“So you want me to go and keep him occupied?”

“Please! Mason and I are dying to get away for a long weekend. Mason racked up frequent flyer miles going to see his family or something, and this is the perfect time for us to go.”

“Too bad the military doesn’t give them frequent flyer miles for deployments,” Bailey said dryly. “They’d be taking a vacation every couple of weeks.”

“Right? We could take a few trips around the world with all the deployments Mason’s been on.”

A shriek from the beach drew Bailey’s gaze down toward the water, but she saw a group of men and women around their age goofing off. A guy was running down toward the surf, carrying a woman in a dress, who clung to him, laughing hysterically.

The water splashed his legs, but he held her high above the incoming water, grinning as their group of friends howled with laughter.

“Goodness, that looks like Noah right now,” Taylor said, leaning closer. “I think he’s with Jacob and one of the other guys.”

“Doesn’t it though?” Bailey asked. “Like I said, all those guys are major flirts.”

“I wonder if Mason knew his friends were here.”

“Probably not, because Mason is attached at the hip to you. The rest of those guys still like to go out and have a good time.”

“Hey!” Taylor said, playfully sticking her tongue out.

“Oh, you know what I mean. They wouldn’t call up Mason to go chase after women on the beach because he has you.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. So anyway, what do you think? Are you in for a long weekend in Florida? We’ll get you a plane ticket with Mason’s frequent flyer miles. And you said you had over a week’s vacation saved up—you’d just need a day or two off.”

“Sounds good,” Bailey said, taking a sip of her mimosa as soon as the waitress handed it to her. “Ahh, this is amazing.”

“I told our bartender that he was serving one of his own,” the waitress said with a wink.

“It’s extra good. What is that, an orange liquor added in?”

“Yep. House specialty. But don’t worry, you won’t get charged extra or anything.”

“Well it’s fantastic,” Bailey said, taking another sip. She took a menu from the waitress and scanned over it as the woman hurried off to her next table.

“God, this is good,” Taylor agreed. “You need to make these for us sometime.”

“Maybe down in Florida. I don’t see the guys going for mimosas though.”

“So we’ll keep them supplied with cold beers. Anyway, we’re renting a three-bedroom condo in Florida, so you can have your own room.”

“And is Mason planning to cook the fresh catch every night?”

“Absolutely. He says he knows what he’s doing and honestly? I don’t doubt him. The guy’s a Navy SEAL for heaven’s sake.”

“I could go for a mini-vacation. I just need to check and make sure I can take the days off. I’ve got plenty of leave though, so it shouldn’t be a problem. And there are worse ways to spend my time than boating with my best friend and a couple of Navy SEALs.”

“Yay! Oh my God, I can’t believe this is really happening. To vacation!” Taylor said, raising her mimosa.

“To vacation,” Bailey repeated, grinning as she clinked her glass against Taylor’s.

A few days down in Florida with a gorgeous Navy SEAL had to be a good thing, right? She just needed to make sure they kept the flirtations to a bare minimum. Because there was no way she was sleeping with him.

Chapter 4

Noah chuffed out a laugh as Jacob ran through the incoming tide, splashing water onto the women they’d met earlier on the beach. The group had just graduated from college and were a little on the young side for him, not that he’d turn down the chance to spend the day flirting with a couple of beautiful women.

Bikinis and curves to kill for weren’t exactly a problem.