Picture Perfect (The Wilsons) (7 page)

A deep blush spread over her face and she felt it travel downwards. “Could you close the door for me, maybe?”

“Oh, sure.”

She saw a muscular forearm come into view, and then pull the door shut for her.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Lea stepped out of the bath. What was going on? She toweled herself dry, and dressed rapidly.

By the time she stepped out of the bathroom,
she was thoroughly annoyed. Adam was half-lying on the bed, flipping through photos on his camera. The sight of him bare-chested reduced her annoyance a bit – he had well-defined pecs and abs, and the body of a man who was strong because he needed to be, not because he was interested in bodybuilding.

Lea managed to sound a lot calmer than she felt. “What are you doing here?”

He looked up at her, and took in her blue cocktail dress, her hair damp and curly and her eyes wary but polite. “I’m guessing there’s been a mixup,” he said casually, “They asked me to switch rooms this morning so obviously they got their records muddled.”

“Hmm.”

He’d said it so calmly, so matter-of-fact, that Lea felt her annoyance disappearing and felt a little silly for being so worked up about it in the first place. Nothing seemed to ruffle Adam, and she wished she could be more like him.
Sure, she’d been in the tub, but it wasn’t liked he’d walked in on her naked, the bubbles
had
covered everything.

“It’s happened to me before,” he went on, obviously trying to calm her down. “You work in crazy places and need last-minute rooms, you see a lot of this kind of stuff.”

She let out a deep breath. “Ok. But I guess we need to go down and talk to that girl in reception.”

“Hmm. I spoke to a guy.”

“Great – and they got mixed up.”

Adam smiled, revealing his rows of perfect teeth. “I think I’ll take a shower first. I just came from the gym.”

She couldn’t help teasing him. “Oh. So that’s why you were in your tighty-whities.”

Adam laughed, his voice a deep
baritone, and refused to get embarrassed. “See anything you liked?”

Lea blushed again, and shaking her head
in mock despair, she wondered over to the wardrobe. Why was it so hard to be mad at him? She kept her back to him as she rifled through her luggage, looking for her makeup bag. When she heard the bathroom door click shut, she finally turned around.

There was a large mirror on the wall, and she applied her makeup rapidly. She heard the shower running, and Adam stepped out of the bathroom, fully dressed, thankfully, and
he watched her critically as she applied the last of her makeup.

“Are we done?”

She nodded, and grabbed her purse, and they both grabbed their carry-ons and headed downstairs towards the reception. As they walked towards the lift, Lea couldn’t help thinking that they looked like a normal couple, about to check out and head back home, and wondered how it would be if that were true.

***

The man at reception seemed as confused as they were, and Adam could tell that Lea was getting irritated again. Trying to stay calm, he explained their situation one more time, giving the man, whose name-tag said “Harold,” their full names, former room numbers and current room number. Adam’d had quite a few run-ins with bureaucracy, and was usually good at staying calm in these frustrating situations. Beside him, Lea smelled sweet and fresh, and he wondered if it wouldn’t be a good idea not to sort out the problem, and just share the same room instead.

Harold’s
face broke out in a broad smile as he finally understood the situation, and after a quick apology, he started typing in things and staring at his computer screen intently.

Finally he
turned to them with a look of consternation and said, “I’m really very sorry about this, but it turns out there are no spare rooms at the moment.”

Lea’s eyes flashed dark.
“Are you kidding me? I pay good money and plan my entire holiday around this hotel…”

“Allow me,” Adam interjected smoothly. Picking a fight with the receptionist wouldn’t help. “This seems like a very nice resort.”

The receptionist stared at him warily, guessing instinctively that Adam was about to spring something big on him. “Thank you, sir.”

“And I’m sure, that at a place of this caliber, you have a presidential suite that you always keep unoccupied for sudden celebrity visitors.”

“Err….” The man stared at Adam slightly bug-eyed. He couldn’t deny that fact, but this wasn’t a solution. “I’m so sorry sir,” he said finally, “I don’t have the authority to allow regular guests to stay there. I’m afraid one of you will have to move to another hotel for a few days, I can call and arrange for everything.”

Lea glared at the man,
looking like she was caught between tears and rage. She was about to say something, when Adam pulled out his wallet and removed his press ID card. He never did this unless it was an emergency, but he hated to see Lea so upset. She was probably thinking she wouldn’t be able to enjoy the wedding.

He slid the card across the counter to the receptionist. “As you can see, I report for
World News Wire
. And I’d hate to do a negative story on this gorgeous resort, I can only imagine how that’d hurt your business.”

Poor Harold went quite pale, started to say something, and then grew quiet again. Adam held his breath, hoping this would work.

Finally Harold said, “Ok. You can stay in the Presidential Suite for these next few nights and Miss Wilson can keep the smaller room. I really do apologize for this mess, and I
do hope you’ll have only good things to say about us in your report.”

“Of course.” Adam gave him a bright
, confident smile, trying not to show how relieved he felt. Beside him, Lea was giving him a funny look. Well, at least she no longer looked so upset. 

As Adam took back his card, Harold said, “Oh, we’d also like to offer you a voucher to our new Skyfalls restaurant – dinner for two, on the house.”

“Thank you very much,” said Adam politely, and headed off with Lea before Harold could change his mind.

As soon as they turned the corner and were out of Harold’s earshot, Lea started giggling and punched his arm playfully. “You skunk!” she said, “You almost gave that guy a heart attack when you showed him your card!”

Adam clutched at his arm where Lea had punched him and groaned in mock pain. “Beating up a cripple,” he moaned, “Oh, the cruelty!”

Lea burst into fresh giggles, and hugged him impulsively. She was soft and smelled like the morning dew, and he wanted to grab her tight and never let her go. But instead he stood there helplessly, with what he knew was a silly smile.

“Thank you,” she said softly, as she let go of him. “That was amazing.”

“It’s nothing,” he shrugged. He wanted to grab her close and kiss her, but instead he found himself saying, “You can have the suite.”

He wanted to kick himself as soon as he said that. Lea was staring at him, wide-eyed with surprise, and he wondered if his offer sounded too desperate. What’d he have to do that for, anyway? He could use a few nights’ stay in a fancy presidential suite.

“Are you sure?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“No, you should have it. You’re the one who did all the smooth-talking.” Lea started to giggle again, and Adam felt strangely pleased.

“No, you can - ”

Adam stopped himself abruptly and stared at Lea. This was getting ridiculous. “Ok, fine,” he said, “Let’s go have a look. Maybe it’s a horribly gaudy place and it’ll offend your, you know, sophisticated sense of style or something.”

He waved his arms in the air, trying to depict a “sophisticated sense of style,” and Lea laughed.

“Ok fine, let’s have a look. I’ve never actually been in a presidential suite.”

“Really? I thought you were the rich kid.”

“Nah. My dad was rich, but he was also strict, and he wanted us to grow up ‘normal’.” Her voice dropped a bit and she said, “Fat lot of good that did me.”

“How come?” Adam didn’t want to pry, but he was curious.

Lea shrugged. “I partied a bit. Did some stupid things.”

“But you changed. You seem pretty normal now.”

By this time, they’d reached the suite, and Adam swiped the
key-card and opened the door. The view stopped the conversation in its tracks.

The small entrance hall opened out into a lar
ger casual lounge room, with its plush leather sofas and baby grand piano. A vertical waterfall ran down one wall, and the other wall had stunning views of a large park, and then the magnificent beach in the distance.

They
left their luggage in the lounge and wandered into the first bedroom, which was decorated in shades of dark mahogany and cream, and then the second bedroom, which was designed in stunning shades of red and maroon. There was a third, smaller bedroom, designed simply but elegantly in pastel colors.

Adam affected a snooty accent and said, “Well, my dear, this chamber is fit only for the lowliest of the president’s entourage.”

Lea mimicked his accent. “Absolutely, my dear Forsythe.”

“And this whole suite is quite subpar compared to all the other suites I’ve stayed in.”

“Really?” She dropped the accent and stared at him in surprise.

He laughed, heading out of the bedroom and back into the lounge area. “No, I’ve never stayed in a suite before. This seems good enough.”

He caught Lea’s gaze and felt a strange shiver run through his soul. God, she was beautiful. And mysterious, and crazy and off-limits, he reminded himself.

“You should have this suite. I
mean it,” she said.

Adam sighed. “We could do this all day, Lea.”

She rolled her eyes and was about to say something when he had an idea. “We could share it.” She looked at him in surprise and he went on, “You know I’d be a good flat-mate, and it’ll be fun living it up in this suite. And you know I’d feel guilty forever if I didn’t offer you the suite, and you’d feel guilty about depriving a cripple if you took it yourself. The bedrooms are far apart, I won’t bother you, and we can come and go as we please.”

He smiled at her hopefully. She looked doubtful, and he handed her the extra pass before she could say no.

Her eyes were still skeptical and she said, “You know there’s nothing between us, right?”

“Of course.” She had made that quite clear. “I’m not going to force you to change your mind, ball’s in your court.”

He hated losers who used “pick up artist” tricks to get girls, and he wasn’t about to chase after someone he might hurt. A sexy tourist looking for fun might’ve been game, but it was obvious that Lea wasn’t the “fling type”.

She looked into his eyes and he felt his hair standing on end. She seemed soft and vulnerable and her eyes glowed hazily. Her eyes dropped from his, to his lips, and she parted her own pink lips slightly.

That was all the invitation he needed – it was as if she had said out loud that she wanted him. He forgot everything he’d told himself about not being with someone he’d hurt, that Lea was a crazy rich kid he should avoid, and he found himself wrapping his arms around her waist, drawing her close, and crushing her soft, pink lips with his own.

She leaned up into him, moaning softly into his mouth, and her tongue thrashed gently against his. She tasted sweet, like summer, and he felt every other thought leave his mind. He wanted it to be a gentle, teasing kiss, but the passion soon overtook them. She
stroked her fingertips across his arms, and they found themselves lying back on the expensive leather couch, his mouth travelling down her neck towards her breasts. She moaned happily, and his hands captured her breasts and squeezed lightly. But suddenly she seemed to remember something, and pushed him off.

He moved back in surprise, his erection straining for release, and noticed with dismay that she had started standing up and straightening her dress. She’d obviously changed her mind, and he almost groaned out loud in frustration.

“What’s wrong?” He tried hard not to sound too disappointed.

“I’ll be late for the rehearsal dinner.”

She headed towards one of the bathrooms without looking at him. After he heard the bathroom door close behind her, Adam finally let his head drop into his hands and let out a soft groan.

***

By the time Lea came out of the bathroom, Adam had gone through his bags and pulled out his camera kit.

She was doing a good job of not looking at him directly, but he strolled over and joined her as she left the room and headed into the elevator. It was clear that she regretted the kiss, and he hated himself for trying. He wanted to apologize or point out that she’d
started
it, but he wasn’t about to make an even bigger fool of himself.

Instead, as they stepped out of the elevator, he said brusquely, “Don’t worry, I won’t do that again.”

She nodded curtly. “Ok.”

That was all they had the time or inclination to say, before they got to the rehearsal dinner.