Ann swallowed convulsively as he continued the slow strokes.
“Well?” he prodded.
“I love you,” she said hesitantly.
“Very good. You’re catching on.”
“Thank you, professor.”
“Should I continue?”
“Please do.”
He did—and no lesson had ever been more exhilarating, no discussion more thrilling.
And when they were lying tangled together, breathless from experiencing all the nuances of the language of love, he whispered, “Have I made myself clear yet?”
“Very clear.”
“Then you’ll marry me?”
“Yes,” she said finally and without hesitation. “Yes, Hank, I’ll marry you.”
He grinned at her. “It’s about time. I was running out of arguments.”
“Somehow I doubt that.” She cuddled more closely into his side.
“Annie.”
“Hmm?”
“I hate to ruin a good moment, but the kids…”
“Oh, my God!” she said, sitting straight up and pulling the sheet up to her chin.
“Settle down,” he soothed. “They’re not in the room, but they are likely to be getting home soon and we probably should not be in here.”
“Good thinking,” she said, gathering up her clothes, which had been flung from one end of the bedroom to the other. “You get out. I’m taking a shower.”
He grabbed her hand and pulled her back. “One last kiss.”
Her lips were still warm and tasted of salt and musk. It was all he could do to relinquish her. Finally, swatting her gently on the bottom, he said, “Go. I’ll meet you in the kitchen.”
Fifteen minutes later, they were seated at the kitchen table with the overly done meal in front of them when the truck doors began slamming outside.
“You’d better eat fast,” Hank advised. “We were supposed to eat the chicken before it turned to leather.”
Ann’s eyes widened. “You mean you weren’t responsible for all this?”
“Nope. Your sweet, innocent children set the scene tonight for the great seduction. I think they got tired of leaving it to us.”
“Are we supposed to tell them how it turned out?”
Hank glanced pointedly at Ann’s glowing face and her hastily donned bathrobe. “I don’t think we’ll have to say a word,” he said as the back door creaked open.
Tracy stuck her head in hesitantly. “Don’t mind us. I just wanted you to know we’re home. We’ll go in the front door.”
“That’s not really necessary,” Ann said.
“It’s not?” Tracy said, her voice instantly filled with disappointment. “How come?”
“Because this is your house and you don’t have to go tiptoeing around in the dark outside.”
Tracy glanced at Hank hopefully. “Did you like dinner?”
“It was very special. Now why don’t you just go ahead and ask what you really want to know?”
At his teasing tone, a broad grin broke over her face. “Did it work?”
He glanced over at Ann and winked. “That depends on exactly what you had in mind. I did ask Ann to marry me.”
There was a barely smothered whoop from the crowd of kids huddling in the dark behind Tracy. The door opened wider and all six faces peered at Ann.
“And?” Jason demanded impatiently.
“I said yes.”
“Oh, wow!” Tracy sighed dreamily.
“Fantastic!”
“We’re going to be a real family?” David asked.
“A real family,” Hank promised. His eyes intent on Ann’s, he added, “All of us.”
With Hank’s promise echoing in her ears, she held out her arms to Melissa, who came running. With a lump in his throat, Hank watched the chubby-cheeked toddler crawl into Ann’s lap and lay her head sleepily against Ann’s breast. No matter what it took, he vowed to fight for Melissa and win. He would keep them all together.
“I think we should celebrate,” Jason said, sounding very mature until his voice skidded up, then back down, in midsentence.
“Good idea,” Hank and Ann concurred as Jason opened the refrigerator door, then turned to stare at them, a puzzled expression on his face. “The strawberries and stuff are still in here. What have you guys been doing all this time? We’ve been gone for hours.”
“Jason!” Tracy said. “How dumb are you?”
He immediately blushed a fiery shade of red, then grinned with impish enthusiasm. “I guess it worked pretty good.”
“I guess it did,” Hank said, reaching over to take Ann’s hand. “Better than I’d ever dreamed possible.”
Epilogue
The backyard was filled with pink balloons. They were tied to the backs of lawn chairs. Like bunches of colorful coconuts, they dangled from the palm trees. They floated above the redwood picnic table that was laden with brightly wrapped packages.
“Hey, Dad, what do you think?” David called as Hank rounded the corner of the house.
Hank followed the sound of David’s voice and finally spotted him high up in the banyan tree. “I think you’d better get down from that tree before your mother catches you and has a heart attack.”
“His mother is up here with him,” Ann said, parting the branches and peering down at him. Hank’s breath caught in his throat. “We’re decorating.”
“Ann,” he began in a choked voice as his heart thumped unsteadily. The woman obviously had nerves of steel. His own had taken a decided beating over the past year.
“Don’t be such a worrywart,” she chided, lowering herself awkwardly from a sturdy limb to the top rung of a stepladder. “I was climbing ladders long before you came along. Who do you think painted the house?”
That was not a point he cared to discuss while his wife was dangling from a tree. He still hadn’t gotten accustomed to the hodgepodge of colors. For the moment, he intended to stick to her tree-climbing activities.
“You were not six months’ pregnant at the time,” he reminded her, holding the ladder steady as she descended.
“I am a little more ungainly than usual,” she admitted, patting her swollen belly. “You never answered us. How do the balloons look?”
“Plentiful. Who’s blowing them up?”
“Liz. Last time I checked her lips were turning blue. You might want to relieve her.”
“I don’t do balloons,” he said emphatically.
“What exactly do you do?” she teased. “I haven’t seen you since breakfast. Have you been hiding?”
“I’ve been having a long talk with Tracy’s new boyfriend.”
Ann groaned. “Hank, you have not cross-examined that boy, have you? Tracy will kill you.”
“No, she won’t,” he said smugly. “She gave me the list of questions.”
“In that case, did he pass?”
“For a nineteen-year-old with pimples and hair longer than Tracy’s, he displays remarkable maturity. If they date no more than once a month, I might consider giving them permission to marry in another five or ten years.”
Ann rolled her eyes. “I’m sure she’ll appreciate that. Has Jason gotten home yet?”
“He and Paul are inside putting together Melissa’s new dollhouse. He’s already made several modifications to the original design. Todd’s so impressed, he’s in there now trying to convince him to study architecture.”
“Where’s Melissa?”
“With Tommy. They’re playing house.”
Ann’s eyebrows shot up. “Isn’t she a little young for that?”
“Apparently not. She thinks Liz and Todd brought Amy especially to play the baby. Amy can’t crawl quite fast enough to get away from them.” He grinned at her. “Does that account for all of them, mother hen?”
She grinned ruefully. “I suppose so.”
He reached out and took her hand. “Then come with me. I have a surprise for you.”
“For me? It’s Melissa’s birthday.”
&nb
sp; “Just come,” he said, leading her in through the front door so they wouldn’t be disturbed. When he had her alone, he handed her a thick, official-looking envelope. He’d already examined the contents.
Hope and fear warred in her eyes as she took it. She fingered it nervously, but made no move to take the papers from inside. “Hank?”
“It’s official. Melissa’s ours.”
A smile trembled on her lips and tears streamed down her cheeks. “She’s really ours?”
“Really. It says so in black-and-white.”
She clutched the envelope tightly, then threw her arms around him. That familiar sense of wonder filled Hank’s heart. They had it all, more than he’d ever imagined himself having.
“Hank, isn’t this the most wonderful day?” Ann said with a heartfelt sigh. As she rested her head against his shoulder she placed his hand over the swell of her stomach. As if aware of his presence, their baby gave a sure, emphatic kick.
“Definitely a football player,” he said with pride.
“A ballet dancer,” she countered.
“Why are you fighting?” a little voice asked from the doorway.
“We’re not fighting,” Ann told Melissa. “We’re discussing.”
“Mommy tends to discuss rather forcefully,” Hank explained as Ann poked him in the ribs.
“Isn’t it time for my party yet?”
“It’s time, short stuff,” Hank concurred. “How about a ride to the backyard?”
Melissa’s eyes lit up as Hank swooped her onto his shoulders, then held out his hand to help Ann to her feet.
“Let’s go celebrate,” he said, his gaze catching Ann’s and holding. “Melissa, don’t forget to make a wish before you blow out the candles on your cake.”
“I already made one last year,” she confided, leaning down to peer into his eyes from an upside-down angle.
“And what did you wish for?”
“I wished for a mommy and daddy, and you know what?” She tapped a tiny finger against his lips.
“What?” Hank said, exchanging a look with Ann.
“It worked,” she said happily. “I got a mommy and daddy now.”
Ann slid her arm around his waist as Hank said, “You sure do, half-pint. And nobody in the whole wide world could love you any more.”
Melissa tugged impatiently on his beard. “Now can I open my presents, please?”
He lowered her to the ground. “Go to it, kid.”
As Melissa raced across the yard, the whole family gathered around. Ann looked up into Hank’s face, her eyes shining. “No matter what’s in all those packages,” she said, “I don’t think there’s anything to compare with the gift we got.”
“That’s right,” he agreed, lowering his lips to capture hers. “Ours is going to last a lifetime.”
Keep reading for an except for Sherryl Woods’s Sand Castle Bay, available from Harlequin MIRA.
1
The television in Emily Castle’s Aspen, Colorado, hotel room was tuned to the Weather Channel, where there was minute-by-minute coverage of the hurricane aiming directly at North Carolina’s coast, the place that had been like a second home to her. Childhood summers there had been slow and lazy and sweet. The beach town her grandmother called home was where she’d ultimately experienced her first heartache, yet despite those painful memories and despite everything she had on her plate at the moment, it was where she needed to be.
Even before her cell phone rang, she was checking flight schedules on her laptop. She clicked on a connecting flight between Atlanta and Raleigh, North Carolina, just as she answered the incoming call.
“Already on it,” she told her sister Gabriella. “I should be able to get to Raleigh by sometime late tomorrow.”
“Not a chance,” Gabi argued. “Flights are going to be canceled up and down the East Coast for at least a day or two. You’re better off waiting until next week and booking for Monday, maybe even Tuesday. Avoid the craziness.”
“What’s Samantha doing?” Emily asked, referring to their older sister.
“She’s rented a car and is already on her way down from New York. She’ll be here later tonight, hopefully ahead of the storm. They’re predicting landfall overnight. We’re already getting some of the wind and rain bands clear over here.”
Of course Samantha would beat the storm! Emily couldn’t seem to stop herself from frowning. Though she’d never totally understood it, the odd competitiveness she’d always felt with her oldest sister kicked in with a vengeance. She supposed with three sisters, there were bound to be rivalries, but why with Samantha and not Gabi? Gabi was the driven, successful businesswoman, the one most like her in terms of ambition.
“I’m getting on a flight out of here tonight,” Emily said determinedly, motivated by Samantha’s plans. “If I have to drive from Atlanta, then that’s what I’ll do.”
Rather than admonishing her, Gabi chuckled. “Samantha said you were going to say that. From the time you understood the difference between winning and losing, you hated it when she beat you at anything. Okay, fine. Get here when you can. Just do it safely. This storm isn’t looking pretty. If it wobbles even the slightest bit to the west, Sand Castle Bay will take a direct hit. You can bet the road down to Hatteras will wash out again unless they were a lot smarter when they did the repairs after the last storm.”
“How’s Grandmother?” Cora Jane Castle was in her mid-seventies but still going strong and determined to continue operating the beachfront restaurant opened by her late husband even though no one in the family had demonstrated any interest in running it. In Emily’s view, she ought to sell it and enjoy her golden years, but the mere mention of such an idea was considered blasphemy.
“Stoic about the storm, but mad as a wet hen that Dad drove over and picked her up to bring her to Raleigh to ride out the hurricane,” Gabi assessed. “She’s in my kitchen cooking and muttering a few very bad words I had no idea she knew. I think that’s why Dad dropped her here, then took off. He didn’t want to be around when she got her hands on my knives.”
“Or it could be he had no idea what to say to her. That’s his way, isn’t it?” Emily said with a hint of bitterness. Under the best of conditions, her father, Sam, wasn’t communicative. Under the worst, he simply wasn’t around. Most of the time she’d made her peace with that, but on occasion simmering resentments rose to the surface.
“He has work to do,” Gabi said, immediately defensive, as always. “Important work. Do you know the kind of impact these biomedical studies at his company could have on people’s lives?”
“I wonder how many times he said exactly that to Mother when he went off and left her to cope with raising us.”
For once Gabi didn’t overreact. “It was a constant refrain, wasn’t it? Well, we’re all grown-up. We should be over all those missed school plays and recitals and soccer games by now.”
“Says the not-so-well-adjusted woman who’s doing her best to follow in his footsteps,” Emily taunted with good humor. “You know you’re no better than he is, Gabriella. You may not be a scientist, but you are a workaholic. That’s why you get so uptight when I criticize him.”
The silence that greeted her comment was deafening. “Gabi, I was only teasing,” Emily apologized, aware that she’d crossed a line. “Seriously. You know how proud we all are of your accomplishments. You’re a top executive at one of the hottest biomed companies in North Carolina, if not the entire country.”
“I know. You just struck a nerve, that’s all,” Gabi said, then added briskly, “Let me know when you’re getting in and I’ll pick you up at the airport, okay?”
Before Emily could offer another apology for what she had recognized as an insensitive, ill-timed remark, Gabriella had hung up. Not with the sort of clatter that would mirror Emily’s own quick flares of temper, but quietly. Somehow that was much, much worse.
Boone Dorsett had been through his share of hurricane warnings and actual hits on the coast. He had the boa
rding-up routine down pat. But when it came right down to it, Mother Nature was always in control of the outcome.
As a kid he’d been awed by the ferocious storms, but he’d had little real understanding of the havoc they could wreak on people’s lives. These days, with a son, a home and a busy restaurant, he had a far better grasp of what could be lost to high winds, devastating storm surges and flood waters. He’d seen roads washed out, houses toppled, lives uprooted.
Thankfully, this latest storm had taken a last-minute turn east and delivered only a glancing blow. There was damage, plenty of it in fact, but so far he hadn’t seen the kind of destruction he’d witnessed in the past. In fact, it had been relatively kind to him. There’d been some flooding at his waterfront restaurant, a few shingles ripped off the roof at his home, but his biggest concern after checking out his own property had been for Cora Jane’s family restaurant.
Castle’s by the Sea had been a constant in his life, as had Cora Jane. Both had inspired him to go into the restaurant business, not to mimic Castle’s success, but to create his own welcoming ambiance. He owed Cora Jane, too, for helping him to believe in himself when no one in his own dysfunctional family had.
The biggest reason for Castle’s success, other than its proximity to the ocean, good food and friendly service, was Cora Jane’s devotion to it. She’d called him half a dozen times since the storm had passed to see if he’d been allowed back into Sand Castle Bay. The minute the evacuation order had been lifted, he’d crossed the bridge from the mainland to check his property and hers.
Now, standing in the middle of the damp, debris-littered dining room at Castle’s by the Sea, he called her with the damage assessment she’d been anxiously awaiting.
“How bad is it?” she asked, foregoing so much as a hello. “Tell me the truth, Boone. Don’t you dare sugarcoat it.”
“Could have been worse,” he told her. “There was some flooding, but no worse than over at my place.”
“Shame on me,” Cora Jane interrupted. “I never even asked how you fared in the storm. Just some flooding?”
“That was the worst of it,” he confirmed. “My crew’s already cleaning up. They know the drill. As for the house, it’s fine. So is yours. A lot of tree limbs in the yard, a few roof shingles ripped off, but otherwise it’s all good.”
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