Chapter Nineteen
Darcy woke in a cocoon of warmth. Sleep hadn’t been her greatest friend lately, but she couldn’t remember anything after Micah had blown her mind. She must have stumbled back to her room at some point and slept like the dead.
Movement under her palms and a masculine moan against the top of her head halted that theory.
Shit!
She extracted herself from his arms and sat up, holding the covers over her nakedness. “I’m so sorry. I must have fallen asleep.”
An incredibly sexy Micah propped his blond head on his hand, his hair hanging in an enticing mess over the muscled swell of his shoulder. “What could you possibly be sorry for?”
She wet her suddenly dry lips. “Um…I’m sure you didn’t want me crowding your space all night. I know what this is, and what it’s not.” So why did her stomach clench when she said it? “Friends with benefits don’t snuggle after something like that, and they certainly don’t sleep together.”
He leaned up, and the covers slipped dangerously low on his tight abs, pooling in his lap. Pressing a sweet kiss to her forehead, he twisted a lock of her hair around his finger. “We’re making up our own rules, and I wouldn’t change a thing about last night. Would you?”
“No, not a thing,” slipped out of her too fast for her liking. It was true, though, so she didn’t take it back. Being caught up in the power of him had been frightening but also made her feel safe.
The way he was gazing at her instilled a hum of fear in the background. Something sad about him. Intense. His eyes held something more than a man enjoying the afterglow, but what? Did he regret what they’d done together? Was he afraid she’d go back on her word and ask for more than he was willing to give, like a real relationship? No, she didn’t want to know, and it didn’t matter, because she didn’t want that, either. “So, what’s for breakfast? I could make French toast, if you like that.”
He nodded, still searching her face as if committing it to memory. “Sounds great. And after that?”
Something fun to drive that sadness from him. “I’d love to explore your heart some more.”
His lips curved down, and he looked away.
“Wait, I didn’t mean story stuff; there’s plenty of time for that.” Though not nearly as much as she’d have liked. “Show me your island, why you love it here. Where are all your favorite nooks and crannies, and where do you drive your secret boat to?”
His devastating smile returned in an instant. “In that case, it would be my pleasure.”
She had no doubt, and later, she also hoped it would be her pleasure again, and he’d give her a chance to find out how to please him in return. Everything had been different with him, including the physical union. Having an orgasm with him moving inside her had been incredible, overwhelming, and potentially addictive.
She’d had the hot fudge sundae of sex.
It would be impossible to find satisfaction in her vanilla life of fingers and battery-operated items after that.
Not that she’d have a choice after Saturday. Her fantasies would be forever locked within the shores of this island. Yep, a tour would take her mind off what had changed between them in one night. Because something had changed more than breaking the sexual ice.
After breakfast and a hot shower that had degraded into something far steamier—requiring yet another shower—they relaxed by the pool. Micah had fallen quiet and appeared to have slipped into his own mind.
She thought about prying, driven by an incessant desire to restore him to playfulness, but that same fear she’d awoken with kept her in the lounge chair. They needed distance and assurances that she wasn’t a naive fool who could fall for a guy in three days. Who did that, anyway?
A knot tightened in her throat. “Listen, maybe I should stay here and get some work done,” she said. “You look like you could use some time without my annoying shadow hanging over you all the time.”
Micah’s brows dipped low over his eyes. Not like he was relieved as she expected, more as if she’d done something to deepen his worry. “Why would you say that?”
“I don’t know; it seems like something’s bothering you. Usually, I’m the cause of that look on people. If you need space, just ask for it. As I said, I’m not your typical pushy reporter who’s going to get up in your face when you don’t want me there, and you have no obligation to entertain me every second just because we had earth-moving sex.” Heat filled her face at the memories of his hard body taking hers against the headboard. “At least, it was for me.”
“The feeling was mutual, believe me.” Hand extended, he stood and brushed the backs of his fingers against her arm, tenderly, sweetly. “I was looking forward to showing you around the lake, unless you’re tired of me already.”
Reaching for him, she hoped her relief didn’t show. If he’d measured her against his other lovers and found her lacking, he hid it well. “Okay, I’m ready whenever you are. Just let me grab my purse and my sunglasses.”
They dashed off their separate ways and met up on the deck again ten minutes later. Darcy had her leather, pouch-style purse slung over her shoulder. Micah had on Oakley sunglasses, a form-fitting navy T-shirt, and beige shorts. He’d also put on sport sandals and a ball cap, his hair pulled through the space at the back of it. Only he could make casual look that divine.
Maybe she should have done a little better than white shorts over her two-piece tankini swim suit and the buff she used as a headband to keep her hair from turning Medusa in the wind. Not that he seemed to mind, a definite check mark in the plus column.
With a smile once again gracing his handsome face, he led her down a path they hadn’t traveled yet, to a dock squirreled away in the woods. A larger boat bobbed in the water inside a boat house.
“I knew it.” She punched him lightly on the shoulder and tried not to notice how his shorts failed to erase the vision of his nakedness from her mind’s eye. Or the curves of his chest that had scorched her back last night. Good lord, she’d slept with the most gorgeous man that had ever walked the earth. Maybe she was enjoying the best dream ever. If so, she wasn’t ready to wake up yet. If Sol ever found out, that dream would become a nightmare.
“I hope this one goes fast,” she said.
“Fast, huh?” Grinning, he raised her fingers to his mouth, playing his lips across them, all the shadows gone from his face. “Last night, and again this morning, you seemed to enjoy slow just as much, or maybe more, than fast. Am I wrong?”
The throbbing in her abdomen returned with a vengeance. She squeezed her thighs together. “They both have their merits. Right now, I’d like to have the wind in my hair and the sun on my face.” And your laughter filling the air.
“Your cheeks are already a pretty shade of pink.” Chuckling to himself, he climbed into the boat and untied the ropes. “Step into my chariot, Darcy, and I’ll see you properly ravaged…by the wind. And show you the sights, of course.”
She tugged at her conservative bathing suit top and took the hand he offered. Other than a few times over the last few days, everything he said had undertones of sex. Now, though, it had an undercurrent of something more profound that tripped her fear sensors. She wasn’t afraid he’d hurt her physically, but deeper. It would only happen if she let it, and she wouldn’t.
Keeping to his word, he put the hammer down, whizzing her past shorelines full of fascinating places he pointed out while regaling her with the history of it all. The bright morning slipped away from her effortlessly, wonderfully, in his presence. Other than a few conversations about the foundation and his antics with Cynthia during high school, they didn’t talk much. Didn’t need to.
Her head buzzed with all of the local lore and tidbits about himself that he’d shared without hesitation. She propped her feet up on the console and enjoyed the rush of wind and the tiny splashes of water that bounced up from the waves.
What a perfect day.
What a perfectly imperfect man.
“What will it cost me to ask about your parents?” she asked over the roar of the motor, stretching her leg out and drawing small circles on his thigh with her bare toes.
“That depends on what you want to know.” His warm hand covered her foot, pulling it into his lap while his thumb massaged the sole. His other hand remained on the steering wheel.
“Mmm, that feels amazing. I’d like to know how they met. What were they like? From the stories you’ve shared, I have a feeling they were fascinating.” When he tipped his head forward, she said, “Hey, forget I brought it up. I didn’t want to make you sad. I just want to know you better.”
Tilting his head, he stared at her with that same sense of surprise she’d seen many times during the past few days. And still, she didn’t understand it.
A small smile lifted the corner of his lips, as if he’d accepted the invitation to remember his mother. “My mother grew up in Venezuela with very poor parents. Her father died when she was twelve, and when she was fourteen, her mother became ill. Hoping to give her daughter a better life, my grandmother snuck my mother into Canada using a human trafficker, not that she realized that’s what he was at the time.”
“Oh, Micah.”
“No, it’s okay. She was a feisty one and very clever, not unlike you. It didn’t take her long to escape and disappear into the streets of Toronto. My father’s family had recently moved from Norway, and he was exploring the city when he happened upon a young girl standing in the shadows of an alley holding a bag that contained everything she owned in the world.”
Choking up, Darcy raised a hand to her throat. “He rescued her. That’s so romantic.”
“My father would never tell the story that way. She’d have saved herself, eventually. He just happened to be the man lucky enough to be with her when it happened.”
“So, what happened then?” Darcy slid to the edge of the bucket seat, eager for the rest.
“My father’s family brought employees with them when they came to Canada, including some to take care of the house. Father brought her home, let her clean up and put on one of his mother’s old dresses, and suggested to his parents that she was an excellent cook looking for room and board, not knowing for sure if she could tell a frying pan from a slow cooker, because they didn’t speak the same language.”
Micah laughed, the whole, lovely sound manifesting in every part of his body, leaving him relaxed against the backrest. “He was shocked his family agreed to take her in so easily. For years, he thought it was his charm that let the girl who’d stolen his heart stay with him. My grandparents confessed later that they’d never seen him so passionate about anything, and they were as drawn to my mother as he seemed to be. So there she stayed as part of the family. She was a wonderful cook, introducing them to Venezuelan cuisine, learning English, even attending school with my father.
“The moment she turned eighteen, they married. Even though they had a common language then, it didn’t change that bond they’d formed in that first moment in the alley. They could read each other in ways I’ve never understood until… So much passed between them in secret glances, it used to drive me crazy. Especially when I was in trouble.”
Until what?
His smile fell. “I didn’t know how perfect my life had been until they were suddenly gone. I’m glad they went together. If they hadn’t, like your grandmother, the other would have died of a broken heart, anyway.” A tug on the throttle slowed the boat to a crawl, his hand continuing to grip the handle so hard, his fingers ghosted to white.
The story resonated around Darcy’s mind. So few people found that kind of love. He’d been born into it, basked in it, been protected by it. He’d known what she’d known growing up in the presence of her grandparents. To have that ripped away… “I can’t imagine how devastating that must have been for you, especially at that tender age when you’re just trying to find yourself.”
“I was so angry with them, I just…switched off. Except when I went to the pond. How could I have hated them for dying? It made no sense then, and it still doesn’t now. In Colombia that first night, I finally took a good long look at who I’d become. The tears my grief counsellor had tried to coax out of me years ago finally fell, and there was no one there to see me accepting karma’s final kick in the ass.”
Darcy rushed across to him, and he pulled her into his lap. “You didn’t deserve what happened to you.”
“Didn’t I? Others lose people and don’t go pillaging the world. I could have chosen to be the man they tried to raise and make something useful of myself.”
“And you have. It took a while, but you’re finally there. They’d be proud of what you’re doing now. You called yourself a monster, but I know you’re not.”
“You can’t know that.” He hid his face against her throat. “In case you’ve forgotten, I coerced you into coming here partly because I wanted to have sex with you.”
“Being horny doesn’t make you evil.” Gripping his chin in her fist, she forced him to meet her gaze, unflinching at the fear that stared back at her. “A monster would have looked back at the man he’d been and felt proud. And when he returned after his captivity, he’d have gone back to being that guy. He wouldn’t have cared what his parents thought of him or sold off his empire to help other people, and no words can come out of this mouth that will make me see you differently.” Passing her thumb over his bottom lip, she kissed him under the eye, encouraged by his sigh.
He cleared his throat and folded his hand over hers, pulling it away from his now-serious face. “You shouldn’t look at me that way. It makes me think you’ve forgotten who I am and what happens at the end of the week.”
The world seemed to tilt as that sank in. “I haven’t forgotten,” she lied, smiling to cover the hurt crushing her ribs. “That doesn’t mean I have to be a cold, hard bitch to you, does it?”
His lips quirked.
“Now,” she continued, sliding back to her own seat, “enough of the heavy. It seems to me you’ve probably spent too much of this past year making up for lost time. So, how about we figure out how we’re going to entertain ourselves this afternoon?” Anything to distract from the stark reminder of their parting.
He studied her a moment longer, then stared forward. “I say we follow the wind and see where it takes us.”
“Sounds perfect.”
The sun blazed overhead as he guided them along the gigantic system of lakes, islands, and all of the fascinating points of interest. Laughter came unexpectedly and often. They became engrossed in deep conversations about philosophy and degrading ethics in the media, about the future of children addicted to video games and faceless communication through social media.
The more glimpses into his psyche he allowed, the more surprised and enamored with him she became, and the more she realized how much their base philosophies of life were alike. Even their early years, growing up under the umbrella of real, lasting love.
Had he ever wanted that for himself? Did it scare him as much as it scared Darcy, and that was why he’d never dated anyone for long? She needed to know.
Gran would have liked him, and that was a benchmark no man measured up to. It would be easy to get addicted to life with Micah, but that future wasn’t for her, because it wouldn’t last. Wasn’t even real. The feelings growing in her were nothing more than a side effect of the secrets they’d shared and her terminally open heart, and they’d soon be left behind on this island.
It would take days or maybe weeks for her to fully process the story about his parents and how it had affected her. And she still had an article to write for Micah’s benefit as well as her own. The emotional ride of the last two days had almost driven it from her thoughts.
God, what would Sol have done with the insights she’d gathered? He’d have crucified Micah, spread his wounds across the paper, ruining the man and his reputation. And she didn’t even have the crux of the story yet. Even if he was willing to tell her the rest, she was no longer sure she wanted to hear it. But she had to.