Yours: A Standalone Contemporary Romance Read Online Free Page B

But it has the additional benefit of being true. I’m doing this for you, Leanne. Carlos is better for you than I am for more reasons than I care to go into. Please believe me when I tell you I’m doing you a favor.”
    She’s disgusted, now. “God, you’re full of bullshit lines, aren’t you?”
    “Pretty much.”
    She blinks back tears. “Any other lines you want to feed me?”
    I think for a moment. “You’re gonna make some guy really happy. I just wish that guy could be me.”
    A nod. “That one is nice and traditional. Any more?”  
    “I think that’s it.”  
    She takes a deep breath and I’m asshole enough to enjoy the way her breasts swell. “You’re unbelievable.” She turns away, takes a few steps across the room to the doorway leading to the rear deck. But then she stops. “You know, I really thought there was more to you than the rich adrenaline-junkie playboy. I really did. I hoped there was. Guess I was wrong.”
    “Guess you were.”  
    I let her get off the boat and onto the pier before I stop her. “Lee?” She turns back, and fucking dammit if there isn’t still a glimmer of hope in those brown eyes. “You know what sucks?”
    “That I always seem to fall for the asshole?”
    “Well, yeah, that too. But no.”
    “Then what?”
    “They weren’t just lines. Every single word was true.”  
    She shakes her head, rolls her eyes, huffs, turns on a heel and flounces away. “Yeah, sure. I fucking bet they were.”
    No point arguing. I let her go, and once she’s gone I throw myself onto the couch running along the outside of the stern deck. I crack open a brand new bottle of Lagavulin, and work on blacking out.  
    I’m not man enough to face the ghosts of all the things I regret.  

    *   *   *

    Two weeks later
    All the wisdom I’ve gathered in the two weeks I’ve been kicking it in the islands around Cape Horn tells me it’s a fool’s errand to try this passage, no matter which route I take—there’s the Straits of Magellan itself between the mainland and Tierra del Fuego, or Beagle Channel between Tierra del Fuego and Isla Navarino, as well as numerous other routes between the Wollaston Islands and Hermite Island. The problem is—as those in the know tell me—all of them are dangerous. They’re all narrow, fraught with wicked, unpredictable winds, strong currents, and are dotted with icebergs and outcroppings of rock. The Drake Passage is the safest, being the widest, though the most southerly, but it’s still no cakewalk by any stretch of the imagination.
    So, of course I pick the hardest: Beagle Channel. I hire experienced sailors to crew for me—there will be no eye candy on this trip.  
    We bomb it, hard and fast. The water is jade green, choppy, tossing us up and down and side to side. It’s fucking cold as balls, and the wind whips and howls nonstop, cutting like a knife, driving us to dangerous speeds, even without trimming the sails too tight. Mountains rise on every side, snow-capped and cloud-crowned. Despite the danger, it is thrillingly beautiful.
    I let the sails belly in the driving wind, haul them taut, ignoring the wise advice of my crew to slow down. We tip as we tack, the wind nearly pushing us over—it’s only a rush if it’s dangerous. I only feel alive if I’m encroaching on death, if I’m toeing the bleeding edge of insanity.

    *   *   *

    Santiago, Chile
    A month and a half later

    After the harrowing trip around Cape Horn I take a while to rest up and to get the Vagabond checked out and re-stocked. The crew I hired for the passage takes their leave of me in Santiago with hefty bonuses all around, considering the risks I took with our lives on that passage. I take on a month’s worth of food and water and spend a bunch of money on new fenders and lines and such, although, all things considered, the boat is in great shape.  
    I haven’t climbed a mountain in a while, and Santiago seems to be as good a place as any to put that to