The Dare

Chapter Fifteen

"Let's go over this again. Besides the drugs, did you do anything else to harm the senator?"

Grandma rubbed her hands together as her eyes darted around the room.

"Ma'am?"

"Oh, alright!" Grandma let out a heavy sigh. "I may have helped them along in their relationship."

"Helped?"

"Lavender in the hut, fertility beads under the mattress, a dreamcatcher by the plunge pool, oyster appetizers every afternoon, and a Michael Bolton love mix."

"Michael Bolton?" the agent repeated.

"Don't knock it until you try it." Grandma smirked.

Beth

I ran to our hut, thrust my body against the door, and let myself in with the dangling key.

Jace was hot on my heels.

And I was out of breath.

But I wasn't sure if it was from excitement or embarrassment.

My past was coming back to haunt me. But it's not that it was a hard past where I'd done drugs or suffered from anorexia or anything like that. It had everything to do with insecurities, ones I'd never faced. And that was the crappy thing about insecurities: they never actually went away until you dealt with them. And I'd never dealt with mine. Ever.

And Brett? He'd just resurfaced every last one of them…

"Boring Beth, Boring Breath, Boring Breasts!" Some of Brett's friends chanted and then high fived one another.

They all walked off. Every last once, except JP.

"So, Beth." He smirked, and a piece of dark hair fell across part of his face. "Now that you know Brett wants nothing to do with you, considering you freaking plastered yourself all over the star of a rival football team, like a total and complete slut," he took a deep breath, "I figured you'd go out with me."

"Go out with you?" I said in a small voice. "Like on a date?"

JP smirked and then burst out laughing. "I'm sorry I can't do this. The guys paid me ten bucks to ask you out, but the look on your face was priceless. I have a girlfriend, she puts out, why would I go for a virgin nerd with glasses who makes guys run away screaming?"

My body crumpled against the floor. The cold tile helped alleviate the massive heat stroke that had attacked my body. I tried breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth, when I felt strong arms wrap around me and pick me up.

I snuggled into Jace's embrace and closed my eyes, angry at myself for allowing a bad high-school memory to render me completely helpless.

Within seconds we were outside, and Jace held me as he walked into the plunge pool and sat. I was in his lap, arms wrapped around his neck.

"Thanks," I said in a small voice.

Jace's face was still, angry, tight. His jaw clenched as he looked away from me and swore, slapping the water with one of his free hands. "What the hell did that guy do to you?"

"Nothing." I tried to squirm out of his lap, but his arms tightened, just trapping me all the more against him.

"Beth."

"It's so stupid." My voice caught. "I don't think I've ever been so embarrassed. I'm sorry I freaked out. I just—"

"Beth," Jace's hand traced my face, "you have no reason to be embarrassed, but if you don't tell me what happened within the next ten minutes, I'm going to get charged with murder, and US senators don't do well in federal prison."

I gave him a weak smile. "It's a boring story."

"I happen to like boring," he whispered.

If any other guy would have said that, I would have taken it as a slam to my personality. But the way Jace had said it? Well, he'd made it feel real, as if he'd been saying that he liked me, had seen beyond what others had.

"Me and a few other nerds were his pity-date at prom. I danced with him. He was really nice and then basically told me I was cool for a nerd. I refused to kiss him goodnight, and for some reason, it pissed him off that I wouldn't put out." I didn't want to tell him the truth, but there really wasn't any other way. "A few of his friends saw you and me kiss, and he was angry that I'd kissed you, a lowly sophomore from another school, and not him. He started a rumor that I'd hit on him, he'd rejected me but felt sorry for me, and that I'd asked him to take my virginity."

"Asshole," Jace hissed, rocking me back and forth in his arms. "I never thought…" he sighed against my neck, "I never thought my kiss would cause so many problems."

If he only truly knew how it had wrecked me.

"The rest of the year was absolute hell." I shrugged, ignoring the tiny voice inside that said I should tell him exactly how much that kiss had affected me, how much it had altered my view of dating and waiting for the right one. "Notes in my locker from random people calling me a slut, whore, bitch, goody-two shoes. It was like I couldn't win. I suddenly didn't fit in anywhere. My smart friends were afraid it was true because Brett was so popular. And the popular people just thought it was pathetic. My freedom came when I graduated and went to college."

"Beth," Jace's thumb grazed my lower lip, "tell me what you want."

"Huh?"

"One," Jace continued tracing my lips, "I could go kill him and go to jail, but I think we've established that as only a last resort."

I laughed.

"Two, I can run for president some day then have the CIA handcuff him to a bed with stuffed animals and a few pornographic magazines ending his political career for good."

"And three?" I leaned into his warmth.

"Three's my favorite one," Jace whispered. "Care to know why?"

I nodded, drunk off his scent.

"Because it involves you and me, lots of kissing, possible drugging, and a hell of a good time. What do you say?"

I kissed his cheek. "I say it may be a good thing we have Grandma here, since she seems to be her own pharmacy."

"Excellent," Jace whispered, his gaze roaming my face then resting on my lips. "I'm going to kiss you now."

"You don't have to." I leaned in anyway. The draw he had on my body should have been illegal. Either that, or they should somehow bottle it up and sell it to single women.

"That's the problem, Beth." His lips grazed mine. "I don't have to, but I really, really want to."

"Oh." That was all that escaped my mouth before our tongues tangled together. I gripped his long hair in my hands and jerked his body closer to mine as he growled low in his throat, his hands fumbling with the wet linen shirt that was still plastered to my body after being pulled into the pool.

I wrapped my legs around his body and hovered over him as he pulled my wet shirt off and threw it onto the ground, attacking my lips with renewed fervor.

"You're beautiful, Beth."

"Jace, just kiss me. You don't have to compliment me and—"

He reared back his eyes, nearly black with desire. "Don't tell me what to say or what to do. If I pay you a compliment, you say thank you. I don't do that often to women. I do it enough in day-to-day life. Hell, it's my job to make people feel good. But you? It's not my job to make you like me. It's my job to make you like yourself, and damn if I'm not going to try to get you to see how gorgeous of a person you are inside and out before these six days are up."

He threw off his own shirt and grabbed me by the waist, lifting me up onto the side of the pool. His lips met my neck and then my shoulder as he pulled down my bra strap and kissed the skin near my collarbone. His kisses were a mixture of sweet softness and urgency. I couldn't get enough of the way his lips felt against my skin and decided that even if I only had twenty-four hours with this man, I'd take it. Id' take it all, and I wouldn't regret it.

How could you regret something you've been dreaming about your whole life?

His hands moved to my thighs as he pulled me closer to his body, grabbing my legs and wrapping them around his waist as he rocked against me.

"Yoohoo!" A voice yelled.

Jace swore and reared back.

"Knock, knock!" the voice repeated.

"Dr. Z." Jace's eyes narrowed. "If we ignore her, she'll leave."

"Right," I said breathless as Jace kissed me again.

The knocking stopped and then suddenly a form appeared on the other side of the privacy-fence by the plunge pool.

"There you are!" Dr. Z's head bobbed up and down in relief. "I have your luggage!"

"From Grandma?"

"Grandma?" she repeated, sounding confused as her eyebrows pinched together. "No, this luggage is from a Travis Titus?"

"Ass!" Jace splashed the water with his hand again.

I laughed. "Thanks, Dr. Z. Just leave it at the door, and we'll grab it."

"Alright, and perhaps you should make use of the bathing suits rather than your undergarments." She winked and disappeared.

I looked down. My purple bra shone like a beacon in the pool.

"Whoops." I said out loud.

"Please." Jace's teeth grazed my shoulder as he kissed me again. "Like this was a whoops."

"Stop." I laughed, pushing against him.

"That's not a word I hear often." He winked then lifted himself out of the pool, but not before dropping his linen pants into a heap on the floor, leaving him oh-so-gloriously naked. "Whoops," he called as he padded all the way to the bathroom and shut the door.

I chose that moment to reflect by dunking my entire person into the cold water.