Gypsy Beach (18 page)

As that very question had been plaguing Ryan
since he’d pulled up to the Inn, he nodded his understanding. Roby
was his only guess, and that seemed far-fetched. He was a greedy
old bastard, for sure, but there was nothing in the Inn that was
worth much of anything. Taking anything of value from Sienna seemed
to work against his desire that she pay him yearly for the Inn.

“I don’t know, sweetheart, but I want you out
of here. I need to know both of you are safe.”

A few minutes later, he unloaded Evie’s bags
and supposed he should be thankful that Alexa did pack all of her
stuff. He settled Evie in the smallest bedroom with the pink
bedspread that his mother had purchased that last summer that his
family had vacationed at Gypsy Beach.

It was nearing two o’clock in the morning, so
his baby girl was fast asleep as soon as he turned out the light.
He whispered a kiss on her cheek and located Sienna in the living
room. She was staring out the sliding glass doors, studying the Inn
across the rippling water.

Ryan ordered his libido to maintain control.
She was scared and exhausted, and it had been a heck of a day.
Hell, he was beyond exhausted, but his cock wanted to hear none of
his logic or reason on why tonight wasn’t a good night.

The gleam of moonlight that danced over her
shoulders and illuminated her beautiful face and the slight swells
of her breasts made her almost impossible to resist.

“Let’s go to bed, baby.” He’d take her lead.
If she wanted to be loved thoroughly, he would take excellent care
of her every desire. If she wanted to be held and reassured that
they would figure out who’d ransacked her Inn, he would provide her
the sanctuary of his arms and the fortitude of his protection. He
would somehow keep his cock and his overactive libido in check, but
it wouldn’t be easy.

She nodded and forced her gaze away from the
awe-inspiring view that his parents had paid heavily for. Tears
glossed her eyes. His heart, that she’d just recently resuscitated,
the evening before, ached for her.

“Come here to me.” He wrapped her up in his
arms. “We will figure all of this out, okay? I promise you. We’ll
get it cleaned up tomorrow, talk to the police again, and turn your
Inn into everything you wanted it to be.”

She nodded against his chest and clung to him
with a great deal of force. Her hands knotted his t-shirt as she
gave into the tears. He swayed her back and forth and attempted to
wipe them away. When that proved impossible, he lifted her up into
his arms and carried her to bed.

“I’ve got you, baby. I’m right here. I
promise.” His constant vows and his capable hands soothed her until
she finally fell asleep against him.

Evie, a half-dozen stuffed animals, her
blanket, and her pillow landed on Ryan and Sienna about eight the
next morning. “Hi, Daddy. Can I have some juice?”

Rubbing his eyes, Ryan unearthed a groaning
Sienna and then made room for Evie between them. “Hi, baby girl.
I’ll get your juice in just a minute, okay? Let Daddy and Sienna
wake up.”

“Did you have a spend-the-night party?”

Ryan debated an answer as Sienna sat up
stared at him in bewilderment. “Evie, listen to Daddy for a minute.
Daddy loves Sienna very much.”

“And I love your Daddy. I promise.” Sienna’s
vow brought life’s blood back to his body. He leaned and brushed a
kiss on her cheek.

“And you know that I love you very much.
We’re going to go to Sienna’s house today and you can help us work,
then we’ll go play on the beach, okay? She’s going to stay with
us.”

Having no idea what his little girl would
make of all of that, he braced for an incursion of questions. “Is
Sienna friends with Mommy, too?”

Trying not to scowl, Ryan shook his head.
“Sienna is my girlfriend. She doesn’t know Mommy.”

“Does Mommy love me very much?”

His heart seized. It refused him the next
beat. His lungs burned with acrid air.

“Yes!” Sienna vowed loudly. “Yes, your mommy
does love you, Evie. Your Daddy and Mommy both love you, even if
they don’t live together anymore.”

Evie nodded, but the question still worried
her. “Can I have my juice now?”

Ryan scrambled from the bed, desperate for an
escape. He didn’t know if Alexa had ever really loved Evie, or if
she was truly capable of loving anyone other than herself.

An hour later, Evie was bringing Sienna a
haphazard collection of things that had been dumped on the floor
for Sienna to put away. Ryan tried to guide her as he restored all
of the mattresses to their beds and boxed up things that would need
to be put in storage while he worked on the house, but Sienna
didn’t seem to mind putting away whatever Evie provided. When the
kitchen was restored to order, Sienna seemed to calm even more.

Ryan continued working upstairs while Evie
helped Sienna with lunch. “Daddy!” Her delighted exuberance made
him smile.

“Evie!” He matched her intonation and
listened to her giggle.

“Sienna says we can have a picnic outside by
the water. I helped make your sandwich. Come on!” She grasped his
hand and attempted to drag him to the stairs.

The house was relatively restored, and he’d
cleared two guestrooms and prepped to repair the hardwoods the next
day. A picnic with his girls sounded like the perfect way to spend
the afternoon. He scooped Evie up and bounded down the stairs with
her.

A hungry grunt escaped his throat when he
entered the kitchen to find Sienna in a sexy little apron that had
him hungry for something that was certainly not packed in the
picnic basket on the table.

Sienna rewarded him with another one of her
sexy smirks. “Don’t be sexist, Ryan McNamara.”

He set Evie down, grabbed the ties of the
apron, and drew her back to his chest. “Not sexist, baby, horny.”
He huffed in her ear. “And trying to stop picturing you wearing
nothing but the apron while I do all of your bidding, never the
other way around.” His erection nudged at her backside, though he
attempted to will it away.

Her breaths sped, and she turned her head to
meet his hungry eyes. She liked that idea. Unwilling and unable to
keep his hands off of her any longer, he gripped her hips and very
discreetly slid her backside against his steel-hard cock. “That’s
what you do to me, baby. I still have so much to make up for.”

Evie had wondered back to an open cabinet of
mismatched pots, pans, and Tupperware pieces. She was pretending to
cook.

“Ryan,” Sienna’s voice strangled over his
name. She gestured towards Evie.

“Tonight,” he husked in her ear as he grabbed
a handful of that sexy ass and then spun her in his arms and tried
to pacify his more licentious side with a long drawn kiss.

After settling a large quilt on the sand,
Ryan and Sienna made Evie a plate of food. “Daddy!” she squealed
after a few bites. She dropped her sandwich when she stood to race
down the beach. “Look at the turtle!”

As Ryan only had eyes for Sienna dressed in a
skimpy burnt orange bikini and a short, open kimono cover up, he’d
missed the mama turtle padding out towards the water. He and Sienna
raced after Evie, who was squealing her delight.

When they caught up to her, she was thrilled
with the turtle’s slow progress back to the water. Ryan lifted her
up in to his arms. “She’s a mommy turtle. She just laid her eggs up
here on the beach, and when the babies are ready to hatch, they’ll
crawl to the ocean just like she did.”

“Don’t they need their mommy to stay with
them? Will she teach them to swim?”

“She took good care of them.” Sienna smiled.
“See, she tucked them safe in the sand away from the water where
they’ll be warm. She needs to be back in the ocean, but they’ll be
okay. And when they’re ready to have babies of their own, they’ll
probably come right back here to lay their eggs. Isn’t that
neat?”

Evie nodded, but her eyes stayed trained on
the turtle. She was mesmerized. “Can I pet her?”

“I think we better let her get in the ocean
as fast as she can. We don’t want to bother her.”

When the turtle disappeared in the chilly
waters, Ryan set Evie down. She took one of his hands and one of
Sienna’s. “Swing me, please!”

With delighted grins, they lifted her up in
the air, reveling in her squeals of delight. They returned to the
quilt and restored her lunch to its plate. Evie turned inquisitive
once her little belly was full of grapes, peanut butter and honey
sandwiches, chips, and Sienna’s homemade applesauce. “Do you know
how to swim?” She folded her little legs and turned her huge brown
eyes on Sienna.

“I do know how to swim, but it’s still too
cold right now.”

“I want to swim like Ariel because she’s very
beautiful, and she sings lots of songs, and she would get to pet
the turtles because she would be their friend, and she gets to
marry Prince Eric.” Evie seemed quite certain that was the path to
happiness.

“Well, Ariel is very beautiful, but just
promise me that you’ll never give up your fins and especially your
voice for any guy, even if he is a prince.” Sienna’s irritation
tumbled out of her mouth without her meaning for it to. Ryan’s
adamant nod and reassuring grin soothed her momentary panic.

“Exactly!” he agreed.

“I promise,” Evie assured her. “I’m going to
marry my Daddy.”

Sienna beamed at her. “Well, he is a very
handsome prince.”

Ryan chuckled and kissed the top of his baby
girl’s blonde hair and then brushed his lips over Sienna’s
smile.

“You could marry him, too, if you want to.”
Evie seemed very excited by that idea, almost as excited as
Ryan.

“That sounds like an excellent idea.” He
winked at Sienna, wondering if somehow he could really make that
very thing happen. Sienna shook her head at him, but couldn’t quite
hide her dizzying grin.

By the time Ryan and Sienna walked Evie from
the Lobster Shack where they’d had dinner, past Mac and Molly’s,
and then out to the Gypsy Beach dock, she was yawning more than she
was talking. They’d made a quick stop before dinner at Wright’s
Drugstore. Sienna had entertained Evie looking at the coloring
books while Ryan stocked up on condoms and lube. Sienna had very
discreetly pointed out her preferences without Evie noticing.

As they pressed onward, Ryan scooped Evie up
and tried to memorize the way his heart swelled with love when she
nuzzled her sweet little head against his neck. He couldn’t imagine
not being able to hold her or having to go weeks without tucking
her in at night.

The moonlight rippled over the rolling waves
and the lull of the crashing waters was soothing her to sleep. “I
think it’s time for bed, baby girl.” She gave him a half nod,
barely able to hold her eyes open.

She’d played in the sand all afternoon and
had pretended to cook in Sienna’s kitchen until Ryan offered to
take everyone to Gypsy Beach’s fanciest restaurant, The Lobster
Shack.
Shack
was really the only fitting description. It sat
just off the pier overlooking the water. They’d had some flood
damage, but a few repairs had been made. The patrons ate at bench
picnic tables whether they were eating inside or out. Crab traps,
overgrown plants, old life vests, and fishing nets all but blocked
the front door, but the seafood was outstanding and the hush
puppies were Sienna’s favorite. Ryan loved watching her inhale
them. He loved that she wasn’t afraid to eat. He loved that she had
no qualms showing off her beautiful body, even if she didn’t
believe him when he told her how stunningly sexy she was.

There was a peace within her that Ryan found
intoxicating, and just as it had been since she was fifteen years
old, it swirled in vast juxtaposition with her longing to take
flight. She thought her breasts were entirely too small and her ass
was entirely too large, but she didn’t care enough to let it stop
her from enjoying her life. He knew she was absolute perfection,
and he planned to spend the rest of his life showing her that.

All Alexa did was bitch and diet, even though
she was quite attractive right up until the moment she spoke. Her
curves had been all Ryan cared about when his mother presented her
as the girl he was to date if he wanted to shut his parents up.

Not lingering on the dock, they walked past
the tiny beachfront shops to the other end of the cove to the
McNamara’s house. He managed to get Evie’s nightgown on and her
teeth brushed before she was fussing from being so tired. He rocked
her for a few minutes and then laid her in her bed sound
asleep.

He’d been fighting a losing war with
possessive hunger and need for most of the day. Watching Sienna
with Evie had his head spinning with the longings of his heart. She
would be a fantastic stepmother for Evie, but tonight, he wanted
her raw and primal. Every time she whisked by him and he caught the
perfume of her, he ached. That flirty bikini had barely obscured
the tattoo that had the enviable position of being permanently
attached to her lush ass.

He wanted to spend all night satisfying that
craving look that formed in her eyes whenever they lingered on him.
He wanted to fill that sweet pussy until they were both thoroughly
spent. His tongue craved the flavors of her. His hands longed to
feel her silky skin with nothing covering her. Longed to pound into
her, to open her, and drown himself deep inside of that slick wet
heat that she made all for him. He wanted to devour her, and he was
tired of waiting.

He’d been on ragged edge all fucking day.
Alexa, the Inn, the break-in, whatever had John looking so
concerned, Roby’s shit claims, Sienna’s worry over Evie, it had all
taken its toll. He needed to make a claim, to tell the world that
he wasn’t going down without a fight. All he needed was Sienna.