Trial Run: Addicted To Love Romance Collection (5 page)

Rob kept laughing, the image of Jason with a snowy-white wig and a bunch of cats twisting around his ankles too vivid for the time being.

“Just remember you’ve just signed up for two weeks of this, buddy. We’ll see who laughs last…”

Rob sobered up instantly. “I don’t suppose I can back out now, can I?”

Jason shook his head. “We’re meeting the guy I bought the boat from at four. After all, you could hardly describe
your
boat to Amelie over dinner if you haven’t even seen it yet.” Rob frowned. Jason had a point. “Plus,” Jason continued, “you’ll want to put a cap on what Amelie packs tonight, or you’ll sink before you get out the Boynton Beach Inlet.”

“I’m sure she’ll see sense.”

“Sure she will,” Jason agreed, but to Rob it sounded like mockery. What had he gotten himself into?

“You’re frickin’ kidding me!”

“It’s a good boat. Been in the fam’ly for… mmmm… maybe fifteen years.”

Rob stared at the aging man, then at the boat, then at Jason, whose face was contorted beyond anything he’d ever seen before due to his effort to suppress his laughter.

“I really don’t think this is going to work,” Rob said. He glanced at the boat once more, trying to find the right set of words to express his intense abhorrence of the thing. “It’s not what I was looking for.”

His eyes did the tour again, resting just a little longer on the half-legible name etched in a clear script, black on the white hull. Mr. Happy. What joker would ever call a boat Mr. Happy? Aside from the very bad sense of humor, weren’t boats supposed to have female names, or at the very least something neutral? Mr. Happy was just not… just not… Ugh!

Why was he even wasting his time? Seething, he straightened up. The little seller’s eyes sparkled. “She grows on you, right, mister?”

“Jason, a word.”

Jason clapped Mr. Happy’s previous owner on the shoulder and said he’d catch up with him at the bar the other side of the waterfront. The man bowed his head and lurched away without another word.

“That boat is not safe,” Rob started, as soon as he had Jason’s undivided attention.

“What are you talking about? It floats. I can’t find any obvious cracks or holes. What’s wrong with it?”

“I kinda hoped for something a bit better than an un-cracked hull. I’m crossing an ocean in it. With your sister.”

Jason puffed out his cheeks and pushed the air out all in one big gust. “Pwft! Ocean? ‘S not like you to exaggerate. It’s only a narrow strip of water from here to the Caribbean. People make it over there on jet skis. This boat is far more secure than that. Besides, you’re gonna wreck it anyway. Why waste a fancy boat?”

“When you said you’d get a boat by lunchtime, I didn’t imagine you’d go steal an eighteenth century relic from the boat graveyard!”

“Here you go again, exaggerating. It was probably built in the eighties.” Rob angled an eyebrow at him. “Okay, seventies. Sixties, at worst. What does it even matter, Rob? It’s a boat. It will take you there. That’s all it has to do.”

Rob ground his teeth and turned back to stare at the offending object bobbing gently by his ankles. It was a simple personal water craft of dubious origin, which had been treated badly. It reeked of fish, and featured a raised cabin and windshield at the prow. The cabin was just about big enough for one person to squeeze in, provided they were under five feet tall, or a contortionist. Two people might have been able to squat in there side by side, if they weren’t too fond of their personal space. Even better if they were prepared to stick their feet out the doorway. There was no door.

At least the engine was shiny, and it seemed to be of pretty recent construction.

“Is the engine…” Rob started.

“It’s new. I’ve just had it installed. It was my only safety requirement.” He gave Rob a look that said ‘See? I do care.’

Rob grunted, still disapproving, but he had to admit the boat was just about good enough for what they had in mind. It only needed to last a few hours, and he could treat it gently until the time came to false-wreck.

“Okay, I’ll make it work,” Rob relented. Jason beamed. “IF,” Rob continued, “and I’m not backing down on this one…”

“Go on.”

“If that guy,” he pointed to the little man loitering outside a shady-looking bar, “can stay off the beer long enough to bleach this nasty stink out of it – and tell him I’ll check! And also if he scrubs that god-awful name off the side.”

“Ha,” Jason laughed. “That was the problem all along! Am I right?”

“No, you’re not right.”

“Whatever. And what would you like Mr. Happy to be called from now on?”

“Anything!”

Jason laughed, but his laugh died down when he saw Amelie approaching fast. Both men hurried away from the boat, but she’d already figured it was the craft she was supposed to travel in, judging by her expression.

“Is that what I think it is?” Amelie asked in an uncharacteristically high voice.

Rob plastered a big fake smile on his face. “My boat,” he gestured toward it.

Amelie scrunched up her nose. “Is it… you know… working?”

“Of course it’s working,” Rob answered, trying to infuse his voice with the right amount of offended indignation. “I’ve been all around the States in it. It’s a good old soldier.” He crossed his arms on his chest, trying his best to look proud.

“What’s it called?” Amelie said, after a curt nod. She craned her neck around to peek at the boat.”

“Umm… It’s been vandalized. I’ve just asked your brother to help me have it re-sprayed before the morning.”

“Yeah, I’ll get that sorted right away. Go have an ice cream or something, you two.” Jason patted Rob’s shoulder and walked away.

Without wasting a beat, Rob grabbed Amelie’s elbow and steered her away from the boat and toward an ice cream stand. She wasn’t smiling. Damn. What if she pulled out? He had to clear the air, or things could get messy.

“What’s wrong?” he asked as he handed her a cone.

“Nothing,” she said, but her eyes drifted to the tiny craft, then wandered toward her feet.

“The boat is safe, I promise.” Rob slipped a finger under her chin and lifted her face up so he could see her eyes. She pulled away.
Talk, Tyson! She’s just in shock. Get her back on side.

“That old lump of fiberglass was designed for ocean crossing, it’s that safe!” he said. “They don’t make them that strong anymore. N-n-not that we’ll need it. The Bahamas are not that far. Think about it: you’ll be on board for just a few short hours.” She still didn’t seem convinced, so he rambled on. “It doesn’t matter what the hull looks like. Inside, it’s all modernized. I’ve got it kitted with all the usual stuff – a Garmin navigator, with track and navigation screens... And the engine is new…”

Amelie sighed and her shoulders relaxed. “Sorry. It was so rude of me, and you’re so kindly doing me a favor. It just looked like a death trap at first sight…” She sneaked a peek over her shoulder, but the view was obscured from where they were sitting – luckily, Rob thought.

“Hey, don’t worry about it. Would I put both our lives in danger?” He waited until she shook her head. “See? Trust me. You’ll be safe with me.”

Amelie’s ice cream had been melting and pooling against the side of her cone. A trickle began to ooze over the edge and she licked it absentmindedly.

Rob sighed and placed a gentle hand on her cheek, waiting for her to look up. Ice blue pools of worry stared back at him from beneath sensual long black lashes. He wanted to wrap her in his arms, kiss those soft lips and wipe all that worry away.

She shouldn’t feel threatened. What he and Jason had been planning was not fair on her; he knew it. Thoughts in a jumble, he blurted out the first words that came to mind.

“It’s okay if you want to change your mind, you know?”

She shook her head right away and straightened up. Rob let his hand drop to the table between them.

“No. I want to go. I trust you.”

A shard of discomfort pierced Rob’s chest, and for one weak moment he wanted to call the whole thing off. Just tell her everything, ask for her forgiveness and suggest she behave more maturely in order to gain her brother’s confidence. And after that, just hightail it out of there. He was beginning to care about Amelie too much. Echoes of these same feelings rattled around his mind and reverberated through his chest cavity. It wasn’t a place he wanted to revisit, not with Amelie, not with anyone. Ever.

But he said nothing. Instead, he spent the next few hours trying to convince himself they would be just fine.

And that was how, this early May morning, Rob found himself steering the small craft – now called Anything; somehow, Jason still believed he had a sense of humor – north toward the Boynton Beach Inlet.

It was still so early, so very quiet, the almost-silent splashes of the waves they made with their passing and the birds’ chirping the only noises he could hear. He let out a sigh of contentment and relaxed. There was no point worrying about the days to come anymore. The decision was made, the bags were packed, and the boat was in motion, with him and Amelie on board. The rest was down to fate. However things turned out, he knew he could live through a few days on a beach somewhere, whether Amelie proved to be the sweetest angel or a harpy spawned from the bowels of hell. All he had to do was keep her and himself alive – simple.

Thoughts of Amelie made him seek her out involuntarily. He found her on her knees, tugging all their supplies out so she could re-arrange them in the tiny cabin.

“What are you doing?” he couldn’t help asking.

She huffed impatiently. “What does it look like? I’m trying to fit our bags in here better. I mean,” she rolled out an eight-gallon tub of drinking water, “why does a plastic bottle need to be protected? It is splash-proof, so it can stay on the deck, or right at the entrance, here, if I can fit it in, while my clothes and electricals can go right inside and stay dry.”

Rob chuckled and rolled his eyes. “I might have known.”

“Might have known what?”

“That all women are essentially control freaks.”

Amelie scoffed. “That’s just because men can never get stuff right. Even something as simple as packing.” She gestured toward the jumble of bags with a smug smile on her face. “It’s almost as if logic is an exclusively female character trait.”

“Mmmm… That’s because men think of the practicalities. They prioritize things and deal with them in order of importance. Girls just don’t get that.”

“My clothes and electrical equipment are far more important than all that water. I can live without water until we get to Nassau. I’ll have water once I’m there. But I don’t want to waste time shopping for clothes, and the chance I’ll be able to find the same quality GHDs on an island is slim to none.”

“GH-what?”

“Flat iron. For straightening my hair.”

Rob couldn’t help laughing. “Yep. I can see the importance of having a good quality flat iron in a place where you’re certain to get your hair wet constantly, in the tropics.”

“Yeah, high humidity is a bitch.”

“So why not change your hairstyle to make it easy on yourself?”

“You wouldn’t understand.” Amelie huffed and went back to stacking bags.

Rob wanted to point out that water was essential for their survival, unlike fancy clothes and flat irons, and so it would be a really bad thing if they somehow lost the drinking water over the side, but he couldn’t think of a way to phrase it without sounding petty or rousing suspicion.

They were past the golf course and the more affluent houses lined with palm trees by the time Amelie declared herself satisfied, and the water bottles did fit back in, but right at the front of the cabin. Rob’s gaze drifted over to a side pocket, where he’d stashed innocuous items he could use as water stills, when the bottled water ran out. The bulge looked undisturbed, so he relaxed. In another compartment, he’d stashed a small first aid kit and a lighter, and Jason had fixed a small hatchet in a clip right at the back of the boat. The hunting knife was in a side pocket of his board shorts. That was one item he could not risk losing. If he fell overboard, the knife went with him.

Now that she’d finished packing, Amelie dropped in the passenger seat beside him and leaned her elbows on the console. She stared at the screens and instruments for a moment, then sighed. “I have to confess – I wouldn’t have the slightest clue what to do with all these.”

Rob chuckled. “Good thing you’ve got me on your team, then.”

She nodded thoughtfully, her eyes still glued to the console. “Yeah. I learned so many things, every single thing that passed my mind, pretty much, but boating somehow escaped my radar. If I’m gonna set up a business in the Bahamas, I’m gonna have to take a few more classes, it seems.”

What a strange thing to do, Rob thought. Why learn something you may not have a use for later? To him, that was wasted time.

The mangroves stretched thick, green fingers either side of the canal, and this time the life they hid was noisy enough to attract and hold their attention. It wasn’t long before Rob had steered them out through the inlet and they were soon leaving the land behind.

A shudder ran through Amelie, and she rubbed the goose pimples on her bare arms.

“Are you cold?” Rob asked.

“No. Just excited.”

Her smile was wide and infectious, and Rob couldn’t help but grin back. May as well make the most of it, because she was going to be scowling enough tomorrow.

“Remember when we were younger…” Amelie started.

“Quite a few things, actually,” Rob answered. “Like the way you never learned that ketchup has a habit of shooting out of your burger bun.” Amelie’s smile dropped a bit. “Or how you never remembered to take your keys with you when you went out, and someone always had to run to your rescue.” A bit like now, he thought, but kept his mouth shut.

“That’s not what I meant,” she snapped, but she was still smiling.

“What did you mean, then?”

“Remember when we played ‘I wish’?”

Rob laughed. “We did that a lot. Which time did you have in mind?”

“Well, I was wondering whether we could play that now, to pass the time.”

“Sure. You start.”

Amelie smiled wider and closed her eyes. “I wish…” she began in a dreamy voice.

Rob stared sideways at her, wondering what could a spoilt rich girl, passing her time until she could get her hands on her mountain of cash, possibly wish for that she didn’t already have. From the tips of her bunched-up perfectly smooth hair to the sleeveless designer top tucked into her too-short shorts adorned with jewels, and down to her slender ankles and monochrome flip flops with bows to the side, she screamed ‘rich chick’.

“I wish I could get Jason to trust me.” Her voice was thick with sadness, but she recovered quickly. She was back to her fun, chirpy self when she said, “Your turn.”

Rob smiled. “You know Jason is ready to trust you. He doesn’t want anything more than to see his little sister is all grown-up and able to look after herself.”

She opened her mouth to answer that, then shook her head. “Don’t change the subject. Your turn.”

“Okay, okay. My turn.” Rob thought for a moment. “I wish… I wish I was brave enough to just change my career.”

“What’s stopping you?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Can’t put my finger on it exactly. Maybe I’m afraid to chuck it in. I earn good money, when I can get a contract, and it would take me time to get to the same level doing something else. Unless…”

“Unless?”

His eyes settled on her face as he answered.

“The competition is stiff on the movie scene, even doing stunt work, like I do. There’s plenty of crazy people around happy to take a few bruises for a big enough stack of dollars. I’m sick of fighting for a few days’ work. While I was filming the last one, about a week ago, someone approached me and offered me a three-year contract…”

“That’s great. Who are they?”

“A private investor.”

“I sense a ‘but’ coming.”

“Yeah. It’s not your normal sort of film.”

“Who cares? It’s a film and you’ll get paid for it. It’s not like you’re gonna be doing low-class porn or something.” Rob felt his expression freeze in place. Her eyes widened and she gasped. “Oh, my God! It is, isn’t it? It’s porn films!”

Rob couldn’t look at her any longer. He turned his head to stare straight ahead, to the line where the sea and the wispy clouds merged on the horizon.

It was quiet for a long moment. Eventually, Amelie spoke. “So, are you gonna take it? I mean, you’ve got the… the…” She swept her hand in the air, aiming at anything from the top of his head to his knees. “The right physique,” she finished finally.

“I don’t know if I could do that. Haven’t made up my mind yet.”

Her soft hand landed on his arm, warm and reassuring. Rob turned to look at her slender fingers on his skin. It was hard to ignore the burning sensation there.

“I don’t really want to go that way,” he said, turning his gaze away once again, “but the little nest egg I’ve built so far will not last me forever. I’ve got to think of the future.”

“Did you speak with Jason?”

Rob shook his head.

“Are you afraid of what he would say?”

“Nah, that’s not it. I just didn’t have the time. Something came up.” He glanced at her pointedly.

“Oh. Sorry. We can have a word with Jason when we return. My brother has got his fingers in so many pies, he’s bound to know of any opportunities around south Florida.”

Rob nodded. “Okay. Now would you mind checking the weather map? I thought we were supposed to have a clear sky. I don’t like the look of those clouds over there.”

Amelie rose from her seat and went to rummage for her phone, which had been packed in one of her bags. She flicked through some screens, then frowned at it. “No. There’s no cloud forecast. No rain. Not even much of a wind.”

“Hmm…”

“What’s wrong?” Amelie asked, absentmindedly slipping the phone in her shorts’ back pocket.

“I don’t like it. Don’t like it at all.”

“You don’t like what?”

“No wind. There’s never a time when there is no wind. Except…”

“Except?”

“Except when the wind is changing.”

Amelie gasped. She’d lived there long enough to know what the change in winds brought about. The hurricane season would hit early this year.