He skimmed a glance over her neat cap of rich russet. "You don't have any gray hair."
"And I pay good money to keep it away." she huffed out a breath. "Now you listen to me, Sam, and keep your ears open for once. I don't care how old those three children are, they still need you. And it's past time you gave them what you stopped giving them and yourself years ago. Compassion, attention, and affection. If Ginny pulling this awful stunt has brought this to a head, then I'm almost glad of it. And I'm not going to stand by and see the four of you walk away from each other again."
she pushed off the stool, snagged her glass. "Now, I'm going to try to calm Lexy down, which should take me half the night. That gives YOU plenty of time to find your son and start mending fences with him."
"Kate. . . " When she paused at the door and turned those sparkling eyes back on him, nerves had him reaching for the bottle of Jim Beam, setting it aside again. "I don't know where to start."
"You idiot," she said with such gentle affection that the heat rose up his neck a second time. "You already have."
I Brian knew exactly where he was going. He didn't delude himself that he was just taking a long walk to cool off He could have rounded the island on foot and his blood would still have been hot. He was frious with himself for losing his temper, for saying things it did no good to say. It ripped at him that he'd made both Lexy and Kate cry.
Life was simpler when you kept things inside, he decided, when you just lived with them and went about your business.
Wasn't that what his father had done all these years?
Brian hunched his shoulders against the rain, annoyed that he'd come out without a jacket and was now soaked through. He could hear the sea pounding as he trudged along the soggy sand between the dunes. Lights glowed behind the windows of cottages, and he used them as a compass in the dark.
He heard a drift of classical music as he mounted Kirby's stairs. He saw her through the rain-splattered glass of the door. she wore soft and baggy blue sweats, her feet bare. Her hair swung forward to curtain her face as she bent to poke inside the refrigerator, one dainty foot with sassy pink toenails tapping time to the music.
The quick punch of lust was very satisfying. He opened the door without knocking.
she straightened quickly and with a short, audible gasp. "Oh, Brian. I didn't hear you." Off guard, she balanced a hand on the open refrigerator door. "Is there word on Ginny?"
No.
"Oh, I thought . Nerves drummed in her fingers as she raked them through her hair from brow to tip. His eyes were dark and direct, with something unquestionably dangerous smoldering in them. Her heart took a rabbit leap into her throat. "You're soaked."
"It's raining," he said and began to walk toward her.
", ah-" It didn't matter how ridiculous she told herself it was, her knees were starting to shake. "I was about to have a glass of wine. Why don't you pour some and I'll get you a towel."
"I don't need a towel."
"Okay." she could smell the rain on him now, and the heat. "I'll get the wine."
"Later." He reached out and shut the refrigerator door, then trapped her against it with his body and crushed his mouth to hers in a scaring, greedy kiss.
Even as the moan strangled in her throat, his hands snaked under her shirt, closed possessively over her breasts. His teeth nipped at her tongue, shooting tiny thrills of pain and fear through her. Then his hands slid down, around her, cupping her bottom and lifting until she was inches off the floor, and wet, straining denim was pressed against the wicked ache between her thighs.
she managed to shudder out a breath when his lips fastened on her throat. "So much for small talk." Hungrily, she attacked his ear. That quick bite of flesh stirred a craving for more. "The bedroom's down the hall."
"I don't need a bed." His smile sharp-edged and feral, he lifted his head and looked at her. "My way, remember. And I do my best work in the kitchen."
Her feet hit the floor again before she could blink. He pulled her arms over her head, capturing her wrists in one hand as he pushed her back against the door. "Look at me," he demanded, then slid his free hand under the elastic of her pants and plunged his fingers into her.
she gave one choked cry-shock and pleasure colliding in a brutal assault on the system that had her hips jerking against him, matching his ruthless rhythm in primal response. Her vision narrowed, her breath shortened, and she came in an explosive gush.
she'd already been wet. He'd found her slick and ready, and that alone had been brutally arousing. But when her eyes went blind and she flooded into his hand, fists of vicious need pounded at his body. His breath was a snarl as he yanked the shirt over her head, fastened his mouth to her breast.