Trouble in Paradise (8 page)

Oh she denied it to herself, but she knew that’s what it was. She was still afraid of him, and seeing him yesterday had made her come face to face with that fear.

While Chloe, Jocelyn and Galinda were marveling over some fashion forward design that could look great on a date while hiding a gun, Galinda had said, Sterling was taking a keen liking to kissing her neck. She was in his arms, where she loved being. Having those strong arms wrapped around her waist from behind felt good—too good for a day outing. They needed some alone time at home with the way she felt right now. Judging from the bulge in his pants and the way he was kissing her neck and licking her skin, she would say he felt the same as she did.

“I can’t stop touching you,” he whispered in her ear. She had to admit she couldn’t stop wanting him to touch her. She had waited so long for this, so long for him to want her, touch her, take her. She had wanted this from the moment she saw him—lust clouding her judgment so much that she broke her own rule and signed the contract he offered without really paying attention to all the details. It wasn’t as if he hid any of the demands that she work exclusively for him in the fine print. Everything was clear cut, but she hadn’t bothered to take note. She was glad she hadn’t. She was glad her attraction to him had clouded her judgment because if it hadn’t then she wouldn’t be working for him now. She would have thought through the downside of being exclusive and she would have most likely said no. Clouded judgment made her sign on the dotted line and she was so thankful for that. Not just the money, but the experience of working for Sterling had been the best part of her adult working life. He was the best when it came to working with anybody. He listened, he educated, he took her around the world to help other people get in shape and eat healthy. And on top of that she was in love with the man. Life had a way of working things out.

“I like when you touch me,” she smiled as she watched the girls in the distance. “But if you keep that up you risk them seeing what you’re doing to me.”

“So?” He slid his hand a little lower.

“Any lower and your hand will be in my panties, Sterling.”

He chuckled, blowing warm breath on her neck. “Maybe I should test that theory.”

“Maybe you should not.” She placed her hand over his to stop his descent. “As much as I want you to we can’t—not here.”

He grumbled before removing his hand and putting a little distance between them. When she turned to look at him his eyes were hazed with desire, and his lips were turned upward with devious consent. She shook her head. “You’re bad.”

“Nah, I’m good. I’ll show you later,” he winked.

“Would you two get over here?” Galinda yelled. “These girls are going to talk me into buying the entire store.”

Bambi laughed hard. “We should go rescue her.” She looked up at him. “And tonight I can rescue you.” She lowered her eyes to his growing erection. He had to be in some kind of pain as big as the bulge against his pants was.

“I’m holding you to that.”

She took hold of his hand and pulled him toward the shopping area. Maybe she would sneak away and buy something sexy for tonight. She was always more bikini cut panties, cotton was comfortable and breathable. But maybe for tonight she should go for lace. She only had two pair of lace boy-short panties and both were still at home. She wasn’t exactly expecting to make love with Sterling and there wasn’t anybody else she wanted so why bring the lace when she wasn’t planning to need them? Well, lesson learned because the lace would be a sweet deal for him when he went to take her panties off her.

“No, I can’t do that,” she mumbled. Sneaking off wasn’t an option.

“Do what?” Sterling turned her to face him.

“Oh I was thinking out loud. Ignore me.”

“Not a chance. Do what?”

“I was thinking I would sneak away and buy something special for you.”

“Not a chance,” he said sternly.

“That’s what I thought.”

“You don’t need to buy me anything.”

“Well it wasn’t for you per se. I would be wearing it—panties—lace.”

He looked her over from head to toe. “I’m sure whatever panties you have on now will be fine. Besides, with how I feel right now I’m more likely to rip them off you, not pull them off you.”

“Oh,” she formed a sexy o-shape with her mouth. There wasn’t a need to go buy something lacy and expensive if he was just going to shred it anyway.

“Now if you don’t stop setting my libido on fire we’re going to have to find someplace where I can pull down those sexy pants of yours and take you now.”

She giggled. “That is oh so tempting…but no. Let’s just focus on the outing. It will take your mind off my body until we get back to the house.”

“Nothing is going to take my mind off that body of yours, Bambi. Nothing at all.”

Chapter Six

“A
ll right let’s take a break people.” Jonathan called it and Bambi was ready for it. She loved what she did. She loved filming the video. But the rigorous schedule combined with worrying about looking over her shoulder had her near exhaustion today. She knew it was crazy. Sterling had made sure somebody was with her each day. Today it was Emerson watching over her, but still she had that uneasy feeling that something bad was going to happen.

“Crazy,” she had told herself. It had been nearly a week and she hadn’t seen any sign of that jerk bastard rapist anywhere around the island. She needed to relax. Of course telling herself to relax and actually relaxing wasn’t such an easy transition to make. Although she would give herself credit because the past couple days of filming had been more relaxed than previously. She wasn’t making mistakes. She wasn’t having concentration issues on holding some of the yoga poses. Things were relatively normal—except for the bodyguard glued to her day in and day out while filming.

She smiled to herself. Sterling was looking out for her. She had thanked him repeatedly for that and he had told her each time that she didn’t need to thank him. He was wrong. She very much needed to thank him, but she didn’t want to annoy him with thanks either so she was trying not to utter the words every five minutes. It helped that he was working out of the hub today while she was working down on the beach. It wasn’t a private spot, but it was so secluded that they hadn’t seen more than one person jog past them and that woman was so far down toward the waterline that it hadn’t caused a problem with filming. She liked the private locations better, but she understood the director’s point of view too. Having more backgrounds in the video would be inspiring. It was almost as if the people had traveled to Tahiti with her.

Being at a distance from Sterling’s working location meant he wasn’t showing up every hour on the hour which meant she wasn’t saying thanks to him every five minutes. Although for a man who was supposed to do some work from the house while he was here he most certainly wasn’t working out of the house much. Every day he was at the main hub and at night he was spending time with Jocelyn and her at dinner out or in and a movie. She would give him credit for taking time off during the day to spend with Jocelyn too. Jocelyn seemed to be having fun nearly stalking Galinda who seemed to be giving her a wealth of information on doing what she did. And when she wasn’t with her Jocelyn was down on the beach with Bambi getting inside tips. They had even done morning workouts together before filming started. One of these days she would love to have Jocelyn be included in filming. Maybe once she was past the age of needing her mother’s approval for these things Sterling could bring in a team and set up a location shoot. They could shoot together, or Jocelyn could do a single person workout video. A hand up was not the same as a handout and since she and Sterling both had a lot they could do to help her get started Bambi hoped he would agree that helping her get started young would be a great way for her to put herself through college.

Jocelyn was smart and an honor student so Bambi knew she wasn’t going to have any trouble getting a scholarship, but a student still had to eat and buy personal items in both the need and want category.

Bambi had just rounded the corner of the portable toilet area when she came face to chest with a man. When her eyes finally reached the face area she realized who she had just encountered and fear snaked up her spine.

Peter’s lips curved upwards in a devious grin. It was the kind of grin that told her he was up to no good and he knew she was afraid. When she left to use the bathroom Emerson was on the phone with Sterling. She had waved and pointed toward the temporary facility and he had nodded to let her know he knew she was going. She hadn’t expected to see Peter here. Had she expected to see him lurking behind the facility she would have waited for Emerson to get off the phone no matter how badly her bladder wanted release.

“Miss me?”

“Leave now.” She squared her shoulders. There was just one of him and one of her and she could put up a good enough fight to attract attention even though there were a lot of trees on the other side of the portable toilet she was sure if she could just get in a good front position she could attract Emerson’s attention.

“I missed you.” He stepped closer. “I never could stop thinking about you.” He reached his hand out and tried to touch her cheek. She swatted his hand away from her face and took her own step back. Somehow she felt as if she were walking farther out of sight and she didn’t want that. She tried to shift position, but when she shifted he shifted to keep her with only one possible direction to go.

“Glad to have a chance to get reacquainted again,” he grinned.

“Go to hell,” she snapped as she got ready to defend herself. He approached and she thrust the palm of her hand into his eye which made him stumble backward. She made an attempt at escape when she ran into Banks brother number two—who technically was number one in the order of birth.

Jake grabbed hold of her by the waist and she started screaming loudly. Screaming and kicking was all she had left when he manhandled her arms into submission.

“Emerson!” She yelled as she thrust her foot out to kick Peter, but he caught hold of one foot and then the other and the next thing she knew she was completely immobile except for her mouth so she kept screaming—loudly.

She didn’t have to wait long before she felt the jolt that sent her body falling to the ground and rolling down a slight decline. She didn’t roll far and when she was able to get her balance she looked back to see Emerson taking on both Jake and Peter.

Perhaps what had her in awe was that he was holding his own so well against two adversaries. Maybe it was his military training. Maybe he was just a really flexible fighter, but God the man was doing what she hadn’t been able to do. He was evading the attacks and delivering enough punches of his own to possibly win this thing. She heard commotion behind her and she looked to see phones already raised to ear, which she was sure they were calling the police. She also saw a couple of the lighting guys trying to make their way over to help.

But Emerson didn’t need help. A solid pull on Jake’s arm and a palm sent with force to his elbow had snapped the bone outward. Then he put his foot to Jake’s kneecap and pushed another bone backward and out before turning his attention back to Peter of whom he broke several bones just the same way before wrapping his arm around his neck and squeezing. She could tell Emerson was squeezing because the veins in his arms were popping to the surface and the look on his face was one of force and determination. Would he kill him? Would he let him go? She wasn’t sure. She had a feeling he was going to kill Peter, but then Emerson’s eyes met hers and the fight was still in him, but so was recognition. Peter was unconscious now so any additional deprivation of oxygen would kill him. Emerson, obviously realizing she was watching, had just released his hold and let Peter fall to the ground.

Emerson stalked toward her, but not before delivering a knockout punch to an already down Jake.

“Are you okay?”

She nodded fervently. “Thank you.”

He shrugged. “I would have killed the bastard, but I’ve never taken a life in front of a woman and I won’t start now.”

She threw her arms around him and hugged him, thanking him again for helping her, for saving her.

She looked at the two unconscious men on the ground. This time she was going to press charges and this time they weren’t going to be able to scare her away from the process. This time they were going to prison for this and she would be sure she was there to fight for that to happen.

Between the cops and Sterling the rest of the afternoon filming schedule was a sure bet off, not on. Everybody seemed okay with that development, although she hadn’t expected they wouldn’t be. What surprised her was how concerned people who didn’t even really know her seemed to be about her. Most of the crew was local and had never met her before, yet they had treated her kindly from the start and today, in this hour, they were being more like family than coworkers.

By the time they wrapped questioning and she saw an official arrest made while the two brothers got carted off to the hospital in cuffs, Bambi was ready for a rest. She gave Emerson one last thank you hug before leaving with Sterling.

“Where’s Jocelyn? Is she okay?”

“She’s fine,” he nodded. “Galinda took her home when I got the call. I called her a little while ago to let her know we’d be back to the house soon. She was worried about you.”

“Sorry,” she shivered. “I was worried about me too.”

Sterling took her hand in his and gave a gentle squeeze as they pulled up the long driveway. They had barely gotten out of the car when Jocelyn bounded out the front door and threw her arms around Bambi.

“I’m okay,” she assured her.

“That’s what Dad said too. I knew you would be. Emerson and Dad wouldn’t let anything happen to you and I knew that.”

She felt Jocelyn shiver a little which told her she was worried just as Sterling had said. “But hey, we both got good news today.”

“We did?” Bambi looked to Sterling who had a smile on his face as he gave her a gentle wink.

“Jordana is getting married. Her new guy asked. He doesn’t want kids around. He told her she can have anything she wants, all the Botox and plastic needs if she gets rid of “the kid” that would be me,” she laughed. “She’s giving Dad sole custody. How cool is that,” she giggled. “And you are finally going to have justice. Those guys can’t buy their way out of this here.”

Bambi nodded. They most certainly couldn’t. The police officers seemed to know the two brothers and from what she could tell they were more than happy to slap the cuffs on them. Apparently those two had been trouble since they stepped foot on the island.

“Your mother is just going to give up custody?” It was a dream come true for Jocelyn and Bambi knew that; she just needed one last confirmation that Jordana really was giving up custody.

Jocelyn nodded. “He’s that rich doctor and since he’s going to make sure she gets all her injections and implants for free she was okay with pawning me off on Dad. She called him. She said she didn’t want me to come back and she would have my things shipped to his place. I’ll miss my friends at school, but at least I won’t be there with her anymore.”

Bambi looked up at Sterling and he nodded the confirmation.

“Wow,” Bambi whispered. “Well that’s working out great for you, Jocelyn. You can finally have some peace.”

Jocelyn nodded. “And I get to spend the rest of the summer here too. Dad says we all need a vacation and you should do the wedding here so we’re staying a while longer.”

“Sterling?”

“I can handle business from here and the office is all set. That’s what I was working on when I got the call about you.”

“Oh,” she whispered in shock. “Does Jordana know we’re getting married?”

“No,” they both said in unison.

“If she knew she wouldn’t be too eager to let go and I’m sure of that. Doctor and free cosmetics or not that woman who calls herself my mother hates Dad too much to make anything easy for him. She says I’m such a troubled teen that she thinks Dad is going to have a hard time with me.” Jocelyn laughed. “I’m not troubled. I just don’t like her.”

Bambi could agree on that. Jocelyn wasn’t trouble at all. But with the issues she and Jordana had been having lately Jordana might have assumed all the blame lay with Jocelyn when in reality it didn’t. “Win-win for us,” Bambi wrapped one arm around Jocelyn and took Sterling’s hand in her free hand.