Pushing His Luck - Rhyannon Byrd Page 0,10
one who’s madly in love with you, Nat.”
With a soft flush on her cheeks, Natalie sighed dreamily. “Oh God. I know it’s silly, but I still feel like pinching myself sometimes when he says it.”
“It’s not silly,” she said softly, ignoring the little pang of hurt in her chest, since there was no point in feeling sad about the fact that the only people who had ever truly meant it when they said they loved her were her family and her precious little boy. Her dreams of having a great romantic love someday, like the one that Natalie and Sean had, were rapidly fading, leaving a hollow ache in her chest. But she was still truly happy for her friend, so the smile on her lips was genuine as she looked at Natalie and added, “It’s not a bad thing to be so into your guy or girl that it still sets off butterflies when things get emotional. That’s a good thing, Nat. You need to embrace it, and be thankful for it.”
“I know.” A goofy grin kicked up the corner of Natalie’s pink lips. “I just never thought I’d be so freaking sappy.”
“Well, for what it’s worth, I love seeing how into each other you and Sean are. And the same goes for Soph and Chris. It gives me faith that…” She searched for the right way to translate what she was feeling into words. “Well, not that I’ll find it myself. Just that… I guess that the kind of love we read about and see in movies really does exist. And that just makes me happy.”
Natalie gave her a sharp look. “What’s this crap about not finding it for yourself?”
Her shoulders lifted in an awkward shrug and she sighed. “Just ignore me, okay. I’m being overly dramatic, and I freaking hate it when that happens.”
Sounding genuinely concerned, Natalie said, “Hey, don’t just brush this off like it’s no big deal. That’s bullshit, K. You deserve a kickass, insane-amount-of-orgasms, romance-of-the-ages relationship more than anyone I know. Don’t you dare let your asshole of an ex and Paul’s douchey behavior make you turn your back on that.”
Pulling in a deep breath, she blinked away the tears that were suddenly prickling at the backs of her eyes and focused on Sean and the other surfers who were sitting on their boards out in the water. “I’m not. I just—” she finally started to say, only to suck in a sharp breath when she caught sight of the tall, muscular body walking across the sand, the guy’s yellow surfboard tucked under one arm and his dark hair tousled by the breeze.
Natalie followed her line of sight and muttered a sharp curse. “Oh shit. I’m so sorry, K. If I’d known that Paul was coming over tonight, I wouldn’t have suggested that we sit out here. I don’t even think he told Sean.”
“Don’t be sorry.” She shook her head as she gave a heavy sigh. “And it’s not like I plan on avoiding him forever. He’s going to be around, so I just have to pull up my big-girl panties and learn to deal with it.”
Natalie’s dark eyes were bright with respect. “Wow, you’re a hell of a lot more gracious than I would be.”
“Hey, it’s not like I won’t be privately wishing I could knee him in the dick,” she admitted with a wry laugh. “I just won’t act on it.”
Natalie laughed, and they moved the conversation on to other things, like the new client she’d gotten that morning—an exciting start-up in downtown that she would be designing a logo for—and the Pilates class they both wanted to join. It was a beautiful evening, and she loved spending time with Natalie, which meant she should have been feeling happy and relaxed. But no matter how hard she tried to keep her gaze focused on the horizon, it kept sliding back to Paul again and again. It was easy to keep track of him out on the waves, his half-wetsuit leaving his incredible abs, chest and tattoo uncovered. And whenever he caught a wave, it was even easier to see that he’d once been a professional surfer. The night they’d kissed, he’d told her that his career had ended before it even really got started because of a bad knee injury, which explained the scars she’d seen on his leg.
So, yeah, it was starting to get embarrassing how many times she caught herself following the athletic, graceful movements of his body out on