Page 12 of Lipstick Kiss

Walking as quietly as he could up to the back of thechair, he observed the group of men strip off their shorts and vests and then run across the lawn to the path leading down to the beach. Freya hadn’t moved in her seat after they disappeared from sight. He came to her side and crouched down when he saw she was fast asleep. Only her nose was peeking out. The hood of the jumper she had been wearing last night was pulled down over her eyes, and the duvet covered her completely.

Luke leaned in and kissed her nose.

They’d shared platonic kisses to the cheek, head and forehead for as long as he could remember. Now he thought if she belonged to another man, maybe he should stop touching her. He knew if Freya was his, he would be having a quiet conversation with any man who touched their lips to her, no matter how platonic it was.

If Freya was his? That sounded strange to say, but his heart warmed at the thought.

“Hey, sleepyhead,” Luke said quietly.

Freya moaned, jolted her head from side to side and then pushed back the hood of her jumper with the hand that had the diamond. In the morning light, it sparkled. Did she really like an ostentatious ring like that?

She blinked a few times, looked across the lawns, and then at Luke.

“Hey, Luke. What are you doing here?”

“Well, I live just over there,” he said, pointing to the cottages. “What are you doing here?”

Freya sat up, then fell to the side, like the blow-up chair was a bouncy castle. Luke watched her roll off and slowly stand, dropping the duvet to the side.

“Oh crap, I missed them,” Freya crowed, flapping her arms to the side.

“Missed who?”

“The hot men,” she said, pointing to the empty lawns.

“Why would you get up at dawn? Blow up a floating device, and drag a duvet to watch hot men exercise when you’re engaged?”

He tilted her head as he watched the blood drain from her face. Freya wasn’t a slouchy outfit kinda girl. Under her hoodie, she wore yellow loose-fitting cotton trousers and white lace-up plimsolls.

Freya’s face went pale, and she looked to her ring, then the lawn and then back at Luke. Not a word came from her lips.

He was back to thinking she had made him up. Now he wanted to know why.

“Is your fiancé one of them?” Luke pointed to the lawns.

“I should go,” Freya said, gathering her duvet under one arm and grabbing the inflatable with the other. “I’ll see you at ten.”

Luke laughed as she dragged everything across the flagstones and down the steps, including her body. He could hear the bumps of the chair as she trudged down and out of sight. He sauntered across to the low wall to watch her walk across the dew-soaked lawn towards the cottages where the buggy was probably parked. How she was going to get the inflatable home would be interesting. But then he could see her walk to Jason and Heidi’s place and toss it into their back patio area.

Freya was lying. How much fun could he have making her squirm?

He spent the next few hours plotting to be evil to get her to admit she was making up a fiancé, and by the time ten o’clock rolled around, he was ready.

Luke had been sitting on the low wall in Archer’s patio area, telling his brothers that he knew Freya was lying. They were sceptical.

“Tell me again why you think she’s lying?” Jason asked.

“We tell each other everything,” Luke replied confidently. “She wants me to believe she has found a man, dated him, fallen in love and now planning to marry the guy, and it’s news to her best friend. Nope, don’t buy it.”

“And if you’re wrong and she has been secretly dating someone because this town is so small, she would be under a microscope and would prefer to keep it all secret?”

“The thing about liars is they forget the lies they’ve told. I saw her three months ago. So she must have done all the schmoozing in the last two and a half months. Nope. Nope. Nope.”

Archer and Jason stared at Luke like he’d lost his mind.

“Why do you care?” Archer asked.

Luke stood back and turned his cheek like he’d been slapped. “I don’t.”

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