Lex picks up the phone and leans on the table, arms flexing. I pause to finally appreciate the intricate sleeve. A thunderous sky wraps around his shoulder, lightning bolts shooting down his bicep to end at his elbow. His forearm is covered in bright watercolor flowers, and on the inside of his forearm is a three-dimensional clock in black and white.
I could literally spend the next two weeks watching him like a TV show. All he would have to do is walk around my bungalow exactly as he is now, bending over to pick things up, stretching. He could just sit and read the paper. I’m not picky. My gaze moves up, and then back down. He really is immensely hung. I’m not sure I’ve had bigger. I definitely haven’t had better.
“What’re you hungry for?”
“Huh?” I pause my ogling.
“What do you want to eat? Apart from the obvious.” He gestures to his crotch with a smile.
I roll my eyes and flop back down on the comforter. “I don’t know. Anything.”
“Burger and fries?”
In all honesty, the idea of a burger and fries makes my mouth water, but I’ve avoided food that tastes like anything for so long I’m not sure my body can handle a burger. Also, I’d have to eat with my hands, and burgers are messy. Not sexy.
“What about antipasto? A cheese and fruit platter? Desserts?”
“Sure.”
Lex taps on the counter as he places an order. “You can put it on my account but deliver to bungalow seven. Yes. Yes. Thank you.” He hangs up and saunters back to the bed, holding out his hand, and he nods to the sliding glass doors. “It’ll be about half an hour. Want to take a dip?”
I give him my hand and let him pull me up. It takes some effort to get my legs to swing over the edge of the bed, but my muscles are taking cues from my brain again, so that’s a good sign. “I’ll just grab a suit.”
“Why bother? It’s late. It’s not like anyone can see.” Stepping over our discarded clothes, I note his socks are purple and covered in happy faces and that his boxers have the same pattern. I must’ve been pretty preoccupied with getting inside his pants to have missed that earlier.
I follow him to the deck, checking to make sure we’re the only ones taking a midnight swim, or whatever time it is. The water is like glass, the night quiet. Millions of stars flicker in the black sky. The moon is massive, a gorgeous pale disc reflected across the water.
Lex descends and dives in, seamless and smooth, hardly making a splash as water ripples out, lapping softly against the deck. He surfaces, running his hand through his dark hair. “You coming?”
The last time I went skinny-dipping was my first year of college. I’d been with Ruby, and some guy I was seeing at the time and his friend. My hope had been to set them up, but he turned out to be a dud, in all departments.
Lex treads water as I make my way carefully down the steps. Now that I’m not having multiple orgasms, and the endorphins are settling, my toe has started to throb. Maybe the water will make it feel better. “Is it cold?”
“We’re on a tropical island, Amalie. It’s beautiful.”
I dip a toe—one on the foot I didn’t hurt. It’s tepid, like a cooling bath. Perfectly refreshing. My plan is to sit on the edge and ease into the water, but Lex has other ideas. He shoots up out of the water, grabs me around the knees and pulls me in with a shriek that echoes across the empty, silent water.
“Shh. You’re going to wake everyone up and then they’ll know you’re naked,” he murmurs in my ear with a laugh.
I push on his chest in an attempt to get free, but he has me by the waist. It’s barely deep enough for me to tread water. If I stretch, my toes touch the sandy bottom. I stop fighting, because his body is warm against mine, and drape my arms over his shoulders. Clasping my hands behind his neck, I lift my chin and take in the stars. The Milky Way is a thick band of cloudy shimmer streaking across the night sky.
“It’s so beautiful,” I whisper, truly appreciating it for the first time since I arrived here. Although, hot sex has a way of making even the most dreary of environments seem pretty awesome.
“Stunning really,” Lex whispers.
I drop my gaze to find he’s not looking at the stars, but at me. “I’m sure my post-sex hair is amazing right now.”
“You look like you belong in an eighties hair band video.” Lex kisses me on the chin, then releases me from his protective hold. Flipping over onto his back, he spreads his arms. “It’s too bad we have to fly halfway across the world for an experience like this.”
I mirror his position. I suppose outside of the city we could’ve had the same view of the stars, but it wouldn’t be anything like this, with white sand and pale blue water, an inactive volcano rising in the distance. And there wouldn’t be Lex either. I have a sudden moment of panic over what I’ve done and what this means. Is it just tonight? Will things be awkward in the morning? Will he even stay? Do I want him to? I think the answer to that is yes. I like what I know of him, beyond just his ability to make me come. I have no idea what Lex’s usual style is. Armstrong painted him as a playboy, and our introduction, along with his antics at the Halloween soirée last year, lead me to believe it was true. But I’ve been wrong before, so maybe I’m wrong now.
Lex’s fingers skimming the tips of my own startles me. I turn my head toward him.
“Where’d you go?” There’s softness in his eyes, worry maybe. I don’t know what it means.
“To the moon.” I gesture to the sky. “I wonder if this stops being beautiful if you see it every day.”
“I don’t think it stops being beautiful. I think people get used to having that beauty around them all the time, though, and sometimes they just take for granted that it will always be there.”
Maybe that’s what happened with Armstrong; the things that attracted him to me in the first place became commonplace. Or maybe what he saw on the inside made him change his mind about what was on the outside. I think I wanted his inside to be like his outside, but it wasn’t. Is that just how life is? I really hope not. I hope that one day, someone will see me, all of me, and that I’ll be enough. I don’t want to settle but I also don’t want to end up alone and lonely.
“Hey.” Lex grabs my hand and pulls me to him, wrapping me back up in his arms. I shiver, not from cold, but from the intensity and the sudden wave of sadness that passes through me. He tips my chin up. “Wherever you keep going in that head of yours, don’t. Okay? Just be with me, right here, in this moment. Just soak up this beauty and stay with me.”
The sudden knock at the door prevents a response. Lex sighs and drops a quick kiss on my lips. “Be right back.”