Tides of Love (Seaswept Seduction Series) (5 page)

She hadn't known he was there.

A moment's wicked pleasure flared in the face of her discomfiture. Hell, she had delivered enough in her day. He had left the coach house before dawn to avoid her.

Her uncertainty made up for his lack of sleep.

With a resigned shrug, she swiped her curls from her face, smoothed her hand over her shirtwaist, and started forward. He couldn't help noticing how her dress clung in moist patches—a result of her poor gymnastic ability and her immodesty. Clung to her hips, the curve of her breast.

Look away, Noah.

He gave his spectacles a recalcitrant shove. No need to retreat. He didn't care how refreshingly undone she appeared. Her hair lifted in the breeze, and she captured the strands between her fingers. Even in Chicago, few women wore theirs that length, just below the ear.

Noah preferred long hair.

When she got closer, he noted that her skirt was tangled in her hand, gathered above any point of decency. Trim ankles. Narrow, fine-boned feet. Too, the years had eased the dappled preponderance of freckles.

"Such a surprise," she said and plunked her basket to the sand.

He frowned and scooted as far as he could without actually moving to a different spot.

"Thank you, Rory, for leaving me wet and floundering."

Rory giggled. "I told you not to do the somsault."

"Som
er
sault. I agree. The first try was shoddy. Perfectly shoddy. Hence, I tried again, much to the delight of a group of fishermen sailing by."

Noah cut his eyes to her, his jaw dropping.

"Oh, Noah." She wrapped her arms about her stomach and laughed. The only other word he understood was, he believed, "fussbucket."

Fussbucket?
He moved to stand, sand squeaking beneath his heels.

She circled his wrist with a finger and a thumb, a gentle appeal. "Stay." She nodded to the basket, curls bouncing against her cheek, smile teasing her lips. "I've brought lunch. Enough for an army."

Yes, he smelled her lunch. He smelled
her.
Honeysuckle and a dash of something woodsy, like moist earth. "I couldn't—"

"Yes, you can. You're too thin. You must be hungry."

Famished, in fact. A turkey sandwich in the train's dining car had been his last meal. Still....

His gaze sliced to her feet, her pink toes digging in the sand. Skin as soft as it seemed, he would bet. Scooting over another inch, he stared hard at a flock of sanderlings bustling around a beached jellyfish. "I don't—"

She shushed him, so he sat. Completely bewildered, while she chattered and shuffled, unpacking enough food for her army. Slices of ham, four chicken legs, a loaf of bread, a small round of cheese, three pickles, two apples, one orange, and a jar of lemonade. The necessities: tablecloth, napkins, forks, plates, cups. Once she'd placed the items in an admittedly handsome composition, she sat, skirt bunched beneath her.

She handed him a napkin. He folded the linen square neatly in his lap, yielding to the surge of relief to see her limbs adequately covered.

"I've brought dessert," she said and tucked Rory's napkin into his rumpled collar.

The males leaned forward, peering into the basket. A feast, a
child's
feast, lay inside. A chocolate bar, a bag of vinegar taffy, and at least ten different penny candies, everything getting mushy in the sun. Rory released a delighted whoop, which Noah silently echoed. He tilted his head her way as a small smile curved his lips, wondering if she remembered his sweet tooth.

A green-eyed glance, an impish smirk. He didn't know what to make of the teasing look. He had never known what to make of Marielle-Claire Beaumont. Mischief and shenanigans, pranks and rough horseplay, accidental touches and a fierce desire to protect. Helplessly, he glanced at her blotchy bodice, doing its best to dry under fixed sunlight and steady gusts of wind. Sinking his teeth into the chicken leg, he tore off a chunk and looked away.

Same old Professor, Elle noted with little surprise.

Deliberate chewing, measured swallows, a leisurely sip now and again. He ate like an aristocrat, long legs folded gracefully, hand propped on the blanket, not a smack or a slurp slipping past. When he finished, he plucked two apples from the basket and flipped one to Rory, who scrambled to catch it, hands cupped. Noah polished his on his creased trouser leg and took a neat bite. Rory mimicked, then attacked with enthusiasm. They shared a smile and a laugh, mouths full of apple bits.

Elle dabbed at the vinegar pooled beneath her pickle. Seeing them together, looking like a matched set, rattled her.

In her youth, when one of Noah's dispassionate displays pushed her fury over the edge, she would make the mistake of gazing into his face long enough to witness a spark of loneliness, or merciful heavens, grief. Which only served to solidify her love like a clay pot in a kiln.

Slipping her finger between her lips, she sucked the tip clean of vinegar. The scent of wet wool drifted to her on a gentle breeze. Wool? Ah, Noah's sweater. She glanced at him, found him staring at her, a pale gray assessment. She popped her finger from her mouth as Rory hummed an off-key tune, a joyful, abstracted ditty. She wanted to know everything about him. Did he have a fiancée?
Juste Ciel,
a
wife?

She searched, trying to read him. She could do it if he gave her enough time.

With a muttered oath, Noah bolted to his feet, scattering sand. "Rory, how about a walk?"

Rory jumped at the chance and raced toward the water; Noah followed with a stiff-shouldered stride.

Elle rose also. Her skin burned from humiliation, not heat. What did he think she was going to do, bite him? Of course, he
had
witnessed her letting the reins of protocol loosen a bit. And,
she had been trying to trespass.

No matter, he was in for a blunt awakening.
Elle loves Noah
might be carved in every tree in the schoolyard, but that didn't make the message an eternal decree. He perplexed her, that's all, and if her knees shook, the shock of seeing him again made that happen. She stalked down the beach, determined to tell him what she thought of his haughty presumption. The nerve, the gall, oh—

She halted abruptly. Two sets of footprints cut into the sand. She shifted her gaze toward the water. Noah and Rory hunkered near the edge, heads nearly touching. Before she changed her mind, Elle settled her foot in the larger impression, heel over heel.

The smooth tickle under the arch of her foot sent a memory roaring through her mind. Running barefoot along the acorn-studded cemetery path, yelping as a sharp stem pierced her skin. Noah had stopped and offered his lanky back. She'd accepted without thinking twice and let him piggyback her the rest of the way. Accidentally, of course, and for just a moment at most, his fingers had brushed her ankle, circling and squeezing. He'd glanced over his shoulder, and something, something blustery as a summer thunderstorm, had passed between them. Something that made him avoid her for two weeks. Two weeks of tears and tantrums because the day after the incident, she found him kissing Christabel Connery in the darkened coatroom at school.

Elle blinked and lurched forward. She halted just behind where they crouched near the water's edge. Windswept and sun-kissed, they created an enchanting picture.

Her hands itched to touch.

A warning sounded, deep in her mind. Gripping her damp skirt in her fist, she leaned in, intent on telling Rory they had to leave.
Now.

"There are two ways to determine its age," Noah said, flipping a bluefish in his hand. A ring-billed gull shrieked and danced nearby, begging for the pungent morsel.

"Deter?" Rory wiped a sandy fist beneath his nose.

"Oh. Tell. Two ways to
tell
its age."

"Is this one old? He's already dead."

"Well, growth rings on scales, or otoliths, would tell us." He tapped Rory's ear. "Otoliths are bones in a fish's ear."

"Fishes have ears?"

"Of course." Noah's lips parted in a smile as he leaned closer. "Have you ever chopped down a tree and counted the rings to tell the tree's age?"

Rory considered for a moment, nodded. "Yup, once with my uncle Caleb."

Noah stiffened, just the tiniest bit. "These... these are the same kind of rings." He drew a circle in the sand, then another around the first. "Two circles. The fish would be two years old."

"How old is this one?"

Noah shrugged. "I'd need a microscope to tell."

"Microscope? Do you have one?"

He nodded.

"Go get it." Rory flipped his hand toward Noah's gear.

Laughter, deep and clear, rumbled from Noah's throat; he bent from the force of it. "No, no. At the coach house. The rest of my equipment is being delivered tomorrow. Next time, maybe."

Rory shook his head fiercely. "We gotta check this fish. I'm afraid he might be young. A baby without a mother."

Elle held her breath. Noah arrested his movement to throw the bluefish into the sea. He brought his arm to his side, the stiff fishtail brushing his trousers. "No mother, huh?"

"Just like me."

Noah swallowed, working hard to recover from his shock. "I'm sure he's a rather old fish. A grandfather, at least, by the look of him. I can take him home and check. If it will make you feel better."

"It will," Rory assured him, leaning close to his uncle.

They could have been father and son, two casts from the same mold. Elle sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. Merciful heavens, how had Zach not realized the reason behind her fascination with his son? Her body overheated, neutralizing the nip of cool water against her feet.

Maybe he did realize.

The boys rose, Noah's hand clasping his nephew's shoulder, Rory making no move to shrug away. When they turned to find her directly behind them, Noah took a deliberate step back, Rory an excited step forward.

"Miss Ellie, we got a grandfather! I'll tell you how old later." He waved the fish close enough for her to get a good whiff. She didn't know how old it was, but it had been dead a long time.

Pasting a smile on her face, she ruffled Rory's hair. "We'd better go. Your father will pitch a fit if we sail home in the dark."

"Do you want me to take him?"

"I'm quite capable of getting a child home, Professor." She grabbed Rory's hand and tugged him behind her. Halting at the food-scattered tablecloth, she began to repack the basket.

She heard him step behind her. "I only meant—"

"I know what you meant. I always know what you mean." She shoved to her feet. Rory stood to the side, jabbing a broken conch shell in the sand.

Noah sighed and blinked eyes so pale the edges dissolved into white. His left eyelid drooped, resisting a return to its previous position. "You'd better go. Before it gets dark."

A sick shot of remorse replaced her fury. Caleb's fist
had
done permanent damage. "Yes, I've—I've got to get back," she said, stepping forward. "Come on, Rory."

Rory waved, oblivious to the tension crowding the air. "The micrascrap, Uncle Noah. I'll see you tomorrow."

Noah's shoulders slumped as he recorded their brisk departure. He felt tangled in knots, an absolute snarl. He had a nephew, he thought, and experienced the first wave of love in ten years.

But, dear God, what had happened to Rory's mother?

He glanced down the endless stretch of ivory shore, bewildered and forlorn. Kneading the ache in his neck, he retraced his path.
Footprints somewhere along here.
He stopped. The larger held another impression. Noah traced the toes, dabs in the sand the size of a dime, and circled the firm imprint of a heel.

He had looked back while squatting near the water's edge and watched Elle place her foot
in
something. At first, he thought she had pricked her sole on a pin shell. Then, the look on her face as she stared at the ground, frightened or confused, maybe even excited, cranked an idea through his mind. A fantastical idea. Impractical and silly.

Perfectly, typically Elle Beaumont.

He outlined the mark of a feminine arch, drew his hand back when his fingers started to tingle.

Elle's fascination with him had never made sense. Summer heat and winter frost, they were disparate beings. He'd loathed her heedless nature, her inattentive squirming, her frivolous chatter. Laughing during church service, talking during school lessons. Tardy for everything. Most of the time, looking like a tomcat had spit her from its mouth.

How had she found anything to admire in someone as dissimilar?

Their differences, and his often blatant disregard, did not mean he had ignored her. Elle made it impossible
not
to notice. Sneaking into his bedroom, stolen apples crammed under her skirt; telling dirty jokes while perched atop a shell slab in the burying ground; gawking at him so often that Christabel Connery carved
Elle loves Noah
into every tree in the schoolyard.

At twelve, her antics had embarrassed him. By sixteen, however, he had come full circle. Disconcerted in an adolescent way, yet speculating, for the first time. Why her eyes flashed in that impassioned way whenever she looked at him, what he had done to warrant the attention, and, if he remembered correctly, what he could
do
with it. After all, how many times had he seen her crawling out or dropping off? Landing at his feet or in his arms. Skirt billowed around her knees, a bare ankle, or bony shoulder flashing.

A healthy young man could only take so much.

He tipped his head toward the sky, calculating. The sun sat low, a flaming ball coloring the water cherry. Still enough light to cross the pass, but he would check on Elle and Rory after he sailed in, just to make sure.

Old habits died hard.

He glanced at the footprint again and nudged his spectacles up. He would have expected this nonsense from the girl with apples stuffed under her skirt, the girl who had made sure Christabel's gibe lasted by spending an entire summer scratching the marks in deeper. What did this mean coming from the woman who flaunted surprisingly generous curves, ruby curls, and a plump bottom lip he could barely tear his gaze from? Noah dashed sand across the troublesome footprint and sank to his heels.