Czytaj książkę: «For Their Baby»

Their gazes met

A welcome moment of harmony. It felt like an oasis in the desert of this difficult journey. Neither of them spoke right away, as if they were both afraid another word would make the feeling break like a mirage.

“Kitty—”

She held up her hand. “No, it’s all right, David. I know it’s hard to accept. Hard to believe. And you’ve got a lot of things to consider. I’m sure you’ll want to talk to your lawyer before you—”

“No.”

She stopped cold. “No?”

“No. I don’t need to talk to Colby. I don’t want Colby’s advice. I know what I want to do.”

She held her breath.

“I want to marry you.”

Dear Reader,

The last time you saw David Gerard, he wasn’t a happy man. He’d just been dumped by the woman he’d hoped to marry. But Belle Carson found her happily-ever-after with Matt Malone in For the Love of Family, the book I wrote for Harlequin Superromance’s wonderful Diamond Legacy series. And that locked gorgeous David out in the cold.

Thanks to your emails and letters, I couldn’t leave him there. Apparently we’re all die-hard romantics. We don’t buy into the myth that nice guys finish last!

David doesn’t take the easy road to true love. When he decides to tap into his inner bad boy, he makes some terrible mistakes—the worst being a one-night stand with a green-haired bartender he meets in the Bahamas. Then Kitty Hemmings shows up pregnant, and David realizes it’s time to pay the price for being such a fool.

First thing to go? That level-headed life he’s worked so hard to build. Because Kitty is one lady who won’t be tamed—not unless this sensible guy is willing to go all out to win her heart.

I hope you enjoy their spark-filled journey toward becoming a family. I love to hear from my readers, so be sure to mail me at P.O. Box 947633, Maitland, FL 32794, or email me at KOBrien@aol.com. Or let’s be friends on Facebook! See you online!

Warmly,

Kathleen O’Brien

For Their Baby
Kathleen O’Brien

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Kathleen O’Brien was a feature writer and TV critic before marrying a fellow journalist. Motherhood, which followed soon after, was so marvelous she turned to writing novels, which could be done at home. She works hard to pack her backyard with birds, butterflies and squirrels. Indoors, her two cockatiels, Honey and Lizzie, announce repeatedly, if not humbly, that they are “pretty birds.” Her colorful Gouldian finch, who lives in her office, fills every day with music.

To Nancy, Kris, Leslie, Deirdre and Dawn,

the SHU buddies who have,

over the past couple of years,

added so much fun and focus to my writing!

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER ONE

SHE WAS GOING to marry him?

Kitty Hemmings stared at the cell phone and tried to process the words she’d just heard on her voice mail. Surely her mother hadn’t said marry. No matter how low the woman’s self-esteem had plummeted, no matter how desperately she needed a Y chromosome by her side, she wouldn’t—she couldn’t—actually marry Jim Oliphant.

The beachside bar speakers launched into a steel drum version of “Red, Red Wine,” and the breeze, always warm here in the Bahamas even in November, gusted gently across her hot cheeks. Suddenly Kitty’s hands began to shake. She gripped the handle of the beer spigot for balance.

Lucinda Hemmings had pulled some pathetic stunts in her time. But marrying that bastard would top them all. Jim was a dozen years younger than her mother. He was slick and charming, but stone-broke, of course, just another barnacle trying to attach his empty wallet to Lucinda’s bank account.

He’d hung around more than eight years, a record for any of her mother’s boyfriends. Kitty had been hoping, any day, to hear that he’d given up and gone away. She’d even dreamed about Lochaven last night, about the Virginia oaks covered in Spanish moss, and the red tile roof, and her own bedroom, where her poster of Johnny Depp still hung on the door. For the first time in eight years, she’d let herself imagine what it might be like to live in a real house again, and not a crummy efficiency apartment or service-industry dorm.

But now…with Oliphant permanently installed…

Her mother had sounded so happy. Kitty bit down on her lower lip, remembering the lilt in the voice, and the subtle slur that said Lucinda hadn’t declined an extra flute of champagne with dinner. Of course not. Jim Oliphant didn’t drink alone. “I know you don’t like him, sweetheart, but…”

Like him? Kitty’s lunch rose briefly into her throat, an acidic reminder of the mandarin oranges she’d wolfed down between shifts. Like him? Who could like Jim Oliphant? He might be square-jawed and handsome on the outside, but on the inside he was what her father called âme de boue. Soul of mud.

Kitty swallowed hard, forcing herself to release her death grip on the spigot. She couldn’t dwell on this now. She was on the clock another ten minutes, that was all. Just until midnight. Then she’d go back to the dorm and, since her roommate, Jill, was working till two, she’d have a little alone time.

Maybe she’d bake something sweet, something from her childhood. Comfort food.

And then, when she let herself think again, maybe her mother’s news wouldn’t hurt so much.

“Hello? Earth to barmaid? Two Slim Spiffies? Heavy on the cherries?”

She looked up, trying to compose herself. She’d seen this guy before. The bartenders had a nickname for every customer. They called this one Mr. Sleazy. She suddenly realized he could have been Oliphant’s older brother. The too-bronze tan, the overly highlighted hair and the sucked-gut vanity that begged you to believe he was twenty-five instead of forty.

“Sure.” She slid the cell phone under the bar and smiled. “What’s in a Slim Spiffy besides cherries?”

Mr. Sleazy leaned in, and she got a whiff of his breath. Oh. So that was a Slim Spiffy. Gin, cranberry juice, orange slices and the guarantee that, before the night was over, he’d puke his guts out into the sand.

Her smile stiffened. His eyes probably weren’t nice on his best day, and this was definitely not his best day. Tiny red spiders crawled across the whites, and the pupils didn’t quite track. She felt her hand begin to tremble again. She hated mean drunks. Jim Oliphant had been a very, very mean drunk.

“Just cherries,” he said, then flicked his tongue over his lower lip. “That’s all I’m interested in. The boys and I made a little bet over there. About whether you’ve still got one.”

Kitty considered pretending she didn’t understand. That was usually her first resort. But she could already feel her blood in her ears. It sounded like the incoming tide. He couldn’t imagine what a really bad time he’d picked to get nasty. She needed this job, but she was inches from either bursting into tears or breaking his ugly nose.

They’d both get her disciplined, but the nose option would at least feel good. She hadn’t cried in eight years, and, by God, she didn’t intend to start tonight.

She scanned the tables, the dance floor, even the artificially lit beach, looking for Jill. Jill actually thought this guy was cute. And Jill owed her—Kitty had covered for her about half a dozen times lately, when Jill wanted to slip out with some hunky customer she’d just met.

But Jill was nowhere to be seen. As usual. That meant the bouncer, one of Jill’s lovers this week, was also MIA.

“Look, the bar always has plenty of cherries,” Kitty said, though her teeth would hardly open to let the words through. “Let that be enough, okay? Just play nice, and tell me what’s—”

“No, no, not the bar.” He winked. “See, honey, we’re thinking you can’t be more than, what…maybe nineteen? We think that green hair, that eyebrow ring…they’re just for show, to cover up that baby face. Come on, baby face. We think maybe you’ve still got a cherry.”

Bastard.

She was twenty-six years old, and felt every year of it, so the “nineteen” comment was pure hogwash. And “baby face” was what Jim Oliphant had loved to call her.

She leaned closer, lowering her voice. “Well, let’s see, honey. What I’ve got…I’ve got a low tolerance for butt-ugly morons and a big, fat can of pepper spray.” She glanced at his crotch. “Any of that make you feel spiffy, Slim?”

His bloodshot eyes hardened as he processed the insult. “What the—” He reached out, as if to grab her arm. “I’ll have your job, you little—”

Technically, this wasn’t a problem. She’d been a bartender less than a year, working her way up from waitress. The first thing you learned, though, was how to handle a drunk. But as she saw his meaty hand move toward her, something snapped and she found it hard to breathe. She inhaled, but choked on the tears she’d been trying to hold back. Suddenly all she could see were sparkling crystals, fracturing the colored lights strung between the poles that held up the bar tent.

Oh, God. She was losing it. Where was the bouncer? Fumbling with her apron, she turned, made an inarticulate sound and started to head for the beach.

“Hey!”

She glanced over her shoulder—he was coming around the bar, head lowered like a bull. An icy feeling spread between her shoulder blades.

And then, out of nowhere, another man was standing in his path.

“Steady, now,” she heard the other man say as he put a palm against the charging bull’s chest. “I think the lady needs—”

She didn’t hear the end of the sentence. She saw her chance, and she took it. She walked fast, and then faster, until she was running. She ran beyond the party lights, through the bright landscape spots that turned the incoming tide to a frothy milkshake, and finally into the darkness of the natural night.

Even when she’d left the noisy bar far behind, she didn’t stop. The Sugarwater Resort was built on a crescent-shaped spit of beach, and she blindly traced its eastern curve. When the soft piles of sand got too thick, she kicked off her sandals and continued to run.

Though her lungs burned, she kept going until she found herself where no lowly bartender should be, out at the very tip, beside the luxury cottages that were rented only by the month, only to people who never asked “How much?”

She finally ran out of steam, and beach, at the last stand of palm trees. She looked around, as if she thought there might be another way out, but of course there wasn’t. The ocean was just a yard or two from her toes. Its dull, scraping sweep was louder than the blood that roared in her ears. She tried to focus on the sound. She tried to find something steady, something to hang on to.

But it was hopeless. She’d run as far as she could, as far as there was, and she hadn’t outrun the memories or the fury. Without her permission, hot liquid began to stream down her cheeks. She pushed her fingers against her eyes, as if she could force the tears back.

No, no. She wasn’t this weak. She was tough, and in control of her life, her body, even her tears. She wasn’t afraid of Mr. Sleazy. She wasn’t afraid of any man. She wasn’t afraid of anything.

But damn Jim Oliphant. Damn him for exiling her from the home she loved, the home that held the memories of her father, who would never have let anyone treat her like…

With a strangled sound, she dropped to her knees. The sand gave under her weight, and then, at the last minute, something sharp bit into her skin. Heat flashed up her leg like lightning. She rocked back on one heel, shocked by the pain, and lifted the other shin.

She must have landed on a sharp shell. Or a broken bottle. Blood—it had to be blood, though it looked black in the moonlight—seeped from a curved gash along the fleshy edge of her shin. And it hurt. It hurt like hell.

“Are you okay?”

She looked up, glaring, furious with herself that she hadn’t heard the man approaching her along the beach. What if it had been that sleazy jerk, arriving for another round? Men like that were gluttons for punishment.

But it wasn’t. Instead, it was the man who had stood in his way, giving her a chance to get free. Now that she was thinking clearly, she realized she knew him—all the female bartenders did. Their nickname for this guy was Gorgeous.

Blond. Blue-eyed. Six-one, with the body of a god, and an endearing way of seeming unaware of any of that.

His real name was David Gerard, and for the past few weeks he’d been renting one of the premium cottages, the best of the best, right here on the tip of the crescent. She’d processed his room card a dozen times or more at the bar, but he’d never hit on her. Oddly, he never hit on anybody. She’d seen about a dozen different big-breasted blondes try their darnedest to snag him, if only for one night, but he always brushed them off gracefully and left the bar alone.

It was kind of fascinating, actually. He ate dinner at the beachside bar every night, as if he were looking for someone, but he never hooked up. He nursed a couple of beers for hours, and spent the rest of the night throwing darts with the oldest, loneliest regular in the place.

They all wondered what his story was. Kitty said he acted like a guy with a broken heart. Jill disagreed. Any woman lucky enough to get her hands on that heart, she said, putting a wry stress on the word heart, would be careful not to let it slip away.

Kitty wondered why he’d followed her out here.

“I’m fine,” she said now, and pulled herself to her feet. Grimacing, she brushed the bloody sand from her leg, then wished she’d dealt with her face first. She lifted her chin, daring him to mention the tears. “It’s just my shin. I think I fell on something.”

He bent down and took her calf between his hands. He didn’t seem alarmed, but his grip was firm. “Let’s get into the light. My cottage is right behind us. Can you walk?”

“Of course,” she said, but the first weight she put on the leg made it sting. “It’s no big deal. I should just go back to—”

“No. My place is right here. So is my car. If you need stitches, I can drive you to the E.R.”

She glanced back toward the hotel, registering how far away the service dorms really were. “Fine. I mean…yeah, okay. Thanks.”

She saw him smile as he lifted her arm and put it over his shoulder. She knew she sounded edgy and ungrateful, but, damn it, she felt like such a fool. There she’d been, ranting about how tough and independent she was…

Sugarwater’s luxury cottages were impressive, but luckily she’d seen the interiors before, so she didn’t embarrass herself by gasping or gawking. He flicked on the living room light switch—she noticed it was set to the recessed mood lighting, which didn’t compete with the view of the ocean through the big picture window.

He deposited her on the wide leather sofa, then fiddled a few minutes in the wet bar behind her. When he returned, he had a plain brown bottle of hydrogen peroxide, some gauze and a bandage.

She stared. “You keep a first aid kit in the bar?”

He laughed, but he was already down on one knee in front of her, gently cleaning off the cut. “Yeah, well, I put a gash in my own leg the first week I was here. Apparently I still can’t surf worth a darn.” He smiled up at her. “Ten stitches. Just came out a week or so ago.”

She smiled in spite of herself. He didn’t seem clumsy. His hands felt sure. And kind.

He went through several pieces of gauze, all of which came away bloody and crumpled. He used the peroxide liberally, and thin, pink blood inched down her calf in dotted lines. He wiped it clean, with light strokes that made her feel strangely warm and tingly.

God. Just how weak was she tonight? Was she actually letting this Boy Scout routine turn her on?

It took a while, as he was clearly conscientious. But it wasn’t all vaguely erotic TLC. Some of it was pure, sensible first aid business. She flinched as he scrubbed away a few last grains of sand.

“Sorry,” he said. He bent closer and probed with careful fingers. Then he dabbed one last time and started peeling the plastic backing from a large square bandage.

“It’s not as bad as it looked. No need for stitches, probably. But you’re going to want to get a tetanus shot.”

“I had one a few months ago,” she said. Her voice sounded husky, and she cleared her throat. “When you work around here, you don’t take risks.”

He nodded. “Good.” He wadded up the used gauze and got up to put it in the trash can behind the bar. Then he ran water to wash his hands.

“How about you?”

She swiveled.

He was pointing to the military lineup of booze along the glass wall. The standard new-guest stock that came with the cottage. It didn’t seem to have been touched, though David had been here several weeks. “Want something to take the edge off?”

For a minute, she didn’t answer. Surrounded by sparkling crystal, he looked like the suave, unattainable hero of every movie she’d ever seen. So easy, so comfortable in his own skin, dressed casually in khakis and blue polo shirt, which probably hadn’t been chosen to set off his taut chest and sexy hips, but did anyhow.

Something inside her stirred. It shifted restlessly. Something that had been asleep for a long, long time.

She tried to ignore it. He was too good-looking. She didn’t trust such handsome men. His blond hair seemed to gleam, and his perfect profile was both manly and beautiful. And, yet, in some indescribable way, he didn’t seem like…like the rest of them.

But that was ridiculous. Green-haired bartenders with edgy pasts were undoubtedly not his type, and Boy Scout gods weren’t hers. And yet…that restless spot inside her felt odd, as if it were being tugged toward him. She wondered if he felt it, too. Something in his eyes made her think he might.

“No, thanks,” she said. “I don’t drink.”

“Water, then.” He brought over two glasses straight from the subzero fridge and sat beside her on the sofa. “Here’s to a little peace and quiet for the rest of tonight. You’ve certainly earned it.”

They both unscrewed their caps and drank a toast. She found herself watching the column of his throat as he swallowed. His neck was bronze and manly, but without that thick, muscled look she hated. The Jim Oliphant look. In fact, he had the kind of body she was usually attracted to. Lean, simple, graceful. As if he would be good at tennis.

Or sex.

He was watching her, too. She felt a blush creep over her cheeks, and she was suddenly aware that their bodies were only inches apart, and that this sofa had obviously been designed for nights of impulsive passion. She wondered whether he’d brought her here with casual sex in mind.

If only he knew how long it had been since sex had been casual for her. She could tell him—almost to the day. Eight years. Of all the things Jim Oliphant had stolen from her, the easy acceptance of her sexuality was the thing she missed the most.

Since the day Jim had pulled his disgusting stunt, she’d had one lover. Just one, a quiet law student she’d met at her first waitressing job. In Atlanta, where she’d settled after she’d come to the end of nearly two years of running. She’d stayed there a whole year, letting Allen erase the memory of Jim’s grabbing hands.

Then Allen graduated, she had moved on…and she’d passed into a long, lonely five years, avoiding intimacy of any kind.

She turned away awkwardly and focused on the picture window. It framed a magical view. Just yards away, the ocean waves angled in, rolling toward the shore. Just before they broke, moonlight created a flashing vein of silver along the glassy curls.

She felt something silver winking deep inside her, as if a shaft of moonlight had penetrated her own murky layers of numbness and fear. It was almost as if somewhere, way down deep, below the scars, below the memory of Jim Oliphant, the real Kitty Hemmings still survived.

“You know, I didn’t thank you. For tonight. It was nice of you to…to step in.” She looked down at her water bottle, then risked a glance up at David. “Usually I handle jerks like that much more smoothly. It’s just that—I was rattled. You see, I got some bad news tonight.”

If he’d asked her what the news was, she probably would have clammed up. But he didn’t. He just waited. Serious. Attentive.

“I found out my mother is going to marry a guy I can’t stand. A very bad guy. I’ve told her about him, but she doesn’t believe me. She doesn’t want to believe me.”

David frowned slightly, but he still had the sense not to speak.

“The hard part is…just tonight I’d been thinking maybe I could go home soon. I’ve been here—or somewhere—for eight years now. I’ve started to get homesick. But now…now that he’s going to be there permanently, I can’t go home. Not ever.”

He was silent for a minute longer.

“I’m sorry,” he said finally. “That must be hard.”

She nodded, wondering why she was unburdening herself like this. He couldn’t care. He didn’t even know her last name, which they never printed on the name tags, for “security” purposes.

But maybe that was why it was possible to speak the truth. He didn’t know her. He couldn’t judge her. And he didn’t seem the judgmental type, anyhow. He actually seemed surprisingly kind.

“It’s even more painful than I thought it would be,” she went on. “I don’t know why. I knew my mother didn’t believe me about Jim. I knew he was still in her life. Logically, this engagement thing shouldn’t be such a big deal.”

He shrugged. “I don’t think pain responds very well to logic. I—” He smiled over at her, a strangely sad smile. “It hasn’t been the best day in my world, either.”

Now it was her turn to wait. She wondered whether this was it…the answer to the question the staff had all been asking. Why did such a hunky, gorgeous guy always look so haunted and alone?

He turned his glass, watching the light glimmer on the water. “A woman I used to be in love with married another man today. We broke up a long time ago, and it’s far from a shock. He’s a great guy, actually. We’re all friends now, and I’m actually even happy for her. I thought I could go, but at the last minute I couldn’t. I just…couldn’t.”

He let the explanation taper off. Their gazes held, though, and something invisible arced between them.

Then she knew he felt it, too. In spite of her green hair and her tough-girl attitude, in spite of the fact that someone this gorgeous clearly should spend all his time with beauty queens, he wanted her.

Correction. He wanted someone. For the first time since he’d arrived at the resort, the loneliness had overpowered him. His voice was calm, his body at ease, and yet she heard the undercurrent of confusion, of betrayal, of loss. It spoke to her, even more than his gentle hands or his bedroom eyes.

She considered the situation, well aware it was foolish to risk a one-night stand with a guest. And yet…it would be such a comfort, not to be alone for a while. Not to think about home, of Jim Oliphant, or where she would go next in this nomadic exile she’d chosen as a life.

This David Gerard was a good man. She could feel it. He was sensual, but gentle. And he was as haunted as she was.

Her father had a French phrase for someone like this, too. Âme perdue. A lost soul.

She hadn’t ever been able to master French, though she’d tried ever since her father’s death, hoping it would bring his memory closer. She wished her accent weren’t so awful. She might say that to David Gerard now.

Deux âmes perdues. Two lost souls.

Did it have to be more complicated than that? Just this once, couldn’t something be simple and sweet? He wanted her, and she wanted him, too. She wanted to make love to him. Right now. Tonight.

He was leaving tomorrow, she remembered suddenly.

A man who was leaving tomorrow was perfect. A night in his bed wouldn’t complicate anything, really. She would break this cycle of loneliness by sleeping with this lovely man, and maybe she’d wake up tomorrow lighter, easier in her own skin.

She felt the anger and bewilderment lift from her, like the sky lifting as the sun came up. Maybe her subconscious mind had guided her feet tonight, as she ran away from the bar. Maybe destiny had directed her here. Maybe it was fate.

The word startled her. Ordinarily, she didn’t believe in fate. Her mother did, and used that convenient imaginary entity to rationalize all kinds of self-destructive behavior. But, even though Kitty was a committed cynic, she couldn’t ignore this powerful feeling.

Look at the two of them, sitting on the sofa with sparks of lust going off like invisible fireworks. Two lonely people, two sets of painful memories that had reached an unbearable climax today. Each facing a long, miserable night of trying to forget.

She touched his upturned palm with her fingertips. His eyes darkened slightly, and a flash of electricity shimmered under her fingers, but otherwise he didn’t react.

“I’m sorry,” he said politely. “I didn’t mean to whine on about my problems. I must sound like an idiot.”

“No, you don’t.” She held his gaze and kept her fingers against his palm. “You sound like someone who doesn’t want to be alone tonight.”

He started to say something, then stopped. He closed his fingers around hers and shook his head. “No, don’t. This isn’t right. I didn’t… I promise you, I wasn’t looking for this. I didn’t follow you onto the beach hoping that—”

“I know you didn’t.” With her other hand, she reached out and touched his cheek. She had to lean over to do it. “Does that mean you don’t want it? Because I do. A lot.”

“I—” He frowned. “Wanting is…I don’t want to take advantage… It would be—”

“It would be lovely,” she said.

“Yes.” He closed his eyes, still frowning. “But—”

“Isn’t that enough? It doesn’t have to be complicated. You’re just a man, and I’m just a woman, and we’re hurting. But we can help each other tonight.”

“Listen.” His eyes fell to her name tag. “Kitty. You’re right. It’s a bad time for me, and I came to the Bahamas thinking maybe I could just—” He broke off and ran his free hand through his hair. “But now, with the way you’re feeling tonight, if I take—”

“You’re not taking from me any more than I would be taking from you. I want you, and I think you want me. There’s…something. You feel it, don’t you?” She took his hand and guided it to her breast, where her heart thudded with hunger. “Don’t you?”

She felt the heat of his palm through the cheap polyester of her uniform. He scanned her face with somber eyes. He took a long breath that seemed to catch on something as it entered his lungs.

“Of course I do,” he said. He grazed her cheek with one knuckle, and then, slowly, he bent his head down and whispered against her neck, “Yes. Of course I do.”

His breath was warm and sweet, and went through her like a honeyed summer breeze. She began to shiver as he dragged his mouth up her throat, and goose bumps cascaded down her body, all the way to her toes.

She had wondered whether, in the end, she would change her mind and back away, as she had done so often, but his sudden human warmth was blissful. Easy and, at the same time, thrilling. She groaned in hungry relief, and pressed her body closer, as close as she could get.

Take that, Jim Oliphant. She wasn’t ruined. She was still a woman, and she could still catch fire from a man’s touch. It just had to be the right man. The right touch.

David seemed to understand that she didn’t want him to waste time with a gentle seduction. She didn’t want to change her mind. He lowered his mouth over hers and took her parted lips. His kiss was fierce, and the inside of his mouth was hot and sweet.

She heard herself moan, and for just a flash she wondered…what was he going to think of her? They’d just met, and—

But she didn’t care. Tomorrow he’d disappear back into his real life, and she’d never see him again. He wasn’t David Gerard, and she wasn’t Kitty Hemmings. They were simply bodies, doing what healthy, hungry men and women did.

His hands slid across her back, down to her hips and up again, into her hair, and everything he touched tingled—her scalp, her ears, her spine, her arms.

She felt a sudden wetness under her eyes, but it wasn’t tears this time. She’d been frozen, and now she was melting. The ice water was seeping out, overflowing. She felt it around her heart, too, and between her legs.

She reached between their bodies and touched him, hoping she could urge him to hurry. She was ready. She’d been ready for years.

He was ready, too—she could feel how ready. But though she stroked that exciting, swollen warmth and traced the strong contours with her fingertips until she could hardly breathe, he never lost his focus.

His lips were still doing fiery things to her collarbone, even while his fingers found the metal pull to the zipper that ran down the front of her dress. Her stupid, too-tight, too-short bartender’s costume.

As the fabric peeled open, David bent his head further, kissing each new inch of exposed skin. The moonlight glistened on his dark blond hair, as if he’d been dusted with glitter.

She threaded her fingers through his hair and arched toward him. Oh, she wanted this so much. It might be midnight outside, but as he slipped the dress from her shoulders she felt suddenly full of sunshine. Her nerve endings sizzled, just like the ocean on a bright summer afternoon.