Seduced (The Billionaire's Command #1) (3 page)

“Alright. You remember
everything we’ve done so far. Just don’t panic, and don’t worry if
you fall, almost everyone falls their first time.”

I nodded and looked out
at the water. After a few seconds I saw a wave that looked
promising. I turned and jumped up on my board, and the next thing I
knew I was riding on the water! I must have been going about a mile
an hour, but it felt like I was racing. I held my arms out, making
sure to keep my balance, and the next thing I knew I had actually
hit the beach. I had done it!

Jumping off my board, I
grabbed it and ran into the water, getting high fives and cheers
from some of the others in the group. Then Stevo called out “Mark”
and the man whose name I now knew went out with his board.

I wasn’t the least bit
surprised when Mark found a wave and caught it almost instantly. He
looked so athletic, so strong, I had even wondered if he should be
in the beginner’s group. At one point he just about lost his
balance, coming only inches away from plunging into the surf, but
saved himself at the very last second.

We spent the next hour
in the surf, practicing on the little waves. After everyone had
done a couple of waves with Stevo watching, we were invited to
separate and find waves of our own. I ventured off a little ways
from everyone else, not wanting to accidentally run into anyone.
Slowly but surely I was getting the hang of this. I was getting
used to it! This was awesome!

The time absolutely
flew by. I guess it was probably only about ten minutes or so
before the lesson was ending, but I was getting really confident.
Maybe a little bit too confident. I decided I wanted to go a bit
deeper, try and take on a wave that was a foot, maybe two feet
high. It was going to be awesome!

I swam out further than
before. It’s not like I was in the deep or anything, the water
wouldn’t have been higher than me. But still, considering this was
my first time ever surfing, it was a big thing for me.

Spotting a wave that
looked pretty decent, I turned my board around, paddled with it and
jumped up when I thought the time was right. Sure enough, I nailed
it! It was awesome. I felt like I was flying, I felt like I was
really
surfing. Floating on the water, it was one of the
best feelings I’d ever experienced in my life.

Then as I came in
towards the sand, almost reaching the shore, my left foot suddenly
slipped along the board. I tried to compensate by moving my body to
the right, but it was too late. My board flew out from under me,
and the last thing I remember was hitting the water with a splash,
and a horrendous pain in the back of my head.

When I woke up, I was
on the beach, blurry faces over me. My throat felt like it was on
fire. I coughed, and seawater came spewing out of my mouth. As I
began to focus, I realized it was Stevo and Mark that were leaning
over me.

“Are you alright there
Caroline?” Stevo asked. I groaned, then nodded. My head was
throbbing, so much so that I couldn’t even care that Mark had just
seen me cough up seawater onto my bathing suit. Oh God, why did I
choose the one piece?

“What happened?” I
finally managed to mumble, my throat feeling raspy and sore.

“You were right by the
sand, it looked like you lost your footing,” Mark replied. “You
fell off the board, and hit your head. The water was less than a
foot deep where you went in. I was the closest person to you, when
you didn’t get up right away I came and got you, and Steve did
first aid.”

“Thank... thank you,
both of you,” I replied, thoughts swirling in my head. Everything
was slowly starting to make sense again, and the more I realized
exactly what had happened, the more embarrassed I got.

Here I was, lying on
the beach because I fell off a surfboard and hit my head in a foot
of water. I couldn’t believe it. I had made a complete and total
idiot of myself. I had to get out of here. I had to go back to the
hotel, forget this had happened at all, forget Mark existed, and go
on with my life again.

I tried to get up,
Stevo and Mark giving me a hand. The world spun and I took a few
tentative steps.

“Are you alright,
Caroline? I can call you an ambulance, if you want to go to the
hospital. I suspect you’ve got a concussion,” Stevo told me, but I
shook my head. The only thing that could possibly be more
embarrassing than what had already happened was having to go to the
hospital on top of it.

Besides, with every
passing second I was feeling better and better.

“No, thanks, I think it
was just a bit of a shock, I’m feeling fine now,” I replied, hoping
my voice sounded confident.

“Let me at least take
you back to the hotel. You can’t say it’s not on my way,” Mark told
me, flashing me that gorgeous smile that, even in the state I was
in, couldn’t help but send a heat rushing through me.
Shit, he
does recognize me
I thought. There was really no way to get
around this. It wasn’t like I could say I didn’t want him to go out
of his road.

“Thank you. That sounds
nice,” I told him. “If you’re busy though, I’ll be fine. I’m
feeling better already,” I replied, flashing a smile of my own and
hoping against all hope that he did have something else to do.

“Oh no, I’m on
vacation, I don’t have anything planned for the rest of the day.”
Crap. There goes that. I guess I’m going to have to actually do
this, I’m going to have to walk back to the resort with the sexiest
guy I’ve ever spoken to.

My heart was pounding
as I handed back my stuff to Stevo, he wished me luck and told me
not to worry if I had to go to the hospital, then Mark and I headed
back to the resort.

“So you’re here on
holidays?” he asked as we headed slowly back down the street. My
headache was pretty much gone, and the more normal I felt, the more
my embarrassment meter went into overdrive.

“Yeah. Our branch won a
contest run by the company, everyone in the branch won a week’s
vacation in Hawaii. Listen, thanks for getting me out of the water.
It’s pretty embarrassing, I can’t believe I did that.”

“Don’t worry about it.
Everyone falls, some people just have worse luck when it comes to
where they fell. It could have happened to anyone.”

“I guess so. Didn’t
happen to you though.”

“That’s because I’m a
sporting legend.”

I looked up at him,
surprised. “Seriously?”

Mark laughed, not in a
mean spirited way, just the way people do when they’re having a
joke.

“Nah. I wish. Well, I
used to wish, anyway. I wanted to be a professional football player
when I was little. Of course, the fact that I was incapable of
catching a ball got in the way of that dream.”

I thought it was going
to be the most awkward thing, walking back with Mark. I mean, I had
never been a conversationalist for conversation’s sake. I always
thought of myself as awkward with strangers. On top of that, I
didn’t know if I could hide the fact that every fibre, every cell
in my body was on fire, electricity passing through me, desperate
for Mark to touch me. I wanted his hands all over me. I wanted his
tongue all over me. I wanted to give him free reign over my body,
wanted him to bring me to new heights of pleasure I couldn’t have
fathomed in my wildest dreams, but under no circumstances could I
let him know that. Absolutely not a chance.

It wasn’t as awkward as
I thought it would be though. Mark was one of those people who can
have a conversation with literally anybody. The more we spoke, the
more at ease I felt, even though I couldn’t help but feel the
pulsating desires in my body every time he looked at me.

“So where are you
from?” he asked.

“Minneapolis. I’m a
financial analyst.”

“I don’t think I’ve
ever met a financial analyst that surfs.”

“I wouldn’t describe
what I was doing out there as ‘surfing’,” I joked, and Mark threw
his head back, laughing.

“You were fine.
Honestly, I was impressed. You stayed on the board a lot better
than most people.”

“I used to figure skate
when I was younger, I guess all that balancing paid off.”

“Oh yeah, that
definitely would help. Hey, listen, can I buy you a drink or lunch
or something before we go back to the Hibiscus? I just want to make
sure you’re really fine before I leave you.”

I’m pretty sure my jaw
dropped open as soon as he asked me.
Oh my God, close your mouth
Caroline, you idiot!
I scolded to myself as I forced my mouth
closed and smiled at Mark in a way I hoped was charming.

“Yeah, that sounds
nice,” I replied. I refused to let myself say anything else. If I
did, I knew I was going to put my foot in it. This crazy sexy guy
that had just rescued me on a beach in Hawaii was now asking me
out? What the hell was going on? This wasn’t the sort of thing that
happened to me, this was the sort of thing that happened on cheesy
TV shows. It just didn’t happen in real life. Especially not to
me.

Get a hold of yourself.
He just wants to make sure you’re ok.

“Awesome, there’s a bar
I like over here, we’ll get a great view over the beach,” Mark
replied, leading me towards a row of buildings. We passed through a
number of small shops before ending up almost on the beach, at a
bar that sure enough, had an absolutely incredible view.

“Aloha, Mark,” a
beautiful woman with curly brown hair greeted Mark only seconds
after we’d arrived. “Your usual seat?”

“Yes please, Alisa,”
Mark replied, and she led us straight to the rail, with a perfect
view overlooking Waikiki Beach and Diamond Head.

“Wow, the view here’s
incredible!” I told Mark as I sat down. “You come here often, by
the sound of things.”

“Not as often as I
like. I’m lucky that I get to work in Hawaii from time to time
though. It’s a beautiful place.”

“So you’re not here on
holiday?”

Mark shook his head.
“No, that was a little white lie. I work all around the west coast
and Hawaii. Today’s a day off though, so I wasn’t lying when I said
I didn’t have anything to get back to. Usually I’m in San
Diego.”

“What is it that you
do?”

“I help my dad run a
couple companies, mainly,” Mark replied.

For the first time I
sensed a shadow forming across his face. I could tell there was
something he wasn’t telling me, something he wasn’t happy with. I
decided to change the subject.

“All these trips to
Hawaii and you’ve never taken surfing lessons before?” I asked, and
Mark grinned.

“Yeah, I guess I
deserved that. Seriously though, it had never really interested me
before. I’m a licensed scuba diver and I was even out doing some
dives yesterday, but I’d never really considered surfing. My sister
called my yesterday, we got to talking about it, she wished she
could come to Hawaii and then asked me about it. She eventually
said it was because I was too chicken, so I actually just went out
today to prove her wrong,” he finished, sheepishly. Oh God, he
looked so adorable with that sheepish look on his face, I just
wanted to grab him and kiss him everywhere.

Instead, I burst out
laughing.

“Well, I guess you did
show her!”

“Yeah, Stevo said he’d
send me some photos he took so I could prove to her I did it.”

We had a late lunch and
a few drinks, sitting by the ocean, and the more time went on the
more comfortable I was, and yet the more I needed Mark. It was like
an all encompassing desire, taking over my body, inch by inch. My
heart pounded when he looked at me. My sex throbbed with desire. I
could feel my bathing suit under my clothes, soaking wet even
though I’d dried myself off after getting out of the water.

This wasn’t me at all.
I was career focused. I chose what I wanted to get out of life. I’d
had enough of the choices in my life being made for me, I decided
years ago that I would make my own decisions. And ever since that
moment, I had. I had decided to finish high school, I had decided
to pay my way through college. I had decided I would work two jobs
to pay for it while minimizing my student loan balance, and I had
decided I would get a good job when I was finished. I had also
decided I was finished with men. Whenever I decided to do
something, I did it. I had a one track mind. And yet, right now, my
body was telling me I wanted Mark without me deciding whether or
not that was a good decision. What was going on?

* * *

Before I knew it, the
sun was making its way towards the horizon as the blue of the ocean
got a little bit deeper. I’d had a couple of drinks, but I
definitely wasn’t drunk. There might have been a little bit of a
buzz, but I honestly wasn’t sure. After all, every second I spent
with Mark made me feel high, alcohol or no.

“I didn’t realize how
late it was,” Mark sheepishly replied when I pointed out the
time.

“Me neither. It was
nice talking to you.”

“Hey, no problem. Same
here. Let me get you back to the resort.”

When we finally got to
the elevators, where we had met the first time, my heart froze with
embarrassment. More than anything, I didn’t want Mark to mention me
running straight into him, and to my relief, he didn’t.

I was on the
22
^nd
floor of the hotel, Mark on the 20
^th
.
The elevator slid silently upwards, carrying us up to our rooms.
Presumably I would never see Mark again. After all, we were leaving
in a couple of days. My heart pounded in my chest. We didn’t speak.
More than anything I wanted Mark to grab me, to take me right here
in the elevator. My skin tingled as I imagined his touch on mine.
Fire coursed through me as I imagined his lips all over me,
exploring me, discovering my every curve, every inch of my
skin.

The ding of the
elevator snapped me out of my fantasy, the doors opening on the
20
^th
floor.