Page 72 of The Island Villa

He reached the beach and she saw him stand up and swipe the water from his face with his hand.

He raised his hand and waved at her, and she felt regret nudge her.

Why hadn’t she followed him into the ocean? What exactly was she risking by going for a cooling swim in these crystal clear waters with an old friend?

Without stopping to question herself any further, she stood up and stripped off her linen shorts and her top, grateful that she’d thought to wear a swimsuit underneath.

Before she could change her mind, she dropped her hat onto the deck of the boat, held her breath and plunged.

16

Cassie

Cassie closed her laptop (she’d written four thousand words! A brilliant morning, particularly when you considered the emotional turmoil doing its best to distract her) and glanced up as she heard a motorboat heading into the bay below the villa.

Presumably, Stefanos. Her mother had mentioned that he had done some work on the boat.

She watched as he cut the engine and then steered the boat skillfully alongside the dock.

She’d met Stefanos a few times over the years when she visited and had always thought he would make a perfect romantic hero. Or was he, perhaps, too physically perfect? It didn’t do to make one’s characters too perfect and Stefanos fit the “tall, dark, handsome” description a little too well. If she wasn’t careful, readers might dismiss him as a cliché. Also, in her experience, exceptionally handsome men often knew they were exceptionally handsome and that tended to make them exceptionally irritating.

Besides, the real appeal for her, the trait that she found sexiest in a man, wasn’t looks—it was competence. She’d rather have a man who would step up in a crisis, than one who was preoccupied with his appearance. Take Oliver, for example. There was that time she’d fallen into the river while trying to photograph ducklings (not her fault—it had been raining and the bank was soft). The water had been deeper than she’d thought, and Oliver had jumped in and hauled her out without giving a single thought to what it would do to his jeans. And he’d been remarkably good-humored as he’d removed pond weed from his hair and hers, and calming as he’d assured her that they weren’t going to die of some terrible waterborne disease. And then there was the time she’d locked herself out of her college room and he’d shimmied along a wall to squeeze his way through her open window, ripping his favorite shirt in the process. The point was Oliver could always be relied on to come through in a crisis, even a messy one. In her opinion, that was the true definition of hero and beat razor sharp cheekbones and broad shoulders, although broad shoulders did come in handy. She’d discovered that when she sat on Oliver’s during a summer festival when her favorite band had been playing and she couldn’t see a thing.

So in fact, Oliver did have broad shoulders, but his shoulders weren’t the reason she liked him.

She watched as Stefanos secured the boat and it was then that she noticed that he wasn’t alone. There was a second person in the boat. A woman.

Interesting.

Telling herself that it was a novelist’s job to observe people, she leaned forward, craning her neck to get a better view.

Stefanos stepped back toward the boat and held out his hand to the woman, who took it and stepped onto the dock with cautious grace.

She was tall, although not as tall as Stefanos. A red swimsuit clung to her long lean body and her hair fell in damp dark waves past her shoulders and half way down her back. Her sun hat half-covered her face. In her free hand, she appeared to be holding a bundle of clothes.

She was beautiful, Cassie mused. In fact, this exact scene might fit perfectly in her current book. Stefanos leaned closer to say something and the woman laughed, clearly amused by whatever it was he’d murmured in her ear.

Cassie felt a twinge of envy. This was intimacy. She could feel the deliciousness of that deep connection. The way they understood each other and communicated with the brush of fingers or a glance. Those were the things she was trying to convey in her current novel, but it was hard to convey in the written word what she was witnessing right now.

She was wondering why her mother hadn’t mentioned that Stefanos was dating someone and who she could possibly be when the woman turned her head.

Cassie felt a jolt of surprise. Adeline?

Adeline had been out on the boat with Stefanos? Even more surprising, Adeline was wearing a knockout red swimsuit? And judging from her damp tangled hair, she’d been swimming.

Cassie wondered how many more surprises this trip was going to deliver.

She should probably give them some privacy, but she couldn’t look away and consoled herself with the knowledge that people-watching was part of her job. Also understanding human behavior, although she had to confess that she often failed at that part.

When she and her sister had parted company that morning, both of them had been feeling anxious and, given the circumstances, Cassie hadn’t anticipated that things were going to return to normal anytime soon. But here was Adeline, smiling and talking to Stefanos as if they were a couple on vacation.

She watched, hypnotized by the scene unfolding in front of her, until she saw Adeline turn and start walking up the path to the guest cottage, at which point she grabbed her laptop and pretended to be engrossed in something important.

“Hi there.” She closed the laptop casually as Adeline arrived. “You’ve been swimming?”

“Yes.” Adeline sat down on the lounger closest to her. “It was impromptu. I bumped into Stefanos. He invited me out on the boat. Given the way my morning had gone, I thought some breathing space might be good before the next difficult conversation.”

Cassie wasn’t interested in the difficult conversations, but she was interested in what had happened between Adeline and Stefanos. It was the first time she’d ever seen her sister anything other than immaculate. And it suited her. If anything, she looked more gorgeous now that she was rumpled and casual. “I didn’t realize you knew each other so well.”

---