Sweetest Sin: Bad Boy Bundle (23 page)

“Oh,” I groan. My nipples harden beneath my robe. My eyes are fixed on his huge cock. Twitching. Dancing in his hand.

Get out of here!
My thoughts pull me away from the glorious sight in Jackson’s room.
Get out before he sees you
.

I’m still not sure how to think about Jackson. A rude, arrogant man whore who would rather jack off than flirt with me?

You need to tell the wine to shut. Up.

The
rest of the night passes without any real incidents, allowing me to wake up the next morning feeling refreshed, dehydrated, and hungry.

I snatch up my jeans and run through the room to put on my clothes. The last thing I want to do right now is miss my chance at breakfast. Maybe the fact that I’m running late means that I’ll miss Jackson.

No such luck.

I walk into the hotel restaurant to find one of the best breakfast buffets I have ever seen in my life. After piling on some fruit and waffles, I sit down at a corner table, set up my laptop, and stare at the blank screen again.

“What are you working on?”

I glance up from my plate to see Jackson helping himself to one of the other chairs.

“I, um. Well. Depends on the time of day, I guess.” I have no idea why that’s such a hard question to answer. But for some reason the answer just doesn’t want to come out.

“Okay. So what are you working on at say….” He pauses to check the clock on his cell phone. “9:33 AM?”

I snort and shake my head. “Cute. Well, I’m supposed to be working on my novel, if you must know.”

“Your novel? You’re a novelist?”

“No. Not exactly. I just, this is my first one actually.”

“Oh okay. What’s it about?”

“I haven’t the foggiest idea yet.”

“Doesn’t sound like much of a novel then.”

I smirk and drive my fork into a strawberry.

“So, is that why you came to Thailand? To write this vague novel?”

I nod and shrug as I wipe the strawberry juices from my chin. “Yea. I, uh, I quit my job. Just a couple days ago, actually. And so I just needed to get away for a bit. Clear my head. And I always wanted to write a novel so I thought this would be the perfect time.”

“I get that,” Jackson says as he shovels some eggs and sausage into his mouth. “Not the novel writing thing. But the head clearing. I get that.”

Five hundred questions rush through my mind all at once. What happened to his sister? Why would he rather masturbate than flirt with me? Instead I just nod my head and start pounding away at my keyboard.

I’m not even sure what I’m typing. Words, I guess. And they seem to be forming sentences. But as far as whether or not they can come together to form a story still remains to be seen. For now, our little banter will do. Dictating our conversation seems to be the best way for me to get words typed up at all.

A few minutes later, Jackson finishes cleaning his plate and he grabs a napkin to wipe his lips. He leans back on his chair and stares at me. I keep my glare fixed on my computer screen, trying to ignore his stare.

“So, what job did you quit to become a novelist?”

“What?”

“You said you quit your job, and that led you to coming down here to clear your head and try to write a novel. What job did you quit?”

“Oh. I. Uh.” The phone call to Felicia runs through my head again. The thunderstorm. John’s voicemail message. Sam’s advice in the bathroom. Tears sting at the back of my eyes. I grit my teeth in an effort to keep them from quivering. After a deep breath I close my laptop and stand up. “It doesn’t really matter.”

Before he can say anything, I leave the table and head back up the stairs to my room. By the time I get there, I can feel the searing pain lumped at the back of my throat. My breathing is sharp, coming in high pitched wisps.

I storm into my room, tossing my laptop onto the freshly made bed.

Minutes
later, Jackson pounds on my door. I take a deep breath and try to clear the tears still stinging at my eyes.

“Yea?” I say as I try to force a fake smile across my lips.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you before. With the questions.”

“You didn’t.”

“Are you sure because you jumped up from the table and ran off pretty fast. You even left your wallet there,” he says as he pulls my wallet from his back pocket.

“Oh. Shit. Thanks.” I grab the wallet from him and open the door wider to invite him in.

He smiles and steps into my room, glancing around.

“Anyway, I didn’t mean to pry.”

“It’s fine.”

He nods and kicks at the carpet.

“Um, do you want some coffee or something? I can brew some?”

“Yea. That’d be great. Thanks.”

I pour water into the back of the tiny hotel coffee brewer and get it all set up. Then I walk back over and he takes a seat in the recliner. So I claim a seat near the corner of the bed and stare into the space in front of me.

“You okay?” Jackson asks.

“What? Oh yea. I’m fine. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have just bolted like that. I don’t know why I did. I guess I just wasn’t prepared to answer questions about my job.”

“Fair enough. I don’t really like talking about my job, either.”

I smile and nod. “And what is it you do?”
Porn star, maybe? Professional athlete?

“I uh — I don’t like talking about it, remember?” Jackson chuckles.

“Oh my God. Oh you’re right. I’m sorry that was really dumb.”

“Yea, a little.”

I laugh with him.

“Don’t worry about it, I’m just kidding. I’m in marketing. Online marketing, mostly.”

“Online marketing. You mean like those annoying pop-up ads on the internet whenever I go to a website?”

He chuckles again and shakes his head. “Well, that is one form of marketing. But no. I don’t do the popup ads thing. My company helps corporations set up their online presence and handles all of their online needs. From making sure their website is being read by the search engines to developing ads and getting them out into social media so they can interact with their customers.”

“You mean, so like if I see my favorite coffee shop on Instagram, that’s you?”

Jackson smiles and leans back in his chair. “Not me, but someone from my social interaction department.”

“You have a social interaction department?”

He smiles and cocks his eyebrow.

“Okay, so let me guess. Most of your work can be done online, so you travel like this all the time.”

He nods and glances around my room. “Yes and no. Yes I do a lot of traveling and yes most of my work is done online so when I do travel I can still check in on everything. But this is my first trip to Thailand. No major clients here to meet. I just came here to try to get away from everything for a few days.”

The coffee pot beeps at us. I jump off the bed and jog over to get coffee pouring. “Oh, shit.”

“What. What’s wrong?”

“I forgot I used one of my cups last night. And housekeeping hasn’t come by yet to restock so I only have one cup.”

“That’s okay. I’m pretty sure I have one to match your coffee mug, too. I’ll just run next door and grab it real quick.”

“Okay, great,” I say as he darts out the door.

Calculating
the number of seconds it will take him to get into his hotel room, grab the plastic cup from his coffee pot, and get back over here is going to take me way too long.  I have to make the most out of this time. I rinse my mouth out with some mouthwash, slap some deodorant under my arms, and remember that the security guard at the airport has my favorite body spray.

“Damn it!” I say just as Jackson shows up back at my door. He knocks gently before walking back in and closing the door behind him.

“Here we are. Once again, a perfect match.”

“Thanks.” I giggle and grab the cup from him and start pouring out the coffee. “Cream or sugar? Or rather, let’s see what we have here. Nondairy creamer powder, pink fake sugar, blue fake sugar, yellow fake sugar, raw sugar, or sugar.”

“Are you serious they have that many choices now?”

I pick up the bowl with the different sweetener packs and show him the variety.

“That’s insane. I’ll just take mine black, please.”

I hand him the steaming cup of coffee and pour myself a cup with two regular sugars. Jackson heads back out to the shared patio, so I follow and sit down there as we watch the beach fill with tourists.

“This is a really nice hotel,” I say. For the life of me I can’t think of anything more exciting to talk about than the weather and the hotel.

It’s like I’m
trying
to convince him that I’m a moron.

I also can’t seem to figure out what kind of pull Jackson has over me. All day yesterday I thought he was arrogant and pushy. And yet now I can’t see any of those things in him. He’s just…sweet. Pensive.

“Are you okay?” he asks me.

I shake myself free from my thoughts. “Yea. Sorry. Just spacing out a bit I guess.”

“Well, thanks for the coffee,” he says. “I don’t mean to grab coffee and run but I have a thing I have to get to.”

“Oh. Right. Because you work online. Well, maybe I’ll see you around sometime then?”

He nods and steps inside his room, closing his patio door and the curtains behind him.

I cannot believe I am such a dork
.

With
Jackson gone, I take my coffee and head back into my room. My laptop still houses the conversation Jackson and I had earlier in the cafeteria. I try turning on the television only to hear presidential hopefuls crying over how they’re going to address the latest acts of terrorism. I switch through between speeches, interviews, and pictures.

Finally I snap the television off and toss the remote over onto the bed. Instead, I turn my attention to the welcome packet sitting on top of the tiny desk in my room. Inside, I’m greeted by restaurants listing, area businesses, and tourist attractions.

Come see Thailand like you’ve never seen her before!
One brochure yells at me.

“What harm could it do?” I think as I place the brochure down and head over to the closet to get dressed.

This is when I realize that my clothes are not exactly vacation clothes. Suits, blouses, trousers, a couple of skirts. Sweat pants. Nothing about the clothes in this bag made it look like I was on a vacation. But then again, I didn’t exactly pack for a vacation, did I?

Nothing I want to be wearing out into the jungles of Thailand. I throw on a pair of jeans and a blouse and decide to head down to the hotel gift shop to see if they have any clothes for sale there.

They don’t.

But the lady behind the counter does tell me about a small boutique just across the road.

Dresses, skirts, sarongs. The clothes in this shop are beautiful. It doesn’t take me long to pick out a few new outfits thanks to the helpful staff. And before long I was back in my hotel room admiring my new vacation look in the mirror. Other than my pale skin and my green eyes, I looked like I belonged in a tropical paradise. I throw my hair up into a loose twist and drape a thin shawl over my shoulders.

And with the brochure in hand, I head off to one of the tours to get my mind off everything. I head over to the hotel information desk.

“Hi, Miss Anders. How are you enjoying your stay?”

“So far everything has been great. Thank you. I was wondering, according to this there is a tour of a national park that starts in about an hour? Can you tell me how to get there?” I hand my brochure over to the young man.

He smiles and nods. “Ao Phang Nga National Park. Yes. You can rent a motorbike to get there. Or we offer free shuttle service.”

“Shuttle service it is. Where can I find that?”

“Just outside. You go out these doors and to your left. You’ll see the shuttles there.”

“Thank you!” I smile and head out the door.

I’m a little shocked to see the line to the shuttles so long. But I don’t know why. On vacation in a beautiful country—of course the tourist attractions would be filled. I wait my turn and step up onto the shuttle and away we go.

My eyes dart from building to building. Everything in Thailand seems so much brighter to me than the scenery back home.

California is beautiful. At least it used to be. Beautiful climate. Mountains. City lights.

I take a deep breath and shake the nostalgia from my head.
Get a grip, Kirsten
, I chastise myself.

A short while later, the shuttle ride ends and before long I am listening to a tour guide explain the ins and outs of white water rafting.

What have I gotten myself into?

The guide divides us up into teams of eight or nine. I’m struggling to get my safety vest tied on securely.

“I didn’t expect to see you here.”

I turn around to the familiar voice.

Jackson.

I smile and keep fighting with the straps of my vest. “I could say the same about you.”

“Fair enough. Kind of hard to work on your novel here, though, isn’t it?” He steps up closer and starts straightening out my straps. Every tug pulls by body closer to his.

His cologne is mesmerizing. Though his eyes are focused on his hand movements, I can feel myself being drawn in to them.

“There we go,” he says. “All set. Try not to die.”

“Thanks,” I say with an embarrassed smile.

Seconds later we’re being herded onto the rafts. Oars are handed over to us and I glance around the group of rafters with me. Jackson sitting across from me, helping the girl in front of him take her seat. She’s tan, tall, with long dark hair and exotic eyes. His eyes are glued to her breasts.

Those have to be fake
I think to myself and sink into my seat. I’m suddenly very aware of the fact that I never caught Jackson checking out my own breasts. I wonder why that is? My breasts are nice. Plump. With sensitive pink nipples. Sure, my figure isn’t molded by plastic and silicone. All natural curves are better than plastic rulers, I think.

Then there are the rest of the rafters with us. Three more men, all gawking and hooting. A few minutes ago they were guzzling down beers before stepping onto the raft, and now they’re holding oars and the rest of us are handing over our lives to them. A couple more girls, pretty but distracted and more interested in whether or not they look good in their safety vest than whether or not they’re safe.

I’m only 24 years old. Yet somehow on this raft, these people have managed to make me feel old.

The guide finishes his speech and away we go. Down the river.

Mist from the river sprays over my face and arms, waking up every nerve. Girls behind me are screaming while the boys act as if we’re riding a roller coaster. Bouncing down the river, I can’t help but smile. And for a few minutes, that’s all there is in the world. Just sun, water, and this oar in my hands.

Everything else disappears into a frothy blur of memories. It’s fun. Something I wasn’t sure I could have ever again.

John would never have gone for something like this.

Then the girl across from me bounced right out of her seat. She landed square in the middle of the raft, screaming and clenching her fists onto the handles. I can’t help but laugh at her misfortune. Jackson reaches an arm out to help her back up. She’s laughing hysterically.

Then I see it.

At first I think it’s an accident. No one can be that brazen, right? Then she does it again. Her hands glides right up Jackson’s thigh and lands on his crotch. Squeezing as she leans into him. He tries to play it cool. Playing like he doesn’t notice. But his cock hardening in the raft betrays him.

I avert my eyes, not wanting to see how Jackson reacts to her hand play.