Paradise Lost (Private 9)

But I kept seeing his face. His smile. That ridiculously sexy glint

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in his eyes. The way he'd looked at me when I'd first arrived at the party tonight. The way he'd grinned like a little boy when I'd opened my Christmas gift. I could feel his arms around me, his hands on my skin, his fingers in my hair. I had a serious problem here

.

I had fallen for a player.

I leaned against the railing and sighed. An odd sort of musky scent filled my nostrils. Before I even could think about where it might have come from, I felt a tug on my necklace and, for a fleeting moment, lost the ability to breathe. Then a pair of hands hit me squarely in the back and shoved. Hard. The necklace cut into my skin as it was torn from my neck. I let out a surprised shout and felt my shoes slip on the slick deck. My heart jumped into my throat as my stomach swooped up into my chest. I grabbed for the railing, but it was no good. I was already falling. A scream escaped my throat, but it was drowned out by the grinding engines and churning water.

One thought wildly repeated itself in my mind during the two seconds it took me to plunge into the ocean. Someone had pushed me. Someone had pushed me. Someone was trying to kill me.

The last thing I heard before I hit the cold, dark water was the sound of gleeful squealing and cheering, as someone at the tables won big.