Weekend Fling Read online

  I catch Trey’s expression. Head tilted, his brown eyes on me blink slowly but there’s curiosity in them. Something else, too, I can’t decipher. Fortunately, the stewardess, Amy, strolls by and I point to my wineglass, gesturing for Trey to ask her for another one.

  The curiosity in his eyes changes and he grins, getting Amy’s attention.

  I can’t look at him. Not now. “Mom, if you’re not okay alone…I can come home. What are you doing, anyway?”

  “Oh, nothing.” There’s a rustling in the background I can’t quite make out. “And yes, of course, I didn’t realize you’d left for your trip. Have fun, okay? Going with anyone I know?”

  Odd that she asks me now. What is going on with her? “A friend I’ve met recently. His name is Trey.”

  “Oh yes, that’s right!” She’s eerily cheerful in a way I can’t describe but it makes my stomach roll. Between getting dressed nicely and now this, her behavior is even more strange.

  “I can call Cara if you want company tonight instead of tomorrow. I know how much you like Jimmy.”

  “Oh, that sweet little boy. Please don’t bother. And I’m sure it’s getting close to his bedtime. No, no. It’s no problem. Have a good weekend, okay? And I love you.”

  Tears burst so quickly into my eyes my chin wobbles before I can fight them back. I love you. Feels like forever since she’s said that in a way that sounds like she means it.

  “I love you, too.” I sniff, and she hangs up. Everything inside me rattles and shakes. What is she doing?

  A glass of wine is slid in front of me and it takes me far too long to reach for it.

  “Everything okay?” Trey asks. I’m already shaking my head. No.

  Gah. This guy. I take a minute and get myself under control. Thank goodness for the travel pack of tissues I always keep in my purse. It gives me an excuse to avoid Trey and settle my nerves. I finally find my tissues and blot my eyes. I don’t usually wear mascara so at least I don’t have to worry about raccoon eyes.

  “I need to make a quick phone call again.” I finally lift my gaze and it immediately slams into Trey’s. His brows are furrowed and he’s watching me with an intensity that sends a different rattling through me. “Is that okay?”

  “Of course, Willow. Your mom?”

  “No.” I’ll have to explain something. What kind of girl breaks down in tears on a plane before takeoff? At least if it were wheels up, I’d have an excuse.

  “I’ll give you some privacy.” He moves to stand, hands on the table, but before I can think, I reach out and cover his. Again. Twice today I’ve reached for him, taking his hand. It’s no big deal, right? Except that same zap of warmth shocks me. Before I can yank my hand back, he flips his, clasping my hand between his.

  “No. Stay. It’ll take a moment.”

  “You sure?”

  His thumb brushes my wrist, and holy hell. One soft brush over a pulse point by Trey with his brown eyes studying me and I’m at risk of forgetting all my worries.

  Stupid six months without good sex. Longer, actually. Scott wasn’t exactly a rockstar in bed at the end of our relationship. Or the couple years prior if I wanted to be honest with myself. This has to be my neglected libido at work.

  “I’m sure.” I tug my hand and he lets it go, but not without a knowing smile. Like he can see my heart racing and tumbling all over my insides.

  I dial Cara’s number quickly and she answers. “What happened? Tell me that asshole didn’t ditch you.”

  My eyes slide to Trey’s. His brows are now raised. She’s being quite loud. I roll my lips together to hide a laugh. “No, and I’m pretty sure he heard you, so thanks for that, crazy. My mom called.”

  “Oh, no. Do you want me to see her?”

  Do I? It’s silly to be worried. She sounded happy…or some weird version of it. I run my fingers through my hair, thinking. “No…not tonight. Maybe tomorrow earlier than you were going to?”

  “Absolutely.” She lowers her voice and it grows somber. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, I’m probably overly worried. But she was being weird. I don’t know…happy? Energetic.”

  “Yeah, I can see how that’d be a problem.” She snorts and I chuckle with her. With anyone else, happiness shouldn’t be a problem. “I’ll go see her first thing. Maybe I can convince her to go to the park with Jimmy and me.”

  “Thanks, Cara. You’re the best.” And pretty awesome for only knowing me since the explosion of everything I thought was stable in my life.

  “That’s what friends are for.” Before continuing she whispers, “Now, go jump that sexy man and forget all your worries. I got this, honey.”

  Cheeks. Hot. Fire. A new reason I can’t look at Trey. Based on his chuckle, he sees the blush anyway.

  “Bye, friend.”

  We hang up, and with cheeks still burning, I take a large gulp of my wine.

  The silence between us is thick and heavy. The lights of the runway sparkle, and Dean was right. There doesn’t seem to be a cloud in the sky. It will be beautiful once we’re in the air, which will hopefully be soon. I’d love for the hum of the plane’s jets to rock me to sleep so I can wake up and have a do-over.

  “My dad left my mom recently,” I say, unable to peel my gaze from the window.

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  That weight on my chest that’s been slowly growing over the last few months feels so heavy it’ll explode if I don’t unload it. Blow me apart from the inside out. I’ve told Molly and Cara bits and pieces. They know about our money problems, but they don’t know everything. It’s embarrassing. And it shouldn’t be. Yet with the black sky and blinking lights in front of me, and Trey’s silence across from me even as I feel his gaze on me, I can’t help but let it out.

  “My mom…she has depression. At least I think she does. When my dad left, it destroyed her. He just came home one day, packed his bags, and told her he couldn’t do this anymore, whatever ‘this’ was, and left.”

  The irony is it’s almost the exact thing Scott said to me, except his came with the guilt of saying I didn’t have enough time for him anymore because I was busy taking care of my mom. Oh, and he’d found someone else. Whether he’d cheated or not I don’t know, but given the cold stare of his as he essentially kicked me out of our home, I wouldn’t be surprised. I was too shocked and scared to ask.

  “My mom has always been so amazing. Sweet, maybe naive, but so kind. And she gave everything to him. She hasn’t been able to function since and I moved back home with her to help out. She’s not paying bills, lost her job…”

  This is humiliating. I snap my mouth shut. I’ve said way too much.

  I risk a glance at Trey. He has his drink in his hand but it appears forgotten as he watches me, head tilted to one side, no hint of boredom or a holy God woman, talk about oversharing expression on his face.

  “Your dad’s a dick.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  He takes a drink and I follow. Maybe Amy can come back and leave the bottle at our table. I might need the whole thing now. “Anyway, he’s gone, and Mom…I don’t know how to describe it, but she’s just oblivious to all of it. Bills. Life. The fact she has no job anymore. I picked up the job at Java’s to help cover her, but she needs help and she’s not listening and I’m so lost with what to do with her.”

  Good grief. I can’t stop talking, and yet expelling all of this to a stranger, even if it’s a hot stranger, is almost freeing. Every confession I make lightens the cage that’s been surrounding my chest. My guess is it also has Trey wishing he had asked anyone else to this wedding.

  “Do you need money?”

  “What?” Yes. Thousands of dollars to get back on track. But is he…offering?

  “Money.” His hand taps on the table, shiny black watch jangles on his wrist and clinks against the
table. “I think you know I have some, if you need help.”

  “That’s not why I agreed to this.”

  “I’m not saying it was.” Yet his shoulders fall. Almost like he expected that, and I’m so stunned and offended. He thinks I’m with him because he’s wealthy?

  “No, Trey.” My words come out clipped and my lip curls. I’m seething mad. I might have lost a lot of myself with Scott, but I’m not that girl. “I don’t need your damn money.”

  “Okay. Listen.” His hands lift, palms facing me, and he sits back in his seat. His dark eyes slide to the window and back to me. “I’m only asking, and fine, you wouldn’t be the first person in my life to want something from me, so that’s my issue, but I’m also offering. If you need help, Willow, I can help. I’d happily do that for any of my friends. Or family members. Hell, I’m the one who’s funding Vance’s surfing expedition.”

  He’s so earnest, it’s hard to stay angry. It gets easier when he grins, that sexy, little cocky smirk of his. “It’s an offer on the table, that’s all, okay?”

  Relaxing into the chair, I nod. “Thanks, I guess, but no. What I need to do is figure out how to get my mom to see she needs help I can’t give her. That’s really all I want. But it’s embarrassing to be twenty-five and living back at home, you know? With no end in sight. And I hate, hate my dad for all of it.”

  “Family is shit sometimes. Not mine, by the way. Mine’s awesome.” He slaps his hand to his chest and grins before sobering. “But Caitlin? I’m walking her down the aisle because her own parents kicked her out of their house years ago and she’s never once heard from them. And Corbin’s dad is ten times worse. Sometimes people are assholes and we have no other choice than to realize that and move on. You’re a good daughter for doing what you can until she does.”

  “Sometimes it feels like I’m treading water aimlessly.” I can’t believe I’ve admitted all of this to him. Or that he’s being so understanding about all of it.

  I tap my hands on the table, a nervous beat, and yet I feel strangely relieved. No one knows the full extent of my mom’s issues, but I shouldn’t be embarrassed about it. Neither should she. It’s not her fault—it’s medical. It’s what makes her not seeing she needs help so frustrating. If she broke a bone she’d go to the doctor. Why won’t she for her mind not being healthy?

  It’s a problem for another day. Talking about it has helped, but I need this weekend away to start finding myself again, and I have to focus on me for a change.

  “So,” I grin at Trey. “How do you think our first date is going? I mean crazy girl and all her baggage that weighs more than, well, her baggage aside.”

  He’s in the process of taking a drink and I can’t see his lips, but his eyes are smiling. “Good.” He pulls the glass down, licks up a drop of whiskey on his lips and smiles. “I think it’s fine.”

  I can’t stop the laugh from bursting forth. My words thrown back in my face, except this time I think “fine” means something much better than it ever has before.

  * * *

  —

  With the vault from my overshare opened, the rest of the flight is spent mostly with ease. Trey tells me about his scholarship to Stanford, where he had joined the crew team and met his friend Corbin. He even goes into some brief history of how Corbin met his now wife, Teagan, who will also be at the wedding. A fake marriage turned real love with the promise of a half-million dollars to help out Teagan if she agreed to play his fake wife. And it had all started when she rear-ended Corbin with her car.

  Apparently, they’re both not only incredibly wealthy, but knights in shining armor, willing to wave their checkbooks like swords when it comes to rescuing damsels in distress.

  Caitlin’s history with her fiancé is equally interesting, and more than once I’m thankful for never signing up for dating apps. Seems like a lot of work coupled with a whole lot of watching your back for the freaks and psychos. And coincidentally, when I mention Cara and her husband, Braxton, Trey gestures to a spot on his shoulder and says another artist in Braxton’s tattoo parlors did the work on his Stanford logo tattoo, and he knows who Braxton is.

  Small worlds.

  He sounds almost too well-adjusted to be normal, and yet everything he says draws me closer.

  He might really be the guy he always appears to be. A bit computer geek, a handful of nice, wrapped up in an undeniably beautiful package.

  Which means spending the weekend with him—at a wedding, of all things, which is known to kickstart any woman’s libido into hyperdrive—might end up being the most dangerous endeavor I’ve ever undertaken.

  “So, I’m curious, what did Caitlin say when you told her you were bringing a date?” I take a sip of sparkling water, deciding that thousands of feet in the air isn’t the time to get tipsy.

  And at the way Trey’s face pales, my eyes widen. “You did tell her you were bringing a date, right? Changed your RSVP?”

  He frowns and scratches at his jaw. “I think I forgot that.”

  Chapter 9

  Trey

  “This resort is gorgeous.” Willow looks around the lobby’s open-air atrium with a palm tree growing through the opening. Above us, the sky is inky black with a hint of faint stars, paled by the lights from the resort and entire San Diego area. “I can smell the ocean.”

  It’s almost impossible to miss, this close to the water, and she hasn’t even seen our ocean-side views. While I had booked us two matching suites, there is a connecting door, and outside on the veranda, the balcony is one long, wraparound deck that is open to both suites, although there are separate seating areas. I’m hoping that at some point over the weekend, she’ll be brave enough to unlock her adjoining door.

  Mine will always be open to her.

  After the rocky beginning to our plane ride, when I feared for a moment she’d bolt when her mom called, the rest of it was pretty damn awesome. I like Willow for way more than her fantastic rack and sexy-as-sin curves. The woman’s intelligence and sweetness with a side of sass are a definite bonus in the turn-on column. Her caring for her mom so much shows how much of a decent person she is, and yeah, maybe I had tested her a bit with the money. I’ll help if she wants it, but she wouldn’t be the first woman to have sweet eyes turned on me while seeking something else entirely from my presence.

  “Would you like to go to the patio for a drink and relax? Or head straight to the rooms?” We’ve already checked in and I’ve had the bags sent up. It’s almost eleven o’clock and traveling always makes me tired, but I’m usually a night owl, operating on only a few hours of nightly sleep. While I’m tired, I’m not yet ready to say good night to her.

  She grins up at me. I like that she’s tall enough I don’t have to bend down. If—when—we kiss, she’ll be the perfect height for me to hold her against my body.

  She covers a yawn with her hand and shakes her head, giving me what I believe is her answer, so I’m surprised when she takes my hand in hers and points to the outside bar with her other hand. “Outside. I love the sound of the ocean at night.”

  I step with her, gripping her hand in mine and changing it so our fingers are tangled together. If she’s going to take my hand, it’s not going to be in a friendly way. She might as well get used to my touch now.

  We’ve barely crossed the opened area out to the back patio, where there is a large circular bar covered by a portico, when my name is bellowed from across the way.

  “Know him?” Willow asks, smirking at me.

  “Corbin.” The man is already out of his chair, his wife Teagan next to him as he guides her straight over to Willow and me. They catch our hands entwined together, and Teagan’s brows raise in surprise while Corbin gives me a completely different kind of look. More like a well, well, well, what do we have here…and I know I’m in for a bucketload of shit.

  Perhaps we should have gone to our rooms
, enjoyed the view of the ocean from the deck outside, but now that we’ve been spotted there’s no getting out of this mess.

  “I apologize in advance for anything my asshole friend is about to say,” I whisper to Willow.

  Her mouth dips open in surprise right as Corbin reaches us. I let go of Willow’s hand as he grabs mine, pulls me in for a half-hug, and slaps me on the back.

  “Good to see you, man. Feels like forever.”

  “It’s been two weeks,” I say, dryly. “And if you hadn’t moved to the coast, it’d be more frequent.”

  “You don’t visit…you don’t call…you don’t write…and somehow it seems you’ve neglected to tell me something.” He smiles at Willow, his point clear, and holds out his hand. “Corbin Lane. And you are?”

  “Willow,” she says easily. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  “This is my wife, Teagan.”

  “Nice to meet you, Teagan. Willow.”

  “Any friend of Trey’s is a friend of mine,” she says, stepping in to give Willow a quick hug before turning her sweet arms to me. Teagan is pretty in an innocent, girl-next-door sort of way. It’s the softness about her that made Corbin fall in love with her. She hasn’t had the easiest life, parents dying at a young age and being raised by an aunt in Tennessee. It always impresses the hell out of me when people can live through such hardness and not become hardened by it.

  “We were going to have a drink and relax. Are you going to stay and join us?”

  “Yes, definitely,” Teagan says, happily, like she always is. “We have room at our table. Caitlin told us you were coming in late tonight so we were waiting for you anyway.”

  “Good,” I say, and gently push Willow forward so she’s ahead of me. Teagan leads us toward the table and Corbin falls in behind me.

  “Although Caitlin didn’t say you were bringing a guest,” he whispers, bumping into my shoulder. “Who is she?”