Page 10 of Cruising for Christmas
He could barely see their door from the peephole, but he saw enough to know they opened it.
“Who the fuck was that?” Shay’s irritated voice rang out.
Ian pressed a fist to his mouth to stifle his laugh, while Norah did the same. Their eyes met as their bodies shook.
“Babe, it’s probably just some kids pulling a prank. Let’s go back to bed,” Ryan said.
“Don’t test me, kids. You’ll regret it,” she shouted out into the hallway before going back into the room and slamming the door.
Ian and Norah burst out laughing and stumbled their way back to the bed. Once they both were settled under the sheets and the lights were out, Ian yawned.
“Do it again tomorrow?”
Norah laughed. “Definitely.”
5
The first full day on the cruise was a sea day. Norah attempted to avoid the room when she could. Ian was too good to stare at, and she wouldn’t be able to keep her hands to herself if the dimple-touching incident was any indication.
She wandered around the ship to see what there was to offer. Booking the trip last minute had her going on this vacation blind. The most she had searched was the weather, and Shay told her what types of outfits to bring. She had no idea what the ship offered as far as activities went.
In the middle of the ship, there was an outdoor area filled with plants. Several staterooms looked down on it, but mostly, the place was empty. She walked along the path, finding benches along the outside. A path toward the middle of the plant fortress led to a secluded bench with flowers surrounding it. She took a seat and stared up at the sky. In this area, very few people could see her. Possibly a few of the staterooms on the upper decks could see between the plants, but those people would have to be out on their balconies. It felt like her own private area.
Despite Shay putting both Norah and Ian in an uncomfortable situation, Norah was thankful she had the opportunity to go on this cruise. Aside from getting out of the holidays with her family, which she wasn’t prepared to deal with, she also was going on vacation—something she hadn’t done in a very long time. Since they were outside of the United States, she also left her phone off in the room to avoid incurring high charges. She couldn’t remember the last time she unplugged, and it was oddly freeing. There were no worries of keeping up on social media, text people back, check e-mails, or impatiently wait for texts that never came. Disappearing from the internet and outside connections felt good.
After several minutes of being lost in her thoughts, Norah stood up and left. She stepped back through the automatic doors into the ship, where the activity was bustling. Parents hurried by with little kids in swimsuits, people swarmed the shop windows, and several more people stood in line outside a cupcake shop near the lobby. Norah made a mental note to visit the shop later. Chocolate cake was her weakness.
She followed a stream of people to the stairs that led to the deck above where the pools were located. The doors opened out onto a sunny deck. People were everywhere on the loungers and in the pool. Norah walked through the crowds, making mental notes of the pools and the age groups that surrounded them. An adult-only pool sat on the far end, and she made her way to it. The crowds thinned out on that end. The pool was smaller and had a lot less action going on, but she liked it. She could picture herself picking up a book and lying out on the lounger as the ship made its way to their next stop.
Apparently, she wasn’t the only one with that idea. Ian laid out on a lounger, a book in hand. This had been her first run-in with him on the ship since she left the room. They had done a good job of avoiding each other, not that she knew whether he was avoiding her. But she had certainly been avoiding him. Despite the ship’s enormous size, she suspected she’d run into Shay at some point, but had yet to do that. For all she knew, Shay was spending the day in bed with Ryan.
A zing shot through Norah’s body, lighting her on fire. Ian wore sunglasses, so she couldn’t be sure if he was looking at her, but his head was slightly tilted higher than it had been a minute earlier. And even if she couldn’t see his eyes, she could feel them.
She smiled and gave a small wave. He nodded in return. Then she turned around and left. If he was up here, that meant their room was empty, and she could shower without worrying about getting in his space.
Norah hurried back down to their room and gathered a few of her shower items before stepping into the small bathroom and locking the door. With how small the bathroom was, she wanted to only bring things in in shifts. She could shower and then brush and blow-dry her hair before she went back into the room to swap her items out. Norah looked around the small bathroom, her embarrassment from falling out of it the night before still fresh on her mind. She could do this.
Norah took a quick shower, the water lukewarm. When she stepped out, she grabbed the nearest towel off the rack and held it up.
“You call this a towel?” she muttered. She wrapped it around herself and it overlapped just enough for her to fasten it in front of her, but the bottom of it barely covered her ass.
She swiped a washcloth over the mirror to clear the steam. With the towel wrapped around her, she brushed out her hair and blowdried it. Step one down. Step two was getting dressed. But where were her clothes?
She turned a circle in the small bathroom to only find the clothes she had been wearing that morning in a pile on the floor. She picked them up, and they were slightly damp from the condensation in the bathroom.
Norah groaned.
“Please don’t let Ian be in here,” she whispered as she pressed her ear up to the door. All remained quiet in the room.
She unlatched the door and popped her head out to find the room empty. Letting out a sign of relief, she hurried to her suitcase and dropped her shower items on the floor next to it, along with the dirty clothes, before picking up the fresh pile of clothes she had laid out. Before she could turn around, the click of the door had her turning in horror.
Ian stepped into the room and stopped short. There she was, standing in a towel that was five inches too short in front of her best friend’s older brother.
Kill. Me. Now.
* * *
After their firstnight of sharing a bed, Ian couldn’t get Norah off his mind. The woman was adorable when she slept. She snored like a freight train, which he wasn’t entirely sure she knew. He had been up most of the night—not because of her loud snoring—but because he was sharing a bed with the woman.
