best for FICTION
Palm trees swaying in a deliciously warm breeze, sky and pool both bluer than a Smurf, sun rays kissing her skin, and a devastatingly gorgeous man – her devastatingly gorgeous man – stretched out on the sun lounger next to her...
It didn’t, Vicky reckoned, get much better than this. This was holiday heaven. There was, however, a fly in the factor 30. Her fellow female holidaymakers, that’s what. They were really getting on Vicky’s 36Bs. None of them could take their eyes off her man. Her Jamie. But then when you were with a bloke who made David Beckham look a bit, well, ordinary, it kind of came with the territory. After more than six months together, Vicky was used to Jamie being stared at and lusted over. But this very obvious, in-yer-face drooling was just getting too much.
‘Oh, I so would!’ Vicky had heard a woman in a tight orange cutaway say as they’d walked down to the pool earlier that morning.
‘Oh yeah... and her who he’s with?’ the woman’s friend – a taut body in a hot pink bikini – had added with a smirk. ‘OMG, she is so punching!’
Vicky had wondered if she was suddenly invisible. Could neither woman see her?
‘He’s with me!’ Vicky had wanted to holler, but instantly thought better of it. How classy would that look? It was so difficult, though. Jamie’s ripped physique was on glorious display – of course it was. They were on a late Spring holiday on an already sun-drenched Med. Vicky really wanted Jamie to be for her eyes only, but what could she do? Hardly insist that he cover himself up.
The hot bod next to her stirred. Jamie turned and smiled at her, his Smurf-shaded eyes squinting in the sunlight.
‘Cocktail time, I reckon babe,’ he murmured. ‘The usual?’
Vicky nodded. ‘Mmmmm!’ She leaned over and kissed him, snaking her arms around his neck as she tried to ignore the envious eyes she could feel boring into her back.
Jamie pulled away. ‘Later,’ he murmured, getting up and stretching languorously like a cat – tight, toned muscles rippling under glistening smooth bronzed flesh. God, he was hot. Vicky watched him stroll towards the bar – his muscly physique outlined in black Lycra swimmers that fitted him like a second skin. She knew she wasn’t the only one looking. Practically every other woman in the place was checking him out. God, she should be loving the fact he was hers – and she was – but there was also part of her that felt insecure. Jamie could have any woman he wanted so. . . why had he chosen her? Vicky was still trying to work that one out. While she knew she was attractive, in no way was she drop dead, moviestar gorgeous.
‘You’re different,’ Jamie always said when she asked him why. ‘You’re smart, kind an
