Emma woke up that same afternoon at about two. She went out into her living room to find a bouquet of 36 roses exactly like the one that JC bought her the night before. Emma read the note with the flowers.
Emma smiled to herself, and her heart fluttered. You couldn’t wipe the smile off her face as she got showered and changed. She was about to settle down to do some work, when there was a knock on her door.
“C’mon in!” She yelled from where she was sitting. JC poked his head in the door and then let himself in.
“Hey, whatcha doing?”
“Hey you,” She said as she got up greeted him with a hug, “Thank you so much for the flowers they’re beautiful, I love them.” JC blushed,
“You’re welcome. So what are you doing, are you busy?” JC nodded towards the table where her laptop was sitting.
“Oh, no. I was just sitting down to catch up on some work.” JC put his hands on his hips.
“I thought you were on vacation, missy. No work for you.” JC went and closed her laptop. He pointed toward the bedroom, “Now, go get your bathing suit. You’re going swimming with me and the guys.”
“Yes, sir!” Emma saluted JC giggling and went and put her bathing suit on, it was a simple, black, halter-top bikini. She pulled on a light blue tank top and some khaki shorts over it. Grabbed her towel and went out into the living room.
“I’m ready, let’s go!” she said.
“Okay, C’mon.” Emma followed JC to their suite. The boys were busy getting ready for the pool. There was a girl sitting on the couch watching TV, she was short only about 5’2”, petite, with highlighted brunette hair. JC introduced Emma to the girl.
“Emma, this is Melissa, she’s Lance’s girlfriend.” The girl turned and waved. “Melissa, this is Emma.”
“Hi, everyone calls me Mel.” She stuck out her hand and Emma shook it.
“Hi, it’s nice to meet you.” Emma responded.
“Okay, great you guys chat while I go get ready.” JC pounced off into his room to get ready. Emma just shook her head and say down next to Mel on the couch.
“I swear, they’re worse than girls.” Emma said. Mel laughed and agreed.
“They are. We’ll probably be ready to go in an hour or so.” Both girls laughed.
"So you're the infamous Emma I've been hearing about, huh?" She smiled,
"Infamous?" Emma asked,
"Yeah, JC hasn't shut up about you since he got up."
"Oh." Emma blushed.
Finally they were all ready to go, Joey and Chris raced to the pool and the rest of the gang tried to keep up. At the pool Emma put her stuff down and took off her tank top and shorts and tossed them on her chair. She turned around to find JC staring at her,
“Take a picture, Josh, it’ll last longer.” She said winking at him, JC stuttered and blushed badly. Emma walked coolly to the pool’s edge and dipped her toe in testing the water.
“Come on in!! The water’s great!” Chris said. Emma bent down to get in when she was lifted up and thrown in. She screamed and then came up out the water sputtering. She turned around to see who threw her in and saw a laughing JC.
“I’m gonna get you for that, Chasez!” She screamed as she lunged through the water at him. Emma got out the pool and chased JC around the pool.
“Run, Spanky, Run!!” Joey shouted from the pool laughing.
“She’s gaining on ya, Jace!!” Chris shouted. Emma caught up with him and pushed him in the water but JC caught hold of her and pulled her in with him. They both came up from under the water laughing. A pool boy came over and interrupted their fun.
“Uh, Miss DeCour?” Emma swam over to the guy.
“Yes?”
“You have a phone call, from a Thomas Oliver.” Emma jumped out of the pool, took the phone and thanked the pool boy.
“Hey honey what’s up?” Emma happily greeted her brother.
“Hi, Emma, not much.” Emma heard cars racing in the background of where ever Tommy was.
“Tommy, where are you?” She asked cautiously.
“Now, Emma, don’t get upset, it’s not what you think.” Tommy stammered. Emma was pacing up and down the side of the pool.
“Well?” Emma asked impatiently.
“I’m just going to race once. It’s no big deal, it’s only a short race.” Emma couldn’t believe her brother.
“No big deal? Of course it’s a big deal!” Emma hissed.
“Hey Emma, get off that phone and get back into the pool!!” Chris yelled. Emma shushed him angrily. JC swam over to where she was, concerned about what was wrong, but Emma was to into her conversation to notice.
“Who was that? That the bodyguard boy?”
“Don’t change the subject. You know I hate it when you race. You promised me that you wouldn’t race until I got back.”
“I know but the guys were in a bind, I had to. Don’t worry Emma, nothing’s gonna happen.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I’m a good driver. You’ve seen me drive, and everyone round here says that I could go pro within a year.”
“I know that you’re a good driver, it’s the other people on the track that I worry about.”
“I’m always careful when I drive, you know that. I’ve raced hundreds of times and never once got into an accident! I’ll be just fine.”
“Well, it really doesn’t matter what I say does it? You’re gonna do it anyways.”
“Emma don’t be like that.”
“Whatever, so what time does the race start?” Emma sighed.
“About 5pm, it should last until 8 or so. It’s a late night race.”
“Fine, okay. Call me after your done. Good luck.”
“Thanks, Emma. I’ll talk to you later, bye.”
“Bye.” Emma closed her eyes and hung up the phone.
“Is everything alright?” JC asked and Emma finally noticed that JC was there. She took a deep breath,
“Yeah, everything is fabulous. I have to make another phone call, okay?”
“Okay.” JC said unsure if Emma was telling the truth. He swam over to where the boys were dunking each other and fooling around. Chris asked JC,
“Is everything okay with Emma?”
“I guess so, she said everything was fine.” JC shrugged his shoulders, he watched Emma chatting on the phone, and she seemed a little better now. He wondered what was wrong with her.
Emma got off the phone with Stuart, she felt a lot better. Emma gave the phone back to the pool boy who gave it to her. JC came up from behind her and put his arms around her waist.
“You gonna hang out with us now?” he asked. She sighed,
“If I have to.” She said sarcastically. They both laughed and JC let go of her.
“C’mon, Lance and Mel said that they could whip our ass in a chicken fight. Let’s go prove them wrong.” Emma happily jumped into the pool. She was so glad that she had something to keep her mind off of Tommy’s race. They easily beat Lance and Mel in the chicken fight and had a great time fooling around with the boys.
After they were done swimming they decided to get a bite to eat. Emma declined because she wanted to be in her room in case something happened to Tommy. But JC convinced her to go and Emma figured it would help her keep her mind off the race.
JC was basically glued to her side, she didn’t mind it though. They kept on locking eyes, which would make her heart pound. But then at lunch, thoughts started entering her mind, What if JC hurt her like Jason did? She couldn’t take that again. He was a huge pop star with millions of fans all over the world that wanted him. What was to say that he wouldn’t cheat on her, too? He’d be on tour most of the time. It was too big of a chance for Emma to take, but every time she looked at him she wanted him more. Emma try to avoid him for the rest of lunch and JC noticed that something was wrong with Emma. After dinner they went back to the hotel and the boys wanted to hang out in their suite for a while. This time Emma couldn’t stay, she needed to break away from JC while she could. JC insisted on walking her back to her suite.
“Thanks for walking me back.” Emma said as soon as they were at her door. She opened her door and tried to go in but JC stopped her.
“Are you okay, Emma? You’ve been acting kind of weird since that phone call today at the pool. Is something up?” Emma avoided his eyes.
“No, JC, I’m just a bit tired, that’s all. We were out pretty late last night or should I say this morning.” She half-smiled and looked up into his eyes and then quickly looked down. ‘Damn.’ She thought to herself, ‘Don’t look at him, you can’t fall for him.’ She tried for her door again, JC stopped her once again.
“Are you sure? I’m a little worried it’s me.” He brushed a piece of her hair out of her face and tucked it behind her ear. “I don’t want to cause any problems for you.” He finished.
“It’s not you,” Emma partially lied, “like I told you, I’m tired and I want to take a nap. Is that okay with you?” She said shortly putting her hands on her hips.
“Okay, okay, I’m sorry I was badgering you.”
“Josh, don’t.” She crossed her arms in front of herself.
“Okay, I’ll let you take a nap, only if you promise to hang out with me later.” His sparkling eyes met hers and she melted.
“Okay, I promise.” She smiled. “Bye, Josh.”
“Bye, Emma.”