A Woman's Heart (7 page)

Placing his feet on the lip of the deck, he moved around behind her, his body now snug against her back and bottom, with one arm looped around her body as his hand grasped the pole. Then he stretched in the same direction as she, and his hand met hers.

She gasped at the current coursing between their fingers, the connection as electric as the heat flaming across her back. His breath was on her neck, sweet breath, and warm, making her long to kiss him and to be kissed in return.

"Get off me," she cried.

He, too, must have felt the heat, for when she twisted around to face him, desire blazed in his eyes.

He pulled his gaze away. "I've almost got it," he muttered, stretching higher, his body rubbing against hers with the movement, inflaming her even further.

"I said get off." Her panic rose. To sink into his heat was as impossible as it was desirable. She pushed against him, fearing to lose herself in his touch.

With a garbled shout, and a sudden wrenching of heat from heat, he was gone, the splash his body made as it entered the water drenching her.

Stunned by his sudden fall, she swung her legs off the railing and stood where he had stood, one hand clutching the pole, the other shading her eyes. She struggled to pick out his shape hidden in the shadows on the water's surface.

"Peter!" she shouted, her heart pounding so hard it reverberated against her eardrums.

"John! Ruby! Help!" she screamed.

Only a ripple showed where the surface had been disturbed. Save for that ripple and the heat still coursing through her, there was no evidence Peter had ever been there. She counted to ten then with a swift glance to see that Alex was safely strapped in his high-chair, she dove into the salty water.

Her open eyes stung from the shock of it, but she couldn't see Peter, could see nothing but shadows.

She dove deeper, her hands stretched out before her, glad now for little clothing and no shoes to slow her down. Then a darker shadow floated near from the buoy on her left and she could see it was Peter.

She reached for him, thinking to catch hold of his arm and pull him to the surface, but his hand shot out and grasped her wrist instead. Despite the cold water, his fingers burned. With a sharp tug, he very quickly had her skimming upwards.

"What the hell did you think you were doing?" he demanded, the moment their heads broke the surface. He glared at her, his eyes dark and fierce.

"Are you hurt?" she asked.

"No," he yelled. "No thanks to you!"

"You were crowding me!" Even here, in the middle of the ocean, he was crowding her. He shook his head to clear wet black hair from his eyes and water sprayed over her. His legs tangled with hers as they paddled to keep afloat.

"I was helping you," he growled.

"I didn't need any help."

"So you thought you'd dump me overboard?"

"Next time maybe you'll listen."

"Is that what you intend to do to Alexander if he doesn't do what you tell him? Push him overboard?"

"No, I..." She bit her lip.

"And what do you mean jumping in after me and leaving Alexander alone?"

She shot a swift glance toward her boat. She couldn't see Alex from where she floated but she could hear his happy babbling.

"Alex is fine," she said firmly.

"Funny place for a swim," John called from above, peering over the side of Jann's boat and grinning down at them.

"Just cooling off," Peter said grimly.

"It was hot," Jann said evasively, then looked toward Peter and saw his eyes weren't as angry as they'd been before. In fact, if she didn't know better, she could have sworn there was laughter lurking in their depths.

"Let's get out," Peter said, giving her arm a gentle tug. His lips stretched into a full-fledged grin. "I've had enough swimming for one day."

* * *

"Isn't summer off-season for the big surf?" Peter asked, pulling back his arm then casting a pebble far out into the oncoming breakers.

"Yes," she answered, struggling to keep her voice matter-of-fact while screwing the telephoto lens onto her camera. "There's been some bad weather around the islands lately." She stared past Peter to the ocean. "Which is unusual for this time of year."

"Hand me that film, would you?" She glanced back at him and held out her hand. He touched her palm as he gave it to her, his fingers scoring her skin with warmth.

"Thanks," she said swiftly, snatching her hand away.

"It's been interesting," he said.

"What has?" Jann asked. She fit the film into its slot before looking at him again.

"Watching you work," he replied, with a lazy smile.

"I'm supposed to be supervising you," she said, uncomfortably aware at how easily his smile warmed her, "not the other way around."

"I thought we agreed to keep an eye on each other."

"I didn't agree to anything." Heat spread up her neck, and she was irritated anew at her inability to forget how his skin felt on hers.

Claire had said her brother was clever and controlling. He was also trying to take Alex away. She'd be a fool to forget that.

Jann glanced down the broad sweep of beach glistening in the sunlight. The surf, as usual, pulled her gaze.

"The Bonsai Pipeline," she said slowly, determined to put Peter into a different place, to make him into something he wasn't, a tourist, nothing more. "It lures surfers from all over the world. It's a God to some. To others..." She stared at the enormous breakers and couldn't stop the shiver skittering across her shoulders. "...a killer."

Then she raised her camera to her eye and scanned the water, finding, at long last, the surfer she'd been watching most of the afternoon.

The young man's face was contorted with the effort of concentration as he lay on his board paddling furiously before a gigantic wave. At just the right moment he scrambled to his feet, then, his body bending like a sapling in the wind, he balanced on the wave's crest and clung to the crashing water.

Again and again, Jann pressed the camera's shutter, excitement buoying her up as she caught the very moment the surfer knew he was there, that with skill and good luck the wave would be his. She caught, too, his exultation.

"Did you get it?" Peter asked, his voice carrying the same excitement Jann felt inside and coming from somewhere close to her ear.

"Yes," she cried happily, forgetting to be wary. "I got exactly what I wanted."

He grinned down at her, his hair blowing in the wind. Jann's heart began pounding like an out-of-control drum before lurching suddenly to a halt. Impulsively, inexplicably, she raised her camera to her eye and pressed down on the shutter.

A soundproof wall seemed to descend around her, the noise of the surf disappearing, as did the laughter of the people walking by on the sand. All that remained was the slow thumping of her heart, suddenly and erratically, resuming its beat. She stood motionless, her cheeks on fire, unwilling to lower the camera and face him.

With an inward moan, slowly and reluctantly she did just that. Peter's full lips had curved into a smile and one brow was questioningly raised.

She glanced down to where her baby lay sleeping on a blanket. "I thought Alex should have something to remember you by when you leave," she said defiantly, grateful to the child for the excuse coming to mind.

Peter laughed, a full-bodied, heart-stopping explosion of sound that erupted from his chest and made mincemeat of her lies. Then he slowly leaned towards her, placing one hand on the back of her head as his lips descended to hers.

The first touch of their warmth drifted somewhere between a promise and a threat, pummeling her with the power of the sea, demanding... enticing... relentless. Hard lips, yet smooth as satin, and salty from the ocean air.

Desire, as unbidden as the kiss, snaked through Jann's body and molded her lips to his. Another moan, as soft as a sigh this time, rolled up from her throat. Twisting her head away, she stepped backward, chest heaving. Tendrils of her hair, snatched by the wind from the elastic tie holding them, whipped against her face like harsh threads of reality.

Peter's smile died. "I shouldn't have done that," he said quietly, his stunned expression revealing to her the shock the kiss had given him.

"No," Jann whispered back. "Why did you?"

"It was just something for you to remember me by when Alex and I leave."

The world seemed to swirl, flipping end-over-end like a leaf in the wind. Desperate for an anchor, Jann forced her gaze downward to the pink-tinged cheeks of her sleeping baby.

Until Alex had come along, she had kept everyone steadfastly locked from her heart. But she'd let Alex in and now she had to keep him safe. Had to keep him with her.

"I want to go now," she said.

"Alexander is sleeping," Peter countered, in a voice sounding as strained as hers. "Don't wake him."

She was tempted to do just that, willing to do anything necessary to get away from this place and away from this man who was winning her baby over. But with Alex sleeping so peacefully, she couldn't bring herself to do it.

She risked a glance at Peter and found him watching her, his expression showing no sign now of the dark emotion just moments before. Stifling a sigh, she put her camera in its bag and set it on a log.

An off-shore breeze fluttered the edges of the lamb skin she'd tucked around Alex. She slipped down beside him, determined to leave the second he awoke.

Peter moved back to the water's edge and stood there a moment as motionless as a statue staring out at the ocean.

Was he thinking about Alex? Jann envied him his tie by blood to the most important person in her world.

Then she saw his hand clench. He couldn't be thinking of Alex. Not if he was angry. He must be thinking of her and the kiss they had shared. Regretting it.

One thing she could be sure of, he wasn't thinking about Claire. Jann angrily scrubbed away a tear. According to her friend, in the year-and-a-half since Claire left high school, Peter had vetoed everything she wanted to do, had distrusted her and investigated her friends. Claire had hated that.

Suddenly, Peter faced her, the sun now low on the horizon behind him, making it impossible to read what was in his eyes. Stepping forward, he lowered himself to the blanket.

Catching her breath and holding it, Jann willed her body small. For if he touched her again, she would tumble into his warmth, and that was not a sensation she could afford to repeat.

Then his shoulder brushed hers and, as spine-tingling as an electric current, the hairs on her arm sprang up.

"Besides," Peter continued softly, as though he had never ceased their conversation, as though he had never kissed her, "the sun will be setting in a few minutes. We don't want to miss that."

Sunset.

Magic—shared with the right person.

But she'd never had and couldn't afford to want a person like that in her life, for love wasn't worth the pain that was sure to follow.

She drew herself up stiffly. "Alex will be awake before sunset."

"Then he'll enjoy it with us."

She stole a glance sideways. The light of the lowering sun reflected off Peter's eyes, concealing all expression, filling them with mystery.

"Besides," he added, smiling at her faintly, "I didn't come all the way to Sunset Beach to miss the sunset."

A knot formed in Jann's stomach, and she turned away, but she sensed before she actually felt his fingers gripping her chin.

"Forget the kiss," he ordered, gently turning her head to face him. "Concentrate on the sunset."

How could she concentrate on anything when her jaw trembled against the rough-smooth texture of his fingers?

"Cold?" he murmured. Not waiting for her reply, he pulled off his sweater and laid it across her shoulders.

It hung heavy, weighing her down, the warmth of his body still captured within. It heated her throughout, but was in some way too familiar, as though Peter himself was the one who held her. Easing the sweater off, she let it drop to the blanket. If Peter noticed her action, he didn't let on.

"Look," he whispered instead, pointing out to sea.

The sun was a ball of flame, flung as if by some giant to the distant horizon while overhead the sky was pink, deepening to magenta in places, then to violet, even purple, tone layering tone in a cacophony of color.

Peter sprawled lower, seeming as relaxed beside her as she was tense. If she could simply ignore him, not look at him. Blinking hard, she reached for her camera, screwed on a wide-angled lens, and focused it on the skyline.

Without warning, his fingers covered hers, sending a tingling sensation exploding up her arm.

"Don't hide behind that camera, Jann."

"I'm not," she protested hoarsely.

"That's a lie." Gently, insistently, he pulled on her hand, forcing the camera away from her face. "You're afraid of something," he accused softly, staring intently into her eyes. "I know you are. I can feel it."