Reese moved to the left and found a well-lived-in room that must have been Hallie’s. She quietly placed the new towels in the bathroom.
The door to the other bedroom was closed, likely unoccupied unless Hallie had it decked out as some type of office. Any guests of Hallie’s probably used that bathroom, which was how Reese decided to close out her task strong and replenish the soaps, at the very least.
Reese opened the door, noticing the clothing strewn across the floor first.
Her confusion ratcheted up a notch when it sounded like a shower was running behind the closed bathroom door, but it took a back seat in her brain when a woman’s scream pierced the room.
She froze, her stomach plummeting from the sound as she quickly glanced up and then immediately back down.
The ground was her best friend right now. She studied it like an artist studying a landscape before painting it.
She knew from her brief glimpse that a woman stood in front of her at the foot of the bed, decked out in nothing but a pair of teeny-tiny boy shorts. Reese’s mind tried to catch up, seeing in her peripheral vision as the woman pulled her earbuds out of her ears before using her arms to cover her chest.
“I’m so sorry,” Reese said when she found her voice, speaking to the floor. “I didn’t know anyone was in here.”
On reflex, she handed the woman one of the towels she was holding in her arms like a security blanket.
It felt hot in here. Why was it so hot?
Reese knew that she should flee the room as quickly as possible, but she was equally mortified and transfixed.
Also, she needed to save this train wreck of aninteraction.
Was this Hallie’s friend? Girlfriend?
“Ugh,” Reese groaned, covering her eyes with a hand and pitching her view into darkness.
“I know I haven’t been working out lately, but I didn’t think it was that bad.”
The teasing voice, sweet but with a bite of sarcasm, made her drop her hand, pulling her eyes toward a body she knew looked sculpted out of marble.
“No. It’s not that,” Reese said once she’d made it to the woman’s left shoulder, which was tan. Smooth. And looked incredibly soft.
She cleared her throat. She’d been out of the game since her business and personal relationships with Megan had imploded. That was proving to be a mistake right now.
No. She was Reese Devereux, and she needed to start acting like it. She’d graduated from Stanford undergrad and Stanford business school at the top of her class. She’d built and sold—begrudgingly—a multimillion-dollar software company. She’d just launched her newest venture with the acquisition of The Stone’s Throw Inn.
Unexpectedly seeing a beautiful woman in nothing but her underwear was just another day at the office—which made a lot of sense given that her office was now a hotel.
“Reese.”
The sound of her name was like a lightning bolt through her chest, and she finally inched her eyes over to meet vibrant green, like a lush, tropical forest after a rain.
It couldn’t be.
Holy shit. “Sydney? Sydney King?” She tried to find the right words but failed. “What are you doing here?”
She unconsciously took a small step forward, trying to get a better look at her brother’s ex-girlfriend—respectfully, of course. It had been years since they’d seen one another in person, not that she hadn’t seen Sydney splashed across magazine covers or on gossip websites over the last half-decade.
Even though her outfit now wasn’t dissimilar to the one she’d worn on the cover ofSports Illustrateda few years ago, it was still hard to accept that Sydney was standing here, in front of her. It was like seeing a teacher out in the wild: unexpected because it wasn’t their natural habitat.
Time had been good to Sydney. Reese could happily admit that. Her long, blonde hair was tied up in a high ponytail, her body all lines of sinewy muscle that ran across her limbs.
Sydney hadn’t bothered to wrap the towel around her; instead she was holding it against her chest as she looked at Reese with less confusion than Reese had expected, given the situation.
“Hallie’s my best friend,” Sydney finally answered, her gaze flicking across Reese’s face like she was looking for something.
What it was, Reese didn’t know.
