Cole and I met my very first day on the job. In fact, he was the very first staff member I met at Siesta Playa. He gave me my uniform, showed me around the resort, and plopped me at my dorm room in staff housing like he was hoping he’d never have to deal with me again.

  We were a disaster from the start. That day, my flight was late getting in. On top of that, the airline lost my luggage. I left a message with the hotel, but I guess word didn’t make it to Cole. Apparently, he was standing there in the lobby for a good long while by the time I arrived, sweaty and flustered, blowing loose strands of hair off my face. I hate to admit this, truly I had plans to take it to my grave, but my first impression of Cole was that he was smoking hot—like Do a double take, press a hand to your heart, blink three times, and try to figure out how to quickly conceal your reaction to him hot. I made the mistake of trying to engage him in friendly conversation and managed to put my foot in my mouth almost immediately.

  “So are you the concierge here?” I asked with a big friendly smile.

  He took full offense to this question, frown and all. “I’m the assistant director of operations.”

  “That’s . . . wow. That’s pretty high up, right?”

  He didn’t answer me.

  Small talk was apparently beneath him.

  Right. Good to know.

  I was about to apologize for the blunder, and about being late, but he was already in the process of taking my bags and turning sharply to walk off ahead of me. I assumed I was meant to keep up with him—he had my stuff, after all—but it was hard because one of my flip-flops happened to break just as I was hurrying out of the taxi out front. Surely Cole realized this, but I was left to sort of hobble along behind him as he kept his breakneck pace.

  “Who wears flip-flops to the airport?” he muttered. I was sure the comment was meant to be under his breath, but I still heard him loud and clear. And at that moment, the tight hold I had over my bad mood burst like an overstuffed balloon. So far, I’d taken all the bullshit from that morning in stride: I’d put up with my delayed flight, the stress of being late to my first day of work, the fact that I was sweating through my clothes, the weird motion sickness from the jerky stops and starts in my hellacious taxi ride over here, my flip-flop deciding to break the exact moment I needed it the most.

  I think I fired off something right back, like “Who wears a suit on a tropical island?”

  His head slowly swiveled toward me and his eyes turned dark and dangerous.

  And so, here we are, stuck in an endless loop of torment. I can’t believe what Lara and Camila were hinting about at the bonfire. Cole is the last person I would ever envision dating, and I don’t even need to ask his opinion. I know Cole would say I’m not exactly his type either. Even still, I know our banter and antics evince a deeper, foundational friendship. We’re enemies because it’s easy, our resting state, the natural order of things. We’ll maintain the status quo only so long as we don’t dig too deep or question our relationship too hard.

  Now, I look at him. He has all the marks of a bully. I’ve always thought he had sort of an old money, East Coast feel about him: taunting cheekbones, shockingly black hair, dark eyes that seem to cut straight through me, and full lips that would feel so good pressed against mine, I know it. I blink and blurt out, “I didn’t see you at the bonfire.”

  Of course he didn’t go to the bonfire, not that I thought he would. It’s not his scene. Getting soot on his dress slacks? Sand on his hands? He’d hate that. He wants to tame the elements, not join them.

  “I wasn’t technically invited,” he points out.

  “You could have come. No one would have cared.”

  He arches a brow, pressing the theory.

  “It was just a small group,” I add.

  “I had other plans.”

  “Like what? Calling the mother ship and reporting your findings?” I continue in an alien accent, pretending I’m him: “Earth humans are more strange than previously theorized. Will need to extend my research exploration trip before I can finalize my report on their habits. Beep boop.”

  The side of his mouth lifts in a smirk. “If you knew my parents, you’d realize how funny that actually is.”

  “Wait. Are they actually aliens?” I ask with wide eyes and mock solemnity.

  He shrugs and looks away, looping back to my previous question when he answers, “I went out on Friday.”

  “Out? Like to the bars?”

  This is almost more shocking than the fact that he might come from another planet.

  His eyes lock with mine as he nods.

  It’s on the tip of my tongue to ask him who he went with. Tamara? Her friends? But I resist. If he spent Friday night sidling up to Tamara, flirting with her in a loud bar, their mouths inching closer to each other’s—I do not want to know about it.

  “Fun,” I say with a cavalier indifference. It’s like I couldn’t care less about his comings and goings. Go to twenty bars, for all I care! A hundred! “I probably wouldn’t have had much time to talk to you on Friday even if you had come to the bonfire.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  He sees right through me.

  Now he’s amused. His smile hurts me.

  “Yes, I was pretty preoccupied with Blaze.”

  I all but mime a blow job for emphasis.

  This is a total lie. After the marshmallow incident I mostly hung out with Lara, Camila, Oscar, and Théo. We played a trivia game on Oscar’s phone, and then I called it an early night. Blaze never came over to talk with me—not once—but I think he’s just shy. I caught him looking at me before I left, like really checking me out, so there’s still hope.

  “Blaze the bartender?” Cole asks in a droll tone. Those three words hold a whole lot of meaning.

  I laugh with heavy sarcasm. “Ha ha ha. Yes. Blaze the bartender. We can’t all be assistant directors like you.”

  I reach out as if to straighten his name tag for maximum teasing effect, but then I think better of it. We shouldn’t touch. My fingers curl into themselves, and then I drop my hand back by my side.

  He clucks his tongue and then tucks his hands into his suit-pants pockets. “Well, I hope that works out for you.”

  “It will,” I say with absolute certainty.

  “You should probably get back onstage.” He nods his chin toward the front of the room. “Your adoring fans are waiting.”

  “Right, but you have to leave. You’re not allowed to watch me make a mockery of myself.”

  His tilted head and the knowing glint in his eyes say, Paige, I’ve seen you make a mockery of yourself a million times over.

  And it’s true, he has.

  Cole has seen the very worst of me.

  Chapter Five

  PAIGE

  Six months ago, on a random Saturday night, I got really drunk at the Conch Bar. To my credit, it was ladies’ night, and the bar was running a Jell-O shot promotion: two for the price of one. As someone who enjoys a good bargain and the taste of sugary alcohol, I simply could not turn down the opportunity life had presented me. Unfortunately, prior to this, the night was already headed south. There was a big group of us out on the town, all girls from the resort. We started with dinner that included copious amounts of wine. After that, we decided to go out and let our hair down, dancing, sharing stories of past sexcapades, and generally just acting like fools. The Conch Bar was our last stop of the night, and that first Jell-O shot was the beginning of the end for me. I was having so much fun until I wasn’t.

  I remember the tipping point. I was standing on the dance floor thinking, They should really turn the strobe lights off in here.

  Of course there were no strobe lights.

  Then the next thing I remembered, we were back at the resort, and I was being dragged down the pebble path through the dense forest that leads from a private circular drive down to staff housing near the beach. It was Camila and Lara who were lugging me down the path, but they were drunk, too, and we kept falling over and laughing. Everything was funny. The shapes of the trees. The color of the moon. The fact that my dress was riding up around my hips.

  “My panties are showing! This is so bad!”

  This was accompanied by peals of laughter. I couldn’t stop if I tried.

  I was lying on the ground, staring up, fully convinced that it would be fine if I just stayed there all night, asleep under the stars, right when a face suddenly cut into my view of the night sky.

  Condescending frown, thick dark eyebrows furrowed in disapproval, full lips tugged into a flat line.

  “COLE!”

  My first gut instinct was sheer excitement that he was here. My archnemesis! My favorite person!

  Then reality set in, and I repeated his name, this time with as much disdain as I could muster.

  “Cole.” Lying on the ground—in no position to argue—I shook my head. “Nope. No. Someone else. Anyone. In fact, just leave me here and let the wild animals have me.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut like I was prepared to meet my demise. “Make it quick.”

  “What’s wrong with her?” he asked my friends.

  His tone wasn’t chock full of concern like it might have been if he were a normal human with normal emotions.

  Those assholes ratted me out in a heartbeat. “She’s drunk.”

  “Can you two get back on your own?”

  “Yeah, and we can get Paige back, too, if you help her stand up.”

  “It’s fine, I’ve got it from here.”

  Lara and Camila didn’t even put up a fight. They willingly left me there with Cole, which meant it was just him and me, alone on that dark path. We could have it out for real, finally. Guns drawn. Knives out.

  I expected no mercy from him.

  Instead, he heaved a deeply annoyed sigh and then bent down so we were more on the same level.

  “You have to get up.”

  “Do I?”

  Most likely realizing that he wasn’t going to get anywhere with me, he took matters into his own hands, hooking his forearms underneath my armpits and lugging me to my feet. “Up and at ’em, champ.”

  I groaned as my world spun around and around. Vertigo on its max setting.

  “Get me off this Tilt-A-Whirl,” I complained with an audible gag.

  He looped one arm around my back, under my armpit so he could take most of my weight.

  “Can you walk?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “If not, I’m going to carry you.”

  It almost felt like a threat.

  “Dear god, no. Not that.”

  I would never recover from being in his arms, though walking alongside him like that wasn’t much different. He had such a firm grip on me. Our hips, arms, chest, legs—everything touched, eliciting sparks, as we trudged slowly down the path. When I swayed on my feet, he held me tighter. When I was hit with a wave of nausea, he paused and told me to take a few calming breaths. I wouldn’t even say we were going at a snail’s pace. A snail shouted at us to get the hell out of his way as we took slow steps toward my dorm.

  “Jell-O shots,” I explained, even though he never asked.

  “Mmm,” he hummed without a hint of judgment.

  “It could have happened to anyone.”

  “I have no doubt. I’ve been there.”

  “You have? When? Tell me everything.”

  He laughed then and adjusted his grip, which made his closed fist accidentally brush against my breast. I froze. He froze. Then we both slowly looked at each other.

  Was it the moonlight, or did his eyes have a gentle kindness in them tonight?

  I didn’t make it very far with that line of thinking, because a second later, my stomach decided to steal the show.

  I managed to get out a desperate “I’m going to be sick” mere milliseconds before bending at the waist and making good on that promise. At least I had the forethought to turn away from him.

  Cole didn’t abandon me like he could have. Tears streamed down my cheeks, and I begged him to go so he wouldn’t see me at my worst, utterly defenseless, weak, and sick. I’d worked hard up until that point to make Cole like me, and if not like me, then at least respect me as an adversary. Now it was too late for that. It was so embarrassing to be a full-grown adult and drunk to the point of being sick. I have no doubt he wanted to chastise me for it, but instead, he held my hair back as I threw up again.

  He told me it would be okay, that I would feel better soon.

  His niceness made me cry harder.

  Cole stayed with me on that path until I had the energy to walk again. I got the impression that he would have preferred to just lug me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and be done with the hellacious task of tending to me, though maybe it was in his best interest to make sure I was safe and well. What’s a superhero without a villain? If I died, he’d lose his plot.

  Outside my room, he took my key out of my purse and helped me unlock the door.

  “Do not look at my shit,” I said, like there was any dignity to salvage.

  Thank god my room was relatively tidy. My bed was made, my pillows arranged just so. My bulletin board was covered with pictures of my parents and me that we’d taken during all our travels. Tiny Paige swimming with dolphins. Adolescent Paige suffering through the Drake Passage on the way to Antarctica. Teenager Paige waving from the side of a research vessel.

  Cole didn’t listen to me. He looked wherever he damn well pleased. I suppose he thought it was payment for his service. He helped me get here safely; he deserved some kind of reward.

  “You were a cute kid,” he said, leaning in to look at my pictures, pointing to a zoomed-in one of me going to town on a towering ice cream cone.

  “And now?”

  He looked back at me over his shoulder, eyes narrowed as if he was really thinking about it. My stomach squeezed tight.

  “Never mind. Don’t answer that,” I said quickly. “I only just stopped crying. I don’t have the energy for your barbs tonight.”

  He frowned like I’d wounded him, but I was already en route to my bed. It looked so good, so clean and welcoming. That fluffy white blanket was just waiting for me.

  “I wouldn’t,” he warned, making me stop dead in my tracks.

  Then he pointed at my clothes. I didn’t even need to look down to realize why he thought it was a bad idea. Of course. I needed to shower and change immediately.

  I didn’t think I could muster the energy, though. The simple concept of having to prolong my collapse onto my bed sent me down to my knees. By this point I was crawling over to my dresser to get clothes. Showering? Not possible.

  Cole stuck it out. “I’ll help you. C’mon.”

  From my hands and knees, I protested. “No. Get Lara or Camila.”

  “They’re as drunk as you are.”

  He was already ushering me toward my bathroom. There was no tub, just a walk-in shower with a translucent white curtain. He turned the water on and checked to make sure it was the perfect temperature. Then he told me to get in.

  “I can’t do that while you’re here!”

  He was exasperated with me by this point. Trying to get me to see reason, he asked, “What would you do if the situation was reversed? If I was the drunk one?”

  Easy. I’d tend to him like my life depended on it. Sponge bathe him if I had to. Feed him like a baby bird.

  “Leave you out there on that path to die” is what I told him.

  He closed his eyes like he was holding back the urge to laugh. When he opened them again, he’d regained his composure and pointed to the shower. His eyes were the most magnificent shade of brown I’d ever seen. “Charming. Get in.”

  Then he walked out of the bathroom and pulled the door shut behind him, affording me as much privacy as he possibly could without leaving altogether.

  I did as he instructed, trying to avoid looking down at my clothes as I undressed, knowing it would make me feel sick all over again. I was far from sober, but at least my stomach had settled down some in the last few minutes. Undressing proved . . . difficult. It was hard to figure out the thin straps of my dress, and the zipper was rooted in rocket science. I have no doubt that I would have been a comical sight had Cole not been safely on the other side of the door.

  “How’s it going in there?” he asked.

  “Uhh . . . fine,” I lied.

  “I’ll be right here if you need me.”

  I blew out air, like, Pfft, yeah right.

  Only I did need him—almost immediately—because just as I was stepping into the shower, I slipped on a pool of water. In slow-motion horror, I simultaneously screamed, reached out desperately for something to catch myself with, and managed only to grab ahold of the curtain; then I yanked it free from the curtain rings—ping ping ping ping ping—on my way to the ground. I landed hard on my butt, a heap of drunk limbs barely concealed beneath a wet shower curtain. The shower spray rained down on my head just as Cole ran into the bathroom, horrified.

  “Shit! Are you okay?”

  I was okay. Unfortunately. The only thing bruised that night was my ego.

  Cole averted his gaze and helped me stand up. While I huddled in the corner with a towel wrapped around me, he fixed my shower curtain the best he could and then demanded I try again. This time, he didn’t leave the bathroom as I started to rinse off, but he turned around and faced the wall. It was deeply intimate. Insanely intimate. My hands shook the entire time I tried to squeeze out dollops of soap and shampoo.

  I thought everything would change then. Our relationship as we knew it was officially kaput. But the next morning Cole did the nicest thing he’s ever done for me: he pretended like it never happened. Not in the sense that he wasn’t going to bring it up. He was.

  “Rough night?” he asked the moment he saw me.

  I just mean, he didn’t coddle me over it. He went after me just as hard as always, the way I preferred it. Our little game was preserved, alive and well for a few more months . . .

  Chapter Six

  COLE

  I lied to Paige at bingo night. I didn’t go out on the town on Friday. I played Call of Duty with two scuba diving instructors until midnight, at which point I decided to punish myself by doing a slow walk by the bonfire. It was still going strong when I got there. I scanned the crowd, not that surprised to see the usual suspects. Paige sat on a towel with her friends, laughing, and she was so beautiful, the scene was so enchanting—it looked like it could have been a commercial for the brand of beer she was holding in her hand.