Betina Krahn (22 page)

He couldn’t think properly, couldn’t control his gaze or his body heat with her mere inches away, half naked and dripping wet. When she reached for his shirt buttons, he grabbed her hand and held it, and she looked up.

“First you strip off your clothes—now mine,” he said, his voice oddly hoarse. “Abandoned creature.”

“I am not. Any serious student of ‘mythological females’ should know that mermaids live by a different set of rules.”

He finished the buttons himself and tossed his shirt up onto the dry sand just as she grabbed him by the arm and headed for the water.

Terror gripped him. But before he could resist, he was ankle-deep and being dragged deeper. Halfway up his calves. Another step … then two more. Water lapped at his knees and wet his trousers. He dug his heels into the sandy
bottom, but she pulled harder and suddenly he was in up to his hips.

His throat was so constricted, he couldn’t speak. Cold and darkness billowed up around him, setting his heart pounding wildly, making him feel light-headed and panicky. He couldn’t seem to move his arms or legs. It was as if rigor mortis were already setting in!

“Come on, Professor, don’t be a stick about this.” She gave him a tug. When he didn’t budge, she apparently sensed something deeper at work and turned to search his stiff face and rigid body.

He watched, choked with humiliation, as she waded back and stood looking up at him until he lowered his chin enough for their gazes to meet. Her eyes were remarkably blue in the moonlight. Insightful blue. Penetrating blue.

“You can’t swim, can you?” she said quietly.

He wasn’t certain if he actually made some affirming motion or if she just read a confirmation in his stiff face and helpless silence.

“You really do hate the water,” she said thoughtfully, as if studying the ramifications of it. The taunting laughter he dreaded never materialized. What he got was a thoughtful nod. He remained braced, unwilling to trust her seeming calm, but she merely continued to study him, as if waiting for him to say more.

“Ironic, isn’t it.” His smile carried a twist of bitterness. “The fish scientist who can’t go near the water. Enjoy it, Miss Ashton. The laugh is on me.”

But she didn’t laugh.

She understood.

It was all so clear, she thought … visible in his guarded eyes, etched into his defensive frown, proclaimed by the tension he wore like a cloak. The word had not been spoken; there was no need to speak it. He was
afraid
. Suddenly it all made sense: his attitude, his behavior in the boat, his stubborn doubts that her dolphins existed, and even his refusal to inspect Prospero firsthand. Fear, her grandfather had often
said, made a person put up walls to keep things out. And Titus Thorne had put up more walls than anyone she had ever known.

“Well, that can be remedied,” she said in an even tone. “Who better to teach you to swim than a mermaid?” She took him by the hand and caught his gaze in hers. “Come with me.”

He looked into her eyes and felt her certainty dissolving some of his tension. Somehow, with her in the water beside him, the prospect of being engulfed by water didn’t seem quite so menacing. He made himself focus just on her, resisting the urge to predestine this “swimming lesson” to failure. He hadn’t much hope for it, but as he watched her soft smile and sinuous movements, he vowed to do whatever was necessary to have these moments with her.

When she reached for his other hand, he gave it up, drinking in the sight of her glowing features and moon-brightened hair. Taking a fortifying breath, he waded back with her to water that was only up to his knees.

“Sit,” she ordered. Taking his hand, she sat down on the shifting sand in the shallow water and pulled him down with her. By the time he made it onto his rear, he was as stiff as a day-old mackerel.

“The key to swimming is relaxation. Accepting the feel of the water and letting the water do what water inevitably does. Just sit down, take a deep breath, and let the water lift and support your body.”

He tried. He sank farther into the shifting water, feeling it surging and rushing around his body, and was soon as tense as a watchspring. She made a judgmental “tsk,” then moved around behind him and sat down with her legs on either side of him. “Lean back.”

“Why—what are you going to do?” he gritted out.

“Help you relax. Now, lean back on me. I’ll support you.”

“This is ridiculous. I’m never going to learn to swim this way.”

“You won’t learn any other way. Now, lean back on me.”

Inch by agonizing inch, he managed to lower his shoulders until she supported them with her hands and upper shoulders. Her face was beside his ear. “Better. Now take deep, slow breaths. That will help you relax.”

Soon she was breathing with him, drawing him into a calmer rhythm, and after a while, he did indeed feel more relaxed … until he felt her shifting beneath him, withdrawing. “No, stay as you were. I’m going to sit beside you.”

He held his breath, but released it when she continued to cradle his head in her hands, keeping it out of the water. Soon he was lying back in the surging water, feeling it rushing over him, then pulling on his body as it returned to the sea. “Doesn’t it feel like a touch?” she said into his ear. “Like a hand sweeping up your body?”

It did indeed. And it wasn’t long before he felt himself responding to that cool, liquid caress. Heat began to curl through his veins once again.

“Look up at the night sky,” she murmured. “The moon, the stars, the occasional cloud. Everything above you and everything below you is really part of one great creation. You’re part of it, too, whether you are immersed in air or water. Can you feel that you belong to it, in it?”

Then her face, cast in shadows by the fall of her hair, appeared over his. “Relax now and let the water do what water does best. Let it lift and envelop you. Close your eyes and let it caress you.”

It felt like her hands, washing up his feet and legs, then rising over his shoulders and chest. It felt like her body pressed against his, lapping softly and erotically against his legs, his chest, his loins. The pull and slosh of the water increased for a time, but with her steady litany of reassurance, he gradually allowed it to buoy him and began to trust her quiet authority. Then he let his head rest on her hand, until it lay half in the water.

The squeezing in his throat and the chill in his limbs were almost gone. Each wave that rippled gently up his body reduced his terror another degree. Soon he was floating entirely, except for her hands under his head and the small of his back. He abandoned himself to her direction. It was a curiously pleasant sensation, floating in water.

After a while, he opened his eyes to tell her so and realized she wasn’t seated, but standing beside him, chest-deep in water. Instantly, he felt his lower half sinking. He panicked and began to flail.

“Where’s the damned bott—Aghhh!” He ceased thrashing and came upright when his feet hit the sandy bottom. He was slightly more than waist-deep in water, well beyond the breaker zone. “What am I doing out here?”

“Floating, Professor. And very nicely, too.” She grinned. “That proves you can do it. It’s just a matter of practice, from here on. Now turn around and lie back in the water, again. I’ll see that you don’t sink.”

He scowled, but she seized his arms and turned him away from her. The sight of her bright eyes and the soft swell of her breasts beneath her thin garment came with him. After some reassurance, he summoned every scrap of determination he possessed, held his breath, and leaned backward. Just when he started to panic, he felt her hands at his shoulders. It took several attempts and some coaxing for him to regain his former comfort level, but Celeste was soon towing him on his back, around in the water.

It was surprisingly liberating. Shockingly simple. He didn’t have to think about it; in fact, the more he thought about it the worse he did. Slowly he relinquished control, giving himself over to absorbing the sight of moon and stars overhead and the soft caress of the water.

His fragmented thoughts gradually collected around the initiator and interpreter of this sensory banquet. Sleek, strong, supple body, delicate features, shining, sun-streaked hair … she was a bachelor’s dream. Curious, wise beyond her years, and deliciously sensual … she was an odd combination
of knowledge and innocence, girlish impulse and womanly deliberation. And she hadn’t a shred of false modesty or coquetishness about her. She had an eye for him and she was both brazen enough and artless enough to let it show.

He bent suddenly at the waist, found the bottom with his feet, and took her by the shoulders. She looked up with surprise, but no trace of annoyance or alarm. In that moment, her eyes were windows onto a luminous soul and he saw into her depths. There was no deceit or manipulation in Celeste Ashton. She dealt with everything the way she had dealt with him just now: honestly, forthrightly. She truly wanted to help him swim, just as she wanted to share her love of the sea and of her dolphins with him … with the rest of the world.

A wave of inexpressible tenderness swept through him. Whatever she had concluded, whatever she had written, it hadn’t been from idealism or arrogance or ignorance. It had been from a genuine desire to share her discoveries, to make a contribution to the world. A sweet, pulsing ache of desire roused in him, and before he could think better of it, he drew her to him and lowered his head.

She met his kiss with gentle caution, testing, searching his mood. Then as his arms closed around her, she seemed to find the answer to her concerns and her arms slid around his bare waist. He pulled her close, reveling in her response, wrapping her in his rising warmth.

He delved into her mouth, teasing, luxuriating in her salty sweetness. She pressed hard against him, molding herself to his larger, harder frame, and in the way of passion, gentled his strength to shelter her softness. Desire ignited in him as he ran his hands down her back, cupping her buttocks, lifting her against his aching body as he savored the taste of her.

Her kisses caught fire as she responded to the feel of him against her body and parted her legs to seek closer contact with him. Feeling her weight pressed intimately against him,
he started with her toward shallower water. She broke that kiss to whisper, “Wait … not yet.”

She fitted her lips to his again and began to lean backward, drawing him over her. Bending her knees, she sank farther and farther into the water, using the strength of their kiss to pull his head down over hers. Soon she was floating on her knees, her back arched, her face up. As the water lapped around her head, she abandoned herself to her most impassioned response yet, and he could do nothing but follow where she led.

When he felt the water against his nose, he opened his eyes in surprise and lifted his head to look at her. Her face was now submerged in water, all but her chin and mouth. She wrapped a hand around his neck and urged his head down again … kissing him from under water. The warmth of her mouth made a stunning contrast to the coolness of the water lapping against his face. Gradually the water spread over his face and seeped around their joined lips, flavoring their kiss with salt.

He closed his eyes and, with his heart pounding, refused to release her to the sea. Held by the power of that contact with her, holding his breath, he followed her down into the water. There was no panic, no dark, encroaching circle of memories. There was only the warmth of his mouth on hers, the coolness of the water, and his trust that she would not lead him where he could not bear to go.

When his breath ran out and he raised his head and wiped his face, it was to a sense of disbelief. He looked at her face, still half submerged but smiling. And as if to prove to himself that it had been real, he lowered his head again and, a second time, sank into the water with her.

This time, he traced her face with his fingertips and found her hair floating around her in the water. He explored its sinuous feel as it wrapped around his hands, and drank in every possible sensation, prolonging that contact. When he finally had to surface, she came with him. After he wiped his
face, he looked at her and found her smiling with an irresistible radiance.

“You just learned to hold your breath under water, Titus Thorne.”

“That’s not all,” he said hoarsely, pulling her toward him.

“Oh?” She laughed softly, sliding her arms around his bare ribs. “What else did you learn?”

It wasn’t possible to put it into words. It was a jumble of impressions, reactions, and feelings. How could he express the way familiar boundaries of conduct and ethics seemed to be shifting, expanding, dissolving, and rearranging themselves? He could feel it, could identify the anxiety it generated in him, but right now he didn’t want to think about all that. He only wanted to feel this closeness, this warmth with her. He lowered his head, drawing her onto her toes, drawing her into the center of his desire for her.

“That mermaid kisses are salty.” He covered her lips with his and abandoned himself to the pleasure of both wanting and having.

Suddenly something struck them from the side, sending them both crashing into the water. Celeste scrambled up, wiping her eyes, and whirled to search the water around them.

“Prospero! Where are you?”

A silver head popped up out of the water not far away, grinning that perpetual dolphin grin.

“I’m sorry, Professor,” she said, making sure Titus was all right. “But I suppose here is your proof that dolphins don’t sleep at night. Come, meet Prospero.” Taking his hand, she pulled him toward that grinning face.

Titus suddenly found himself in chest-deep water, face-to-face with Celeste’s dolphin. It was larger than he had imagined, at close range.

“Say hello to Professor Thorne, Prospero,” she said, nodding her head in an exaggerated fashion.

The dolphin nodded, then paused as if to look Titus over.
Then it gave its head a violent flip and shot a stream of water square in Titus’s face.

He lurched back.

“Prospero! That wasn’t nice!” Celeste exclaimed. She gave a hand signal, ordering the dolphin to go. It obeyed, but then it came right back.