by Liz Talley
“I don’t... It’s hard to explain....”
What was hard was understanding why a woman like Lynn—smart, successful, gorgeous as hell—would allow a man to treat her that way. Let him divorce her but still do everything she could to keep their “family” intact.
Including allow Kara to fly to San Francisco with the man when she didn’t have to let the little girl leave the city.
“Try me,” he said. The waves rushed to the shore. And he couldn’t let this go. He was on a date.
And wanted, at the very least, a kiss good-night.
He had to know what her situation was.
At least, that was what he told himself. And since much of what was going on with him where she was concerned didn’t make a hell of a lot of sense, he just went with what he told himself.
“Brandon doesn’t have flings. He’s only ever had one lover, other than me.”
“How do you know? A bachelor, living alone...”
She stubbed her toe in the sand, lurched and tightened her grip on his hand as she righted herself. “He doesn’t live alone.”
That was too much. The man lived with his mistress, but still kept Lynn on the hook? Then something else hit him....
“Kara’s with her father’s lover this weekend?”
Lynn’s chin dropped. And he regretted his outburst. He’d been living alone with Darin too long. Lost his ability to have some tact.
“I’m sorry. That was completely insensitive.”
She licked her lips. Sucked them in. The moonlight glistened on her face, and he caught shadows of emotions he couldn’t read.
His hand holding hers was the only right thing at the moment. Darin and Maddie had made some time on them. They were visible in the distance, but he could no longer hear them at all.
Maybe they should think about turning back.
He had miles to go before he’d be ready.
“I’m sorry,” Lynn finally said. Her voice sounded normal. Pretty much. But it wasn’t open. Not the same as it had been when she’d talked about her and Brandon being best friends in high school.
“Yes, Kara is with her father and his spouse. But it’s not quite what you think. Douglas respects me and my place in Brandon’s life. It’s a bit unusual, but...it works for us. Mostly.”
Darin and Maddie had stopped walking. They were sitting in the sand by the water, but not close enough to get drenched, pulling handfuls of wet sand between them. Grant watched for a second. Remembering.
Darin was the most incredible builder of sand castles. As a little kid he’d begged Darin to take him to the beach and build castles. More times than not, his big brother had done so. Together they’d add wings and build moats and then Grant would start to look for branches that would be trees. He’d use pieces of colored candy wrappers he scavenged on the beach with tiny pieces of drift bark stuck into them to resemble flowers. He’d build shell fountains....
If Darin was going to build a castle for Maddie they’d be a while.
He pulled Lynn behind the jagged side of a cliff that jutted out onto the beach.
He tilted her head up. Looked her straight in the eye. And had to swallow. There was so much there for him to read.
He wasn’t sure he could take it all in.
The hurt. The doubt. And the desire to be wanted.
The third part he could handle. But it wouldn’t be right if he didn’t deal with the other two first.
“Your ex-husband is gay.”
“Yes.” Her chin started to lower, and with one finger, Grant held her face up to the moonlight.
“Did you know when you married him?” They’d been best friends since high school. They’d made a plan.
Because Brandon had needed help to overcome a lifestyle he didn’t want? Because he wanted a traditional family and Lynn was willing to give it to him?
“No!” At least his question had brought some fire back to her eyes. “I had no idea! Brandon and I... We... Our sex life was quite healthy.”
“Before you were married?”
“Yes. We were the stereotypical prom-night-things-got-out-of-control couple. Except that...it was...nice. And we knew we were going to be getting married as soon as we were out of college and so...it wasn’t a onetime thing. By any means.”
It was “nice”? If he’d had a woman say that about him afterward...
Lynn deserved to know what lovemaking was meant to be. With a man who could give her more than nice.
Whoa, Bucko.
“So you found out after Kara was born?”
The sand formed a hard mound under the arches of his feet. Tugging gently on Lynn’s hand, he sat down, pulling her with him. Her skirt flowed out around her, over his shin. With very little effort he could slide his hand up underneath it.
“She was five weeks old,” Lynn was saying. “I knew there was something different about him. I thought he was jealous of Kara. Of how she was completely monopolizing my time and attention. I was breast-feeding and only had eight weeks at home with her before I was going to have to go back to work and...as much as I knew medically about taking care of children, I had a ton to learn about being a mother.”
“I’d think it would be unusual if a woman wasn’t completely taken up by a new baby’s arrival. Especially a first baby.”
“Brandon was caught up with her, too,” Lynn said. “Which was probably why I let her take over so much. I thought we were doing it together. You know, she was another adventure on our path of life. The most incredible, most important adventure.”
One he was never going to have. With her. Or anyone.
“And then he told you he was gay.”
“Yeah. He’d never been particularly close with any of the guys in school—he always hung out with me and my friends, but that just seemed natural to us. I asked him once when he’d first had the idea he might be, and he said that he’d wondered a time or two, but put the thoughts down to having settled into a monogamous marriage that meant having sex with only one person for the rest of his life. He didn’t think it meant anything.
“Until he found out I was pregnant with Kara. Somehow having a daughter, a family, made him look at life entirely differently. He wasn’t as happy as I was—as he’d expected to be. He said he’d expected to feel like his life was perfect when we finally got pregnant, and he didn’t.
“Until he met Douglas. And everything fell horrifyingly into place.”
“He said that? ‘Horrifyingly’?”
“Yeah. If you knew Brandon you’d understand. He really does love me. And he knew what the truth was going to do to me. But he couldn’t lie about who he was. Not to me.”
“That’s when you went back to college, got your masters degree and nurse midwife certification and started a new life.”
“Brandon supported me so I could go back to school full-time and also be at home with Kara for most of the first year. I took what courses I could online. He knew being with Kara and getting my CNM certification were my life’s dreams.”
“Apart from you and him growing old together.”
“Right.”
“So he gave you what he could.” He’d rather have hated the guy.
“Yep. And he still does. He tries so hard to anticipate my needs and be there to fulfill them whenever he can.”
Just not her sexual needs.
Which could be where he came in.
And in a strange sort of way, he guessed, it worked.
CHAPTER TWENTY
“WE SHOULD GET back to Maddie and Darin.” Lynn jumped up and walked over to peer around the cliff.
“They’re sitting right where we left them, right?”
“Yeah. Wow, you should see this castle they’re building.”
“I’ve seen m
ore of them than I can count,” Grant told her, leaning back on his hands in the sand, his long legs out in front of him.
Drawing her attention to his fly.
She’d just talked about sex with a man who wasn’t Brandon. In her capacity as a nurse, she had no problem discussing any and all bodily functions. But she didn’t talk about hers, not with anyone. She had a handle on her emotions and on her physical feelings. And that was how she wanted it.
Until she looked at Grant and wanted him.
He was watching her. Checking out her breasts. Her skirt. She was wearing a pair of lace panties beneath the thin cotton. The air crept up her skirt, caressing her bare skin.
She grew moist.
“Come here.”
Grant had hunger written all over him, along with the confidence of a man whose hungers had been assuaged many times in many ways.
She sat back down next to him.
“I told you this was a real date,” he said, staring at her lips.
“I know.”
Did he think sex was the norm for a first date? Did he think she’d agreed to a roll in the sand with him?
The thought made her nipples harden. But that was only for her to know. For her to deal with.
Sliding his hand beneath her hair to cup her neck, Grant held her still with no force at all as he leaned toward her.
His eyes were open, watching her, pulling her toward him. Holding her gaze focused on him. He opened his mouth, but didn’t say anything. She stared at those lips. Wanting to know how they felt.
And she was going to know.
His face was an inch from hers. She could have pulled away but she waited. Frustrated that he was taking so long.
And then he kissed her.
His lips touched hers. Held hers. Moved on hers. They opened and hers did, too, moving with his, staying with his, as their bodies came closer. His tongue touched her lower lip. A swift stroke. And then again. One more time.
He slid inside her mouth. Gently. Exploring more than conquering. As though he was interested in every single little thing there was to know about her.
And that was when she knew that every little thing about him mattered to her.
Lynn pulled back.
He couldn’t matter. Not that much.
She wasn’t going to have her happiness, her future, any part of her life, intertwined so intimately with another person’s again. She wasn’t going risk someone else having a change of feeling, or a latent self-discovery, that stripped her life away from her.
“That was...way better than nice.” His voice was gravelly in a bedroom sort of way. Being on the receiving end of it was almost more than she could bear.
It took her a moment to realize he’d used the word she used to describe sex with Brandon.
And realized he was completely, absolutely right. With one kiss he’d completely shattered her idea of what sex should be like.
Her hands were shaking. He took hold of one, turned it over and, with his other hand, he caressed her palm.
“I have a proposition for you, nurse.” His voice. The way he said her title. The look in his eye. The scent of him. He was flooding her with sensation. Overriding everything she knew to be true.
“What’s that?”
He was going to ask her to let him under her skirt. And, God help her, she almost pulled it up and spread her legs for him right then and there.
Darin and Maddie were going to be working on their castle for a long time. Kara was so far away she couldn’t get to her if she wanted to.
And she had needs. Heaven help her, she had needs....
“A partnership, of sorts.”
Her heart started to beat faster, if it were possible for it to beat any faster than it already was, and she waited for him to continue.
“I have no room and no time in my life for a committed relationship,” he said. He had her attention.
“Running my own business is a huge responsibility,” he was saying, as though completely undisturbed by their kiss. But she knew what the bulge underneath his fly meant.
It meant she could be patient and listen to him.
“But a lot of people own businesses,” he continued. “However, you add Darin into the mix, and some days it’s damn near impossible for me to keep track of everything I’ve got to do, let alone get it all done.”
“I understand.” Didn’t he get that she was glad he wasn’t promising her the sun and the moon?
“And from what I’ve seen and understood of your life, your needs are pretty much all covered. You’ve got your ex, who is your best friend. You’ve got all the companionship you could possibly have time for with all the women at the Stand. You’ve got your daughter, and a secure family unit....”
He made it sound as if her life was perfect.
“As far as I can see, the only critical thing missing for either one of us is sex.”
She coughed. It was one thing to think it. And another thing to say it out loud. In the dark. On the beach. With the moon above and the ocean lapping just a few yards away, the waves reaching toward them with a force that was larger than life.
“Do you disagree?” His fingers had slowed on her hand and his head was turned toward her. Their knees were touching, only the thin fabric of her skirt and the heavier cotton of his pants separating their naked skin.
“No.” She couldn’t lie about it.
“Then my proposal is that we remain as friends, but with benefits. When time and occasion permits, we have sex.”
Was the time and occasion right then?
“I... It’s...unusual.” But it resonated with her. Her life was unusual. And he was offering her everything she needed without asking for anything more.
“Agreed.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?” His hand dropped, and hers landed...on the bulge in his pants.
The move wasn’t deliberate. On her part or his. She knew it, and her belief was confirmed by his sharp intake of breath.
The bulge beneath her hand moved. Grew. She didn’t squeeze, exactly, but she explored a bit with her fingers while her palm lay still on top of him.
“I expected to have to work harder to convince you,” he said, his words sounding slightly choked.
“You knew I’d agree.”
“I’d hoped you would. And was prepared to resort to begging.”
He wanted her that much?
The proof was beneath her hand.
“I have one condition,” she said. “And it’s nonnegotiable.” No matter how badly her body needed his to end this insane climb toward ecstasy, she would walk away with her legs firmly together if he couldn’t comply.
He wasn’t just hard, he was rock solid. She moved her hand a bit, needing to feel more of him.
“What’s your condition?”
If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was strangling.
The smile that had been lingering on the corners of her lips faded away completely. He had to know she wasn’t kidding.
“As long as we have this...partnership—which is defined as being in place until one or the other of us communicates an end to the other—we are sexually exclusive.”
“Monogamous,” he said, his lower lip jutting out as he nodded.
“You agree?”
“I took it for granted,” he said. “You’ve only had one lover, Lynn. I know that what I’m asking, what we’re doing here, is serious.”
“But not for life. It’s only serious for the sex.”
“Agreed.”
She squeezed. Hard enough to make his hips rise up off the ground. “Then I’d say you have a deal.”
“The best deal I’ve ever made,” he said, his voice lowering as he leaned in to kiss her agai
n.
His lips touched hers. And his hand slid under her skirt to her knee.
“Lynn? Lynn? Lyyynnnn!” Maddie’s voice rent the air. First with excitement, and then with very quickly escalating panic.
“Maddie?” She jumped up, calling out. “Maddie? We’re right here!”
Thank God she was still fully dressed. She rushed around the corner, afraid of finding Darin prone on the ground.
Or gone.
Instead, she found the two of them racing around the beach, looking frantically in every direction.
“Hey!” Grant’s voice boomed. “Over here, bro!”
Darin’s head shot up and, grabbing Maddie’s hand, he hurried her over toward Lynn and Grant, who were running in their direction.
“Where were you?” Darin asked as Maddie, still clinging to one of Darin’s hands, threw her other arm around Lynn and started to cry.
“I thought we were lost,” Maddie said. “I thought we were building our castle and forgot about you and got lost.”
She thought she’d been left.
“Hey,” Lynn said, both hands on Maddie’s shoulders as she faced the other woman. “We aren’t ever going to leave you, not anywhere, you got that?”
Maddie nodded.
Lynn persisted. “You know that, right? Alan was very, very bad to take you out to that cabin and leave you there, Maddie. Good people would never do that to you. Remember?”
Maddie nodded again. “I remember,” she said, sounding as if she had more marbles in her mouth than usual. Then she grinned. “I was just being a dope, wasn’t I?”
She looked back at Darin.
“No, you weren’t,” Darin said. “It was dark and we couldn’t see them and neither of us can drive.” He turned to Grant. “I asked you to let me talk to Maddie alone because it was a date and you did and I’m glad,” he said. “Thank you. Now do you want to see our castle?”
“Of course,” Grant said. He was a step back from the three of them.
“Yeah, we came to find you so we could show you our castle.” Maddie grinned up at Lynn.