On Wings of Magic (15 page)

“Yes.” He gave her a gentle push toward the elevator and a swat on the bottom—again. “You can even bring the cat, since she apparently likes to swim. I need to get to know her, anyway.”

“You don’t need to know Gypsy, and I—”

Hawke sighed. “If you don’t run up and change, honey, I’ll take you to the boat just the way you are.”

Kendall considered challenging that statement … except that she knew he would. Damn him. Giving him a goaded look, she turned away, suffering the indignity of another swat with nothing more than an irritated mutter.

“Be back down here in ten minutes.” He sounded amused.

“Yes, master.” She made the reply sarcastic, but as she got in the elevator and heard him laughing, she wondered if it was truer than she wanted to admit to herself. Hastily, she shunted the thought aside. No more soul-searching; she was still raw from the last time.

She was back down in nine minutes, wearing cutoff jeans and a colorful T-shirt over a bikini, and carrying her beachbag. With her cat draped around her neck.

Hawke took her wrist again and began leading her toward the door, and when she protested that she hadn’t said good-bye to Sarah, told her easily, “You’ll see Mother again.”

The promise left Kendall silent and uneasy.

Hawke drove one of the hotel jeeps to the south end of the island, where a small marina lay. About a score of small boats were berthed there, mostly sailboats of various size.

Ignoring Gypsy’s mutters of dislike, Hawke got out after parking the jeep and came around to help Kendall. “Your cat doesn’t like me,” he observed wryly.

Watching him retrieve a large wicker hamper from the back of the jeep, Kendall said calmly, “Because of that first morning. You fished her out of a bathtub and she hates to have her bath interrupted.”

Hawke stared at her for a moment, then at the yellow-eyed cat. “Hitching my fate to a couple of spitfires,” he murmured. “I ought to have my head examined.”

Before Kendall could respond—fortunately—he
took her arm and began leading her toward the boats. The one he finally stopped beside was a twenty-foot beauty. Without comment she allowed him to help her over the side.

He stowed the hamper below, then returned to stare consideringly at Kendall. “Do you know boats?”

“Yes.” She didn’t elaborate.

“Good,” he said briskly. “Then you can take the wheel.” He stripped off the black stacks to reveal a pair of white swim trunks, leaving the pirate shirt on. “Will Gypsy do anything cute—like try climbing the sails—if you turn her loose?”

“No.” A smile tugged at her lips for the first time. “Gypsy knows boats too.”

An answering smile gleamed in his eyes. “Then by all means, let her loose.” He busied himself making ready to sail.

Deciding to simply relax and enjoy herself, Kendall released her cat and then placed her beachbag out of their way, taking her seat behind the brass wheel. “Does the boat have a name?” she called out to Hawke, vaguely irritated with herself for her inability to keep her eyes off him. Particularly his legs. Damn.

He looked back at her in the act of raising the sails, grinning. “Of course. She’s called the
Enchantress.”

She might have known.

They were both somewhat caught up in getting the small craft out of the marina for some time. Once out, Hawke, rather to Kendall’s surprise, didn’t offer to take the wheel. Instead, he went below for a moment, returning with a small white pail.

Kendall looked at him uncertainly. “I don’t know these waters, Hawke. Are there any reefs, or—”

He was shaking his head. “Not on this side of the island. Just keep heading due north.” Sitting down cross-legged on the deck near the wheel, he opened the small pail and produced a piece of raw fish, which he gravely offered to Gypsy.

The cat, sitting at Kendall’s feet, stared at the morsel rather disdainfully for a moment, then delicately accepted it. Hawke offered a second. Gypsy accepted it. And a third.

Trying to keep one eye on her steering and one eye on the little scene going on beside her, Kendall dutifully kept the boat heading in the right direction. Ten minutes later she heaved an inward sigh as she heard Gypsy giving her version of a purr—which sounded something like a large engine idling. Hawke had a friend for life. By the time they reached the northern end of the island, the cat was in his lap, blissfully having her chin scratched.

Hawke took over the wheel then, expertly swinging the small boat around the northern tip of the island and drifting east slightly before heading south.

Once they were on course, Kendall stripped off her jeans and T-shirt, revealing the tiny black bikini beneath. Bending over to get her sunglasses out of her bag, she asked dryly, “Did you invite Gypsy along just so you could seduce her with fish?”

“Something like that.”

“It’s only cupboard love, you know.”

“Good enough. When it’s a cat.”

Kendall sat down on the padded seat beside the
cabin door and lifted a brow at him. “As opposed to—?”

“A human. For instance,” he went on blandly, “I’d hate for you to start loving me just because I fed you fish.”

“What about diamonds and rubies?” she murmured, determined to take him lightly.

“That’s a bit different. The tiara was given with a certain spirit—which I trust you appreciated.”

Kendall bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. “Oh, I appreciated the spirit. Everyone in the
hotel
appreciated the spirit.”

He grinned at her pained tone. “Well, you have to admit—there can be no doubt about my intentions.”

She hastily shoved the sunglasses onto her nose. “Where are we going, by the way?”

“Change of subject?” he muttered wryly, and then went on before she could respond. “Nowhere in particular. I thought you might want to see some of the other islands. Can you scuba dive?”

“Yes.”

He grinned faintly and shot her an amused glance. “Stupid question. Is there anything you
haven’t
done?”

“A few things.” Kendall wasn’t about to tell him the most important thing she hadn’t done. He probably wouldn’t have believed her anyway. Not that she could blame him. With her life-style, most people would have considered her virginity a miracle.

“Skydiving?” He cocked a quizzical brow.

“I’ve tried it.” When he looked startled, Kendall laughed and added, “Not willingly.”

He looked even more startled. “What?”

She sighed. “It’s a long story.”

“So? We have all day. And you can’t leave me hanging like this!”

Kendall drew her legs up on the seat and watched Gypsy make herself comfortable at Hawke’s feet. “Well, it was about five years ago. Daddy had an assignment in South America, and didn’t want me to go. I was supposed to visit friends in the States. Anyway, I decided to go, so I—uh—stowed away on his plane.”

“Good Lord,” Hawke murmured faintly.

“Ummm. Daddy was a little more vocal about it. But the plane was in the air by then, so he couldn’t very well shove me out the door. I’d gotten him smoothed down—barely—when the pilot announced that he was having engine trouble. And we were right over this godforsaken jungle, with no landing strip for miles.

“The pilot—not being the courageous sort—decided he’d rather not go down with his ship, and bailed out. And since the rest of us didn’t know much about flying, we had no choice but to follow suit.”

“What happened?” Hawke looked intrigued.

Kendall drew one knee up and rested her chin on it. “Well, we’d all had survival training, so we stayed alive. But we had to spend three horrible nights in that jungle. I woke up on the second morning to find a boa constrictor curled up beside me. It was nearly as big around as I was, and twenty-five feet long.” Reflectively, she added, “I’ve been afraid of snakes ever since.”

Hawke was staring at her. “You’re kidding?”

She crossed her heart solemnly. “I swear.”

His mouth twitched. “What happened to the boa?”

“I really don’t know. I shut my eyes and started screaming. By the time Daddy got me calmed down, it was gone. Either I’d scared it off, or one of them had.”

There was an odd expression in Hawke’s eyes as he looked at her. “Tell me more.”

Kendall shifted a little uneasily beneath that look. “It’s almost always boring to hear someone else’s adventures. Besides—it’s all pretty tame.”

“Climbing mountains, jumping out of planes and waking up next to boa constrictors is tame?” He shook his head. “Really, Kendall, I’d like to hear about your life. And I doubt very much that I’ll be bored at all.”

Deciding finally that she’d rather talk about her life than have Hawke make more comments about his intentions, she obeyed his request. She touched lightly on various events in her Ufe, most of them comical. Like the time the son of a diplomat had mischievously turned his pet mongoose loose in the middle of a diplomatic ball. And the time in Africa when she’d been adopted by a baby elephant, which insisted on following her everywhere she went just like a pet dog—and led to some very strange encounters. And the time in Arabia when she had unwittingly gotten herself locked in with a harem—and the diplomatic red tape her father had had to wade through to get her out.

Funny things. Things to keep Hawke chuckling softly at the wheel of the sailboat. Things to keep herself from thinking too much about him and how she felt about him.

Hawke finally piloted the boat into a small cove on one of the islands, and she scrambled forward to drop the sails. He dropped the anchor and then went below, answering Kendall’s quizzical look with a succinct “Lunch!”

When he came back up, bearing the wicker hamper, she said uneasily, “Surely I haven’t talked that long.”

He grinned. “Of course not—sea air just makes me hungry. Besides, I enjoyed it.”

Since she wasn’t wearing a watch and couldn’t read minds, she had to take his word on both counts. Unfolding the blanket he handed her, she spread it out on the cleared space behind the wheel and then knelt to examine the contents of the hamper. Sea air made her hungry too.

From the looks of it, he’d told the hotel cook that an army was going sailing. There was chicken, potato salad, rolls, cheese and crackers, various fruit. And a bottle of vintage wine—complete with two delicate goblets. Kendall examined the label on the wine bottle and raised an eyebrow at Hawke. “For a picnic?”

He grinned. “You know wine too, I see.”

“I have a working knowledge.” She frowned at him. “This should be opened on a special occasion.”

“This is a special occasion.” He produced a corkscrew and took the bottle away from her. “A certain young lady I know did a very good job of evening the score this morning.”

Fighting back a giggle, Kendall began to prepare two plates. “Oh, really? Got her own back, did she?”

“I’ll say.” He poured the wine into the goblets and handed her one, gravely accepting the plate she
handed him. “In fact, she embarrassed the hell out of a certain romantic hotelier.”

Kendall smiled at him sweetly, and waited.

He sighed and abruptly reverted to first person. “I ought to turn you over my knee for that little stunt, honey.” When she continued to regard him easily, his mouth twisted slightly. “Except that I can’t, can I? It wouldn’t be fair. You were playing by my rules, after all.”

She lifted her glass in a silent toast and sipped her wine, still smiling.

“You learn fast,” he observed wryly, then winked at her and began eating.

Kendall followed suit, deciding that sooner or later she was going to ask him about the scar again. Sarah hadn’t been able to tell her where he’d gotten it, and she
was
curious. But it took either anger or nerve to ask a man a question like that, and right now she had neither.

They talked casually while they ate, feeding Gypsy tidbits from time to time and just quietly enjoying the soft sounds of water lapping against the side of the boat. It was a companionable time, and Kendall had never felt so content.

Feeling sleepy after the meal, she lay back on the blanket and rested her head on a life jacket, deciding vaguely that she wasn’t going to move again if she could help it. “You’re spoiling me,” she murmured lazily, hearing him pack away the remainder of lunch.

He stretched out beside her, raising himself on an elbow and reaching over to remove her sunglasses. Sleepy blue-green eyes gazed up at him. “I’d like to,” he said, his voice dark, hypnotic. “I’d like to spoil
you; Take care of you.” His lips quirked slightly. “Keep all the gremlins at bay.”

“Romance,” she whispered, too sleepy and utterly boneless to protest the idea. “But I can take care of myself, Hawke.”

“I know you can.” He placed an arm across her waist and smiled down at her a little crookedly. Whimsically, he went on. “You’re a little thing. Beautiful, delicate, and you look about as fierce as a week-old kitten. But strong. You’ve led a life that tested every gentle quality in you again and again. It should have hardened you, made you cold and cynical.”

“It has,” she murmured, thinking of her reluctance to love.

“No.” He shook his head slowly. “You’re still gentle. Even when you’re angry, the gentleness is there. You could probably swear the devil out of hell—in six languages—and still be gentle. And you’re right; you can take care of yourself.”

His arm tightened slightly. “But I still want to take care of you. I want to surround you with beauty and romance. Bring you flowers and buy you silly presents. I want to make sure that you’ll never be hurt the way you were in the past, that you’ll never have nightmares again.”

He leaned over and kissed her softly. It was a warm, drugging kiss, filled with gentleness and something else, something Kendall couldn’t identify. She sighed contentedly and slipped her arms up around his neck, needing to touch him and not giving a particular damn—at that moment—about anything else.

Hawke made no demands. He continued to kiss her gently on her lips, her nose, her eyes. Soft caresses no heavier than dew. If there was passion in
him, he held it rigidly in check. He seemed almost to cherish her, his wine-scented breath sweet and warm on her face.