“I’m not sure either of us would’ve felt this way if we’d met a few years ago. If we’d been the people we were then. You pulled yourself out of a pit, Eli.”
“I had help.”
“I don’t think people take help unless they’re ready for it, whether they know it or not. You were ready for it. It hurts my heart to remember how sad and tired and dark you were when you first came back to Whiskey Beach. It would break it to see you that way again.”
“That’s not happening.”
“I want you to have your answers. I want them, too. I just don’t want them to be something that sends you back into that pit, or that puts you on the other side of it, that changes you back into someone I don’t know. It’s selfish, but I want who you are now.”
“Okay. Okay.” He took a moment to line up his thoughts. “This is who I am, and who I am forgets things, gets caught up and is learning to like having someone remind him not to. I’m not that different from who I was before all this happened. But what happened focused me. I don’t want to be a problem for you, but I’m not going anywhere. I’m where I want to be. That’s one answer I’m sure of.”
She pushed at her hair again, angled her head. “Get rid of a tie.”
“What?”
“Get rid of a tie. One tie, your choice. And let me read one scene of the book. One, again your choice. Symbolism. Throwing out something from before, offering me something from now.”
“And that solves the problem?”
She wagged her hand back and forth. “We’ll see. I guess I’ll go figure out what’s for dinner and make sure you eat.” She gave him a poke in the belly. “You’re still on the skinny side.”
“Not a lot of meat on you either.” To prove it, he plucked her up, made her laugh as her legs wrapped around his waist.
“Then we’ll have a really big dinner.”
She pressed her lips to his, hers still curved as he spun her around. And as she drew back, saw just where he was headed.
“Don’t! Eli!”
She went into the surf with him, rolled and tumbled. Gasping, she managed to gain her feet, just as the next wave struck and sent her sprawling.
Laughing like a maniac, Eli pulled her up again. “I wanted to see what it was like.”
“Wet. And cold.” She shoved back her dripping hair as the excited dog swam around them. What did it say about her, she wondered, that his impulsive, silly act had wiped away her earlier annoyance and nerves? “Moron.”
“Mermaid.” He pulled her against him again. “That’s what you look like, just as I thought.”
“This mermaid has legs, currently freezing. And sand in very uncomfortable places.”
“It sounds like a long, hot shower’s on tap.” Gripping her hand, he pulled her to shore. “I’ll help you out with that sand.” He laughed again when the wind struck. “Christ! It’s freezing. Come on, Barbie.”
Caught up, that’s what it said about her, she thought. She was just caught up. She managed to snag her shoes as they ran across the beach.
Twenty-four
THE INSTANT SHE DASHED INSIDE THE MUDROOM, ABRA peeled off her dripping hoodie, toed off her soggy shoes.
“Cold, cold, cold,” she chanted, teeth chattering as she dragged off her wet top, wiggled out of her clinging pants.
The distraction of wet, naked, shivering Abra slowed Eli’s progress. He was still struggling with his sodden jeans when she streaked away.
“Hold on a minute!” He fought off the jeans, his boxers, left the whole mess in a pile and a spreading pool of seawater and wet clumps of sand to race after her.
He heard her chanting still.
“Cold, cold, cold!”
He caught up just after the shower spray exploded along with her garbled cry of relief.
“Warm, warm, warm.”
She let out a little shriek when he grabbed her from behind.
“No! You’re still cold.”
“Not for long.”
He spun her around, plastering her against him, and grabbed a hank of her hair. And, covering her mouth with his, felt the heat rise.
He wanted to touch, everywhere, all that wet skin, those long lines, those subtle curves. He wanted to hear her throaty laugh, the catch of her sigh. When she shivered now, it was from arousal, anticipation, while the flood of hot water rained over them both.
Her hands glided over him, a light scrape of nails, an erotic dig of fingers. She turned with him under the spray, around and around through the pulsing waterfall, with her mouth a wet, hot demand against his.
He wanted her happy, wanted to erase the trouble he’d seen in her eyes on the beach. He wanted to shield her from the trouble to come, as it surely would.