I’m awake before sunrise. It’s still relatively cool, so I put on my running gear and hope that the exercise will shake the restlessness I haven’t been able to dispel since I got here.
By the time I make it to the Kapalua Coastal Trail, the sun has risen enough to ensure my run along the volcanic rock path is safe. The air smells sweet, and the water is the deepest blue. When the waves crash against the cliffside, the whitewash splashes up and glitters in the morning light. Even though I’d still rather be back at work, I do appreciate the beauty and tranquility of this spot.
After I’ve run the entire route, about four miles round trip, I stop and take advantage of a natural formation that works as a chair. I sit and stare out at the ocean for a long while. The regret I have for how impulsively I broke up with Bryce is something I can live with. I don’t want him back. I just wish I had dealt with it better. It’s the mistake I made at work that bothers me more. My instinct is to redouble my efforts, to work even harder. But there’s a part of me that isn’t sure that will get me what I need. Because I’m starting to understand that I need some kind of change in my life. I’ve finally begun to think I need a real life. One that is about more than work.
I just don’t know if I’m even capable of opening myself up to that.
* * *
After showering and grabbing a quick breakfast of local fruits and coffee, it’s still only seven o’clock. That means another long day stretches out in front of me.
Before I can convince myself otherwise, I call for my rental car at the valet and set off in search of a store to buy a laptop, not even thinking of the fact that such stores wouldn’t be open at this hour.
A working vacation is better than nothing, I rationalize as I fiddle with the GPS. I’m not all that far from the hotel when I realize I’ve started in the wrong direction. I have to go several miles more before I can find a spot to make a U-turn. Just as I get going on the road that will lead me to some kind of civilization, a chicken appears in front of me.
Yes, a chicken.
Tons of wild chickens roam all over the island, and everyone just lets them be. It’s a little weird.
This particular chicken startles me so much that I slam on the brakes and swerve onto a dirt road, not wanting to hit it. Coming to a stop, I try to catch my breath. My adrenaline is pumping.
Over a chicken.
Laughing, I shake my head.
Once more, however, I need to find a spot to turn around. I slowly continue down the rust-colored dirt path. The road isn’t wide enough to make an easy turn, so I keep going, hoping it will open up. On either side of the road, tall green grass cast golden by the morning sunlight, waves in the breeze. It feels like it’s just me out here, and for a moment, I don’t mind. I don’t think about my mission to go find a laptop. I don’t think about how much longer I have to stay on vacation. I don’t think about the mistakes I made. Instead, I roll down my window and put my arm out, letting my fingers graze the tips of the grass as I go unhurriedly by.
It’s a fleeting moment of peace because soon I’ve come to the end of the path. It overlooks the ocean from at least two stories above and is a breathtaking vista. I drag my eyes away from the expansive blue water and realize the area has opened up with plenty of room to make a U-turn, even with the handful of other cars parked here.
Deciding I’d better use this opportunity to get a better sense of where I’m going, I park the car, grab my cell phone, and step out. The salty air is humid as I watch the scattering of surfers down below. A few of them catch a long, rolling wave, but most hold back. It’s hard to tell from here whether the waves would be considered “good.” What I can see is that there are a lot of rocks, even a large outcropping, that must be avoided. It looks dangerous, leading me to think that the surfers must be well experienced if they’re out there.
Turning to my phone, I quickly find that I have absolutely no service. I fiddle with it anyway, hoping that if I angle it one way or the other, I’ll get a couple of bars. Nothing. Desperate, I hold it up over my head and wave it around a little.
“If you add a little hula dance, it just might work.”
I gasp at the suggestive words directed at me, turning to find a grinning man to my left. It takes me a second to realize how foolish I had probably looked as I contorted to try to find a signal on my phone and that this stranger is teasing me over it.
Check that.
This gorgeous stranger.
The man is tall with lean, sculpted muscles straining against his thin T-shirt, a chiseled jaw lightly covered by the scruff of a beard, and defined cheekbones. His skin is tan, his eyes are pale brown with gold flecks, and his medium-brown hair is on the shorter side and untamed. But it’s his playful smile that does me in. And it’s the upturn at one corner of his mouth that has me wanting to taste his lips.
There’s an expression in Spanish that perfectly captures how positively delicious someone like him is: Es un mango.
He’s a mango. A sweet, juicy fruit.
“I was just playing,” he says, thankfully pulling me from my completely inappropriate thoughts. “Odds are good you won’t be able to use that thing out here, though. You need help with something?”
Uh, yeah, I need help. I need help pulling my tongue up off the dirt and back into my mouth. Figuratively, at least. He is objectively one of the finest men I’ve ever seen. And he’s left me speechless. I realize I must look like one of those hyper-dramatic actresses in a telenovela, at a loss for words when faced with a handsome stranger. I remind myself that I’m a thirty-year-old attorney and that I need to snap out of it.
“No, no thank you,” I say, standing taller. “I’m fine.”
“You sure about that? You really seemed to want to get that phone to work.”
God, even his voice is sexy. It’s deep, but with a hint of raspiness.
I can’t remember the last time I was so intensely attracted to someone. It sure wasn’t like this with Bryce. I mean, he checked all the boxes: handsome, smart, in great shape. But there was no real heat between us.
And even though this stranger is still eyeing me with amusement, waiting for me to answer, and probably thinking I’m some sort of flaky weirdo, heat is exactly what I feel between us.
“I, um,” I start. “I was on my way into town, actually. But one of those crazy chickens ran me off the road, and I turned down here sort of by accident.”
He laughs, but it doesn’t feel like it’s at my expense. Not when his eyes are so warm, his expression so open. There’s something both boyish and world-weary about him. The combination doesn’t make sense, but it is incredibly compelling.
“Yeah, those chickens don’t exactly follow the rules of the road. But that’s a good thing for you, isn’t it?”
A red flag goes up with that last comment. It makes me think he’s about to give me some obnoxious come-on line about how that chicken running me off the road brought me to him and doesn’t that make me a lucky little lady?
“How’s that?” I ask, a challenge in my voice.
“If it weren’t for that crazy chicken, you may have just blown on by and never seen one of the most beautiful parts of Maui,” he says with a grin.
“Oh.” I feel foolish for presuming ill intent from him.
“This is Honolua Bay. If you go down that way a bit more, you can find a rad jungle trail to the water. But it’s pretty rocky and not that easy to get into the water. Once you do, though, if you swim out past the shallow, you’ll find a snorkeling paradise.”
“Is that what you’re doing here?”
“Nah. I’m here to hopefully catch some waves.” He glances over my shoulder at the water, and I can tell he’s anxious to be in it.
“Don’t let me stop you.”
His eyes drift back to mine. And then they slide downward, surveying me. Every inch of me.
The gauzy white slip dress I’d thrown over my ruby-red bikini falls short against my thighs. I’ve always thought that my legs, shaped by the quick, high-intensity runs I squeeze into my schedule whenever possible and accentuated by wedge sandals, are one of my best features. By the way this gorgeous stranger is eyeing me, he would seem to agree.
“Listen, uh, I’d invite you to join me in the water down there,” he says, tearing his eyes from me, “but it’s not the best place for a casual swim.”
“That’s okay. I’m sort of on a mission, anyway.”
“Right. You said you were headed to town?”
“Yeah. I’m desperate to buy a laptop. I need to check in on a case.”
“A case? That sounds like lawyer-speak. God, I hate lawyers,” he says absently and I cringe. Thankfully, he doesn’t notice, as his eyes have once more been drawn to the water below. “Uh, you’re not a lawyer, are you?”
“A lawyer? Me? No. Um, nope.” Why I felt the instinct to lie to him baffles me, but there it is.
“Oh, good.” He graces me with that crooked grin once more. “Well, Hula Girl, good luck with your mission.”
“Thanks.” That one word trails off prematurely as I watch him pull his T-shirt off, revealing a chest that makes my mouth water. It’s smooth, except for ridges of muscles. The exquisite definition I noticed earlier in his arms is matched on his torso and even down to his hips where his black and gray swim trunks are slung low enough to showcase a perfect V.
He turns to the bed of a Chevy pickup truck that has seen better days and pulls a surfboard from it.
I hesitate longer than I should before forcing one foot in front of the other toward my rental car.
“Oh, hey,” he calls out.
I whip around to face him once more.
“There’s a little place, a locals’ place for food and drinks, called Makai’s. I’ll be there tonight after eight. Why don’t you stop by? That is if the chickens don’t run you off the road.”
His smile is a tease. A flirt. An invitation.
It makes me melt like a teenager. I struggle not to show the effect he has on me.
Clearing my throat, I give him a noncommittal shrug. “Maybe.”
He nods before securing the surfboard under his arm and making his way barefoot down a barely defined red-dirt trail.
Instead of going my own way, I edge closer to the cliffside, watching his descent. It’s not an easy path, but he manages to glide down. Within minutes, he’s reached the water’s edge and has carefully climbed onto the rocky entry, finding just the right spot to drop his surfboard before diving in after it.
Now that I have the perspective of watching someone in particular, rather than random bobbing figures, I realize that the waves are big. Bigger than any I’ve ever seen in person. My gorgeous stranger soon mounts his board and rides a glassine wave with ease, though. He navigates the rocky shoreline as if by instinct, dropping off the board before he gets too close to danger. I spend the next twenty minutes transfixed by his grace in the water, enjoying what appears to be his natural talent for surfing.
But then he looks up and spots me. He’s straddling his board, in a lull between waves. I can see his grin even from this distance, and I’m mortified to have been caught watching him. He, however, seems amused as he raises a hand and flashes the hang loose sign.
I finally turn away, wondering what I was doing staring at this surfer boy.
Time to focus once more on my mission.
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