Bad Cruz(27)

“I haven’t heard anything specific. All I’m saying is that if you put a bit of effort—and a lot more clothes on—you’ll find people aren’t as allergic to you as you think.”

“I thought guys liked big hair and boobs and tiny clothes.”

“Not the kind you want to attract.”

“And who should I want to attract?” The conversation was taking a surprising turn once again. “People like you?”

“For instance.” He took a sip of his espresso, crossing his legs like George Clooney in a private plane commercial or something. “Why? Would ending up with someone like me be so terrible?”

No, it’s just that someone like you would never look at me in a billion years.

“Yes,” I said curtly, the sting of rejection already prickling my soul before he blew me off. “It actually would.”

Cruz snarled, baring his teeth in what was supposed to be a smile but left me feeling cold and a little queasy. He stood up, setting the iPad down, handing the waitress his cruise ship ID card, so I wouldn’t have to pay.

If he thought I was going to take the high moral ground and demand to go Dutch, he had another thing coming.

“For the sake of this trip ending without any murder charges being pressed against either of us, I suggest we stay away from each other and meet in the stateroom at the end of every day,” he suggested.

“Sounds good.”

“Where we will share a bed, seeing as I’m not going to sleep on the floor or let Bonnie run my bank account into the ground.”

“That’s fair,” I said evenly. “But there’ll be a pillow barrier between us.”

“All the better.”

“Good. Great. Glad it’s all settled.”

“Oh, and Tennessee?”

“Yes?”

“Next time you lock me out of my own room, paid for by my family, I’m smearing you with blood and tossing you off the ship as shark bait. Understood?”

I could tell by the darkness gleaming from his ocean-blue eyes that he wasn’t completely kidding.

Still… I had to push.

It had become a game.

One I couldn’t find the maturity to stop.

“Whose blood would that be?”





Two hours later, I found myself in what should be my natural habitat—poolside, on the upper deck, tanning my butt cheeks.

After talking to my parents and ensuring that Bear was having a blast (apparently, he hadn’t left the arcade since ten in the morning and had even found a fellow smelling-of-goat teenage friend named Landon), I snagged a sunbed, grabbed a soft paperback someone had left behind, ordered a fruity cocktail, and did something I hadn’t done since age sixteen—relaxed.

No double shifts at the diner, cleaning, washing, doing the laundry, or helping Bear with his homework—or Trinity with her wedding preparations. No bending over for teenage boys or braving the wrath of my ex-high school friends who sneered down at me, with their wedding rings and mortgages.

Even the book was really good for something I’d found with a discounted sticker and a suspicious white stain.

The day was turning out to be too good to be true, which was how I knew things were about to go sideways. Mark my words, if the Elation didn’t suffer a fate similar to the Titanic by the end of the day, then the entire cruise was going to suffer from food poisoning.

Shortly after I had a refreshing salad full of fruit and nuts for lunch, me and my food belly returned to our sunbed. I turned on my stomach and flipped a page in the book when a shadow cast over my body, descending down to my right as someone took a seat on the sunbed beside me, even though the whole row was empty.

There’s a special place in Hell reserved for people who choose to sit beside you when everywhere else is available. And I truly, sincerely hoped this place was overcrowded, and that everyone there had BO, because that’s what these kind of people deserved.

“Why, hello there, sweet cheeks.”

He was definitely not referring to the pair on my face.

I squinted up, using my hand as a visor against the sun. The guy in front of me looked like your typical frat boy, not a day over twenty, with a baseball cap turned backward, Hawaiian swim trunks, and a Bros Before Hos tattoo across his chest that I wagered his fraternity friends had inked themselves with, too.

“Name’s Dale.”

Of course it was. I bet when his mother had an ultrasound, all they saw inside her uterus was a cardboard sign that said douchebag.

“Nessy.”

“That’s a cute name. You from around here?”

Where would that be?

The middle of the Caribbean Sea?

“Look, I’m real flattered you saw my tush and didn’t think I was a twenty-nine-year-old overworked, underpaid single mother, but that’s what I am. So can we skip the chitchat, and may I suggest you try the waterpark across the deck? Lots of girls your age there.”

I was entirely too direct. But struggling single moms did not have the luxury of blipping around with flunk-boys.

“I don’t mind you’re twenty-nine.” He was rolling a swizzlestick from one side of his mouth to the other.

“Well, I do.” I let my head drop against the sunbed and turned it in the other direction, considering the conversation over.