Silence (Silence #1)(37)

“Swim and then slides?” Mia suggested. No, go away!

I forced a smile.

“Sure.”

Mia led the way to the largest pool with the rapids, and I followed with Oakley. She did look a little uncomfortable; her arms were folded over her chest. I knew she didn’t like much attention, but I didn’t want her to not wear what she liked because of that. I wouldn’t let anyone touch her. She stepped closer, her arm pressing against mine as we walked. There were a few guys that looked at her. I couldn’t blame them, but it did give me a twinge of jealousy.

I jumped into the warm water after Oakley. As soon as she was in the pool, she seemed to relax a little. We messed around in the pool and on the slides for a while, and I finally managed to convince her to go on the slides. She made me go down it with her but hell, I wasn’t complaining, it was the perfect excuse to touch her! Every time she looked at me it made my heart hammer against my chest.

“Wanna get some food?” I murmured against her skin as I kissed along her jaw. Mia had gone to the toilet, and god knows what or who Jasper was off doing, so we had a few minutes. Oakley let out a startled breath, and nodded her head.

“Okay, let’s go.” My voice was embarrassingly urgent. I probably sounded like a dirty old man on one of those sex phone lines. Oakley’s skin broke out in goose bumps as we walked back to the changing rooms to get dressed and go to the restaurant.

“Hey,” I called out to her. She looked up at me immediately. “Love you.”

I watched as a huge smile crept across her perfect face, lighting up her eyes. Yep, definitely the luckiest bastard alive.



The rest of the week passed too quickly, and it was soon time to go home. I stood in the airport feeling like crap and just wanting to go back to the hotel. The holiday had been the best of my life, and every day I became closer to Oakley.

We had decided to wait until after her birthday to tell everyone. She would be sixteen, and they were more likely to be okay with it then. Not that I thought they would hate us being together, but I didn’t want to risk it, in case.

As our plane took off, my heart sank to the pit of my stomach. This sucks! As soon as we were able to leave our seats, Jasper was off chatting to some girls he’d met on the holiday who were on the same flight, so I grabbed Oakley’s hand.

“This has been the best two weeks of my life,” I said honestly, squeezing her hand. She nodded and gazed directly into my eyes.

“I love you,” I whispered in her ear. She smiled, biting her lip and snuggled into my side. I sighed happily and laid my head on hers. I wondered if I would ever hear her actually say those three little words? Not that it really mattered though, I knew she felt them, and that was more than enough for me.





Chapter Twelve


Oakley




I felt so sick that we were almost back in England. The holiday was officially over. Cole and I would have to pretend that nothing was going. I had to figure out how Dad would react when we did eventually tell everyone. Would he be okay with me and Cole being together? He had already said that I was growing up, and he did seem to be giving me more freedom. Was he really ready to let me go?

Cole was glancing out of the airplane window with a sad smile. What was he thinking? Usually he was such an open book, but when it came to the two of us, I had no idea. I sat back in my seat and tried to act as if it wasn’t driving me crazy.

“I hate the end of holidays,” Mia grumbled beside me. “The plane home is the most depressing thing ever.”

I couldn’t have agreed more. Reality was the worst. I would rather live in that holiday-state, where everything was perfect, forever. Nothing was perfect, though. I knew that. I couldn’t even fool myself into believing that I could have anything even close to perfection.

“How’d it go?” Cole asked Jasper, smirking as he sat down on the row of seats beside ours. Jasper had seen a ‘smoking hot’ girl as we boarded the plane. As soon as we took off, he made it his mission to go find her.

Jasper’s eyes lit up.

“I just joined the mile high club!” he boasted.

Just what I wanted to hear! I grimaced and looked past Cole and out of the window.

“Of course you did!” Mia scoffed. Mia and Jasper argued like brother and sister. She hated his womanising but sympathised with the reason behind it. Jasper gave up on his cheating ex; Mia couldn’t bring herself to do the same.

“Jealousy doesn’t suit you, Mia.”

“You think I’m jealous of you screwing some random in a smelly plane toilet? Wow, you really are up your own arse,” she argued, shaking her head.

“Firstly, the toilet wasn’t smelly, and secondly, I got her name first, so she wasn’t random. It was one of the best experiences of my life. The girl could sure–”

“Thank you!” Cole snapped. “We don’t need your dirty details!”

I pressed my leg against his and smiled, thanking him for stopping my brother talking. Jasper didn’t seem to have a filter for when he was in the company of people who might not want to hear about his exploits, or any kind of filter, actually.

For the rest of the plane ride, I just looked out of the window. A huge quilt of cloud hid most of the sky, but it was still peaceful. It also provided me with something to do rather than listen to Jasper go on about how many times he had scored on holiday.