“You might slap my face if I told you.”
Her eyes widened. “Is that why you’re holding on so tight?”
Her hand was soft, warm, delicate. He wanted to rub it across his chest, wanted to taste it with his lips, wanted to feel it moving down his body. “One of the reasons.”
Gussy was enthralled by the contact, but wary. She could feel the stares beaming at the back of her head, could maybe even hear the hiss and spit of percolating gossip. Holding hands with the gardener was definitely not done in the Throckmorton’s circle—at least not publicly. But then, had Gussy ever consciously chosen to become a part of the circle? Her inclusion was an accident of blue-blooded birth. If she had any gumption, she would do as she liked and let the stuffy prigs sputter all they wanted.
“As long as they’re good reasons,” she said, planting an overly enthusiastic kiss on Jed’s jaw. That would show them!
He glanced down, the color of his irises deepening. “Maybe bad is better.”
She giggled; he brought out of her a long-buried bent for flirtation. “Why, Jed, you’re not bad, you’re wicked!” she bantered, but her voice was a touch too shrill. She couldn’t quite maintain the proper level.
He gave her a raised-eyebrow look of caution. “Where’s the best place to watch the regatta?”
“From either the porch of the yacht club or the deck of Felicity and Ted’s new house on the point.” She nodded toward an ostentatiously modern structure jutting out over the fingertip of the rocky peninsula that formed one side of the bay. “We’ll run into my grandmother at the former and Andrews at the latter.”
“Better to avoid both, I’d say.”
She was glad he saw the wisdom in that. “There is another place I know of, out on the rocks, a little tricky to reach, but…”
“But what?”
She looked sheepish. “It’s best known as a make-out place to the local teenagers. At least once evening comes.”
“Sounds good.”
Her eyebrows went up.
“The view, I mean,” he said. “Not the other.”
“Of course not,” she agreed, admirably holding a wave of disappointment at bay. A boisterous family surged around them, holding sticks of pink cotton candy. “We’re too adult for that sort of thing,” she continued once the family had passed, her stare centered on the vivid, jumbled patterns of the Episcopal Sisterhood’s quilt display. “I imagine it’s awfully cold and hard and uncomfortable out on those rocks at night.”
“Don’t you know firsthand?” Jed asked lightly, squinting at the sailboats rounding a buoy.
She couldn’t help but grin at the far-fetched likelihood of a local boy having asked April’s quiet, plain, younger sister to join him at Make-out Rocks.
Jed picked up on her small smile; it seemed knowing to him. “I guess you’d better not answer that question unless you want to incriminate yourself.” He started off without waiting for an answer, taking up her hand to tug her along. “Let’s go.”
Gussy scrambled after him. “Wrong way!” She steered him back around. They held hands all the way past the eagle-eyed church ladies and even the open entrance of the canvas flower tent, neither of them daring to look inside should Marian Throckmorton be looking out. Leaving the main crowd, they turned down a bricked alley behind the fish market. They crossed a short, narrow causeway, slippery with lichen and sea foam, and then came to the rocks, jagged peaks on one side, flattened out to several levels of smooth plateaus on the other. Below, a group of teenagers had staked out a pebbly patch of the shingle beach.
“This way,” Gussy said. On the seat of her white duck trousers she slid down dark rocks worn smooth by the surf, leading him to a nook where they’d be sheltered from the wind yet still have a grand view of the harbor. Sleek, graceful sloops were gathering for the last race of the afternoon, skimming the water like osprey on the hunt.
“Beautiful,” Jed said. He was looking at Gussy.
“Mmm, yes,” she agreed. “I used to come here all the time. When the tide was out I’d climb down to find the tidal pools hidden among the rocks, tiny jewels, worlds unto themselves, and farther along by the steep cliffs there’s a marvelous cave with anemones growing in the dark…so quiet and mysterious and scary, but beautiful. Really beautiful.”
She didn’t sound like a femme fatale. Didn’t look like one, either. Wisps of her hair had worked free from the braid and were flying about her face. Her cheeks were ruddy, her eyes, undisguised for once by the lenses and frames of her missing glasses, were filled with a crystal, amber light. Jed was infused with a longing that was more than physical. It defied all his other instincts. He stayed silent for several heartbeats, listening to the hiss of the waves and the clang of the buoy. Listening to his inner voice.
They spoke at once. “Where’s your glasses—”
“So how’s business—”
She smiled. “I’m wearing contacts. I do sometimes.”
He smiled. “Business is picking up. But I’ll be doing a lot of the manual labor myself until I’m busy enough to hire full-time help.”
“Maybe you should give me a job,” she suggested lightly. “I’m honest and dependable. And I don’t need a high wage. That’s one benefit of living with my grandparents, anyway.”
Pragmatic reasons for restraint began to seep back into Jed’s reasoning. He desperately wanted to believe that being sensible was a good-thing and surrendering to his senses was not. “Have you ever in your life held down a job for any length of time?”
Gussy dropped her chin onto her bent knees, watching her fingertip trace patterns on the smooth ledge beneath them. “I had a college internship at Collingswood Gardens. And I’ve done a lot of gardening work—volunteer—for various groups since then. I organized the group who landscaped Sheepshead Bay’s town park.” She frowned, rubbing at a bit of white quartz embedded in the black rock. “It doesn’t sound like much, does it?”
Jed didn’t want her to feel worthless. From an heiress’s point of view, she had no reason to. Why should she work for a wage she didn’t need? “That sort of thing is a vital contribution, Gussy. It really is.”
“Still, it’s not the same as earning a paycheck.”
“Well…I think it’s possible you might gain some independence if you did decide to find a job. That’s all.”
She looked at him questioningly.
He patted her shoulder. “Sorry. I’m not hiring at the moment.”
Her sudden laugh was staccato. She sat up straighter, tossing her braid over her shoulder, shrugging off his comment. “No need for apology. It’s not like I was serious! Why, I’m so busy already, with my needlepoint projects and my family obligations and my—”
“Social schedule,” Jed interjected.
“Oh, yes, absolutely! My calendar is stuffed to the gills with dates for sailing and golfing and dinners and dances…”
“Yeah, I got that idea.”
“I’ll probably be getting engaged any day now.”
Jed’s heart shrank. “Is that so?” he said, laconic to the death.
She nodded energetically. “Oh, yes, absolutely.”
“Who’s the lucky guy? Andrews?”
“Maybe. Or maybe it’ll be Billy or Peter Gilmore.”
“Or the playboy bachelor in the black Raptor who doesn’t care if he runs you up a tree.”
“Edward Peasport III,” she supplied solemnly, making Jed laugh. It was a harsh sound; she offered a weak smile in response. “I don’t think it’ll be Edward Peasport III.”
“At least you have the sense to eliminate someone.” Besides himself, he added silently, although he wasn’t entirely sure that she had—as far as extracurriculars went.
Gussy was remembering the harried ride with Edward and her fleeting sighting of Jed, shirtless and gleaming with perspiration, so potently male that the yearning of her feminine impulses had been almost painful. That she would react so strongly to only a glimpse of Jed had effectively ruined any c
hance Edward had with her—even if he hadn’t turned out to be as thick as his billfold.
She sighed, knowing she’d lied to Jed. She was further from becoming engaged and independent than ever. And the reason was sitting beside her.
Jed Kelley.
Gussy tried to watch the regatta even though all her thoughts were concentrated on Jed. He was primal, earthy, intense, unlike any man she’d ever known. They’d each attempted to deflect their growing attraction—Jed by putting her off after she’d kissed him and he’d returned the kiss a hundredfold; Gussy by pretending that she was seriously interested in Andrews and the others. She knew it hadn’t worked for her part, and she suspected it hadn’t blunted Jed’s feelings, either. Though she was mainly inexperienced except for the one time with Andrews and a few humdrum relationships with college guys, being the subject of one of Jed’s vital electric blue looks would make even the most naive of girls aware of his intent.
His intent was part of her problem. She was too meek and mousy for a wildly inappropriate affair. Frankly, if she were capable of that, she’d be capable of anything.
Maybe that was what scared her. Letting go, breaking free, giving up all Throckmorton-supplied safety, security and convenience.
Truly being her own woman. Truly taking charge of her life.
No. Gussy shuddered with the realization. She couldn’t do it. She was too much a coward.
Jed put his arm around her. “Cold?”
“Umm,” she murmured, purposely noncommittal as she leaned into him, letting herself rely on his ready strength. Dangerous, that. But momentarily okay.
Very okay. Jed smelled like the earth, rich with sunshine and rainwater and the salty wind off the ocean. An addictive scent. She looked up at his face, examining the hollow cheeks, the white line of the scar, the broken bones mended stronger than ever. He was hardened. He was a survivor.
Emotionally, too? Gussy thought of Julie Cole, picturing Jed loving another woman, asking her to marry him. Her heart ached with jealousy and possessiveness—things she had no right to feel.
Yet emotion had no logic. She lifted her head and nuzzled his neck. His skin was damp from the fine mist that hung in the air; her tongue took a slow, savoring lick of the underside of his jaw before guiltily withdrawing. Why was the impulse to touch and taste and stroke this one man so persistent that at every turn her usual reticence was overwhelmed?
Jed shifted against the rock ledge, taking Gussy fully into his arms. She raised one hand, wanting to caress his face. He turned toward her tentative touch, fiercely pressing her hand against his mouth, kissing the soft palm. Her fingertips danced over the flexing muscles of his jaw, the light sanding of his afternoon beard. He took her hand, then caught the other, holding them tight in both of his as he buried his face against her palms, murmuring her name in a way that was entirely unfamiliar to her.
“Jed…” She slid her arms around his shoulders, clasping her hands at his nape, tugging him closer. Her lips were eager for his.
“Looking at your hands makes me crazy,” he whispered.
“My hands—!” she said. His were inspired. They skimmed her face and arms as gently as the mist; they grasped her waist with the firm assurance of a man who knew what he was doing.
His voice seethed with need. “I want to feel them everywhere.”
Shutting her eyes, she touched her forehead to his. Their breaths intermingled. They were close, enclosed, a world unto themselves. “I recognize the impulse,” she whispered.
“The impulse,” Jed repeated. He swallowed audibly. “Impulsive.” He swallowed again. “Without thought.”
Gussy’s desire was on tenterhooks. “What?”
“Give me a minute,” he said. “I know I can eventually make myself let you go.”
“But—”
Abruptly he removed himself, knocking away her hands with the motion. Cool ocean air swirled around her body, stealing its delicious warmth. Her mouth opened. “But—”
Jed’s expression was impassive. “You’re about to become engaged, remember? This is no time to be impulsive, even if you haven’t settled on the appropriate groom.”
She drooped, hoist limply on her own petard. “R-right.”
He looked out to sea. The boats were specks in the distance, strung like pearls on the blue satin swells. “I don’t belong in the race.”
Gussy held herself in her own arms since Jed’s would not be forthcoming, at such a loss she could only nod in wretched silence. She’d already come to the same conclusion—before her treacherous body had made her forget everything but physical hunger. That was all it was…she hoped.
Never mind that he hadn’t even kissed her on the lips.
GUSSY COULDN’T HELP herself. All the previous week she’d been peering out of windows, spying on Jed as he worked in the garden, mooning over him, really, and even now that he’d flat out said he wouldn’t compete for her attention, she still couldn’t help herself.
She was dressed for the yacht club’s biggest dance of the summer, in a flirty, froufrou getup of royal blue chiffon. It was a simple yet extravagant dress, sleeveless, with a low, scooped neck and a just-past-fingertip-length skirt that flared out from the narrow waist like a tutu in gathered layers of crisp tulle and taffeta overlaid with the filmy chiffon. There was even a narrow velvet ribbon in her hair and matching high heeled shoes on her feet. She felt like a Barbie doll who thought Ken was a bore and secretly wanted to date G. I. Joe.
She walked through the dimming early evening light with fresh-cut flowers arranged in a silver sailing cup, intending to sneak into the carriage house and cheer the place up a bit, à la Martha Stewart. Even though Jed’s truck was gone, her skin prickled as she let herself in and went upstairs. “Yoo-hoo!” she warbled at the landing, just in case.
The apartment was messy, still half-unpacked. Gussy put the flowers down on the coffee table, stepped back and considered the effect, then tried them on the round pedestal table that Jed had moved beneath the dormer window that looked out on Throckmorton Cottage and the sea. Tidying automatically, she made a space at the center of a muddle of tax forms, spreadsheets and an open box of fresh business cards that had spilled across the table.
She paused in the center of the room, intending to listen for the sound of Jed’s pickup but curiously drawn to the enigma of his everyday possessions. There was much to learn from them.
Like everyone else in the world, he owned several John Grisham paperbacks. But also a copy of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass and what appeared to be Hemingway’s entire output She wondered if he’d read them all. There were two years’ worth of Sports Illustrateds stacked beside the love seat and a Wall Street Journal, opened to the stock index, on the dusty TV. The framed black-and-white studio photo on the bookshelf had to be his parents on their wedding day. A mounted hockey puck had come from the 1993 NHL playoffs. He’d rented Sense and Sensibility, very sentimental; that was surprising. And could he actually like that ratty, lurid orange-sunset-and-cactus-onblack-velvet Arizona pillow?
Why did she care? If all that she felt for him was physical attraction, if he was only a fulfillment of her fantasies, then why did looking at the dent his butt had made in the cushions of the love seat fill her with such swoony emotion? Why did seeing a spill of dirt from his gardening boots make her sigh?
Even though Gussy told herself that she was being ridiculous, she was still about to inspect the flyleaf on one of his books when she heard it.
Tap-tap-tap.
She froze. The sound came from the stairwell.
Tap-tap-tap.
She turned, gathering explanations and apologies, wondering why she felt thrilled and expectant rather than embarrassed. Perhaps the flowers were more of an overture than a housewarming? Perhaps she’d been hoping to run into Jed all along?
It was Percy who came through the doorway, grinning, tongue flopping out of the side of his mouth, nails clicking on the hardwood floor.
Gussy deflated.
She sank to her knees, the party dress puffing out around her, and wrapped her arms around the squirming golden retriever. “Oh, Percy, what am I going to do?” she said into his ruffled fur. “I’m falling in love with Jed Kelley.” She sighed voluptuously, wallowing in her irresistible desires. “I just can’t seem to help myself.”
THE SHEEPSHEAD BAY Yacht Club was housed in a rambling old dowager of a building perched on a pile of huge gray rocks overlooking the marina. The weathered cedar shingles were either mossy or salt rimed or cracked. The ancient shutters were constantly working themselves loose; during a thunderstorm they clattered like castanets. The various levels of porches and balconies creaked in the wind, sometimes seeming to sway with the rhythm of the waves as if the entire structure might one day launch herself into the ocean and sail away.
To one side were the clay courts where semiorganized round-robin tournaments were held every other weekend, and beyond them, past the flagpole and the pocket park, was the open-air pavilion.
Built early in the century from several truckloads of massive cedar logs, the pavilion had aged well. Below a green-shingled, tentlike roof that still smelled woodsy, the wide waxed planks and sturdy pillars had mellowed to a deep honey-gold color, as rich as maple syrup. For dances, tiny twinkling outdoor lights were strung from the rafters as haphazardly as stars; in the arches above the railings paper Chinese lanterns swayed in the breeze, round and glowing as a dozen full moons.
At times, under the right circumstances, with the right hair and dress and partner, a girl dancing at the yacht-club pavilion could feel like a princess.
Gussy, bumping along with Andrews in a stiff, formal, dance-school fox-trot, wasn’t expecting magic. A blister was forming on her right heel because her new shoes were too tight, and she had a terrible premonition that every time she swung her hips her slip showed.
Peter Gilmore cut in, but he wasn’t Gussy’s prince, either. While Peter was always agreeable, he was also well on his way to becoming a fusty old confirmed bachelor, far more interested in the mating habits of the cormorants than his own. Gussy’s grandmother was bridge partners with one of Peter’s old aunts—‘nuff said, as far as Gussy’s dance card was concerned.
The Amorous Heiress Page 8
