Chapter Nine
They pulled the boat back into the harbor and started to help all the guests disembark. The older couple that Dalton had been chatting with earlier stopped to thank him for his help and tell him about the great time they had. The wife grabbed hold of his face and kissed his cheek hard with a loud smack.
“I’ll never wash this part of my face again, Margie,” Dalton said, playing up his accent and winking. “George, you better get her back to your room before I try and run off with her.” The couple laughed, and she swatted at Dalton as her husband grabbed her around the waist and pulled her in the direction of the resort. A few steps down the way he spun her and pulled her in for a deep kiss.
“May we be so lucky someday,” Kyle remarked to Dalton, nodding his head toward the older couple, still kissing on the pier.
“Speak for yourself, dude. Well, hello…” Dalton replied, grabbing Staci’s hand, helping her down. He kissed the back of her hand, and she giggled and batted her eyelashes. “I do hope to see you later this evening, Staci with an i.”
“We were talking about going up to Paradise Point tonight. Have a couple of bushwackers, see what kind of trouble we can find.”
“Then I guess I’ll just have to find my way up to Paradise Point. And I promise, after a couple of bushwackers, we can find plenty of trouble.” He waggled his eyebrows.
“I’m looking forward to it,” she said low and husky, winking at Dalton. She turned to Kyle and smiled brightly. “Thanks for everything, Captain Kyle.”
“See ya,” he nodded. He turned to check to see if anyone was left on the boat. Much to his dismay, he saw the only guest left was Brig, standing there talking to Drea.
He climbed back onto the boat, trying to make it look like he wasn’t watching them carefully. She was smiling, but only her customer service smile. Could Brig tell that it wasn’t genuine? He saw Grayson come up behind Drea and say something to Brig, but couldn’t quite tell what it was. Drea pushed him away, laughing, but then turned back to Brig looking a little more serious. She gave him a high five and he turned to make his exit off the boat and down the pier.
Kyle walked back to the bar where Drea was sorting through paperwork. “Hey, you.”
She looked up and smiled at him. Her real smile. “Hey back.”
“So, what does the rest of your week look like?” Grayson asked, coming up the stairs from the underdeck.
“Well, Dalton has tomorrow off, I think, and then spends the rest of the week over on the Believin’ with Bobby for the booze cruises. Kyle and I have private tours every day until Sunday, when we’re both off. And they are small private tours—I think our largest group is four or five guests, so that’ll be really nice.”
“We have a day off together?” Kyle perked up.
“Yes, just like we usually do.”
“Right, it’s just I’ve been picking up those extra tours and you’ve been out with Leona, so we haven’t really taken advantage of those off days in awhile,” he responded, stumbling over his answer. Shit, I sound like a dumbass, and in front of the boss.
“Dude, keys to the Runnin’ are yours. You two wanna go out and play on Sunday, fine by me. Hell, leave Saturday night. Just as long as you’re back for work on Monday,” Grayson said, leaning against the bar.
Before he could answer, a symphony of trills and beeps came from their phones, which were all housed in a drawer in the bar. Drea opened the drawer, reaching for the phones and absentmindedly handing each guy their phone.
Family mtg, Big House Beach, 10 min. BE THERE. -V
“What the hell does he want now?” Grayson grumbled. “He couldn’t have told us whatever this is at breakfast this morning?”
“Think he was too busy delivering the news that you had to wear the shirt. Speaking of which, don’t think I’m not on to you and why you had the brilliant idea to come and join today’s excursion, since it meant getting to take it off,” Drea commented, looking at her uncle knowingly. “So, you better put it back on, but your secret is safe with me.”
“You always were my favorite niece,” he said, pushing up from the bar and kissing her forehead. He grabbed the shirt and made his way off the boat.
“Never mind I’m your only niece!” she called out. She turned to look at Kyle, smiling really big. “We should head that way. And, I’m totally down for an escape on Sunday if you are.”
“Oh, absolutely,” he responded without hesitation. “There is no place I would rather be than on this boat with just you.” It was the truest statement he’d made all day. There was still a pit in his stomach over everything else, but things had to be turning around if she was suggesting a date. Well, not a date, but an escape as she put it, just them. He saw the light return to her for a moment and he had to stop himself before he ended up with another hard-on.
“Perfect.” She grabbed her and Dalton’s phones, turning to go. “Let’s go, Dalton, family meeting.”
“What family? I’m not family.”
“You are per Vaughn’s group text just now. And I’m not gonna be the one to tell the big bossman that you’re opting out,” Kyle responded.
“Then funny cousin Dalton at your service! So can I call him Uncle Vaughn now too?”
Drea laughed out loud at the two of them as they helped her onto the pier. Kyle didn’t let go of her hand as they all headed toward the resort. She didn’t pull her hand away and Kyle smiled to himself at the simple gesture. Dalton could have the harem of blondes—she was the only girl he wanted hanging off him. He wondered if this small act of bodily contact meant as much to her as it did him, if she thought about holding other parts of him in her hands, about their bodies coming together in dirtier, more intimate ways.
She hadn’t put her tank back on over her bikini top when she got back on the boat after swimming with the guests. Her beautiful, perfect breasts were still on display, their slight movement as they walked holding his attention out of the corner of his eye. Gah, the things he wanted to do to her. He tried to sneak a full-on look without her noticing—he didn’t want to have to lie if she asked what he was doing. I’m thinking about how badly I want to hold those bad boys in my hands, and suck on your nipples and make you scream with desire.
Well, so much for holding back on that hard-on.
Drea was soaking up every moment of Kyle’s hand in hers on their way to Big House Beach. It’d been an emotionally exhausting day of did they/didn’t they in her head about Kyle and Staci, keeping Brig at arm’s length, and being “on” for a full boat of guests for today’s outing. The quiet comfort of his hand holding hers was everything to her, and still somehow, not enough. She cherished the relationship they had built over these last five years, and if being his best friend was all she ever got, then she’d find a way to deal with that. But she wanted what she’d witnessed with Staci last night, she wanted to be able to hang on in a way that declared that they belonged to each other, she wanted to be able to dirty dance with him and kiss him. She wanted to press herself into his hard body, feel him move above her, under her, inside her. Board shorts only hid so much when you spent every day with a person, and he’d held her enough to know that she was not going to be disappointed with whatever she found in there. Not that she could ever be disappointed in Kyle for anything.