Sweet Adventure Read online

  She folded her arms. I’ll show him. Won’t he be surprised when I’m not the first one of us to beg for a paddling break?

  “Anything else you need?” Zoe asked, brightly.

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Here’s a card. Call me if you think of something.” Zoe’s eyes darted to each side, and she leaned forward, whispering, “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Sure,” Katie answered, wondering if she was about to be involved in a conspiracy of some sort.

  “That other guy who checked in with Gary… is that who I think it is?”

  Katie rolled her eyes. She’d been with Gherring, Inc. for so long, she’d forgotten Steven was famous enough to be recognizable. “It’s Steven Gherring, in the flesh. But do me a favor, and don’t tell a bunch of people.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t.” She pressed her hand to her chest. “We’re very discreet here at Indigo Bay Resorts, but I’m excited to see him. He looks as amazing in person as his picture on the cover of Go with the Times.”

  “One of the top ten bachelors in the country.” Katie remembered Steven’s heated argument with his publicist, who’d explained Steven couldn’t prevent the article, so he might as well cooperate and try to influence the final copy. “But don’t get your hopes up. I don’t think he’s ever going to change his bachelor status.”

  “No worries. I’m happily married,” said Zoe. “And I don’t think I would’ve ever hoped to marry Steven Gherring, anyway… I might’ve dreamed about it, though.”

  Armed with a small cooler and a new brightly colored bag she’d purchased at the gift shop, Katie made her way from the cottage to the beach. When she arrived, she found Steven lounging on one of three chairs they had arranged on the beach beside a surfboard. She was glad for the cover of sunglasses, since her eyes had to be bugging out of her head. Though Gary had warned her that he was going to surf with Steven, she’d never seen the man without a shirt. It seemed almost as odd as the fact her unrelenting boss was lounging on the beach without his computer. The thought reminded her she ought to be working, since Steven was paying for her to be there.

  “Hi, Mr. Gherring,” she said. “Gary told me you don’t have anything for me to do, yet. But I’m ready to work whenever you are.”

  “Believe it or not, Gary convinced me to take the weekend off.” Steven stood up, all six feet three inches of him, apparently solid muscle, despite his forty-nine years. She knew he was training for the Iron Man competition in August, since she’d entered the date on his schedule. But she was surprised to find him in physical condition that rivaled Gary’s.

  Nicole is going to die when I tell her about this!

  Steven took the cooler from her hands and set it on the blanket.

  “Thanks.” She spread a beach towel over a lounge chair and settled herself in. “Did you know Gary told me you insisted on renting a surfboard for me?”

  “We didn’t. We only got two surfboards.”

  “I know that now. But he told me that story on purpose, just to upset me.”

  “Sounds like him.” Steven shrugged as he returned to his chair, propping his feet on the lounge.

  “You’re so different from him, I don’t know how the two of you are close friends,” said Katie. “But I guess he’s a good personal trainer.”

  “We’re more alike than you realize. Gary puts 200% effort into everything he does. The big difference is he doesn’t take life too seriously.” Steven lifted his sunglasses and peered out from underneath them. “I have to admit this trip is good for me, even if he had to drag me here, kicking and screaming. I tend to drive myself into the ground.”

  “Well, I wish he’d stop picking on me. He’s worse than the little kid who lived across the street from us when I was growing up.” Irritated, she squinted up and down the beach, itching to chew him out. “Where is he, anyway?”

  “Here he comes.”

  Steven pointed at the ocean, where a man was riding toward shore on a surfboard. When a wave crashed into his legs, flipping him into the water, she couldn’t help the sick feeling that swirled in her gut. She might be angry, but she didn’t want to watch him die in a shark attack.

  “Mr. Gherring?”

  “Call me Steven. Please.” He chuckled. “It feels weird for you to be so formal while we’re in swimsuits.”

  “Okay, Steven…” It was so hard to say, after almost two years of calling him Mr. Gherring at work, she decided not to call him anything while they were at Indigo Bay. “Isn’t there a danger of shark attacks in these waters?”

  Steven sat forward and swung his legs around to face her. “I won’t lie to you and say there aren’t any sharks. But I can tell you sharks on the South Carolina coast don’t have a taste for mammals. Any bites that happen are accidental and usually on really crowded beaches—maybe ten bites in all of last year.”

  “That’s ten too many for me.” Her gaze scanned the beach, a private area for resort guests, which certainly couldn’t be described as crowded. Yet the tension in her stomach didn’t ease until she saw Gary step out of the surf, carrying his board. “I still don’t want to get in the water.”

  Steven’s smile was sweet and sympathetic, as he stood and walked over to his surfboard. “Don’t worry about it. No one’s going to pressure you to do anything you don’t want to do.”

  No one but Gary.

  “Hey! You made it!” Gary called as he approached.

  Speak of the devil. Too bad he was such a handsome one, with water dripping off his well-muscled chest. It was hard to keep her mind focused on the fact he’d lied to her.

  “Did you guys see my ride?” Gary asked.

  “You caught a good wave,” Steven remarked, as he headed toward the surf. “Now, I have to catch a better one.”

  “Yeah. It was a nice ride until I got into the soup and went down.”

  Almost to the water’s edge, Steven called over his shoulder, “You coming back out?”

  “In a sec.” Gary dropped his board and joined Katie, sitting sideways on the adjacent chair. “Isn’t it beautiful?” he asked her, his fingers pushing wet hair strands off his forehead.

  “It is.” But Katie was thinking about his well-toned torso rather than the gorgeous beach. She purposefully averted her eyes from his chest, even though her sunglasses hid the direction of her gaze. At least her flush could be mistaken for a reaction from the hot summer sun. “I’ve got a bone to pick with you.”

  He grinned, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees. “Pick away!”

  “You lied to me.”

  “Moi?” With his face effecting an offended expression, he splayed his hand on his chest.

  “Yes, and don’t try to deny it. You told me Steven rented a surfboard for me, and he said he knew better than to do that.”

  Gary laughed. “Katie, that wasn’t a lie. I was teasing you.”

  “There’s no difference.”

  “Only because you’re so incredibly gullible that you believe anything I say. If you’d thought about it, you’d know Steven wouldn’t have rented a surfboard for you.” He shook his head as if he were addressing a young child. “You should’ve known I was teasing.”

  “But I don’t know,” she complained. “My parents didn’t tease.”

  “Surely your brothers and sisters teased. Don’t you have any siblings?”

  “Only my older sister. But she died when she was nine.”

  Katie was caught off guard by the sudden empathy on Gary’s face.

  “I’m so sorry. That must’ve been terrible for you.” His wet hand reached out to touch her arm, sending goosebumps in every direction.

  A surprising lump formed in her throat. She’d driven the painful memory from her mind, though the aftermath had changed her life forever. But it seemed like his playful mask had been ripped off his face, exposing a deeply caring and selfless soul, the kind her heart craved.

  “That’s really hard.” He didn’t press for details.

  His thoughtf
ul face turned toward the ocean where Steven was no doubt floundering about, making himself bait for the sharks. Katie refused to look. She found little comfort in the idea that they would spit her boss out after having a taste.

  “I guess I do tease a lot,” he mumbled, still staring at the water.

  “You do,” she said.

  “I’m sorry, Katie. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

  He sounded so contrite, her anger dissolved away. It wasn’t really Gary’s fault she hadn’t grown up in a normal home, with lots of siblings, where she would’ve learned how to handle teasing. Instead, every conversation she could remember with her parents had been a serious one. It was like growing up in a post-apocalyptic movie.

  After her sister’s death, her father had done his best to prepare her for any conceivable emergency. But his focus had been on training her to avoid risk. This included rigorous swimming lessons, taking her to lifeguard proficiency by the time she was fifteen. The one time she’d rebelled against his authority, at the age of eleven, by climbing high in a maple tree, her mother had taken to bed with hysterics for twenty-four hours.

  “How could you be so selfish? You could’ve died, just like Kindra,” her father had rebuked. “If you pull another stunt like this, your mother will go insane. She can’t handle it. Don’t you see that?”

  Determined to protect her mother’s fragile spirit, Katie had never again bucked his strict rules. And for the most part, comfortable in her orderly life, she viewed his restrictions as sensible, rather than oppressive. Nicole, however, had been urging Katie to “loosen-up” and set her own, self-defined boundaries. Without her roommate’s influence, she’d never have found the courage to make the trip to Indigo Bay.

  She glanced at Gary, whose broad shoulders still drooped. There must be a way she could learn to handle his tendency to joke around. A grand idea popped into her head. “I have a proposal.”

  “A proposal?” His melancholy mood vanished as he snatched her hand from the chair, lifting it to kiss her knuckles before she tugged it from his grasp. Just like that, he was back to his usual bantering. “I accept! We should get married here, on the beach. Indigo Bay has weddings all the time. And Steven can be my best m—”

  She tossed her towel at his face, cutting him off. “Stop it!” She stifled a giggle. “You know that’s not what I meant.”

  “Such violence!” He let the towel fall off his face, exposing his fake horror. “First you dump water on me. Then you hit me with your towel—”

  “Gary, I’m being serious here. I have an idea how I can always be sure whether you’re teasing or not.”

  His lips pulled back in a wide grimace. “That could take all the fun out of it.”

  She continued, ignoring his antics. “I propose that whenever you say something and I ask, ‘Is that the truth?’ you have to answer immediately with a ‘yes’ or a ‘no,’ and you have to be truthful.”

  He squinted up at a single cottony cloud floating across the blue sky, as if he might find a way around her proposition.

  “Well,” she said, “will you do it?”

  “Sure.”

  When a dimple danced in and out of sight at the corner of his mouth, she grew suspicious. “Is that the truth?”

  He fell back against the chair, laughing. “You really don’t trust me, do you?”

  “You have to answer yes or no.”

  “Yes.” His blue eyes twinkled. “I will answer truthfully if you ask me that question.”

  “Good.”

  Gary stood and moved next to his board, shifting from foot to foot in the burning sand. “Sure you don’t want to come out? I’d love to teach you how to surf.”

  “No, thank you. I’m happy here on the beach with my book.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  As he bent to retrieve his surfboard, two twentyish girls in bikinis paraded past, sending appreciative looks Gary’s way. Somehow, he didn’t seem to notice them.

  Of course, he doesn’t. He’s so used to female attention he takes it for granted.

  “Be sure to stay hydrated.” He eyed her cooler.

  “I will, Mr. Personal Trainer.”

  He lifted the board over his head, giving her a mouth-watering view of his six-pack abs. “But don’t eat anything. Steven’s cooking dinner tonight.”

  “He can cook?” She’d always assumed her boss had food delivered or paid someone to prepare meals for him.

  “He’s Steven Gherring. Of course he can cook. He can do everything—that’s why all the women love him.”

  “I’ve wondered about that,” Katie glanced out in the waves where Steven was lying on his board, paddling away from shore. She quickly turned her head, before shark images overran her imagination. “Why hasn’t he ever gotten married?”

  Her boss, devoted to his work, acted as if he didn’t have time for a relationship. Perhaps more of a perfectionist than she, he was successful, but was he happy?

  “He used to date a lot, but he’s almost given up.” Gary’s face, once again, took on a sober expression, as he lowered the board to his side. “Being rich has made it almost impossible for him to meet a woman who values him for who he is instead of the money he has.”

  “I hope he knows I don’t feel that way,” Katie said, imagining how hurtful that would be.

  Gary’s muscles flexed along his jaw. “Maybe you should tell him.”

  “Oh, I could never do that.” That sort of awkward conversation would probably make her boss think she was interested in dating him… a sure way to lose her job. She could be more sensitive, though, and express her appreciation whenever possible. But his plight had her worried.

  If a man like Steven Gherring can’t find someone to love, what’s going to happen to me?

  6

  After a shower, Gary emerged from his bedroom to find Steven, in fresh clothes, typing on his computer.

  “I was hoping you’d already started dinner,” Gary said, peering over Steven’s shoulder. “I thought you agreed not to do any work until tomorrow.”

  “I’m not working,” Steven shook his head. “I’m looking at my training data. I think you were right about needing to relax a little. I picked up some time on my run this morning, and I don’t even feel tired after surfing all day.”

  “That makes one of us.” Gary groaned and lunged forward on his right foot to stretch his left calf and hamstring, repeating the process on the opposite leg. “I’m exhausted.”

  Steven closed his computer. “Since we’re kayaking in the morning, I thought I’d do a bike ride in the afternoon. Do you want to come?”

  “I’d slow you down too much.” It was a good excuse, but his real reason for staying behind was to spend a few hours alone with Katie. Although part of him felt guilty for pursuing her after what she’d said earlier on the beach.

  He’d seen the longing on Katie’s face, heard the wistful note in her voice, when she admitted she valued Steven for more than his wealth. On the other hand, Steven didn’t seem the least bit romantically interested in Katie. Wouldn’t Gary be doing both of them a favor if he managed to secure Katie’s affections for himself? Surely he wasn’t obligated to inform Steven of her attraction. If the man had been with her for almost two years without figuring it out, he didn’t deserve her.

  Steven slapped him on the back, jerking him out of his reverie. “Come help me fix dinner.”

  “I have no cooking skills.” Gary followed him into the kitchen.

  “You can cut up vegetables for the salad,” said Steven. “I’m cooking pan-seared scallops with lemon-caper sauce. And we’ll have asparagus, too.”

  “I don’t think you’re getting enough carbs for the calories you’re burning.” Gary searched through the drawers until he found a cutting board. “That could be contributing to your lower split times.”

  “It’s possible. I’m in such a habit of avoiding starches.” Steven cocked his head to the side. “I’ll serve it over pasta.”

  “Sounds gre
at.”

  As they worked, Gary’s guilt grew. He owed Steven his life. Perhaps he should try to discover whether his friend held hidden feelings for Katie. It would be like Steven to keep that sort of thing to himself.

  He cleared his throat. “I guess you and Katie spend a lot of time together.”

  “You could say that.” Steven took several items out of the refrigerator.

  “Have you spent much time together outside the office?”

  “Nope.” Steven bent to retrieve a pan from a deep drawer. “I haven’t subjected her to that kind of torture. I’m sure she couldn’t handle more than eight or nine hours a day with me, even if we do have a lot in common.”

  “A lot in common?”

  “You’re the one who called her my clone,” Steven said, as he unwrapped a stick of butter and placed it in the pan. “It’s amazing to find someone with the same perfectionist tendencies.”

  Not particularly pleased with Steven’s assessment, Gary took out his frustration on a piece of celery, chopping it so fast the pieces came out in ragged chunks. “But in a lot of ways, she’s really different from you.”

  “Like what?” Steven asked.

  “You’re about as fearless as they come, and Katie gets nervous about everything. Like the way she wouldn’t even step foot in the water, today.”

  On the stove top, the butter sizzled as Steven added crushed garlic, producing a heavenly aroma that made Gary’s mouth water.

  “Katie doesn’t let anything stand in the way of getting her work done,” said Steven. “She’s smart and dedicated, with integrity up to her eyeballs. That’s all that matters.”

  “If you think she’s so great, why haven’t the two of you ever dated? You’ve had relationships with some of your past personal assistants.”

  “The thought crossed my mind,” said Steven, as he added cream to his mixture. “But I didn’t think she wanted that kind of relationship with me. I couldn’t ask her out on a date and risk losing her as my PA.”