“What about—?” I started to ask.
“He will find his own return ride to the club,” Han answered.
Awesome. The last thing I wanted to do was give that creep another ride in my “shitty” car. I’d only asked because I was still in responsible teacher mode—a switch I needed to turn off right about now.
Han helped me gather all three surfboards from the beach. And by the time we started the walk back to the car, K Diamond had disappeared from sight.
Cue the relief, but that didn’t make the situation any more comfortable. There was an awkwardness between Han and me now that hadn’t been there when we were sitting on our boards—even during the conversation about my father. And as I stood in the Jeep’s door frame to secure the three surfboards with bungees to the top of my Jeep, I struggled to figure out what to say to the guy who’d saved me from K Diamond twice now in one month.
A mumbled, “Okay, well…thank you for intervening,” was the best I could come up with when I hopped back down to the ground.
He took a step closer. Unlike K Diamond, his cologne hadn’t stood up to the sea. He smelled like ocean, sunshine, and a whole lot of man.
“What did he say to you before I arrived?” he demanded, baring his teeth.
I was so surprised by the question, I answered without any thought of reserve or redaction. “He said that you go through women like toilet paper and that you’d be gone soon. He also said that you’d get sick of me in a few more weeks, a month tops. That you’d ditch me as soon as you saw something you liked better.”
Han regarded me for several heated beats. The look in his eyes…I didn’t know how to describe it. Was it dangerous? Was it hungry? Or both?
I never had the chance to decide for sure. His mouth slammed into mine, and the next thing I knew, he was kissing me.
At least it started out as him kissing me. The press of his lips, the push of his body into mine, the way he ground himself against me as he took full possession of my mouth…that practical switch inside of me—the one that maintained professional distance during classes, read articles on internet marketing, and balanced all my receipts at the end of the month—flipped off without warning.
And suddenly, I was kissing him back, pressing all the soft and achy parts of my body into the hard parts of his.
We were in broad daylight, and K Diamond was gone. There was no reason to put on another show. Nonetheless, desire pooled between my legs. Wanting this, wanting—
He jerked away. And I panted, the tropical breeze biting into my charged skin like an arctic wind.
“Don’t accept anything from him. No lesson requests, no gifts. Nothing,” he said, his voice coarse and more heavily accented than before. “If he tries to contact you again, let me know. I will make him stay away from you.”
“I won’t. I will. And thank you,” I answered, still breathless from that kiss.
I’m tough. So tough. But no one had ever kissed me that way. Hard and rough, like they were fucking my mouth.
“What K Diamond said…” I cut my eyes away, my heart beating weird and vulnerable. “I know he’s a liar. I don’t believe hi—”
“It’s true.” Han cut me off with a hard look. “Every word of it. You should also know I do not do relationships. So do not expect anything more of me. You are lucky to have gotten this.”
I considered his words and straightened, bringing my eyes back up to meet his. “Lucky isn’t how I’d describe having to pay you back the bullshit interest on that bullshit bet with two years of spontaneous service. But if that’s how you want to describe it. Okay.”
Whoever that soft wimp who melted under his kiss had been, she was gone, replaced by the bad-ass surfer who refused to let even the biggest waves intimidate her.
Han scanned my new toughened stance with a glint of amusement in his almost black eyes. “I will also find a ride back to the club. Go home, Jasmine.”
Another command and it made me bristle. Nobody got to order me around. That was half the reason I’d become a surf teacher after shutting down my pro dreams. I’d wanted a career where I called the shots.
But I guess that didn’t count for him. A possession. That was what I was to him until further notice. And as I watched him walk away toward the main road, his half body tattoo rippling over his defined back, and newer, firmer resolution took hold.
I would not play this game with him for the next two years.
I would pay him back. Pay him back and get out of…whatever this was with him.
