Anything for Her(50)

He was nuzzling her neck when Allie stiffened and gasped. “Oh, no!”

“What?” He straightened and put a hand over his eyes. Across the lake, the boat had slowed and was circling back. There was no water-skier behind. “Did you see what happened?”

“Just him and then a big splash.”

“I’ll bet he got cocky.”

She couldn’t seem to tear her eyes from the scene across the lake. “You think he’s all right?”

“Yeah, I think he’s all right.” God, he hoped so. Despite his reassuring words, he jumped to his feet to see better. Allie did the same.

“There he is. He’ll have to learn to start from the water. Unless they’re going to pick him up. No.” It looked as though the handle of the towline had been tossed back to the figure in the water. He was left bobbing while the boat made another gentle semicircle and gained speed. “He’s up...he’s up... No. Shit.”

“Is he okay?”

“I’m worried about his ego, not his physical well-being.”

“Oh.” She was all but on tiptoe as they watched another attempt begin. “Come on, Sean,” she whispered. “You can do it.”

The kid made it up this time and they were off around the lake.

Allie patted her chest. “I don’t know if I could take having children.”

Nolan laughed. “Me, I figured if I skipped all the early years, I wouldn’t have anything to worry about.” Anna had found the argument convincing, right?

Allie’s snort sounded an awful lot like his sister’s.

He didn’t resume kissing her; Sean would be by any minute. Allie sat back down and tipped her face contentedly up to the sun. He did the same. “Wish he’d had a friend to bring with him,” Nolan said after a minute.

“It’ll happen. I mean, he’s not getting in fights, and nobody is making fun of him or anything like that, right?”

Suddenly less drowsy, Nolan frowned. “I don’t think so. No fights, anyway. I’d have heard from the school about that, I’m pretty sure.”

“Mmm. He’ll be fine, then. It takes time, that’s all.”

“That’s right. You said you moved a lot. You must be a pro at starting over in new schools.”

“We talked about it, a little,” she said after a minute. “Sean and I. He said school is okay, but that he didn’t make any friends last spring. We agreed that it’s harder then. Everybody already belongs. It’ll be different this year.”

“It’s October.”

“I’ll bet he has guys he hangs out with at school. And maybe some girls flirting with him.”

The boat roared by, closer to the shore this time. Sean’s grin was jubilant as he shot past.

“I’m glad we did this,” Allie said, her voice utterly free of tension, as though something had loosened inside of her. She quit holding herself up on her elbows, instead lying flat on her back. Her eyes closed.

Nolan sat looking down at her, feeling a squeeze in his chest. God, she was beautiful, poetry in motion and equally graceful on those rare occasions she was still, like now. His gaze ate up the dark curve of her eyelashes against ivory cheeks, the delicate skin of her eyelids, the wing of eyebrows, the purity of her bone structure and the long arch of her neck. The suit clung to her small, perfect breasts, slim waist and supple hips. And those exquisite legs.

The funny thing was, even as he looked, hungry, awed at his own luck and totally appreciative, Nolan knew that this grip she had on him had to do with a lot more than her beauty. It was the sunrise of her smile, the way she lifted her chin in defiance. It was her patience as she worked over the quilting frame with her back so straight and her arms held just so, the unexpectedness of the fabrics she put together, the way she listened to him, the fierceness of her anger and—hell, maybe most of all—the ghosts he could see in her sometimes haunted eyes.

Vulnerability that moved him—and frightened him.

His heart beat heavy and hard in his chest. Life had been easier before he looked into her eyes and stumbled into something unexpected. On a silent, shaken laugh, he knew. Scared to death or not, he couldn’t imagine going back. A world without Allie.

He made himself turn his face away and look out over the water. Another boat passed, this one towing two skiers. He watched it and them, without seeing.





CHAPTER NINE