Just Married!

by Cara Colter

  “And I’m trying to tell you it’s not,” he said softly but every bit as stubbornly as her.

  For a moment she looked ready to fight, but then she just sighed.

  “Eating on the beach will probably wreck the skirt,” she said. She plucked at something on it.

  The material already had a run in it, probably from the dog. She looked up at him suddenly, daring him to draw a conclusion about that.

  “Who cares about the damned skirt?” he said, and meant it.

  “Now you sound like the real me,” she said, and when he hooted with laughter, she rewarded him with that smile again, and he was aware of being glad their day together had not ended, and that they had been given a chance to start again.

  Ethan Ballard was rescuing her, Samantha reminded herself, watching as he stood in line to get hot dogs from Ernie’s. And before that, the shopping trip, the visit to Annie’s Retreat had all been part of a game. That was how he played, pathetic as that was.

  None of it was about him liking her.

  And why should she like him? He was a bigwig investment shark from Boston who didn’t care anything about little people like Annie and Artie and her. He didn’t even know how to have a good time.

  But she did like him, even knowing how damned foolish that was. She liked him and she was glad in some horrible, fickle part of herself that wasn’t sensible that he had asked her to play his bride for a day, even if he had downgraded it to fiancée in the last moment. She was glad she’d gone shopping with him, she was glad to have seen Annie’s Retreat and she was glad that he had rescued her from that horrifying scene unfolding outside her store.

  Look, she told herself sternly, you’re twenty-five years old. It’s hardly a news bulletin that you like a man.

  Well, okay, in this town it probably was, which meant they should go eat their hot dogs somewhere else.

  In fact, it was more like It’s about time than a news flash. What if, for once, she just relaxed into what life offered her instead of trying to fight it?

  So, she liked him. How big a deal was it? Why not enjoy that? For one afternoon? Why didn’t she teach him what playing really meant, show him a little hint of her world, just as he had shown her a little hint of his?

  It didn’t mean she had to bring him home to meet her brothers. It didn’t mean they were going to get married and have babies at Annie’s Retreat, sweetly intoxicating as those thoughts were.

  It just meant she could enjoy the moment, and bring him along for the ride. She didn’t have to look at the future, and more important she didn’t have to look at the past, and measure everything against the scale of potential loss.

  And with that in mind, feeling strangely light, Samantha went down the street from where he was buying hot dogs at Ernie’s and bought two kites—the satin fabric kind with the wonderful colors and long, long tails—to fly on the beach after they’d eaten lunch.

  As she climbed back into the car, she shucked off the jacket, even though the camisole was probably a little too revealing to wear by itself.

  Live dangerously, she ordered herself.

  And she was so glad she had obeyed when she saw the heat flash through Ethan’s eyes when he got back in the car.

  “Nice kites,” he said, his voice hoarse.

  She should have slugged him. That would have made her brothers proud. But for some reason, tired of living her brothers’ vision for her instead of her own, she just laughed.

  She took the hot dogs and drinks from his hands, but when she noticed he had gotten water for the dog the unwanted stab of tenderness she felt for him made her wonder if it was going to be possible to keep this simple.

  But she told herself it was too late to change her mind, and that there was no such thing as a Hall who was a chicken, and she directed him to a beach that was dog friendly and just far enough from St. John’s Cove that she hoped they weren’t going to see any locals who would be reporting her impulsive outing to Mitch.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  THIS is what you got when you made the decision to live dangerously, Sam thought. This is what you got when you decided to show six feet of pure, muscled man how to play.

  Ethan had shrugged off his shirt fifteen minutes ago, and now he was running on the hardened pack of the surf, the dog at his heels, unraveling the spool of kite string behind him. His laughter rang out, clear and true, like church bells.

  “Run faster,” she called to him, holding the kite at the other end of the string, waiting for exactly the right moment to toss it into the waiting breeze.

  “I’m running as fast as I can,” he protested.

  “My granny Hall can run faster than that!”

  He rewarded her with a burst of speed, and she admired the clean, powerful lines of his legs for a moment—the purely masculine energy of him—before she took mercy on him and tossed the kite in the air.

  “Launch attempt forty-two,” she called.

  “Ninety-two,” he shot back, getting the hang of this playing stuff. The truth was neither of them were really counting the number of times they had tried to get the thing in the sky. This time, the kite caught the wind and wiggled upward, a bright yellow sun with thirty feet of rainbow silk unraveling behind it.

  But she couldn’t watch the kite for long, gorgeous as it was against a sky that had proved flawless once the fog had lifted. The sea, restless during their visit with the Finkles, had become quiet. Instead she watched the play of his muscles under sun-gold skin, admiring the broadness of shoulders and the tautness of belly, the white flash of his teeth as he tilted his head back to watch the kite.

  The smile disappeared as the kite tilted crazily one way, then the other, and then nosedived straight down toward the ocean!

  “No!” she cried. “Don’t let it get wet.”

  He managed, at the last moment, to maneuver it away from the water, so it planted itself deeply into the sand.

  A lesser man might have groaned in frustration, but he laughed, and began rolling up the string, ready to try again. “Get ready for launch attempt one hundred and six,” he instructed her.

  “My brothers would like that,” she said, picking the kite out of the sand and inspecting the frame for damage, while he rolled string. “You’re no quitter.”

  And then she realized she had spoken the thought out loud, as if he was a candidate to squire their sister, but she realized she was taking herself too seriously when Ethan appeared not to notice the comment at all.

  She reminded herself again to just play, to just enjoy the gift of this day. They tried to launch the kite again, and then again.

  Ethan tried to bring his fine business mind to the activity: he licked his finger and tried to calculate the strength of the wind, he made adjustments to the frame, he fiddled with the tail. But finally, by magic rather than science, his kite lifted on the wind, took string, pulled upward and stayed.

  Then, with one hand holding his kite spool, he had to try to help her get hers in the air. It was his turn to hold the kite, while she ran.

  The skirt, thankfully, didn’t hinder her running ability. In fact, she liked the way it felt skimming along her legs, flying up around her as she raced down the sand.

  “Faster,” he yelled at her. “Run faster, gypsy woman.”

  So, he had noticed the flying skirt, too.

  The camisole wasn’t built for athletic activity; the straps were as annoying as the ones on the bridesmaid’s dress had been last night. She nearly lost the kite every time she had to push a strap back up.

  Finally, with her gasping like a fish, her kite joined his in the sky. The kite zinged upward, taking string like a fish on a run.

  “Hey,” she yelled at him. “Keep your kite away from me!” If she really meant that, she wouldn’t keep moving back down the sand toward him, but she did, until they stood almost shoulder to shoulder, heads craned back as they maneuvered the kites.

  Naturally he took her command to stay away from her kite as a challenge, and he kept
bringing his kite recklessly close to hers so that they nearly touched, so that they looked like they were dancing with each other, swaying, dipping, falling, soaring.

  It was like watching a mating ritual. And the result was about the same, too.

  The kites finally collided, the strings tangled and they fell to the sand like a parachute that had not opened properly.

  “You call yours Charlie, and I’ll call mine Amanda,” he said, flopping down on his back in the sand.

  Waldo, exhausted from chasing the kites, took up a post beside him, eyeing Ethan with the suspicion of a spinster chaperone, but not growling at him anymore.

  Sam flung herself on her back on the sand beside Ethan. The camisole was stuck to her, and her hair was glued to her forehead. The skirt was limp and crushed.

  Which was probably how she would feel tomorrow when it sunk in that it was over. But for now, she enjoyed the feeling of his eyes on her, warm with appreciation. She wanted to touch his back again.

  It probably felt different naked than it had felt with the shirt on it.

  She shoved her renegade hands under her back.

  “I’m hot,” he said. “I’ve got to get in the water.”

  She looked wistfully at the calm sea. “No swimsuit.”

  “So what? Don’t worry about it. We’re engaged. Practically. Besides, nobody’s watching us.”

  And then, as if it was taking her too long to make up her mind, he stood and stretched. He was going to go in without her!

  Except he wasn’t. He took one step toward the water, and then ducked back on her, flipped her over, put one arm behind her back and one behind her knees and heaved her up, the motion seeming effortless on his part.

  She was cradled against his chest, so shocked by sensation of his naked, sun-heated skin, that for a whole three seconds she didn’t even fight him.

  But then, grinning wickedly, he moved toward the water.

  Whose dumb idea had it been to teach him how to play? Not letting on—she hoped—how much she was enjoying all this, she struggled, and gave a token scream.

  “Don’t! The camisole will be see-through if it gets wet! Ethan!”

  “I won’t look.” But he winked to let her know he was just a guy, after all, and he probably would.

  Her struggles were no match for his strength, a fact that pleased her way too much considering she had always taken such pride in thinking she could look after herself.

  He waded out into the surf, carrying her easily over the first few rollers. Waldo barked frantically on shore, afraid to get his feet wet.

  “My hair,” she told him, one last attempt to save herself from the embarrassment of the camisole that was going to turn transparent. She blinked at him with every ounce of feminine wiles she possessed.

  He wasn’t fooled. He laughed. “You don’t give a rat’s whiskers about your hair.”

  And then he slipped his arms out from under her. She fell into the water with an ungraceful crash, drank a bit of salt and got water in her eyes. Still, despite those discomforts, the water was cold on her hot skin, invigorating, as sensual as a touch.

  She was glad he had taken the decision to get wet out of her hands, not that she intended to let him know that!

  She stood up, sputtering, to see him already running away, crashing through the incoming rollers, sending gleeful looks back over his shoulder at her.

  She yanked off the skirt, sorry to have it meet such an untimely end, and dove into the breakers after him. In water, she could swim faster than she could run! All Halls were part dolphin, and Sam loved water. She moved into a strong crawl, watched him glance back once more before diving, cleanly slicing a wave with the strength of his body.

  He moved out past the breakers, then cut a course parallel to the shore. She was amazed that he swam as well as she did, or any of her brothers. She wasn’t even sure she could beat him in a race to the buoys.

  The initial cold shock of the water had faded; it felt perfect now, like an embrace, like soft silk against her skin.

  “What are you going to do with me when you catch me?” he called, flipping over, treading for a moment, letting her close some of the gap between them.

  “I’m going to drown you.”

  “That’s what I was afraid of.” He let her get to where she could almost touch him, and then with an easy grin he took off again, heading back toward the shore, letting the waves carry him.

  He paused again, near shore, finally getting breathless. “Wouldn’t it just be easier to admit you’re glad you’re in the water?”

  “Easier for you!”

  “You love it out here. Woman, you are part fish! Mermaid.”

  “Don’t try to charm me.”

  He swam close, treaded water, tried to peer beneath the surface at the camisole she was pretty sure was now transparent. She flattened her palm against the water and splashed him hard in the face.

  She should have remembered he was not a quitter, because instead of dissuading him, he took it as a challenge, swam toward her, ignoring her shouts to stay back, her laughter, her increasingly aggressive splashing.

  One final duck, and she was in the circle of his arms, his flesh warm through the veil of the sea. Instead of trying to pull away she surrendered to his easy strength and to the sensation of her wet camisole pressed into the slippery surface of his chest.

  His feet found the sandy bottom, and he held her and went still. The playfulness died on his face.

  “You’re beautiful,” he said softly.

  “I told you not to try to charm me.”

  He kissed her.

  And she was charmed. Completely.

  It wasn’t like that brushing of lips she had instigated last night. His lips claimed her, possessed her, asked more of her than she had ever thought she had to give. They stripped her to her soul, and built her back up, showed her, finally, that he had been right all along.

  He knew who she really was. Not a girl any longer, content to play a child’s games.

  She was a woman, and it was a wonderful thing to be.

  He tasted of salt. And strength. And promises.

  She kissed him back, hungry for him, starving for this thing that was happening between them.

  Waldo moaned from shore, a plaintive howl, and it pulled her, ever so slightly, from the place she was.

  Enough that she remembered all her brothers’ warnings about what men really wanted. It was what she really wanted, too, wasn’t it?

  But somehow it wasn’t. Some instinct for survival told her it was way too soon, told her that there would be nothing but regret at the end of this road if she followed it too far.

  Regretfully Samantha took advantage of the fact he was distracted—very distracted—placed both her hands on his shoulders, pushed hard enough that he lost his footing and went under the water.

  He came up laughing, shaking droplets of water from his face and hair, and then he came after her, and they played it all out again, the kisses never quite as deep, never quite as hungry as that first one.

  Finally exhausted and exhilarated they moved out of the water. She managed to snag her skirt, now as attractive as a lump of soggy tissue paper, from the surf. Ethan had left his shirt at the water’s edge, and he pulled it quickly around her, but not before his gaze burned her.

  They had no towels, so they lay down in the white, fine sand, the sun kissing them back to warmth.

  His shoulder touched hers, his eyes stayed on her face, a small appreciative smile on his lips.

  “Do you think things have blown over at your place? I could drop you off, you could change clothes. I’ll go back to my hotel and change, too. Then we could go grab a bite to eat together.”

  Together. A small word, used every day, thousands of times a day.

  How could it sparkle with new meaning? How could she feel like she didn’t want to leave him, not even for as long as it took to change clothes?

  It was weak to feel this way. So why did she feel as if s
he had waited all her life to feel it?

  “Dinner,” he said. “Somebody told me the Clam Digger is spectacular.”

  She remembered her last date at the Clam Digger. She wasn’t quite ready to expose all the rawness of these new feelings to her watching community—or her overly protective brothers. Not that they had acted very protective last night.

  But brothers could be unpredictable, especially Mitch.

  “I could grab my little barbecue and we could pick up some steaks and shrimp, barbecue down here on the beach.” That felt private. And easier than looking at him over a dinner plate, with strangers all around them.

  Or worse, in St. John’s Cove, not strangers at all!

  “Perfect.”

  He didn’t seem to care about the effects of the sand and the salt water on his car any more than he had cared about the skirt. He helped her in, and they drove back to her apartment.

  She was happy to see that the street in front of her place was quiet. The ladder had been moved and the letters taken down, only straggly pieces of tape left where they had been. Unfortunately she could still see the nose of Amanda’s yellow convertible.

  He saw it, too. “You want me to come in with you? Maybe I could say something helpful.”

  She was touched that he didn’t want to leave her alone to deal with Amanda’s heartbreak, but she wasn’t sure if Amanda would appreciate his concern or be embarrassed that her very successful cousin was witnessing the breakdown of her life.

  “No, it would be better if you didn’t.”

  “Okay. How about if I come back for you in about an hour?”

  “Fine.”

  Not the least self-conscious—this was a resort town after all—Sam took the stairs two at a time, loving the feel of his too large shirt brushing her naked thighs.

  She opened the door to her apartment and felt that wonderful sensation of homecoming that she felt every single time she walked through the door.

  Her apartment was a treasure. This building was nearly as old as the town, and Sam’s apartment had many of the original features, gorgeous hardwood floors, wainscoting, copper roof panels, leaded glass windows, luxurious oak crown moldings and trim.