through her light cotton dungarees, and she caught the merest hint of his scent, clean and redolent of fresh air and very male.
Mary was fixated, electrified. At no time during her sheltered life had she experienced anything like the sensations that rioted through her. The shape of his down-bent head against the sky was a hieroglyph with archetypical meaning, and the shadowed, intent expression on his face made her stare in wonder.
Chance murmured, “Walk you to the door, Mary?”
It was so old-fashioned. Genteel. She was enchanted. “Thank you,” she breathed. “Oh, and thank you for bringing me home, too.”
“My pleasure.” After holding her a pulsing moment too long, he turned and slid one hand to the small of her back as they strolled to the porch. “I’ve enjoyed meeting you.”
“Me, too.” She stared at the steps hard, willing herself to negotiate them properly and not do something stupid like trip and fall flat on her face. That was hard to do when her knees seemed to have a mind of their own. They paused at the door.
“Are you planning to go watch the fireworks on the beach tonight, or are you calling it a day?”
“I—haven’t made up my mind yet.” She wasn’t that tired after all. The celebration didn’t start until ten. She could have some more coffee, a shower, maybe a quick nap, and she got to sleep in as late as she liked tomorrow. Just an hour or two, for Tim’s sake. “Are you going?”
“I thought I might.” His low voice was somewhere between gravel and velvet, a fascinating combination: dangerous and smooth. “Perhaps I’ll see you there, then.”
“That’d-that’d be nice.”
Nice?
He had never removed the hand from her back. Now he brought up the other one and stroked her cheek lightly with the back of his fingers. The sensation was so liquid, so gentle, she nearly melted into a puddle at his feet. Then, slowly, his head came down and his mouth covered hers.
Her eyelids drifted closed, and the world went somewhere else, as the shape and the pressure of his mouth eclipsed everything. After a long, timeless moment, gripped by some mysterious suspense, she parted her lips and touched her tongue to him, and tasted him. He tasted like fresh air and something else, something that was entirely, uniquely himself.
Then his hand shifted to cradle the back of her head, and he kissed her deeply. His tongue thrust into her mouth and stroked at hers, delving in hard, and she moaned in surprise, in delight.
This is what it all means, this explosion of flavor and intensity of feeling; she kissed him back, eagerly, shakily, falling into this new eroticism and drowning in it.
Chance sucked in a hissing breath, pulling back just long enough to stare at her with eyes that glittered hot like a raptor’s, and then he plunged down again and ravished her mouth.
She clung to his shoulders mindlessly. He had turned her inside out, and all her nerve endings were raw, exposed to the warm summer breeze. When he ran his hand up her back to press her closer against his body, it was like being jolted with a strong electric current.
“…why haven’t you come in yet—hey! Mary? Who the hell are you kissing?”
The young, imperious voice penetrated her heated mind slowly. It.apparently did the same for Chance, who lifted his head. She made the oddest, most shocking sound when his mouth left hers. It sounded so needy, so like a whimper. Through blurred eyes, she saw his nostrils flare, and his hand, at the nape of her neck, spasmed tight in an instinctively possessive grip.
Two observations, then: Tim was at the front door, now sounding offended. And she was clinging to Chance like a limpet. She dropped hold of him fast, they fell away from each other, and she turned to Tim defensively.
“Why—why—are you spying on me, Tim?” She was having trouble getting her breath back. God, she was having trouble getting any kind of presence of mind back.
She turned to look at Chance, who had whipped away, putting his back to the two of them. As she watched, he ran both hands through his hair, pivoted back toward the scene again, and regarded Tim’s lanky frame with narrowed eyes. “Who the hell are you?” he demanded.
She watched shock go over Tim’s bony face. Then the boy drew himself up very tall—and he was, too, much taller than she was—and he shot back snottily, “I’m her brother, you moron.”
“Tim!” Mary exclaimed in a shocked voice. He stalked over to wrap a skinny, protective arm around her, glaring at the intruder.
“And Victor’s on the phone for you,” Tim added pointedly to her.
Chance put his hands on his hips. He looked composed again, almost remote, except that his eyes were dilated black as sin, and his expression was tight. “Who the hell is Victor?”
“Her fiancé,” snapped Tim defiantly.
Mary sputtered as she ogled her brother. “What has gotten into you?” she demanded. Then she said emphatically to Chance, “He’s just a friend!”
Chance frowned sharply. “I thought you said you were her brother.”
“I am!”
“No, I mean Victor!” she exclaimed.
His eyebrows shot up. Was that an evil gleam in his eye? “Victor is your brother?”
“No, he’s her fiancé!”
“He is not!” She punched Tim in the side. “Timothy, stop it! Victor is just a friend. This little demon is my brother.”
“Your very protective brother, I see.” Chance stepped forward and held out his hand. “I’m Chance Armstrong. I gave your sister a ride home from the hospital.”
“Chance?” muttered Tim, his leery gaze sliding sideways to hers. Something undefinable seemed to pass between the man and the boy. Mary couldn’t decipher it. Whatever it was, it was decidedly a male thing, something in Chance’s unwavering, cool gaze that made Tim’s bristling slowly die down. He reached out uncertainly and received a firm, no-nonsense handshake from the older man. “I, er, how d’you do?”
Oh, now he remembers his manners, she thought distractedly. But she noticed Tim still hadn’t let go of her.
Chance looked at Mary and gave her a nod. “I’d better be going,” he said quietly. “See you later?”
“I—yes, see you later.” She held out her hand. He gave her fingers a brief, hard squeeze, and then he strolled down the steps and to his Jeep.
Tim led Mary inside. She watched over her shoulder as the Jeep’s headlights came on and Chance drove away.
“Mary? What are you looking at? You were really kissing that guy. I’ve never seen you do that. Did you forget what I said? Victor’s on the phone—unless he’s hung up by now.”
“Hunh?” Mary murmured dreamily. “Oh, of course.”
Tim was right. She’d never been kissed like that before. What kind of a kiss was that anyway? It was the kind that sucked your soul out of your body.
Hey, she wanted to call out to the man who’d just left. You forgot to give my soul back.
Instead she went in to answer the phone.
Some time later…
“Mary?” Tim’s voice. “I brought you coffee like you asked. Mary, are you awake?”
She fought her way out of a black hole, toward wakefulness and the sound of her brother’s voice. “Mmm, ’s the coffee. Oh, thank you, baby.” She lifted her head off the pillow, eyes still glued shut, and he kissed her face several times.
One thing she cherished about Tim was that they had always shared an uncommonly close bond, and he was unusual for a prickly fourteen-year-old