Page 57 of Letting it Ride

I set the glass down harder than I intend to. “Arewe starting a relationship, Cam?” I look him in the eye.

“There she is,” he says, a smirk growing on his face.

My eyes narrow. “What does that mean?”

Cam reaches across the table and covers my hand with his. “I don’t want you to be different around me now, Addie. You’ve never been one to be shy or hold things back. You’ve always just said what’s on your mind. I like that about you. So, to answer your question, yes, I want to start a relationship with you. Does that answer those questions that have been floating around in your mind?”

“You want another virgin piña colada?” I ask Cam, swinging my legs to the side of the lounge chair. “I’m going to get another daquiri.”

He nods, eyes closed in the sun. “Charge it to the room, okay?”

I can feel his eyes on me as I walk toward the poolside bar. This bathing suit might be even better than the little white one I left on the ship. It hugs my curves in just the right way. When I put it on, Cam’s eyes darkened with lust, and I had to practically drag him out of our room to come to the pool.

After lunch, we came back to the hotel, and we’ve been lounging on chairs in the sun while I reapply sunscreen every ten minutes or so. The poolside bar makes amazing drinks that we’ve been sipping on while we eat our way through their snack menu. It’s so relaxing that I think I might like it even better than sightseeing. My arm is already feeling better, and I can feel the throbbing pain slowly subsiding as we sit in the sun. The doctors told me it needed to stay totally dry for twenty-four hours, but we’re getting close to that.

I use my phone to look up “Can you swim with stitches?” and find plenty of warnings against swimming in potentially bacteria-laden areas. I peer at the pool. It looks clean, but there are a lot of people here. And little kids. I’ve been around enough of them to know at least two of those kids have likely peed in the pool already today. I pout a little.

“What’s wrong?” Cam asks, looking over at mefrom where he’s sipping a virgin piña colada on a lounge chair.

It appears to be his drink of choice when he has something other than soda. I think he’s had three of them today. I made fun of his girly drink the first time he ordered it, but the teasing has lost its novelty, because Cam truly doesn’t care. He just likes his little drink with the umbrella and cherries.

“I want to go swimming,” I whine, leaning to my side to look at Cam.

“And? Are you supposed to do that with stitches?” His forehead wrinkles as he thinks.

I was hoping he’d tell me it was fine, negating what I’ve seen online. Cam telling me what I want to hear is obviously better advice than whatever physician wrote this website. I hold up my phone, the results of the internet search still showing on the screen.

“Apparently not in dirty things like pools. But I was hoping they were just being overdramatic,” I admit, my mood souring a pinch.

He leans back against the headrest and closes his eyes. “Huh. Whatever would we do without phones to look everything up?”

We’d be able to go swimming, that’s what.

Cam’s response was almost sarcastic, and I know he left his phone behind when we left the ship, but hiscomment makes me realize I haven’t seen him with a phone in… a long time. I furrow my brows as I think. It’s been since we boarded the ship, in fact.

“I haven’t even seen you check your phone. I’m glued to mine even on vacation. How can you keep yourself from checking it? The emails would pile up if I didn’t go through them every day.”

He doesn’t open his eyes, but one side of his lips curves in a smile. “I left it in my duffel bag for the trip, turned off. It’s been peaceful. At least as far as texts and phone calls are concerned.”

Peace and quiet sound good, but… “What are you going to do about a phone? Are you just going to wait until they mail your stuff back?”

“Nah. I’m due for an upgrade anyway. I’ll get a new one and mail back the old one as a trade-in once I get it back.” He winks at me. “Maybe I can even call you with my fancy new phone. It gets lonely at poker tournaments, you know. I might need a video call to see a friendly face. Or… something.”

My face heats as butterflies swarm in my stomach at the idea ofthatkind of call.

I cover my mouth as I let out a loud yawn.

We’ve just finished dinner and I’m starting to get sleepy, between the sun and the cocktails and the glass of wine I had with my meal. We’d talked earlier about exploring the island at night, but I’m not sure I have the energy.

“Let’s just get you to bed,” Cam says with a soft smile. His hand is on my elbow as I stand from my chair, and once I’m steady, he slides it down to hold my hand.

His hand is perfect—not too big, not too small. Warm and comforting instead of being clammy or sweaty. And he holds my hand with the perfect grip strength. It makes me feel safe, the way he takes charge when I need him to and the way he takes care of me.

And it’s making me think about last night. I’ve had sex before obviously, despite what my brother would probably like to think. I’m twenty-seven. I lost my virginity freshman year of college, and since then, I’ve dated a handful of guys.

I’m not ashamed to say I like sex. And with the right partner, it can be amazing. I thought I’d had mind-blowing sex with some of my ex-boyfriends.

But all of that pales in comparison to what I felt last night with Cam. I’m not talking about just his size, although that’s… shall we say, alargefactor. He fit with me perfectly. It was like we were made foreach other.

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