They all laughed.

Victor and Dylan exchanged a look. The woman was on the prowl all right. But did she want a seven-pound reminder of her trip to Tulum?

“You still have time,” Avery told her. “There’s a couple cute guys at the bar.”

They all turned their heads.

Victor frowned.

“Are you talking about the blond guy that looks like he lives on a surfboard?” Shannon asked.

“He is cute,” Dylan said.

“He’s twelve,” Shannon pointed out.

“He’s drinking at a bar, I doubt that,” Victor said.

“Okay, eighteen . . . we are in Mexico.”

He looked more like midtwenties to Victor.

“If he’s single and straight, you could tap that in ten minutes,” Avery challenged.

“You know you sound like a dude, right?” Erasmo asked Avery.

“Hey, women talk as much smack as men.”

Victor saw the game as it was rolling out. He also noticed how Shannon started rubbing her hands on her thighs. He’d bet money that she wouldn’t even try hitting on Mr. College Kid on Spring Break.

“I’d have given my left nut for a lady like you when I was his age,” Victor said.

Shannon snapped her eyes to his. “Are you suggesting I hit on him?”

He couldn’t believe the next words out of his mouth. “I can’t ask you out for three months, apparently. A lot can change in three months.” Like she could find someone to take care of that biological ticking clock. Suddenly his challenge sat like acid in his stomach.

The table went silent.

Shannon pushed back from the table and came to her feet.

Victor’s mouth went dry.

There was no way . . .

“Challenge accepted.”

She’ll turn around.

She’ll turn around . . .

Oh, damn, she isn’t turning around.

Chapter Sixteen

Damp palms and a racing heart . . . you’d think she was at a junior high school formal, asking the popular boy to dance.

The eyes from everyone at Shannon’s table bored into her back as she approached Surfer Boy.

Hearing Avery’s words in her head, Shannon moved in beside her target and leaned against the counter as if she were attempting to gain the bartender’s attention. “I hope you don’t mind me squeezing in,” she said over the noise of the bar.

Surfer Boy turned her way midsentence with his buddy, did a double take, and blew off his friend.

She pushed her hair over her shoulder and smiled.

“Well, hello.” As hellos went, his was suggestive.

“Hello.” She smiled and ignored the nerves jumping in her gut. Okay, so he wasn’t eighteen . . . but it was highly possible he was in his early twenties. Very cute, but cute being the key word. His gaze did a quick up and down. Not gay, she concluded.

“I’m Steve.” He put his hand out to hers.

“Shannon.” She reached out to shake his hand, and he turned it around and kissed the back of it. She wanted to find the gesture endearing, but all it did was make her want to laugh. Like where had he learned that? TV? Netflix?

“You’re stunning,” he said with a wink.

She took her hand back, placed it against her chest. “You’re sweet.” Okay, okay . . . she’d proved her point. The last thing she wanted to do was lead this kid on only to cut him off.

“What are you drinking?” he asked.

“Margaritas, but I can buy my own drink.”

He reached out and placed a hand on her arm.

She looked over her shoulder to see if her party was watching. Three sets of eyes were pinned.

Victor was gone.

“Let me buy you one. It’s our first night here,” he said.

Without being terribly obvious, she wiggled out from under Steve’s hand.

“Is that right? How long will you be here?” Shannon smiled at her admirer and glanced away.

Where is Victor?

“A week. Then it’s back to the grind.”

“Work?”

Steve shook his head. “School. One more year and I’ll be out.”

The bartender stopped in front of them.

“The lady will have a margarita.”

She tried to wave the bartender off. “It’s okay, I can—”

Steve reached for her hand and placed it on the bar. “I insist.”

Okay, no more touching.

She pulled away.

“There you are!” Victor appeared behind her, a hand on her shoulder. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”

She sighed in relief.

“Is she bugging you, young man?” Victor asked Steve.

Steve dropped his hand, his smile gone. “Excuse me?”

Victor turned Shannon toward him, both hands on her shoulders. “Do you really want to blow sixty-two days of sobriety now? You’ve come so far.” His eyes twinkled with amusement.

Lost for words, Shannon stared and blinked.

Victor placed an arm over Shannon’s shoulders and glanced at Steve. “It took me six months to get her into AA.”

Steve stiffened when the bartender delivered the margarita.

All three of them looked at it.

Victor reached into his pocket, tossed a few bills on the counter, grabbed Shannon’s hand, and dragged her away.

“AA? Really?” she asked when they could no longer be overheard.

Victor didn’t answer, he just kept moving. She had to jog to keep up with him. Instead of heading back to their table, he pulled her toward the beach, away from the people, the music . . . the lights.

“Slow down.”

Victor stopped without warning, and she ran into him.

The amusement in his eyes was replaced by something much more heated. “How far would you have gone?”

“What?”

“With the twelve-year-old? How far?”

Oh my God, what was he accusing her of? “He wasn’t twelve, and hello . . . you challenged me.”

“Is that all it takes? A dare?”

His angry questions made her blood boil. She snapped her hand out of his. “You started it.”

“He was pawing you.”

“He was trying to pick me up.”

“And getting somewhere, apparently.”

She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “What is this? Jealousy?”

Victor opened his mouth, closed it.

“You have no right to be jealous. I’ve known you for what, six days? All you’ve done was toss a couple compliments and flirtatious barbs. If I want to hook up with College Boy, I will!”

Victor’s nose flared, tension snapped in the air.

“Fine,” he gritted out between his teeth.

“Fine!” Shannon turned on her heel and made it three steps.

Victor caught up with her, grabbed her hand, and spun her around. “Not fine.”

His lips crashed down to hers, heated with the same emotion she felt bursting from her skin.

She sucked in a breath, stunned still, and let him fold her into his arms.

Victor kissed her with such fierce abandon the only thing she could do was hold on and try to breathe. Her mouth was open, gasping, and he was laying claim everywhere he could.

He’s kissing me.

Oh, God, it had been so long.

The scent of him, the need in him . . . in her.

Shannon’s body caught up with his. She tilted her head and kissed him back, full, open-mouth kisses that skipped anything timid and went right into overdrive. Raw and needy, she wrapped her arms around his back, dug her fingernails into his shirt.

His hands were in her hair, the back of her neck, her spine. He didn’t let her up for air, just kept kissing her for what felt like hours.

Only when his pace slowed down and his kiss became softer did her brain engage. Bad idea . . . it didn’t matter that she wanted this man or that her body was damn near begging for him.

Perfect timing for a baby.

The second the thought popped in her head, Shannon slammed on the brakes. She dragged her swollen mouth away from his. “I can’t.” Her breath came in pants.

“You want this,” he whispered.

No denying her desire, her reactions proved he was right. “But I can’t do this to you.”

He smiled down at her in the moonlight.

Slowly, their breathing returned to normal.

“I want to see you again.”

“We aren’t leaving until—”

“Back home,” he clarified.

She wanted to deny him. “Victor—”

“In three months. Give me three months and then give me a chance.”

What the hell was she supposed to say to that?

He lifted a palm to the side of her face, traced her lower lip with his thumb. “Wait for me. Let me be the next man to kiss these lips.”

“Victor . . .”

“Please, Shannon.”

Three months? Her emotions clashed with common sense. Confusion muddled her brain. “Where did the asshole I met on the plane go?” she asked.

He reached around to the back of her head, moved in close. “A woman in a white bikini chased him away.”

He kissed her one last time, slowly. Thoroughly.

“He was pissed! Holy shit, I didn’t think he could come out of his seat fast enough when that guy started touching you.”

Shannon listened to Avery’s take on what went down at the table after she’d left. They lounged in the plunge pool, as they had nearly every night they’d been in Tulum. The price of the room was worth every penny to shed the suit and swim naked. Maybe the people on the nude beach had found the answer to life.