Somewhere on St. Thomas: A Somewhere Series Romance (17 page)

Applause lifted around us in a rolling, enthusiastic wave, and my castmates and I grinned at one another, giddy with excitement.

I ran to my curtain-call spot. The curtains whisked open. We held hands and bowed, and then, in turn, each of us in major roles stepped forward.

I felt my cheeks flame to match my red hair as a rose bounced off of me when I stood from my bow, causing a ripple of laughter. I was almost sure I heard Sam’s baritone voice bellow, “Yeah, Ruby!”

I scooped up the rose and stepped back. The curtains closed with a swish, and we turned to one another, hugging and hysterical.

It was a good while later when I came out into the lobby, changed out of my greasepaint and costume and wearing my usual jeans and Northeastern University hoodie.

“You were amazing!” Sam, my not-boyfriend, swung me up in his arms, spinning me around so that my legs flew out. I squeaked with delighted surprise. “I had no idea you had pipes on you like that.”

“I’m full of surprises,” I said, and then Sam’s sister, Shellie, was hugging me and pressing an armload of roses on me, along with their parents, who’d come down to help Shellie pack to return to New York for the summer.

The reminder of summer gave me a quaver of worry. I had no idea what I was doing this summer, and I was pretty sure I couldn’t just camp out in the dorm.

The chaos of well-wishing went on awhile, as this was the last performance of the season, on the last weekend of school of the season, and on the way out of the lobby I even hugged Henry, my first-ever not-boyfriend, and thanked him for the silver rose he handed me shyly.

“For your pile,” he said.

Sam looped an arm possessively over me, but I shrugged it off. “Thanks, Henry. Have a great summer.”

I pressed on, past Henry and the rest, determined to get back to my room for a shower before the big cast party being held at the drama professor’s house. Sam refused to be brushed off and followed me.

Meanwhile, my eyes kept searching.

Searching, searching, searching through the full lobby. Looking, whether I wanted to admit it or not, for a tall figure with shoulder-length, bronzy-chocolate hair, big shoulders, and cobalt eyes that could see for miles across an open sea.

I was looking for my most devastatingly attractive not-boyfriend, Rafe.

But Rafe McCallum wasn’t there.

I turned to Sam with a bright smile. “I’ll race you back to the dorm. Here.” I thrust all the roses and flowers into his arms and ran out the door.

I used all the adrenaline from the performance and all the angst I’d felt in a disappointment I wouldn’t even admit to myself, to power myself at top speed across the open campus, dodging around groups of people. Sam laughed somewhere behind me—impromptu racing wasn’t unusual behavior for either of us.

I ran through the moist, cool night as fast as I could, trying not to feel crushing disappointment that Rafe hadn’t seen my performance.

I knew I’d sung and acted better tonight than I ever had, imagining him in the audience. I didn’t even know where Rafe was right now, except that he was somewhere on the ocean on the
Creamy Maid
, the yacht he crewed for, and it had seemed from the letters he’d posted along the way that the ship might be making its way from San Francisco to Boston.

I’d hoped it was. Wished it was. The last letter I’d had from him had been a week ago, postmarked from North Carolina. It had seemed possible that the
Maid
might have made it this far by now, but I was probably deluding myself.

I could hear Sam thundering along behind me, his laughing shout. “Ruby, you wild woman! Slow down. I can’t see over all these flowers!”

Sam was my roommate Shellie’s brother, and in the dating misadventures of Ruby Day Michaels, he was, along with Rafe, one of two guys I still cared about. I was single now and not dating anyone, but Sam had reappeared in my life after classes at Cornell let out and had been putting the moves on me all week since.

And meanwhile, I couldn’t stop looking for Rafe, and I’d hoped he’d somehow make it to see my play.

How unrealistic is that
? I berated myself. He didn’t even know I was in a play. I hadn’t communicated with him since our breakup after spring break, and even though I still had the gorgeous ruby ring he’d given me stashed in the metal leg of my bed, I hadn’t communicated one word that might cause him to come all this way.

Sailing his ship.

None of that had stopped me from hoping wildly, crazy conflicted fool that I was, that somehow he’d make it to see me before Northeastern shut down for the summer.

I reached the doors of our dorm and waited for Sam to catch up. “Sam, would you mind meeting me at the cast party in half an hour? I need to shower, change, and decompress for a few minutes.”

Sam stood breathing hard. He looked hunky and adorable in the amber security light near the door, his arms piled high with my flowers, six feet of rock-hard football player with a neatly trimmed tawny beard and golden eyes that never failed to move me in some way.

He handed me the flowers.

I could see the disappointment in his face. It felt like kicking a Labrador puppy. But Sam had been crowding me a bit much this week after we’d supposedly set some rules for our relationship—i.e., that we weren’t having one. We were simply spending time as friends when it worked out for either of us.

But the friendship I had with Sam had always been a sexy one, and he was having trouble keeping his hands to himself. Now that my arms were full of flowers, he took my face in his hands and I saw my green eyes reflected in his for just a second before his mouth came down on mine, all hungry, manly deliciousness.

I sighed out a breath into his mouth, leaning into him, the flowers crushing between us and releasing their scent in a heady wave. When he’d thoroughly plundered my mouth, he stepped back.

“Now I’ll go,” he said, and turned to lope off.

That was Sam. Steely will, physical presence, humor and friendship all in one complicated package.

But nowhere near as complicated as Rafe.

Surfer, sailor, drifter. Renaissance man. Someone who knew how to use his hands. And his mouth, too, and everything everywhere in between.

I pushed into the building, deserted tonight with all the parties and half the students gone home already. I clumped wearily up the stairs to the fourth floor, where our dorm suite was, feeling ninety rather than nineteen, the adrenaline buzz worn off.

I’d told myself I wasn’t going to worry about anything until after finals and the play.
Then
I’d worry about this summer. Though my parents had saved all year to pay my way back to Saint Thomas, I wasn’t at all sure home was where I wanted to go right now.

I didn’t know where I wanted to go.

I pushed open the exit from the stairwell and stopped in my tracks. My jaw dropped at the sight of pure male magnificence on my doorstep. Rafe McCallum was leaning against the battered entry of our dorm room.

Chapter 14

“Rafe!” I cried, and ran forward, dropping the flowers at his feet and flinging myself into his arms, leaping up onto him. He staggered back, laughing, having no choice but to heft me up against him as my legs crossed around his waist and my arms tugged his mouth down to mine in ecstatic greeting.

He shifted me higher, so our crotches were in alignment, and settled his hands over my ass to hold me up, as my arms clung to his neck and I kissed him in a clumsy frenzy.

“I’m happy to see you, too,” he muttered between kisses.

“I thought you might be coming here,” I gasped. “I hoped. From the route the
Maid
was taking. I told myself I shouldn’t be hoping. I hadn’t done anything but break up with you…But your letters…”

He wrenched his mouth from mine for a second. “They worked?”

“Oh, they worked all right, you pirate.” I felt his hands, those clever, agile, hardworking hands, sliding along my ass crack to hold me up against him, and I loved the dark tension of the slightly painful grip he had on me. “And that jewelry box on my birthday. Oh God.”

We kissed some more, and I thanked whatever impulse had told me to send Sam away. This would have been a very different greeting if I’d met Rafe with Sam in tow.

“Your performance was amazing.” Rafe gazed into my eyes. “You’re so full of passion, Ruby. Everything you do shines with it. You literally light up a room.”

“Oh, you saw it, then.” I felt the blush roar up my chest and across my fair skin to make my cheeks burn. Being a redhead had its downsides, and blushes were one of the many.

“Wouldn’t have missed it.”

“How did you even know?”

“I asked your resident assistant. He knew where you were, that it was your last performance. Can we go inside now?”

“Oh, jeez. I’m sorry.” I dropped my legs, but he didn’t seem in any hurry to let me down, still holding my ass tightly so that I was plastered against him.

“I couldn’t forget how great you felt in my arms, but this is even better than I remembered,” he murmured, and kissed me for a long while. I felt my whole body going soft, pliable and molded to his tall, chiseled frame. My hands stroked through his bronzy hair, even longer than usual and past his shoulders, wandered over the planes of his lightly stubbled face, around the tender curve of his ear.

Finally, he released me. I staggered and we laughed, and I got my key out and unlocked the outer door as Rafe picked up the flowers and followed me in when I unlocked the door of my room.

“Looks like a dorm room.” He peered over the battered flowers at my humble surroundings.

“Looks like a bomb went off in here,” I apologized. “I’ve had a crazy schedule with full-time rehearsal, work, and finals.”

Rafe cleared off the one chair and sat on it. “What were you going to do before I waylaid you in the hall? I’m sure there’s something you should be going to.”

“Yes. A cast party. But I’d rather catch up with you,” I said. “I just need a quick shower first.”

My face flamed again, remembering the last time we’d showered together, and I saw in his unwavering cobalt gaze that he remembered, too.

“I could use a shower as well,” he murmured. “Okay if I join you?”

“Oh God,” I muttered, and it was a prayer. Was I really going to just jump on him, with Sam’s kisses still on my mouth? I was right back in my terrible dilemma about who to be with—and the stakes felt even higher now.

“Much as I’d like that, we’d better not,” I said. “I couldn’t help how I said hi to you, but I’m still technically on a man time-out.”

“So that’s Sam. The big guy with the beard. I saw you together outside the building.”

Rafe knew about Sam, but the last time we’d talked, I’d told him we’d broken up. Unfortunately, it had been a little harder to maintain than I’d anticipated, and if Rafe’d seen us outside the building, he’d seen Sam kiss me.

“Yeah, that’s Sam,” I said miserably. “Can you maybe find something to put the flowers in while I shower? We’ll talk after.”

He just nodded, and I went into the bathroom, locked the door, and leaned on it, shutting my eyes for a long, breathless moment.

“I’m really in the pickle jar now,” I muttered. One of my mom’s sayings. I longed for her with a sudden fierceness, her warm hugs, her strong arms, her certainty about right and wrong. What would Mom do?

“Rafe,” I whispered. Mom had already told me who had her vote. But she’d never been practical like I was. She was a dreamer, and that dream had led her to marry my dad and spend her life as an impoverished missionary in the Virgin Islands.

I was going to do different things and have different things. Like a career, and money, and security. I stripped off my clothes as I thought of how many things I wanted different from what my mother had. Things I could have with Sam but probably not with Rafe.

And Rafe had made things all or nothing by refusing to sleep with me until we were married and by giving me a ring that was totally over-the-top—an antique star ruby that was nearly irresistible.

It actually made me mad now, thinking of it, as I turned on the water of the shower. He shouldn’t be able to hold out on me, tell me what kind of sex we could have and when, and use my lust for him to get me to marry him.

Emotional blackmail. That’s what it was!

On a wave of that anger, I opened the door and stuck my head around it. “Your ring is in the hollow metal leg of my bed. Left side. You can take it out of there and take it with you.”

Rafe hadn’t moved from the chair directly across from the door, and his deep-sea eyes seemed to burn as he stared at me. “Did you know there’s a mirror behind you?”

I turned my head to look. Rafe had a clear view over my shoulder of my bent-over, creamy-white ass, dangling breasts, even the tuft of bright hair between my legs. It looked like some porn-star fantasy pose. No wonder he hadn’t appeared to register what I was saying about the ring while getting such an eyeful.

“Emotional blackmailer!” I exclaimed, and slammed the door and locked it.

I planned to fully explain that comment to Rafe in detail when I got out of the shower.

I washed my hair, fuming, shaved everything that could be shaved, and even blow-dried my hair, thinking sulkily about Rafe waiting outside and hoping to make him half as irritated as I was.