Hurricanes in Paradise by Denise Hildreth (best ereader under 100 .TXT) 📗

the sun. So let’s say . . .” She looked at the white face of her two-tone Baume & Mercier watch. It was already two o’clock. “. . . six o’clock.”

The doors of the elevator opened, and they walked out onto the geometrically patterned carpet in rich jewel tones.

Riley hesitated slightly again. “Sure . . . yeah, six will be fine.”

“If you had plans, Riley . . .”

“No, no. . . . My job is to make sure you have everything you need. It’s my pleasure. And you just let me know where you’d like to go tomorrow, and I’ll make sure that we have reservations for those places as well.”

“I was going to say, if you had plans, you needed to cancel them.”

She watched as Riley’s head snapped back slightly and her eyes widened. “Oh. Well, no worries, then. Because I didn’t have any plans.”

Riley slipped the key into a room at the end of the hallway and pushed the door open to one of the twenty-six coveted Sapphire Suites. Laine walked across the marbled floors of the foyer and into the expansive space of the seventeen-hundred-square-foot suite. She kept going until she looked straight out through the wall of windows in front of her. The azure ocean seemed to begin where her living room ended. It was as if she could step out the door and walk on the water.

“Do you like it?” Riley asked.

“It’s beautiful. Thank you,” Laine said as she continued toward the double doors that led into the bedroom. She noticed the desk sitting in front of the window and felt a thud in her chest. She stopped abruptly. “Mitchell called you?”

“Um, yes, he did. Why? Is there a problem?”

Laine chewed at the inside of her lip, then turned to Riley. “No . . . no. I just saw the desk.”

“He said you like to look at the ocean when you write.”

Laine walked to the entrance of the bedroom and spoke without turning around. “I’m going to unpack now. I’ll meet you for dinner at six.”

Laine could tell Riley got the message. She heard her feet stepping back onto the marble. “Well, I’ll just leave your keys here on the foyer table. If you need anything before dinner, just let Gerard or me know. We’ll be more than glad to bring you anything. No need to call room service or housekeeping. Just dial one and that will get Gerard, and two will reach me.”

“I’ll be fine,” Laine said as she leaned against the doorframe of the bedroom. “See you at six.” She still didn’t turn around.

When she heard the click as the door closed, she set her Louis Vuitton canvas handbag at the doorway of the bedroom and headed back into the living room. She scanned the inviting tones of the cream sectional; the dark wood coffee table; and the coral accents of sofa pillows, lampshades, and floor-to-ceiling draperies. The colors were similar to the tones the architect had chosen throughout The Cove and were all woven together in a large area rug that rested beneath them as their anchor and in the abstract, hand-painted artwork that hung on the large wall separating the master bedroom and living room. She walked around the sofa and pulled open the large sliding door. The music of the surf, the smell of salt, and the rush of warm air burst through as if they had been toddlers waiting to get inside.

She walked onto the balcony that wrapped around her suite and leaned against the iron railing. As she began to relax, her phone rang. Tension flared. When she reached the phone, Mitchell’s picture stared back. She hesitated. It just made it harder. The more he called, the harder he made it. That’s why she had fired him. She had to eliminate all contact. But he wouldn’t quit contacting her. Her ruby and diamond ring, which was now the only ring she wore, flashed from her right hand as she hit Accept.

“Hey,” she said, turning back toward the open doors and walking out onto the veranda.

“Desk okay?” he asked.

“Mitchell, you shouldn’t have called them. Really. I can move my desk.”

“But I know how you like it.”

She sat in one of two cushioned teak chairs on the balcony, slipped her feet from her shoes, and placed them on the teak ottoman, her French pedicure greeting the sun. “I know you do, Mitchell. But I’ve got a lot of work to do this week, and really, I’ve just got to get all of this behind me. You do too. Please, I need you to leave me alone. You’ve got everything you need. I’ve taken care of you financially. Please . . .”

“You know this has never been about money. I just need to know you’re taken care of, Laine. No one knows how to do that like I do. Sorry if this call disrupted your week.” She could hear his hurt. “I won’t call you again while you’re there.”

“I mean not ever again, Mitchell. Not just not again this week.”

“You really want that? You really want me to never call you again?”

She heard the shift in his tone. But she steeled her voice. “Yes, Mitchell. I’m asking you to never call me again.”

There was a long pause on the other end. She could picture him sitting there behind his desk, baby blue tie that matched the color of his eyes knotted loosely around his pressed, button-down white Oxford with his sleeves rolled up just below the elbows. One hand would be pushing his blondish-brown hair out of his eyes, hair highlighted by the sun from the weekends he spent out on their boat. His boat now.

“Okay, Laine. The next call will have to be made by you. But no matter what has happened to us, despite what brought us to this divorce, please know that I do and always will love you.”

Laine felt the tears fall down her face. She leaned her head in her hands and waited until she could respond without revealing to him the fact that she was crying. “I know. Thank you. Good-bye.” She removed the phone from her