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He made a token protest but really, a run on the beach sounded great.
Chapter 8
It was a strange feeling, walking along Beach Road with Rafe, exactly like she’d done probably thousands of times. But this morning, it felt so entirely different that she didn’t really know how to handle it. Should she hold his hand while they walked? No, because they weren’t a couple. Then, of course, she was normally so affectionate. Maybe she should stop doing that, or do it more, or try and aim for the same amount of affection? It wasn’t like she ever measured it, so how would she know when she’d overdone it? So weird. And it wasn’t like he was trying to hold her hand or be coupley. God, maybe they had made a mistake. Maybe she wasn’t capable of friends with benefits. Maybe it was all just going to get too strange. Not naturally prone to overthinking things, she found she was having a hard time working through the current situation and her feelings around it.
Rafe waited outside the cafe while Mikayla grabbed ham and cheese toasted sandwiches and coffees. He looked ridiculously hot in his aviator sunglasses, leaning against a pole, holding the dog leashes in one hand. She came out, handed him his coffee and sandwich, taking Buttercup’s leash off him as she did so. He cocked his head to one side and looked at her. “Everything okay?”
“Sure!” She answered, with way too much enthusiasm. He stood there looking at her for a long moment, but since he had his sunglasses on, she couldn’t read his expression properly. She took a deep breath, forcing herself to relax a little. “I’m fine,” she said, more naturally. “You?”
“Yeah, I’m good.”
“Great.” She allowed Buttercup to pick up the slack in the leash, turning away from Rafe and heading down Main Street, to the beach. They ate their sandwiches while the dogs ran their initial spurt of energy off, then Rafe took a soccer ball out of his backpack. Wesley saw it first and came streaking over from the shoreline. He sat in front of Rafe, panting, with his tongue hanging out, like he was grinning up at Rafe. Throwing the ball on his boot, Rafe sent it rocketing up the beach and they watched as Buttercup caught sight of it and madly raced her brother to get to it first.
Mikayla and Rafe leaned against the rock wall that separated the beach from the footpath, drinking their coffees in companionable silence. It was such a normal, everyday thing for them to do that it helped restore her equilibrium. Once she finished her coffee, she threw both their empty cups in the bin and strolled off along the sand. When she couldn’t sense that he was behind her, she turned back to see him standing near the wall. He’d taken his sunglasses off and was unabashedly checking out her ass as she walked away from him.
“So, this friends with benefits thing.”
“Yeah?”
He walked over to her, stepping close, so they were almost touching. “Does it include PDA’s?”
“Oh, so it’s a friends with fringe benefits arrangement you’re after, is it?” She closed the distance, pressing herself against him and putting her arms around his neck, grinning as he pulled her against him.
“Well, if you’re gonna go around wearing pants like that, can you blame a man for wanting to tweak the contract?”
Her breath hitched as he ran his hands over her lycra clad bottom. “These are my football training pants. You see me in them all the time.”
“Yeah, but now I know exactly what you look like out of them. So…” he let the sentence trail off, brushing his lips over hers.
“So…” There was something here, something she should worry about, but his hands felt so good on her body, his lips so good on hers, that she let it go. She gave in to the kiss, angling her head, sighing when he wrapped his arms around her. The moment spun out, the soft morning sunshine, the light morning breeze, the screech of a seagull wheeling overhead. Hm, not quite so lovely. She broke away, jogging backwards for a few steps before spinning around and sprinting along the sand towards the shoreline, where Wesley and Buttercup were wrestling over the soccer ball, knowing Rafe wouldn’t be far behind her.
She grabbed the sodden ball and walked away from the water’s edge as Rafe slowed to a jog. She dropped the ball on the sand, placing her foot on top of it. “Buttercup,” she said, flicking her fingers, waiting until Buttercup ran around in front of her and crouched low to the ground, hyper alert and ready to spring.
“Sit,” Rafe said in a low, firm voice to Wesley. Wesley sat, every muscle quivering with the tension of wanting to get into the game.
Mikayla kicked the ball. She grinned from ear to ear when Buttercup stopped it with her nose, holding it in position hard with her paw so that when Mikayla came to retrieve it, she had to say “release” before Buttercup would let go. Her tail wagged furiously as she hustled out of the way so Mikayla could kick the ball again. She deliberately kicked it with a bit more force, giving Buttercup a bit more of a challenge in running it down, but the dog was too quick, jumping on it to stop it, then pushing it with her nose so that it rolled along the sand, back to Mikayla. “Oh, you are such a clever girl. You sure have got the hang of that.” She knelt down to give Buttercup a vigorous pat, smiling again as the pup’s whole body wriggled with excitement. Mikayla rose to her feet, shooting Rafe a challenging look. “Alright, game on.” She shot into action, kicking the ball with the side of her foot, away from where Rafe and Wesley were. Wesley was off like a shot, rounding up the ball and at Rafe’s whistle, nosing it back to him, pushing his sister away with his body when she tried to get the ball off him.
Rafe toed the ball around a little, rounding it to the top of his foot, into the air, bouncing it on his knee, once, twice, then kicked it long. Mikayla whistled for the dogs to hold back as she got to the ball first, deliberately pushing her body against Rafe as he tried to toe it away from her. She slid her arm around his waist and down, squeezing his butt as she pushed the ball to Buttercup, and they ran again, rounding up the ball. Rafe brushed his fingers over the side of her breast while he pulled her away from the ball. “Cheat,” she gasped, trying to smother her smile and failing. They went back and forth like that, every time they came within touching distance of each other, there was groping until Rafe lost his footing, with his arm around Mikayla. The dogs had to scamper out of the way as they fell to the sand. Mikayla laughed breathlessly, pushing her hair out of her face as she grinned down at him.
She gasped as he flipped them, so that he was on top, smiling down at her. His grin slowly faded when he looked at her, the heat building in his eyes, warming her. He dipped his head, pressing a soft kiss to her lips, then lifted his head to look at her again. She felt trapped by his gaze, her breath stilling in her lungs. He kissed her again and she opened her lips, sliding her hands down his back to his hips. She was just floating on the sensation of his kiss as his body pressed her into the sand.
Then she gasped with shock as a wet, canine nose pressed against her face and snuffled into her neck, the breath hot and stinky. She scrunched her face up and turned away. “Ugh.”
“Mikayla.”
She froze as she heard her mother’s voice above her, grimacing as she felt Rafe’s body weight disappear. She squinted up at him, taking his hand as he reached down to pull her to her feet. “Ah, hi, Mum,” she said, wiping her hands on her pants. She felt like a naughty teenager.
Nora looked at them both for the longest time, her expression neutral. “Drop in later.”
“Ah, sure. Okay.”
“Rafe.”
“Nora.” He acknowledged her terse greeting with a nod, then she turned on her heel and strode off down the beach, her little Scottish terrier hard on her heels.
“I feel like I’m in trouble.”
“Yeah.”
