Sanctuary Island (22 page)

She cocked her head, gaze intent on his face. “Yeah, but you meant something else. Didn’t you?”

Grady sighed. Not for the first time, he wished Ella were a little less perceptive. “Well, you’ve seen the horse bands. One stallion plus a bunch of mares—that’s pretty much how it goes, and they generally stick close together like a family. But if you see a lone wild horse, that’s a male yearling who got kicked out of his band by a more dominant stallion.”

“That’s sad.” Ella propped her chin on her crossed arms. “But if his family ditches him, can’t he just start his own band?”

“Sure, if he can steal a mare. And sometimes a few stallions will join together and form a bachelor band.”

Silence spread between them, punctuated by the hoot of an owl in the pine trees overhead. When she spoke, her voice was soft and muffled.

“What if he can’t? He’d be fine on his own, right? I mean, being alone isn’t the worst thing in the world.”

Grady chose his words carefully, aware that there were undercurrents to this conversation that he didn’t fully understand.

“Horses are pack animals. They don’t deal well with loneliness. If that lone stallion doesn’t find or make a new family, he’ll … well, if we don’t get to him in time and bring him into the barn, try to tame him—he’ll go down to the cove where Tough Guy was born, he’ll lie down, and wait to die. That’s why they call it Heartbreak Cove.”

*   *   *

Ella breathed through the bolt of electricity stiffening her every limb. Everything was all tangled up in her head—her confused feelings for Grady, the fight with Jo, and oh God, Merry … and now this.

The possible fate of the foal she’d helped bring into the world was like the final tap of the hammer to the crack in her heart, the last blow needed to break her in two.

“Hey, don’t look like that.” Grady sounded alarmed enough to make Ella wonder just how pale she’d gotten. “I’m not pronouncing a death sentence on our little man, here. Who knows, maybe he’ll grow up and fight the dominant male, take over the band, and become the leader of his own family. Or maybe he’ll get kicked out and take up with a buddy, and be fine, just the two of them. There’s a lone stallion out there whose best friend is a feral kitten from one of Jo’s barn cats’ litters. You never see one without the other.”

“Great.” Ella laughed, but it sounded damp and wobbly, even to her. “So what you’re saying is, I’m destined to become a crazy cat lady?”

Confusion drew Grady’s dark gold brows down into a line. “I don’t know what—”

“Nothing, ignore me,” Ella said, waving it away. She felt incredibly tired, all of a sudden. “Thanks for trying to put a good spin on it. I hate the idea of leaving Sanctuary and then hearing about Tough Guy wandering the marshes all alone, dying of loneliness.”

Grady got that look on his face, the closed-off look he got lately whenever she mentioned her impending departure, but when he spoke, his voice was threaded through with firm promise. “I won’t let that happen. If his band kicks him out, I’ll bring him into the barn myself, and I’ll work with him until he’s happy in the paddock. You don’t have to worry about him.”

Ella bit back a sigh. It was too late for that. It had been too late before she’d heard anything specific about the dangers that could befall the foal. But she appreciated Grady’s solemn vow more than she could express. “Thank you. That means a lot to me.”

He studied her. “Did something happen tonight? You seem upset.”

“Nothing much. Except my sister is making the biggest mistake of her life.”

Grady’s brows climbed toward his hairline. “What now?”

“When I leave in a few days, I’ll be the only one on the ferry back to the mainland.” It hurt to even form the words in her brain, but Ella forced them out. “Merry’s staying here. She’s quitting her job and moving to Sanctuary Island.”

“Is she?” Grady’s gaze was wary, watchful. “Jo must be happy.”

“Well, as long as Jo’s happy.” Anger coated the back of Ella’s tongue with bitterness.

He shook his head. “I can’t say I’m sorry—not when I wish you’d stay longer, too.”

Ella fisted her hands against the slap of truth. “I wish we’d never come to this stupid island,” she whispered.

The solid heat of his body along her side went statue still, coiled tension and power tightening his jean-clad thighs as Grady moved to stand.

Ella grabbed for his hand just as he pushed off the steps, her heart in her mouth. “I’m sorry,” she cried, feeling wretched as he stared down at her, eyes burning like molten jade on his frozen face. “I didn’t mean that.”

“Sure you did.” His jaw ticked once. “You’ve been up front about it from the beginning. Don’t start lying to spare my feelings now.”

“I’m not!”

He tugged away from her. Ella launched herself off the steps to follow him as he paced down the driveway before turning on her.

“Grady, please.” Ella kept her voice as steady as she could when it felt like everything inside her was twisted into knots.

He looked away from her, his jaw like granite. “Why did you come here tonight?”

The straightforward, uncompromising question rocked Ella back onto her heels. “I guess … because I couldn’t stay in that house. I needed to get out before I broke down and said something Merry and I can’t come back from.”

That brought his stare back to her, and the banked fires in his gaze set Ella’s blood ablaze. “No. That’s not why. And you’re not upset about Merry making a mistake, either.”

Ella blinked. “What?”

“You…” He struggled for a moment, his throat working as he swallowed around the words that tried to escape. “Merry is your family. You’re mad at Jo for stealing Merry away, but she didn’t. They’re both still there. They’re still your family.”

It hit her like a dash of cold water in the face. She shook her head to clear it, but Grady wasn’t done.

“You’re not afraid she’s making a mistake—you’re afraid of being alone. You think if you’re alone, you’ll wither away and die.”

The truth rang like a bell inside her. He was right.

All the breath left her body. He was so fierce and gorgeous in his righteous anger. She blinked, dazzled and dazed. It felt as if she were waking up from a deep sleep.

“Take a look around.” Grady spread his arms out at his sides.
“You’re not alone.”

“I know,” Ella whispered. She must have swallowed some kind of truth serum. “I think I always knew—that’s why I came here tonight. Not to get away from Merry and Jo, but because I needed you. Needed to see you.”

His strong brown throat moved as he swallowed convulsively, knocked sideways by her confession.

Excitement rolled around her chest, warm and tingly. Ella silently vowed to open up and spill her innermost thoughts and feelings more often if it got this kind of response from him.

“I’m right here,” Grady said, low and steady.

*   *   *

Ella looked every bit as wrecked as Grady felt, her eyes huge and shocked in a face as white as a gull’s wing.

Her pale pink mouth worked silently for a second before she let out a muffled little sound and leaned up on her toes, both arms going around his neck.

Grady caught her more by instinct than any sort of romantic smoothness, his mind still churning over the revelations of the past few minutes, but the moment her lips touched his, all thought beyond pure, animal desire flew out of his head.

She was soft and smooth against him, a bundle of nerves and tension that wound tighter and tighter the longer they kissed. Waves of sound crashed and broke in his ears as the blood rushed through his body.

They stumbled into the house, knocking elbows on the door frame and scraping shins on their way up the stairs. Grady was so caught up, lost in the honeysuckle scent of Ella’s hair, the salt-sweet savor of her skin, he couldn’t bring himself to stop touching her long enough to get their clothes off.

In the end, it was Ella who disengaged with a tremulous smile, shuddering breaths heaving her chest against his, and said, “Can I … is it okay if I take your shirt off?”

The ingrained instant of denial was followed quickly by a trickle of warmth. He liked the fact that she’d asked, that she’d seen his scars before and hadn’t run. Maybe it was time for
him
to stop running, let someone catch him.

Gripping the hem of his shirt, Grady held his breath and pulled it off over his head. The cool air of the room hit his skin in a ripple of goose bumps.

He felt naked, even though his pants were definitely still on. He could tell because of the painful constriction around his cramped erection, which hadn’t subsided at all. Apparently, his dick was completely fearless when it came to Ella Preston.

Grady looked down at the first slow, tender touch of Ella’s fingers. She brushed timid fingertips along the lines of his chest, her hand warm and heavy enough not to tickle as it drifted down his side. And the look on her face … Grady had to close his eyes again to avoid climaxing on the spot at the frank, honest desire in Ella’s eyes.

“We’ve been here before,” she murmured. “This time I want to see it all. Show me?”

He tensed, understanding at once. She wanted him to turn around, display the worst of his scars for her, and trust that she wouldn’t be scared off.

“I don’t know if I can yet.” The aching words ground out of him like gravel under truck tires, but Ella only nodded.

“It’s my turn, anyway.” She gave him a particularly female smile, one of those mysterious lady smiles that hinted at secret knowledge, and slowly unbuttoned her black cotton shirt.

The smooth, subtle curves she revealed dried out Grady’s mouth. He found himself licking his lips and staring, as if he could pierce through the scalloped edges of her black bra with the power of X-ray vision.

But he didn’t need to, because Ella twisted an arm behind her back and deftly unhooked the bra, letting it fall to the floor in a flutter of filmy lace seduction.

All of a sudden, Grady could breathe easier.

Okay, he was still breathing pretty hard, but it no longer felt like a boulder was sitting on his chest, crushing his lungs.

They were both naked from the waist up, their skin glowing pale in the yellow light of his ancient bedside lamp, and Grady couldn’t think about the scars that had dominated a corner of his mind since he first woke up in that hospital covered in white bandages.

He could only look at Ella and appreciate the pure, perfect symmetry of her form. The lean, uncomplicated lines of her body, the slope of her ribs and the roundness of her breasts, topped with dark pink nipples that tightened under his gaze.

It wasn’t that the scars no longer mattered—if he blinked, he still pictured them like neon glaring through the darkness—but devouring Ella with his eyes mattered more.

The longer he stared, the more pink she became as a flush spread from the tops of her breasts all the way up her neck and onto her cheeks. Grady’s fingers itched to discover the heat of that blush, the silken grain of her skin.

But before he could touch her, Ella backed up a step with a shaky smile and uncertain eyes. “Your turn.”

Grady froze, and Ella’s eyes went soft and understanding.

“It’s okay,” she said. “You don’t have to. We can just…”

“No.” Grady cut her off with a firm shake of his head. He might not be a daredevil anymore, but he was still a man. He was doing this. They were doing this. Ella had stripped herself bare for him, in more ways than one. He could return the favor. On impulse, he leaned down and stole a quick kiss for luck.

Her lips parted easily beneath his, welcoming him in, and Grady took heart.

With fingers that were remarkably steady, Grady unbuttoned and unzipped his jeans and pushed them down his legs, along with his underwear. His erection was so hard it slapped against his stomach as he straightened up. Ella’s bright eyes went straight to it, hot and needy, but the tough part was still to come.

Pushing out a strengthening breath, Grady turned around and let Ella look her fill.

The muffled gasp from behind him made Grady close his eyes. He knew what she was seeing—an ugly tapestry of red, pink, and white lines scoring up over the left side of his back and hips, ending in a concentrated mass on his left shoulder blade.

It took everything he had, every ounce of the courage he used to take for granted, to stand there in front of her.

Ella sucked in a breath as if she wanted to say something, but no words came. Grady spoke to the blank white wall in front of him, picturing the compassion and empathy on Ella’s beautiful face.

“You were right—they basically had to build me a new shoulder. I’m like Darth Vader, more machine than man, at least on that side.”

“Oh, Grady,” Ella said, sounding as if she’d swallowed something that made her throat hurt.

He shrugged, vividly aware of how the movement tightened and stretched the scars across his shoulders.

The first tentative brush of her warm fingers against his back startled him. No one but doctors, nurses, and physical therapists had touched him there in years. Summoning all his self-discipline, Grady planted his feet and braced himself to endure—but to his shock, the way Ella traced slow lines across the scars seemed to uncoil something inside him, a knot he’d been clutching tightly to himself for a long time.

“I’m glad you got out of that building alive.”

“You know, we didn’t manage to rescue everyone that night. There were casualties from the first explosion, even more from the second. Not everyone made it out alive.”

Grady struggled for a breathless moment, but the thought that was always with him, running under every moment and through every action, spilled out of his mouth.

“Some days, I’m not so sure I made it, either.”

“You did.” Conviction filled her voice, her words hitting his skin like a cleansing rain. “You’re right here, like you said. With me.”

She didn’t say anything more, but her gentle touch said everything Grady could’ve hoped to hear.

Ella was still there. He’d showed her a glimpse of the deepest, darkest part of himself and it hadn’t scared her away.

Facing her was one of the hardest things he’d ever done, but the moment his eyes met Ella’s, he forgot the struggle. He forgot everything but the quiet strength of her, the complete acceptance in her deep blue eyes.