The Honeymoon Trap Read Online Free PDF Page B

she couldn’t still talk to him. He was only exchanging one set of clothes for another. ‘So what kind of boats do you like, Eli? Are you a yachtsman or are powerboats more your thing?’
    ‘I like both. Jackson’s builds both.’
    ‘Jackson’s is the family business, right? I looked it up. Not in a stalkerish kind of way. More of a wanting to know if you were who your brothers said you were kind of way.’
    ‘I can understand that.’
    He talked more freely when he wasn’t looking at her. Perhaps he wasn’t used to women in full gownage. ‘You said the guy you were sharing with had to pull out and that’s why you had a spare ticket. And so you thought of me.’
    Silence.
    ‘I mean, people share convention rooms all the time in order to cut costs. And if you’re the gregarious type it makes sense to share.’ Only he wasn’t the gregarious type. ‘Why didn’t you come on your own?’
    ‘I’m working on stepping outside my comfort zone.’
    ‘So my vague suspicion that your brothers somehow put you up to this is wrong?’
    ‘Maybe not that wrong.’ He sounded resigned. ‘Are you asking me if I want to be here?’
    ‘Do you want to be here?’
    ‘I’m looking forward to the swim.’
    ‘You can swim at home.’
    ‘Different beach.’ He hadn’t answered her question. ‘I’m looking forward to checking out the computer games,’ he offered as the bathroom doors peeled open, revealing Eli Jackson in bare feet and dark blue board shorts, his T-shirt still firmly in place.
    ‘Which are you?’ she asked him. ‘Boat builder, dive master, charter boat operator or fisherman?’
    ‘I do them all, although these days I deal mostly with the boat building side of things.’
    Zoey sighed and sipped at her champagne. The man was damn near perfect.
    He cleared his throat. Zoey figured she might just have been staring at him and daydreaming. Again.
    ‘I’m just going to go for that swim now,’ he offered. ‘Out there.’
    ‘Have fun.’
    ‘People keep saying that to me,’ he muttered. ‘As if I don’t.’
    Interesting. ‘I’m saying it because it’s something nice to say to someone I barely know. So.’ She reached for the bowl of strawberries, the whole lot, and set about selecting another one. ‘Go. Swim, work off some of that restless edge – don’t think I can’t see it because it’s very shiny – and then come back relaxed and vaguely exhausted, possibly hungry. I might even leave you some strawberries… Or I may have ordered room service by then and you can have some of that. Regardless, rest assured that I will be having fun.’
    She glanced up at him beneath overly long lashes, just in time to see a crooked smile on his face before he quickly smoothed it out into something altogether more bland.
    ‘Hey, Zoey… I forgot to say earlier that it’s good to finally meet you in person.’ He was edging towards the door, no towel, no sunscreen, nothing on his feet. The patrons of the Palace Venexiana were in for such a treat. ‘It’s really good to see you.’
    ‘Likewise, Eli.’ The door closed behind him with a quiet click. ‘Likewise.’

Chapter Five
    Z oey watched from the hotel window as Eli waded into the surf, not a shred of fear in him for the roiling mess that constituted the surf of the day or the ginormous, dumping waves. Only a few brave souls were in the water and Zoey was glad she hadn’t agreed to join him. She loved to swim, but one look at those conditions would have had her heading for the nearest nice tame swimming pool, the kind where if you asked nicely, someone would bring you a drink with a little umbrella in it. She watched some more as Eli disappeared beneath the whitewash of a wave and popped up on the other side, sleek as a seal. Not an easy man to know, or understand.
    But boy was he an easy one to sigh over.
    Zoey picked up her phone and pulled up Sophie’s number. A promise was a promise – she’d call her sister once a day. ‘Hey,