Honor Bound Joey Hill (best new books to read txt) 📖

had no idea. Another thing he found so appealing about her. “No, dork. I meant you.”

“Me?” She looked down at herself, then back at him. “Nothing to look at here except a grumbling stomach. Let’s go eat. If I don’t get some coffee soon, you’re going to have to carry me to the restaurant.”

Ella wanted to eat at the coffee shop downstairs. Clay wanted to take her someplace special, somewhere she could enjoy the view and have a good breakfast. She’d balked, but he’d insisted, leading her instead out the front door, where his car was waiting.

“Where are we going?” she asked as the valet opened the door on the passenger side of Clay’s rental car.

Clay slid into the driver’s side and buckled his seat belt. “Not far.”

“Good. You did hear me say I was starving, right?”

The drive was only a few miles up the coast, but the view would be worth it. The restaurant was set on a cliff. He parked and they walked the steep hill from the parking lot to the restaurant.

“Great. Making me burn what few calories I have left before you feed me.”

He glanced down at Ella, who grinned up at him.

“If you faint before we get there, I’ll carry you to the table.”

She laughed and slipped her hand in his.

The restaurant was crowded, as he knew it would be. It was a popular spot, a lot for the great food and made even more so by the view. Floor-to-ceiling windows offered a spectacular show of the sea crashing against the rocks that made up the foundation for the restaurant, which seemed to balance precariously on the craggy cliff. If you sat at one of the front tables, which they did, it would almost seem as if you were hovering over the ocean.

“Wow,” Ella said as she took her seat. “This is definitely worth waiting for.”

“I thought you might like it here.”

“Who wouldn’t? The ocean, the breeze . . . It’s breathtaking, Clay, especially to someone who’s landlocked like me.” She turned her gaze to him. “And you, too, of course. This is amazing.”

“Yeah, I found this place on my last trip here and came back every morning for

breakfast.”

“I can see why. And I’m sure whoever you brought was very a ppreciative.”

He laughed. “I didn’t bring anyone with me, Ella.”

She poured cream into the coffee the waitress had brought. “No? I would have thought Hawaii was a romantic destination, that you’d bring a woman.”

“I come here to go fishing, not for romance.”

She arched a brow. “Could have fooled me.”

He laughed and leaned in, took her hand in his. “Well, not usually anyway.”

“So I’m an exception.”

“Definitely an exception.”

“Then again, what we’re doing together isn’t really romance, is it?”

“What were doing together can’t be labeled.”

She slid her hand away and grabbed her cup, leaned back in the booth. “Sure, it can. It’s just sex, right?”

“Yeah. Right. Just sex.”

Why did it feel like more than that? He of all people knew that he wasn’t capable of anything more than that with a woman, and especially someone like Ella, who was all about emotion and permanence and marriage. That wasn’t where his life went. They’d agreed it would be sex with no strings. She seemed happy with the arrangement.

So what was irritating him?

After breakfast, they headed down to the beach, where Clay chartered a boat.

Ella stepped aboard, helped out by one of the crew. She turned to Clay. “How many others will there be?”

“Others?”

“Yes. Other people in this group excursion.”

His lips lifted. “Oh. None. This trip is private. Just you, me and the crew. I thought we’d tour the island, maybe stop somewhere and snorkel.”

“Really?”

He loved when she was excited and happy. Her eyes lit up like a child’s. And she hadn’t been pumped up about anything in a long time. He was happy to give this to her. “Yeah, really.”

They sailed out of the port and onto the open sea, heading out at a leisurely pace. Clay led Ella to the front of the boat where there were cushioned seats waiting for them. The sun was out and warm, so he shed his shirt and kicked off his sandals.

“Oh, great idea,” Ella said, and stood, pulled off her tank top and shucked her shorts.

Damn. Even though he’d had her naked last night, the sight of her in her bikini was enough to make his mouth water and his dick twitch. She had smooth skin, she was slender and well built, and she fit a bikini like a model. Yet she wasn’t perfect. She bore scars here and there—minor injuries incurred from working construction alongside her crew. Her hands were calloused, her nails short and scraggly, and her feet looked as though they spent the day stuffed in work boots.

Maybe that was what he liked so much about her—she wasn’t buffed, puffed and

polished, didn’t look as if she spent her days at the gym and the spa being pampered. She worked for a living, just like he did. She had a fundamental understanding of what his life was about, which was light-years away from any woman he’d ever dated. He could

actually carry on a conversation with her—hell, he wanted to talk to her, which was rare with the women he was usually with.

She pinned him with a curious stare, her hands on her hips. The wind blew her hair across her face. “You taking inventory?”

He grinned. “Maybe.”

“Well, stop it. It freaks me out. I know I’m not perfect.” She slid into one of the cushioned chairs and propped her feet across the raised deck of the bow.

“I know. I was just thinking that.”

She slid her sunglasses over her eyes. “Gee, thanks. You sure know how to compliment a woman. I’m amazed you get as many dates as you do.”

“No, I was thinking that I can appreciate how imperfect you are, because I’m not perfect.

These scars, for instance.” He lifted her arm and traced his finger across the faint ridge on her forearm.

“Damn weld burn. Went right through my shirt.”

“Yeah.