"Ouch. That's cold."
"Maybe, but I understood it. I figured if she was willing to give up five years for the sake of a job, she deserved to have it. I put in my notice and decided to go someplace where people don't act that way. When I heard about this job..."
"No brainer." Felicia finished for him.
"Exactly." He nodded.
"Do you still love her?" It was forward, too forward, she knew, but she couldn’t stop herself from asking.
"No." He shrugged. "There were things I loved about her. I loved her spirit and her thirst to accomplish things, but there's a limit to everything. "
"I get that." She nodded, then stared into the ever-darkening sky. "At least, I think I do."
"I don't know that I'd still be with her now even if things had gone differently." He rolled onto his side, then said, "So, what about you, Felicia Webb? I pour out my soul to you and you have nothing to say in return?"
"Hmmm, I don't know that there's much to be said. I'm an investment banker. I work hard. I'm an only child. No serious boyfriends." She shrugged. "Normal stuff, really."
"I doubt that very much," he said. "There's something about you. Something that makes you work so hard. Something that drives you."
"The pleasure of a job well done?" She shrugged and the sand abraided her skin.
"Come on."
"Honestly, I don't know. I think...I think I picked this job because it seemed stable. It'll be even more stable if I get this promotion and then I can really affect change, you know? Make things better for everyone. That's all."
"Why do you care if things are stable?"
She considered that for a moment. “Don't you want your life to be?"
"I mean, not really. I've moved across the country twice."
She smiled. "Good point. I don't like moving though. Never have. My parents were roadies for Steel Blue Drum when I was growing up, so we were always moving around." She cringed, remembering the bus that had been her home for so much of her life. "Once I put down roots someplace, I just wanted to stay there. I didn't think that was so much to ask."
"No, I suppose not."
Silence stretched over them for a long time and Felicia closed her eyes as the water crashed down and trickled out to her ankles, lapping sometimes all the way up to her calves before pushing back out again.
"I can't remember the last time I had so much fun," she said at last.
"You know? Me neither." He glanced over at her, and when he offered her a half smile she returned it, noticing only briefly just how heated his gaze had become.
Slowly, she glanced down, noting the speckles of sand on his chest, and she clenched her palm to keep herself from reaching out and brushing them away.
But why should she? Sure, she was going back to New York. Sure, she’d only known him for a few days. What did any of that matter?
Here and now she was letting everything fall away. Everything but the things that would truly make her happy. And right now? She knew what she wanted most of all.
“Remember what you said about me needing to find some kind of release?” she asked, already blushing.
“Yeah.”
“Well, I think surfing was a good start…” She chewed on her bottom lip, but then said, “But I think I have something else in mind you can help me with.”
He turned to face her, his eyebrows raised, and she closed the space between them as quickly as she could, determined not to let the moment die before she’d had her chance.
At first, his lips were stiff and unmoving and she wondered if she’d made a mistake. If the way he’d been looking at her all day and studying the way she rode across the waves had nothing in common with her feelings toward him. But then, she as soon as she pulled back and found his hungry blue gaze, he was leaning into her, accosting her with the heady smell of him—that potent combination of salt water and Irish Spring soap—and then, at last, the rough stubble of his cheeks brush against her as he leaned in to find her lips.
Nervous and cautious and anxious as she felt, though, there was nothing tentative about their kiss. Within an instant, his tongue swept out to meet hers and she answered him greedily, pulling him into her mouth to taste the mintiness of his breath mixed with the sweet salt of the water on his skin. He tasted like the ocean, like happiness, and serenity itself, and it made her head swim.
She wanted to say something, to tell him that it might not be a good idea, that she was there for business, but then his fingers found her bicep and he was pulling her down to rest against the sand with him and every thought was forgotten. Everything except the feel of the rough sand on her back as he pressed her down and dragged her arms over her head.