Honeymoon - James Patterson [85]
He called to her again from inside the bedroom, the lunch order placed. “Darling, do you realize that you’re not exactly dressed out there?”
Nora replied, tongue in cheek, “I’m just trying to even out my tan lines.” She listened to him laugh. “Besides, this is the French side of the island, honey,” she said.
Earlier in the week, she and Jordan had driven up past Grand Case, over to the nude beach at Orient Bay. Were it up to Nora, she would’ve stripped and made herself at home. Not Jordan. Nothing doing. That was one local custom he had no intention of partaking in. Nora didn’t even try to talk him into it. She’d already come to learn that very rich men with overseas accounts never want to take their clothes off in public. No doubt it has something to do with shielding their assets.
Nora went back inside the villa and slipped into one of the resort’s fluffy white robes. It felt cozy against her skin. She climbed into bed with Jordan and snuggled up against his broad chest.
There was just one problem.
She couldn’t get John O’Hara out of her head. His smell, his taste, the way he seemed to get inside her head better than any man she’d ever been with.
And it made her angry. She didn’t want these thoughts, she didn’t want to be in the arms of someone else, Jordan Mauch or anyone, and be thinking about O’Hara. It hurt too much. What the hell is wrong with me? I don’t fall in love.
“Earth to Nora . . . ,” Jordan said.
She snapped out of her faraway gaze. “I’m sorry, honey,” she said. “I was just thinking how perfect everything is.”
He smiled. “Just another day in paradise.”
They shared a kiss, only to be interrupted by a knock at the door. Lunch had arrived.
Jordan climbed out of bed and pulled open the door. “Thank you,” he said as the room-service attendants wheeled in their large serving table. They were wearing the usual Docksides and shorts, with linen shirts and large straw hats.
Suddenly, off came the hats.
“Hello, Nora. I told you we’d meet again,” said O’Hara.
“Don’t you dare talk to her!” snapped Susan. She drew her gun and took perfect aim at Nora on the bed. “You’re busted, you bitch!”
Then she turned to Jordan Mauch. “And you . . . you’re the luckiest man alive.”
Chapter 112
THAT AFTERNOON A VERY strange and unexpectedly nice thing happened—I got some time off, and I got to spend it with Susan. We wisely decided to check out the beach at La Samanna, which was long, wide, and dazzlingly white. There was even an old shipwreck down the shoreline.
“Are we sure we can trust these local guys?” I asked Susan as we caught a few rays.
“You’re acting like they’re the Keystone Kops, or something,” she said.
I was referring to the gendarmerie, the police on St. Martin.
They’d taken Nora into custody until the extradition papers could be finalized for her return to New York.
“Maybe it’s just me,” I said, “but it’s hard to put a lot of faith in policemen who wear shorts. We’re not even talking about normal ones, either. Did you see those things? They were so tight, I could tell their religion.”
Susan turned to me with an incredulous stare I’d seen many times before. “Shut up and drink your drink, John.”
She had a point. As she always does.
Our police work there was done. Nora was safely in custody, and the case was closed. We’d even checked in with John Jr. and Max back home to see that they were okay with their grandparents, Susan’s mom and dad, who still sort of liked me, in spite of everything.
If just for a little while, Susan and I deserved to be sitting right where we were. Side by side on comfy beach chairs at this unbelievably ritzy resort, watching the sun go down against the backdrop of a beautifully illuminated orange sky. Hell, we’d even gone for a swim together.
I reached over with my mai tai. “Here’s to Nurse Emily Barrows.”
Susan clinked my glass with her piña colada.
I leaned back in my chair and sighed deeply. I felt a sense of satisfaction and an equal amount of relief. I also felt a twinge of something I couldn