Surrender At Sunset

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“I thought I was eating pretty well,” he said as he stepped closer. “There’s no marshmallow cereal or instant cups of soup in there.” He stopped next to her, his body so close that his arm brushed against hers as he looked down at her list. She had changed into shorts and a tank top, a far cry from what she’d been wearing when she’d arrived. The brush of his skin against hers caused goose bumps to break out on her skin.

“Thank heaven for small miracles. I’m going to make a grocery store run.”

“You don’t have to. I can have whatever you want delivered.”

“And let somebody else choose my fruit? You must be crazy. There’s a grocery store in town, right?”

“There’s two. One that sells gourmet stuff. The other is where most of the locals go. Just tell the car’s GPS where you want it to go and it will lead you there.”

“Or you could lead me there.” She didn’t know why she’d issued the invitation, but the thought of leaving him alone in this huge house didn’t sit well with her.

“No.”

She was taken aback by his brisk refusal. “No? It will be dark by the time I get back. I was hoping there would be less of a chance getting lost on the island if you come with me.”

“You can wait until morning to go. There’s enough food here for the night.”

“I just thought you could show me around a little.”

“It’s not my job to show you around,” he said coldly. “I’m paying you for a service and that’s it. You have three choices. Take your chances alone in town tonight. Go in the morning. Or make a list of things you need and I’ll have them delivered. I’m not going into town.”

“Okay. I’m sorry. I’ll go in the morning.”

He nodded. “If you’re hungry, the frozen pizza isn’t bad.” He walked away then, leaving Virginia a little bit heartsore and a hell of a lot confused.

Chapter 4 (#ulink_429f5725-97f5-588d-8385-f8e214078363)

Carlos woke up the next morning feeling like a world-class asshole. He had been rude to Virginia last night. Incredibly rude, and if his father had heard him he would have smacked him in the mouth.

She’d just wanted to go to the supermarket. It wasn’t a strange request; it wasn’t something that would require a lot out of him. Buying groceries was something that normal people did, but he hadn’t been normal in a very long time. And he hadn’t been off his property since he’d heard that the team’s doctors weren’t removing him from the injured list.

There was no need to leave here. There was nothing he had to do. No schedule he had to keep. Even before he left Miami he’d never ventured into a store. Everything he needed was delivered to him. All he had to do was pick up the phone.

It wasn’t as if he could just leave the house and go to the supermarket like anybody else. He’d stopped being able to the day he’d been drafted to the majors right out of high school. He wasn’t able to go to the park with his siblings without somebody recognizing him. He hadn’t been able to go to dinner in a normal chain restaurant without being mobbed by fans.

He had loved it, at first. He was grateful for all the love and support from his fans, but when he’d got hurt all that had changed. Now all people wanted to know was when he was coming back. When he was going to take his team to the playoffs again.

He didn’t have an answer for them. His parents had both worked two jobs to move them to a better neighborhood. His sister taught at-risk kids. His little brother was studying to be a surgeon. All he had to do was play baseball. And now that he couldn’t, he felt a little like a failure. He had lost the ability to do the thing that had made his father swell with pride every time he saw him play. Maybe he was on Hideaway Island to escape all of that, the expectation, the disappointment, now that he couldn’t give people what they wanted. He couldn’t do the only thing he had ever been good at.

That was why he had balked when Virginia had asked him to go grocery shopping with her. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d left the house, much less gone out in public.

He went downstairs looking for her. She wasn’t in the kitchen, the dining room or the living room. Her bedroom was empty, her bed made up, the room clean as if no one had slept in it.

The house felt empty. Unlike last night. The house had felt different; it hadn’t felt as empty. He hadn’t felt as empty, knowing she was there. But now he wondered if she had gone, quit because he was the asshole who didn’t want to leave his house. He walked outside by the pool area, finding it empty, but then he spotted a little pair of gold sandals in the sand on the path that led to the beach.

As he walked down the pathway, seeing her footprints, his chest began to feel looser. And there she was, sitting at the edge of the water, her feet being splashed by the waves. Her dress was bunched up at her waist and she seemed lost in thought.

He kicked off his sneakers and sat beside her. The sand was damp, the water cool, but it was a shock to his system. He hadn’t done this before. He had what most people dream of—a private beach. Half an island to himself. Unspoiled nature surrounding him, and yet he had never sat outside and enjoyed it. Never felt the sand between his toes, never smelled the sweet, salty air, never looked out on the endless blue ocean that was right outside his home.

He felt guilty because he was here to enjoy this place when his father couldn’t. His father would be so disappointed to see that he hadn’t even bothered to go outside and just breathe it all in.

“I’ve never been on a beach alone,” she said to him after a moment. “Especially a beach like this. It’s truly something, isn’t it?”

“It’s beautiful. How long have you been out here?”

“Since the sun came up. I couldn’t sleep last night so I came out here to think.”

“To think,” he repeated. “About what?”

“About this job. About whether I’ve gotten in over my head. I was thinking about if maybe I should leave.”

He was quiet for a moment, knowing he needed to apologize for snapping at her last night, but not knowing how to begin. “Do you want to leave?”

“I feel as if I’m intruding, Mr. Bradley.”

“I feel as if you’re supposed to call me Carlos.” He stood up, extending his hand. “Come to the market with me.”

* * *

He had a Range Rover in the garage solely for her use, but she wanted to him to drive the old-school black convertible that was big as a tank and took as much gas. It had come with the house; the former owner had fixed it up himself.

“I’m feeling a little like Lena Horne in the 1950s,” she said as the ocean air whipped around them. “Just give me a big pair of sunglasses and a fabulous scarf.” She had her bare feet up on the dashboard, those long shapely legs stretched out before him, distracting his attention from the road. He was very tempted to run his hand up one of them, just to feel more of her softness, but he stopped himself. Never in his life had he met anyone he wanted to touch more; never in his life had he found a woman so tempting.

“I never would have thought to come here until you called me,” she said, looking at the scenery around her. “This doesn’t feel like Florida. It feels as if I’m in another country altogether.”

“My parents brought us here once, as kids. So when the opportunity came up to buy it, I did.”

“I would have loved to come here as a kid,” she said wistfully. “My parents aren’t the relax-on-the-beach, sand-between-their-toes type of people.”

“My mother is from Costa Rica. She had a hard time living in Maryland, away from the water, so every summer my parents would pack us in the car and drive us down to Florida. My father loved the beach. He saved all his vacation days for the year so we could spend two weeks down here. He would park his chair in the sand in the morning and wouldn’t leave until sundown that night,” he said, finding himself sharing more about himself than he meant to.

“What did the rest of you do?” she asked, smiling.

“Ran wild.” Memories came flooding back to him of Ava and Elias running around the beach with inflatable water tubes around their waists, and his older sister reading in the shade of an umbrella.

“I’m jealous.” She shut her eyes and leaned back in the seat, letting the rays of the sun hit her face. “My parents were all about culture and educational vacations. As an adult I can appreciate seeing Prague. As a seven-year-old, I’d much rather have gone to an amusement park on the Jersey Shore.”

“Your parents took you to Europe as a kid?”

“Yes, my mother is a mathematics professor who teaches courses with names like Complex Functions Theories and Partial Differential Equations. My father was a high-ranking military man and dealt with a lot of foreign officials. They wanted their children to be well-rounded individuals who could excel in any setting.”

“Are you?”

“You’ve met me. What do you think? My parents were expecting a doctor and another professor in the family. But my brother is a paramedic and I decorate people’s houses for a living.”

“You think they are disappointed in you?”

“Oh, I know they are, but I learned a long time ago that I have to follow my dreams, not the dreams they have for me.”

He pulled into town and was greeted with the sight of brightly colored buildings in mint greens, bright blues and yellows. There were people strolling up and down the small streets and diners eating on restaurant patios, but it wasn’t crowded. It didn’t feel like the height of tourist season, which it was. The whole place felt relaxed, a throwback to another time, and Carlos felt himself growing relaxed. He didn’t think he would like being in town. But this place was so different from Miami. He forgot that was why he was drawn to it in the first place.

A few minutes later they were in the market, with him pushing the cart while Virginia went through her list.

“You aren’t one of those low fat/no fat people, are you?” She stopped in front of the milk case.