Yeah. He’d about swallowed his tongue. True that there were no white marks anywhere he could see, but the mental image had made him want to strip off the nylon scraps and explore for himself. Do a double-check. Maybe rub some sunscreen on, because it would be a crime to burn her pretty skin.
“Nothing to say?” She’d flopped onto a lounger, lying down on her belly and then—his all-time favorite memory of the day—had reached up to tug the strings undone. The skimpy fabric had fallen away, exposing the generous curve of her breasts.
He’d growled out a “Carry on” and beaten a hasty retreat, the big, bad SEAL run off by a string bikini.
Another wave of exhaustion battered at him. He hadn’t slept more than a couple of hours these past few days and he’d be no good to her if he passed out standing up. The empty lounger seemed like his best bet. Palming his secure phone, he texted Levi.
Is HRH covered?
The odds of Maddie being awake at shortly after sunrise seemed minimal.
Sure enough, Levi responded almost immediately.
Sleeping. I can be inside in two if she needs a good-night kiss.
His reaction was instinctive—and telling.
Hands off.
And of course Levi ran with it.
No hands. Got it. Tongue okay?
Never leave that SEAL a loophole. Instead, he went for honesty.
I’m out for an hour.
After Levi confirmed that he’d keep watch over Maddie and no one—not even the zombie overlord in the yet-to-happen zombie apocalypse—would get to her, Mason let himself relax. He dropped onto the lounger and rolled over, concealing the handgun tucked against the small of his back. This early in the morning, none of the resort guests should be up and about—they seemed to prefer Maddie’s version of early morning, which kicked off at lunchtime—but better safe than sorry. Monkeys and birds chatted back and forth in the treetops, and the faint pounding of the surf traveled across the lagoon. Yeah. He’d slept in worse places. This would do.
He set his internal clock and let sleep take him.
* * *
FANTASY ISLAND CAME with a sleeping beauty.
If Maddie had known Mason was the reward for early-morning exercise, she’d have jumped out of bed. He looked downright edible—and sound asleep. Poor baby. She stepped off the path and into the lookout point. Just as pretty as it had been the other morning, when Mason had startled her and she’d lost her memory card. Calm blue lagoon with a clear view of the fringing reef. Lots of palm trees and just a slice of white sugary beach. She was looking at calendar material.
The man didn’t hurt, either. She told herself that her heart banging in her ears had nothing to do with Sleeping Beauty, even if he did look cute, sprawled facedown on the love seat. When he didn’t so much as twitch as she approached, she checked to make sure he was breathing—which he was, because his lungs were undoubtedly as fit as the rest of him—and then checked out his mighty fine ass in his cargo pants. He wore the usual pair of industrial-strength boots and the fitted cotton T-shirt that seemed to be his wardrobe staple when he wasn’t sporting chef whites. Today he looked like a mixed-martial-arts champion or someone else suitably large and rough around the edges. The only thing missing was a sleeve of tattoos. God, she loved a good tattoo.
Almost perfect, but not quite...
Huh. Maybe that could be fixed.
She rummaged in her bag—the joys of being prepared—and fished out a stick of sunscreen. She was an excellent almost girlfriend, because this was classy colored sunscreen that came with cartoon characters on the tube. But really, she had a problem. What to write? The thick, corded arm over his face severely restricted the amount of available real estate. His other arm stretched across his head. She looked up at the sky. Perfect. It was like having her very own darkroom—he’d be sporting her extraspecial message in about another hour. Delicately, she finger painted a word onto his arm, outlining three perfect letters in the cream. H-O-T.
She was just settling in to enjoy herself when Mason came awake. One minute, her sleeping beauty was sprawled out in a power nap, and the next he’d rolled, pulling her beneath him and pinning her wrists with one hand. His hand gripped her jaw, the other pressed over her throat.
Oh. My. God. Mental note: don’t poke the sleeping giant.
The sunscreen fell from her hand as her heart kicked into overdrive. Mason looked...scary. And she wasn’t entirely sure she could breathe.
“It’s just me,” she said hoarsely.
He blinked and looked down at her. He didn’t ease up on his grip on her jaw. “Maddie?”