When I closed my eyes for a moment, I could see myself with a similar scar. A scar that matched the one across my lower belly.
Not today, Willow. Focus on him, on learning this shit, and not on that.
I opened my eyes and sucked in a deep breath. “You ever gotten hurt surfing?” I asked in a husky voice. It seemed better than coming right out and asking how he’d gotten injured. He turned his head a fraction to give me an amused look. I let him study me for another thirty seconds, then I snorted, crossing my arms over my chest. Did he have to make me feel like his blue eyes were burning two holes into my face?
“It’s a simple yes or no answer,” I stated.
“You ever gotten hurt acting?” he asked.
All the time. I could have told him what I was really thinking, that acting had hurt me more emotionally than physically, but then I cleared my throat and shrugged. I pretended to be interested in a piece of lint on my swimsuit. “If you count stubbing a toe or breaking a fingernail on a prop, then yeah. Guess I have.”
A flicker of disappointment passed over his face but it disappeared almost immediately. He sighed and scratched his head before sweeping his hand out at the ocean. “You’re going to get hurt,” he said. “A lot. Hell, you’ll probably be black and blue by the time the rest of the cast gets here.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” I replied dryly as he squatted down and repositioned our boards a few feet apart in the sand.
He winked up at me, and I told myself it was because the breeze chose that exact moment to send strands of golden hair into his eyes and not because he was being a sarcastic ass**le.
“I’m not being a dick, Wills.” He patted the purple and white board and motioned his head from me down to it. I ran my tongue along the inside of my cheek, jabbing the tender flesh hard, to keep from telling him to f**k off. When he cocked an eyebrow, I sighed deeply and kneeled beside of him, in front of my board.
“Don’t tell me we’re going to meditate.”
“Remember what I said about people in the film industry?” he asked.
“You hate them?”
He looked down at his turquoise and red board for a few moments, frowning like he was trying to make up his mind about something. “Don’t f**k with me or I’ll drown you,” he finally muttered. He was grinning when he said it.
I clenched my fingers into the sand, grabbing up two big handfuls.
“We’re starting with some basics,” he replied, his blue eyes gazing at me fixedly. “No going out for you today.”
“What type of basics?” I released the sand from my fingers and dusted my palms together.
“For some reason I feel like you wanted to throw that in my eyes,” he teased. I wrinkled my nose at him. “Lie down on your board, on your stomach.”
Reluctantly, I stretched out on the smooth surface, so that my face was an inch from the retro looking Channel Islands logo. Tossing my long hair over my shoulder, I looked up at him in time to catch his eyes raking over my body. Jesus, this guy wasn’t the least bit concerned about being obvious, was he?
“Maybe I should have brought my bodyguard,” I snapped.
He shuffled over to me, repositioning me so that my body was completely centered on the board. As he worked, he said, “If we went to bed together it wouldn’t be on the beach. Though I plan on seeing you in that exact position, fully unclothed.”
I scoffed, twisting my neck to follow his movements as he crawled around me to examine my form. “Confident, are you?”
He paused. “It was a hypothetical statement, but as a matter of fact, I am.”
“Are you this hypothetical about all the girls you train?” I asked.
He lifted one of my feet, spending entirely too long touching his fingertips to its arch, before he placed it down against the end of the board. “Put your other foot just like that,” he ordered. I complied, and he added, “And no, I’m not like this with all the girls I train because I don’t get involved with my clients. At least, I haven’t yet.”
Why did that sound so hot coming from him in that accent?
“And what makes me different?”
He came around to face me, to study me a little more. I felt totally exposed lying there facedown, and I placed my head between the diamond-shape made by my outstretched arms. “Who said you were?” he asked finally.
I didn’t immediately lift my head back up because I didn’t want him to see the flush that spread across my face.
For the next two hours, we worked on Cooper’s basics: popping up on the surfboard and form. After the eightieth time of doing it—the point where I felt like my legs and arms were going to fall off from pushing myself up and standing in a lunge-like position in the middle of the surfboard—he looked pleased.
“Did you just fist pump?” I groaned irritably as I turned over onto my back in the sand. I gave the purple board a glare. I didn’t want to see the damn thing for at least a day or two—that’s how badly my muscles already ached.
Smiling, he said, “Proud of you, Wills. You’re getting there.”
I rolled my eyes as he began dusting the sand off both our surfboards. “I didn’t do anything,” I pointed out, hoisting myself up on my elbows so our eyes could meet.
“Sure you did. You didn’t flounce, did you?”
At least his standards for giving me praise were low.
He held my board out to me. I grumbled, got up, grabbing my shorts and tank top, and took the surfboard with both hands. “Here, carry it on top of your head, like this.” He flipped his own upside down, and centered it on his head.