I followed her to Trudie’s just so I could watch that ass in those wet jeans. When she went inside through the sunroom door, I circled back around, into the trees at the edge of Trudie’s yard, where I’ve got a tree house and a tool kit. The rocky shoreline around the cottage has been featured in several of my paintings. I like to capture the gulls as they swoop down for fish. Last summer, I painted a storm from here. That afternoon, the wet air and occasional sprays of rain made the oils layer less densely, so the clouds looked lighter, more illuminated. This evening, I’m going to see if the moisture in the air has the same effect on Red’s ass; her hips; her sweet, pink pussy. I want her as real as I can make her.

I climb the stairs that wrap around a big oak tree and duck under a small, tin roof. I pull my kit out from under the wooden bench that wraps around the interior perimeter of the little tree house. I know before I take out my canvas, paints, and tools how I’m going to paint her. Red, spread out on the stones, her legs throw open, one finger rubbing circles on her clit, one finger knuckle-deep in her pussy.

I pull out my fold-up metal easel and open the large plastic case where I keep canvases. I sit one on the easel and spend fifteen minutes or so readying my oils, using water from a bottle to get the brush the way I like, dabbing on a primer that I mix myself.

I start out with a coat of pale beige, followed by a few streaks of pink. I layer on some blue and gray and blend until I’m satisfied with the tone of the sunset sky. My hands make quick work of the rocks, the grass, the flowers. This comes more naturally to me than my job in finance ever did. I’m ambidextrous, so when one hand gets tired or cramped, I hand the brush off to the other.

On a whim, I do something I don’t normally do: I go ahead and etch my signature “W” in the lower left corner. It’s just another way to mark her. When I’m satisfied that it looks like all the other “W”s, I turn my attention back to the landscape.

One rock is in the forefront, set off to the side, surrounded by small purple flowers. I put Red there, nude, with wild hair, hard nipples, and a sweet, red pussy. I remember driving into it, burying myself there. I remember her hands bound in mine, her body pliant and willing.

I work a while on the glimmer of her skin: purest porcelain. Her hair: almost the same red as a strawberry. I capture the mounds of her breasts, the softness of her stomach.

I’m breathless, swinging my legs wide so my cock can spring up. My balls draw up. I reach down and cup them, slide my hand inside my pants like a college kid and stroke up and down my length.

Red.

Jesus, what a fuck.

It’s been a long time since I had this reaction—to anyone. I’ve come twice in the last two hours and here I am, needing it again because I can’t get her out of my mind. I’m breathing heavily, shoulders rising up and down, as I get her legs and cunt just right. I keep my hand on myself but don’t allow myself to come while I work the details out.

I’m finally relaxing, dragging my palm around my head and heading back down to the base of my shaft, when I hear a scream.

I know who it is and what’s gone wrong before I’m out of my tree stand. She’s caught up in the current, out beyond the rocks. I just know it.

I fly through the trees, across the clearing, around the house, and down the rocks. I throw off my shirt and kick off my shoes and don’t take time for my pants, still damp and melded to my legs. I stop on one of the lower rocks and glance in the waves nearby; I immediately sweep the sea beyond.

After a few seconds holding my breath, I see her head bobbing, far out. Christ, she’s so far out!

I dive into the waves and come up swimming hard. The current’s strong here, even for me—and I played college water polo. It’s been a long time since I fought the tide and longer since I rescued someone. But if I can’t get my hands on her, she doesn’t stand a chance.

* * *

I’m dimly aware of him pulling me through the water. My head tipped back, getting splashed with waves. Big biceps. Mmm. There’s an arm around my head. I have a dream that it’s James Wolfe and I’m his dead wife. I dream of Katie and my mom, cheering us on.

Then I’m on the sand, and someone’s mouth pressed on mine. I’m sprawled out on my side, coughing, coughing, coughing…

Stars explode behind my eyes, and everything seems washed in white. I’m feeling warmer now—so tired. I could float away… Except…my arm hurts. Both of my arms. They hurt. They hurt because someone is squeezing them.

“Look at me, Red. Fucking look at me.”

I try to obey.

It’s him. It’s…Race.

I cough again, and get a brief glimpse of his face. Then his hands are scooping under my back, pulling me against his chest. Big hands rub my hair and shoulders. His arm goes around me. His hand presses against the small of my back. For a dizzy minute, I wonder why he thinks he has to support me sitting up. Then I notice I’m shivering—really hard.

“There’s a…current,” I grit between chattering teeth.

He looks down at me. “No shit. It’s almost dark. What the hell were you doing out there?”

“I d-don’t know.” I’m so cold. I feel like I might throw up.

Before I can think more about the question, he scoops me up with his arm under my knees, carrying me against his chest like an injured lamb. I try to look around, to get a sense of where I am, what time it is, what’s going on. The last thing I remember was trying to keep my mouth above the waves and sucking in a huge mouthful of water.

I get a glimpse of the choppy, gray ocean and the rocks around us. Then he stands to his full height and turns toward the grassy outcropping just above us, the one I climbed down to get here. The one in Gertrude’s yard. The sky jolts over us, and I can feel him climbing up rocks, toward her house. I press my cheek against his chest and squeeze my eyelids shut as tears begin to flow. I feel embarrassed. Scared.

I hate remembering how quickly the current had me whipped, the way it spun me head first, like a tornado victim tossed by a cyclone. I could have died out there. I would have died had he not been there. Alone, a small voice whispers in my head. You would have died alone. Because you are alone. One single sob punches from my chest before I find the strength to clench my throat.

The arm around my shoulders pulls me closer.

Race leans down, and I guess he plucks his shirt from whatever stone he left it on, because as soon as he straightens back up, he wraps the button-up around my arms and chest. It’s cool and damp, but it still does the job; in a few more steps I’m feeling warmer. His hand rubs my arm. It’s gentle, moving in circles. Surprising…

When I get the nerve to look up at his face, I can’t glean anything from it. He’s looking up, toward Gertrude’s cottage, which we’ve almost reached. His lips are pressed into a line, but he doesn’t look irritated or angry. He just looks focused.

It only takes another minute or so for us make our way across the grassy lawn and up two stone steps leading to the front door. I’m wondering how we’re going to get inside when he steps over to a wall lamp by the door, sticks his fingers behind the bulb, and pulls out a shiny, silver key.

I press my lips shut as he slides it in the lock and pushes the door open.

As soon as he steps inside, his grip on me tightens, and I feel something change. His body seems to harden—like he’s angry. He lengthens his strides as he carries me through the hall, up some stairs I never even noticed last time I was here. His bare feet slap the hardwood floor upstairs as he shoulders through a little cedar door and stalks across a flower-crazy pink and white bedroom as if he’s going to save—or end—the world.

I guess he’s angry at me.

He steps into a bathroom with sunflower wallpaper, a pale stone floor, a podium-style sink, and an enormous, raised garden tub.

He sets me beside the tub, turns on the water, and looks me briefly in the eye before he kneels in front of me and strips my panties off. They’re torn from earlier, barely hanging on my hips. He stands up to unfasten my bra, and the instant his hands brush my back, I know I’m lost to him again. His fingertips trail fire.

My breasts bounce free, drawing his eyes. I’m surprised when he doesn’t touch them—just lets his gaze linger, then wraps his hands around my waist and sets me in the bath. The water is hot, so hot it burns a little as my skin adjusts to it.

“Sit down,” he orders, and I obey without a thought. He leans over the tub’s side, puts his fingers on my temples, and lowers my head back, under the faucet. His fingers are hard, not gentle. Is he frustrated? Just annoyed? I was pretty stupid, I guess, but did saving me really put him out so terribly?

With every stroke of his hands through my tangled hair, he seems tenser. I’m extra aware of my body, prone before him. Aware of his chest. How dark his skin is. How deep the ridges of muscle around his pecs and abs; his huge biceps.

He’s washing my hair. Taking his time. And yet I still feel his…intensity.

“You don’t need to do this,” I murmur, even as he rubs his fingertips pleasantly against my scalp.

“Your assessment of my needs or yours isn’t very valuable right now.” He doesn’t return the look I give him, but opens a bottle of shampoo and pools a pink, half-dollar-sized circle in his palm. With his left hand still supporting my head, he tells me, “Shut your eyes.”

I shut my eyes and consciously decide to let my worries go. I almost died. He saved me. I’m still here, and this feels good. I’m tired of second-guessing everything.

I allow myself relish the feeling of his hands soaping my hair. I can feel him breathing. Feel his arms flex as his fingers work. Every few seconds, he touches my face: a brush of his forearm on my cheek, the base of his palm on my temple. I struggle not to shiver.

Then he tilts my head into the stream of water from the faucet. He smooths his hands back through my hair, working the soap out with firm, massaging motions. Oh, God.

Is it insane that I almost drowned, and now I’m daydreaming about having him between my legs?

His fingers continue their ministrations, massaging as he directs my head left and right, forward and back. He’s still tense. Or angry or frustrated. Whichever, I feel sure it’s because of me. After one final, shiver-inducing sweep through my hair, he lets me go.

I expect him to say something—maybe about how he was very busy doing important island-related things, and the time he spent saving me could have been spent nursing a wounded seagull to health.

Instead, when I open my eyes, I find him climbing over the side of the tub. He’s still shirtless, wearing just wet slacks. His chest is so much wider than his hips; it looks enormous in the dim light of the bathroom. My gaze roves his abs, following his happy trail down past the waist of his slacks, to the bulge I knew I’d find. Knowing what he really looks like underneath his clothes makes me feel…hungry.

This is insane. Until this point, I told myself sex with him was just a…I don’t know. A fluke. A Red-gone-crazy, beautiful-asshole-taking-advantage, ridiculous, fantastical fluke.

I don’t even know him. We have nothing in common except this chemistry.

Why do we ignite each other this way?

All I know is he’s crouching down over me, sinking down into the water with his slacks on, and I’m wondering why he didn’t take them off.

Water laps around his chest. I think if I live to be older than Gertrude, I will never forget the way he looks right now. That stunning face, those black eyes, and that sweet-Jesus-amazing chest.

His face is tight, almost pained as he raises his hands to each side of my face. At first I think he’s going to kiss me, but his mouth doesn’t soften. He doesn’t tilt his head closer. He sets his fingers on the sides of my forehead and drags his thumbs along my temples.

“Lean against me, Red.”

His glorious fingers rub my forehead in some magic way that erases weeks and weeks of tension as my shoulders sag. I’m propped against him, giddy on the inside, so relaxed I’m losing track of time.

My mouth twitches. “If you’re trying to earn my support…with the island…this is a good way to start.”

I smile a little, and when I cut my eyes up so I can see a sliver of his face through my hair and his arms, I’m surprised to find he looks grave. I tense a little, but his fingers keep on soothing. It’s as if he’s telling me two different things. His fingers say, It’s okay—relax, but the rest of him says, Something wicked this way comes.

Abruptly, he moves his hands off my head and neck and sits back on his knees. I’m so relaxed it takes me a second to lift my head. When I do, I find him looking at me pointedly. He’s calm but coiled.

“I want to know,” he says slowly, “what possessed you to get in the ocean.” His eyebrows narrow. “Are you a swimmer?”

I bite my lip, feeling like an errant child. “I used to swim. In college”

His eyebrows pull together, as if maybe I’ve given the wrong answer. “And then you were a writer.”

I sit up a little straighter. Pull my dripping hair over my shoulder and start to wring it out. “I still am,” I tell him quietly. “Not like Gertrude—but I guess you know that. You know all about me, don’t you?”

His face is still a solemn mask. “I know some.”

It’s a testament to how insane I’ve gone that a part of me likes this. He must have gone to a lot of trouble to put the money into my bank account. How on earth did he even get the number? I’m not quite sure I want to know. I shift into a different position, leaning against the side of the tub, and look back up at him. I wait a moment for him to say more, and when he doesn’t, I squeeze my hair out, feeling inexplicably nervous.

“I still don’t understand why you gave me the money.”

He blinks. “You needed it, didn’t you?”

“You know I did. That’s why you took it away. To control my decision about the island.” I thought he was an asshole before, but now I think there’s a little more to it than that. “You’re a control freak, aren’t you?”

I watch his face carefully for some validation, but he gives none. He straightens his spine, so I can see all of his pecs and the top of his smooth abs over the surface of the tub. He asks his next question slowly, his mouth moving before the words come out. “Did you think you would make it back to the island?”

“What?”

“When you were swimming.”

“That seems like a random question.”

His eyebrows arch. “Did you think you would make it back?”

I exhale slowly. “No. I didn’t.” I rub my forehead. I thought I would drown. “What does that have to do with you being a control freak?”

He leans forward slightly. “What was that feeling like?” He sounds so serious. It almost scares me.

“The feeling of almost drowning?” I think about the question honestly. “It was freeing.”

“Why?”

“Are you a psychologist?” He has that vibe: that intense, mind-fucker vibe about him. The one that makes it so I’m not ever sure what to expect from him, or how I feel toward him.

“I’m not a psychologist. But I’d like to know.”

I pull in a deep breath. The air feels steamy from the bath. I look down at the water, stained dark by his slacks-clad lower body. Then I look into his eyes. “I don’t know why it was freeing. I guess because I thought my worries would be over. I could just stop trying.”

How pathetic. I must be a weaker person than I thought if all it takes to do me in is losing my boyfriend and my job. I wrap my arm around my breasts, feeling exposed.

Race moves slightly closer. The water ripples around him. He looks right into my eyes and asks, “You’re tired, aren’t you, Red?”

I’m surprised to feel my eyes sting with tears. I guess I really am exhausted. I should never have gone swimming in the open ocean like that. “I’m really tired,” I murmur. And stupid.

And ashamed.

I start to get up, to get out of the tub. I want to go to sleep right now. Just find a bed and collapse.

I’m rising up on my knees when Race’s hand closes around my wrist. “Stay there, Red. I’ll get a towel.”

I nod. I think I need to get away from him. Tomorrow morning, I’m leaving. He can have this island. I’ll take his ten thousand dollars down to Florida, where I can be alone.

Pain twists in my chest, and I realize for the first time that it’s what I feel that I deserve. This aloneless that I’ve had for so long. First Dad, then Mom, and now my fabled grandmother. Everyone snatched away. Maybe that’s why I’m so intoxicated by this man. Because I’ve finally realized I have no one else.

I watch his body as he gets out of the tub. His slacks show me every delicious line of his body: his grabable ass and his very nice package. He trails water to a cabinet. It drips off his hands and down his slacks as he gets a soft, pink towel. He holds it open as he steps back, but I sit there for a minute, feeling ridiculously raw.

“Don’t be shy. Your body is beautiful.” I stand, and he folds the towel around me. He turns me so my back’s to his chest and rubs his hands all over me, warming me. His voice, when he speaks, is a rumble in my ear. “I have a proposition for you, Red.”

He turns me to face him.

His eyes glitter with the reflection of the water.

I can see his hardness through his pants.

“Stay here with me. Rest. You’ll want for nothing, and you won’t have to make any decisions.” He sinks slowly to his knees, pushes the towel aside, and finds my pussy with his tongue—giving me a long kiss before he pulls away. I can feel his breath against my thigh as he looks up at me. “You’ll be satisfied in every way you can imagine.”

He wraps both arms around my butt and ducks under my towel. He pushes his tongue between my lips, licking as my legs quiver. I’m panting in seconds, sliding to my butt on the floor with my legs spread and Race between my knees. He glides a finger inside me—moves it in a slow, slick glide; he kisses my nipple, pulls away, looks down at me.

“I want you to agree, Red. This could be incredibly fulfilling—for us both.”

I pull back, despite the way my body calls for his. I feel like I barely have control of myself, and I’m not sure how much I like that.

“I would be your sex slave.” The words sound so strange.

“No, Red. I would take care of you. Take care of all your needs. And you’d take care of mine.”