“You like it?”
She nodded. “We’ve seen a lot of boats, but this window seat is a nice touch, Oliver.”
She crossed the room and hoisted herself up on the bed, her bare feet dangling off the edge. She sighed and he closed his eyes at the piece of bare skin that appeared between the band of her cropped jeans and plain yellow T-shirt as her arms stretched above her head to fall onto the bed. “This is next-level comfort.”
Oliver shook his head and then let himself fall beside her, making her giggle as the force of his weight bounced her up. “You’re welcome to share it,” he said, wagging his eyebrows at her lasciviously.
“Always a flirt,” Molly lamented with a responding smile. “You can’t even help it, can you?”
Oliver shook his head. He could, of course, but being relentlessly charming was basically his most effective life skill. “I’m afraid it’s a terminal condition,” he said gravely.
He felt her shoulders shake before her laugh actually started. “Well, Captain, at least we’ll be able to bury you at sea.”
“A true sailor’s death,” Oliver confirmed wistfully. “I couldn’t ask for more.”
A small smile still on her face, Molly said, “I think we’re going to have fun this month, Oliver.” Then a big breath in and a sigh. “Lord knows, I need a break. I can’t tell you how much this means to me. Thank you for being such a good friend.”
Oliver took her hand in his and squeezed. “We’re going to have the best time of our lives, Molly, and by the time we’re done I promise your problems will be only memories.”
Molly squeezed his hand back, her head turning to his on the mattress. This close he could see the lighter brown streaks in her eyes and wished he could take away all the hurt in them. All he could offer her was a luxury yacht voyage and companionship to let time pass by more easily.
“I know you’re right,” she told him. Then she looked up at the ceiling and snorted. “I should have known you’d put mirrors on the ceiling.”
He shrugged, the motion invisible with his shoulders buried in the fluffy duvet. “You know I like looking at myself as I fall asleep. My beautiful face comforts me.”
Molly pushed lightly at his shoulder. “You’re not as vain as you want people to think.”
He wasn’t not vain, but she was probably right. There were a lot of things he’d worn as armor in his old life that he hoped to put away while he was on this ship.
“I’m so pretty it makes my own teeth hurt,” he persisted, jumping off the bed before he did something stupid like touch her. “That’s why I also did this.” Then he pressed a button on the wall and the mirrors went black.
“Well, aren’t you fancy?” Molly said, sitting up on the bed. “You’ve definitely made this boat your own. I’m proud of you, Oliver.”
Those simple words so freely given clenched at his insides. Molly gave everything she had away for free and he soaked it up like a dead-inside sponge, so unused to someone offering a compliment without an ulterior motive. Hell, he rarely did it himself.
He took her through the rest of the boat before they returned to the sky lounge on the top deck and settled in. There was some business to take care of before they hit the open ocean.
“Oooh,” Molly laughed, wiggling around in the lounge chair, big white sunglasses perched on her nose and the breeze gently blowing a strand of hair over her face, “this chaise is deluxe. I could definitely get used to this.”
He grinned. “I think you’ll like the chef, too. I’ve heard good things. He worked for a friend in the city so I got to sample some of his dishes and his chicken paillard was the best I’ve had.”
“I’m really excited about it. You know how I feel about cooking,” she told him, her hands stilling on the tablet in her lap.
“How could I possibly forget you endlessly burning your grilled cheese?” She’d set off the fire alarm more than once on their first boat together.
“In my defense, I’m also the person who has to fix something if it goes wrong, so no harm no foul.”
“It hardly makes it more acceptable,” he pointed out, taking a sip of the tequila on the rocks the chief steward had brought him. “I still don’t understand why you, a woman of science, refuse to believe that cooking something on high is a bad idea.”
“Things take too long to cook if they’re not on high,” Molly complained.
“Not if you count the number of times you have to remake everything that you burn to a crisp the first time,” he said blandly.
Molly laughed, turning her head to meet his eyes where he was sitting at the bar. “Details.”
He shook his head as she tapped away on the tablet, adding her requests to the provisions list. “What are you putting on there?”
“Lots of cheese and bread,” she said, a goofy smile on her face.
He shook his head at her. “We’ll be on the water without a chef for the first couple weeks, so I’ll cook. We’ve also only got a skeleton crew, so only one interior steward and one deck crew person, but I’ll help out where needed obviously.”
“Sounds good,” Molly nodded, handing him the tablet. “Your turn.”
Oliver looked down at the list of items she’d requested be ordered from the grocery as well as any last-minute items from department stores they might need for an extended sail that hadn’t fit in their luggage.
“You literally requested fifteen pounds of various cheeses,” he said, floored. “You do understand how much cheese that is, right?”
Molly had a mischievous look on her face as she climbed off the chaise and took the seat beside
