Page 48 of Head Over Heels
She couldn’t read his expression behind his sunglasses, but she saw her reflection staring back at her. Damn, but she did rock this swimsuit. “My parents are in India living in a meditation commune for the year.”
He laughed. “Oh really?”
She couldn’t help the quiver of a smile at the corners of her lips. “Yeah, really. I think next year they plan on going to Nigeria to paint.” She wrinkled her nose. “They’re what people like to call ‘free spirited.’”
“How’d you turn out like you did?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You wear Chanel sunglasses.”
“How do you know they’re Chanel?”
“I have two sisters that are label whores.”
She laughed before shrugging. Maybe friends was possible. “I don’t know. My parents are weird as hell, but when my mom got pregnant with me, even they couldn’t figure out how to drag a newborn all over the world. My dad’s from the South Side of Chicago, and when my grandma died, she left him her house that had been sitting empty. So they put aside their traveling and settled until I was eighteen and could fend for myself. So in some ways I had a very traditional childhood, except my parents cleansed the house with sage, chanted a lot, took in visitors from strange lands, and didn’t believe in rules.”
He raised his sunglasses to perch on top of his head. “What do you mean by until you were eighteen?”
They’d taken off the second she’d left for college, but she didn’t want to make a big deal about it. After all, she’d grown up listening to them talk about all the things they wanted to do once they were free, so it hadn’t exactly been a surprise. Wanting to change the subject, she shrugged. “They had things to do and places to see. What about you? What were your parents like?”
Silent for a moment, he studied her like he had questions before his expression cleared. “I grew up with a traditional family filled with a disgusting amount of love and support.”
She wondered what that was like. Her parents loved her, of course. They were great, as long as you didn’t expect anything parental from them. Over the years she’d begun to think of them as friends she was happy she didn’t have to see a lot of. She put on a bright smile. “That must have been nice.”
“It was.” His voice lowered. “What was a teenage Sophie like without rules?”
“Exactly how you’d expect me to be,” she said.
Silence hung in the air before he said, “So about your back.”
She gulped. “What about it?”
“Turn over and let me get it for you. I wouldn’t want all that pretty skin of yours to burn.”
She went tingly all over thinking about him rubbing his hands over her skin. “That’s not necessary.”
He smiled. “Don’t tell me you’re afraid for me to touch you.”
Her brows slammed together. “Oh my God, you’re not honestly trying to dare me, are you?”
“Of course I am.”
“Well, it’s not going to work.”
“That’s a shame.” He gazed down at her with those searing gray eyes. How their coolness burned so bright was beyond her, but he left a trail of fire in his wake. Oh right, she needed to concentrate on making him a friend. Maybe friends that flirted a little. If she could just shift her perception to something like the way she viewed Charlie, it could work. Charlie was gorgeous, and sure they flirted sometimes, all good-natured and sexy, but it didn’t mean anything. She’d always looked at him as a wrong time, wrong place kind of guy.
Not too different from Ryder.
“Maybe I should come lay out with you. I have some reading to catch up on.”
She needed to say no, but instead she shrugged. “It’s a free country.”
How could they establish an easy friendship if she avoided him? She thought of using her list of things to do as an excuse but abandoned the idea. It was Sunday. Sunday was designed around no rules, no obligations, and all play. Wasn’t that why they called it Sunday Funday?
“In that case, I’ll be back.” He turned and jogged down the steps.
She tried not to notice his perfect ass in faded jeans.