Page 49 of Just My Luck

He took off his sunglasses and rubbed his eyes. He looked a wreck.

“Jeez, are you okay?”

He shook his head wearily. “No.” Signaling the bartender for a drink, he sank onto a stool. “I’m in trouble.”

Her ears perked up. That sounded promising. Nathan had gone to college on the East Coast and spoke such good English that she could barely pick up his trace of an accent.

“Well, I’m almost always in trouble one way or another. Maybe I can help.”She sipped from her mai tai. “Work or family?”

He shot her a glance full of wry despair. “That’s the trouble. For me it’s the same thing.”

Interesting. Maybe she was finally getting somewhere. “How do you mean?”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Ouch.” She pretended to be wounded. “Fair enough. I’ll leave you be.” She collected her drink and made to withdraw, but he snagged her arm.

“No, stay. Drink with me.”

“Well, only if it’ll help wipe that look of despair off your face. No one’s supposed to be that miserable on vacation in Hawaii.”

Nathan muttered something into his drink.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Lincoln was taking a break, leaving Yumi in charge of the boys splashing around in the swimming pool, including Eddie.

She didn’t trust Yumi’s lifeguard skills, but Eddie was an excellent swimmer. Besides, the resort paid a real lifeguard.

As he left the pool area, Lincoln caught her eye and gave a brief jerk of his head toward the wing of the hotel Tanaka had booked. Message received. He was going to skulk around Tanaka’s entourage. Her job would be to keep Nathan where he was.

She shifted her attention back to Nathan, who was complaining that he wasn’t really on vacation at all.

“My family doesn’t know the meaning of the word ‘relax,’” he said. “When I went to Yale, that was my first encounter with the concept of ‘chillaxing’.”

“You found attending Yale to be chillaxing?”

“Compared to being at home in Japan, yes.” He drained another shot of tequila. He was really putting them away today. “You would understand if you knew anything about my family.”

“Well, I make it a point to know nothing about the families of handsome men.” She winked.

When he laughed, she knew she’d cheered him up, and a relaxed, happy Nathan was more to her advantage.

“I like you,” he said, cocking his head at her. “You’re not what you seemed at first.”

Uh oh. “I’m not?”

“I thought you were fucking the man who takes care of your son.” He glanced over at the pool, so she laughed loudly to keep his attention on her. She didn’t want him noticing that “Jim Spencer” the manny wasn’t there.

“Fucking him? God no. I never screw the staff, at least not literally.” She lifted her glass in a toast.

It worked. He grinned and clinked glasses with her. Phew.

“I will tell you that he wants to.” Nathan downed another shot, then signaled for one more. “But you must be used to that, Zaharina.”

Uh oh. Time to steer things back to their friendly drinking-buddies vibe.

“The thing is, my ex-husband has spies everywhere,” she murmured. “And he’s vengeful. So I have to be verrrry careful about who I spend time with. I don’t need that kind of trouble.”

He shifted away from her. “Neither do I. I have enough already.” Another shot down. All that tequila was starting to take effect. “Do you know the worst part? It wasn’t my fault. But I will get the blame.”