Our a Cappella (5 page)

Chapter 11

Shayna

I love having Uncle Nate live with us. Especially now that it’s just the two of us since Mommy and Daddy left for the weekend. He sleeps on our couch and snores so loud I can hear him, even when I shut my bedroom door, but he makes up for it by making me pancakes. They’re not as good as Mommy’s homemade pancakes, but the ones that come in the box are pretty good. Uncle Nate says I can eat them with syrup since Mommy’s not hear so I put syrup all over them and then take individual spoonfuls of just the syrup.

I wonder if he’ll let me have whipped cream out of the can like he used to when we were in Alabama.

We’re going to the arcade today. I don’t like video games but Jose and Uncle Nate do. I think Tonya and I can convince them to take us to the beach afterwards. She likes the beach almost as much as Mommy and I do.

Daddy told me
he was taking Mommy to the beach so I thought Mommy would be happy but they got in a big fight over it. Actually, they get in a lot of big fights. It used to scare me when they started yelling at each other but now I think they’re kinda funny. Mommy swings her arms around a lot and tries not to say bad words and Daddy walks back and forth, shoving his hands through his hair. Daddy’s mom told me that one day he was going to lose all his hair from doing that so often. I hope not. I like his long hair.

Chapter 12

Trent

“I’m so mad at you,” Erin tells me as we cross the bridge to Islamorada.

Those are the first words she has
so much as uttered in my direction since our latest fight yesterday evening, and I’m torn between wanting to throttle her or just take Nate up on his offer and go fishing with him. I abruptly veer off to the shoulder, ignoring the horns blaring at me from cars as they speed around my car. I walk around the car and sit on the small rocky beach, skipping stones the best I can. 

Erin follows me, which is a good sign. A part of me thought she might either drive off without me or use the time to study. Okay, I
admit, I could have been less of a dick and let her study in the car rather than playing music I know she doesn’t like at an ear-bleeding volume. But her hell-bent personality forces me to be stubborn, so it’s really her fault.

“Trent, can’t we just – ”

“I swear to God, Erin,” I interrupt her. “If you tell me to drive us home, I’m breaking your head and dumping your body.”

While I
obviously don’t mean what I say, I refuse to look at her. Prepared for yet another fight, I stare into the bay and count how many times my stone skips.

She sits down beside me and places a rock she found on my lap.

“Would you use that to break my head?”

I look around and point at a large boulder. “I’d use that.”

She nods her head in understanding.

“You’re a pain in the ass,” I tell her.

She nods her head again. “I know,” she agrees, sounding sad and defeated. She rests her head on my shoulder and because I can’t stand to see her like this, I decide to defuse the tension and tug on her long hair that has spilled forward.

“Aren’t you going to apologize?”

“Apologize?” She asks and I can hear the smile in her voice. “You kidnapped me. Forced me to go on vacation to one of my favorite places with one of my favorite people,” she scolds.

“Nate taught me how to hog tie you in case it came down to it.”

“You wouldn’t,” she says seriously, but I can feel her body shaking in laughter.

I maneuver mys
elf so that I am on top of her making it easier for me to grab her wrists and ankles, and I gently send her body onto the sand until she is lying flat on her back. Through her laughter I hear her beg me to stop, but I take my shirt off, using it to tie her hands and feet together. Seeing I have done a piss poor job at it, I keep a firm hand on her so she can’t get loose.

Peering at her smiling face, I ask, “Ready to apologize?”

“Never!” she shouts through the laughter that has overtaken her.

She looks so adorable, I lean down to kiss her forehead, and unwittingly loosen my hold on her until she is able to squirm free. Quick and flexible, she pounces out of my reach and runs down the small stretch of
sand before us. Faster, I catch up to her and put her on my shoulder with a quick smack on her ass.

I lay her back down on the sand and sit on her. She’s smiling back at me, a grin so big it makes my heart swell with pride that I put it there.
I lean into her, lacing my fingers with hers and kiss her gently on her chin, over her eyes, the corner of her mouth. She calls them whisper kisses and they drive her crazy so I continue to shower her with whisper kisses until I hear her breathing quicken.

Erin tries to free her hands from mine so
that she can touch me and while I revel in her touch, I’ve decided to torment her. I don’t really care for any apology anymore. I just enjoy watching her eyes smoke over with desire, her lips part in invitation.

I
kiss her shoulder and explore her collarbone and neck with my tongue. With our body temperatures rising I am forced to stop when I hear an awkward but forceful cough behind me. I look over my shoulder to find a father and son duo carrying their fishing gear staring at us.

On a grunt
, I give up and roll off Erin until I am also lying on my back. Erin sits ups and bursts out in laughter when she sees them.

“Bunch of cock blockers,” she
teases and snuggles her body closer to mine until her head rests on my shoulder.

We lie there in silence, neither of us feeling the need to fill it. I feel Erin melt into me as she listens to the waves crashing. And whe
n a sigh escapes her lips, I know I was right in making her come to the Keys with me. The beach relaxes her in a way not even music can.

Erin shifts her body until she is looking at me so I reach out my unoccupied hand and caress the back of her head. She puts her hand on my arm and smiles at me before she leans in and kisses me.

“I accept,” I tell her and she slaps me on my shoulder.

“Fine,” she rolls her eyes at me but relents. “I promise not to be a total shit this weekend.”

“That’s a shitty apology.”

I help Erin to her feet and don’t bother looking at our intruders as we make our way back to the car. Already in Islamorada, our drive to the villa I rented is fast.

Not allowing Erin’s OCD to take over, I pull her to our back patio before she can start unpacking. I look for the kayaks advertised online and wiggle my eyebrows at Erin in invitation when I find them. She quickly looks back at our villa and sighs, not saying out loud the words I can clearly hear nonetheless.

I drop the kayaks into the intracoastal, promising her I’ll help her unpack when we get back. I try not to outwardly cringe when I hear Eminem’s MMLP2 from her phone and almost blast Black Sabbath from mine, but decide to let her win this one little battle.
And while I’d never admit it to her, I do sort of like his latest album.

We paddle for almost an hour,
when Erin spots a small pod of manatees she points out to me. We slowly inch our way towards them until we are beside them. Unsure if they are fearless or too slow to move away from us, I reach out and touch one’s back as it swims under the kayak. Wanting a better look, I wink at Erin and dive into the water.

“Trent,” I hear her exclaim when I come back up for air.

I blink out the sting of the salt water and look at Erin to see her eyes are wide and her mouth is slightly open, either in astonishment of my bravery or annoyance at my stupidity. Knowing Erin and how cautious she is, it’s probably at my stupidity. But, because the manatees don’t seem to mind my intrusion, I ignore her and free dive under the water with these creatures, only coming up for air because my lungs demand it.

“Come in, Erin,” I tell her after a few minutes. 

She watches me apprehensively as I swim towards her, probably thinking I’ll tip her kayak over. She’s probably right.

“They’re not gonna hurt you,” I reassure her as one surfaces next to me and lets out a loud
burst of air through its nostrils.

She lets out a nervous laugh but reaches out to touch it. Her hand shake
s so badly I’m tempted to just pull her in, but I doubt she’d see the humor in it. She smiles back at me when she makes contact and she’s so damn cute I nearly climb in her kayak just to kiss her.

Determination sets in her face and she takes her top and shorts off, exposing her slim body with slight curves
in a small bikini I can’t wait to take off. With my teeth.

“I’m going in,” she tells me seriously, trying to mask her fear of the unknown.

Erin is the bravest person I know. She’s overcome more than any one person should have to endure in a lifetime. But it’s left her wary and cautious, not that she lets many people see her insecurities or fears. She’ll stiffen her spine and trudge through her anxiety before she admits defeat. And right now these sea cows are her adversary so she is determined to join us in the water just so she can give fear the middle finger.

She jumps in feet first on the opposite side of where the manatee and I await her. She reaches me breathless, with adrenaline coursing through her veins. I swim in front of her so that I am in between her a
nd the small pod when we reach where they swim below us. She smiles at me, a smile full of amusement rather than the panic I anticipated to see.

This time, Erin winks at me before she takes a breath and goes underwater to get a
closer look of the manatees below us. I follow her and am shocked when I see her glide her hand over one’s back. She comes back up laughing, her eyes dancing from the joy she found in her courage. Without a word, we go under again, enjoying ourselves amongst these elusive creatures.

Eventually they leave us so we get back on our kayaks and head back to the villas.
Once we reach our dock, I angle my kayak against it and easily lift myself up and then my kayak. Erin follows suit so I take her hand in mine and help her up.

“You know,” Erin begins and I’m already amused, waiting to see what fun fact she’s going to dispense, “
mermaid folklore actually comes from manatees.”

“So you’re telling me mermaids don’t exist?” I ask
, cocking an eyebrow as I lift her kayaks back on our dock.

“Think about it,” she tells me as she hands me a bottle of water. “They kind of have the same body type as mermaids.”

“Except mermaids are hot with shells covering their big boobs,” I counter.

“They couldn’t very well make mermaids to look like
those sea cows. Where’s the allure or glamour in that?”

“Who’s
they
?” I tease her, pulling her body to mine.

“They,” she repeats. “The people who make up stories about dragons and unicorns and mermaids.”

“You’re seriously gonna sit here and tell me dragons don’t exist?” I ask her, my mouth open in mock horror and she nods. “How can you be so sure?”

“No one’s ever seen one.”

“No one’s ever seen majority of the world,” I respond, willing an imagination she never fully developed to take flight.

She smiles at me
, reeking of practicality, and takes my hand in hers.

“What do you say we do some exploring
ourselves?” she asks and from the gleam in her eyes, I know damn well what kind of exploring she’s got in mind.

I let her guide me up the stairs to our bedroom but before she can slip her bikini off, I grab her by the waist and gently tug on her bikini bottom with my teeth. I feel Erin’s fingers run through my hair as I remove her bottom and she only stops when I start tracing my fingers up her thigh. My fingers continue to caress her body ever so softly, a whisper that I know gives her chills of excitement. I stand up, my hands still caressing her as I begin to nuzzle her throat.

Her hands go around my neck, her fingers moving upward until again they are combing my hair. I reach around her, untying her bikini top, and freeing her breasts so that I can fully explore them.

“Trent,” Erin moans my name when I place my lips on her nipple.

With one quick movement, I pick her up, cradling her in my arms before I place her on the bed. I quickly remove my shirt while she helps me with my board shorts. Within seconds, we are both naked and panting. I climb on top her, eager to be inside of her. Our lips connect as we begin a dance only the two of us are privy to know.

Incapable of slowing down and exploring, I slam into her, grunting until we both find our release. I roll over, taking Erin with me so that she is lying on my stomach.

“Chewbacca sex,” she says kissing my chest. “It never gets old.”

I grin and let out a roar just so I can hear her laugh in response. Erin rests her head on my chest and falls asleep while I caress her bare back.