“I shouldn’t have brought you here. I’m just not ready for . . . uh, this. I think you should go.”
George looked at me and soon his shock gave way to profound confusion, which then gave way to something else.
He stood up and put his shirt back on. “It’s that other guy, isn’t it?”
“What guy?”
“Alex?” He sounded a bit pissed now.
“What?” I spat out. “NO! God, what do you mean? Pppsshhtt.” I made a strange sound that I wished I hadn’t made because it sounded so ridiculous.
George eyed me suspiciously. “Sure.” His voice dripped with sarcasm. “Whatever you say.” He started walking for the door and I was totally and utterly relieved. Then he turned and looked at me.
“Good luck with him.” He smiled. Cruelly. “I don’t think he’s put an end to what he’s doing.” He exited and I was left standing all alone in the room feeling terrible.
CHAPTER FIFTY
I walked through the garden, an itchy, sick feeling brewing in my stomach. The thought that Alex was having sex with someone else made me feel queasy. And not just anyone else, but heeeeeeeer. The girl with way to many “eeeeeee’s” in her name. But I bet she was good in bed, one of those uninhibited French types. Up for anything. A real fun-time kind of gal!
Every time I imagined what was happening, my skin crawled and my heart raced. It wasn’t pleasant. And not even the tranquil surroundings of the garden that I’d been walking in for ten minutes already were helping. So I headed to the beach hoping that the soft sounds of the lapping waves would help quell the quease. I tried not to look in the direction of Alex’s room, but couldn’t help it. The door was closed, the blinds had been dropped and the light inside was dim . . . definitely set up for sex.
My mind ran away with me for a second as I wondered what kind of sex they would be having. Shit!Stop imagining him having sex, I mentally scolded myself and kept walking towards the beach. But as I got closer a familiar figure came into view. I stopped and looked at it. He looked at me with such cool, calm, flat, dead wasteland eyes that it made me furious. I stormed up to him and crouched down on the floor so that we were eye to eye.
“You were right, okay? Are you happy now? Is that what you want to hear, you beastly, prehistoric devil turtle? Huh?” I glared at him and he didn’t blink.
“Val?” I heard a voice and my head snapped up. At first I couldn’t see where the familiar voice was coming from.
“Is that you?” the voice asked. I stood up and looked around. And there, in the distance . . . Alex. He was dripping wet and standing in the calm sea.
“Alex?” I called out.
“Who were you talking to?” He started walking towards me and stepped straight into a cool shaft of soft moonlight.Wow!Breath stolen. Heartbeat skipped. He was drenched in a silvery light and I had never seen him looking so good before. There was something almost ethereal about him.
He came even closer. “Well, that was quick.” He cleared his throat and looked awkward.
“You too,” I said, sounding equally awkward.
I walked onto the beach and stopped. Alex was now ankle-deep in the water. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and drops of water were sliding down him like warm, gooey chocolate. I stared in awe.What else was I meant to do?He was just so magnificent and manly and wet and hard and I wanted to reach out and touch him. In several places.
“I didn’t . . .” Alex suddenly said. “We didn’t . . . have sex.” He closed the gap between us.
“You didn’t have sex?” I asked, the inflection of my voice shot up, as if I was excited.
“But well done to you!” He gave me another strange double-thumbs-up; it looked so forced.
I shook my head. “I didn’t either,” I admitted quickly. “I tried. But I couldn’t.”
“Me too,” he said. “I don’t think picking women up in bars and bringing them back to my hotel room is my thing.” He smiled.
“Oh, so Alessandreeeeee is not your kind of thing?” I couldn’t help the sarcasm in my voice.
“Not really actually.”
“I thought Alessandreeeeee would be everyone’s kind of thing.” Still with that sarcasm.
Alex smiled. “She might be everyone else’s, but she’s not mine.”
I smiled back at him. “George wasn’t my kind of thing either.”
