Adrienne could turn around and continue her search for the protection bracelet. But who was she kidding? She was completely incapable of letting Valerie go. Not after that.
So, instead, she followed her along the rocks. Although slightly less gracefully and way more methodically. Adrienne stayed closer to the sea where the rocks were smoother, while Valerie moved inland over the rougher limestone. At one point Adrienne’s shoe slid on a patch of loose grit that sent a small avalanche of pebbles skittering down toward the ocean below. Her stomach had done that swooshing thing when she nearly knocked her cell phone off her bedside table in the middle of the night.
Then Valerie angled across a wider rock shelf, and suddenly they were closer again. Their paths converged without either of them saying anything. The production tent shrank behind them until it was nothing but a speck against the sand. The rocks were too narrow and uneven for the shoulder cameras, which was probably why production stayed near the beach unless a challenge forced them farther out. Once Adrienne was certain none of the camera crew had followed, and Valerie had slowed to a more manageable pace, she finally asked the question that had been gnawing at her. “Did you throw the challenge?”
Valerie came to a complete and sudden stop. She whipped her head back and frowned so deeply that Adrienne had to bite back a comment regarding frown lines and aging. “Are you seriously asking me that?” she snapped.
“Yes,” Adrienne said matter-of-factly, then she hopped onto a boulder shaped like a hippopotamus’s back. “I am. I think you threw the challenge because you want to get back at me for the swap thing.”
Valerie inhaled deeply and turned her head toward the sea. “No,” she said softly. “I didn’t throw the challenge.” The wind picked up. Adrienne could see it tugging at the water’s surface until it broke into frothy whitecaps that kept forming and collapsing. She didn’t have to see Valerie’s expression to know that she was lying. But why? Why not just come out and say it?
“You don’t like me, do you?” Adrienne asked, stepping over onto another boulder. If she had any sense, she’d stay put. But she couldn’t. She felt like a stray piece of iron being dragged toward a giant magnet. Valerie was the magnet, and the more she hopped, the closer she got. “You haven’t liked me since you met me onThe Valentine.”
“I never said that.”
“But you don’t have to say it,” Adrienne said. “I can see it in your body language. In the way you look at me.” Adrienne wasno stranger to people looking at her with both admiration and deep dislike. She’d spent her entire life watching women smile at her face and then lower their voices the second she walked away. Her life was too easy. Her beauty opened doors before she could reach for the handle. She was spoiled. Entitled. Shallow. Oftentimes all three. But Adrienne didn’t mind; it was the tax she paid for existing in her family.
“How do I look at you?” Valerie asked, looking amused, as if Adrienne were a puppet performing at the Bob Marionette Theatre, or some kid moaning about a drippy ice cream.
It irked Adrienne enough to pause and really think about her reply. Unfortunately, the best she could come up with was, “Like I’m a pot with mold growing inside of it.”
“I’m surprised you know what that looks like,” Valerie shot back without pause.
“There it is again.” Adrienne huffed, feeling exasperated. She felt worse than exasperated, if there was even a word for how she was feeling. “You think I’m just some trust-fund cliché. You think all I care about is holidaying overseas and my skincare routine.”
“Isn’t it?” Valerie said, cocking her head to the side. “Isn’t your entire image tanning on yachts in the middle of the Mediterranean and using serums more expensive than a house?”
“There’s more to me than my family’s wealth,” Adrienne snapped back. “There’s more to me than what I put out there on social media. I’m not the person I portray on social media.”
Valerie stepped forward. In fact, she leaped over an entire rock, landing on top of another with the grace of a ballerina. “Do you know what I see when I look at you?” she asked.
Adrienne knew better than to reply. Either way, she wasn’t going to like the answer.
“I see someone who was five minutes into this game when she decided she could take what she wanted without thinkingabout anyone else,” Valerie said, skipping over another rock. Then another, moving ever closer to Adrienne, whose legs felt like thick cement blocks. “You’re selfish and egotistical.” She leaped over yet another rock. “And you don’t care about anyone else but yourself.” And then one more rock. “But this life isn’t just about you. There are other people in this world. People who don’t have your money or your last name. And yet you seem to forget that you were born into your life, Adrienne. You didn’t earn it. You didn’t work for it. You’re no more significant than a street sweeper or a garbage collector. In fact, you’re less than them, because at least they do something good for this world.”
Adrienne went still.
Not because of what Valerie had said. But because Valerie was standing on Adrienne’s rock, because Valerie was so close to her that Adrienne could see the salt crust on her collarbone, the faint line of sunburn on her shoulders, and the thin strands of hair that stuck to the sides of her neck. She was still dressed in the same black sports bra and raspberry purple exercise shorts she’d worn during the challenge. But the smears of dirt were gone from her cheeks. Her hair was wet from a dip in the sea.
Then, for the longest second, Valerie stared at her. At her eyes. At her nose. At Adrienne’s mouth.
And for some reason, Adrienne felt a growl between her hips. A surge of desire she hadn’t expected. A feeling so sudden it seemed to throw every sensible thought clean out of her head.
Adrienne wanted to kiss Valerie. In fact, she wanted to do more than just that.
Suddenly the wind shoved a loose strand of hair across Valerie’s face. Adrienne moved one inch closer to her but didn’t touch her. She didn’t skim her finger across her cheek where the strand lingered, or dip her finger to Valerie’s exposed clavicle, even though she was desperate to. And she sure as hell didn’t smooth her hands down Valerie’s ribs despite the tingling itch inher hands. If there was any touching today, she wanted Valerie to cross that line.
But would she?
Valerie stared at Adrienne’s lips a second longer, and Adrienne felt it like a shift in the air, that hesitation, that very specific moment where something could have gone one way and instead... didn’t. Adrienne sighed. She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t disappointed, that she’d hoped Valerie would feel the sexual tension in the air because surely, one would have to be numb not to.
Valerie stepped in suddenly and closed the gap between them completely. Her lips were pressed against Adrienne’s lips before Adrienne could even redirect her disappointment. Before Adrienne could even realize that she’d misinterpreted that moment.
Valerie’s hand shot upward and curled around the back of Adrienne’s neck, tilting her head down. Adrienne didn’t hesitate; she hooked her fingers into the waistband of Valerie’s shorts and tugged her flush against her until Adrienne’s hardened nipples crushed against Valerie’s chest. The height difference felt insignificant. The taste of wild mint on Valerie’s tongue was overpowering. Adrienne drank it in like a woman dying of thirst.
Then, Valerie’s lips left Adrienne’s mouth and traced a searing path down her neck. Adrienne’s head was spinning. The world felt upside down. Or was it the right way up? Was having a woman’s lips on her neck way more normal than being out here on this Greek island?
“You’re right,” Valerie muttered as she tongued Adrienne’s skin. “I don’t like you. But I also haven’t stopped thinking about you sinceThe Valentine.”
