Page 6 of Beauty and the Beach
“I’m not going anywhere,” I go on. Goodness knows I need the money. “Patrice is paying me to be here, Emu. I’m staying.”
He looks around quickly, undoubtedly checking if anyone is in earshot, and then he leans closer, caging me in with one hand on the back of my chair and the other on the table in front of me. He smells like leather and mahogany, and I want to punch him in his stupid face.
I want to never look at him again. I want to forget everything that’s happened to us, every nightmare that keeps me awake, every painful memory.
But he’s never seemed to want the same thing, regardless of how poorly we get along. “Give me one more ridiculous bird name,” he breathes, his eyes flashing, “and see what happens?—”
“Emu,” I repeat loudly, snickering even though I know it will annoy him. But why call him Phoenix—animaginarybird—when there are so manyrealbird names available? “Be grateful it wasn’tTitmouse”—a nickname I’ve used before and will absolutely use again—“orRoosterorAmerican Woodcock—” But I break off as he moves, my grin dying as he reaches for me. “Wait,” I say. His hands find my waist; my eyes widen. “What are you—wait. Hey.Hey!”
He’s not listening; he’s too busy hauling me out of my chair.
“Let go right—now—” I say, trying to land hits on whatever bits of him I can find. His grip tightens as I continue to squirm. “Put—me—down?—”
But my words turn into a yelp of surprise as he hoists me over his shoulder right there—in the middle of the town square, in front of Patrice and the rest of the shelteremployees and the poor animals who just want to find homes—he slings me up like a freaking sack of potatoes.
I call him a name that Nana Lu would make me gargle with soapy water for using.
“Tsk, tsk,” he says, sounding smugger than I’ve ever heard him before. “Language, Amsterdam.” I can hear that curl in his lips and the flash of triumph in his eyes. “I’m sorry”—he grips me tighter around the thighs, sounding not at all sorry—“but I promised your brother I’d keep an eye on you, which means I can’t let you die of anaphylaxis.”
“Yeah, right,” I say with a scoff as all the blood rushes to my head, my blonde hair falling around me and obscuring my vision. “This is about the bird name.” I pound my fists on his back. “Put me down!”
“No,” he says. “Now smile nice and big for all the people who are watching you flail around like an idiot.”
The square is surrounded by shops and businesses on all four sides—including Cuts and Curls, where I work—so I have no doubt there are a lot of people seeing this. I don’t smile, though. I pinch him as hard as I can in the side instead.
He doesn’t say anything; he doesn’t even flinch. He just says one thing: “You smell like dead fish.”
Holland
There area few things you need to understand about Phoenix Park.
Phoenix Fact #1:He’s hot. Like, stupidly hot. And he knows it. Taller than is frankly necessary; gorgeous tanned skin; thick blue-black hair that is absolutely wasted on him. If I had hair like that, I would grow it down to my butt and flip it around in people’s faces all day, and they would thank me for it. “Thank you, Holland, for blessing us with the existence of your hair. Thank you for poking us in the eyes with your luscious locks.” That’s what they would say.
Phoenix Fact #2:He’s rich—and at the risk of sounding like a broken record—I would even saystupidlyrich. He’s the eldest grandson of the Butterfield corporation or company or whatever it’s called, and the only grandchild who was deemed competent enough to hold an executive position.
I will grudgingly admit that while his hair is wasted on him, his wealth is mostly not. He lives in a nice-but-not-exorbitant home on the west side of the island, and he doesn’t throw money around. He also works a billion hours a week, so it’s not like he’s lazy. This might be the only positive thing I can say about him.
Phoenix Fact #3:Our relationship is nothing short of overtly hostile. We didn’t get along when we met years ago,and we don’t get along now—especially since we knew each other mainly through my brother, and Trev has passed. There are no thinly veiled barbs, no passive aggressive snipes; we go to war whenever we’re together, and we don’t waste time pretending otherwise.Time is a precious commodity,after all, which is what Phoenix says and happens to be one of the only things we agree on.
This sort of relationship would be tragic if I were pining after him, but I am decidedly not. He’s a dream turned nightmare, the kind of man who’s sexy on paper but less sexy when you’re the one who has to put up with him day in and day out. Bossy, arrogant, overbearing—everything I would expect from Butterfield’s youngest-ever chief operating officer.
And don’t let the idea of some giant, successful company seduce you. In romance novels I read about thirty-year-old executives working at any number of cool, suave, urban corporations; there is none of that here. Yes, Butterfield is one of the most profitable companies in its sector, and yes, it’s a household name, but it’s not doing vaguely defined tech work or app development or financial advising. Butterfield is not a shiny, sexy, Fortune 500 company.
Butterfield is a tampon company.
Or, rather, they started out as a tampon company. Tampons made from eco-friendly, nontoxic, biodegradable materials. They then moved on to incorporate other sanitary products—pads, mostly, along with wipes, toilet paper, and diapers for babies and senior citizens alike. And though I will never, ever,evertell Phoenix this…Butterfield’s tampons are pretty great. As far as tampons go, anyway.
I’m not really a pads girl. They give me wedgies.
“I talked to your grandmother last night,” Phoenix says ashe walks, pulling me back to the present. My fist stops mid-punch where I’m hitting his lower back.
“So?” It’s something he’s done for years, ever since Trevor died. Nana Lu adores him. She showers him with love, and they trade stories about Trev, and he’s a total gentleman to her.
I guess if he’s going to be a gentleman to someone, it should be Nana.
“She said she was going to ask you why you’ve been taking extra shifts at the salon,” he says. “Hold your breath; we’re passing the dogs.”
I inhale shallowly and wait; Phoenix’s stride lengthens as he picks up his pace, and I hold my hair aside with one hand so I can wave my apology to Patrice with the other. She watches with a look of bemusement as I disappear out of sight over the shoulder of this caveman. When the dog enclosures are no longer visible, I let go of my breath.
