Stand-In Bride's Seduction

Which left her in a very precarious position. Clearly, Sara’s engagement to Reynard had been a fresh new thing for them both. Rina knew full well how alluring Sara could be; she’d watched her in action often enough. But Sara and Rey hadn’t even slept together, for goodness’ sake. Who got engaged on what had apparently been such a platonic relationship to date? Was Sara playing hard to get? Was that what had coaxed the proposal from Rey all along? And if she was having second thoughts, why on earth had she simply not said so to him, rather than indulge in this subterfuge?

Something just didn’t ring true, but until Sara divulged more details, there really was nothing she could do but continue the pretense—no matter the travesty it made of her own feelings.

“You’re very quiet today. Everything all right?” Rey’s voice broke into her thoughts.

“Just thinking, really. Nothing important.”

“We will be at the waterfront soon. We’ll leave the car at my apartment building and we can walk there for a predinner drink.”

“That sounds lovely. I’m looking forward to it.”

“As am I.”

He gave her a slow wink and again that throbbing pulse beat through her, accompanied this time by a pull from deep within her body. She gave herself a mental shake. This wasn’t for her benefit, it was for Sara’s, she told herself sternly. She had no right to feel this way, to react this way, to wish that things could be different and that she could explore these new sensations he elicited in her.

“I don’t know how well these shoes will bear up to much walking, though. I hope it’s not far.”

Rey cast a quick glance at her feet and gave a short laugh. “Don’t worry, I’ll be there to carry you if necessary.”

The thought of his strong arms around her, holding her, carrying her—it was getting to be too much. She forced an answering laugh from a throat that had suddenly grown too tight.

“I don’t think it’ll have to come to that,” she said, slightly breathless.

“Pity,” Rey responded, his voice deep and intimate in the close confines of the car.

It was definitely time to get their conversation back onto a safer track, Rina decided and scoured her mind for something they could discuss without it entering into waters she had no desire to swim. Well, no right to swim anyway.

“Do you mind if I ask you something?” she said, keeping her voice light.

“Sure, what is it?”

“This curse your grandfather kept talking about. What’s it all about?”

“Ah, yes. Not one of our family’s best moments in history,” Rey replied enigmatically. “I tell you what. I’ll explain over our drinks, after we’ve done some dancing.”

“Dancing?”

“Didn’t I mention it? The restaurant is built over the water and the dance floor is one of the most popular in all of Puerto Seguro.”

Dancing she could handle, high heels or not. It was something both she and Sara loved and did equally well. Although, she hadn’t had the opportunity to indulge while she and Jacob had been together. He’d been uncomfortable on the dance floor and to keep him happy, she’d thought it was a small thing to forgo her own love of dancing. To be able to indulge tonight sent her pulse thrumming in anticipation.

“Sounds like fun,” she responded with a smile that stretched from ear to ear. She couldn’t wait.

And it was fun. Despite the relatively early hour for entertainment in the Med, the dance floor was crowded. To her delight, Rey was equally as skilled a dancer as her, even more so perhaps, she decided as he deftly twirled her out from his arms and back again in tune to the heady beat of the music playing from the discreetly placed speakers. She’d half expected the restaurant to be empty, being a week night, but the place was humming with activity. The tapas bar was doing a particularly fast trade on wines and beer and the delicious tapas menu which featured a lot of the local seafood as well as what Rey referred to as “foreign imports.”

By the time they found a table, overlooking the harbor, Rina was feeling far more relaxed.

“Phew, that was great. Thank you for bringing me here,” she said, catching her breath before taking a long, cold sip of the iced water that had just been delivered to their table. “De nada. We were supposed to come here the night before you went to France, remember? You’d been begging me for days.”