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Between her room at the lovely White Strand Inn and the sand on the other side of the pool bar, Sophie Birch lost her virginity.
She blinked a dozen or more times, trying to get used to the contact lenses she’d only started wearing two days ago, and focused on tanned, capable hands. The second drink promised to be better.
“Try this,” the bartender said, putting a blended fruit cocktail in front of her. This one guaranteed to incinerate her insides with sweetness rather than the hot steel otherwise known as tequila.
Sophie lifted her gaze and smiled, hoping her pale skin hadn’t turned pink everywhere. She was positive her cheeks matched the strawberry speared on the edge of her tall glass.
“I can’t believe you’ve only had virgin cocktails,” her new friend, Honor, said from the barstool beside her. Honor drank her pretty reddish-orange drink like it was ginger ale.
Honor also looked cooler than cool while doing it. She had dark blond hair and blue-gray eyes, and no one as pretty as her had ever been so nice to Sophie before. Of course being that Honor worked for the mayor’s office as an event specialist meant she sort of had to.
The only reason Sophie had agreed to a “drink” in the first place was (a) because Honor had knocked on her hotel room door to welcome her to White Strand Cove and act as her liaison during the film festival and then promptly escorted her to the bar and (b) to calm her crazy uneasy nerves. She had the sweaty palms and trembles in her limbs to prove her nerves were stressed out.
She needed to chill. Immediately.
Drinking probably wasn’t the best way to start her first job going solo as a special events coordinator, but she had no idea how else to relate to the laid-back beach vibe. Her boss was supposed to be here, but she’d broken her leg last week in a water-skiing accident, and so Sophie had flown from Montana to California in her place to oversee the Surf Fanatic Film Festival.
It’s work, but I want you to make it a vacation, too,her boss had said.Everything is in place and should only require minimal supervision, so live a little.Sophie had never taken a vacation before. She gazed out to the gorgeous dark blue sea. She’d also never seen the ocean before. Her heart did a few flips every time she looked that way.
“I’m sorry I spewed my tequila sunrise all over you,” she said to Honor.
“Don’t be.” Honor waved her hand likeno big deal, my friends spit their drinks on me all the time.
Sophie got the feeling she and Honor could be good friends, and she was grateful to the town for giving her such a wonderful welcome gift. She didn’t make friends easily back home.
“Oh, this is yummy,” Sophie said, sipping her piña colada. She could get used to these.
Only not while working. She’d been handed an amazing opportunity and she didn’t want to blow it. She planned to do the best job ever for the film festival and to make her boss and company proud. Prove to everyone—including herself—that she had what it took to take on bigger events on her own. Leaving her research job studying brain regions and function last year hadn’t gone over very well with her parents, and her mother was always looking for an opportunity to remind her that she was better suited for analysis than what color tablecloths looked good.
The mind is a terrible thing to waste,her mom would say, the cliché one of her favorite ways to share her displeasure.
Tonight, Sophie’s job officially started. Today she’d have a little fun, even if it was a galaxy out of her comfort zone. She glanced down at her plain blue cover-up, then over at Honor. Honor had simply whipped off her blouse when Sophie soiled it with her drink, and now she wore a bright green bikini top with tiny white embroidered flowers and a pair of very short white shorts.
“Don’t drink it too fast.” Honor tipped the glass away from Sophie’s mouth. “Just because you can’t taste the alcohol doesn’t mean there isn’t any in there.”
“Right,” Sophie said. “Maybe we could get some lunch, too? I didn’t eat on the plane and only grabbed a banana this morning before I left for the airport.”
“You must be starving.” Honor reached down the bar and picked up a small laminated card. “How about sliders and a quesadilla? We could share.”
“Sounds great.”
“Oh, but the fish tacos are really good, too.” She put down the tiny menu and grinned. “Let’s get all three.”
Sophie smiled. Yep, good friends.
She wondered if everyone in White Strand was as nice as Honor. Her shoulders finally relaxed and she breathed in the scent of the ocean, suntan lotion, and something floral. Greenery with bunches of tiny pink flowers decorated the perimeter of the bar and pool area.
“Are you the liaison for every—” A loud clatter and then high-pitched squeals interrupted her question and drew her attention to the beach. A group of young women descended on some guy, and a few sunbathers around the pool were scurrying to join them. All Sophie could make out was blond hair and broad, tanned shoulders. Probably a pro surfer from one of the films. On the flight over, she’d done her research on the movies but hadn’t had a chance to brush up on all the stars who would be here. She planned to lie in bed and do that tonight.
“Zane! Zane!” the women shouted.
Oh. She knew whohewas. She had a surf lesson with him in an hour. Her boss had made the date, but when she’d handed Sophie her itinerary, she’d given Sophie strict orders to follow through with everything on it.
It didn’t matter that she’d never set foot in the ocean before, right?
Her head swam for a minute. There were roughly one hundred trillion synapses in the human brain, and surely the right ones would fire when she needed the proper motor skills for surfing.
