Chapter Twenty-two

Clay lay flat on the hard-packed sand, close enough to the water that the occasional wave passed under him, soaking his clothes and digging a sinkhole for his body.

A sinkhole. The perfect metaphor for this mess.

He’d been out here long enough that his eyes had completely adjusted to the darkness, allowing him to see the Milky Way in all its celestial glory. A nearly full moon hung in a cloudless sky, cutting a river of silver over the calm waters of the Gulf. Nothing but the sound of the steady surf and the distant buzz of cicadas interrupted his miserable thoughts.

Thoughts that had turned dark, cynical, and circular as each moment passed and he accepted that Lacey wasn’t going to show.

A warm wave punctuated the realization, seeping around his body again, leaving him wet and chilled, sucking him deeper into the sand.

Who could blame her? He’d lied, even if it was a lie of omission. Sure, he had plenty of reasons—she’d back out, he wanted the affidavit, the allegations were false, the charges dropped—but that didn’t change the truth.

And he’d given her a hard time for having excuses.

Who could blame her for blowing him off tonight? For staying with her friends and family, or letting her ex-boyfriend work his magic and convince her that he could be a real father to Ashley? Because Clay sure as hell didn’t want that job. Did he?

He slapped his hands on the wet sand and pushed up, wanting to wash away the thoughts and the sticky muck that had turned his skin and clothes into forty-grit sandpaper.

Popping open his button-down shirt, he shimmied free of the wet sleeves and threw the shirt on the sand. Then he stripped off his sopping wet pants and boxers and tossed them on the pile with the shoes he’d long ago abandoned.

Naked, he strode into the surf, instantly relieved of the sand but not of the agony in his chest. He dove underwater and stayed down; his lungs ached. He popped up and sucked in a mouthful of salty night air, wiping the water from his eyes just as headlights cut a swath across Lacey’s property.

Holy shit. She came.

She killed the lights, then the engine, and slammed the car door. He heard footsteps on the cement foundation, imagined Lacey walking around her property looking for him.

Why didn’t he move? He couldn’t. If she came to him, if she forgave him, if she joined him in this water and let him do all the things their bodies wanted and needed to do, he’d say things he’d regret in the morning.

Things like This isn’t casual.

When, exactly, had that happened? Probably when he’d walked into that town hall and seen the heartbreak on her face—and felt it right in his own gut. She mattered, damn it. She mattered to him already.

He caught a glimpse of her hair in the moonlight, and the peach-colored dress she’d worn that afternoon. She stood still by the picnic table, looking around, probably trying to get her own eyes to adjust.

After a few seconds she climbed up on the picnic table, wrapped her arms around her legs, and rested her chin on her knees. In a matter of minutes her eyes would adjust and the moonlight would reveal his pile of clothes or his truck parked near the bushes.

But she put her head down and started to sob. Chest-tearing, throat-ripping, nose-sniveling sobs of bone-deep pain.

Oh, man.

Way to go, asshole. Way to crush the spirit of the most spirited woman he’d met in years. Maybe ever.

Goddamn it. He strode forward, unable to stop, scooping up his pants in one move as he walked, barely stopping as he stepped into them, ignoring how wet they were. She didn’t hear him over the bawling that already had her shuddering.

He didn’t want to scare her, so when he got about fifteen feet away he started to whistle softly. The six notes he often whistled, a favorite song, a simple sentiment, the music from her movie.

A kiss is still a kiss.

She stopped crying, but she didn’t lift her head.

He whistled the next bar.

Very slowly, she looked up and met his gaze. With each step closer, the moonlight emphasized more clearly her swollen, red eyes, the streaks of makeup and tears, the tremble of her lip.

“Of all the sandy beaches in all the world…”

She shook her head at the lame attempt at humor. “Don’t.”

He stopped a foot away, aching to reach out and take away all that pain. He went for the obvious instead. “I’m sorry this happened, Lacey.”

“Not as sorry as I am.” She wiped her face, but that just made her makeup smear worse, and punched his gut a little harder.

For the time it took for two, then three, waves to break on the sand, they just stared at each other.

“Did you talk to David?” he finally asked.

“David didn’t buy the properties,” she said. “He did meet with Tomlinson, but he said it was to try and buy them as a gift for me, but Tomlinson said an offer was already on the table, which must be the one through the bank. David backed off.”

He didn’t think that was true, not for one second, but it seemed like a lousy time to try to crucify her ex. “Any theories, then?”

She shook her head. “He’s going to try and find out who bought the lots.”

“I’ll find out.”

“How?” she asked.

“How’s he going to do it?” he countered.

“The way he does everything: by throwing money around. What’s your plan?”

“My sister knows a million mortgage brokers,” he said. “She can get information like that.”

“Is that legal?” she asked, plenty of disdain in her voice.

“Yes, Lacey, it’s legal. I’ve never done anything illegal in my life. Stupid, short-sighted, chicken-shit cowardly, and badly motivated, yeah. Guilty as charged. I haven’t lied to you, except by not telling you everything straightaway, and I haven’t broken the law.” He blew out a breath but wanted to finish the speech. “I have made some of the biggest mistakes in the name of love and loyalty that a person can make.”

She stared at him, still holding tightly to her legs, the skirt slipping down in the awkward position, but he didn’t steal a peek at her bare thighs. He was too busy searching for forgiveness in her eyes.

“And I’m still the right man for…” You. “The job.”

She swallowed, her eyes welling up as she tried to speak. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but… I… can’t…” Her voice cracked with a sob.

“Forgive me?”

She shook her head. “I can’t…”

Again, the word wouldn’t come out. “Give me a second chance?”

“I can’t…”

“Trust me? I understand all those things, Lacey. I underst—”

“I can’t stop wanting you.”

Oh. “Is that why you’re crying?”

“I’m crying because…” She took a deep breath and let out a wry laugh as she exhaled. “Because I thought you left and I felt like a love-sick idiot for coming here.”

He came closer, reaching out to her. “We’re both idiots, then.”

She sniffed and inched back, but only a little. “My friends didn’t all agree with this, you know.”

“I’m sure they didn’t.” He sat next to her and she didn’t leap away.

“Especially Zoe. And she’s been your biggest cheerleader. I didn’t want to come here. No, I didn’t want to want to come here. Does that make sense? Of course it doesn’t,” she rushed, answering her own questions, barely taking a breath. “Then I got here and I thought you were gone and I can’t believe how much that hurt me.”

“Shit, I’ve done a bang-up job with you today.”

“I know, right? And still… God, how bad do I have it for you?”

“Bad.” He kissed her forehead, then wiped the tears.

“It’s like you have some kind of hold, some spell over me, and it’s really scary.”

“It shouldn’t be scary.” But were those thoughts that far off from the ones he’d just had? “We’re both just cautious,” he said softly.

“Cautious means you’re scared,” she said. “Are you scared?”

To death. “I’m not sure what I’m getting into,” he admitted.

She searched his face, practically begging for him to say more. But he was in no position to tell her how he felt for her. He didn’t know what he felt for her. Just that he did.

She closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against him. “I’m not a lousy judge of character, usually. I mean, I can spot a bad guy from miles away, and, honestly, I’m not one of those women with a string of loser boyfriends. My heart says you are not a bad guy.”

“I’m not.”

“And my body…”

“I’m pretty sure I know what your body says.”

“But my friends say that I should fire you.”

“Want to know what I say?” He cupped her face, holding her gently as she nodded.

He didn’t answer his question until he’d eased her all the way back on the table and settled so close he was just about on top of her.

“Fire me later,” he whispered into a soft, airy, sweet kiss that wasn’t anything like the fury and frantic connection he imagined they’d have the first time they made love.

He let her get used to the weight of his body against hers, the sensation of their tongues doing their favorite dance, the pleasure of his erection rising against her stomach.

She gripped his arms like she might fall without their support, squeezing his muscles and sliding her hands over his back and rear end.

“You’re covered in sand and you’re wet.”

“Mmm.” He nibbled his way down the V-neck of her dress, which buttoned from her cleavage to the bottom. “I was in the water.”

“You were?”

“But first I was lying on the sand.” He got the first few buttons of her dress open with little more than a flick, spreading the cotton to reveal a white lace bra. And the swells of her gorgeous breasts beneath it.

“What were you doing in the sand?”

He kissed her creamy skin, thumbed the nipple, earned a whimper of delight. “Thinking about you.”

“Thinking about this?”

The next three buttons were just as easy, and then the dress fell all the way open. He kissed her cleavage, down her stomach, then opened another button. “No, I wasn’t thinking about sex.”

“You are now.”

“True, but…” The last three buttons left her bare but for white lace panties. He completely spread the dress open, kissing his way down to his destination. “I was…” He licked her belly button. “Thinking about…” He put his mouth over the silk. “How much I want to…”

She squeezed his shoulders, lifted her hips, let out another groan as he pulled down her panties. The sight of her shot fire and agony and need to his every cell.

“To what?”

He sat up slowly, drawing away from her skin but knowing he’d be back.

“C’mon.” He slipped her dress over her shoulders, unhooked her bra, and scooped her naked body into his arms to carry her across the sand to the water.

Halfway there, she let her head drop back, an act of complete surrender.

At the water’s edge he put her on her feet and stood back to look at her, bathed in moonlight and glowing from arousal. “God, you’re gorgeous, Lacey.”

She just smiled. “You know what I think, Clay Walker?”

“What?”

“That nothing you do is casual, even sex.”

The water lapped his ankles and, as it ebbed away, the sand disappeared, leaving him in a sinkhole again. Once again he was digging himself deeper and deeper, but he just couldn’t seem to stop.

“You might be right, Strawberry.”

When they reached the sandbar, Clay pulled Lacey into his chest, crushing her mouth with a kiss and then leaning her back so that the moonlight poured over her body and her hair skimmed the water.

Every sense was alive and sparking, her hands desperate to feel every amazing inch of him, her mouth greedy for more of his lips and tongue. She felt light-headed from the scent of sex and salt and the sounds of his sexy words and helpless groans.

But another sense sparked, too, an undercurrent of awareness that had nothing to do with sex but everything to do with emotion.

Standing, embracing, entwining, they kissed, the water lapping waist-high, invading her most private parts as his tongue invaded her mouth. His hands were everywhere, on her breasts, down her back, under her thighs so he could hoist her higher. The tide took her right where she wanted to be, up against the shockingly hard length of him, already sheathed with a condom he’d put on before they got in the water.

That strange awareness, that sense of something familiar, teased her again, then disappeared when he turned her around so her backside was tucked into his hips. Nothing was familiar about that.

He positioned himself between her legs, closing his hands over her breasts, stealing her sanity as he caressed her budded nipples and glided his shaft along the super-sensitive skin between her legs.

Waves of déjà vu rolled over her.

How was that possible? Even if she could remember the last time she’d been intimate with a lover, there had been no water, no full-body assault of pleasure from a man who’d positioned himself behind her. Because she wouldn’t have forgotten that.

So why did it feel familiar?

The question tickled like his lips on her ear. “Do you like that, Lacey? Does that feel good?”

“Yes, I like it. I like this. I like—oh, that. I like you.” The admission felt good on her lips. Almost as good as his fingertips on her nipples.

“And this? Do you like this?” He dragged his hands down and cupped her backside, holding it firmly as he stroked from underneath with a granite-like erection.

“Oh my God, I like that so much.” She moaned as the swollen head rolled over her most tender spot, his hips grinding into her backside.

“And that?”

His body was a relentless, unstoppable assault on her senses, making her weak and helpless and lost, still reminding her of something so powerful she couldn’t stop it, something scary and huge and life-changing. But what?

She pushed away the thoughts and gave in to the building tension, the twisting, squeezing, aching knot developing low in her belly as his erection slid between her legs, from the back to the front, right over the knot that was about to unravel.

“Clay, if you keep doing that I’m going to…” She lost the last word as he bent his knees so she could sit on his lap, forcing his erection directly and mercilessly over her clitoris. She cried out a little, wild with pleasure when he reached down and used his hand to intensify the sensation, slipping one finger inside her.

“Are you ready, Strawberry?”

So ready. She nodded, unable to speak.

“Do you want me inside you?”

“Yes. Now. Please, now.”

“Now.” He echoed her thoughts and then turned her around to face him, the buoyancy of the water bringing her to his eye level. “This is it.”

For one breath of a suspended moment, they were eye to eye, mouth to mouth, chest to chest, then he lowered her right onto him… and they were body to body. This is it. This is it. The words had an eerie echo of the past, a warning and a threat as well as a promise.

Without closing his eyes or kissing or saying a word, he slid all the way inside, as deep as he could go. His breath caught as he plunged deeper, held still, then began to stroke in and out.

Everything faded. Every deliciously intense feeling and thrill faded to nothing but that one place where they were joined. His hands stilled, his kisses halted, even their tattered, frantic breathing suspended into near silence as they both focused completely on the connection of their bodies.

She dropped her head on his shoulder and gave in to the rhythm. Each stroke took her closer to the edge, each thrust shoved her a little past sane, each splash of water between their hips and thighs and mouths and chests nudged her closer to a climax.

Until he froze completely, all the way inside her, looking right into her eyes, and time completely stopped. Everything was silent. Motionless. Hovering like the calm before…

“Lacey.”

“Clay.”

“You can…”

“I know. I’m about to.”

Closing the space between their mouths, he kissed her and started up again, thrusting over and over, deeper and deeper, faster and faster until everything shattered and exploded and roared in her head.

And then she remembered when she’d felt this way before. Exactly this way. Torn and destroyed, then lifted up with anticipation and optimism. The only other time in her life when something so powerful crashed through her world and changed it forever. When a force of nature had stolen everything she thought she cared about and left her with nothing but hope.

The hurricane.

Only this time she had no insurance against the damage to her heart.