Crazy for You (7 page)

Tasha smiled more broadly and chuckled. “No,
but I’ll share.”

Andrew stepped back and put out his hands.
“No. Definitely not. I’ll think of something else.”

Todd returned and handed the keys to her
along with a welcome packet. “Hope you enjoy your stay, Ms. Smith.
Please let us know if you need anything when you get to your room.
Dial seven on your phone for my desk.” He grinned at her and
smiling broadly back, Tasha took the things from him.

“There is one thing,” she asked. “Do you have
roll-away beds here?”

“Why yes, I think we have a couple.”

“I’d like one in my room. Mr. Powell will be
staying with me until his reservation is straightened out.”

Andrew grasped her by the arm. “Now, look. I
didn’t agree to this.”

“But there’s nothing else.”

“Surely there’s something.” He turned back to
the man. “Surely there’s someone else I could room with, even
temporarily?”

Todd brought a finger up to his lips. “Yes,
I’d forgotten, perhaps there is someone.”

“Is this a male?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Does he...wear clothes?”

“Um, yes, he does.”

“Then I’ll take it.”

“I’ll have to talk to Samuel first,
though.”

“Is that him?”

“Yes. He’s the resort meditator. A kind,
gentle man. I’m sure you’ll like him.”

Andrew breathed a sigh of relief. Finally,
someone halfway normal.

“He doesn’t go nude, does he?

“Oh no,” he replied. “He usually wears a
toga.”

A guffaw of laughter exited Tasha’s mouth.
Andrew glared at her.

“Bring me the roll-away,” Tasha said.

“Do not bring the roll-away,” Andrew
countered. “We won’t be needing it.”

Tasha lifted one brow. “Oh? And are you
planning to share my bed?”

Horrified, Andrew balked. “Uh...no! I mean.”
His face turned scarlet. “I mean...”

The man looked from Andrew to Tasha, who
nodded her head to him. “I’ll have Josh bring one up after while.
Just in case. In the meantime I’ll have to talk to Samuel about
sharing his room. So perhaps you should go with Ms. Smith in the
interim.”

“Josh?”

“Yes. Josh. My right hand man.
Jack-of-all-trades around here. Assistant cook, too.”

“Can he drive a bus?”

“No. Sorry to say. Union contract.”

“Great,” Andrew muttered. “That’s just great.
I’ve landed somewhere between Oz and the Bermuda Triangle. Togas.
Maintenance men-slash-cooks. Nude beaches. Bus strikes. No room. No
luggage.” Somewhere along the line, his idea of plush beach resort
was fading. This place appeared to be some sort of wacky cross
between Cheers and The Beverly Hillbillies. Jamaican-style.

Tasha laughed, “At least you still have your
laptop.”

Andrew stared.

Thirteen

Room 214, Oceanview

The Club Regale

Tasha slid the key into the lock and pushed
open her room door. The hotel was surrounded with trees and dusk
was quickly falling, so the shut-up room was a bit dark and cool.
After crossing the threshold, she pulled back the curtains and slid
open the windows on two walls. Immediately the room appeared
lighter, and warmer.

The ocean was visible to her right; the
resort recreation area and pool to her left. The king-sized bed
occupied nearly one wall and a huge floor-to-ceiling mirror graced
the opposite side. Mirrors were also attached to the ceiling above
the bed.

Hm... Interesting.

She glanced around. The room’s furnishings
consisted of two rattan chairs, a small sofa, and an apartment
sized refrigerator. The decor was beachy, of course, with a shell
motif and potted plants scattered about. Light and breezy. The
bedspread was an aqua and mauve shell pattern; the sofa and
cushions on the rattan furniture were upholstered with a similar
companion fabric. The curtains, the same gauzy aqua fluttered from
the window. The ocean breeze was welcome, freshening the air in the
room.

Tasha tossed her backpack to the bed and
stepped around it to look out the ocean view window. A large palm
tree sat right outside. She listened to the gentle rustle of the
leaves. “This is nice,” she said, more to herself, than to
Andrew.

His footsteps sounded behind her. “If you
like early rain forest,” he muttered.

Tasha turned. “You can always go sleep with
Samuel,” she quipped.

“I plan to,” he bit back.

Glancing about, Andrew’s gaze perused the
room’s interior. Tasha watched his face. She still hadn’t quite
figured him out.
Who are you, Andrew Jacob Powell III?

“I guess it will do...temporarily.” He
brought his gaze back to her face. “Where’s the bathroom?”

Tasha turned and took in two doors on the
back wall. Upon inspection, they found that one led into a walk-in
closet, the other a full bath. Andrew walked inside, fiddled with
the toilet handle and turned on the water in both the sink and
shower.

“Well, at least we’ve got running water, and
hot at that.”

“Expecting a little shack out back with a
half moon on the door, were you?” Tasha arched a brow.

Andrew rolled his eyes and walked away. “At
this point, I’m not quite sure what to expect.”

Tasha went to the bed and began rummaging
through her things. She pulled out several items of clothing,
shorts, t-shirts, and such and stashed them into a drawer of the
dresser behind her. She glanced at Andrew, who was pacing the other
side of the room. A wicked thought came over her.

She picked up a handful of her underwear and
started back toward the dresser. “Don’t know why I’m even bothering
to unpack these things,” she mumbled, glancing quickly to Andrew.
“I probably won’t be wearing them anyway.”

Andrew paced to the left. Tasha turned back
to her bag.

“Guess I should unpack the necessities,
though. But I guess I’ll just stuff most everything back into the
backpack and put it in the closet. No use dirtying things that will
have to washed later.” She mumbled the words, half to herself, half
to Andrew, then peeked at him.

He’d stopped in mid-stride and stared at
her.

“What do you mean?”

Tasha straightened, then returned to the
dresser. She pulled back out all of her clothing and began stuffing
them back into the backpack. “Well, I probably won’t be wearing
them much, you know. I’ll probably spend most of my time, er...
sunbathing. I plan to check out that nude beach. And of course,
being the exhibitionist I am...”

Andrew cleared his throat and stepped closer.
Reaching forward, he grasped some of her clothes and put them back
in the dresser drawer. “You most certainly will need clothing.”

“What for?” Tasha goaded. She wanted to smile
so badly her mouth hurt. “Oh, and by the way, what do you plan to
do for clothing? Of course, you most likely won’t need much. I
mean, a swim suit...maybe...and something to wear at night. Unless
you plan to frequent the toga parties, in that case I’m sure we can
find an extra sheet around here. Perhaps a pair of shorts to wear
during the day. Need help shopping? Unless, of course, you plan to
frequent the nude beach and Jacuzzi area. So really, the fact that
you have no clothing will most likely not be a major factor—”

Andrew threw his hands up in the air and
walked away. “I’ll handle my clothing situation, thank you! And,
the fact that I don’t have clothing is not by my choice. You do
have clothes. Wear them.”

“Why? No one knows me here, except you, and
we don’t really know each other, do we? What does it matter? Why
don’t you think about it? Why don’t we just let our hair down and
try it?”

“You’re absolutely stark raving lunatic mad,
aren’t you?” His face was wild.

“I don’t think so.”

Tasha looked Andrew up, then down. Boy, did
the man need a vacation. Wound up tighter than a drum. Had to be
stress. He would be a challenge, she reminded herself, but maybe,
just maybe, this vacation hasn’t been for naught. Maybe she could
do something here to help this man ease back into life a bit and
escape the business world for a few days.

“What are you thinking?” he prodded.

“I’m wondering—”

“Well, stop wondering! Stop looking at me
like you want to know what I’d look like without my clothes!”

Tasha chuckled. “Now that’s a switch.”

“What do you mean? I don’t look at you like
that!”

Turning back to the dresser, she picked up
her clothing again. She stifled a grin. “I didn’t necessarily mean
you. It’s just that women in general usually feel like men are
undressing them with their eyes. Does it make you
uncomfortable?”

“Yes. It makes me damned uncomfortable. Stop
it.”

Tasha laughed again. “For your information, I
wasn’t doing that. I was just thinking that perhaps you need this
vacation more than most.” She stepped closer. “Think about it. I
don’t know how you ended up here, but you did. Obviously, it was a
mistake. I, on the other hand, knew pretty much what I was getting
into. And guess what? This trip was a gift from my mother! Imagine
that. I plan on having the time of my life the next few days. And
seeing that you, at the moment, have no choice in the matter, you
might want to consider doing the same.”

“But—”

“I don’t know you and you don’t know me. When
we leave this place, we’ll never see each other again. More than
likely, we’ll never see anyone connected to this place again. So
what I plan to do is spend the next five days relaxing and doing
whatever I feel like doing. And if, within those five days, I
decide to try nudity as a change of pace, I might just do it. I’m
not hurting anyone. And no one is hurting me.”

“I’m not—”

“So, you can sit here, Andrew Jacob Powell
III, grovel over your misfortune, and pine away the remainder of
the week. Or you can loosen up that noose around your neck and hang
loose for a few days. Makes no difference to me. But let me tell
you this. I didn’t come all the way here just to hole myself up in
this hotel room. And if you’re as smart as you appear to be, you
won’t do that, either.”

When she stopped talking, she was facing
Andrew, barely inches separating their faces. “So what do you have
to say about that?”

Andrew just stood there. Speechless.

****

By the time Josh had delivered the roll-away
bed and had pronounced to Andrew that Samuel was not to be found
and that Todd had not gained permission for Andrew to stay with him
yet, Tasha was starved. Josh, who turned out to be a Jamaican
version of a Jed Clampett look-alike, complete with bib overalls
and a floppy straw hat, stood in the doorway of their cabin at his
departure. Tasha was just glad he was fully dressed, but she
wouldn’t have told Andrew that.

If the truth be known, she wasn’t any more
keen on this nudity thing than he was. She was no more anxious to
take off her clothes in front of perfect strangers than the average
female would be. But damn if she couldn’t help teasing Andrew into
a state of fluster. He was so darned cute when he looked
bewildered. And she could tell that he thought she was the oddest
human being ever to come along the pike.

Well, she guessed she wasn’t quite like
everyone else, but that’s what made her the way she was. He would
just have to leave her or take her.

“Josh, tell us how we go about getting
something to eat in this place,” Tasha inquired.

The older man brought a hand up to his
stubbled chin, pulled at it, and looked at the floor. After a slow
minute, he raised his gaze. “Well, seeing as how you’ve probably
not had time to get settled in yet, you probably haven’t read your
information packet, have you?”

Tasha glanced to the bed. The packet was
still lying there, unopened. “No, I haven’t.”

“Well.” He scratched his head and continued
to drawl, “there’s the cafeteria downstairs, but it’s been closed
since eight o’clock. There is a buffet open on the beach until
midnight, but it’s a bit of a hike and seeing that you all are
tuckered out… You could probably find some appetizers at one of the
bars.”

Tasha glanced at her watch. Nine-thirty-five.
She eyed Josh. She really wasn’t up to night-life at the moment and
she doubted if Andrew was, either. “Now Josh, didn’t I hear
something about you being the assistant cook?”

An easy grin spread over his face. “Now that
you might have heard. Care to come see what we can dig up?”

Tasha nodded and threw a glance to Andrew.
“Want to come?”

He sat in the rattan chair on the far side of
the room. She guessed Josh’s news about Samuel didn’t help matters
any. Ever since they’d arrived, and Tasha had goaded him about
going nude, he’d sat and muttered about all the injustices he’d
been dealt the past twenty-four hours. Tasha had just left him
grumble. In the mean-time, she’d taken a shower and had organized
her belongings. Now she was ready for something to eat.

“Bring me back something,” he tossed back at
her.

“Afraid you’re gonna see something you don’t
want to see?”

He shrugged and turned away from her in the
seat. Tasha chuckled and followed Josh out the door.

****

Andrew hadn’t realized how hungry he was. He
guessed that with all the turmoil, he hadn’t stopped to think about
eating. When Tasha had brought in the two large turkey sandwiches
on sliced sourdough bread, a small bag of potato chips, and two
bottles of iced tea, he could have kissed her.

He could have kissed Josh, as well.

He’d taken the twenty minutes or so they were
away to assess his situation. He always came up with the same
conclusion. There was nothing he could do about any of it. Not at
the moment, anyway. It was possible he was going to have to stay
the night with Tasha. Tomorrow though, he was getting out of here,
one way or another.