Page 45 of A Quick Stop in Paradise

“Are you sure you’ve never been with a girl?” Brooklyn laughed, and I shrugged.

“Call me a natural.”

She caressed her fingertips down the length of my spine, sending tingling feelings through my body. “I will call you just that. I could absolutely get addicted to you… I’m glad I waited instead of getting off myself.”

I could not believe I was saying this in the full light of rational thinking, well outside the sex haze clouding my thinking, but I said, “I mean, if you want that again another time, you can just wake me up…”

She laughed. “You say that now, but getting woken up for sex is a little less fun than it sounds. It’s still getting woken up before you want to get up.”

“It’s sex withyou.Are you kidding?” I propped up to give her an incredulous look, fighting down laughter. “I really did decide to give women a try and just… went and picked out… the single hottest one alive.”

She gave me a long, languid smile. “I think I’m just your type, Ryan.”

“I could hardly believe anyone not… having you as their type.” I buried my face against her collar again. “I don’t think sex has ever felt like… anywhere close to…”

“Is this you realizing you’re actually a lesbian, or realizing you’ve just been settling for some pretty shitty men?”

I snorted. “Hey, you almost went for it with one of the men I’ve dated.”

I saw the glint of caution in her eyes, but apparently she got the appropriate read that I was well and truly over that asshole, because she relaxed. “Honestly, I’ve slept with a lot of people who aren’t good in bed. Sometimes they get you with being attractive and then they disappoint you. I get the feeling Shane would have been a disappointment, judging by how you’re losing it over having someone make you feel good.”

I laughed, burying my face against her to hide the blush. “I don’t think I’m a lesbian… I might, uh, like women more than I realized, though. But I think the main thing is just that you’re literally the hottest woman alive.”

“So…” She brushed my hair back from my face. “Not to get too presumptive, but if I’m the hottest woman alive in your mind, any chance that means we can keep doing this? Becauseyouare not one-and-done material.”

Brooklyn Sterling actually thought I was hot. To think Shane used to say I wasplain,told me when I was breaking up with him that I didn’t deserve him anyway, whenBrooklyn Sterlingthought I was hot.

I wondered, briefly, if Shane might have liked me better if I’d had sex with him like this. He clearly hadn’t been satisfied, and I couldn’t blame him—we only ever did one or two things in bed, maybe half an hour all told, every couple of months. But then—I hadn’twantedto do more than that. Brooklyn made meneedit in a way I hadn’t realized was possible, a way more than justI’m ovulating and you’re my partner so it seems like a good setup to have sex.

I wasn’t a lesbian, was I? I was pretty sure… I could still see myself doing this kind of thing with a man, too. Just… it was the sad realization creeping in that the answer wasit would have to be a man who cared about me.

Maybe it wasn’t just that Brooklyn was my type. Maybe it was something a little more than that.

Of course, she was also hot as hell.

I kissed her collar. “I am literally all yours,” I said lightly, and I pushed past the self-rejection to say, casually, “Honestly, if you wanted to just keep me around in this house for the rest of my stay and have sex with me anytime you wanted, it’s not like I’d complain.”

She laughed, kissing the top of my head. “If I didn’t have a job, I’d take you up on all of that,” she said. “And I’d like to do more with you than just fuck. But trust me that it is high on the list. I’ve got a day off today, though, so let’s go reheat that breakfast and see how far we get before I need your fingers again.”

“Mm. Do you suppose I should get my fingernails done shorter?”

“They’re just fine right now. And I happen to like a pretty manicure. But let’s move before I get turned on thinking about your fingers.”

I suppose if wehadto. I was getting hungry.

∞∞∞

“Yeah, no, not looking forward to it,” I said, leaning against the counter. The resort lobby was sleek and polished and felt like something from another lifetime, but I tried to focus on Allison on the other side of the counter, looking like a different person in her uniform, the lobby quiet around us right now. Allison gave me a tired look.

“I can imagine,” she said. “Your family’s a lot.”

“Still, they’ve been blowing up my phone, so I figured I should finally have a proper talk…”

She nodded, and she glanced both ways before she folded her arms on the counter, leaning in closer to me. “So, how did last night go?”

“What?” I felt my face burn suddenly bright-red—I didn’t know if it was written all over me somehow that I’d slept with Brooklyn—but I felt like an idiot when Allison raised her eyebrows and said,

“The club?”

---