Wallbanger (Cocktail #1)(28)
Author: Alice Clayton

“Yes, I suppose we should.” I laughed again as he held out his hand to help me up. I couldn’t gain any traction, so I hung on to his hands, my feet slipping all over the floor.

“This is never going to work,” he muttered and swooped me up. He carried me into the living room and set me down. “Watch it there. Snoopy is drooping a little,” he noted, gesturing to the part covering the girls.

“You’d love that, wouldn’t you?” I sassed, pulling things tighter.

“I’m going to get changed, and I’ll bring you back some dry towels. Try to stay out of trouble.” He winked and headed back to his place. I laughed again and went to the bedroom where Clive was now just a bump under the covers.

I looked in the mirror over my dresser as I dug for something to put on. I was positively glowing. Huh. Must have been all that cold water.

An hour later things were back under control. We’d cleaned up the water, alerted the people downstairs in case there was leakage below, and placed a call to the maintenance guy.

We began to move toward my front door, mopping up the last little bit of water with the towels Simon had generously provided.

“What a disaster!” I cried, pulling myself up off the floor and sinking down on the couch.

“Could have been worse. You could have had to deal with this after only three hours’ sleep, and being woken up by some woman screaming at the top of her lungs,” he said, coming to sit on the arm of the couch.

I arched one eyebrow, and he recanted.

“Okay, bad example since that scenario is something you’re familiar with. What are you going to do now?”

“I dunno. I need to stay here and wait for the guy to fix this mess. In the meantime, I’m without water, which means no coffee, no shower, no nothing. Sucks,” I muttered, crossing my arms across my chest.

“Well, I guess I’ll be across the hall, drinking coffee and thinking about my shower, if you need anything,” he said, starting for the door.

“Ass, you are totally making me coffee.”

“Are you taking me up on the shower, too?”

“You won’t be in there with me, you know.”

“I guess you can take one anyway. Come on, you little cockblocker,” he huffed, pulling me up off the couch and leading me across the hall. Clive tossed one last angry cry at me from the bedroom, and I shushed him.

“Oops, wait. Let me grab breakfast.” I snatched a foil-wrapped package from the table.

“What’s that?” he asked.

“Your zucchini bread.”

I swear he almost bit through his bottom lip. He must really like zucchini bread.

Thirty minutes later, I sat at Simon’s kitchen table, legs curled underneath me, drinking French-pressed coffee and towel-drying my hair. He seemed really relaxed and happy, and he’d devoured the entire loaf of zucchini bread. I barely managed half a slice before he took it away from me, the entire chunk disappearing in his mouth.

He pushed away from the table and groaned, patting his full belly.

“You want another loaf? I baked plenty, you little piggy.” I wrinkled my nose at him.

“I will take anything you want to give me, Nightie Girl. You have no idea how much I love homemade bread. No one’s made anything like this for me in years.” He winked and let out a tiny burp.

“Now that’s sexy.” I frowned and took my coffee cup into the living room, glancing out into the hallway to see if the maintenance guy had shown up yet.

Simon followed me in and sat down on his big, comfy couch. I wandered around, looking at all his pictures. He had a series of black and whites on one wall, several prints of the same woman on a beach. Hands, feet, tummy, shoulders, back, legs, toes, and finally one of just her face. She was gorgeous.

“This is beautiful. One of your harem?” I asked, looking back at him.

He sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “Not every woman has made a trip to my bed, you know.”

“Sorry. I’m kidding. Where were these taken?” I asked, sitting down next to him.

“On a beach in Bora Bora. I was working on a travel photography series—the most beautiful beaches of the South Pacific, very retro styled. She was on the beach one day, local girl, and the light was perfect, so I asked if I could take some shots of her. They came out great.”

“She’s gorgeous,” I said, sipping my coffee.

“Yes,” he agreed with a sweet smile.

We sipped silently, being okay with being quiet.

“So what were you planning to do today?” he asked.

“You mean before my pipes revolted?”

“Yes, before the attack.” He smiled over the rim of his mug, blue eyes twinkling.

“I didn’t have a lot planned, actually, and that was a good thing. I was gonna go for a run, maybe sit outside and read this afternoon.” I sighed, feeling warm and comfortable and cozy. “What about you?”

“I was planning on sleeping the entire day before tackling a mountain of laundry.”

“You can go sleep, you know. I can wait in my own apartment.” I started to get up. Poor guy, he’d gotten in late, and I was keeping him from sleep.

But he waved me off and pointed to the couch. “I know better, though. If I sleep I’ll have jet lag all week. I need to get back on Pacific time as soon as I can, so it’s probably a good thing your pipes attacked.”

“Hmm, I guess. So how was Ireland? Good times?” I asked, settling back.

“I always have a good time when I’m traveling.”

“God, what an amazing job. I’d love to travel like that, living out of a suitcase, seeing the world, amazing…” I trailed off, looking around again at all the pictures. I spotted a slender shelf on the far wall with tiny bottles on it. “What’s that?” I asked, heading for the curious little shelf. They each contained what looked like sand. Some were white, some gray, some pink, and one was almost pitch black. They each had a label. As I looked I felt, rather than saw, him move behind me. His breath was warm in my ear.

“Every time I visit a new beach, I bring back a little sand—like a reminder of where I was, when I was there,” he answered, his voice low and wistful.

I looked more closely at the bottles and marveled over the names I saw: Harbour Island–Bahamas, Prince William Sound–Alaska, Punaluu–Hawaii, Vik–Iceland, Sanur–Fiji, Patura–Turkey, Galicia–Spain.

“And you’ve been all these places?”