by Jan Hudson
When they came to rest, she found herself sprawled atop Kale, thigh to thigh, chest to chest, nose to nose.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Fine. You?”
“Intact.” He reached and slowly dragged out the straw hat, which was crushed between them. “Your chapeau, mademoiselle.” He plopped the bedraggled thing on the back of her head.
With its crown smashed, it promptly slid off.
Her lips twitched. “I think it’s dead.”
Bubbles of mirth caught in her throat and exploded. The corners of his eyes crinkled. One side of his mouth lifted in a lopsided grin. They both broke into gales of laughter.
Shoulders shaking, Sunny buried her forehead in the crook of his neck. His arms went around her, and she could feel the laughter heaving his chest against hers as he held her close, could sense the rumble of the sound against her nose.
She could smell the delicious sun-warmed scent of his skin mingled with the lingering redolence of lotion and spicy after-shave. Without her thinking, the tip of her tongue went out to taste the enticement of his throat.
His laughter stopped. They grew still. His body tensed beneath hers. Then his fingers moved ever so slightly in slow strokes below her shoulder blades.
She lifted her face and looked at him. His eyes glinted with a sensual awareness as potent as a riptide. Her breath caught as the power of it engulfed her. She couldn’t think; she couldn’t move.
He closed his eyes, clenched his teeth, and took a deep shuddering breath, as if to breathe in her essence or to gain strength from the salty air. His hands moved downward to the swell of her bottom and pressed her against his hardness.
His face looked as if he were fighting a thousand inner devils . . . and losing.
A drop of moisture splattered against his forehead. His eyes flew open. “What was that?”
“I told you it was going to rain.”
He spat out a succinct expletive that made her giggle, and they scrambled to their feet. The wind had intensified, the waves were beginning to kick up whitecaps, and an ominous line of dark clouds was moving in rapidly from the Gulf.
He cursed again and grabbed her hand. “Let’s make a run for it before it pours.”
“But the shells!”
“Forget the shells. I’ll buy you a tubful.” He dragged her down the dune toward the beach and pulled her behind him as he ran.
After a few hundred yards, she yanked her hand away and yelled, “Stop! I have to go back for our sunglasses.”
“Forget the damned sunglasses.” The raindrops had escalated into a blowing drizzle.
“But mine are prescription. You go ahead and put the top up on the car,” she said. “You can run faster.”
“Dammit, Sunny”—he dragged his fingers through his hair—”you’re going to get soaked.”
“I told you that I won’t melt. I like the rain.” Gesturing with her hand for him to go on, she turned and dashed off in the opposite direction.
Muttering curses with every long stride, Kale sprinted toward the Cadillac. Just as he fumbled the keys from his pocket and reached for the door handle, the bottom fell out of the sky, dousing him with buckets of rain. He let out another string of epithets and hurriedly raised the top and rolled up the windows.
He grabbed one of the beach towels and used the dry side to wipe the leather seats and console, then tossed it into the backseat and waited for Sunny.
And waited.
And waited.
Where the hell was she?
He knew he shouldn’t have left her alone. What if she was hurt? He uttered another colorful oath, jerked the door open, and stepped out into the driving torrent. Immediately his clothes were plastered to his body by the deluge and water sluiced off his head, obscuring his vision.
The rain slacked off only minimally as he ran back the way he’d come, calling her name over the pounding waves. His imagination went crazy. He could picture her, her leg broken, sobbing and helpless. Perhaps she’d gotten turned around and was wandering lost and alone. Maybe she’d tripped and had been knocked unconscious.
A quarter mile south, he spied her in the distance, meandering toward him as if she didn’t have a care in the world.
She’d retrieved that silly yellow hat and was wearing the bedraggled thing on her head—not that it did any good. In the downpour, the waterlogged brim had lost its shape, and it flopped down like a limp ruffle over her eyes, with rain coursing from the folds like a gutter spout.
Every few steps she held her arms out and twirled in circles, lifting her face to the rain. What in the hell was she doing? Violent emotions pounded his gut. He was torn between wanting to grab her and hug the daylights out of her and wanting to tear a strip off her with a tongue-lashing she’d never forget.
As she neared, he ground his teeth, then shouted, “Sunny! What in the bloody—” The rest of the words stuck in his throat.
Her face was lit with a smile so dazzling that it almost drove away the summer squall. And her wet shirt stuck to her body like a thin film that vas even more revealing than the bunched shower curtain had been. She wasn’t wearing a bra. Less than an arm’s length away, her nipples, dusky coral and hardened into peaks by the rain, drew his eyes like a magnet and stole any rational thought from his brain.
He was vaguely aware of her words as she said, “Did you get the top up? I found my glasses. Yours too.” She held up one of the plastic bags. “And I was able to recover most of the shells.” She held up the other bag.
He was still fascinated with her breasts. His gaze seemed glued to them. Her pert nipples seemed to entreat him to touch them, stroke them.
Of its own volition, his index finger reached out and slowly circled one tightened areola. She looked down at his hand, then up at him. Beneath long lashes clumped with raindrops, her eyes were very large, very blue, and filled with wonderment.
A raging rush of hormones left him breathing rapidly and conjuring up flashes of the beach scene in From Here to Eternity. He rubbed his palm over the swell of her breast. She didn’t speak; she only watched. Never had anything felt so sweetly erotic to him.
His conscience told him to put his hand in his pocket, the girl in the car, and his libido on hold. His id told his conscience to take a hike. He could no more resist the temptation of her lush lips than a cobra could resist the charmer’s flute.
“Tell me to stop,” he said thickly.
She looked up at him with those big blue eyes and said, “Why should I do that?” Her lids slowly closed. “It feels wonderful.”
“Oh, hell,” he groaned, and captured her mouth like a starving man at a banquet.
Her lips were damp and cool, but her tongue was wet and warm. Her breast was soft in his hand.
With his free arm, he lifted her close against him. Her body was so small and delicate that her bones felt as fragile as those of a dove.
With the rain washing over them and desire firing his blood, he felt like a steam boiler about to explode. He wanted to rip off her clothes, lay her on the wet sand, and take her while the surf rolled over them. Never had he wanted a woman so badly in his entire life.
He struggled for control, allowed himself one last lingering taste of her, then pulled away. It was the hardest thing he’d ever done.
He took her arm and strode wordlessly to where the Cadillac was parked and opened the door.
“Get in the car,” he said, grinding out the words and balling his fists to keep from taking her in his arms again.
“But, Kale—”
“Get in the bloody car!”
Chapter Four
On Thursday, when Sunny and Estella met Kale in the hallway of KRIP, he gave them a barely perceptible nod and strode past without even a polite remark.
“What is wrong with that man?” Estella asked as they sat down at the makeup table. “He acts like a tiger with a knot in his tail.”
“Beats me,” Sunny replied. “He and Foster have been closeted all we
ek, and the only way I know he’s in the house is that I hear the shower running in the bathroom. He hasn’t said two words to me. Anytime I try to make conversation, he just scowls and growls.”
“Did something happen between you two last Sunday? He’s been acting peculiar—make that more peculiar—since your trip to Padre.”
Sunny shrugged and focused her attention on adding extra mascara to her lashes and more blush to her cheeks.
“Come on, fess up. Something must have happened.”
“Well, one minute he seemed to be . . . enjoying himself, and the next he did a hundred-and-eighty-degree turn. I think the rain dampened his spirits.”
“Define ‘enjoying himself.’”
“Well, you know”—she waved the brush in her hand—”enjoying himself.”
“Mmmm.” Estella gave her a smug smile. “Did the boss make a pass at you?”
“Define ‘pass.’”
Estella rolled her eyes. “Pass: touchy, touchy; kissy, kissy; come to my place and I’ll show you my etchings.”
Sunny ignored her. She brushed her hair and sprayed it with a light mist.
“Well?” Estella prompted.
Sunny heaved a big sigh. “You’re not going to let this go, are you?”
“Uh-uh.”
“He kissed me.”
“Ohhhh, I see. And Little Miss Don’t-Bother-Me-I’m-Interested-Only-in-My-Career put him in his place and stomped on his male ego.”
“No.” Sunny dropped her gaze and riffled the bristles of the hairbrush with her thumb. “He ended it. He pushed me away and acted like an absolute troll all the way home.” The memory squeezed painfully at her throat, and she looked up at her friend. “I guess he was disappointed. I know I’m probably not as sexually sophisticated as the women he’s—” She swallowed the tightness in her throat and tossed the brush on the table.
“Aw, honey, there’s nothing wrong with you,” Estella said, taking Sunny’s hands in hers. “Don’t let that network-stud image throw you. He’s such a cold SOB that he probably wouldn’t know what to do with that thing in his pants if it stood up and whistled ‘Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy.’”
Sunny stifled a giggle. “Estella!”
“It’s the truth. Forget that turkey. In another few days, he’ll be outta here. Come on, let’s have one of those famous smiles.” She stood, flung out her arms, pooched out her belly, and pasted on a wide, theatrical grin. “It’s showtime.”
Sunny couldn’t help laughing.
When they walked in the newsroom for last-minute preparations before airtime, Sunny asked, “Where’s Hulon?”
The floor director looked disgusted and gestured with his head toward the windows.
“Oh, no, not again,” Sunny said. She hurried to the end of the room and stuck her head through the open window. Hulon was outside, huddled in his usual corner of the ledge. “Hulon! What are you doing out there?”
His eyes were squeezed shut and a tissue was pressed to his lips. “I can’t take it anymore. I’m going to jump. This time I’m really going to do it.”
Sunny’s shoulders slumped as she heaved a sigh. “Hold it a minute. We’ll talk.” She kicked off her shoes, took a deep fortifying breath, and threw one leg over the windowsill.
A strong arm snaked around her waist and dragged her back inside. “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Sunny blinked up at Kale Hoaglin, who looked angry enough to chew the mainmast off a schooner. “I’m going out on the ledge to talk to Hulon.”
“No,” he said, lifting her by the waist and setting her out of the way. “I’ll talk to our neurotic anchorman.” He stuck his head out the window. Sunny crept up behind him and leaned forward to listen. “Hulon, haul your butt in here. Now.”
Hulon shook his head. “You don’t understand. I’d rather be lying crushed and broken on that parking lot than facing those cameras again. I’m terrified of that little red light. I have nightmares about being devoured by exterminator cameras with laser eyes. I’ve tried to tell Foster again and again, but he won’t listen.”
“I’m listening. Give me a few days to come up with a solution.”
Hulon laughed sardonically. “I’ve heard that line before.”
“Five minutes till airtime,” the floor director called.
Kale raked his fingers through his hair. “You haven’t heard it from me. Be in my office at ten o’clock Monday morning.”
Hulon looked pensive, but he didn’t move.
“We’re on the air in less than five minutes. Either get in here now or jump.”
“Kale!” Sunny exclaimed, shocked at his callousness.
He turned around, his irritation evident. “Hell, he’s not going to jump. I’m sick of the manipulative little bastard’s grandstanding. Have you forgotten that his antics almost got you killed?”
“He’s very disturbed, Kale.”
He raked his fingers through his hair. “I’m disturbed too. Damned disturbed. Will you have dinner with me after the broadcast?”
“Dinner?” she said, surprised at his invitation. “Okay.”
With a minute to airtime, Hulon sheepishly slid into his chair behind the desk. Sunny patted his arm. “Everything will work out fine. You’ll see.”
* * *
Sunny and Kale sat in a secluded alcove of a penthouse supper club overlooking the city. They had watched the sunset and enjoyed the growing darkness as the lights twinkled on in the town. Round-globed street lamps along the seawall and strings of bulbs on the barges and restaurants on the T-Heads and L-Heads glistened over the dusky water. The Harbor Bridge became an arch of golden luminaries. The long, curving jetty, which protected the downtown basin, was a serpent of glowing lamplight stretched across the bay.
“It always amazes me how beautiful the city is at night,” she said. “Look over there. It’s like a fairyland of ethereal crystal ice palaces lit by fireflies.”
Kale craned his neck to see. “You mean the refineries? It’s the lights on the plants and treatment units reflecting off the silver paint that makes them look like that.”
Sunny laughed and shook her head. “Are you always so literal? Where is the poet in your soul?”
“I think it got lost in the mountains of Afghanistan.”
“Squint and look again.”
He followed her directions and peered to the north. “Ah, yes, I believe you’re right. Definitely ice palaces wrapped with strings of Christmas lights. I see them now.”
“And the Miradores Del Mar, the Overlooks by the Sea, along the seawall are exquisite at night.”
“You mean those Moroccan-looking gazebo things?”
She cocked an eyebrow. ‘“Gazebo things’?”
“Sorry.” He squinted his eyes. “The Miradores are like spun sugar structures atop a wedding cake.”
She laughed. “Nice try, but no cigar.”
The waiter arrived with their entrees. Dinner was very pleasant, romantic even, with candlelight and fine wine accompanying their scallops and shrimp. They talked of trivial things while they ate, of college days and family, funny experiences, favorite authors and music. Sunny learned that Kale could be a charming conversationalist when he put his mind to it.
He seemed relaxed and looked very handsome with his hair tamed and wearing a tie with a pink dress shirt and navy blazer. The tie, the first she’d seen on Kale, looked suspiciously like the one Foster had worn to the office that day. She smiled into her coffee cup.
“Something funny?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Tell me,” she said, replacing her cup in its saucer, “is pink your favorite color?”
He frowned. “I’ve never thought much about it. I guess I like blue best. Or maybe yellow. Why do you ask?”
“Because all your shirts are pink.”
He plucked at his shirtfront. “They used to be white. And my red shorts used to be a brighter shade.”
She laughed. “I presume laundry is not your forte.”
/> “I guess not. But at the time, I was in a hurry and water was scarce. Would you like some more wine? A liqueur?”
She shook her head. “One glass is my limit tonight. I still have the ten o’clock weather to do, and I’d hate to be sloshed on the air. But I’ll have another cup of coffee.”
After Kale signaled the waiter for a refill, she said, “The show has certainly improved since you’ve been here. But poor Hulon. . .”. She sighed. “What are you going to do about him? He really is terrified of being on camera, you know.”
“I’m not sure yet. I have a couple of ideas. But one thing is clear; I need more than a week for Foster and me to get the station back on track. I may have to ask the network for more time away. Another month or so, at least.”
Sunny had been stroking the tablecloth with the tip of her finger. At his words, her heart lurched and she glanced up sharply. “That means that you’ll be staying at the house longer. Should Estella and I find another—”
He reached across the table and squeezed her hand lightly. “Don’t concern yourself about it. We can keep things the way they are for the time being. My plans aren’t even definite yet.”
Don’t be concerned, he’d said. Of course she was concerned. She’d developed a gigantic crush on the man sitting across from her. How comfortable could she be in the same house with him for an extended period?
Although she was almost embarrassed to admit it, more than once she’d found herself fantasizing about him as she’d lain in bed listening to the shower running at odd hours during the night. In her fantasy, he’d step out of the tub, fling open the bathroom door that connected to her room, and pad naked to her side. He’d slip beneath the covers and whisper lovely things in her ear. He’d stroke her body the way he was stroking her hand now, and—
Jerking herself out of her reverie, she quickly pulled her hand from under his and patted her lips with her napkin.
She gave him a bright smile. “We’ll worry about that later then. Now I have to get back to the station.”
Kale paid the check, and they drove the few blocks to the KRIP lot.
As he was helping her from Ravinia’s Cadillac, she could have sworn he was about to kiss her, but another car pulled into the lot. They walked inside.