She blinked. “I still don’t understand.”
God, she was killing him. “You keep telling me you don’t do this. You’ve obviously got some shit going on, and I don’t want to be something you regret.” Adding to the burdens she carried wasn’t on his agenda, and yet that’s exactly what he’d accidentally done. He didn’t know how to fix this, or if he should even try. With his track record, he was just as likely to make it worse as he was to make it better.
“I don’t get you.” She pulled the blanket more firmly around her, covering her body nearly completely. “Like are you even real? Because at this point, I have my doubts.”
That surprised a laugh out of him. “I’m real, sweetheart.”
“If you say so.” She frowned. “I think I might be the one being an asshole right now, and I’m not sure how that happened.”
“Hey.” He waited for her to look at him. “Come here.”
Kendall slowly, almost reluctantly, settled back against him. He managed to keep the tension from his body, to not wrap her up and hug her until she felt better about this whole thing again. He didn’t want to be something—someone—she regretted. A silly thought, maybe. He had every intention of leaving this ship behind and not looking back once they docked in Orlando in the morning.
The thought didn’t bring him the relief it had earlier today. He gave into the urge to wrap his arms around Kendall and cuddle her close. Another thing he didn’t normally do. Easier for everyone when sex was clearly just sex and not edging into anything messy. Sometimes he cuddled his partners, sometimes not, but most of them preferred the latter. He’d never felt the lack before, but now he couldn’t imagine walking away from Kendall before he had a chance to smooth this out. The scent of her floral shampoo wrapped around him, and he mentally cursed himself for pulling her closer when all his cock wanted to do was sink into her.
Not today. Not like this.
Then when?
There would be no other opportunity. Not when he had every intention of cutting his vacation short.
She finally sighed and all the tension bled from her body. “I just wanted to reconnect with my friends. We were so close in college, and since then everyone is so busy all the time. I’m just as bad as everyone else, so I’m one hundred percent not throwing stones, but I miss them. I thought this was such a brilliant idea to spend more time together, but I managed to mess that up and booked us the wrong cruise.”
She’d mentioned something like that earlier, but he was too busy trying to keep her from walking into a wall to pay too much attention. “No way do they hold this against you.”
“I don’t think it’s that, exactly.” She snuggled closer almost absently. “It’s just not what I thought it was going to be. Nothing about this is. I should have realized that a cruise would offer them all sorts of things they want to do beyond lying by the pool, but I didn’t really think about it. Even though we didn’t have finalized plans today, it still feels bad that I was alone.”
He couldn’t help giving her a squeeze. Alex had never wanted to be good at comforting and the softer set of people skills, but he did right in that moment. Surely a squeeze was helpful? He just didn’t know. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine.” The wobble still in her voice said otherwise. Kendall gave herself a shake and propped up on her elbow. “How did you end up on this cruise? It doesn’t seem like your kind of thing.”
“It’s not.” He let himself drink in the sight of her, enjoying the way the twinkle came back into her green eyes. “My grandfather thought it would be a good present to force me to take a vacation, but this was his idea of a good vacation.”
Her eyes went wide. “Your grandfather is on this cruise?”
“What? No.” He laughed and it felt…good. “No, Pop said this kind of shit would be bad for his heart.” He gave their intertwined bodies a significant look. Alex’s heart wasn’t doing too great at the moment, either. His cock still hadn’t calmed down, but he gave that up for a lost cause. A little agony never hurt anyone.
She smiled. “That’s a fair point. I admire his moxie. My younger sister might think something like this was a brilliant idea, but I’m pretty sure my older sister would die on the spot if she was on the ship.”
Moxie. That was one way to describe Pop.
“He thinks I work too much.” Alex didn’t mean to say it. But then, he didn’t mean to do a lot when it came to this woman. Right now, he should be making his excuses and establishing that this was the end of the road for them. He should be telling her that he wouldn’t be around for the rest of the cruise.