Читать книгу Souvenir - Therese Fowler - Страница 9

TWO

‘The northeast side’s where the best waves are,’ yelled Valerie Haas, over the sputtering whine of the motorbikes she and Carson McKay had rented for their excursion on St Martin. The West Indies isle, known for its split Dutch and French identity, was one of three islands they were considering for their wedding location, as well as the site of a vacation home. ‘And the nude beaches are there, too!’

‘Where’s a good bar?’ Carson yelled back, ready to be done with the noise and the hot wind and the vibration in his crotch, nude beaches or not.

He preferred riding horses to motorcycles by far, and was riding this souped-up scooter only in deference to Val. She would’ve had him on something much more powerful if it had been available to them – something worthy of a motocross track – and had been disappointed to have to settle for only 100 cc’s. She wouldn’t even consider the little Suzuki SUVs, insisting that the best views were accessible only with the bikes. He had to admit she was right; the roads up the low mountains deteriorated as they got farther from the small coastal towns, and a few times they’d taken mere trails to different points of interest. Val had wanted to locate a home rumored to have belonged to Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston several years back. Though the house wasn’t officially on the market, they were told, she thought it might be fun to buy it if possible – a surefire conversation starter, she’d called it, as if their lives weren’t already full of those. They found the house this morning, tucked into the hills of the island’s French side, but he wasn’t wild about its rocky landscape and lack of large shade trees. Val, raised in Malibu, would have gone for it anyway. Carson thought of the lushness of central Florida, the oaks and cedars and palms and twining, flowering vines, and declared that notoriety wasn’t enough to persuade him.

Now he pointed to the side of the gravel road, indicating that he was pulling over.

‘You’re not done already?’ Val said when she came to a stop next to him.

The sun pressed heavy on his forehead, forcing sweat down the sides of his neck. He wiped it away. ‘’Fraid so,’ he said.

‘We aren’t even close to finishing the tour.’

He snorted. They’d been out since seven-thirty, and it was closing in on two o’clock. Lunch had been fried plantains and some fizzy fruit soda at a roadside stand. ‘Feel free to go on, but I’m heading back to the villas.’ There was a terrific bar there, and, should he happen to consume a drink or two more than made it safe to ride, he’d already be ‘home’.

Val pushed her sunglasses up onto her shaggy white-blond hair and squinted at him. ‘Okay, I’ll go back with you – if you make it worth my while,’ she said, grinning that same provocative grin she’d used on him the night they’d met, in LA at the launch party for his latest CD. He’d seen thousands of come-hither smiles over the years, but hers was different. Confident – but not threatening, the way some women’s were. Some women were so aggressive they scared him. Val, who at twenty-two was already world famous in her own right, had enticed him with a smile that made him feel like he could reciprocate without remorse. He’d had his share of remorse over the years, and a few extra portions for good measure.

He shook his head, admiring her brilliant hair, the long, lean muscles in her thighs and arms that were products of uncountable hours of surfing and training. She’d won her first junior championship at fifteen, had her first endorsement contract a year later. ‘You’re awfully easy on me, you know.’

‘I know,’ she agreed.

‘It’s a real character flaw.’

‘I never said I was perfect.’ She pushed her sunglasses down and turned her motorbike back toward their resort, a collection of luxury villas on Nettle Bay. ‘Catch me if you can!’