By your third day at the resort, everybody has already warned you about JJ Maybank.

Not seriously, though. Nobody ever says it seriously when it comes to him. The warnings always arrive wrapped in laughter and eye-rolls and stories that sound too ridiculous to be real.

Don’t let him teach you poker unless you wanna lose money.

Don’t get in his truck unless you’re cool ending up three counties over somehow.

And whatever you do, don’t flirt back unless you plan on surviving the experience.

Apparently JJ has a habit of turning entire summers into bad decisions people remember forever.

You don’t really believe the hype until you walk into the staff dance hall.

The room feels alive in a messy, sweaty kind of way. Old records crackle through giant speakers while couples move across worn wooden floors beneath strings of crooked yellow lights. Humid summer air drifts through open windows along with cigarette smoke and distant crickets outside. Compared to the polished country-club perfection upstairs, this place feels real.

And right in the middle of it all is JJ.

He’s teaching a dance routine badly.

Not because he can’t dance — honestly, he moves better than anybody else in the room — but because JJ does everything half chaos, half charm, fully unserious.

“You gotta stop lookin’ like somebody shot your dog, sweetheart,” he tells one girl while spinning her beneath his arm. “This is dancing, not emotional warfare.”

The entire room bursts out laughing.

JJ grins like he was born for attention.

Then his eyes land on you standing near the doorway.

And immediately misses his next step.

His partner stumbles straight into him hard enough that both of them nearly hit the floor.

“Oh my god,” somebody groans.

“Nope, hold on,” JJ says instantly, pointing directly at you from across the room. “That was actually her fault somehow.”

You blink. “You don’t even know me.”

“Yeah, but I got instincts.”

“You got hit in the head with a surfboard last summer!” somebody yells.

“That made me more intuitive, actually.”

The room erupts again while JJ runs a hand through sweaty blond hair, grin sharp enough to look dangerous under the low lights. Up close, he looks even less appropriate for a place this expensive. Faded tank top. Sunburnt skin. Chain necklace catching dim light while he walks toward you like trouble personally learned how to flirt.

“You lost?” he asks casually.

“No.”

“Damn. Was kinda hopin’ I got to rescue somebody dramatically.”

“You seem like the type to make things worse.”

“Oh, absolutely.” JJ grins wider. “But I’d make it worse in a memorable way.”

You laugh before you can stop yourself.

And for half a second, something softer slips through his expression. Fast enough most people wouldn’t notice. Like making you laugh mattered more than he expected it to.

Then the grin comes back immediately.

“There it is,” he says triumphantly. “Knew I could do it.”

“Do what?”

“Get the rich pretty girl to stop lookin’ at me like I’m a rabid raccoon.”

“Maybe you are.”

“Nah.” He steps closer, lowering his voice slightly over the music. “Raccoons got survival instincts. I do not.”

The honesty in that lands strangely hard despite the joke wrapped around it.

Across the hall somebody yells, “JJ, quit flirting and teach the damn lift already!”

JJ ignores them completely.

Instead, he holds his hand out toward you like this was inevitable from the second he saw you standing there.

“You dance?” he asks.

“A little.”

“That’s alright.” His grin turns reckless again. “I make stuff up half the time anyway.”