Read Online Hot Island Nights by Sarah Mayberry - Free Book Online Page B

hotel staff wouldn’t guess she hadn’t slept in her own bed. She’d probably been agonizing over where her panties were all day—then he’d walked in and teased her with his little show-and-tell routine.
    “Relax, okay? Nobody saw, and nobody’s thinking anything about you. They’re all too busy getting pissed and trying to find someone of their own to shag to give two hoots about us.”
    She stared at him, her face stiff with tension. “What was I thinking? I must have been mad.”
    She said it so quietly he almost didn’t hear her. Then she turned on her heel and pushed her way through the crowd until she reached the stairs. He watched her take them two at a time, her back stiff with tension.
    “Shit.” He took a mouthful of beer. Not in a million years had he meant to hurt her. He’d wanted to make her laugh, get that martial light in her eye, provoke her into insulting him some more in that hoity-toity way of hers.
    He turned to face the bar, resting his elbow on the scarred wood. Next time he saw her, he’d apologize. Once she’d had a chance to calm down, she’d understand.
    He tried to push the incident from his mind, but ten minutes later he glanced over and saw a waitress deliver a round of meals to the table where Elizabeth had been sitting. Her English friends looked confused and he could see them searching for Elizabeth as the waitress stood with an unclaimed burger and fries.
    Great. She’d abandoned her dinner because of him.
    Damn it.
    He pushed his beer away and crossed the bar.
    “Elizabeth wasn’t feeling so great,” he explained to her worried friends. He took the plate from the waitress. “Thanks, Sall. I’ll take this up to her room for her.”
    “Sure. Thanks, Nate.” Sally gave him a quick smile before heading back to the kitchen.
    He left the table before Elizabeth’s friends could ask any more questions, stopping by the bar for a quick detour before heading upstairs.
    The barman had given him Elizabeth’s room number and he balanced the plate on his raised knee as he knocked on her door.
    There was a short pause before a voice answered.
    “Who is it?”
    “Room service.”
    Another pause. Then the door opened.
    “I didn’t— Oh. You.”
    Her face was still flushed and a few strands of hair had escaped from her neat hairdo.
    “You forgot your burger.” He lifted his other hand. “And I thought you might be thirsty.”
    Her gaze fell on the Pimm’s and lemonade in his outstretched hand.
    “I’m not hungry. Or thirsty.”
    He shouldered his way past her and put down the plate on the bedside table, placing the glass beside it.
    “Better eat it quickly before it goes cold.”
    “I’m not hungry,” she repeated. “And I’d very much appreciate it if you’d leave my room.”
    He studied her a moment, wondering how to get past her to-the-manor-born outrage. “Elizabeth. I’m sorry, okay? It was dumb. Really dumb. I was trying to be funny, not humiliate you. Okay?”
    “Funny? Clearly your sense of humor and mine are vastly different, because making a public display of something that should be a very private matter is not my idea of amusing.”
    “Look, if I could take it back, I would. But I can’t. And your burger is getting cold, and I don’t want that on my conscience, as well.”
    She crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m not going to choke down food I don’t want simply because you’ve suddenly developed a conscience.”
    She started to say more, but he reached down and grabbed a couple of fries and put them in her mouth.
    She spluttered, but she was far too polite to spit them back out. He watched as she chewed furiously.
    “You really are an absolute pig, aren’t you?” she said once she’d swallowed.
    “Maybe. Want some more?”
    “No!” she said. Then her tongue darted out to lick a salt crystal from the corner of her mouth.
    He laughed and she looked hugely chagrined. “Busted,” he said. He offered her the plate again. “Going hungry