Chapter 12: Pretend

Seeley’s hair was still drying from her quick shower at the dive shop when she ordered a fruit punch at Charm Bar. Barlow and Loretta said that all divers would get a 25% discount on lunch.

However, again, the toffee-eyed diver knew that Barlow always had another angle.

She planned on doing another dive later that day, but not until after she checked on the little fuzzball, Pirate. She felt a bit guilty, stopping for lunch before she checked in on him, but back at the dive shop, Loretta had shown her pictures that Yasmine sent her of the cute black kitten playing with a toy, and his eye looked almost all better.

The copper-haired woman would have to think soon about what to do about her plans. She had messaged her parents that she was in Tucunia, and sent them some photos, though not the one of her and Asher, and said she was doing fine.

However, aside from her fun with the enigmatic green-eyed man, she didn’t feel ‘fine’. The young woman with caramel eyes felt as if she stood at the precipice of a tall, craggy cliff with nowhere to go but down.

She thought of the huge boxes and pieces of luggage in her tiny hotel room, and how her savings wouldn’t last here much longer past her sister’s birthday visit. She went to open her travel app to check the prices of flights going back to her hometown.

“Hey there pretty pool shark, this seat taken?” a smooth baritone voice asked, and the freckle-cheeked woman put down her phone.

“Asher!” she exclaimed. Where had he come from?

“Is that a yes or no?” the tan, gorgeous surfer asked, caution and hesitation softening his high cheekbones and sharp jawline.

She understood why he may think she’d not want to get lunch with him. She didn’t expect him to come back either. These sorts of things never really lasted. Her friend Brittany and her sister Kristi both have had ‘vacation fun’ with someone and never saw them again.

But Asher, wearing a tight white lifeguard tank and red swim trunks was here—he didn’t disappear.

And she very much wanted to see him again, and it looked like he felt the same.

“Uh, no, come sit!” she said, trying to remember what his original question was.

“Great.” The ripped lifeguard sat down across from her, their knees hitting under the small two-top table. “I’m starving and good food tastes great with better company.”

Seeley smiled and fought a blush.

“That’s a cheesy line, but I will agree with you,” she said, looking over the menu.

“It’s true. Have you ever had a great steak with someone who either bored you to tears or looked like they wanted to jump over the table and stab your eyes out?” he retorted and Seeley snorted, her mind thinking of this one dinner with Colton at a 3-star Michelin restaurant.

He spent the whole dinner arguing on the phone with someone over money that she barely tasted the award-winning steak. Why was it she was just now noticing how she’d often feel more lonely in her relationship with Colton than she did when she was alone?

“Yeah, I have, and I agree.” Seeley looked up and met Asher’s eyes, her lips parted at the intensity of the playful connection between them.

She was deciding between the catch of the day and the crab cakes when Barlow brought Seeley her fruit punch, and Asher a ginger ale.

“Hey, so…you know…right, man?” Barlow kept his voice down, something that caught both hers and Asher’s attention.

“Uh…know what?” The tan, green-eyed man looked just as confused as the copper-haired diver did.

The tall, thin man with the afro sighed heavily and took out his phone. “The WWE villainess Michelle McCool is here on Little Tucunia.”

Asher’s eyes went wide, and his strong jaw went slack.

“What? Why? When?” Asher asked panicked, taking Barlow’s phone and scrolling.

Seeley scrunched her face in confusion because why would some WWE wrestler make the handsome surfer in front of her look like he wanted to get the next flight out of there?

“Yas found out from one of her friends working at the Wooten. You know how good she is at finding out secrets. It looks like Eva got to Tucunia a few days ago, but I guess your ex hadn’t said anything to you then.” Barlow’s voice was small, and it all began to click into place for Seeley.

The WWE thing was just code—Asher’s ex, the one who had ghosted him, was on Tucunia.

“Ugh, Yasmine must’ve told Orlando because he was acting weird. Damn. I don’t…” The gorgeous surfer put down the phone, and dug the heels of his palms into his eyes and leaned back.

Seeley snuck a peek at the phone and her eyes went wide.

In a perfect pose, in front of the most picturesque sunrise, was a slim, beautiful blonde woman with curves that Seeley would have to pay a surgeon for.

Her stomach sunk to her gut and churned itself raw. If those were the girls that the man in front of her was used to dating, with poreless skin and hair that behaved…then why was he across the table with her?

Was Asher playing her just like Colton did? Did he see her as just someone to be with until Eva or a girl that looked like and was successful as Eva came back into his life? No. Asher never promised anything long-term, and she was the one who pretty much used the sweet, handsome surfer to make her sister envious.

Frustration sparked in hot and sharp in Seeley’s lungs, not because of anything Asher did, but because her brain told her heart not to get invested, and her heart had already cracked open the door a teensy bit.

Time to close it.

“You know, I should go…” Seeley pursed her lips, pushing back from the table.

She wanted to ask Barlow for a to-go up for her punch. She’d just get something quick on the street on the way to see Pirate.

“No, don’t go. Please, Seeley.”

Time froze.

She had never, in her twenty-four years of life, had anyone say her name with that much desperate, vulnerable emotion before. The caramel-eyed woman looked up to see the usually confident, smirking, playful man looking like the world just crashed down on top of him.

His skin even looked paler; the sexy flush of his cheeks had completely drained out.

Was…Eva to him what Colton was to her?

Seeley tried to imagine what she’d be feeling if Colton were to go to her hometown after she tried to move on from his backstabbing betrayal. After she had finally tried to salvage the broken pieces of her trust, confidence, and life, he showed up as a surprise to just throw it all back in her face.

Hell, even if he just showed up here now on Little Tucunia….

“I mean, if you want to go, I’m not gonna–”

“It’s fine, I’ll stay. I’m hungry anyway,” The copper-haired diver reassured him, and the frenzied, chaotic look in his eyes that he was trying hard to play off calmed like a storm dying out over the sea.

Barlow shot the green-eyed surfer a look that Seeley couldn’t read, and Asher bashfully shrugged.

“Yeah, same. How about the catch of the day?” the brunette offers and the caramel-eyed woman smiled and nodded.

“I’ll put in these orders, but I’ll be back.” The tall, dark-skinned man put a pencil behind his ear and walked back to the kitchen.

“So…did you want me to stay for like…moral support?” the freckle-cheeked woman asked, taking a sip of her wonderfully tangy and sweet fruit punch that reminded her instantly she was in the tropics and not in a soap opera.

“Actually…I have a favor to ask, more like a deal,” Asher said, planting his elbows on the table and leaning his angled face near hers.

He was so close she could see flecks of gold in his green eyes.

“Uh…okay, what is it?” Seeley shook her head a little bit to rush him to the point.

“Can we do what we did with your sister, but with Eva? Can we pretend to be together when she shows up?” Asher asked, serious as a heart attack.

Seeley’s eyes went wide, then she lost it.

Laughter bubbled up deep from in her lungs and tears pricked at the corners of her eyes.

“Why are you laughing? If she wanted to make amends she would’ve unblocked me and talked to me, but she didn’t. I don’t know what she wants but I know she’s gonna mess with my head and I want to show her I don’t need her.” The surfer gesticulated with his hands widely pointing out toward the beach.

“You want to pretend you’re in a relationship with–” she caught her breath, “someone like me to make a famous swimwear influencer like her jealous? This won’t work.”

The copper-haired woman couldn’t understand it. Seeley knew she wasn’t ugly, but by comparison to Kristi, she was considered to be the ugly duckling or at the very least, ‘late bloomer’ of her family. And well, Eva was a smoke show. On top of that, she was a successful influencer with almost a million fans. The only things that Seeley had close to a million of were freckles and reasons to leave Tucunia and never come back.

By all accounts, Eva blew her out of the water.

“What? What do you mean by ‘someone like you?’ You’re beautiful, kind, and bada*s. It will totally work.” Asher looked into her eyes, and she could see that he believed what he was saying.

Granted, he didn’t know her that well, but damn did it make her heart flutter that he thought she was on par with a woman like Eva.

Seeley didn’t know what to say, she just looked over, at his toned, broad shoulders, his pushed-back brown hair, his almost perfect teeth, one of his teeth had the tiniest of chips, and his soft lips.

“Please, can you…can you just pretend to be with me? I’ll pay for dinners and stuff, and like…uh…whatever you want, I’ll do.” Asher’s knee began to bounce under the table.

It wasn’t a bad offer.

Seeley wasn’t just about to give something for nothing though. She wasn’t going to play love-struck honeymooner and not get something in return. The last time she did that, she got played hard. You never give up a good position in billiards, and she wanted to stop allowing what she didn’t want to accept.

“I’ll do it under two conditions.” She held out two fingers and the handsome surfer in front of her lit up like the fourth of July.

“Like anything, name it.” He clapped his hands together, rubbing them, eager like a sports bet.

“One, you have to keep being my fake boyfriend until my sister comes. That means sending her cute selfies and videos treating me like a real boyfriend and taking us out to dinner at a nice restaurant when she gets here.” Seeley crossed her arms, expecting some pushback because guys usually hated selfies.

“Done, easy. I’ll go on a cut and do double workouts so my abs will look extra good.” He patted his torso and Seeley didn’t think he had much fat to lose.

“Two, after my sister’s birthday dinner, I’ll break up with you. I won’t make you into some cheater, but it won’t be mutual, and you’ll have to really look crushed by it, okay? This will help you win back Eva, too,” she said, putting down her other finger.

Asher blinked for a moment as if restarting his train of thought.

“That’s fair, yeah,” he said a bit less eagerly but still grinning. “I’ll look so devastated I’d win an Oscar.”

The freckle-cheeked woman held out her hand in a handshake, and the handsome surfer grabbed it. The feel of his calloused, warm hand holding hers tingled up her arm and down her spine. Did he feel it too, or was it just her?

“Done and done…handsome.” Seeley tried a pet name.

“Okay…uh, babe?” he tried, and the copper-haired woman made a face, hating that name.

Behind Asher on the beach, she saw a group of people taking photos of someone.

“Uh…Asher, look alive because I think we’re going to have to start acting now.” Seeley jutted her chin out to a parting group of people.