“Look down,” Brandon suggested.
Sandra did… and gasped. She’d overlooked the beachfront while she was so focused on the view. Down there, fifty feet below them, was a magnificent ocean home nestled amongst massive boulders. It was built in the middle of an enclave that cliffs carved out in the land. The little trail Brandon led her on, it seemed, was much more than that—it was a private path to a magnificent property. A long, wooden dock extended from the house to the water, and a beautiful pleasure yacht was moored at the end.
Somehow, as she was taking everything in, Brandon’s hand found the small of her back. She let herself be pulled into him. The motion was so smooth, so natural, she didn’t notice it at first—until she became aware of the growing heat radiating from his touch, and flowing into her entire body. He stepped close, and his clean, musky scent overpowered her senses. She gave a little shudder, but didn’t pull away. Her body responded so readily to him. She wasn’t even sure she wanted to fight it anymore.
“What is all that?” she asked, motioning down in front of them.
“Our destination.” Brandon smiled. “Come on.” Taking her hand again, he led Sandra down the trail toward the property.
The walk was shorter than she expected. When they reached the waterfront, Sandra stood in awe of the splendor of the house. Large, beautiful oak beams guarded the entrance, and enormous floor-to-ceiling windows decorated the rest of the façade. The lights were off inside, but sunlight pierced through the glass to light up the expansive interior.
“This is yours?” Sandra asked.
“A friend’s,” Brandon answered.
“He lets you use it?”
“She,” Brandon corrected. Almost immediately, Sandra felt an inexplicable sting of jealousy. It was small, yes… but it was noticeable.
“She must be very wealthy,” Sandra noted carefully.
Brandon stopped, and gave her a blank look. “The house is hers,” he explained, “but the yacht is mine. Come.”
“Is that where we’re going? Your boat?”
His eyes glimmered. “For me, she’s more than a boat, but you be the judge. Come on,” he urged. “Clock’s ticking.”
Sandra shot him a look.
“Your words, not mine,” he reminded her.
Sandra picked her way across the rocky beach as Brandon led her toward the dock. “You know, this isn’t what I expected from you,” she admitted.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, when I said I’d give you an hour, after you asked me out, I thought you’d take me to a restaurant or something.”
Brandon affected a hurt expression. “Surely you didn’t think that poorly of me.”
“No, no,” Sandra backtracked, “it’s just—”
She stopped abruptly when he started laughing. Laughing at her, again… but she realized the hurt look he gave her before had been laced with sarcasm. She’d taken the bait hook, line, and sinker. It’ll take some time for me to get used to his humor, she thought sourly.
“I have a little imagination in me yet, you’ll see,” Brandon chuckled. “This is your first date in two years. I couldn’t lose the chance to create something memorable for you.”
“Why?” If he could be direct, so could she.
But the question didn’t throw him off. “That’s for you to decide at the end of the night,” he answered.
“You can’t impress me just by having a boat, you know.”
Brandon laughed again. “It works with some girls, I’ll admit, but you seem to be more discerning than that. You’re not one to be won over by cheap parlor tricks, are you?”
“No,” Sandra said after a moment. “And I’ll take that as a compliment, I think.”
“It’s one of the few you’ll get from me,” he winked.
She frowned. He laughed once more.
Together, they came to the dock, and climbed up the slanting walkway. All of this is rather impressive, Sandra admitted to herself. Brandon and his friend, whoever she was, must both be incredibly rich.
What kind of a man did I get myself involved with? And why on earth is he interested in me?
“What do you do?” Sandra asked on impulse.
Brandon smiled. A secret glimmer danced across his eyes. “I’m a businessman.”
“What kind?”
“The successful kind.”
Sandra gave an exasperated grunt. Would the man never give a straight answer? Before she could call him out on his evasive response, they reached the yacht. Sandra could hear the hum of the motor running, the sound of water lapping gently around the hull. From a distance, the yacht was impressive, but from up close… it was spectacular. It was so big, and from the look of it, completely new. There was not a speck of dirt anywhere; all the metal pieces glistened like they’d just come off the factory floor. The name VEGA was printed in prominent white letters on the side of the boat, clashing against the midnight blue paint of the hull.
She must have gaped just a little, because Brandon chuckled beside her.
“Don’t tell me you’ve never seen a ‘boat’ before?” he teased.
“No, it’s just—”
“Ah, never been on one before?”
“I have, just not—”
“On one so magnificent?” A playful smile formed on his lips. Sandra ground her teeth. “I thought you’d like it.”
He led her up the gangplank and onto the vessel. When Sandra saw what the deck looked like, she was again speechless.
The yacht was replete with splendor. The aft deck, where she stood, housed a lacquered cherry table in front of a leather settee. Unlit candles stood in deep glass bowls on the table, and both the floor and ceiling tiles gleamed in the fading sunlight. An American flag hung from a pole off the stern of the boat.
Sliding glass doors offered a clean view into the salon. Two white leather sofas stretched along the walls of the room. In the middle stood an impressive oak table. Two bottles of champagne sat in an ice bucket atop it, and drops of condensation trickling down their sleek glass sides. White granite countertops decorated the bar at the end of the room, complete with matching cabinetry.
“What is all this?” Sandra asked, motioning at the champagne, the candles.
“This?” Brandon mused. “It’s for later. Come, I have to show you the upper helm.”
Sandra followed him up the curving stairs to the fly bridge, which was just as spectacular as the rest of the boat. Dual captain’s chairs stood on an elevated platform, and the open space offered a panoramic view of the ocean before them. Brandon stepped beside the controls, fiddled with some of the switches. Immediately, the low hum of the engine became much louder. The boat began to move smoothly into the water.
Sandra came to stand beside Brandon at the helm as they cruised out. “Where are you taking me?”
“There’s a spot you need to see,” he explained, “farther out.”
“You know the area? I thought you just arrived?”
He smiled. “What gave you that impression?”
“I’ve never seen you around town before.”
“That hardly means I’m a stranger.”
“In a town of five thousand people, it does.”
“Hmm.” He smiled. “And you, Sandra? You’ve got a hint of an accent. I take it you’re not from around Washington, either?”
“Very perceptive,” she mimicked, copying his phrase from before. Yet she was impressed. “Not many people pick up on that anymore.”
“Let me guess,” he said. “…you’re from the Midwest?”
Sandra lifted an eyebrow in surprise.
“I’m right, aren’t I? Somewhere around… Illinois?”
“Wow. Yes. Chicago. How did you know?”
“You have a hint of an Upper Midwest accent. I can tell from the way you stretch your vowels.”
“That’s pretty impressive.”
Brandon smiled. “Only because I got it right.”
She considered that for a mome
nt. “If you got it wrong…”
“You’d have called me out for trying a pull a cheap parlor trick on you.” He winked.
Sandra had to admit, he was right. Not many people could be as unguarded as Brandon seemed. She was finding that she liked Brandon the person—as opposed to Brandon the body—a whole lot more than she would have thought this morning.
“You want to steer?” he asked, breaking Sandra from her contemplations.
“Me? No.” Sandra shook her head. “No, I couldn’t possibly.” The last time she’d had her hands on a wheel, her car had broken down in the middle of the street, seconds after she’d nearly run over a stray cat. The last time she’d steered anything, in fact, was when she drove herself to Ocean Shores. That entire drive had been an ordeal from hell.
“Come on,” Brandon urged. “It’s easy. You just put your hands here…”
Sandra squeaked as Brandon caught her by the waist and pulled her toward him. He was so strong that she couldn’t have resisted even if she had wanted to. His hands enveloped hers, and directed them to the steering wheel. The boat lurched forward suddenly, and Sandra gasped, but Brandon only laughed. She saw that he’d pushed the accelerator forward at the same time.
“It’s like this,” he explained. Sandra’s heart was racing. She took a deep breath to steady her rattling nerves—not helped by having Brandon’s arms around her, his pelvis pressed against her hips, his chest against her back, and his hot breath on her ear—and focused on steering the boat as he directed, and not on the enthralling man so close to her.
But when she relaxed, and let herself go… she found herself directing the yacht through the pristine spring evening with ease. She felt an unexpected rush at controlling the enormous vessel. As Sandra steered, Brandon poked fun of her technique, and she jabbed back at him just as hard. Brandon had a quick wit, just to her liking, and a good head on his shoulders… when he didn’t let it get too big for his own good. It wasn’t long before they were laughing and flirting, leaving the shores of the mainland behind. Soon after setting out, Sandra spotted an uninhabited island hidden behind a curve of the land. It was rife with evergreens growing above breathtaking cliffs that the surf crashed against. As island grew larger, the sky began to darken overhead, carrying the day toward twilight.
When they were less than a hundred feet from the island’s shore, Brandon shut the engine off and let the lapping waves carry them forward. He stepped to the railing and looked out over the water. Sandra came up beside him. The view was incredible. From this close she could hear the gulls crying out as they circled above the island’s rocky cliffs.
Brandon turned to her. “Are you comfortable with yourself, Miss…?”
“Hawthorne,” she told him.
“Hawthorne? With relation to the writer?”
“No,” she admitted, “but I wouldn’t have thought you’d pick that up.”
“Is that right?” He smiled. “I think you’ll see, Miss Hawthorne, that people can be full of surprises. For example, I’m much less crude than you seem to have made me out to be.”
“I’m starting to understand that.”
Brandon smiled. “Come down with me?” Without waiting for a reply, he started down the curving steps to the lower deck. Sandra followed him, placing her feet carefully as the boat rocked on the tide. She followed Brandon into the salon. He stepped behind the bar and bent down, emerging with two champagne flutes. “If you’ll be so kind?”
“Oh!” She turned around, reached for one of the champagne bottles, pulled it out of the ice bath by the neck, and glanced at the label. It wasn’t some pedestrian sparkling wine, but a vintage of 1995 Krug Clos d’Ambonnay. It was some of the most expensive champagne available. She recognized it because her dad had been an ardent collector of fine wines and liquors, and kept a cabinet full of the best brands at home. “You know, you didn’t have to do all this—”
“I wanted to.” She was interrupted by the feeling of Brandon’s arms wrapping around her. His hard body pressed against her back, and she could feel his warmth radiating through her sweater. His scent filled her lungs—that clean, masculine aroma tinged with a hint of salty air. She stiffened at the sudden intimate contact, made without the pretense of teaching her to steer, but Brandon did not flinch and smoothly exchanged the champagne bottle in her hands with the two flutes.
“Now,” he whispered, stepping away, “hold them out for me.”
Sandra did as she was told, and felt an unexpected sensation of loss as Brandon’s body parted from hers. With a twist and pull, the bottle came open. Sandra held the flutes in unsteady hands as Brandon poured the rose-gold liquid.
They returned to the railing and toasted before taking their first sips. The sun was close to setting now, and the golden glow from its last rays made the atmosphere between them electrifying. The champagne was absolutely decadent. Sandra sighed as the sweet, fizzy liquid trailed down her throat.
“You like it, I take it?” he asked.
“It’s not every day you get to have Clos d’Ambonnay.”
Brandon blinked. “I’m surprised you know it.”
“Is that another compliment?” Sandra offered a wry smile. “Better watch out before it becomes a habit.”
He laughed. “It’s a good vintage. Apparently, Champagne experienced the hottest August since the sixties that year. It made for a difficult year for pinot noir grapes, yet Krug still managed to produce such an extravagant wine.” Brandon brought it to his nose and inhaled. “You can smell the minerals and honeycomb, flowers and Asian spices. And when you put it to your lips…” he took a small sip, “you can’t help but appreciate the firm structure, the hint of ginger and grilled nuts.”
“I didn’t know you knew so much about wines.”
“It helps when the person you’re with can appreciate what you say.” He smiled. “Like I told you before, I’m much less crude than you think.”
Another sip and Sandra could already feel herself loosening up. It was quiet on the boat. Peaceful. The sound of the surf, the distant cries of the gulls, and the pleasant evening air all filled her senses.
“So,” Brandon asked, “how does someone like you go two years without having a date?” He was all serious now. The playful, teasing vibe from before was gone, replaced by an intimate, sincere interest. “Unless it’s something you don’t want to talk about.”
“I’m not scared to talk about my past.” Except for one thing, she thought. “My last boyfriend… kind of turned me off guys for a while.”
Brandon lifted a curious eyebrow.
“Not like that!” she exclaimed. “It’s just that… well, it’s a long story.”
“Tell me.”
Chapter Five
Sandra took a deep breath. Maybe it was the champagne, maybe it was the atmosphere. No matter what it was, she felt like Brandon was genuinely interested in what she had to say.
“I moved in with him after college,” she began. “My parents loved him. His name was Henry. We met in school. I was doing my undergrad; he was doing his masters.”
“Go on,” Brandon prompted, eyes sincere.
Something about his manner made Sandra feel that she could trust him. Not in everything, of course—not so quickly—but something told her he was mature enough to respect what she told him. She owed it to herself to tell the truth. She hadn’t spoken to anyone about her ex after leaving him—hadn’t felt she could trust anyone enough for that—but with Brandon, things were different.
It was strange. Brandon was unlike any man she’d ever known. He obviously had an irreverent side to him, but here he was, being sweet and tender. It was a far cry to the mocking Brandon she’d met that morning.
“Actually, he was more than just my boyfriend,” Sandra admitted. “We were engaged.”
Brandon’s eyes widened in surprise, and then instantly narrowed, as if he wanted to fire a million questions at her. He posed only one. “He asked you to marry him?”
“Yes. He propo
sed just before graduation. We had been dating for a year, then, and we were both in the final year of our programs.”
“But now you’re here… single…” Brandon stepped closer, leaning against the railing beside her so their upper arms touched. His voice became deep and penetrating. “What went wrong?”
“All of it was wrong,” Sandra said. “I mean, there was nothing bad about him. Henry was the type of guy every mother wants her daughter to marry. He graduated from a good school. He worked for a few years in a well-paying job. He went to get his masters to advance his career—his company promised him a promotion once he got the degree. When my parents first heard about him, they were over the moon.”
“But something tells me you weren’t,” Brandon observed.
“I was, at first. But…” Sandra took another deep breath, “…I was living a lie. I was doing what was expected of me rather than what I wanted. Actually, maybe it was what I wanted, at first,” Sandra corrected. “But it turned out all wrong in the end.”
“You weren’t true to yourself.” He locked eyes with her and held her gaze. Sandra found the moment sobering. She didn’t know if she could handle his intense eyes now. She looked away, back toward the island. “What did he do?”
“He worked as a quant in one of those big trading firms. He studied theoretical physics in school, did his masters in computational finance. He was freakishly smart. Large investment companies love guys like him. Henry always put his nose to the grindstone and worked hard. He didn’t complain, didn’t make trouble—”
“A wallflower,” Brandon observed.
“Yes,” Sandra said. “Yes, exactly.”
“I’ve met a hundred men like him.” Brandon shook his head. “You’re not the type to be satisfied with someone like that.”
Yours to Savor Page 5
