Island Fantasies: An Island Escapes Travel Romance Read online

  “Merci, Gaston. Au revoir!” she called.

  Kyle glanced in the mirror as Gaston revved the pickup away. Definitely not something he saw every day. A woman with a walkie-talkie and four gallons of diesel, looking out to sea like it was her backyard. Maybe when no one was watching, she’d turn into a mermaid and swim away.

  Chapter Two

  Hannah held down the radio call button and hailed the crew on the boat. “Windfall, Windfall, this is Hannah, over.”

  It was a long minute before anyone replied, but she had a minute. She grinned at the shadow of a fish flitting through the shallows. Hell, she had all day.

  “This is Windfall, over,” came a clipped British accent.

  “Hello, Darren. Would you be able to pick me up, please?” she asked, on her best behavior. Darren was the boat owner’s best buddy, and she needed to make a good impression to keep her job as crew.

  She’d asked around at dozens of boats back in Tahiti, but none had a position open for an extra crew member. At least, none that didn’t involve warming the captain’s bunk. But Robert, the owner of Windfall, had come along just when she was about to give up, and he seemed safe enough. A bit of a Captain Bligh when it came to giving orders, but how choosy could she be? The important thing was that she had a ride now, westward from here in French Polynesia — at the very center of the Pacific Ocean — to dream destinations in the Cook Islands and Tonga. Maybe even Fiji, if things worked out. She would help sail the boat, cook all the meals, do all the cleaning up. She’d work herself to the bone if it meant making her dream of crossing the Pacific under sail come true.

  “I’ll be right there,” Darren replied and clicked the radio to standby.

  Hannah gazed out over the sparkling water of the lagoon and to the silvery horizon beyond. Windfall bobbed at anchor not a half mile away, with her sleek lines, sugar-scoop stern, and sparkles of sunlight reflecting on the red hull. Hannah’s mind promptly brushed away the details and substituted her own dream boat: something a little smaller, a little older than Robert’s fancy yacht. A little cozier, yet sturdy and capable of taking her anywhere she liked. With anyone she liked, because she would be captain, and she could choose where she went, when, and with whom.

  She entertained herself with fantasies of a long line of handsome men, all begging her for a job. There’d be a tall blond with a Scandinavian accent, a dark and rugged pirate-type, and…

  The image of the man in the pickup flitted through her mind. Yeah, having crew like him wouldn’t be a hardship. He could have been a model: chiseled features, a wave of brown hair — truffle brown, yum — contrasting with the white shirt. Judging by his skin tone, the man was a new arrival in the tropics. Still, he had enough color to suggest that he got outdoors often enough. Plenty of color in those striking hazel eyes, too. If only if he weren’t so damn groomed. He was shaved much too closely, his hair trimmed just so. A little too…styled for her taste. And what was with the rolling suitcase? This was a place for dusty backpacks and duffel bags, not Gucci or Samsonite.

  She sighed. Her dream man was a carpenter, the kind with callused hands and a kind heart. A beer drinker, not a brandy sniffer. She didn’t need a prince, charming or otherwise. Right?

  Still, a girl could dream.

  The sound of an outboard engine slowly overpowered the gentle whisper of waves over the coral shore, and she looked up.

  “Hello!” Darren called, all smiles and sunburned cheeks. Sunburned bald spot, too.

  Dream, meet reality, Hannah sighed to herself. Windfall’s current crew was over sixty and had cracked lips. Robert, the owner, was pretty much the same, minus the smile.

  “Did you hear from Robert?” she asked Darren once they’d loaded the supplies and motored off across the anchorage.

  “He’s booked on a flight back here in two weeks.”

  Hannah could have done a happy dance. Robert had been pulled back to England for a family emergency, so she had a little breather from the man’s demanding company. A chance to enjoy her incredible surroundings for two whole weeks, pretending the boat was hers. Of course, Robert had left her with a long job list and an unspoken threat. If she hadn’t completed those tasks by the time he returned, she would lose her position as crew and thus her chance to sail across the Pacific — her chance to realize a dream. So she better get cracking.

  Her eyes darted over the boat’s rigging and deck, going over the to-do list as Darren clumsily maneuvered the dinghy toward the stern. So much work, so little time. And to complicate matters, Robert’s friends were using Windfallas a floating hotel for the next few days.

  The good news was, they’d be leaving soon. The bad news was, Hannah couldn’t really bustle around the boat and get much work done with Darren and his wife Cynthia trying to relax and soak in the rays.

  “So, Hannah,” Darren said once they had loaded everything onto Windfall and sat down to the obligatory cup of tea.

  Tea, when she itched to get started on sanding the rails.

  “Yes, Hannah…” Cynthia pitched in, stirring her tea. Not quite meeting Hannah’s eyes.

  Her gut sank as she wondered what she had done wrong.

  “We were thinking about how hard you’ve been working on the boat,” Darren started.

  “…how very hard you’ve been working…” Cynthia nodded along.

  Hannah looked from one to the other. What were they getting at?

  “And thinking about how cooped up you must feel on a small boat like this…”

  Windfall was forty-four feet long — a palace, as far as she was concerned.

  Cynthia nodded earnestly. “How very cooped up you’ll feel once you’re at sea.”

  Hannah had come halfway across the Pacific already, hitchhiking on various boats, and she’d never felt confined. All that sky, that water! How could she feel anything but free?

  “And we had a marvelous idea,” Darren went on.

  “A marvelous idea!” Cynthia nodded eagerly.

  Hannah wasn’t so sure about whatever it was they were suggesting, no matter how politely.

  “We’d like to treat you to two nights at a hotel.” Darren smiled broadly. “Give you a little privacy.”

  She blinked at them for a while. Were they serious?

  Apparently, because they both nodded eagerly. “Our treat,” Cynthia murmured.

  Your average sailor might have jumped at the offer, but Hannah had to work hard to muster a polite smile. She’d only just settled in and started to get a feel for the boat. To leave now, with so much work to do…

  “Then you can enjoy a few days off, and we can enjoy…” Darren flashed an apologetic smile.

  Privacy, she figured. And she couldn’t blame them, because forty-four feet wasn’t much space for them to share with a perfect stranger with a totally different agenda than their own.

  And so it was that, less than an hour later, Darren deposited her back on shore.

  “Are you sure that’s all you need?” he asked, holding the dinghy close to the rickety dock.

  She swung the small backpack to her shoulder. She had a book, a towel, a bikini, and a spare change of clothes. There wasn’t much more she needed for two days. “All good,” she murmured, casting a wistful glance toward the boat. Beach hotels weren’t really her thing; she’d much rather be on the boat. But it was a generous offer, especially considering hotel prices on Maupiti. Most importantly, she wasn’t being thrown off the boat for good.

  “All good,” she said. “Thank you.”

  “Have a nice time!” Darren called and pushed off.

  She looked left. Looked right. Sighed a little, tugged her sun hat lower down, and set off along the road. Darren had arranged everything but a ride, which was fine with her, because a two-mile walk with views like this was a treat, not grounds for complaint.

  A steady sea breeze blew from the south-southwest, making the palms sway and their shadows dance. Just offshore, a fisherman balanced in an outrigger canoe, casting his hand
net in a graceful arc. Two kids zipped by on rusty bikes, slaloming in and out of each other on the deserted road.

  It was one of those times she could have laughed out loud, sucking in the impressions around her. One of those times she wished she could lean toward a friend and say Hey, look! just to share the moment.

  Hey, look! she’d say, pointing to a stingray in the shallows.

  The friend — better yet, Dream Guy — would smile and snap a picture.

  Hey, look! She could point out the frigate bird wheeling over the lagoon. Then she might pause and look back at the coral-block chapel built on a promontory by the sparkling water.

  Dream Guy would put an arm around her and smile. Now that’s the way to worship.

  Amen, she’d say, and the two of them would laugh, snap a selfie, and amble merrily along.

  She squeezed her lips together and strode on. Sometimes, having a healthy imagination wasn’t such a good thing. Hers supplied a thousand visions of what the perfect life would be — and how perfect she might be. In her dreams, she was never lonely or tired or alone. She had a cadre of good friends and good times, spent sailing merrily from island to island under the sun. In her dreams, she had a good man to do it all with. Someone special. Someone to cuddle with as the sun set, someone to wake up and marvel at the sunrise with.

  She sent a rock skidding across the cracked asphalt. In reality, she was a little tired of facing the world alone. In reality, she had to remind herself what she was trying to prove.

  But the second she remembered, she’d slam negative thoughts to a screeching halt. This wasn’t just about her dreams, but a friend’s, too.

  That was all that mattered — realizing a dream for both of them, damn it, even if she had to go it alone.

  She tilted her head toward the sun and inhaled the salty air. There was no place she’d rather be, right? No place she’d rather be.

  She made the words into a tune and whistled them as she continued down the road. Two days of downtime, and then she’d head straight back to Windfall and prove to Robert what a reliable crew she made. Then she’d be off across the Pacific to live an adventure. To discover. To make good on a promise.

  And maybe even to put some ghosts to rest.

  Chapter Three

  After another ten minutes of trying to comprehend the amiable driver’s French, Kyle had arrived at his hotel, Le Beau Soleil. That much French, he knew. Le Beau Soleil was right on a blindingly white beach — the kind you had to look at for a good, long minute and breathe deeply, just to believe such a place could truly exist. The tropical water went from translucent at the foreshore to turquoise shallows and through every hue of green and blue in the rainbow until it met a line of foaming white a mile away — the fringing reef that sheltered the duck pond of the lagoon from the heaving ocean outside.

  As for Le Beau Soleil, well…it was a little scruffy around the edges. More like a beach shack than a hotel, with an open-air dining room and a view over turquoise water. The whole place was made up of a long, low building with a thatched roof and a half-dozen round bungalows that looked like the next strong breeze might blow them away.

  Quaint, he decided to call it. All very quaint.

  The main draw was that, of the three hotels on the island, this was the only one without an Internet connection for guests. God knows Kyle didn’t need the temptation. He was feeling itchy already, wondering how many emails were piling up in his inbox and how his brother Len was managing.

  But no, he had a bet to win. It was just for bragging rights, but still. It was the principle of the thing.

  If only he weren’t already stressing about a thousand things that were probably going wrong back in New York. Shit — did he tell Len where the Brackman files were before he left? Yes, yes, he did. But would Len remember to check with Phil about the new graphics? Would he get the report done in time?

  “Iaorana,” called a voice, and Kyle turned.

  “Bonjour,” he said to the Polynesian proprietress. Her smile was the most genuine he’d seen in weeks, and her flower-print dress danced around her ample frame like a wave.

  Luckily, she let him check in using English, and in no time, he was following her down the coral-lined path to his bungalow, dragging his rolling suitcase awkwardly in the sand. But the room opened right to the sea, and the queen-size bed had a classy look to it thanks to the mosquito net tied over it like a canopy.

  “Don’t worry,” Tiri said. “With the sea breeze, you won’t need the net.”

  Kyle scanned the room and found two geckos, one lamp, and not a single power outlet. Even if he had brought a phone, he couldn’t charge it.

  Tiri left him with a smile, and he stood there for a good minute, wondering what to do. He was on a South Pacific island; it was time to relax. How hard could that be?

  He drummed his fingers on the door frame. Scuffed the floor with his shoe. Cleared his throat and looked around. Finally, he changed into shorts, scored a coconut shell drink at the bar, and settled into a beach chair. He lay quietly, looking at the thousand shades of turquoise in the lagoon. A guy could spend years looking at a view like that, right?

  Except that five minutes later, he was checking his watch and calculating New York time. His niece’s ballet recital was on soon. Surely it would be okay to find a phone to call his sister and wish everyone good luck? His brother Len would be preparing for tomorrow’s big meeting, too, and Kyle itched to be in on that conference call. There was a lot riding on that meeting. Would Len manage the presentation all right? Jonathan was sure to bring up the Kaufman portfolio, and even though Kyle had coached Len on just how to deflect that move, he wasn’t sure if his kid brother would handle it. And then there’d be Rick trying to sneak in that line item he’d been after for months. Kyle had coached Len about that, too, but…

  He checked his watch again. Surely he could make just one call — one quick call! That wouldn’t be cheating, would it?

  He drummed his fingers on his stomach. God, whose idea was this stupid bet? How the hell was he going to survive here for another — watch check — eleven days, three hours, and sixteen minutes without checking in back home? Another two minutes ticked by, and Kyle tried not to think about how much he could have gotten done in that time back in New York.

  He flipped onto his stomach, forcing his jaw to relax. He told Len he’d trust him, and he would, even if it killed him. But another day of peace and quiet and he’d be shaking like a junkie in withdrawal. He tried flipping back over, but that didn’t help. Neither did clenching and unclenching various muscle groups, one at a time. The one yoga class Cindy had dragged him to did that to relax, didn’t they?

  Didn’t work back then, didn’t work now. Kyle sighed. How long to dinner?

  Two very long hours, in which time Kyle admitted to himself that he was not the relaxing type, no matter how panoramic the view or how spectacular the sunset. Half an hour before dinner, he was at the makeshift bar, moving an imaginary cursor over an imaginary laptop screen, calling up the day’s reports. When he realized what he was doing, he picked up the drinks menu and winced at the amateurish layout. Three different fonts, no alignment. Like the hotel logo, which was written half in Helvetica, half in Comic Sans. Comic Sans! Kyle wasn’t involved in the design side of his company, but he knew enough to shake his head. The hotel website he’d checked out at home was the same — out of date, badly designed, practically screaming, “Amateur here!” He could picture that tagline right now — it’d be written in Comic Sans, too. It was a wonder he’d found this place at all. No wonder there were only a handful of guests here.

  At least Tiri, the proprietress, had arranged for him to rent a windsurfer the next day, so he’d have a way to kill a couple of hours. Things were looking up — a little.

  “Iaorana.” The sailor chick walked into the bar, greeting the proprietress as if they were old friends.

  Kyle brightened. The only other guests in the hotel were a young French couple who seemed permanentl
y locked in a kiss. In fact, they looked like they’d just rolled out of a steamy afternoon in bed. But sailor chick was alone, so maybe he’d have a little company for dinner. That would help pass the time for sure.

  His hopes rose as she approached his table, then plummeted as she swept straight past. Barely a nod at him before she took a seat at the far table — the farthest possible table, in fact. She flipped open a paperback and immediately buried her nose in it. Some kind of action novel, from the look of the helicopter chase on the cover.

  Kyle blinked a few times. Okay, so maybe she didn’t want company.

  Yet.

  Chapter Four

  Of course, Hannah noticed him. How could she not notice him? But she was still so absorbed in mentally rearranging her to-do list, she couldn’t quite concentrate on the man-view.

  Still, it wasn’t every day she got to stay in a hotel that cost three figures for a single night, so she might as well make the most of it while she was here. No cooking, no cleaning. Just a little downtime and a good book. Lucky she had one, too, because the only other guests were an amorous French couple who finger-fed each other baked fish and never stopped gazing at each other like they were naked and in bed.

  Well, there was the good-looking guy, too, but he was the untouchable type. The kind who reminded her of her high school days: he would have been the popular quarterback, while she was the totally uncool cross-country runner, admiring him from a distance while pretty girls shoved their pom-poms in his face. The most interaction she’d ever get with a guy like him was sitting six tables over at sports recognition night.

  Sweetheart, none of that matters, her mom used to say.

  Except it did. Well, it had. And anyway, the man wasn’t her type. Too polished, too business-minded. She could see it in his ramrod-straight back, his furrowed brow. He probably worked eighty hours a week; you had to to afford a vacation in an exotic place like this. He was everything Hannah wanted to leave behind when she set sail across the Pacific: the hurries, the deadlines, the traffic.