Barefoot in White (Barefoot Bay Brides) (12 page)

“Well?” He blamed his racing, slamming, unstoppable heart on the run, but after the kind of training he did, he knew this pulse rate was due to nerves and anticipation.

“Yeah, well.”

He blinked at her. What the hell did that mean? “Yeah, well, what?”

“It’s…” She gave him a tight smile, her eyes turning deep blue now. An apologetic, pitiful blue. “It’s good, Nick.”

Just good. And not a really enthusiastic good, either. More like a…
meh
kind of good. “Not great?”

She didn’t answer right away, but looked like she was searching for words. Words that wouldn’t sting. Shit.

“It has so much potential. You have so much potential.”

He stared at her. Screw potential. That’s not what he wanted to hear.

“You know what you have to do, right?”

Curse? Punch a wall? Quit? “Start over?”

“No, you have to tell the truth.”

“It’s fiction, Willow.”

“Okay, then tell your truth.”

He closed his eyes, the shot a direct hit.

Chapter Ten

“I could have lied,” Willow said. And maybe she should have, because Nick’s gutted expression made her remember how she felt when something she said, did, wanted, or wore didn’t stand up to her mother’s rigorous expectations. “But that book’s too good to lie.”

“You just said it sucked.”

“No, no.” She shook her head vehemently. “I did not. I said it could be even better. Would I be out here cooling myself off if that make-out scene didn’t…affect me?” And by affect, she meant turn her entire lower half into a pool of liquid lust. His language was evocative and tantalizing, the imagery completely sexy without being corny.

“It affected you?” A spark of hope lit his eyes, but she didn’t get to enjoy it, because he snagged the bottom of his T-shirt and ripped it over his head. Speaking of evocative and tantalizing…

His abs were so defined, there were shadows in between the muscle cuts. His chest, damp with sweat, heaved with a deep breath, drawing her gaze to the blue ink near his left shoulder, the semicircle that represented the earth and single star high above it. This wasn’t the first time she’d seen a fan with the Zenith album graphic tattooed on him, but it was definitely the first time she’d had the urge to…lick it.

He toed off his sneakers and tipped his head toward the water. “I’m hot.”

No kidding.

“I’m going in.”

“Suit yourself.”

“Actually…” He pulled at the waistband of his sweats. “Unsuit myself is more appropriate.”

Her jaw unhinged. “You’re going in naked?”

“You’ve seen it before.”

“Doesn’t mean I want to see it again.”
Liar, liar
. But, still, after reading that kiss, she wasn’t sure her libido could stand the pressure.

“I hate clothes.”

Just her luck. She leaned back on her palms, squinting up at him. “Sadly, our society requires them.”

He thumbed his sweats lower, revealing more skin and muscle. “If it offends you, look away. I’ll be in the pool in a second.”

“I don’t think the word is ‘offend.’”

She waited for his grin or quip, but his expression was still dark. He inched the sweats down, following that sweet strip of dark hair, sliding over those narrow hips, across the ripped muscles that led right to…

She really ought to close her eyes. Or turn her head.
Or peel off her dress and join him
.

“You’re killing me, Nick,” she admitted.

“Punishment for hating my book.”

“Oh, yeah, looking at you bare-ass naked is absolute torture.”

Finally, he smiled. “As bad as the book?”

“Would you stop? I didn’t hate it. I think it’s amazing and could be even more amazing.”

He didn’t answer, but in one smooth move, he dove into the deep end in a way that gave her a perfect view of his ass. Which, even upside-down, made her mouth go bone dry.

She watched him swim, his perfect form distorted enough by the water that it wasn’t completely obscene, just…wonderful. He moved like he’d been born in the water, shooting from one side of the pool to the other in long, powerful, silent strokes.

As he neared her end, she leaned forward to really get a good look and, whoosh, he turned with the grace of a trained swimmer and pushed himself back to the other side.

She expected him to pop up, but he came back again, then returned, then back again.

How long could he hold his breath? He had to have been under there forty-five seconds already.

But he gave an easy kick and shot across the bottom again, back and forth until she lost count. Finally, he surfaced about six inches away from her, not a bit winded.

“Damn,” he muttered. “I didn’t even make two minutes.” He smacked the water.

“How long did you want to stay under?”

He shook his hands in the air. “Unbound and in seventy-five-degree water? Two minutes sucks. Shit.” He snorted some water. “I suck today.”

“Okay, pity party’s over.” She splashed some water with her feet. “Can we talk about the book now? Because I loved so much of it.”

He swiped his hair off his face and stood in five feet of water in front of her, his shoulders and head glistening in the sun, the dark nest of hair and man below the water line, everything visible enough to torment the hell out of her.

He took a step closer, and she fought not to look down. Didn’t most men shy away from water for fear of shrinkage? Of course, if that thing shrank, it would be nearing normal. His eyes were mesmerizing enough to hold her gaze, water droplets on the lashes almost like tears.

“Tell me what you loved.”

She flipped her feet and made waves around his chest, enjoying the hint of vulnerability on a man who looked anything but right now. “I got a little misty-eyed when he left his sister.”

“You cried?”

“It felt, you know, real.”

He grunted softly and dropped underwater.
What the hell?

But before she could figure out what had just happened, he surfaced, shaking water off his head before saying, “It was real.”

“So the book is autobiographical?”

His head went under. Damn it! She kicked water so hard her toe touched his forehead, and she instantly snatched it back, but not before his hand clamped around her ankle. She shrieked as he tugged.

He emerged slowly, gripping her ankle firmly, his large hand easily spanning the diameter. “You wanna play water games with a SEAL?” He grinned. “’Cause you’ll lose.”

Tugging a little more, he inched her closer to the edge. She’d be in and soaking wet in seconds. The thought of being in the water with him sent something unholy right down to the toes that practically curled in his hand. He’d peel off her dress, strip her down to nothing, and—

“No,” he said, the word ripping her from Fantasy Land.

“What?”

“No, it’s not autobiographical.”

She eyed him. “Lieutenant
Spencer
Gannon is a SEAL from Northern California who played every sport ever invented, went to UCLA, and was deployed in Iraq. You’re telling me he’s not based on Lieutenant Nicholas
Spencer
Hershey with the same bio?”

He narrowed his eyes and cocked his head. “How do you know my middle name?”

Because she’d licked up crumbs of information about Nick Hershey like a starving puppy cleaning the kitchen floor. “I’m smart like that. Am I right? That Gannon character is you, through and through.”

He didn’t answer right away, probably because denial would have been a lie. “They say write what you know,” he finally said.

As he spoke, he reached for her other ankle, and she didn’t bother to fight that. The pleasure of it was instant and real, like taking a thumbnail-size piece of a chocolate-chip cookie. So easy to rationalize the quick flash of deliciousness, so small it didn’t count.

But then she should have inched away, wrested free, or demanded he let go.

She didn’t. That was the second bite. She waited for the twist of guilt, but the only thing she felt was much lower and sharper and more primal. After all, a gorgeous man was stark naked and holding on to her ankles, and she was in a dress with enough flowy material in the skirt that he could easily…spread her legs.

So she didn’t fight or move or, really, breathe. She simply reveled in the sensation of his hands on her skin.

“Tell me the truth: Am I wasting my time?” he asked quietly. “Is this a pipe dream?”

“Trying to get me in the water with you? Yes.”

He gave her a look. “You know what I mean. The book. Is it a complete clusterfuck that should be deleted?”

“Nick, I’m not a professional who knows anything about books. You could ask a literary agent or a publisher or someone who reads military memoirs.”

“I will, but it’s not a memoir.” He squeezed a little harder. “It’s fiction. It’s an action thriller set in the theater of war.”

Not to her. “I think it’s more of a romance.”

His lip curled in pure disdain. “Like hell it is.”

“Well, Gannon likes that reporter, Charlotte.”

His eyes flashed in shock. “That’s not her name. It’s Christina.”

“Yeah, I noticed you switched back and forth. It was Christina in the beginning, but the stuff you wrote toward the end, you called her Charlotte. I made a note of that for you.”

He grimaced. “I was power writing at that point. Fast.”

“So, maybe that tells you something about this character.”

A whisper of fear flickered over his face, as fleeting as a moving shadow. “Like what?”

“Like I said, I’m no expert, but maybe the fact that you don’t have her name straight is a sign she’s not completely clear in your head.”

“No, she’s clear.” Suddenly, he let go of her ankles and disappeared again, launching into another lengthy underwater session.

Willow let the water lap against her legs, though it did little to cool her off while she watched his naked form glide from end to end. She inhaled a whiff of summer-scented air, suddenly getting another clear insight into Nick. He was like an ostrich—only his hiding place was water, not sand.

And Charlotte/Christina was real. She knew that like she knew her own name.

He finally popped up.

“I now understand why you became a SEAL.”

“The classic response to that is so I can blow shit up, as you’ve probably heard.”

“Not you,” she said, fluttering her feet in the water. “You go underwater when you want to avoid something.”

He considered that, blinking water out of his eyes. “And you run. We all have our avoidance techniques.”

“You don’t want to avoid my comments, do you?”

“If you tell me I’m writing a romance novel, I do. Because it’s a military—”

“Action thriller. Got it. Do they all have so much kissing, touching and, whoa, tender scenes by the river?”

“Tender?” He sounded wounded. “I was going for ‘rip your guts out’ with that gunfire in the background.”

“Reminded me of his heartbeat.”

He shook his head. “And how he washed out her injury? Dude’s capable.”

“And romantic.”

“Shit.” He slapped the water, eyeing it like the escape called to him. She sneaked a good long look at what was below the water line, not quite clear enough to make out the details, but sufficiently visible to make her whole body sweat and tingle and knot with need.

“It’s not a freaking romance novel,” he murmured, ducking back to wet his hair and swipe it straight off his face. Even with the Dracula look, he was handsome.

“Does she live or die?” Willow asked.

He stared at her, silent. Maybe speechless.

“Because that will dictate what kind of book you’re writing,” she explained. “I don’t know about the business of writing a book, but I read a lot. And my guess is that if she dies, you have a better shot at the military-action-thriller reader, but if she lives, you’re going to get the happy-ending people. I’ve never read a romance that didn’t have a happy ending, and someone dies in every military thriller.”

“Lots of books have happy endings.” Frustration and emotion made his voice gruff. “I don’t understand why that matters where the hell they stick it in a bookstore.”

“All I know is that if she dies, you’re safe. It’s not a romance.”

A storm brewed in his eyes. “Well, she’s going to live,” he said softly. “She
has
to live.” That last sentence was spoken even more softly, but still she could hear one thing in his voice. This mattered to him.

“Will that feel real?”

“Real? I don’t care if it feels real. It’s better than real.” Down he went under the water again.

Had he loved this Charlotte/Christina? Or just lost her? Whatever, Willow had no doubt the woman was real, and he wanted her to live…at least in fiction, and probably in his memory.

When he shot up, he shook his head like a wet dog, and she waited for him to look at her again.