Still Into You (13 page)

He cleared his throat, no doubt catching her in her perusal, and squatted next to her. His hand slipped under her knee. “Here, seawater actually helps the sting. Let me wrap this around your leg, and then we can go to my room. We’ll get you feeling better.”

She cocked an eyebrow at him. “Oh, really. Might want to tap the brakes there, Rico Suave. Despite my state of undress, I don’t just go to strangers’ hotel rooms. I’m not quite that easy.”

Dimples appeared as he fought a smile. “Oh, not quite
that
easy, but easy. Duly noted.”

She shot him a withering look.

“For the record, that’s not why I was inviting you to my room. Although, I promise
that
certainly would distract you from the pain. But all I mean is my roommate is Mr. Prepared. He keeps a first-aid kit for the beach and always has a bottle of vinegar in it. It will help deactivate the venom.”

She frowned. Two grown men on a beach vacation together? Great, not another good-looking guy who preferred other good-looking guys. Not that she was looking for anything to happen anyway. He was a stranger. An extremely pinup-worthy stranger. But still. In her sexually deprived state, a little flirting could be almost as satisfying as an orgasm. Almost.

With gentle hands, he bent her leg and wrapped his wet T-shirt around her thigh. His focus was on the task at hand, but she didn’t miss the sneaky sidelong glance toward her open thighs, where her wet panties were probably revealing every detail of what lay beneath.

She cleared her throat, and his gaze darted back to her leg, but the corner of his mouth tugged up a bit.

Well, well, maybe not so gay.

Her body heated at the thought, even though her brain knew that, straight or gay, she wasn’t going to do anything with her rescuer. “So how long were you out here? I thought I was alone.”

He glanced up as he draped the shirt around her leg a second time. “I was here the whole time.” He crooked a thumb behind him. “Was sitting in one of the lounge chairs on the far end. I thought you saw me when you looked down the beach, but I guess not.”

“You could’ve said something, you know.”

He gave her an unrepentant grin. “If a beautiful woman wants to go for a naked swim, who am I to intervene?”

“Very gentlemanly of you.”

“Hey, never said I was a gentleman. Just a hero.”

“Right,” she said, her tone dry.

He tucked the end of the shirt underneath the first layer, securing it. “Is that too tight?”

“No, it’s actually helping the burning a little.”

“Hold on.” He climbed to his feet and jogged a little ways down the beach, grabbed something from one of the lounge chairs, then walked over to where she had left her clothes and picked up those as well. When he returned he held out her T-shirt. “Go ahead and put this on. You’re not going to be able to put on the jeans, but you can wrap my beach towel around your waist.”

“Thanks.” She took her shirt and towel from him, pulled the first over her head, then got to her feet and knotted the beach towel around her hips. She tilted her head up to smile at him. “So, Mr. Humble Hero, you have a name?”

He stuck out his hand. “It’s Jace.”

Her body froze, the world seeming to tip off balance for a moment. Had she heard right? She stared at him for a moment, taking in every nuance of his face, the earlier whispers of déjà vu now becoming shouts.

Was it really him? His hair was longer, his body harder and more mature, the green in his eyes more wary, but the resemblance was there. It’d been years—twelve, actually. The nineteen-year-old boy she’d known had become a man. “Jace
Austin
?”

* * *

Oh, shit.
The recognition that flashed in the woman’s blue eyes had Jace dropping his hand. This chick knew him? He frantically flipped through his mental Rolodex, starting with the girls-I’ve-slept-with file.

When they’d locked gazes earlier, he’d felt a nudge of familiarity but had dismissed it. Surely, he’d remember this dark-haired beauty, especially if he had gotten the privilege of touching that lush little body. But something about her was poking at the recesses of his mind.

He rubbed the back of his neck and offered an apologetic smile. “Uh, yeah. Jace Austin. I’m sorry, have we met?”

She flinched a bit—the move subtle, but not lost on him. Damn, well now he felt like a jackass.
Had
they slept together?

She recovered quickly, the corner of her mouth tilting up. “Don’t worry. I’m sure I look a little different than I did at sixteen. Especially without that god-awful bottle-red hair and eyebrow piercing.”

Sixteen? Red hair? The flashing list of names in his head suddenly flipped back over a decade and landed on one he hadn’t thought about in years. One he’d purposely tried to block out. No, couldn’t be.
“Evangeline?”

She shrugged and looked out at the water, the wind whipping her hair around and disguising her expression. “It’s Evan now. I stopped using my full name a long time ago.”

“Wow, I don’t even know what to say,” he said, shaking his head. “You look great. I’m so glad to see that you’re . . .”
Okay. Alive.
“Here.”

She turned back toward him and smiled, though it didn’t light her face the way the earlier smiles had. “It’s good to see you, too. But, if you don’t mind, before we go down memory lane, how ’bout that vinegar?”

“Oh, right,” he said, his mind still whirling. “Follow me.”

And she needn’t worry. The last thing he was going to do was initiate any reminiscing. No, some things were better left buried. And how he’d destroyed the girl he’d sworn to look out for was A-number-one on that list.

Chapter Two

Evan leaned against the back of the couch in Jace’s hotel suite and clasped her hands in front of her to keep them from shaking. She’d thought about Jace so often over the years, despite her best efforts not to. She had wondered how he was doing, but she’d never allowed herself to look him up and check. She’d been a coward—afraid of how she’d react seeing him all grown up, possibly with a wife and kids or something.

When she was a teenager, Jace had been the perfect boy in her eyes. The only guy who’d been able to make her smile during those dark years. She’d stupidly assumed his attention had meant more than simple friendship, more than pity for a screwed-up foster kid. But God, how wrong she’d been. Of all the disastrous mistakes she’d made in her life, falling for Jace had been her biggest. She’d paid dearly for that error—still paid for it—but he would never know that.

And now he’d seen her moping alone on the beach and going skinny-dipping drunk. Stellar. If she’d wanted to show him how far she’d come, how put together she was now, she’d certainly gotten off to a shining start.

“I’m going to go grab the vinegar from Andre’s room,” Jace said, pulling her from her thoughts. “Why don’t you go in the bathroom and unwrap your leg? I’ll bring you the bottle.”

“Yeah, okay,” she said, proud her voice was steady despite her jangled nerves.

She made her way to the restroom and sat on the edge of the tub, arranging the towel to cover her lap. The burn of the jellyfish sting had lessened a bit from its five-alarm status, but continued to make it hard to sit still. Or maybe it was the fact that Jace was here that had her ready to jump out of her skin. Even after all these years, simply being near him had her stomach doing silly flip-flops. She needed to get it together.

She unwrapped the makeshift bandage and laid it over the edge of the tub right as Jace poked his head into the bathroom. “How’s it looking, Ev?”

The affection lacing her old nickname poked at something she’d long since buried. She forced a casual shrug. “Looks like I got in a fight with a jellyfish and lost.”

“Here.” He stepped inside and the room seemed to shrink as his tall, still-shirtless frame filled up the space. He squatted next to her and uncapped the bottle of vinegar. “This should neutralize the sting. Might be a little cold.”

She winced when he poured the liquid over her thigh, but despite the shock of the contrast in temperature, the sting started to ease. “Ooh, that’s better.”

His hand cupped her knee and he ran a thumb over the curve of it, causing her breath to hitch. He glanced up from his crouched position, his eyes seeming to see right through her this-is-no-big-thing façade she was working so hard to maintain. “You okay, Ev?”

She could tell by the somberness of his expression, the edge of concern in his voice that he wasn’t asking about the sting. The combination of his touch and the sentiment almost undid her, almost brought forth the tears she’d hadn’t cried in a decade. She looked back at her leg. “I’m fine, Jace. Really.”

He blew out a breath and stood. “Pat your leg dry. I’ll be right back.”

A few seconds later, he returned—thankfully with a shirt on. God knows she was having enough trouble concentrating around him without the added distraction of his bare chest. He tossed a ball of blue fabric to her.

“What’s this for?”

“It’s a pair of track shorts you can use. They’ll be big, but hopefully the drawstring will help. You’re not going to want to put your jeans back on over that sting.”

“Oh, right. Thanks.” She stared down at the shorts.

He cleared his throat. “Uh, why don’t you go ahead and get changed. I’ll be in the living room.”

He’d already seen her in her underwear on the beach, but she knew why he was giving her privacy. Now that they each knew who the other was, the wall of the past was now firmly erected between them. There would be no more lighthearted flirting. Certainly not from her end.

Regardless, she appreciated the few minutes of alone time. It gave her time to regroup, pull her shoulders back, and slip back into the woman she was now—instead of the teenager she’d regressed to as soon as Jace had appeared.

When she stepped back into the living room, Jace was leaning over the small refrigerator, clanging bottles around as he searched for something. He glanced up from his task when she cleared her throat and sat on the couch.

“I was trying to see if we had any soda, but it looks like all we have is beer and water.”

She smirked. “I think I’ve had enough alcohol tonight. Plus, I need to get back to my room.”

A squeak from the other side of the room caught her attention. She turned her head just as one of the bedroom doors swung open on whining hinges. A drowsy-eyed man wearing only plaid pajama bottoms filled the doorway and leaned against the doorframe. “J, what the fuck are you doing in here? I’m trying to sleep.”

Jace frowned in the man’s direction. “Watch the language, Andre. We’ve got company.”

Jace’s roommate turned his head, his dark eyebrows lifting when he spotted her. “Oh.” His gaze traveled down the length of her, pausing at the borrowed shorts, and a sleepy smile crossed his face. “Well, hi, there.”

Evan heated beneath Andre’s attention, the hint of Spanish accent and the flare of interest in his eyes singeing her. No worries about the two gorgeous men in the room being gay. That was for damn sure.

Jace snorted. “Back off, Romeo. Evan’s an old friend of mine and is only here because she has a wicked jellyfish sting. So you can dial down the flirt.”

“Wait a second.” Andre scrubbed a hand over his face and stepped closer, his eyes narrowing as if evaluating her closer. “Evan? As in Evan Kennedy?”

“No, Evan Litch—” Jace began, but she interrupted.

“Yes, Evan Kennedy.” She stuck out her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

Andre sauntered forward and took her hand, bringing it to his mouth and planting a kiss on top of it instead of shaking it. “Pleasure.”

Jace walked up behind him, his brows knitted together. “You changed your name? Why does your new one sound so familiar?”

Andre laughed and sank into the armchair next to her. She would’ve answered Jace, but she had a hard time drawing her attention away from Andre’s lean, tan chest and the silver nipple rings glinting in the lamp light.
Oh, my
. Not to mention Jace’s well-built form in her peripheral vision. Man, she was like a starved woman at a buffet. Beyond getting away from her past with Jace, she needed to get away from all this testosterone.

Andre answered for her. “Because this lovely lady is engaged to the guy who’s running the whole couples shindig this weekend. She’ll be Mrs. Doctor Dan in a few months.”

She nodded. “Yes, November.”

“Hold up,” Jace said, drawing her attention back to him as he crossed in front of her and sat on the couch opposite her. “You’re
engaged
?”

She cringed inwardly. Why had she let herself flirt on the beach? She knew better than that. Now she looked trampy on top of flighty. Fabulous. “Yes.”

“To
the
Dr. Dan?” Jace eyed her in a way that made her want to shift her gaze to the floor. Like if she met his stare, he’d see every bit of the truth written on her face.

“Yes, the very one.” She stood and forced a brief smile. “And I doubt he’d be happy knowing I was half-dressed in someone else’s hotel room in the middle of the night. So I’d better head back.”

“You didn’t tell him you were going to the beach?” Jace asked, the frown lines around his mouth deepening. “That’s dangerous, Ev. You should’ve told someone you were going out there. What if that undertow would’ve kept you under and I hadn’t been there?”

Her jaw flexed. “I would’ve been fine. The jellyfish sting distracted me, but I would’ve been able to swim to shore. And I don’t need to report where I’m going every second of the day to anyone.”

“You do if your plan is to go skinny-dipping drunk in the middle of the night,” he said, his voice rising.

Andre looked back and forth between the two of them, but was obviously smart enough not to jump in the conversation.

Her cheeks heated with a combination of shame and anger. “I don’t need a keeper, Jace. I didn’t need one when you knew me before, and I don’t need one now.”

Jace looked ready to argue the point, but then his shoulders sagged and he released a breath. “You’re right. It’s none of my business. I’m sorry.”

Her fists, which had clenched during the exchange, loosened. This was ridiculous. Why was she arguing with someone she had no intention of laying eyes on ever again? Jace was her past. She’d spent a decade burying her old life and that version of herself. No good could come of dredging up any of those memories. She needed to keep Jace locked away in that “mistakes” box and get out of here.

“Look, I appreciate your help tonight. Really.” She turned to Andre. “And thanks so much for the vinegar. It really helped.”

“No problem, sometimes my Boy Scout–like preparedness comes in handy.” Andre gave her a little mock salute, but she had a hard time believing the wholesome routine when he was so busy looking like Latin-flavored sin.

Her gaze strayed to the door. “Um, well, I’d better get going.”

Jace ran his fingers through his still-damp blond hair and sighed. “When are you leaving the resort?”

“Today. We have workshops until five and then we’re headed back to Dallas.”

“Let me buy you lunch,” he said, standing in her path when she took a few steps toward the door. “We can catch up.”

She didn’t stop walking. “Jace, I don’t think so. I’ve got a lot going on and am so busy with all this—”

“Hey.” He laid a hand on her forearm when she tried to move around him, halting her. “I want to hear how you’re doing. How your life has been. What happened after you left.”

He meant after she’d run away. And what had happened was that her life had fallen completely the fuck apart. Not exactly fun conversation to share over burgers. And not a story she could ever tell him. She shook her head. “I just can’t, Jace. I’m sorry. Thanks again for your help tonight. It was good to see you.”

Without warning, he tugged her against him and enveloped her in a bear hug. Her cheek pressed against his solid chest, and the intoxicating scent of male wrapped around her. No, not just male scent, Jace’s scent. A warm, familiar smell that yanked her back through time, back to the last moment she could remember feeling truly content.

He kissed the crown of her head. “Take care of yourself, Ev. I’m glad to see you’re okay.”

She pulled out of the embrace, swallowing past the tightness in her throat, and gave him what she hoped was a convincing smile. “I’m doing great, Jace. Just terrific.”
Fan-fucking-tastic
.

There was a storm behind his green eyes as he stared back at her, but after a moment, he returned her smile and stepped past her to open the door. “Glad to hear it. Now get back to your room before your fiancé comes hunting us down in a jealous rage.”

“Right.” She glanced at Andre, who was watching her and Jace’s exchange intently. “Nice to meet you, Andre. Y’all have fun on the rest of your vacation.”

He lifted a hand in good-bye, and after one last look at Jace, she walked out of the room, holding her breath until she heard the door click shut behind her.

* * *

Jace let the door close and then dropped back onto the couch with a groan.

“Whoa, what was
that
all about?” Andre asked.

Jace pressed the heels of his hands to his brow bone to stave off the fierce pounding that had started there. “Which part?”

“Um, not sure what to start with—Dr. Dan’s woman being here at all or the fact that you totally jumped her shit like you had some right to her.”

Jace shook his head. “We have history. It’s been twelve years, but I know her well enough to see that she’s feeding me a platter of bullshit about being great.”

Andre stretched his legs out and propped them on the coffee table as if ready to settle in for a good story.

Too bad this story sucked.

“She seemed fine to me. You sure you’re not reading too much into it?”

“No, I watched Evan on that beach. She was sad—and drunk. I didn’t know who she was at that point, but I almost got up to talk to her to make sure she was all right. But then she started taking off her clothes, and well, I got a little distracted.”

Andre sniffed. “Can’t blame you there. The girl’s smoking. I saw her in the lobby yesterday and definitely conjured up some mental pictures her fiancé wouldn’t have appreciated.”

Jace tilted his head back and stared at the ceiling. “Believe me, I had the same thoughts down on the beach. I flirted with her and, up until she realized who I was, she was giving me all the positive signs—like she was interested.”

“Huh. That’s surprising. She and the doctor are supposed to be some power couple. She stays behind the scenes but he talks about her all the time on his radio show. Their whole image is based on that ‘we’re the super happy all-American couple, so let us help you be that way, too.’” Andre’s snide tone made it clear how he felt about that sentiment.

Jace released a frustrated breath and lifted his head. “See, that’s what I don’t get. If things are going that awesome for her, why was she out there alone at three in the morning looking so lost? And where the hell was her fiancé? He should be looking out for her. She could’ve drowned.”