Wrecked (Sons of San Clemente Book 2) (2 page)

E
ven through the door she could hear him puking. Hollis balled up her fist and pressed it against her mouth to keep herself from saying anything stupid. He’d never handled pain meds well. She dragged in a shaky breath and looked around the room feeling helpless. This was so not what she’d expected.

Water. Tea. He didn’t drink tea but her grandmother did. She had every loose leaf tea ever grown in India or Bangledesh or wherever else they grew tea. Tonight, Kadan would drink tea. And she hoped that her grandmother had something to spike it with because even if Kadan hurled up all his pain meds and refused to take more, she had no intention of being stoic.

Why was he here? Why, why, why here? She couldn’t have him here. Not here. Not now. Not when she needed to regroup and plan for her, what was it now, third or fourth act? He had his own house in San Clemente. Just two blocks up from the beach. Why the hell was he in her grandmother’s beach guest house? Her grandmother wasn’t even here this spring and summer. She was remodeling her house. Seriously. Again. And that was why Hollis dared to make the trip. Slinking home to buy herself time. Secretly.

Except not so secretly apparently.

She bit her lower lip hard and measured out the tea leaves, filled the kettle, turned on the gas stove. Like she was a normal woman home for a visit. A visit that might not really end.

“Don’t think.” She admonished herself tightly.

Thinking was all she’d been doing and a fat lot of good it had done her over her life.

He hobbled back and for some reason she couldn’t stand to look at him on the crutches. Not Kadan. Her Kadan moved like a panther, all long and lean and muscled and flowing like a predator across any room, any beach, anywhere. Her Kadan moved like liquid sex and menace. A deadly, sexy swagger that always made her feel faint and combustibly hot. Even when he’d been briefly hers, she’d been mesmerized by his walk. Just struck dumb every time. And then when he’d lock eyes with her and smile. Oh, God, she’d been unable to keep her clothes on. But every woman within his sphere had had the same challenge. Definitely still did. So why was he here alone? Kadan had rarely been alone.

She reminded herself of that—that she’d been one of many. That he had been a more prolific lover than many rock stars. More popular than most movie stars. She couldn’t count how many times when they’d been out, they’d been joined by others—friends, acquaintances, fans, and women, always women, touching him, flirting with him, asking him to sign their barely covered by their bikini top breasts, ignoring her like she didn’t exist. Like she wasn’t there. He had never been her Kadan. Not even in bed. She’d just been stupid enough to pretend.

She could hear the water about to boil so she distracted her careening thoughts by bringing out two mugs, pouring the water into the clay pot with the tea leaves. Then she rummaged through her shopping bag of fresh produce, fruit, almond milk, and gluten-free bagels for the ginger. She peeled a small amount, diced it, and ground it down in the mortar.

She added the pulp to one mug then strained the tea into it, the whole time not looking at him.

“So, I’ve had a surgery.” He stretched his long, tanned, supremely muscled arm along the headboard of the bed.

She had to keep her eyes off of him that was all. She would not look to see if he’d added any new ink on the story of his arms. Not look at the defined muscles on his chest or his abs, not think about how she had memorized them with her fingers, her lips, her tongue.

“Ditch the tea. I’m not eighty.”

That was the problem. And if he were really going to be laid up, he could at least have the decency to look sick or feeble, but nooooooo not Kadan Carson. Even gimpy, deteriorating and wracked with pain, he looked infinitely jumpable. She was totally soaked. She hated herself and her stupid body.

And the way his hooded eyes bore into her back, she could feel him sizing her up—her mood, her body, her level of discomfort in his presence. She’d never been able to play it cool in his presence. Not at twelve or sixteen or twenty or twenty-two, and it looked like staring down the barrel of thirty offered her no emotional Kevlar to resist him. She might as well be naked under a bright light for his analysis. A high school biology frog had never felt this exposed.

She hesitated, then at the last minute, squiggled a little agave on top of the tea, added a curl of candied ginger and took a deep breath.

“No way am I drinking that.” He eyed her approach. “And what’s with the nice girl routine? Last time I saw you, you cursed me out in front of dozens of friends and the press and then hurled a Corona bottle at my head.”

“That can be arranged.”

It wasn’t as if she expected him to forget her jealous tirade, but he didn’t need to bring it up when he was flat on his ass in her refuge. And he definitely didn’t need to sound so amused.

“And I missed on purpose.”

“Thanks,” he said drily and she felt another surge of heat race through her blood, damn him.

“Drink.”

“Or?” One dark brow angled at her.

Her stomach flipped, and she could swear her heart missed a beat before beating a double time tattoo.

How did he do that?

“Drink.”

She handed him the tea and was surprised when he palmed it and stared at the light green contents before he took a sip. “Thank you.”

Her knees went and she whooshed onto the side of the bed. She closed her eyes. She had to get a grip. She had to get on with her life, and she definitely had to get over him. How could her body and her stupid, stupid heart still even tolerate this smug, arrogant sex on two legs. Or one leg now, she reminded herself bitterly.

She dragged in a shaky breath. She was just surprised, that was all. She hadn’t expected him. She figured he’d be in Thailand now. Or Hawaii. Or anywhere but here.

“You look good, Hollis.”

Hollis. Not the hated “duchess.” Or worse yet “Ivy,” when she’d been young because she’d been so “invasive.” “Clingy” was another word he’d lobbed at her. She should be thrilled. They were adults. Acquaintances. No stupid, half-insulting, half-friendly nicknames. He’d moved on. She would, too. She had moved on.

“The ginger will help with the nausea.” She marveled at her calm voice.

“Great, actually,” he continued as if she hadn’t spoken. “But tired.” With a finger he reached out and traced the freckles sprinkled along her cheekbones. “Thin.”

Women spent their lives starving themselves and beating themselves up to get thin so men would love them and this asshole was criticizing. Her cheek tingled where he’d touched her and her breath tangled.

“What meds do they have you on?”

He sipped the tea, shrugged his shoulders as eloquently as a lion would going into stalk mode. She would not look at him. She wouldn’t.

“Which ones?” She asked again.

“Vic, but that makes me itch. Perc, which makes me sick.” He shrugged.

“I would have thought they’d give you oxy.”

He shook his head. “Too addicting. We sound like dealers.” He grinned.

The full treatment. Wide smile all the way to his sparkling blue-black eyes, lit with amusement, laugh lines, teeth whiter than the Pacific’s white caps, inviting her to dive in and swim.

Hollis stared at her tea as if it contained answers. Only pale liquid gleamed at her. No leaves pointing the way to her future. The words she’d wanted to say to him so many years ago were all gone.

Good riddance.

They would be like strangers.

He leaned back against the black, cushioned headboard, eyes closed, tea cradled in one large, perfectly sculpted hand. God, it hurt to look at him. Still. All these years later, and it was like she was fourteen again, doodling his name in her school spiral-bound notebooks. Sixteen, spying on him every morning when he would surf with her twin brother, making them both late to school. Eighteen, wearing ridiculously short skirts or shorts and tiny tanks ‘Just happening to walk by him’ back and forth, back and forth.

“Tell me you’re taking something for the pain,” she whispered into the silence, knowing that it had to hurt like hell.

He shook his head.

“I’ve tried.”

She winced.

“Can’t keep it down. But you know that.”

“Just one surgery?”

“Three.”

Her breath seeped out and her body sank in on itself as if the years of ballet as a child and teen and the years of yoga now had never happened.

“We could get you a drip.”

“Not worth it.

“If I’d known that, I would have spiked your tea with—” She broke off. What did one spike tea with? Tequila was all she’d brought because she loved margaritas, and staying alone at the beach trying to figure out the rest of her life after she’d dropped out of her surgery residency and tanked on her two other career attempts definitely required margaritas. Maybe even shots. A lot of shots. And limes and salt.

But she wasn’t alone. Hollis swallowed hard, trying to dislodge the sorrow permanently lodged in her throat.

“Planning to stay awhile, duchess?” He challenged.

“D
on’t call me that.”

“Duchess?”

Hollis stood up and went outside. She had to get away from him. She could smell his masculine scent. He’d always smelled so potent to her—warm wind, the ocean, hot sand, citrus, and something fresh and green like juniper or pine. He literally made her mouth water. Even when she’d hated him, she’d ached to touch him, to breathe him in, to lick him, taste him, meld him into her bones.

She shut the front door behind her. Her feet were already bare. She walked a bit in the sand. It was cool, the warmth of the April day long gone. The sound of the waves rolling over the sand, one after the other, as the high tide finally neared its peak was soothing yet ominous. Hollis loved the ocean but it terrified her. She hadn’t swam in it for years. But it called to her in a language she could no longer speak. Haunting. Compelling.

She backtracked. Sat on the edge of the wooden planter that enclosed the front patio and dangled her feet over the edge. She couldn’t see the water, just the jagged lines of white rising and crashing, reforming. The Earth’s heartbeat.

Kadan used to say that. Why did she still remember all the things he used to say? All the stupid, phony things he said that had made her feel so special, so different from all the others. She leaned back and stared at the sky, the glittering gems that looked flung across the endless canvas of the universe in a fit of temper, but yet did have an inherent order, a pattern discernible to those who looked.

Hollis hadn’t really seen stars in years. Seattle was so often cloudy. And the city lights reduced the stars to a pale, gauzy pinprick light. What could she find tonight? Okay, there was the North Star, so the Big and Little Dipper, Orion’s Belt....

She barely heard the click of the door and the thump of the rubber trimmed crutch was muted. Even injured and groggy from pain, Kadan was stealthy. Her heart kicked up and she feared he would hear it.

“You’re wasted as a world champion surf god,” she said going for breezy. “You’d have been an excellent spy.”

“I never thought of that.”

He lowered himself next to her. He’d pulled on Burton board shorts. They rode low so she could see the indent of his hips and because he’d left the tie undone, she could imagine the dark arrow of hair below his navel angling down to what she’d considered Nirvana.

Hollis could see the flex of muscle in his thigh as he bent down to sit. She resisted the urge to jump up and help. Her days of helping the injured were over. Done. Besides she could barely breathe just with him starting to sit so close. Imagine if she touched him? Held him as he fully sat down on the planter? She’d pass out.

“Do you really think I could follow someone around and remain unnoticed?”

Her mouth was so dry she could barely swallow. She grimaced. Of course not. Who wouldn’t notice six foot three inches of broad shoulders, long, graceful, muscular limbs, shaggy black hair, softly curling around the face of a devil with high cheekbones, strong jaw, full lips, complete with a dimple when he really smiled. And his eyes. Twin deep, blue oceans to drown in.

“Sure.” She deadpanned. “You totally blend in. Maybe too timid to be a spy.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard that more than once before.”

She’d forgotten he had a sense of humor. Never missed a beat no matter what happened. What anyone dished his way. The press. Jealous boyfriends. Rivals. Her. Damn. Damn. Damn.

What to say now? Where to go? Anywhere but here. This was her safe place. Hers. But no. She could feel the heat radiating from his bare legs. His chest.

“Do you have a fever?”

“Maybe you should check my temperature.”

His voice was pure sex.

“Maybe I will.” She flipped her ponytail so it hit her other shoulder like a dare. “I still have a lot of my medical equipment, but I think”—she furrowed her brow like she was deep in thought—“I only have my rectal thermometer with me.”

“I’d like to see you try, duchess.” He leaned back, his teeth gleaming white in the night. “I’d enjoy some of the experience.”