Page 72 of The Romance Adventure
“I had my drone from the skydiving trip and took some footage out by the tree where I found you earlier. Captured the road into town all the way out to the peninsula. Figured it would help you and we could use some of it to track our progress on the resort.”
“A little before and after action?” Seems my guy is going through a transformation of his own. I squeeze my arms around him. “Thank you. This is going to be awesome. I have a special surprise too. But my lips are sealed.” I wink.
As if words of praise and recognition aren’t Royal’s love language, he turns to the painting on the wall. “You said you just paint murals. Isla, this is a work of art. The way you made it look like the books washed to shore and the dock built of books, and the cat mermaid—?”
“Oh, that’s nothing.”
“It’s magnificent.”
Maybe my love language is words of praise, at least when coming out of Royal’s mouth. He’s usually so set on looking like he’s going to destroy everything in his path—what with the full-lipped pout and those pewter eyes—when he likes something he sees, it’s refreshing, a small miracle.
I pour us each an iced tea, then drop into the loveseat. Turns out that painting and solving small-town mysteries that I didn’t know existed is exhausting.
Royal joins me. Because the plush chair is so smooshy, we kind of sink together at the seams. I let myself lean into him because I can’t get enough of the heart hiccups at his touch.
He continues to take in every detail of the bookish seascape design. “You’re talented. Wow.”
“Careful with those compliments, Royal.”
He angles to face me as if seeing a new side of Isla Pratt—not just a goofball bundle of sunshine, but a real artist. My mother’s opinion of me would’ve mattered. Bean’s opinion definitely does, and so does Royal’s, as it turns out. I want him to see and know that there are various dimensions to me, not just a woman who fled Charleston because of a bad boy decision. ...And I’m starting to believe that Royal was the best one I’ve made in a long time.
“Everything I said is true,” he says.
“It’s better if you don’t give me the wrong idea.”
“That you’re immensely talented?”
I playfully swat him. “Stop being so nice. I might just start liking you.”
His eyes dip to my lips. “What if I told you that—?”
“What are you love birds doing in the loveseat?” Bean stands in the doorway of her shop, but instead of the sharp brow of an angry parent scolding us, a smile plays on her lips.
Nutmeg stands at her side looking rather smug, though, as if she’s just waiting for us to be told there won’t be any dessert with dinner tonight.
“Look, I painted your cat.”
My sister glances down at her feline.
“No, I didn’t paint the actual cat. I added her to the mural.”
I catch Bean’s grin as I grip Royal’s hand and we run out of the shop like two teenagers almost caught smooching. We don’t stop until we’re at the end of the dock. We drop to sitting, letting our toes skim the water.
“Sorry about the abrupt departure, but I didn’t want to miss out on this,” I whisper before bridging the space between us.
We kiss and it’s as spectacular as the first time. Kind of like how seeing fireworks never gets old or how I’d never tire of eating ice cream.
However, whereas at the start of our initial kiss, Royal was hesitant, now he’s sheer confidence, a man who knows what he wants and how to get it. The thing is, in this short time, he’s figured out what I want—how I like when his fingers thread in my hair, the gentle press of his thumb along my chin, and the exact moment to switch sides before my neck gets tired.
A smile on my lips builds toward a laugh, but I hold back.
His mouth goes still and he asks, “What?”
“Who knew this could be so perfect?” I say.
Royal chuckles. “Not me. Not even close. Yet you’re right. It is perfect.”
We return to the kiss and it intensifies as if we each want to catalog the exact ways we fit together, complement each other’s contours, and know the precise measure of when to give and when to take.
