“Your dad worries about you, but he loves you.”
“My dad is a lying, cheating ass.”
“Wait, what?” Sydney blinked in surprise. This was news to her. How long had Mya been keeping that bit of information to herself? But why’d she get the feeling that wasn’t the reason Mya had been on guard for the last twenty-four hours when they were there to relax? Unless the idea of working with me makes her nervous?
“I don’t want to talk about it, but my parents are separated. It seems my dad has been sleeping his way through New York.” Mya lightly patted the top of the book. “I’m going to need another mimosa.” She frowned. “How about you tell me about the hot cowboy in this book.” She lifted one hand like a request to let go of the topic of her dad. Discussing cheating wasn’t exactly Sydney’s favorite thing anyway, and Mya knew that.
“Well, okay. Yeah, I’d say the cowboy delivered.”
“Who’d you picture for your man candy while reading since his face is hidden on the cover?” Mya grinned, her mood lightening up again. “And damn, woman, I really do need to take up reading if it’s got you blushing right now. A rare sight to see.”
“It’s the sun,” she lied. “But if I were to blush, you’d probably be the only one to ever witness it happen.”
“Okay, so spill. Who’d you fantasize about when reading about the good sheriff?” She shifted her sunglasses back in place. “Or was he bad? Wink wink.”
“I think you’re actually supposed to wink, not say that.” At least they were both smiling again.
“Right, right. So . . .? I need answers because based on your absence of speech, the guy you have in mind is someone you know.” Mya sat taller with excitement.
“The only men who hit on me lately want something called a situationship. Hell if I know what that means. Not together but together?” She shrugged. “Or they call me a MILF. Right to my damn face.” What happened to a real man? A gentleman? Someone who treated a woman right. Took her out on dates and asked her questions with the purpose of getting to know her, not just getting her in the bedroom. “And these guys are babies. Barely thirty. I swear I don’t understand the new trend of these young guys wanting an older woman. While men my age want younger women.” Alice is my age. She’s thirty-seven. Seth chose her. Damnit, don’t think about them right now.
“You’re stalling. Borderline blabbering, which is so not your norm. Which means you don’t want to fess up about the real man who played the cowboy sheriff in your head last night.” Mya opened the book and began skimming pages again. “I’ll find a hot scene and read it aloud until you tell me his name. You know I’ll do it.”
“Is that supposed to scare me?” Sydney laughed, reaching for her glass, having forgotten it was empty.
“Oh, this part is spicy.” Mya traced one of the lines with her finger, her lips tipping up into a smirk. “‘That’s quite the penal code you have there, Sheriff,’ she said as he unsheathed his weapon.”
Sydney held her stomach while laughing, her ab muscles a little sore from the intense core-dominant yoga session that morning. “It does not say that,” she finally managed. “And you didn’t even use ‘penal code’ correctly.”
“I made you laugh, though, so let’s call it a wash. But this part here about the handcuffs is more than intriguing. Maybe I do need this book when you’re done.”
“No, the sheriff’s mine.” She hadn’t meant to react so quickly, but well, the words had come out. Sun and mimosas to blame. For sure.
Sydney squeezed her thighs together at the memory of the scene from the book she’d mentally role-played after reading last night. And the leading man had been someone she knew. A Southern, cowboy-hat-wearing sheriff with espresso-brown hair and the most incredible brown eyes she’d ever seen. They were a near match to how the author had described the sheriff’s eyes in the book. What had she called them? An antique cherry brown? Or maybe it was mahogany. Hell, some type of light wood.
But . . . damn. Beckett Hawkins, and the hands on that man too.
She’d done her best not to stare at him when he’d reached for an appetizer from a serving tray by her at Savanna and Griffin’s wedding last month, but the immediate image of his hand wandering over the slope of her ass cheek popped into her mind anyway.
And so last night, it only made sense for it to be Beckett she thought about. Wishing it was his fingers, not hers, coaxing her into orgasm.
“He’s a sheriff in real life, which is probably why I thought of him,” Sydney confessed when she’d only meant to think that thought.
“Oh?” Mya lowered the book to her lap and pivoted her way. “The sheriff with a daughter you mentioned meeting back in Alabama? That hot hunk of a man?”
“How do you know he’s hot?” Sydney challenged, knowing she’d never describe a guy that way.
“You blushed when mentioning him. Remember, you don’t do that often and only around me, so . . .”
Ah, damn Mya for that. But she was probably right.
Beckett had made an impression on her. He was a single parent like her. And maybe everyone called him grumpy or moody or whatnot, but she understood his protectiveness. They were alike in that regard as well.
“So, you pictured him while you got yourself off, huh?” Mya was loving every minute of this.
“I know what you’re thinking, and nothing will ever happen between us. I only thought of him because he’s the only small-town sheriff I know who also wears a cowboy hat. It made sense.”
Sydney sat up, an idea coming to mind. One that Seth had teased her about over the years, insisting she’d never do something as thrilling and shameless as tossing her top on a beach that wasn’t a nude one.
She was a totally different woman now than when she was married to him though. A “warrior,” right? Bold. Fierce. Enough.
So, Sydney went for the knot of her bikini top at her back and untied the strings.
“Topless, huh? Might draw attention to us.” Mya stowed the book back in Sydney’s bag as Sydney allowed the little black triangles to fall to her lap.
“Eh, let them look. Who cares, right?”
Mya pursed her lips for a moment as if she was on the verge of sharing whatever she was keeping from Sydney. “Sure. I mean, if we’re going to truly relax, I guess we go big or go home?”
CHAPTER FIVE
“Dad, can I ask you something?”
Beckett held the phone to his ear as he opened the terrace door of his hotel suite and was greeted by harsh heat, a shocking contrast to the air-conditioned room. “Yeah, baby girl?”
“Daaaad, I’m not a baby anymore. Officially a teenager.” Like he needed the reminder.
“You’ll always be my little girl. The apple of my eye.” He let go of a somber breath, his thoughts gliding back to the past as he moved out farther on the terrace.
“I’m going to be a father,” he remembered announcing to his dad over the phone almost fourteen years ago. “I’m dealing with gangs and the cartel. Lowlife assholes.” His voice had been shaky. And not from the bourbons he’d tossed back. He’d been truly terrified about bringing a kid into the world, especially given his job and the shit he’d witnessed. “I—I don’t know how to raise a child.”