All of Me (8 page)

Cole and Mia were supposed to be flying out on Monday, yet the contingency plan was to take Ginny along if she still appeared uncertain.

Ginny shrugged, her posture relaxed. “Okay.”

“Really, pretty girl? Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

Mia patted her chest and sighed. She pulled Ginny in for a hug. “I’m so proud of you. You’ll have so much fun while we’re gone, you won’t even miss us.”

“Can I have a party?”

Cole laughed and covered it with a cough. “A party, huh? What kind of party?”

“A slumber party.” Ginny nodded emphatically. “With Lacey and Faith. Can I?”

Mia grinned. “Great idea. How about you and I make supersecret invitations this afternoon?”

Alec parked the car next to Cole’s in the pier’s lot and turned to Faith. “You’re going to love this. Jake and I used to come down here as kids. Ready?”

“Yes.” Her stomach twisted and coiled, from excitement or nerves, she wasn’t sure.

Ginny bounced in the backseat. “I’m ready.”

Faith laughed. “Come on, then. Just stay close, sweetie. It looks like it’s pretty crowded.”

They exited the car and several scents accosted her at once. The salt from the ocean. Popcorn. Grilling meat. Roasted corn. Rain-drenched grass.

Ginny came up beside her and stared. “It’s so cool!”

It was pretty awesome. Against the fading sun, three massive piers jutted out over the ocean. The one on the left held a twenty-story-tall Ferris wheel. Food vendors lined both sides of the one in the center, and the one to the right had carnival games inside small tents. The beach in front of the piers was crowded with people sitting in the sand or
at picnic tables. A DJ played music from a stage behind the dunes.

She looked at Alec only to find him staring at her feet. A muscle ticked in his jaw.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Forgot you said you painted your toenails. It’s a turn-on.”

She looked down at her toes peeking out of her flip-flops, polished the pretty iridescent blue. A turn-on? Alec couldn’t possibly be flirting with her, could he? He really knew how to shut a girl up. Or knock her over. He drew his gaze away from her feet and out over the piers, while she fought to control her breathing.

“It’s busy,” Alec remarked when the others came up beside them.

Cole grunted. “Tourist season.”

Mia gave Cole a worried look that Faith pretended not to notice. After his injury, he didn’t go out in public often, and when he did, he hid the scars on his shoulder and neck. Tonight he’d worn a polo shirt, which covered most of the scars. Cole smiled and winked at Mia, letting her know he was fine. Faith pretended not to notice that, too. She’d never had that kind of unspoken bond with anyone, not even Hope.

She trailed behind the others as they made their way across the grass and to the beach. Alec fell in step beside her, watching her from the corner of his eye.

“If I buy you popcorn, will you eat it?”

Why wouldn’t her stomach calm down? “You don’t have to buy me popcorn.”

“I don’t have to do anything besides breathe and pay taxes. I want to do it.”

She fought a smile. “Yes, I’ll eat popcorn if you buy some. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Ginny wanted games first, so they headed in that direction. Jake found a tent that had a ball toss, and they stopped so he could attempt to win a stuffed animal for Lacey. On
his third attempt to knock down the pyramid of bottles, Faith sought a nearby bench and sat, figuring he’d be at it a while. Lacey clung to Jake’s arm, doing everything in her power to distract him. Ginny clapped and cheered him on, while Mia and Cole were involved in their own conversation.

Faith found herself laughing when Jake finally earned enough tickets to get a small stuffed animal. A dolphin, it looked like. It may as well have been roses the way Lacey responded, pulling him in for a kiss.

“Looks like you’re a people-watcher, too.” Alec sat next to her and handed over a bag of popcorn. “I can sit for hours, observing, imagining.”

“Imagining what?” She took a bite of popcorn, letting the salt and oil melt onto her tongue. If she had a weakness, popcorn was it. Usually she just air-popped some for herself at home. This was divine by comparison. She had to bite back a moan.

The others moved one tent over so Ginny could shoot water through a pine-board cutout of a clown’s mouth.

“I imagine everything. What encompasses their lives, who they go home to, their fears, desires. I get the best ideas watching people. Sometimes I just make up stuff and go with it.”

“What kinds of things do you make up? Like stories?”

She tore her gaze away from Ginny and looked at Alec. Big mistake. His black hair ruffled in the breeze, sending a scent of something purely male in her direction. One corner of his mouth tilted up in a half smile, making her pulse trip. His gray-blue eyes steadily took in her face, lingering on her mouth, before he sucked in a breath and looked away.

He cleared his throat. “Take those two over there.” He nudged his chin in the direction of a couple holding hands outside of a tent. “Her hairstyle is seriously outdated and so are her clothes. So she’s either stuck in 1985, or . . .”

Faith took his bait and settled her gaze back on him. “Or what?”

“Or she was abducted by an invasive alien life-form and just now returned to earth. Her husband missed her terribly and is happy to have her back, thus he doesn’t mention her archaic fashion sense. He was a fan of the eighties anyway. He knows the words to every Cyndi Lauper song released.”

“Very interesting.” A smile tugged at her mouth as she tilted her head. She couldn’t, for the life of her, figure him out. Sometimes he looked lost and desperate. Then at other times, like now, he was charming and funny. It threw her off balance.

“You try.”

“Me?” she squeaked.

“Yes, you.” His voice dipped into a teasing timbre that sent shivers down her spine and caused her face to heat. “Give those two a try.”

She glanced in the direction he was indicating. A young teenager stood beside her father eating an ice-cream cone a few feet away. “He’s recently widowed or divorced. She’s a sullen teenager who wants to be close to him but it’s not cool, so she pushes him away.”

When Alec didn’t respond, she dared a glance his way.

He closed his mouth. “Okay, not to point this out, but you missed the humor mark.” He glanced at the father and daughter, who were now walking away. “What gave you that idea about them?”

Alec appeared more intrigued than irritated, so she shrugged. “The father had an indentation on the ring finger of his left hand, like he’d recently removed a wedding band. It also looked like it hurt him to smile. The daughter caught herself laughing a few times at something he said, but she quickly looked around afterward to see if anyone saw her.”

His eyes narrowed and his mouth quirked into a smile. “You’re like that
Monk
detective on TV. Or
Psych
. I’m not afraid to admit I fear what you see when you look at me.”

Before she could respond, Ginny ran over. “Can we go on the Ferris wheel now?”

The others were waiting for them at the end of the pier. Shoot. Faith hadn’t meant to hold them up. She’d been so wrapped up in Alec and his little game that she’d paid no attention to the group. Jumping to her feet, she wrapped an arm around Ginny in a brief apology before making her way to the beach.

“Slow down, Faith,” Alec said. “They’re not going to ostracize you for talking to me.”

“I shouldn’t have made them wait,” she called over her shoulder, not reducing her brisk pace until she hit the end of the pier.

“Hold up.” Alec grabbed her wrist. “We’ll meet you by the Ferris wheel,” he said to Jake. “Save us a place in line.” Over her shoulder, he watched until they were gone and then focused his attention on her. “Why do you do that? Half the time you attempt to be invisible and the other half is spent trying to measure up. They’re not looking for perfection, Faith. Just friendship. Just you, as you are.”

She stilled. It was too much.
He
was too much.

Just as you are.

Didn’t he know how hard those . . . nice things were to hear?

She couldn’t draw in air. The edges of her vision grayed as her heart rate accelerated. The
thump, thump
against her temple droned out the noise of the pier. She swayed, the sand beneath her unstable.

“Christ, breathe.” Alec cupped her cheeks and forced her to look at him. “Breathe, Faith. You’re freaking me out.”

The panicked edge in his eyes brought her back, combined with his warm palms against her cheeks, his scent of soap with a trace of . . . sandalwood? Somehow the brink of black nothingness eased away and it was just her and him. The center of her chest ached as she gasped in air.

He dropped his hands and took a step back.

People were staring.

“I’m . . . I’m sorry. Let’s just go.”

His gaze was penetrating. It stripped her bare and left her embarrassingly wanting. He missed nothing, not a single aspect of her face.

After a moment, his jaw clenched. “Were you abused? Did someone hurt you before?” The last words were spoken in a growl that raised the hair on her arm.

“No.”

She wanted to say more, to explain how new this all was, but her mouth wouldn’t work. He’d see her differently. They all would. She’d be no one again. They’d only known each other a couple of weeks, but already she was more secure with herself, branching out and taking chances.

But they didn’t know her, these people. She kept the scars hidden for a reason. Really, who wanted to be friends with someone who’d never had any?

How foolish to think anything would be different just because she’d changed locations.

Because he was still staring at her with that silent, invasive expression, she sucked in a breath and straightened. “They’re waiting for us.”

“I really want to shake you right now.” He took a step closer. “I don’t mean that as a threat. I’m just stating fact. I really want to shake some sense into you. There’s something not clicking between here—” he lifted his hand and traced a line with his finger from her heart up to her temple “—to here,” he finished.

It wasn’t the first time someone had called her cold and detached, but somehow, coming from Alec, it hurt so much more.

“I do have feelings, you know,” she whispered, needing him to understand at least that much. Tears burned her eyes.

She turned to head toward the Ferris wheel, but really she just wanted to go home and crawl into bed.

“I never said you didn’t have feelings. I’m saying you’re afraid of the good stuff.”

Afraid of good stuff and not recognizing it were two
separate things. This conversation was done. She wasn’t going to goad him by revealing her pathetic attempt at starting to live.

They walked the rest of the way in tense silence, meeting up with the others near the front of the line.

Ginny clapped. “Look, Faith. It’s so big.”

Faith looked up at the towering, spinning wheel, lit against the night sky. Her mouth dried out. She had a sinking suspicion she was afraid of heights. “Yeah. Maybe I’ll stay down here, keep the numbers even.”

Cole laughed. “Nice try. I’m afraid of heights, too. Mia’s going up with Ginny.”

Alec said nothing but she could feel his gaze on her.

Before she could think too hard or protest, it was their turn. Someone who smelled like cigars pulled a bar down over her lap after she sat in the bucket-like seat. Alec’s thigh brushed hers in the intimate space. Then the ride moved.

She pinched her eyes closed. “Oh boy.”

Alec laughed. “Relax. You’re safe.”

At the top—
the top
—the ride halted. “Why are we stopped?”

“They’re letting more people on and off. It’ll start again soon.” He covered her hand with his over the safety bar. “Look at the view, Faith. Open your eyes.”

Blowing out a ragged breath, she slowly did as instructed. And stopped breathing again. Miles and miles of black ocean spanned the horizon. The waves were lit by moonlight, the stars a picture-perfect backdrop. It was amazing.

“You know a great way to calm down when you’re nervous?”

She turned her head and gasped.

Their faces were so close that his hot, shallow breath fanned her cheek. His gaze darted between her mouth and her eyes. The gray blue of his irises was almost swallowed by his dilated pupils, his lids at half-mast in the most lazy, seductive trance.

Heat filled her core. Spread. The solid muscle of his shoulder and bicep pressed against her arm, and even through their shirts, the touch was intense. She followed his cue and looked at his mouth. Firm, full lips with more of a reddish hue than most men. She wanted him to close the distance so bad she nearly begged.

When was the last time she’d been kissed?

Forget that. He had asked her something. A way not to be nervous? “How . . .”

“Distraction is the key.”

He growled, low in his throat. Closer he inched, until his lips caressed hers. A barely there meeting of mouths that sparked an inferno inside her. Slowly, his gaze still pinned to hers, he brushed his lips over hers, side to side, as if trying to get a feel for her.

“You’re an old soul, aren’t you, Faith?” he asked against her mouth.

She shivered. Her mind was a muddled mess. She wasn’t even sure she’d heard him right, or what being an old soul had to do with kissing her. And he needed to. Kiss her. Strange yet not unpleasant sensations took over her body. Her hands trembled, he stomach fluttered, her face heated, and her skin prickled in anticipation of what he’d do next.

Then the ride moved and she yelped. The feeling of falling abruptly cleared her head.

He pulled away until nothing but their thighs touched once more. Surprise was etched into his eyes, in the way his mouth hung slightly open. A second later, regret moved over his features.

A kiss, or an almost kiss, shouldn’t make him feel regret. Unless . . .

Unless he was embarrassed by her.

He swiped a hand down his face and turned straight ahead, the wind whipping his hair into chaos. “Let’s just stick with the view.”

*   *   *

Alec hovered between loathing and self-contempt on the walk back to their vehicles. Attraction was one thing, acting on it was another. After Laura, he’d had his share of partners. But Faith wasn’t some one-nighter or random hookup like those he’d gotten lost in back in New York. A woman like her played by a different set of rules. Like the forever kind. For the past nine years, he’d avoided her type.

He had no business making a play for her. No matter how soothing her voice was to his soul or how adorable he found her freckles or how amazing those honey-brown eyes looked when she stared at him. She smelled so damn good, too. Vanilla and sugar. It made him want to see if she tasted just as decadent.