But he kept thinking about Marjorie. How she’d been waiting for him, radiant . . . and he’d stood her up like a coward and was now in hiding.

What a fucking chicken he was.

He knew it, and yet, if the other option was hurting her, he’d be a goddamn chicken if he had to. Anything to avoid hurting Marjorie’s feelings and ruining her time on vacation. So maybe it was cowardly of him, but he had a reason, and a purpose.

“Sir?” Smith asked, interrupting him from his work-slash-mooning.

Rob looked up, removing his headphones and closing his laptop. “What is it?”

“Gortham is staked out on the fourth floor, and he says that Logan Hawkings is hovering at the doorstep to your old suite. He’s making calls trying to locate you.”

Ah, so Logan had come sniffing after him after all. Figured. The asshole just couldn’t resist, could he? “I’ll go up and say hello.”

“Are you sure that’s wise, sir?”

“I’m pretty sure it’s not, but it needs to be done.” Plus, he wasn’t a coward. Logan wasn’t the one he was hiding from, not really. It was Marjorie, and the knowledge that he really, really wasn’t good enough for her and wanted her anyway.

So he headed up the elevator, back toward his old room—the one Logan had kicked him out of so politely—and strolled down the hall.

Logan was still there, phone to his ear. He turned, spotted Rob, and hung up his phone. He stalked down the hall toward Rob, a contrast from his own strolling, forced casual steps. “I might have known you were still here, you piece of shit.”

“Hawkings,” he said broadly, extending his arms in a fake hug. “Come on. You kiss your mother with that mouth?”

“I thought I told you to leave,” Logan snarled. “But no, you decided to play like a dirty dick when you didn’t get your way.”

Irritation sparked, even though Rob knew it shouldn’t have bothered him. He’d been called worse. “Actually, not at all—”

“Going after a sweet, innocent girl just to worm your way into a meeting with me? Don’t you think you’ve gone a little far with that?”

“Now wait just a goddamn minute—”

Logan threw his hands up, just as furious as Rob. “You want a meeting with me? Fine. I’ll meet with you, but you need to leave Marjorie Ivarsson alone.”

Rob clenched his jaw, rage blinding him. “You fucking leave her out of this. She’s mine.”

“You’re the one that needs to leave her out of this,” Logan roared. “She’s an innocent woman and you’re fucking trash to use her like this.”

“‘Use her’?” Now Rob was yelling. “Fuck you, Hawkings. I’m not using anyone.”

“Bullshit,” Logan said. “You win. You get your meeting, but you leave that girl alone.” He clenched a fist. “We won’t tell her about any of this. She’s a sweet, sheltered girl, and it’d break her heart. I’m not about to stomp on her feelings. I happen to give a shit about them.”

“Fuck. You.”

“Like I said. You win. We can meet tomorrow.”

“I don’t want your goddamn meeting. So you can tell me no? Go fuck yourself.”

“Get out of my goddamn resort.”

“If you kick me out, so help me, I will make the biggest fucking scene you can imagine.” Rob gave him a cold smile. “Your wedding is in what, two days? Hate to have a scandal show up on your doorstep just in time for it. The missus would probably be mighty upset.”

Logan’s shoulders heaved, and for a moment, Rob thought the man might punch him. Instead, Logan’s nostrils flared, he gave Rob one last simmering look, and then he stormed away.

Rob maintained his cool until Logan turned the corner. Then, he moved to the nearest wall and put his fist through it, leaving a gigantic hole in the drywall. His knuckles split, but the pain only momentarily dimmed his rage.

Fuck him. Fuck Logan if he thought that Rob was dicking around with Marjorie’s feelings. What kind of lowlife bastard did they think he was?

Worse, what kind of lowlife bastard was Marjorie going to think he was, once they told her the truth?

He punched the wall with his other fist. Great. Now both of them hurt, and he was still pissed.

Chapter Nineteen

When midnight passed and Marjorie didn’t call him, Rob started to get concerned. Surely they weren’t out to dinner this late, were they?

When one A.M. slid into two in the morning, Rob decided to go to Marjorie’s room and talk to her. If she was hurting, he wanted to try to fix it. He knocked on her door, but there was no answer. He texted her. Still no answer. He waited outside of her room for ten minutes, impatient, and then when no one came by, he slipped a credit card into the lock and jimmied it. If she was in her room and ignoring him, the latch would be flipped and he wouldn’t be able to get in.

But a moment later, he was able to get in, and the door swung open. The room was empty. Marjorie wasn’t in.

Where the hell was she?

A twinge of worry cut through him, and he shut the door quickly again, then headed to the elevator.

She wasn’t in the lobby. He searched the gardens, and she wasn’t there, either. The restaurant was closed due to the late hour, and the bar was empty of all but a few booze hounds. He didn’t really think she’d be there—after that one bad evening, she hadn’t drunk a drop.

There was only one place left to check.

Rob headed out to the beach, took off his leather Bettanin & Venturi wingtip shoes, and began to walk the shoreline, looking for a huddled figure and blonde hair.

Sure enough, at the far end of the beach, almost a mile away from the resort, he saw a lonely woman walking the waves and staring out into the distance. From where he stood, she looked fragile and sad, not the strong, smiling Marjorie he was used to.

And he knew in his gut that he’d hurt her tonight. That thought weighed on him like a stone around his neck. His sweet, sensitive Marjorie had been wounded by his callousness. God, he was such a dick.

He walked up to her and waded out ankle high to where she was standing. She didn’t speak, so he looked out on the horizon with her, trying to see what she was regarding. After a moment, he teased, “I hope you didn’t lose your top again. If it’s out that far, we might never find it.”

She didn’t laugh. She just looked over at him with sad eyes. “Why are you here, Rob?”

He tossed his shoes down on the sand behind him and shoved his hands in his pockets, like a guilty kid. “I came out here because I was worried about you.”

“Really? You didn’t seem all that worried earlier tonight when you blew me off.”

“Something came up.”

Marjorie gave him a look that told him she knew he was lying.

“I swear, I never meant to hurt your feelings, Marjorie.”

“Then why did you?” She crossed her arms and finally looked over at him, and he realized she was still in her dress from earlier that evening, all long-legged and beautiful. Her shoes were nowhere to be found, her feet bare as the water rushed over them. “Why was it that after spending all day telling me you couldn’t wait to see me, you suddenly had some ‘issue’ that came up and made you cancel on me? In front of my friends?”

“Oh, is that what the surprise was?” He asked, feigning a grimace. “Man, I’m sorry.”

“You’re not sorry!” She glared at him and then looked away quickly, dashing her hand to the corner of one eye in a movement that made his heart squeeze. “I mean, if it was something I did, at least have the guts to tell me—”

“Something you did? What do you mean?” When she didn’t look at him, Rob moved in front of her and held her by the arms, trying to get her to look at him. She avoided his gaze. “Marjorie, what do you mean, something you did?”

She swallowed hard, her throat working, and kept her head ducked. “It’s just . . . last night was my first night . . . for a lot of stuff. And I thought it was great and that there was no shame in the room, right? But then today, you avoided me, and I couldn’t help wondering if it was something I did or didn’t do—”