Her fingers trailed along the smooth cotton bedsheets as she got out of bed. The way her delicate movements shifted the sheets on his skin was one of his own secret luxuries. He watched her pull on her robe to cover her body.

A decade ago, she wouldn’t have bothered. She was unashamed of her looks. But time and experience had taken its toll on her confidence. She still knew she was beautiful, but she no longer felt secure in this world. Too many things had happened too quickly.

He watched her walk away from the bed. The natural sway of her hips was quite delightful to behold. She disappeared into the bathroom, and he closed his eyes. The minutes ticked by, marked by the electric alarm clock on the nightstand. He was awakened from his pleasant half-asleep state by her sultry voice, “Put on your trunks. I want to go swimming.”

His eyes opened, and a faint smile crept across his lips at the sight of her standing there in her bathing suit, sorting through her suitcase for her cover-up. The suit was red and sexy and showed off her voluptuous curves. She’d put her long hair up in a long ponytail, and already wore her strapped sandals. This was why he had booked them in the only luxury hotel in Boston with a pool, the Colonnade.

He sat up and reached for his suitcase, but didn’t need to. She tossed his trunks to him, and he grinned as he pulled them on. He put on his white undershirt and glanced at her again. She wore a short white dress as a coverup, and he loved the way the low curve of her ass showed just beneath the hem.

With simple white sneakers on his feet and the room key in the buttoned pocket of his trunks, they ventured into the hallway. He stole a kiss outside the elevator, and she shied away with a soft feminine laugh. They rode the elevator up to the 11th floor, and the stole another kiss in the stairwell before they made their way to the rooftop pool.

The late afternoon sun was bright and unrelenting as soon as they stepped onto the roof. Out of habit, he scanned the area as he tapped a cigarette from its pack. He froze, “Teena, wait!”

She stopped at his side, “You’re always so paranoid, Edward.”

He grabbed her by her delicate porcelain-skinned wrist, “Look.”

She glanced around, and visibly blanched as her eyes rested on the young man he had spotted, “Fox? What’s he doing here?”

“Apparently he’s enjoying the rooftop pool with his British girlfriend.”

Teena focused on the young woman he spoke to. She lay in the sun on the edge of the pool, barely wearing a tiny turquoise bikini. Teena’s eyes narrowed, “I don’t much like her.”

He pulled her back into the stairwell. “You don’t even know her,” he said dryly as he tucked his cigarette back into its pack and they started down the stairs.

“I don’t have to know her to know she’s not right for him. Ever since the first time he told me about her I knew it.” He listened to her expound on the reasons Phoebe Green was bad for Fox the whole way back to the room, but once they were there, he found a way to take her mind off the matter.

While she showered, he dressed. And then he stopped, grinning at the sound of a peal of laughter from the next room. He pressed his ear to the wall with the thrill of seldom-practiced voyeurism. And turned ashen at the sound of his son’s voice, “Hold still while I frisk you. I am a Federal Agent.”

He backed away from the wall and finished adjusting his tie. 18 minutes later, he and Teena walked down the hall together, and didn’t look back.

Step 1. Serve
Step 2. Resist from Within