Caribbean Crush (Under the Caribbean Sun) (2 page)

Harmannus crossed his arms over his chest and narrowed his dark gaze. “I’ll do my stag-night duty, Tonnis. But you really should keep your distance from Janny Baird. She’s not interested in anything you have on offer.”

His father stiffened beneath his arm. “We’re here for Johannes and Saskia, nothing else.”

“I can hardly stand how much love the two of you have for me.” He released his father and took a long pull from his beer. He only thought of Janny as an obstacle. Her best friend, on the other hand, was something he planned on being all over, as soon as humanly possible.

“Keep your mind on business, son.”

“This is a vacation, Papa. Worry about marrying off this grump, not me.” He nudged his brother with an elbow, silently imploring him for a distraction. He got none.

“Trust me,” Harm said, nodding his head toward the women. “Keep your distance. The best steersmen are always ashore.”

He raised a brow at the old proverb, wondering why the hell his brother cared where he dipped his pen. But his opinion didn’t matter. No one’s did. Well, except Kristin’s and why she’d changed her opinion of him.

“I love it, thank you.” Kristin stared down at the Dutch tile pendant in her palm, grinning at the delft blue rendering of two children playing jump rope. She glanced at Janny’s tile, a majestic bird perched on a limb. Saskia’s best friend, Holly, showed them that hers was of a grand sail boat puffing in the wind.

“I wasn’t sure what to give as bridesmaid gifts, but these seemed traditional and personal.” They all took a turn on the hug wheel, relaxing back into the cane chairs set on the lawn of Saskia’s father’s home. After the rehearsal, they’d reconfigured for a dinner that had become more of a social hour. Everyone seemed relaxed and happy, which had Kristin feeling out of place since she wanted to escape the scrutinizing stare of Antonnis Prinsen.

He’d somehow figured a way for them to stroll down the aisle together, which had meant touching him. She rubbed her arm, trying to wipe away the tingles that still remained. Even though she reminded herself that this was the man who’d broken her, not just her heart but her very ideals, she got a delicious rush from his presence.

The soft sound of a siren rose up from Janny’s purse. Kristin winced in recognition of the ringtone. She knew before Janny got off the phone she’d been summoned back to the hospital, the life of a resident rarely slowing down enough to enjoy a night off.

“Do you have to go?” Sass wore a pout worthy of a kindergartener.

“I do. My friend Tia is having twins. I promised I’d be there.”

“Tia Lowry?” Sassy pressed her hands together and beamed a megawatt smile. “I didn’t know she was still here.”

“It’s Tia Madison now.” Janny smiled, her mocha skin flawless in the waning light.

Grabbing at the escape hatch, Kristin spoke. “I’ll go with you to help with the boys.”

“Her mom has them.” Janny winced and mouthed “sorry” when she realized her mistake. “Do you want me to drop you off at home on my way?”

“You can’t both leave.” Sass leaned forward in her chair. “The boys are heading out for a stag night, so we have to make a show of going out ourselves to keep them on their toes.”

“I have lesson plans to prepare for next week,” she lied. She’d plotted out the final month of her students’ kindergarten year ages ago.

Holly laid a manicured hand on her arm and gave a mock shudder. “Please. Don’t leave me alone with a bride and her mother.”

She couldn’t help but laugh and nodded in agreement. Getting away from Tonnis was imperative, but she didn’t have to miss out on the wedding festivities he wouldn’t be at. She’d bonded with Saskia as a kid, soon after her mother had relocated them to the small Caribbean isle. Eight-year-olds were entirely too interested in fitting in, and having blonde hair had put her in a small minority. Though Sass was a year younger, her red hair and freckled skin had bonded them together in a village where dark complexions were the norm. Even Janny, with her lighter skin and pale-blue eyes, stood out as different.

It was a chasm still evident today in her classroom. Islanders went to the public school, while non-natives attended private institutions. Her first year back on Anguilla, she’d taught at the private school, then dedicated herself to doing her level best to ensure the education provided to local kids was on par.

Kristin found herself alone once Janny escaped. Sass went to collect her mother and Holly was trying to talk her Prinsen boyfriend out of the keys to his truck. She stared at the horizon, the sky painted with the golden purples of the sunset.

“Did you miss me?” His warm breath against her ear had the hairs on the back of her neck standing up as his voice, dark and heavy, coiled around her.

“Why don’t you go away and let me find out?” She crossed her legs and sat up straight, watching as his athletic body filled the chair Janny had just abandoned.

“You don’t want me to go anywhere without you.” He winked, his predatory gaze teasing the whisper of desire deep in her belly.

“Have you had these delusions evaluated? I’m sure Janny could recommend a good psychiatrist.” She checked the buttons on her blouse, suddenly feeling exposed.

“What happened to you, Kris? I thought we were friends.”

“Were we?” She matched his gaze, silently imploring him to have a heart. They’d been much more than friends, at least on her side. “I haven’t heard from you in years. Not exactly how
friends
treat one another.”

“You’re mad?” He leaned forward, bracing his corded forearms on his muscled thighs. “When I think of you, I remember all the fun we had.”

Sure he did. And no doubt he’d thought she’d flop onto her back and spread her legs at the sight of him. She hadn’t been that easy the first time around. They’d danced around that for years before falling into a sequence of summer romances. Four summers of bliss followed by radio silence. When she’d needed him most.

“I’m sorry if I hurt you in some way. You’ve always been so special to me.”

“Stop.” She pressed her knees together and leaned forward so she could end this game without an audience. “I’m not interested in being your vacation piece, okay? You had your chance with me, and I will never, ever be interested in playing that game with you or anyone else again.
Begrijp
?”

He raised a blond brow and leaned back, assessing her from head to toe. “I didn’t play you. But it’s good to hear you still remember the lessons I gave you in Dutch.”

“Unbelievable.” She tucked her hair behind her ears, tension pounding like the drums the band played. She scanned the thinning crowd for Sass and Holly but couldn’t see either.

He stood and held out a hand. “Walk with me. We need to clear this up.”

She glanced at his hand, then up his muscled body to his face. She might have been blinded by physical beauty in her youth, but she’d learned better. “We need to get through this wedding. In a few days you’ll be back in Holland and I’ll be able to forget you ever darkened this island again.”

He grasped her hand and yanked her to him faster than she could fight. She gasped and tried to pull away, but he’d gripped her elbow with one hand, splaying the other over the small of her back and propelling her across the lawn.

“I don’t have anything to say to you.” She said between clenched teeth, wishing she’d worn shoes with a heel she could dig in instead of flip flops.

“Don’t make a scene,” he whispered, leading her down the low hill toward Blowing Point Harbor.

Chapter Three

Blame it on youthful inexperience, but he’d always thought letting Kristin go was the most altruistic thing he’d ever done. He’d liked her too much to string her along, and he hadn’t seen a way for their futures to intertwine. She wanted a family, he wanted success.

Even if he’d asked her to come to the Netherlands, he’d have had no time for her, and she’d have wound up resenting him. Things would have met a tragic end neither of them deserved. He’d known that five years ago, after his last carefree summer on the island. And so he’d let their affair fade into a happy memory he held dear.

Realizing she didn’t share the same fondness for their time together cut him to the core. They’d shared four summers of learning and exploring and loving, at least as much as he’d ever been able to love anyone he wasn’t related to. He’d adored her from twenty to twenty-four, still using her memory as the measuring stick for all other women. And she saw him as… He didn’t even want to think about it.

“Let go of me.” Kristin wrenched away, pushing in front of him as she marched the last few yards toward the deserted strip of beach. She wound her way through outcroppings of coral that littered the slice of sand like ruins of statues. She left her shoes next to one and waded out into the shallow sea. He followed course, joining her in the knee-deep water.

“I never meant to hurt you.” He wanted to explain, and yet he wasn’t sure what she was so angry about.

“Tonnis, you have to hear me.” She turned to face him, a storm of turmoil in her warm-brown gaze. “I don’t want you to chase me, to try and make it all better. We are nothing to each other and never were. So don’t go flirting and playing. Let’s get through this wedding and go back to never thinking about the other.”

“But I do think of you.” He stared out at the horizon, the sun disappearing into the ocean like his chance of making Kristin ever understand.

“You are one sick fuck, you know that?” She turned to leave, but he caught her by the elbows and pulled her up against him. Her breath caught, her eyes widening as he focused on her perfectly kissable mouth.

“I have thought of you. Fondly. Often.”

She pursed her lips, her breathing ragged. “Of me, or of fucking me?” She hardly spoke the words, and her voice was filled with accusation and pain.

He released her arms but didn’t move away. He brought his hands to her face, tracing one hand along her jaw and sliding the other into the silken waves of her hair. Heat rushed through him like a dam breaking, overrunning everything that protected him from feeling too much.

The urge to act on every old desire rose thick and hard between them. An unexpected sensation twisted deep in his soul, reminding him how out of his element he’d felt that last summer. Things between them had been so urgent, so intense. Too intense.

But he wasn’t a twenty-four-year-old kid anymore. He was a man who didn’t want to be the cause of anyone’s pain, disappointment. He wanted to be that happy memory to her that she was to him. Something to build on rather than run from.

“Kristin,” he whispered, bringing his mouth to hers.

“Don’t,” she responded but didn’t move away. She froze in a silent challenge. She’d always been a challenge, had always inspired him to be better.

“Let me make it up to you.” He spoke against her lips, wanting nothing in life more than to kiss her, taste her and please her.

“You can’t. It’s too late for that. Let it go and leave me be.”

“I can’t.” He’d rather die a painful, slow death than let her think he’d used her. Without their summers together, he never would have made it through university, never would have achieved the success he now had. She’d made him feel worthy of it, had channeled his adolescent rebellions in helpful directions. “I want you to look at me that way you used to.”

“I used to think you were something you’re not.”

“What’s that?”

“In love with me.” She closed her eyes, a single tear trailing down her left cheek.

He pressed a kiss there, tasting the salt of her pain. “I was.”

“Love doesn’t run, Tonnis.”

Her words hit him like a kick to the solar plexus. He couldn’t argue that he had opted for the easy way out. He’d been young and stupid and made a horrid error in not letting her have a voice in the decision. No doubt they would have had the same outcome, but his way had saved her years of pain.

He framed her face in his hands, tilting her chin to look up at him. “You’re right. I thought a clean break would be easier for you, but I was wrong. Let me make it up to you.”

“You can’t. It’s in the past. Let’s leave it there.” She blinked, her watery gaze begging him for mercy.

“I need to make you see how much you meant to me. We have to rewrite the ending of our affair.”

“I’m not interested in reliving the past.”

“Even if this time, you’re in control of the way it ends? Give me the weekend to show you how much I cherished our summers. And then maybe you’ll see our time together the same way.”

“And if I don’t? Do I get to erase you from my memory? Never return a call, an email, a letter? You’ll leave me be whenever you come for a visit?”

“Or maybe you’ll remember how good we were together, how much we shared. Maybe I’ll haunt your dreams the way you haunt mine. I’ll have you waking up with a smile.”

He pressed his mouth to hers, years of silent desperation unraveling as her lips parted beneath his.

Her heart jerked at his touch, her stomach tensing with the kiss. She’d told herself for years that she hated him, blamed him for the tragedy that came at his abandonment. And yet as soon as she’d seen him today, that flutter of excitement had returned, her libido dancing in anticipation. No matter that she knew better, that she no longer had the excuse of youthful, romantic notions of happily ever after, she wanted to feel that fire again.