Barefoot in the Sand (Barefoot Bay)

  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.

  Chapter 23

  It was barely seven when Lacey’s phone buzzed with a text, pulling her out of a watery dream. Clay. It had to be him texting. He’d followed her home from the beach to make sure she arrived safely, which was sweet and had given them another half hour to make out on the porch. When she climbed into bed at almost two, he’d texted one last good night.

  She fully expected to see “Good morning, Strawberry” on her phone when she blinked the sleep away to read the message.

  Zoe Tamarin: Meet us at airport to say good-bye to J. That is if you are not in use as human canvas for his MDT

  Oh, his drafting tool was magic, all right. Smiling, Lacey sat up and texted back. On my way.

  Fifteen minutes later she tiptoed into Ashley’s room to leave a note, taking one minute to gaze at her sleeping daughter. Why were kids always heartbreakingly beautiful when sound asleep, their needs met, their angelic faces so perfect you’d do absolutely anything for them? God was sneaky that way.

  Lacey’s fingers itched to touch her child’s cheek.

  And she was still a child, despite the outline of a young woman’s body under the sheets and the slow shift in Ashley’s features to a heart-shaped face that looked so adult despite a few blemishes every month.

  What had happened to her baby? Secure in the knowledge that a freight train could roll through the room and not wake her daughter, Lacey brushed a honey-colored lock from Ashley’s face, grazing the cheek she’d kissed a million times.

  A mighty ache gripped her heart and closed her throat. Now, this sensation was familiar, a love she’d known since before Ashley was born. A love unlike anything she’d ever felt for anyone or ever would feel. She’d never felt this way about David in their happiest of halcyon days, never looked at either of her parents and felt weak with love, never hugged any girlfriend with the sense of helpless wonder.

  This was pure and whole, and so unconditional. When the easy thing to do would have been to give her up or follow David’s advice and terminate, Lacey had held on to her princess.

  “Princess Pot-Pie,” she whispered, the ancient nickname rising up from memories of post-bath cuddles in the rocking chair and early morning walks through town with Ashley still in a stroller. She’d had a million names for her baby, but that was her secret favorite.

  The shelf built into the headboard was mostly empty, except for the brand-new iPod Lacey’s mother had sent to replace the one lost in the storm. A few hair ties, a Glamour magazine Zoe bought her when they’d been at Walgreens the other day. But no well-loved copy of the first Harry Potter book, no pictures from camp last summer, no movie-ticket stubs or eighth-grade yearbook.

  The storm had stolen those memories, and Lacey had to remember that the loss couldn’t be easy for Ashley. Lacey knew that life went on, and that memories were stored in your heart, but Ashley’s world was upside down. They had no home, no stuff, and no way of being sure it would ever come back.

  On the corner of the bed Lacey spied Aunt Zoe’s uni, awash with gratitude that she’d taken the risk to save it.

  But now they were in the middle of another emotional storm and more things were at risk. If a man came into Lacey’s life, what would that do to her relationship with Ashley? Would David’s reappearance destroy the delicate balance Lacey had cobbled together with her daughter? And what about Clay? Could he ever fit into this tiny family?

  An unexpected jolt of desire hit her. She wanted Clay to fit into this family.

  But by staying close to him, was she distancing herself from her daughter?

  Unexpected tears burned and Lacey blinked them away. Had she ever cried this much before?

  Ashley turned and let out a quiet sigh and Lacey stroked her head one more time.

  “Little Princess Pot-Pie. You know I’ll always love you the most.” She leaned over and placed the softest kiss on Ashley’s head, loving the smell, the feel, the very being of—

  “Did you just call me Princess Pot-Pie?”

  Lacey laughed and finished the kiss noisily. “I did.”

  Expecting mockery, Lacey’s tears turned to a smile when two slender arms reached up and wrapped around her neck, pulling her closer. “I love you, Mommy.”

  She almost folded in half. Instead, she choked a little, mostly because the lump in her throat was strangling her. “I love you, too.”

  “Oh my God, are you crying again?” Ashley pushed her back to see. “Why are you so weepy all of a sudden?”

  “I don’t know.” But the unexpected tenderness pulled Lacey onto the bed, replacing the need to see Jocelyn off at the airport. These moments with Ashley were too precious and far too rare.

  “What’s the matter, Mom?” Ashley asked.

  “You never say I love you,” she replied honestly. “And I’ve heard it more than once, maybe more than twice, in the last few days.”

  “I’m sorry. Dad told me I should tell you more often.”

  Shit. That was not the motivating factor she wanted to hear. “That was…” A tad manipulative. “Nice of him.”

  “Yeah, he’s nice. Why are you dressed? Where are you going?”

  “The airport, I’m sad to say. Jocelyn has to go back to L.A.”

  “Oh, no.” She sounded truly disappointed. “Will she be back?”

  “I don’t know, but would you like to come along for the ride? We can spend the day doing something fun on the mainland with Zoe and Tessa, if you like.” Which might take care of some of the Mommy Guilt when Lacey stayed out late again with Clay tonight. Because she knew she would.

  “Can’t. Dad’s taking me cave diving.”

  Cave diving? Lacey almost spat. She couldn’t get out the “No!” fast enough. “Not—no! Do you know how dangerous cave diving is?”

  Ashley squished up her face. “He said you’d say that and we should ease you into the idea.”

  God, she hated that they were talking about her, about how to manage her, while she was gone. Then
maybe you shouldn’t be gone so much, a nasty little voice in her head said.

  “But he was going to tell you when you got home last night.” Ashley gave Lacey a scrutinizing look. “You did sleep at home last night, didn’t you?”

  “Ashley!”

  “I meant you didn’t stay at the Ritz with your friends,” she added quickly. Even though both of them knew that was so not what she meant.

  “I wasn’t out all night,” she said. “I got home late, though.”

  “You were with him, weren’t you?”

  She swallowed, absolutely determined not to lie. “If by him, you mean Clay…”

  “Mom, he’s a sleazebag. When are you going to realize that? You called it the day he showed up on the beach trying to get your business by running around half naked.”

  Lacey dug for the right answer, the way to keep the connection alive but honest. “You’ve sure changed your tune, Ashley. You thought I was a b-word and he was the cutest thing you’d ever seen.”

  “Well, he’s not. He’s a slimebucket.”

  “Actually, he’s not.”

  “You’re going to defend him after what happened at the town meeting yesterday? Mom! What is wrong with you?”

  “There are two sides to every story, Ash, and he has one that doesn’t paint him as the devil, like Charity Grambling tried to do. He’s going to do the job for me—”

  “What?” Her eyes bugged out with exaggerated disbelief. “Mom.” With disappointment in her voice, she plucked the uni from Lacey’s hands, as if she couldn’t stand for it to be on the wrong side of this argument. “I can’t believe you like this guy.”

  Oh, she liked him, all right. Way too much. “I like his work.”

  “Yeah, right.” She curled her lip. “What were you doing with him at the beach last night?”

  “How do you know I was at the beach with him?”

  “Because I got up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and walked on sand in the hall.”

  “Oh, boy. Now you’re a detective.”

  “Am I right?”