How to Honeymoon Alone

“Five minutes,” Phillip mutters. “Right. So, with the dipshit, you had participation trophy sex?”

I blink at him. “Sex doesn’t have winners and losers.”

“Oh, Eden, it definitely does,” he says. “I like winning… and I like making sure the woman I’m with wins, too. Several times.”

I have to swallow before answering. “Oh.”

“And the matches last longer than five minutes.” His tone is the same matter-of-fact one I’m used to. His eyes meet mine with a hint of humor, laugh creases appearing at the corners… but on his knee, his fingers are tapping away.

Like he’s not quite as unaffected as he’s letting on.

“So, you don’t miss it at all, then?” he asks.

“Sex with Caleb?” I ask. “Or sex in general?”

“Both. Either.”

Heat creeps up my neck, but I consider the question. Consider the man in front of me. It feels like we’re veering into a territory that’s less beach and more quicksand. “Both, in the beginning. Now just the second one. The, um, last option. Sex in general.”

Phillip’s lips lift into a curve. “Tough subject?”

“No,” I say. “Well, maybe a little.”

“We can change it.”

I shake my head. “No, no. Do you? Miss it, I mean?”

He gives a slow nod. “Yeah, I suppose.”

“Mmm,” I say. Breathing feels hard. “That’s natural, I guess. In your relationship then… you two didn’t have… that problem?”

Phillip doesn’t look away from me. “No, but we had plenty of others, don’t worry.”

“Oh. Right.”

He tips his head toward me. “So how long has it been?”

“Since I had…”

“Yes,” he says. The unspoken word in my sentence seems to expand in the empty space between us, growing until it’s all I can hear.

“Well, over three months at least,” I say.

He frowns. “Painful.”

“Well, in the beginning, I was too sad to notice any kind of lack, really.”

“That makes sense,” he says. “And what do you-”

My phone chimes loud enough to make me jump. I reach over to where my bag is lying and dig it out.

The text makes me grin. “Oh my God, the turtles are hatching tonight!”

“What?”

“The turtles, they’re hatching tonight.”This text is property of Nô/velD/rama.Org.

“Did they text you to tell you that?”

I roll my eyes. “No, Jamie did.”

“Jamie?”

“From the catamaran cruise. You remember, right?” I stand up and look back down at my phone. “He’s sending me the location, too. There will be a bunch of volunteers there… we can join them!”

There’s a groan from Phillip’s direction.

“Don’t you want to?” I ask, grinning. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime thing, you know.”

He puts down his bottle. “God, you’re crazy.”

“Yes, but you like a bit of vacation crazy, don’t you? Oh, come with me. It’s going to be amazing.”

He looks at me with something like amused resignation in his eyes. “Fine,” he says. “But I’m holding you personally accountable for the outcome.”

I’m already slinging my bag over my shoulder. “Come on. You can tell me your good riddance on the way.”

The front desk calls a taxi for us. Apparently, it’s not normal for the Winter Resort guests to order one at 10 p. m. to drive to the east coast, because she looks at us as if we’ve lost our minds.

Phillip seems to agree with her.

But he doesn’t say a thing as we get into the car, or when he hires the cab driver to stick around when we get there.

We arrive at the coordinates Jamie had sent, but the place looks dark and deserted. I can hear waves, though, so the beach must be close by.

“We’re probably about to get robbed,” Phillip says calmly by my side, and I can’t tell if he’s joking or not. I think so, but his sarcasm is tough.

“Oh, of course we’re not!” I say. The rum of the last couple of hours has settled into a pleasurable buzz in the back of my head, like a song you can’t help but tap your foot along to. “Jamie and I spoke about this organization during the sunset cruise.”

There’s a surprise in his tone. “You did?”

I nudge Phillip’s shoulder with mine. “Yep. You were on your phone, I believe. Now let’s find this group…”

We walk around the dense shrubbery, and the ground turns from packed dirt to fine sand. The moonlight casts a silvery shadow over the landscape, and through the thickets, I hear waves breaking against the beach.

And then, voices.

“Over here!” someone calls. “It’s starting!”