by Marie Force
“And I thank you for that,” Seamus said gravely, which earned him yet another scowl from Joe.
When Seamus tried to take Caro’s hand, she shook him off.
Baby steps.
Carolina focused on her son. “Are you going to be able to live with this?”
“You haven’t given me much choice.”
“Actually,” Seamus said, “that’s not true. You know as well as I do that if you disapprove or express your disappointment or in any way seem put out by it, she’ll throw me over like yesterday’s news. So it does matter. If you’re going to do any of those things, I, for one, would appreciate you doing them now before this goes any further.”
Carolina started to say something in protest, but the challenging look Seamus tossed her way had her closing her mouth.
Everyone looked to Joe, waiting breathlessly to see what he would say or do.
After a long moment, Joe said, “I’m not going to do any of those things.”
“Are you sure?” Seamus asked. “You don’t get to change your mind in a week or a month or a year.”
“Neither do you,” Joe said pointedly.
Seamus, who understood what Joe was saying, nodded in agreement. “Neither do I.”
“It might take me a while to get my head around it, but I won’t stand in the way.” To his mother, he said, “I’d never want to be the cause of your unhappiness. I hate that you thought I would.”
Tears filled Carolina’s eyes as she went to her son and hugged him. “Thank you.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Seamus caught Janey wiping away a tear. “Caro?”
She pulled back from her son and turned to Seamus. “Come here.”
The glance she directed at her son was filled with trepidation.
Joe nodded and squeezed her shoulder.
Carolina took a couple of halting steps toward Seamus.
He held out his arms to her. “Come to me.”
She seemed hesitant to get close to him with her son and daughter-in-law watching, but Seamus knew it was vital that she take this first most important step in front of them.
“It’s okay, love,” he whispered. “Everything’s going to be okay now.”
A sob escaped her as she moved into his embrace and buried her face in his shirt.
As his heart pounded erratically, Seamus closed his eyes, said a silent prayer of thanks to the Lord above and closed his arms around her. “Shhh, don’t cry, my love,” he said, running a hand over her back. “Please don’t cry.”
He opened his eyes to find Janey leading her husband from the room. Joe met his gaze, and the message was clear—hurt her, and you’ll answer to me. Seamus gave a small nod to show he understood and then refocused his attention on Carolina. “There, love, it’s all good. Joe knows about us, and nothing bad happened.”
She rested her hands on his hips, her fingertips pressing into his back as her sobs became hiccups. “Nothing bad happened.”
Seamus smiled and tightened his hold on her. “Do you know what that means?”
She shook her head.
“It means,” he said, tipping her face up so he could see her eyes, “there’s nothing standing between you, me and this.” He kissed her softly when he would’ve preferred to kiss her much more intently. But now they had a lovely future stretching before them, and he could afford to be patient.
Carolina, however, wasn’t in the mood to be patient and surprised him with her passionate response. Her fingers clutched his hair—almost painfully—as her tongue tangled with his.
Seamus was on the verge of doing the unthinkable at work when he came to his senses and broke the kiss. “Not here.”
“Where, then?”
Startled by the urgency he heard in her voice, he took her hand. “Come with me.”
“Don’t you have to work?”
“I’ve got three hours until my next run.” All thoughts of the paperwork he’d plan to do had been abandoned.
“That won’t be enough time.”
“We’ve got all the time in the world, love. All the time in the world.”
When Kara’s alarm went off at six, Dan wanted to weep. He’d only been asleep a short time and was sincerely sorry he’d ever agreed to sail this morning. But Mac and the others were counting on him, so he wouldn’t renege. However, he wanted to. All he wanted was more of what he’d had during the night—the best sex of his life.
He glanced over at Kara, asleep next to him with her hair spread out on the pillow and her lips pursed in her sleep. She was so damned gorgeous, and he felt like the luckiest bastard on the face of the earth to have spent the night with her.
Where they’d go from here was the big question. Would this be one magical night, or was it the start of something more? He wanted very badly to know the answer to that question but wouldn’t wake her to ask. Instead, he slid out of bed and got busy gathering his clothes, which were flung about the room.
She hadn’t changed her mind about inviting him home. If anything, she’d been even more enthusiastic when they got to her place. The missing buttons on his dress shirt were an indication of just how enthusiastic she’d been. To Dan, the gaps in his shirt were like hard-won trophies. Now he had to ensure that he didn’t mess up what had been a promising start.
“Are you leaving?”
Dan turned, surprised that she was awake. “I’ve got to be at the dock in an hour.” He sat on the edge of the bed and kissed her exposed shoulder.
She shrank away from him.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“You promised you wouldn’t hate me.”
“I don’t.”
“But?”
“Nothing,” she said again.
“Why do you keep saying that?” he asked as anxiety worked its way down his backbone.
“Because that’s what I want—nothing. Last night was fun. I enjoyed it very much. But it doesn’t mean we’re a thing now.”
“So you were just using me to get laid?”
“I didn’t say that!”
“How would you put it, then?” Needing to channel the hurt and anger, Dan stood and grabbed his belt off the floor, jamming it through the loops with unsteady hands.
“I don’t want to be involved with anyone,” Kara said, looking remote and closed off, the way she had for weeks, before he finally got through to her. “I told you that from the beginning.”
“I knew we shouldn’t have had sex. I suspected I’d regret it when it was happening, and now I know it for sure.”
“I’m sorry you regret it.”
“The only thing I regret is that we’re back to square one.” He snapped his watch on his arm and grabbed his coat off the chair in the corner of her bedroom. “And I regret that I don’t have time now to discuss it further because I have somewhere to be.”
“That’s fine. There’s nothing left to discuss.”
He stared at her, incredulous. “I’m disappointed in you, Kara. I thought you had more guts than that. I guess I was wrong.” He made the mistake of taking one last look at her face, which was how he discovered she was stunned and hurt. Though he regretted hurting her, he didn’t regret saying it, because she’d hurt him, too.
In the car, he pounded on the steering wheel until his hand was sore. “Goddamn it!”
Chapter 22
“You never went back to work,” Carolina said when she opened her eyes from the deepest sleep in recent memory to find Seamus watching her.
“You noticed that, huh?”
“Uh-huh.” In the span of a few seconds, images from their interlude flashed through her mind, indelibly imprinted upon her memory—Seamus all but dragging her across the street to the small room on the third floor of the Beachcomber, the thud of the door as it closed behind them, the abandon with which they’d torn at each other’s clothes, coming together frantically at first and then slowly and reverently a second and third time.
His hand landed on her shoulder and moved sl
owly down her arm to link their fingers. “I called the office to tell them I had a personal situation, and they brought in one of our backup captains to cover for me for the rest of the day.”
She felt her face heat as she continued to relive the erotic hours they’d spent together. And now they had a whole day together. For that matter, they had the rest of their lives.
“What’re you thinking, love?”
“I can’t believe this has happened. That we get to be together. I never thought…”
“I always hoped, but I didn’t think it’d happen, either. And now that it has…” He dipped his head to kiss her. “I may not let you out of my sight for at least a year, if not longer.”
“Stop,” she said with a hand to his chest. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“If you marry me, I won’t have to worry about you slipping through my fingers or meeting someone you like better while I’m over on the mainland.”
Her eyes widened as his words registered. “Marry you? I just agreed to date you!”
He cupped her breast and squeezed her nipple, making her want him all over again, as if she hadn’t already had him three times. “Is that what we’re doing here, love? Dating?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Aye, I know what you mean, and I also know you’re not a hundred percent sold on the idea.”
“What does that mean? I’m here, aren’t I?”
“You’re here this way,” he said, squeezing her breast for emphasis, before releasing her to tap a finger against her forehead, “but up here, you’re still worried what everyone will think of Carolina Cantrell taking up with a much younger man.”
Perturbed by his analysis, she said, “You don’t know that.”
“Am I wrong?”
Cornered and uncertain of what she should say, Carolina shifted her focus to the wall over his shoulder.
“We could always go away from here to a place where no one knows either of us,” he said.
“This is my home. I don’t want to be anywhere else.”
“Are you prepared to deal with the people who won’t understand this? Who won’t understand us?”
“Yes,” she said haltingly. “Of course I am.”
“If we got married, everyone would know we’re serious.”
“That’s no reason to get married.”
“The fact that we love each other is a pretty good reason, too.”
Carolina thought about that.
“You do love me, don’t you?” he asked.
Her gaze shot up to meet his, looking down at her with a wary, expectant expression on his handsome face. “You know I do.”
“Do I? You’ve never said it.”
“I… I meant to.”
His face lifted into an adorable half smile. “I’m listening.”
“Are you always this pushy?”
“Only when it really, really matters.”
Listening to him talk was almost as sexy as making love with him. “I love you, Seamus O’Grady, giant pain in my ass.”
Laughing, he pushed his imposing penis against her hip. “I’d happily be a giant pain in your ass, if you’d like.”
Shocked to the core by the implication, she stared at him.
“I want to do everything with you.” He moved over her and brushed the hair back from her face as he stared down at her. “Everything. Most of all, I want to marry you and have a life with you.”
As if she’d always loved him, Carolina’s legs parted to admit him. She was sore and achy and still tired, but she’d wanted him so badly for so long, she couldn’t imagine denying him.
“Ah, Christ,” he muttered as he sank into her. “There’s nothing in the whole world better than this.”
Carolina could hardly disagree as he filled her and stirred her and surrounded her with his love.
“Marry me,” he whispered in her ear as he thrust into her. “Marry me, marry me, marry me.”
She kept her face buried in the curve of his shoulder. “I can hardly think when you’re doing that.”
“What’s there to think about?” Without losing their connection, he turned them so she was on top looking down at him, unable to hide from him any longer. His green eyes were sharp and intense and filled with love and longing and so many other things she couldn’t begin to process it all. “I love you, Carolina. I’ll always love you.”
“I love you, too.”
His fingers dug into her hips to keep her from moving. “But?”
“I need to think about it.”
The disappointment registered in his expression for an instant before he rallied and surged into her, stealing the breath from her lungs. “You do all the thinking you need to do. In the meantime, I’ll keep you entertained until you decide.”
With him moving inside her, it was hard to think about anything other than how badly she wanted to feel this way every day for the rest of her life.
This, Tiffany decided as she dragged herself to the store, must be what it was like to get hit by a truck. The worst of the flu symptoms were gone, but her body ached from being sick and from having sex with Blaine for half the night. What did it say about her that even when stricken with the flu, she couldn’t keep her hands off that man?
She hung out the Open flag and pulled out a mannequin dressed in a see-through teddy with matching black panties to the sidewalk. As she went about her opening routine, her mind wandered to Blaine and the evening they’d spent together. When she thought about the things they’d done… Even the owner of a shop like hers could still be embarrassed, remembering being face down on top of him with her bottom and other important parts right in his face. And the stuff he’d done!
A flash of heat tingled between her legs, making her shudder from the impact. She couldn’t wait to do it all again.
Her cell phone rang, and she took the call from Dan. “Please tell me you have good news.”
“I have good news.”
The din of voices in the background made it hard to hear him. “What’s all that racket?”
“Oh, sorry, I’m sailing today with a bunch of very loud guys who’ve been razzing me about working when I’m supposed to be helping them. I wanted to let you know I called your landlord this morning, and he’s willing to accept a new check, provided this doesn’t happen again.”
“It won’t,” Tiffany said. “I promise.”
“That’s what I told him.”
“I can’t thank you enough for this.”
“The landlord told me it was Jim’s idea to begin eviction proceedings.”
Nothing he did should’ve shocked her anymore, and yet…
“Tiffany?”
“I’m here.”
“I took it upon myself to give Jim a call to let him know how much I’m enjoying life on Gansett and how I’m thinking about permanently relocating, since there seems to be a pressing need for a second attorney on the island.”
Tiffany snorted with laughter. “Oh, that’s fabulous! He must’ve been totally freaked out.”
“To say the least,” Dan said with a chuckle. “I told him how after seeing him in action a few times, how happy I’d be to run him right off the island by hanging out my own shingle.”
Tiffany laughed again. “There’s nothing you could’ve said that would frighten him more than threatening his monopoly on the island’s legal work.”
“That’s what I figured. I gotta say, it was fun to give him a taste of his own medicine. I told him to leave you alone or we’d file defamation charges, which would really do wonders for his practice. I don’t think you’ll be hearing from him again, except where it concerns Ashleigh.”
“Thank you so much.”
“It was completely my pleasure.”
“Send me a bill for your time.”
“No way. I haven’t had that much fun in years. It’s on the house.”
“Well, if you’re ever in need of a gift for a special lady, come by the store, and I’ll hook you up.”
/> “You got a deal. Talk to you soon.”
“You really didn’t have to do this,” Maddie said to her father-in-law as he waited with her for her father to arrive. She’d invited Bobby to come to her home and had a pitcher of lemonade waiting on the table on the deck so he wouldn’t have to come inside. Mac was off sailing for the day, Thomas had felt well enough to return to camp, and Hailey was down for her morning nap.
“I promised my son I’d take care of you,” Big Mac said, “and I never break a promise.”
“You’re a good dad—to all of us.”
He seemed taken aback by the unexpected compliment. “That’s awfully sweet of you, honey.”
“It’s true. I had no idea how fathers were supposed to behave until I met Mac and got to know you. After seeing the way you are with your kids, I know why Mac is so amazing with ours.”
“You couldn’t pay me a finer compliment.”
Maddie looked out over the meadow where she and Mac had been married almost two years ago. The encroaching fog made it impossible to see the normally spectacular view of the water. “It’s getting kind of foggy out there. Will they be okay?”
“Of course they will. They’re my kids.”
Maddie stared into the fog for a long moment. “It’s embarrassing, you know?”
“What is?”
“This whole thing. I’m a full-grown adult, but the idea of seeing my dad again reduces me to a quivering five-year-old.”
“Which is exactly why Mac didn’t want you to see him alone.”
“I’m glad you’re the one he recruited to babysit me.”
Big Mac smiled. “I volunteered. I’ve got a few things I wouldn’t mind saying to Bobby Chester if the opportunity should arise.”
Maddie laughed at the calculating expression on his face, but her laughter faded at the sound of tires crunching over the gravel driveway. “Here he comes.”
“Don’t let him intimidate you, sweetheart. You’re strong and brave and resilient—and you’re all of those things no thanks to him. Don’t you forget that.”
She squeezed his hand, fortified by his support. “I won’t.” Despite his assurances, her stomach was a mess as she waited for her father to come up the stairs to the deck. And then there he was—tall, stocky, gray-haired, slightly bloated. Nothing at all like the pictures of the handsome, smiling young man her mother had kept around the house long after he left them.