Double Fault

Chapter 18

FLROENCE'S POV:

Pierre, Kika, and I were sitting in the back of the smaller transport boat being bounced up in down, while Charles drove us back to home base at the yacht.

I kept my eyes on his back flexing as he would turn the steering, and then I paid attention to his hair catching the wind and the bandana he used to keep the hair away from his face. His skin, along with all of ours, had been tanned and kissed by the sun over the last week.

Besides the athletic clothes we all had on this morning, we lived in our swimsuits the entire week and enjoyed being away from the rest of the world. By day two all of us gave the yacht's landline number to any important people, and turned our cellphones off leaving them in a basket in the living room. No one had bothered ringing us on the boat though, including my dad. Relaxation oozed out of me, and I wasn't ready to go back. Pierre and I managed to get our morning workout in everyday, then the rest of the days were filled with swimming, games, naps, reading, and whatever we wanted. Then we would alternate between who prepared the meals.

When it was time for bed, Charles and I would enjoy the alone time emotionally and physically. Right now was about getting to know one another fully, and seeing where it would take us. It was obvious both of us were on a crash course to a relationship. Kika would make it clear each night at dinner. Damn, can you two just make it official already? The tension is killing me. She was right, at this point I was head over heals for Charles, but I was content of being together without having to worry about what to call it.

I let my mind come back to today. It was the final full day, and we had just finished at the tennis courts. The group finally talked me into playing doubles tennis at a nearby yacht club. I had avoided their pleas all week, but I finally gave in this morning.

I couldn't hide my amusement while the staff freaked out over my presence and had no idea who the famous drivers were. The manager of the tennis courts was beyond friendly offering us the nicest court, free services to play, and lunch on the clubs dollar. We enjoyed it all, and I made sure to take pictures with each staff and left them with some signed merchandise.

The actual doubles tennis reminded me of how much tennis is appreciated as a social game. I couldn't remember the last time I hit around for fun, and I found myself falling in love with the sport all over again.

Kika and Charles were fun to play with and kept me laughing the entire time, but it was easy to tell Pierre was quite good and had played many of times. The first match we played was couple vs. couple, and it was full of lob shots, running around, trick shots, balls into the net, and Kika claiming she almost peed her pants from laughing too hard.

Kika then begged me to run a little clinic, and I did my best to refuse until Pierre demanded it. They wanted to know what it was like to take the serve of a pro, so the next 30 minutes was spent with Kika, Charles, and Pierre standing in a line taking turns to try and return my real serve. They managed to get a handful back to me, but I made sure to show off my volley to put it away.

We played another doubles match boys vs girls and Kika pulled me aside before the game began. "I know you took it easy on Pierre and I earlier. I'm gonna need you to not hold back, we are fucking destroying them."

I turned up my game a little bit, putting some more challenging shots up, and Kika was relentless with her shit talking. We still had plenty of laughs during the match, especially when Charles tried to challenge some of my baseline shots out of frustration, but overall it was pretty competitive. Kika celebrated when she made the winning volley of the match, doing her best impersonation of winning a slam.

"Earth to Florence," Kika said pulling my attention back to the present. We were back to the yacht.
~
Charles and I were preparing the last dinner of the trip while Kika and Pierre were finishing up the puzzle we had worked on all week. We were making a pasta seafood medley from scratch with fresh seafood Charles picked up from Monaco the night before. There were scallops, clams, and muscles steaming on the stove, and Charles and I were working on the homemade pasta. I was running the dough through a crank that was forming the noodles when I felt Charles tap my shoulder. I turned around to face him when a puff of flower hit me in the face.

"I hope you're kidding," I scoffed reaching up to clear my eyes. Charles ran around the the other side of the island eyeing me trying to hold in his laugh.

"Excusez-moi, I sneezed," he grinned.

"Viens m'aider [come help me]," I said with a pout. Charles walked over grabbing a kitchen towel and began patting at my face while also kissing my nose, cheek, and forehead in a flirty attempt to help clean. Sorry was pouring out of his mouth between breaths. I let myself giggle while I let my hands go behind me feeling for whatever I could grab. My hands landed on the carton of milk. While Charles continued his attack of kisses against my face, I brought my lips to his distracting him with a kiss. With the carton in my hand I reached my arms up like I was reaching for his hair, then tipped the carton over his head. The milk dumped onto his hair, spilling all over his back and into our faces. He quickly parted keeping our faces close, his eyes shocked as he stepped back. "Oops," I whispered slipping out of his grasp and trying to run out of the kitchen. Before I was a few steps away I already felt his hands around my waist catching me. He spun me around and picked me up on the counter, standing between my legs. My efforts to get away didn't work, not that I was trying that hard.

"Tu es mon problème [you are my problem]," Charles almost growled, his eyes heavy on me. He kissed me passionately knocking the breath out of me. I was consumed by him, kissing back as I could feel the milk dripping down our faces. My legs wrapped around his waist and he lifted us walking. I did my best to not lose focus, moving to my kiss to his jawline down to his neck. While my mind was consumed with him, I knew we were moving throughout the yacht.

"I hope you forgive me," Charles breathed out finally pulling me back. Before I could open my mouth to respond, there was a feeling of falling. The ocean then surrounded us, and I unlatched myself kicking up to the surface!

"You ass," I yelled when Charles surfaced beside me. My hands went back to the top of his head dunking him, and I swam back pulling myself onto the boat, gasping and trying to recover from the shock, my laugh was uncontrollable. Charles pulled himself up and laid next to me, the grin was glued to his face when I looked over at him.

"Sorry, I figured we needed a cold shower."

CHARLES POV:

"Well I have to admit, I for sure thought we were going to have to call in takeout with the half time break you two had, but dinner was delicious," Kika said pushing her plate away.

"Don't look at me, that was all Charles fault," Florence said defensively enjoying the wine. She had her legs pulled up onto the chair with her, she wore my button up shirt as a cover up which was falling off one shoulder, and her hair was left to flow freely, the salt water giving it a messy wave. She spun her wine in the glass while listening to Pierre, her smile wide and eyes squinted. She belonged. It was clear her walls have completely come down for all of us this week, and I couldn't have asked for a better trip thanks to her.

Unfortunately the peace from the outside world did get bursted right before dinner, reminding me we would have to leave the boat. My manager called the landline while Florence was outside setting the table. It was the first time I heard from anyone not on the boat in almost a week.

Apparently, there was a new picture that was released today going viral. Someone had managed to get a picture of us on the yacht. I didn't want to bother looking at the picture today, so I had him explain it to me. Florence was sitting between my legs, leaned back against my chest with her arms resting on my knees, while we were lounging and reading our books. He stressed the picture was fine, but the buzz around this specific photo got hot enough that my media team had to reach out to Florence's manager tonight. I was told Florence and I needed to brainstorm statements for tomorrow and the media attention would be heavy coming out of vacation. I was beyond angry at the continuous invasion of privacy, but I didn't have the energy to deal with it while we enjoyed our final night. Unfortunately, I knew the conversation would had to intrude at some point before we left the safety of the boat.

Florence looked over to me from across the dinner table bringing me into the conversation, and it allowed me to ditch the new information momentarily. I poured myself another glass of wine to help keep my mind off the outside world.

***off to the beach! No updates for the weekend, but I'll be back