The sun shines through my window as I'm getting ready for the day. I put on a sexy black bikini with shorts and a crop top over it and decide to leave my hair with its natural waves. Once I'm ready, I grab my beach bag and leave my room.

"Buenos días!" I shout as I make my way down the hall to Santiago's room. "Everyone get up!" I kick every door I walk past and receive a few shut up's.

"Someone's in a good mood," Santiago says as he pulls a t-shirt over his head.

"Ready to go?"

"Slow down. We gotta eat something first," he laughs and slides past me out the door.

"Ugh. I hate eating in the morning."

"Well, breakfast is the most important meal of the day." He turns around and flashes me a smile.

"You sound like abuela."

After we both finish our cereal, we leave to go pick up Brooke. Jace told me he'd meet us there because he has to take Alice to her friends house.

"Remember your sun block, guys," I remind them as Brooke strips to her bathing suit and Santiago takes off his shirt.

"It's so hot today," Brooke says as she takes the sun block from me and starts putting it on.

"Well c'mon, let's go in the water," Santiago tells her.

"Gotta wait 'til that dries," I tell them and Santiago rolls his eyes.

"Oh, who cares? Let's go." Brooke seems eager about Santiago's offer and starts running towards the water.

I watch them for a minute as Brooke takes forever to go in because the waters cold, and when I start to look around, anxiety creeps up on me. This is the first time I've been alone in public since that guy tried to force me into his car.

Panic rises in me as I look around, trying to find his face, having convinced myself that he's here. I scream when someone grabs me from behind.

He lifts me up and I continue to scream until he drops me.

"Woah, Yasmin! People are looking," Jace laughs.

I slap his arm. "I thought you were a murderer!"

His smile fades. "Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."

"It's okay." I put my hand over my heart and try to calm my breathing and feel like sticking a middle finger up to all the people scowling at us.

"Sun block?" I change the subject, holding it out for him.

"Wanna put it on me?" He smirks.

Yes.

"No." I shove it against his chest.

"Fine, play hard to get."

"I'm not playing." I walk around the sun lounger and pull my shirt over my head, then take off my shorts. When I look up I notice Jace watching me, but he looks away and focuses on applying the lotion.

"Okay, can we go swim now?" Jace complains after I finish applying sun block to myself.

"No, I gotta wait until it dries."

"Stop being such a Mom. Come on."

"No. Nope. I refuse." He walks over to me and I continue to say no until he lifts me up and throws me over his shoulder.

"Jace! Put me down this instant!" I shout as he carries me towards the water. All I can see is his ass and the sand, which gives me an idea.

"Ouch! Stop, you freak," he squeals as I pinch his butt.

I'm in hysterics at him wriggling around, but my laughter is replaced by screaming as he throws me into the cold water.

When my head comes back up, I wipe my hair out of my face and blink the salt water out of my eyes. "You little shit." Why am I always getting thrown into water?

He dives into the sea and comes up much more gracefully than I did, flicking his hair out of his face and smiling at me.

"What are you staring at?" He asks and I realise I've been admiring his beauty a little too long.

"Just how much uglier you look when you're wet." I retort back, trying to deflect from him catching me out.

"Please. How I look right now is making you wet."

"Um, no actually, I think it's the ocean making me wet." I look down at my body in the water, pretending to be trying to figure it out.

"Okay, smartass." He laughs and suddenly grabs me by my legs, making the top half of my body go under the water. I quickly hold my breath and flap around to get back up and when Jace let's go of my legs, I decide to stay under and go for him, pulling down his swim shorts.

He grabs them before I succeed and I come back up to his amused face. "That desperate to see my dick, huh?"

I groan. "I can't win with you."

"Nope, you can't. But can I do that to you?" He puts his hands behind my back, going for my bikini strap and I squeal and grab his head to push him under the water. However I fail again as I'm not strong enough to get his whole head under, so instead I just start splashing him.

"Stop," he laughs and grabs a hold of my arms and pulls me to him. I finally catch my breath as I look into his bright blue eyes and watch the water drip down his face from his hair. The tingling in my stomach and lower half makes a reappearance as I feel his hard body against mine.

Jace seems to be affected by our positioning too, but neither of us move as we're frozen together, him towering over me. The cold water suddenly feels too hot.

He let's go of my arms and places one hand on my waist and uses the other to move a strand of hair out of my face. The hand at my waist slowly slows down to my thigh and pulls it up and I wrap my legs around him, having no idea why I'm letting this happen. I think I've lost all self control.

With my hands holding onto him, I feel his soft wet skin as my body heats up. Fuck, I don't think I've ever been this turned on. The feeling is almost unbearable. I need to stop this before I end up kissing him then regretting it, but I don't think I have it in me.

"I..." Jace starts.

"We interrupting something?" Santiago says and we both snap our heads to look at him and Brooke.

Part of me is grateful that he stopped us and part of me wants to cuss him out.

"Nope," Jace says and throws me into the water again.

Salt water fills my nose and I come up coughing and wiping my face, losing my patience with him. We just had such a nice moment and I thought he was gonna say something sweet, but instead he just reminds me that he's still Jace Daniels, the asshole.

"Good," Santiago smiles at Jace but there is also a warning in it. He starts moving back towards the beach.

"Jeez, I finally get one Fuentes brother off my back just for another to jump on it." Jace says and follows him. I start to wonder why Alex has suddenly changed his opinion on Jace and let him come into my room and talk to me. Has he finally stopped being suffocatingly over protective?

"What was that about?" Brooke whispers to me, excitement showing on her features.

"Nada."

"Oh come on, Yasmin. You looked like you were about to kiss."

"Thank God we didn't," I mumble.

Just as we reach the shore a ball comes flying towards us, followed by a girl running after it. Jace flicks it up with his foot and catches it in his hands.

"Thank you! I'm so sorry about that," she says sweetly. I already feel myself getting annoyed and decide to walk away, hearing Jace telling her it's okay and saying something that makes her laugh a little too much.

I wipe my face with my towel then sit down and do my best not to watch him talking to the girl. It's frustrating feeling this way, because I've seen Jace kiss girls and I've seen them leave together and it's
made me feel kind of shitty, but I got used to it. But now I don't feel so used to it anymore.

"We should go to sand 'n' shakes after this," Brooke suggests and Santiago agrees. "What do you think, Yas?"

"Yeah."

"Girl, wipe that frown off of your face," Santiago says while grabbing my chin and pulling it to look at them and away from Jace.

I smile sarcastically. "Better," he says.

Jace starts jogging over to us and the girl watches him for a second before turning back to her friends. I wonder if he found her attractive, or what they talked about, and if he got her number. Ugh. I don't care. I don't care.

"Anyone got water?" Jace asks as he lies down, his abs completely on show to me.

"You didn't bring your own?"

"No, I didn't." He gives me a weird look.

"That was stupid."

"Okay. You gonna give me yours or not?"

I grab the bottle of water out of my bag and throw it at him a little too hard and it hits his stomach. He lets out a sharp breath as he winces and I feel slightly bad.

"Why?" Is all he says. I shrug and he takes a drink.

I go on my phone while Jace joins in with Santiago and Brooke's conversation about the sea and how it's scary that there is so much of it that is undiscovered. I text Val and ask if he wants to meet us for food. I asked him to come today but he declined, but his mind may have changed if his drug comedown is over.

Valentino: come there and deal with u and Jace either fuckin or screaming at each other? no gracias lol. jk it would be quite entertaining. I mean the arguing, not the fucking. ew. unless... no ew kidding

I screw my face up but am glad that he seems to be in a better mood and is acting more like vulgar Val. But he does know you can delete texts, right?

When I put my phone down, I see Santiago and Jace both lighting cigarettes. The strong stench fills my nose immediately and I cringe.

"Can ya'll do that somewhere else?" I glare only at Jace.

Jace doesn't say anything as he looks at me and inhales, then puts the cigarette out in the sand while he blows out the smoke.

"You could've just went somewhere else," I say, feeling more annoyed that now I don't have a reason to be annoyed at him.

"I don't wanna go somewhere else."

"Wouldn't you rather be with those girls?" I nod towards the girls playing volleyball that threw their ball over to us.

"No. Why would I?"

"Because they're hot."

"I'm sitting with the hottest girl in the world right now. Why would I care about them?"

I look away, not knowing what to say. This is why I prefer to start arguments with Jace, it gets rid of the awkward tension and I can just change all of my feelings to anger instead of dealing with the sadness or the desire I have for him. That's what we've always done – just shout and scream at each other. But now he's not letting that happen and it's annoying.

After a few hours have passed, we all get hungry and go for dinner at sand 'n' shakes. We all have a good time but there is still tension between Jace and I from what happened in the water. I hate it. I wonder if we won't be able to be friends like before now that I know how he feels about me, and I also know how I feel about him.

"I'm gonna go to the bathroom," Brooke says once we've paid the bill and we're ready to leave.

"Me too," Santiago says and looks between Jace and I while walking away.

Jace turns and walks out the door without saying anything. My feet can't help but follow him out into the darkness of the night.

"Hey! Wait up," I call and jog to catch up to him.

"You good?" He stops at his car and unlocks it. I bite my lip and look at the floor.

"I'm sorry for being a bitch earlier."

"I thought it was bad to call a girl a bitch?"

"It's fine for me to say it, but it's degrading when men call us it. Like they never use that word against other guys as if it's just another word for a female."

He nods. "Well, no need to apologise. Although I don't understand why you were jealous over that girl if you just want to be friends."

"I was not jealous," I lie and cross my arms over my chest. "I just didn't want you to smoke around me."

"Yeah, but you started being a dick after that girl spoke to me. It's cool, just doesn't make sense."

"How does it not make sense? Even if I was jealous, which I wasn't, it doesn't mean I can't feel that way just 'cause we're only friends."

"You wouldn't feel jealous unless you wanted to be more than friends."

"But that's not the point. The point is that we can't be more than friends, even if I wanted to be."

"So you want to be more than friends?"

"Shut up." I push his shoulder and he smiles and holds onto my hand then pulls me towards him.

"Stop yourself," I warn as our bodies collide for the second time today.

His hand moves down past my hip and his fingertips run over my thigh, making my skin tingle. "I'm not doing anything."

"Sí, you are." I ball my hand into a fist and lightly hit his chest but instantly regret it as I feel how strong it is. My hand stays where it is for a moment before I slowly run it down him, feeling his abs and holding onto his waist, but I force myself to stop when I reach the waistband of his shorts.

Why does he do this to me?

When I meet his eyes again he seems surprised. "What?" I question.

"I like when you touch me."

I slowly put my hand under his shirt and move it over his stomach, causing him to shiver. I forgot how much of an affect I have on him. I used to use this against him back when things were simpler, as a way of getting back at him for what he did. To show him what he'd lost. I almost want to tease him again but touching his skin turns me on so much that I think I'd be hurting myself just as much.

He closes his eyes and sighs as my hand moves higher up on him, then he grabs my thigh with the hand that was lightly touching it and squeezes. I almost moan but don't let it come out.

"We need to stop doing this," I breathe.

He looks at me with lustful eyes and slowly moves his hand up me, moving it around to my lower back and pulling me against him harder. "I don't want to stop."

My breath hitches. Neither do I.

In a split second I decide that I can't resist it anymore and grab his head with one of my hands, pulling him towards me, and placing my lips on his.

The kiss is slow and makes me feel things over my whole body. My skin feels like it's on fire and I wonder how it's possible to feel this way from a single kiss. I grab ahold of his t-shirt and he moans into my mouth as the kiss intensifies. I wonder if it's making him feel the same as I do.

My mind goes blank and all I can focus on is his lips until we pull apart. I already hate the small space between us and want to close the gap again.

"Shit," he says softly and his warm breath fans my face. All I want to do is feel him again, but the fear and regret slowly starts creeping into my mind. The voice in my head telling me how stupid and naive I am.

"They're coming," Jace says, looking behind me and I hear Santi and Brooke talking as they get closer.

I quickly step away from him and the regret overpowers all of my other feelings. "I need to go."

"Yasmin," he says with a hint of pain in his voice as I rush away from him.

+++

teaser: yasmin has questions for Alex

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