“Good-bye, Chelsea,” he whispered softly, placing his cell phone on the lounge table next to him, thinking about Chelsea. And Olivia.
As he grabbed his laptop and powered it up, he heard the familiar sound of a woman’s laugh. God, I love that sound, he thought as his body came alive with electricity. It had been over a month since he had felt that sensation. Looking out over the horizon, his heart raced as he searched for the source of that laughter. He heard that sound in his dreams every night. Only one person had a laugh that beautiful. He was certain his Olivia was near. Grabbing his coffee, he walked over to the edge of his balcony, taking in several people running on the beach.
That’s when his heart almost stopped.
There she was, running up the shoreline toward his hotel. He stilled, watching as she placed one leg in front of the other in rapid succession, her hips moving in perfect rhythm. She made running look so easy.
His brain tried to tell his body to move, to run out of his suite and onto the beach. But he remained completely frozen, shock etched across his strong face. He stared as Olivia stopped running, looking in the direction that she had just come from. He could almost feel her smile as she stood gazing up the beach, laughing at something. Alexander followed her eyes to see a relatively tall man running toward her, obviously having trouble keeping up. He kept watching as she took a deep breath, the smile gone from her face. She slowly turned and looked out over the ocean.
And that’s when Alexander saw it. The sadness. The hurt. The loss. He knew that look all too well.
Because it was the same way he felt.
~~~~~~~~~~
Olivia looked toward the shore, waiting for Cam. As she watched a few small children run out from the back of the Ritz and into the ocean, their parents trying to catch up, she felt that familiar tingling sensation. Her eyes began searching the beach as if certain that he was there. But how could that be? She hadn’t told anyone where she was, and she had made it quite clear that it was time to move on. But there was an electricity in the air that Olivia hadn’t felt since the day she left Boston.
She scanned the beach, half expecting to see Alexander running up to her. She secretly wanted to see him, to run into his arms, have him swing her around and declare his undying love to her. But that only happened in the movies, not real life. And her life was as real as it got.
She looked out over the ocean waves, and the sadness took over. Her smile disappeared and that’s when she felt it…the emptiness. She thought she had felt empty before, but this was a new kind of emptiness. She realized how big of a mistake she made when she left Alexander, and she began to regret that decision. But there was no way he would take her back, knowing that the risk of her doing the same thing all over again was so high.
No. Olivia had made her decision and she would have to live with it. Those five little words still played over and over in her head… It will destroy me, too.
Hearing a child scream in excitement, she turned. People strolled along the white sand beach behind her. Tourists sat on their balconies of the Ritz, most likely enjoying their morning coffee. She wanted to cry when she thought about all those mornings she drank her coffee in bed with Alexander.
Her heart dropped when she noticed someone on the top floor of the Ritz, standing on a wrap-around balcony, staring down at her. It was too far away for her to make out who it was, but the stature was eerily familiar. Or maybe she just so desperately wanted Alexander to come searching for her, even though she had told him to move on.
“Jesus, you’re fast, Libby,” Cam said, finally catching up to her as she stared at the top floor of the swanky hotel, not responding, a blank look on her face. He wrapped his arm around her waist and gently kissed the top of her forehead. “You okay?” he asked, noticing her lack of reaction to him.
“Yeah. I’m fine.” She squinted, still looking at the man standing on the balcony, knowing there was something so familiar about whomever it was. She closed her eyes, trying to clear her head. She felt as if she was losing her mind. She needed to forget about Alexander. She saw him everywhere and it needed to stop.
Turning to Cam, she placed a gentle kiss on his lips, making him smile. “Ready to go back?”
“No,” he laughed. “But I guess I don’t have a choice, do I?”
“Not really!” she shouted as she took off running, glancing back over her shoulder at the balcony on the top floor of the Ritz, unable to shake the feeling that Alexander was nearby.
CHAPTER SIX
OKAY
THAT BASTARD! ALEXANDER THOUGHT as he watched the tall sandy-haired guy kiss Olivia’s forehead near her scar. It made him furious to think that someone else was touching her. His face flashed red with anger as he watched Olivia kiss him on the lips. Those are my fucking lips!
He wanted to cry. He wanted to scream. But mostly, he wanted to kiss her, to feel those soft lips again. He was losing control of everything.
As she started to run away, Alexander saw her look back, her eyes trained on his balcony. She was a long distance away but, in his heart, he knew that she felt the same electricity and turned to find the source. He was certain of it. Pacing back and forth, he needed to figure out what his next step should be. He was lost. She was within his reach. He could have shouted her name. Screamed it. Made her recognize him. Just seeing her made him feel as if he was breaking all over again, if that was even possible.
He faintly heard the door to his suite open and close. “Martin!” Alexander shouted, still shaken up over his first Olivia sighting.
“Yes, sir?” Martin appeared on the balcony as Alexander stood locked in place, watching Olivia run away, now just a tiny speck.
Alexander’s heart raced, thinking about how close she was to him. He very easily could have run out of his suite and caught up with her, but he had no idea what to say. No. Before he approached her, he needed more information.
“She’s here, Martin. I just saw her running on the beach. I don’t know what to do, but she ran north. She must live out there somewhere.” His eyes frantically searched Martin’s, desperate that he had a way of finding her. Alexander couldn’t think at that moment. He normally had an answer to everything, but he was so rattled after seeing Olivia that he was frantic, his mind racing over a thousand different scenarios.
“I’ll look into public records and see if there have been any transfers of real estate or anything else in the last month,” Martin responded calmly.
Alexander sighed, his brain function finally returning. “I highly doubt she would have done that. She didn’t want to be found. That defeats the purpose. No. I think our best bet is just to explore this little island. It’s not that big. It’s maybe three miles wide and ten miles long so let’s not rush this. Let’s not scare her off. I don’t want her to realize I’m here and then run again.”