you for asking.” She started forward to move past him. “If you’ll excuse me?”
He stepped into her path. “No, I don’t think I will. Excuse you, that is.”
She wouldn’t look him in the eye, which might have been the very reason he noticed the faint circles, like bruises, in the delicate skin below her golden irises.
“Please, Mason,” she whispered, “I can’t take your sniping. Could you…please, could you just not?”
He took another step closer. “I don’t want to…snipe. What’s wrong, honey?”
He watched the muscles in her throat work as she gulped. She raised her free hand to smooth a lock of hair off her face, and he noticed the tremor in her hand.
“Talk to me, Stacey.”
Her lips pressed together, and she shook her head. “I-I can’t, Mason.”
He didn’t want her to go, needed to find some way to keep her near him. “Are you taking your boat out?”
She glanced behind her to where it rocked. This time her chin quivered. “I was supposed to.” Her voice was a whisper again. “I’ve got some logistical issues. Jace was supposed to crew, but something came up at the last minute…” Her voice trailed away. Mason could imagine what had happened, but he bit back his response. She turned a bright, brittle smile on him. “But hey, I still have a great weekend away from the capital.”
“Come with me,” he offered.
She started to shake her head. “It wouldn’t…”
“We’ll do day sails. I’ll come back in tomorrow night. I was going to spend the night anchored in a cove, but we can come back so you can sleep aboard your boat. No strings, Stacey. Just a chance to relax.”
He was tempting her. He could see it in the way her eyes darted longingly to his boat. There was nothing better than feeling the wind and the tilt of the deck.
“She’s fast,” he added. “Faster than Bran’s boat. I’ve beaten him both times he’s challenged me.”
He watched her thumb twisting nervously at her wedding and engagement bands. Finally, she smiled. “I’d like that.”
“Come on over at eight. We’ll spend the day on the water.”
She nodded, said good night and padded back toward her boat. It was only then he noticed she was barefoot. Sexy. It was something out of the norm for the always-correct Stacey Barlow-Barrett Winchester. Maybe the woman he’d made love to was still in there somewhere.
* * * *
She nearly chickened out a dozen times. But in the end she went, because she was a Barlow-Barrett, and she couldn’t resist sailing on a boat whose captain had twice beaten Brandon in a race. No one else in the family could do it, even their father.
She put on her suit, covered it with a polo shirt and shorts, slipped her bare feet into deck shoes and shoved her hair inside a ball cap before slipping on dark glasses. If she kept the sunglasses firmly on her nose then Mason wouldn’t be able to see the circles under her eyes.
Stacey realized as she traversed the distance between their boats she felt freer than she had in the past couple weeks. And then she felt a stab of guilt. She shouldn’t feel free with her husband away. She tried to tell herself it was simply because she would be sailing and it had been such a long time, but in her heart she knew the relief was in being away from both Jace and Justin. Her disappointment the previous evening hadn’t come from the fact her husband would be elsewhere, but that she would be limited in where she could sail without someone to crew, and she hadn’t felt like hiring a stranger. It made her uncomfortable. It seemed like people available to hire were invariably men, and she didn’t want to be on the water for hours with someone she didn’t know. It was like asking to be assaulted.
A gull wheeled overhead, and a few other sailors were preparing to depart for a day out on the waters of the Chesapeake Bay, but Stacey had eyes for only one of them. Mason was on deck, his dark hair lifting in the morning breeze. Feet planted firmly apart, he sipped from a mug of coffee and watched her approach. When she reached the side, he held out a hand to help her aboard.
“Good morning. I didn’t think you’d show.”
He still held onto her hand, and Stacey felt heat. She gulped as warmth flooded her from head to toe. He’d always affected her like this. Why this man? Why not her husband? She pulled her fingers from his, dug them in the pocket of her shorts. “I did almost chicken out,” she admitted. “Several times.”
“But you’re here.”
What to tell him? How much could she admit without feeling like she was betraying Jace and their marriage? Stacey stared out at the water, so calm here in the marina, but she knew out on the bay, it would be much more turbulent. “I needed this time here…sailing.” She turned to look at him again. “Do you ever feel like you’re losing touch with yourself?”
“Yeah.” Mason stuck his hand out. “Come on. Let’s get out on the water. You captain, I’ll crew.”
She shook her head. “No. I’m only a mediocre sailor. You call the shots. I want to see what you can make her do.”
She laughed, feeling suddenly more carefree than she had since…before her engagement. Guilt assailed her. Stacey ducked her head and went to work, doing her best to complete every task he gave her as quickly and thoroughly as possible. Once they were out on the bay, tacking a course southward, Mason grinned at her. “You’re a helluva crewman.”
She grinned back. “I’ve had plenty of experience crewing, first with my dad and sometimes with Brandon.”
“What about your eldest brother?”
“Seth?” Stacey shook her head and laughed. “He’s never sailed for speed. He’s as likely to float around in the middle of the ocean while he daydreams. I never understood that because he was always so serious and driven other than when he went out on his boat.”
Mason glanced sideways at her. “It must be his safety valve, like a pressure cooker. It’s yours too, isn’t it, except you want speed.”
“Yes.”
“You know, I can be an ear if you need to talk.” He kept his eyes on the horizon ahead of them. Stacey watched him, wishing more than anything she could pour it out, but doing so would cross the line, especially with Mason. If he knew… No, she couldn’t go there, even in her thoughts.
“I can’t, Mason. It’s not something I feel comfortable discussing…with anyone.”
His gaze narrowed on her. “Okay. Enjoy the day. I can give you that much. Make yourself comfortable. She can pretty well sail herself until we get to the cove I had in mind. We’ll anchor there and have lunch.”
Stacey nodded before going forward to perch near the bow. She wrapped her arms around her bent knees and simply enjoyed the feel of the wind and the sun on her face. Periodically she had to tuck tendrils of hair the wind had pulled loose from her cap back beneath it, and she enjoyed that too. Jace always wanted her hair sleeked into a French twist or a snug knot at the back of her head. Going with her feelings for a change, Stacey whipped off the cap and let the wind simply blow through her long hair.
She wanted the sun on her skin, and a moment later, she peeled her polo shirt off to reveal the top of her very conservative bikini. She’d leave the shorts on for now, but she already felt her tension ease, which made her wonder at how circumscribed her life had become when simply letting her hair down and showing her bikini top became such a big deal.
* * * *
When she took the cap from her head and shook out her golden blond mane of hair, Mason groped on the shelf in front of him until he found his sunglasses. After slipping them on, he could ogle her to his heart’s content without her knowing it, and most of all without making her uncomfortable. When she