“No plans, but there is a list of activities we can do here, so whatever we can all agree on and fit before the five o’clock ferry this arvo. I was thinking beach volleyball first?”
No one dares to disagree with the bride, so after chitchatting about the weather and whether feeding the ibis is really that bad, we all decide to meet down by the volleyball courts on the beach in fifteen minutes.
By the time we reach the beach twenty minutes later—Penny is a notoriously slow walker—Byron and Blake are already hitting the volleyball to each other over the high net while Isabella puts on sunscreen on the sidelines.
“Do they serve cocktails on the beach?” Penny asks me. “Or snacks?”
Honestly, with the amount of food she consumes, she should be much bigger. A spike of jealousy stabs me. She seems to eat and drink whatever she wants, when she wants and how much she wants. All the time. I don’t know where she puts it. I think she’s 60% boobs and then the rest is just a little padding all over. I never noticed it before. Maybe she’s bulimic—this thought makes me feel relieved and mean at the same time.
“I don’t think the waiters come all the way down here. But if you go up there and order, I’m sure you can take it back here.”
She looks behind her at the hotel’s restaurant fifty metres away and shrugs. “Too far.”
“Blake, is Keats coming soon?” Isabella asks, standing up and dusting her bottom.
I can’t tell if she wants her ex-boyfriend to turn up or stay away, especially after the huge pissing contest between the brothers at tobogganing yesterday. Surely, she noticed that they’d almost killed themselves racing down the sand hills.
“He’s got a cracking hangover, shorty,” Blake tells her. “Not sure he’d be much use on anyone’s team even if he did join us.”
“Okay, so we could play two on two with one person sitting out,” Isabella suggests, ever the natural organiser.
“I’ll sit out. I don’t do running,” Penny says. “Especially before ten o’clock.”
“Okay, we can play two versus three—whoever has Penny can have three players.”
Penny flashes Isabella her middle finger, chuckling.
“You’re with me,” Byron says, wrapping his arms around Isabella from behind. “Blake can have with Penny and Jess.”
“Or I could sit this one out, chick. I’ll cheer. Sort of,” Penny says, extracting a tiny tube of Shiseido sunscreen from her beach bag and applying protection all over her exposed fair skin. “You want some?” She offers me the tiny container.
“I’m good.” I don’t want to use up the precious liquid inside. I take out my big bottle of supermarket sunscreen and slather that all over.
Isabella walks up to her and pulls her up off the sand.
“You’re lucky I love you.” Penny reluctantly gets up with a grin, her eyes straying to Blake who is waiting on his side of the volleyball net, spinning the ball on the tip of his middle finger while we get ourselves organised.
Penny’s right. He is gorgeous, and the perfect height for me. I could wear high heels around him and not feel like a tank. I’ve been wearing flats so much these last few months just to stay level with Keats. But other than the fact Blake is engaged, I don’t feel anything for him.
The game starts and Blake and my height advantage immediately has our opponents scrambling as we block shots at the net. Is it petty of me to enjoy kicking Isabella’s much smaller arse? Yes. Am I going to stop? No—especially since we have a handicap with Penny an obstacle on the court. She doesn’t even move to get out of our way.
Keats arrives a few minutes later while my team leads 8-3. He gets put on the other team to even out the numbers and the height difference—now both teams have four members at six feet tall or over, and two short arses barely over five feet. Keats is looking a lot less nauseous, and after he slips off his shirt, I fear our lead might be in danger because now I’m totally distracted by the brothers’ matching lion tattoos.
Keats keeps his sunglasses on but his smile tells me he likes the arrangement as he tries to sail his response to Blake’s serve over my head. I jump and spike it right at his face, biting back a swear word when he dodges the volleyball, easily turning around to set it up for Byron. His brother hits it back to our side, right at Penny’s feet where it leaves a dent in the sand, despite Blake’s valiant dive to reach it.
Isabella cheers, and high-fives her fiancé, barely pausing before she does the same to her ex. Both men grin back at her, totally smitten. Four more straight points later and the three of them are hugging each other like they’re fighting for their lives in The Hunger Games.
“Aww,” Penny says, totally not caring that the score is now tied at eight all.
“It’s a freaking threesome over there,” I mutter under my breath as Isabella takes the ball behind the service line again.
Byron and Keats position themselves near the net like a wall of hotness that so far Blake and I have been unable to penetrate—all of our attempts have been blocked by the McAllister brothers, who have an uncanny knack for knowing where the other is on the court.
Isabella serves again. I back up, my eyes trained on the ball as it arcs over to our side. I jump, aim for Isabella, hit the volleyball, and flatten her already flat chest.
“Ow!” she says as the ball bounces off her, immediately out of bounds. “Geez, Jess!” She rubs the gap between her tiny tits.
Byron and Keats are at her side in a heartbeat, and there’s an awkward pause as Byron waits for his brother to step away, so he can attend to his
