Page 86 of Places I've Never Been

“I doubt that’s true.” To distract himself from the flesh she slowly revealed, he picked up the swim trunks he’d discarded next to the bed last night and pulled them on. “It sounds to me like it was about time you told her what’s what.”

Mattie tugged a light blue sundress out and frowned at it. “I don’t do that, you know? Like, ever. Lizzie calls me the peacekeeper of the family. That’s why I’m the backup Bellamy. I sing backup on stage. I’m always there in the background. Whenever Piper and Della fight, I’m the one who steps in between them. At least, until we split up.”

She tossed the dress onto the bed and dove back into the closet.

Adam retrieved the crumpled linen shirt he’d tossed aside last night from underneath a chair. “That’s a long time to hold a grudge.”

Mattie emerged from the closet with a white top and bright blue skirt. “I’mnotholding a grudge. It’s not that.”

She dumped the clothes onto the bed, dropped the towel, then pulled on underwear.

It was a striptease in reverse that made his body tingle in anticipation. “I’m not saying it’s a bad thing. You deserve to hold a grudge after what she did.”

He pulled his shirt on and tried not to notice how her top and skirt didn’t quite meet in the middle so that a tantalizing strip of bare skin winked at him.

Mattie slipped on sandals and picked up her bag. “I just wish we really could go back to before. I was happy then. It was fun. Me and my sisters, taking on the world. Traveling everywhere. Meeting new people. I loved it. I loved being with them. Then it was just gone.”

“Yeah, but now you’re here in a tropical paradise, with a rock star.” He pulled her close for a quick kiss. “So obviously that’s better, right?”

“You are remarkably self-assured, you know that?” She smiled and wrapped her arms around his neck. Her lips found his, and they let the conversation drop for a few minutes.

Mattie pulled away from him just as his hands began to wander. “We should go. We have a song to finish, remember?”

He stifled his inner protest and followed her out of the villa and into the waiting golf cart.

Chapter Twenty-One

With just eight days left in paradise, Mattie woke up alone and disappointed. She’d sent Adam home the night before because when he stayed neither one of them got any sleep. They had to be fresh for the work session today, a fact she’d told him several times before he reluctantly agreed.

Now she felt the pang of regret as she pushed herself out of the empty bed.

Mattie pulled her phone out of the drawer for the daily check-in.

Della had sent a flurry of texts during the night, or rather happy hour, if Mattie was doing the time zone calculation right. Assuming, of course, that Della was in New York now, and not LA. It was a big assumption. Della wasn’t on tour anymore. She could be anywhere.

Mattie tensed in anticipation of what her little sister had to say.

Talk to me.

Please?

That guy’s a pickle headed donkey wipe.

Mattie giggled at the phrase Della had come up with when they were kids. It was the worst possible insult her six-year-old brain had been able to come up with.

That song is all you.Anybody can tell.

He wouldn’t have a hit without you.

Want me to set the Bell Babes on him?

Mattie shook her head.It wouldn’t do any good to have a horde of enraged Bellamy fans attack Devon on Twitter. Better if he just faded away into obscurity.

It was ironic her own work guaranteed that wouldn’t happen. The song she’d written with Devon was still number one on the charts.

Della’s texts continued.

I’m so,so, so sorry. About everything.

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