Chapter 1
Lucian
I was so close to just walking away from the table and jumping overboard. My mother had dragged me along on this Sullivan family vacation that she and all my aunts had planned for our entire family. They made sure that it was on a cruise ship, so that no one could escape.
But I was still seriously contemplating the idea of jumping overboard to get away from the lot of them. Forty-eight hours cooped up with my entire family was not my idea of a good time. My mother Dorethy and father Duncan had been all over each other since the start of the trip, all of the couples in my family had. We were blessed to have the ability to know our 'one' at first sight. The person you were going to spend the rest of your life with, and we always find them!
Knowing you were going to find your one true love at first sight is great in theory, but in practice it takes a lot of patience. There is no such thing as “conventional dating” for us. Either we click with you at first sight, or we don’t. Those of us who pursued relationships outside this, usually ended up in a bad spot when we found our one. It happened to my uncle; he said the pull to your ‘one’ is so strong you can’t deny it. He felt really bad for the women he was with at the time, and it made it difficult for him with his 'one', because he was in a relationship when he met her. How do you explain to someone that you know you are meant to spend the rest of your life with them, when you are currently in a long term relationship with someone else.
We all learned our lesson from his mistake. My brothers, cousins and I have all decided to wait for our one true love and have pushed ourselves into our work while waiting for them. We’ve done extremely well for ourselves owning several large businesses that we recently merged into one larger corporation. Having chosen to go into real estate, I spent the past six years since, earning my Honor's in business, investing in, and flipping houses and buildings. I earned my first million by the time I was twenty-three. Business really boomed last year, and I decided to bring my brother and cousins on board. I had helped them to get premises for their businesses and even owned part of some of them, so it only made sense to merge those companies together.
Hence why our mothers have forced us on this vacation, we’ve all been working so hard, they felt we needed to get a little forced relaxation. I was feeling the opposite of relaxed at the moment. My entire family was taking up three tables in the buffet restaurant on-board the ship. They made sure to get the closest table to the buffet, which means everyone that needs to get to the buffet line, has to go past our three tables to do it. My cousins and uncles are taking full advantage of the unlimited amount of food, as they’ve dragged the rest of us here at 6 pm when the buffet opened, and it was currently 9 pm and they were half an hour from closing.
My father and Uncle Matt were currently fighting over who was going to get the last of the pulled pork when the servers brought it out. At this point, I’m surprised there’s even any food left, with the way my family is eating. My mother and aunts are busy discussing what treatments they’re going to get at the spa tomorrow. And my brothers and cousins are standing over the remains of the Thai food options, trying to pull whatever scraps they can get out of the trays.
I personally, haven’t been able to muster up the energy to get really excited about the buffet, like I normally would. I’ve been feeling a little off since setting foot on the ship two days ago. At first, I thought it was sea sickness, but then I realized it was just like I felt antsy. Like I needed to keep moving. And somehow it just started to feel worse this evening, like ants are crawling under my skin. I haven’t been able to shake this feeling of my skin heating up, and it was getting stronger by the second.
Looking around, I try to see what could be making me feel like this, when a shadow looms over me from behind. When I turn around, my heart stops, everything stops. I’m looking into orbs of molten silver, surrounded by the thickest, longest lashes, I have ever seen. She has a heart shaped face, with the cutest little button nose and full pink glossed lips. I’m frozen in place and can’t seem to look away when I growl, “Mine.”
***
Victoria
I had felt uneasy about taking a vacation on a cruise ship, but the travel agent insisted that this was the perfect fit. I get to travel to a couple of places in one trip and I don't have to worry about lots of different flights and transfers, not to mention going out on my own to all those different places. I wanted to see the world, but suffering from anxiety made making travel arrangements a nightmare.
Now I didn’t have to be anxious about meeting new people at each destination, I could just meet a group of people on the ship and stick with them. Though so far, the whole connecting with new people thing was a bust. Two days in and I still hadn’t made any friends.
Sure, I'd talked to a few people, but everyone seemed like they had their group set, and weren’t interested in adding any tag-a-long’s. My sisters had said going alone would be a bad idea, but what else was I supposed to do, when none of them were interested in coming with me.
“Why would you want to go anywhere else?” they said.
“Home is the safest place for us.” they said.
Well, I'm was sick and tired of staying in a small town in the middle of nowhere. Tonight, was the night! I am determined to make at least one friend and enjoy the rest of my trip with companionship. I just need to march into this buffet and choose a table with someone that looks like they would be friendly.
Walking into the buffet, I start scanning the crowds, but felt my eyes being drawn to the tables right in front of the buffet. There's what appears to be a large family there, taking up three whole tables, eyeing up all the other dinners like they were enemies. This should be the last place I would want to go, but for some reason, I fell drawn there. Before know what I'm doing , my legs have carried me across the room, over to one of the tables.
Drawn to a man with pitch black hair and broad shoulders, who was currently scanning the surroundings intensely like he was looking for someone. The bluest eyes I have ever seen, turn to me and widen in shock, before turning brooding.
“Mine.” He growls.
I stare at him confused, looking around I try to decide if he’s talking about the food on his plate. His family does seem to have a rather unhealthy obsession with the buffet. As I back up, he reaches out to grab my arm, and when he touches my skin, I feel a tug in my chest and a burning on my hip.
I pull my top up and look at my birthmark, the one every member of my family has, the one that looks life a flame and lets me know when I come into contact with my fated mate, and its changing from brown to red. When I look up, those bright blue eyes, are looking at my birthmark in recognition, I see his other hand covering his own hip.
Before I even have a moment to think, I’m in the air, my stomach pressed into a very firm shoulder, looking down at the sexiest ass, I have ever seen, and I am ’oh so tempted to touch it.
