Outside, the April-night air was cool on Nicole’s arms and bare shoulders as they strolled around the pool, her high-ish heels clacking on the cement, and then down a sidewalk along the golf course. She sipped her wine as they walked, feeling stupidly decadent in a pretty dress strolling along a gorgeousfairway in the twilight as the stars came out, a little buzzy, with a handsome man carrying her bag.
He said, “San Diego is so beautiful. It makes me wonder why I live in Connecticut.”
A breeze coasted through the trees. “Are you from there?”
“Scranton, Pennsylvania, originally.”
“Here in the West, most people are from somewhere else, but I’m from Oceanside. I’ve never been to Pennsylvania.”
“A lot of mountain ranges and forests between towns, as I remember.”
“Were your parents from there? Mine are from Colorado.”
As she took a few more steps through the gathering night, Nicole wondered if he’d heard her, but he must have. Except for the whispering leaves on the trees around the path and cars hissing in the far distance, the rhythmic clap of their footsteps was the only sound in the night.
Warmth in her palm, and his hand closed around hers as they walked.
He slowed and stopped, then tugged her hand to turn her toward him. As she looked up to see what was happening, his dark silhouette was already bending, and his lips brushed hers.
The darkness, the quiet, the intimacy of the seclusion closed around them, a secret moment for a soft kiss.
His gentleness stole her breath. Yes, the wine and the anticipation swirled in her blood. If he’d grabbed her and thrown her up against a tree, she would’ve ripped his clothes off and jumped to wrap her legs around his waist, but this slow kiss, the taste of wine in his mouth, the warmth of his body traveling through the cool night air as if their clothes were already in a pile at their feet, the sweet fragrance of night-blooming jasmine and the scent of soap and masculine cologne from his body that was almost touching hers kindled a delicate but deeper fire.
He released her hand and stroked the underside of her jaw.
Nicole reached up, holding onto his shoulder and then the back of his neck for balance as the kiss lingered, and then they parted.
“How far is that villa?” she asked.
“Just at the end of the sidewalk, past these trees,” he whispered.
“Let’s go.”
21
Dessert
NICOLE LAMB
Nicole toddled along with Kingston, holding his hand again, for the last few yards until they got to a ground-floor suite in a two-story, four-plex villa, where he used his phone to activate a keypad beside the door and let them in.
Inside was a house.
On the other side of the wide living room was a dining room and a small kitchen, and then a door to a bedroom stood ajar.
Nicole was attuned to floor plans and square footage, having just moved apartments. This part of the hotel suite was definitely half the footprint of the entire house she’d grown up in. Depending on the bedroom, she guessed the suite was at least fifteen hundred square feet.
For a hotel room.
For one person.
Yeah, Kingston was used to nice things.
Their open bottle of wine was sitting on the coffee table with two fresh glasses, plus one slice of apple pie and a tri-striped serving of the triple chocolate mousses she’d mentioned while they looked at the menu. “When did you order this?”
“I wrote it on the bill.”
“Sneaky,” she said, grinning.
