Temptation Island by C.C. Soltry Read Free Book Online

her head, worry filling her eyes.  “No, I don’t think so.  Why, what could be wrong?”
    Setting down the glass again, Marek turned his head to look at Carm.  “It’s nothing that I haven’t experienced before, if it is what I think it is.”
    Carmen reached over and gripped his tanned hand with her small one.  “Marek, what is it?  Tell me.  Are we in trouble?”
    Marek chuckled, “Depends on your definition of trouble. I think we’ve been slipped some mushrooms in our drink, Carm.  If so, then you’ll definitely get your vacation to remember.”
    “Mushrooms?  Do you mean magic mushrooms ?”
    Marek stared Carmen in the eye and watched it hit her.  Watched as her eyes went wide and she leaned back in her chair.
    Waving her hand back and forth in front of her face, Carmen glanced past it to Marek and whispered accusingly, “I knew you were trouble.”
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    CHAPTER FOUR
     
    Sharp, prickling pains danced against the back of her eyelids as Carmen painstakingly opened her eyes.  A greasy wave of nausea hit her as she tried to focus.  A groan escaped as the pounding in her head became more pronounced with the effort.  Little drummer boys were steadily beating a rat-a-tat-tat on their drums somewhere behind her temples. 
    Carmen felt like shit.
    Inhaling a cautious breath, Carm gazed at the tin ceiling of her hotel room and did a mental take of her body.  Her mouth had been stuffed full of wool and her tongue felt two sizes too big. And she wished someone would chop her head off just to stop the agony.
    What the hell happened last night?
    Gently placing her hands on her throbbing temples, Carm tried to swallow around the Brillo pad stuck in her throat.  Gingerly stretching her long legs, Carm bit back another moan as the movement brought to light aches in her body she didn’t know she had. 
    She tried to remember the events of the previous night but couldn’t think around the pain in her abused head.  Boy, she must have really tied one on last night.
    Apparently you had a little too much fun, Carm my girl.
    Unsure if it had been worth it—evil little leprechauns were busy doing an Irish jig in her head—Carm stretched her bare arms up in the air.  Slowly taking another deep breath, mindful of her iffy stomach, Carm absurdly felt like laughing.  And she would have laughed if her head wasn’t about to roll off her shoulders.
    She hadn’t been this hung over since her college days.  Maybe not even then.  The way she currently felt brought new meaning to the term shit on a shingle.
    Now if she could only remember what had gone on she’d be thrilled.  As her sensitive eyes adjusted to the bright light streaming in through the open window Carm gazed up at her hands. 
    “What the--?”
    Too concerned with what was on her hand to worry about the fact her raw throat felt like minced meat, Carm brought her left hand down for closer inspection. At the same time something else occurred to her.
    She was naked as a jay.
    Carm never—ok, rarely—slept naked.  But that wasn’t really the part that had her worried.  Bringing her hand within a few inches of her face, Carm squinted her eyes and stared.
    No, it couldn’t be, could it?
    Shiny as a new penny and perched on her left-hand ring finger sat a dainty oyster shell ring.  The sunlight brought out the blues, greens, and pinks of the shell as Carm turned her hand this way and that. 
    She’d had one of those rings when she was a kid and her parents had taken her and Kate to the Oregon coast.  She and Kate had begged their dad to let them buy them and had sported matching ones the entire weekend.  Carm remembered the rings had cost her dad the grand total of less than fifteen bucks.  But they’d been darned nifty to ten and twelve year olds.
    What the heck was she doing wearing one now?  On her ring finger, no less.  Not something a girl especially wanted to wake up and find herself sporting after a night of hard