.”
“Sure. If that’s what you want…”
It is.
