Instead of looking at him in disgust and going to seek better company, Mandy licked the cream off her finger and shot him a wicked look. “I’m in charge of your schedule. Maybe next week you’ll find baseball penciled in for Saturday at one o’clock. The Yankees are playing.”

“You would, wouldn’t you?” His assistant was efficient, he’d give her that.

“Yep. I have access to your credit card.”

He laughed in spite of himself. “Get two tickets then. You and me.”

“You got it.”

And at that moment, it occurred to him that he was sitting back in his chair, completely relaxed, and not one thought about his laptop lying idle in his room had crossed his mind.

He was on vacation and it didn’t hurt.

Wonders never cease.

“Walk with me.” He stood up and tossed his napkin on the table. There were a hundred people around, dancing to the live band, eating their dinners at the dozens of candlelit tables set up on the sand. Crowds didn’t bother him—he usually liked to get lost in an anonymous crowd—but here, tonight, he wanted to be alone with Mandy.

He had changed his mind about his assistant. He no longer wanted to avoid her. He wanted to kiss her.

To taste those full pink lips and draw her into his arms, hand in her soft wavy hair. To absorb her feeling, her scent, take her all into him and remember what it was like to know passion, pure tactile pleasure.

Damien stuck his feet back in his sandals, but Mandy shook the sand off hers and put them in her bag. “Where are we going?”

“Nowhere. Just walking.” He gazed at the horizon. “I’ve forgotten how to do that.”

Every step he took had a purpose, every thought in his head task oriented. He didn’t walk for pleasure, he didn’t indulge in daydreaming.

But as the sun started to sink and the palm trees danced in the breeze, he wanted to walk and do nothing, be nothing, pretend that he was normal, a whole human being, who could have a beautiful woman at his side.

Mandy put her arm through his, leaning on him a little as they started to walk. He liked the feeling, like she trusted him. Like she wanted to touch him.

“Are you happy, Damien?”

The question caught him off guard, made him give a snort. He wasn’t even sure what happiness was, or that it existed. He believed in hard knocks; he believed in hard work, but happiness? It was nothing but a faint, fading memory.

They were walking past beach vendors who hawked their T-shirts and jewelry and artwork from their makeshift shacks. Damien was saved from answering by an aggressive salesman calling out, “Señorita! Hola…I give you good price, come see. Pretty bracelet for a pretty woman.”

Mandy shook her head with a smile. “No, thank you.”