Free StealingThe Bride by Yvette Hines

bump into him.
    “Morning to you, too.” She smiled and tilted her head
down for a moment, as if she were shy at been so close to him with people
around after what they had shared the night before.
    “Okay,
Kolby, everything’s locked up. We’re ready,” Mita shouted to him as she waded
through the surf to the boat. Not needing help, after years of practice, Mita
placed her hand on the side of the boat and hoisted herself out of the water.
    Leya
took her seat and he went to the front of the boat to beginning the excursion
at Manta Point. There wouldn’t be any more time to fantasize about a woman he
needed to stay far away from. He had a job to do for the next few hours and it
was damn time he remember that fact.
    *
* * *
    “Oh
my God, that was the most amazing of experiences.” An older man was saying as
all the scuba divers stood in line handing in their tanks to Mita at the water
sports cabana.
    Leya
smiled at the older man as she unzipped her neoprene suit. “It truly was. I do
believe swimming beside those manta rays was a memory I’ll never forget.” She
was glad she’d taken her water camera. She couldn’t wait to get back home and
show the pictures to Kathryn and Summer .
    “For
me it was all the schools of fish. So many fish moving in sync around the reef
and nibbling on the underbelly of the big fish,” a young woman with short blond
hair standing behind Leya, next to a middle age man, added.
    Leya
remembered the woman announcing during the adventure that she and the middle-aged
man, who looked old enough to be her uncle, were on their honeymoon. Leya
couldn’t help but think that the woman had caught herself a rich sugar daddy.
Mentally, Leya shook her head. Finding some wealthy guy and living off him was
not her thing. She much preferred having her own career and making her own
money. Even if she didn’t use what she earned very often.
    Finally
up to the front, she handed in her tank and told Mita which tote bag was hers.
While she waited for the Indonesian woman to return with her things, Leya
wiggled out of her suit. When Mita came back to the counter, Leya exchanged her
wetsuit for her bag. She pulled out a short sundress from her bag, another item
she had purchased on her first day here. Stepping away, she called out a
good-bye to the few remaining from her group as another group stood in line
awaiting their snorkeling gear from a middle-aged Indonesian man.
    She
hadn’t seen Kolby since he helped everyone off the boat. She’d forced herself
not watch where he went or to look out on the ocean and see if he was still on
the vessel. Most likely he had other groups to manage. Besides, they’d had
their one night now it was time for her to focus on what to do the remaining
part of her vacation.
    She
rounded the hut and headed toward the path back to the main portion of the
resort when she heard her name.
    “Leya!”
    Her
stomach tightened and heat radiated along her spine. Those signs alone let her
know before she turned around who called her. Pivoting she saw Kolby a few feet
away from her moving closer, his shoulder length hair blowing in the breeze.
Now out of his short wetsuit, he was dressed in black trunks and a white T-shirt
with beri bantuan on it.
    She
didn’t even attempt to calm her rapid-beating heart, which had kicked up speed
seeing that he sought her out.
    “I
just wanted to tell you that I didn’t sneak away this morning.” He wasn’t even
a little out of breath from his run to her.
    “No?”
    “Not at all. You looked really tired, so I
didn’t want to wake you. I had to take care of a few things before the
excursion.”
    She
was happy to hear that. When she had awaken and found him gone, she figured
that he was just trying to make things easy on them both by not having to make
awkward good-byes.
    “That’s
good to know.”
    “I’m
sure you’re hungry after all that swimming, I know I am.”
    Hungry
wasn’t the word for it. She felt as if she could eat a