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My eyes spring open. The top of a blonde head is snuggled under my chin and my nose is full of flowers and sweetness. I fell asleep.Wefell asleep.Together.
I glance around the living room, then down to where Kenzi’s curled by my side on the couch. A ray of sunlight breaks through a gap in the curtains, lighting the expanse of soft golden skin beneath my hand, the curve of her hip, the dip of her waist, all the way up to the naked breast pressed against my rib cage. Fuck. My fingers twitch. I swallow thickly. Check the time on the wall clock by the kitchen door. Nine thirty. Nine-fucking-thirty. I never sleep past sunup.
Her hand on my stomach smooths up to my pec, brushing my nipple on a sleepy groan. I puff out a sharp breath and scrub my face, careful not to jostle her. What happened last night breaks through my groggy mind. The milk. The water. The look on her face when I pulled her down the sofa. The look on her face when the burn ointment made contact with her raw skin. Fuck, I hated hurting her. I blink away the image of her scrunched eyes and the color leaving her face to focus on what came next.
We drank cocoa with cream from a can, her on one side of the sofa, her silk cover-up thing wrapped closed up to her throat. Me on the other, mug in hand like a bull at a fucking tea party.
I remember talking. I remember telling her more about Amooz and my first tour. The good stuff. The fun stuff. I remember the guard she rightfully wears around me lessen and lessen until she was laughing at my stories and even telling me some of her own. How she’s a night owl. About her Gran, and the summers she spent with her. About her brother and the rest of her family. I remember her smiling at me like she hasn’t done in months.
How we got from that to this I don’t fucking remember.
Holding my breath, I gently lift her hand from my chest and lay it on the sofa by her hip, then shift sideways away from her.
The drag of her skin across mine nearly rips a groan from me. I grind my teeth, stare at the gap in the heavy curtains that woke me and maneuver her onto her side on the sofa.
On my feet now, I rub my chest as I stare down at her. Her lips push out with an exhale, her long lashes fanned out over her cheeks. It’s the first time I’ve seen her still. She’s forever laughing or talking or glaring at me. Now she looks—
She flips onto her back with a groan, throwing her arm across her eyes, her dressing gown completely undone and covering absolutely no part of her. For the love of—I avert my gaze. Almost trip over the low coffee table behind me in my attempt not to look. I should go. I drag my hand over my mouth and force myself not to go back and pretend that that sofa, with her, isn’t exactly where I want to be.
Despite waking up late and taking an extra-long, extra cold shower this morning. I’ve managed to get a fair amount done.
I stand back and check over the solid wood countertop I’ve spent the last couple of hours installing into the front of Laia’s pie shop. It looks good. Exactly like the one she showed me, but half the price. I made it from scratch. Fixing this place up on the side may not have been in my original plans when I came to Clua, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t enjoying it—working with my hands—building something out of nothing. Being a Marine may have been in my blood but working with wood comes as naturally to me as dismantling an M27.
I still remember the first time my granddad handed me a hammer and told me to get to work. I was five. My dad had been on tour and my mom was busy with my little sister Jaynee. I’d taken to running away whenever her back was turned. From that day on, they never had to look further than my dad’s workshop to find me.
Wiping my hands down my worn cargo shorts, I glance around for the brush. Dad would be shaking his head if he could see me now—Granddad too. I wouldn’t blame them either. I turned my dad down—turned down taking over the family construction business he set up for returning veterans back in Miami in favor of setting up a surf school on an island he’d never heard of.
Marines like us don’t walk away from our responsibilities when we’re discharged, son. We look after our own.
I drag my hand over my mouth, still staring at the pale wood, the smell of sawdust and varnish so familiar—so comfortable—that for a second, I wonder if I’m doing the right thing in not taking over the business. But it’s not the building side of things I’m walking away from—it’s all the shit that comes with it.
The proud stares. The pats on the back. The fucking never ending thanks from well-meaning strangers.The nightmares. Every one of them a reminder that I don’t deserve their thanks or their appreciation. That I fucked up and people died because of it.
I’m being selfish. For the first time in my life, I’m not doing what’s expected of me—not living up to my dad’s sky-fucking-high standards. Here I’m not Sergeant Taylor, 5th generation Marine, medically discharged from active duty, honored, praised, then unceremoniously dumped by his fiancée when shit got real. I’m not the prodigal son of Sergeant Major Taylor, Semper Fi legend and dedicated veteran-saint, providing livelihoods for his brothers after the military is done with them.
Here I’m just Mylo, the surf guy.
Here I’m me.
Here the mother-fucking nightmares don’t come half as often.
I grab the brush leaning against the wall and get sweeping. It might have been a productive morning, but it’s been a damn hot morning too. I wipe the sweat from my forehead with the back of my forearm. Focus on the fact that the air-conditioning should have been here long before I got back because every time I stop moving, I can feel her. Still feel Kenzi’s warm skin pressed against mine—the curve of her waist beneath my palm—the way her head fit beneath my chin, like she was built to sleep there.
My phone vibrates in my back pocket. I pull it out. Another message from my sister. I’m due for a check-up soon. It’s a slap in the face. A cold hard reminder of why it doesn’t matter how good she fits, nothing can happen with Kenzi. I shove my cell back into my pocket.
Sweat tickles between my shoulder blades. I drop the brush and drag my grubby T-shirt over my head, pulling my hair out of its knot in the process. I haven’t had it cut since a road-side bomb almost blew my fucking arm off on my last tour. My sister calls it the first sign of my rebellion—I call it laziness. I tuck my T-shirt into the back of the tool belt around my waist just as the little bell Laia loves, but I’ve been dying to get rid of, jingles above the door. I’m still tying my hair back when I turn.
“Fee? You in here?” Kenzi stops in her tracks. Wide blue eyes blink. Take me in. Then fix on my face. “Oh, Mylo. Hey.”
I hold her stare. It’s not intentional. I shouldn’t. But fuck if she’s not easy to look at. Loose, cream linen pants and a white sleeveless shirt, her hair down in almost white-blonde waves. “Felix isn’t here.” I scratch my beard, but still can’t seem to force my eyes off her.
“Oh, right.” She wets her bottom lip, her gaze darting down to my dusty chest once more. “Sooo, I fell asleep last—”
“How’s your—” I cut her off, my gaze dropping toherchest before I can stop it.
“It’s fine. Perfect actually. Thank you. Amooz should bottle that ointment and put it on the market. He’d make a fortune.”
“I told him the very same.”
