Something to Believe In Read Online Free PDF Page A

mind and he hopped from his stool
with a ready grin. “Show me the way and I’ll follow wherever you go.”
    Lilah’s small hand slipped into his and he instinctively
squeezed, liking the feel of her hand in his. He imagined he was going to like
the feel of Lilah—period.

CHAPTER FOUR
    L ILAH TOOK HIM TO A BEATUP Jeep and they climbed in. “This yours?” he asked, buckling
up.
    “It belongs to Larimar, but Pops and Grams always said we could
use the resort vehicles to get around as long as we didn’t do anything too
stupid. They were pretty laid-back about certain things.”
    Justin thought of his father and how he wasn’t laid-back about
anything. Even though he’d bought Justin a BMW Roadster for his sixteenth
birthday, the man had dictated where and when he drove it. Limits were
fine—hell, he’d been a spoiled rich kid up to no good most times—but the senator
had taken it to extremes. It’d gotten to the point where Justin had just said
screw it and found alternate transportation. In the end, he’d been happier, if
not as stylish. To this day, that Roadster sat in the garage, collecting
dust.
    Lilah drove like a native, taking the sharp curves with ease,
as the Jeep rumbled past the resort and up a steep incline.
    “So where we going?” he asked, reaching up to hold on as she
shifted the Jeep into a lower gear to climb the hill.
    “My favorite beach,” she answered with a smile.
“Hawksnest.”
    “Sounds exotic.” He grinned. “You’re not taking me up here to
have your wicked way with me are you? I’m not that kind of boy, you know.” Her
light laughter teased a wider grin from him. “Not buying that, huh? Which
part?”
    “We’re almost there,” she said by way of answer, and he
chuckled, happy to be there with her.
    Justin leaned his head against the headrest and breathed deep
the lush scent of the tropical foliage that flanked either side of the road as
they drove out of town. It smelled fertile and ripe, almost sweet.
    “Smells good, doesn’t it?” she asked.
    He nodded, his eyes still closed. “Yeah...it does. Better than
New York on a hot summer day that’s for sure.”
    “That where you’re from?”
    “You mean my accent didn’t give it away?”
    “Well, it did but I didn’t want to assume.”
    “No worries. I’m a proud New Yorker. I’m a moderately fanatical
Yankees fan, my favorite food is a dirty water dog, and I knew my way around the
subway before I was ten. So yeah, New York, baby, all the way. Greatest city on
earth. Have you ever been?”
    She shook her head, almost shyly, and he nearly offered to take
her sometime. Thankfully, he reined in that errant thought before it popped from
his mouth and ruined an otherwise fabulous night with promises he didn’t intend
to keep. “So, tell me what it’s like to grow up in paradise?” he asked.
    “See for yourself.” Lilah chuckled and pulled off the main
road. The beach was only ten to twenty feet from the road. The soft lapping of
waves against the sand combined with sounds in the sweet, redolent night air
that he’d never be able to identify and he found himself struck by the sense of
peace that followed.
    Bright moonlight bathed the darkness with milky light, giving
the water a silvery sheen, and he momentarily worried about the things in the
water they wouldn’t be able to see. But his worry was soon eclipsed by the
realization that Lilah wasn’t waiting for him as she grabbed a large beach bag
stuffed in the back of the Jeep and then struck off toward the beach.
    She pulled a large blanket from the bag and spread it out, and
then she shocked him when she simply stripped, shimmying out of her white shorts
and gauzy top. His eyes bugged at the tiny bikini clinging to her lean curves
but she didn’t stop there. She cast him a sweetly provocative smile before
untying her bikini top and letting it drop to the sand.
    All he could do was stare. Words dried up in his mouth and she
took his shocked silence as