The Redhead Plays Her Hand
Page 28

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Adam Kasen was fired from the set of action movie Private Dick after weeks of tension between cast and crew. The production company said only “We needed to go in another direction.”
Once more I found myself on a beach, beside an ocean, without a top on.
Laying back in the warm sand, I let my fingers sift through, centering down to the thin edge of a shell. I plucked it from the grains and examined it in the strong sunlight. It was swirled through with gray and iridescent pink and spiraled down in circles thin enough to see through. Over my shoulder, a shadow took shape on the sand.
“You can’t take every shell home with you. I hardly have any room in my suitcase as it is with all the stuff you bought for the baby.”
“Hey, that kid’s gonna need everything I bought,” I protested as he flopped down next to me.
“You don’t think Holly’s going to buy everything under the sun for her? As soon as she found out it was a girl, there was nothing pink left in any baby store this side of Mulholland! Michael said it was like a pink explosion at their place.” He laughed.
“Good point.” I grinned as he peeked under my big, floppy hat.
Jack’s sun-freckled nose presented itself first, then those sweet lips. I kissed those very lips, and they kissed me back. I fell back onto the towel, pulling him with me. Sticky with sweat and salt, our skin stuck together, hot and twisted. Hungry lips met mine again and again, halting only when I heard a telltale motor.
“They’re close,” I warned, reaching for my bikini top.
“So was I,” he sighed, reluctantly tying me up and hiding my boobies—from him and the cameras.
On vacation again in the Seychelles, we learned quickly that things had changed since the last time we were here. We could no longer frolic na**d on a beach in the Indian Ocean without a care in the world. Well, we could, but then my boobies would be splashed across every gossip rag in the Western world, and Jack wasn’t quite so ready to share them.
Luckily, our island was isolated enough that they could only approach from the water, and we could hear them coming.
And they could hear me coming, something Jack was also careful about keeping under wraps after a particularly wicked session in the outdoor shower had me screaming his name over and over again. I tried to keep quiet, I truly did, but mother-of-pearl, it was hard.
And so was he . . .
And so was he.
I grinned at him, letting him pull me up off the sand to stand next to him and look out over the deep blue. Knotting my sarong more securely around my waist, I squinted at the horizon, searching.
“I hear them, but I don’t see them.”
“They’re out there. We should head in.” He settled me in front of him with his hands around me, flat against my tummy. Tucking his chin into my shoulder, he held me tightly.
We were enjoying our last little bit of time together before he left to work on his next film. There was just enough time for a little break before the holidays, and when he asked if I wanted to take a trip, I agreed immediately. I wanted to come back to our lovely beach house.
Hearing the roar of motorboats a little closer now, he slapped me on the ass and hustled me toward the house. “Come on, Crazy. They already got enough shots of you in your bikini.”
They really had. In the past, I would have been horrified to see pictures of my bathing suit–clad backside as I dug for shells in the sand next to my boyfriend, who had his hands all over said backside. But now? Eh. It was just how we rolled.
He paused as we shuffled across the beach on our way back to the house and began tracing his feet through the sand.
“You writing me another message, George?” I laughed as I stood on the steps, shaking sand off my legs.
“Uh-huh.”
“Another grand gesture?”
“Uh-huh.” He grinned, his tongue poking out of his mouth as he wrote with his big toe.
“You gotta come up with something new. That’s old material. You need a new grand gesture,” I teased, taking off my hat and letting my curls run wild in the ocean breeze.
He finished and extended his hand to me. “Why don’t you shut up and come read it,” he challenged, mischief in his eyes.
Wicked wanton man.
I kicked back down the steps, the sand hot between my toes, and took a running leap at the last minute to pounce on him. Catching me in midair, he let out an oof, a very British sounding oof, mind you, and let me monkey-crawl around his torso to perch on his back, wrapping my legs around his waist.
As I nibbled at his ear with my hands in a choke hold around his neck, he wobbled over to his masterpiece. Which he’d crafted with his toes.
“Okay, let’s see this grand gesture.” I giggled, peering over his shoulder and slapping at his hands as they tried to raise up my sarong skirty thing.
I could see one letter, then another, and then it all became so very clear.
Marry me?
I froze, no longer slapping. My legs, however, tightened.
“Ow, ow! Crazy, hey, ow!” he cried, unlocking my legs and pulling me off his back. With me in front of him now, he tilted my chin up and chuckled at the look on my face.
I was shocked.
Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a box. Small, black. This was real.
He took my hand and opened my fingers, which were frozen into some kind of terribly romantic claw. Placing the box inside, he opened it up to showcase a perfect, round, brilliant diamond. Just one perfect diamond on a platinum band. Giant. Sparkling. Wow.
He leaned down to nuzzle me, pressing kisses across my face—eyelids, nose, cheeks, that damnable spot just below my ear. And in the Queen’s English, in that very ear, he said, “Marry me.”
I looked into his eyes as tears spilled over and down my face. They had to go around a giant smile to make their way to the sand below.
Yes.