‘And as much as I would love that, Cam, I’m not letting go.’
He smiled at me again, and then made a big show of settling himself into a more comfortable, relaxed position. He moved his weight onto his other leg, ran his free hand through his hair again and cocked his hip, as if he was settling in for a night of Netflix on the couch with an ice-cold beer. The sheer audacity of this man. ‘Well, neither am I, so we’d better settle in for a long stand-off.’
We glared at each other. Neither of us was going to loosen our grip on the hairband, that much was certain.
‘So what have you been up to these six years?’ he asked casually. As if nothing was going on and we weren’t attempting to kill each other over hair accessories.
‘Are you trying to make small talk?’
‘Well, since it looks like we’re going to be here for a while, we might as well get reacquainted.’ He leaned in for a second and studied my hand. ‘No ring? Haven’t met that special someone yet?’
‘He’s at home. Sidney,’ I said quickly, and something passed over his face. It was quick, almost imperceptible, but I’d seen it.
‘Congratulations. I hope he can handle you.’
I scrunched my face up into what I hoped looked like total disdain. ‘Oh, he handles me just fine, thanks.’
‘Good to know.’
I felt this absurd urge to ask him if he was single. But no!
‘So now what?’ I said instead.
‘I suppose we just stand here until someone decides to let go of the band.’
‘That’s not what I was referring to.’
‘Then I’m sure I have no idea what you’re referring to,’ he said.
‘Were you always this slow, or is that a recent development?’
He laughed again. ‘I forgot how fun this was.’
‘Well, you’d better enjoy it, because it’s never going to happen again.’
We maintained eye contact, neither of us blinking. I would be damned if I was going to be the first one to break, even though myeyes were beginning to sting and my vision was starting to blur. Luckily, he was the one who finally dropped his gaze. I mentally breathed a sigh of relief, which quickly changed to something else as I felt his eyes roam my body once more, my face, chest, down to my waist and hips and then back up, where they finally settled on my neck.
‘Forgotten what I look like?’ I quipped, trying to hide the fact that my neck suddenly felt like it was on fire.
He stepped forward. ‘Never.’
‘Asshole!’ I yanked even harder, but still the elastic didn’t budge. ‘What are you really doing here?’ I asked.
‘I told you—’
I cut him off. ‘Yeah, yeah, enjoying a holiday.’
‘And you?’
‘I told you too—’
‘Yeah, yeah, birdwatching. Got it,’ he said. ‘Seems like we’re both going to have to figure out a way of doing whatever it is that we came here to do without getting in each other’s way. You know, me relaxing by the pool and you snapping pics of our fine feathered friends.’
‘You forgot the tree frogs,’ I added.
‘Of course, how could I forget those,’ he said, another smug smile playing on his lips.
‘And how are we going to do that?’ I asked.
