Barefoot in White (Barefoot Bay Brides) (9 page)

“From different parts of the country? I’m surprised, because you seem like you’ve been friends forever.”

“Feels that way,” she agreed, thinking about how quickly the three of them had evolved from professional colleagues to best friends. “I told you we traveled together for one solid year to visit resorts, and we clicked. And I was totally ready for friends again…”

She realized how that sounded the minute it came out.

“I mean, friends and a new business and a change,” she said quickly. “We bonded instantly and knew that we could be a powerhouse operation as a threesome rather than struggling individually.”

“What do you mean you were ready for friends again?”

Of course he was too smart to let that slip by. She attempted a casual shrug. “Oh, I mean friends that are in the same business.”

She wasn’t going to keep letting him take her back there, damn it.

“Don’t you ever miss Los Angeles?” he asked, and she sensed it was just another way of asking how and when and why she’d shunned her friends and family.

She had prepared answers for those questions. She’d been asked this before. “I didn’t really live in LA, per se. I moved way out to Canyon Country years ago, and that turned out to be an inconvenient place to have a business. I was living on the freeway to meet clients and review sites. This”—she made a sweeping gesture toward the water and boats, the sweeping arc of the causeway that led to the mainland—“is like paradise compared to Southern California.”

He didn’t answer, studying the view with a hesitation just long enough to make her think he didn’t agree.

“Do
you
miss California?” she countered. She knew he’d grown up outside of San Francisco and assumed he lived up there.

“Not how I’m living now. While I’m on this leave, I’m staying with my younger brother in Manhattan Beach, which is not conducive to writing—or sleeping or thinking—since he’s got a lot of friends and they are in and out constantly. I had an apartment down in San Diego when I first entered the SEALs, but when I was deployed the first time, I let the place go.”

“Where would you live if you ended up leaving the SEALs?”

He closed his eyes and very slowly shook his head. “I don’t want to even think about it, Willow.”

“So if you’re not deployed, would you quit the service?”

“I’m not big on quitting, really. But…I didn’t train like a beast to push papers in some building.” He gave his head a little shake, like the thought actually hurt him, but then he turned to her.

“You must get back to LA to see your parents, right?” he asked. “Or is it New York where Misty said she sees your mother?”

She laughed softly.

“Why is that funny?” he asked.

“It’s like we’re doing a perfectly choreographed dance of subjects neither one of us wants to talk about.”

He brushed his fingers on her shoulder. “Your mother?”

All right, she’d be honest. “I don’t talk to my mother that often.”

“Is that by choice?” he asked.

Her lips formed a tight smile as she nodded, her focus on a boat headed south on the navy water. “Yep. Mine.”

He waited a beat, then, “Can I ask why?”

A hundred responses floated through her brain, so she chose the one that would resonate with a man who missed dangerous battles. “Consider it a survival technique,” she said. “Surely a Navy SEAL would understand that.”

For a long moment, he looked at her, his eyes registering that, on some level, he understood.

“We’re not…what’s the word?
Estranged
,” she added. Just the opposite, in fact. They knew each other far too well. “And we do talk sometimes.” Briefly, rarely, and only by phone. “But mostly, I can’t stand her manipulative personality. Constantly trying to get me to be or do things that she wants with no regard for what I want.”

“That would suck. What about your dad?”

“He loves to be manipulated by her, that’s why they’re still so in love. But my dad…” She felt a slow smile growing. “My dad’s okay. She’s his weakness, and I forgive him for that.”

“Do you see him?”

“Once in a while. They both have insane schedules. He’s still on the road a lot, and my mother runs a monstrously successful design business. They’re rarely on this continent, let alone at home. But, yeah, I see him if we can work it out.” Except she hadn’t seen him in…eighty pounds. Which was the way Willow measured time over the last few years.

To lighten the conversation, she leaned a little closer, letting their shoulders touch. “Betcha I could get you an autograph. If you promise never, ever to sing
Will Ya, Will Ya
again.”

He laughed, closing the rest of the space between them by dipping close to her ear. “Gotta know if it’s real, gotta know it’s forevah,” he sang softly.

She closed her eyes and gave a soft grunt. “Oh, that stupid song.”

He dropped back, his jaw hanging open. “Stupid! Not only is that one of the most important songs in the history of 1980s rock music, it’s also one of my personal favorites in the history of all music.”

She couldn’t help laughing. “God, your bar is low.”

“Your father
wrote
it.” He practically sputtered.

“Not only that, he proposed to my mom by singing that at a concert in front of fifty thousand people.”

“I read that somewhere. They all sang, ‘Will ya marry me?’ instead of ‘Be my girl.’”

“You
are
a hard-core fan. So, here’s something even the biggest Z-Train fans don’t know.” She dipped her head close to his to whisper. “I was conceived to that song.”

He slapped his hand over his heart as if it had cracked into pieces in his chest. “Oh, man, I think I just fell in love with you.”

And
her
heart skipped, rolled, dropped, and landed somewhere in the vicinity of her belly. “Well, that didn’t take much.”

Turning to her, he reached for her hand. “You know this means I’ll never listen to
Will Ya, Will Ya
again and not think of you.”

Imagining how many times that would have him thinking of her, everything in her melted like the last bits of ice cream in the bottom of her cone.

“Now, Willow. Let’s stay on this subject of things you want to avoid.”

She gave him a pleading look. “Come on, Nick. I ate ice cream. I told you about my mother. I confessed I am the result of a hit song. Now what line do you want me to cross?”

He just smiled and inched closer. “I told you, I’m researching kissing.”

His eyes were so dark, they pulled her into him, making her want to get closer, deeper,
inside
those eyes. Something that felt very much like what she now thought of as “empty-hunger” engulfed her. That need to be filled, to be satisfied, to be comforted, even though nothing was really empty or dissatisfied or uncomfortable. Empty-hunger was what got her into trouble with food, and empty-lust was about to get her into trouble with Nick.

Except it didn’t feel empty, like the desire for a piece of cheesecake. It felt real. Like the longing for a sweet taste of his mouth. “I thought writers had great imaginations. Can’t you wing it?”

“Then my kiss will read like some idiot wrote it.”

She grinned.

“Some other idiot,” he corrected. “Like when I read a battle scene and they get the weapons wrong, it pisses me off. What if I get it wrong?”

“Lips are the only weapons involved. You can’t mess that up.”

“There’s so much more to a kiss, Willow.”

Really? She wanted to know. She might have inched closer, but at that moment, she wasn’t really in control of every movement. He lifted their joined hands and brought them close to his lips. “Why do you seem so dead set against a little, tiny, simple, inconsequential kiss?”

“Because one loss of control leads to the next, and what if I can’t stop?”

“I’m okay with that.”

She laughed, reaching up to put a hand on his shoulder to push him back but, oh, man, that was a nice shoulder. Hard, thick, powerful. A shoulder to lean on. A shoulder…to ride.

“Your eyes are turning gray.”

She widened them. “What does that mean?”

“I think this is what happens right before you give in. They turned gray when I asked you to get ice cream.”

“It’s the color of fear,” she whispered.

“You know what I taught you about fears.” He closed almost all the space between their mouths, still holding her gaze. “You face them, you live them, you beat them. Fear of losing control will be gone.”

But she wasn’t really afraid of losing control. This was Nick Hershey. She’d kissed him once before, and he’d been so turned off, she had practically tasted the aversion to her on his lips.

That
was her fear, and it wasn’t even deep-seated. It was right on the surface, clawing at her heart.

Ancient insecurities and a lifetime of self-hatred welled up like a bubbling fountain, pulling her back.

“This is not research,” she said. “Where’s your notebook?”

“Right here.” He pulled out his phone. “This is absolutely for research purposes only. In fact, we can stop and take notes after each kiss.”

“How many will there be?”

“How many can I have?”

She had to laugh. “How many do you want?”

He lifted their joined hands to his lips, a smile breaking behind his knuckles. “Let’s start with one and see what happens.”

What could one hurt, right?

She closed her eyes and gave a simple nod. Nick remained perfectly still for a long beat. Too long. Long enough that the ache inside her turned cold.

She opened her eyes, and he was staring at…his phone. She peered down to see him typing in a note-taking app. His fingers glided over the screen as he typed
Willow
.

“How many research partners do you have?”

“Just one.”

Then, he placed one hand on her jaw, cupping it with strong fingers and a warm palm. It took everything in her not to nuzzle him like an affection-deprived dog, practically itching for his hand to slip deeper into her hair and cradle her whole head as he kissed her.

But he still didn’t do it. In fact, he dragged his hand from her face and picked up the freaking phone again.

“Now what?”

“I want to write what I’m feeling.” He tapped the screen. “I think it’s important that I remember exactly what it feels like before the actual kiss.”

Was he serious? Or looking for a way out…

“For God’s sake, Nick, just kiss me.”

“I thought you’d never ask.” He dipped his head and brushed her lips with his, making her shudder at the touch before she slowly lifted her arms.

Her hands settled on his upper arms, her grip tightening as each amazing sensation rolled through her. The tangy, rich taste of chocolate and mint, the warm pressure of his lips on hers, the scent of ice cream and aftershave, and the gentle caress of his hand on her jaw. His fingers slipped deeper into her hair, hot and strong, holding her as if she were precious.

She couldn’t help the softest whimper, which made him angle his head and intensify the kiss. She leaned closer so he could slide his hand through her hair and pull her into him to kiss her cheek, her jaw, her hair, her ear. She heard him laugh and felt him sigh.

“I like kissing you, Willow,” he whispered.

“For research.”

“You fell for that?” He chuckled and leaned in for another kiss. “Not for research, for real.” He kissed her again, opening his lips to tease her teeth with his tongue, sending a thousand fluttering butterflies roaring through her stomach.

No, not for real. This couldn’t feel real. It was too soon, too close, too wrapped up in the past. She inched back, breaking the kiss with a bit of insistence.

“Then you better take notes and get home and write that book.”

His smile faltered as the words hit him. “What’s going on?”

“What’s going on? We’re kissing in the middle of the day in a park like…like…”

“Like people who are attracted to each other and spending the day together in a way that is perfectly acceptable.”

Was he attracted to her? He hadn’t been before. She tried to cling to that, however irrational it felt out here in the sunshine, a new woman living her new life.

“But…” The word bubbled on her lips.

“But what?”

“But we should go.” She started to stand, but he still had one of her hands and brought her right back down.

“Whoa, just a minute there, darling.”

“Darling?”

“It’s a term of endearment.” He squeezed her hand. “I find you endearing, so therefore, I use it. I find you…”

“Repulsive.”

He choked, eyes wide. “
What
?”

“I mean, you did, long ago. And I—”

“I told you what happened, Willow, and I apologized and I meant it. You have to let go of the past or—”

“I did. I have. I know I have to let go, in fact, I have made an art form of letting go of the past, and it’s working out really well for me, and you, frankly, are the embodiment of all I hated about myself in the past, so let’s just leave this at res—”