Sleepwalker (45 page)

She had almost reached him when the sound of her steps on the sandy beach betrayed her, and he turned and saw her.

“Mick!” He smiled, looking so glad to see her that she knew she’d done the right thing, knew she hadn’t imagined what was between them, or exaggerated it, or made more of it than it was.

“Hey.” She was smiling, too, as he took the few steps necessary to reach her, picked her up off her feet, and swung her around. Then he set her back down and kissed her. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back.

And the earth moved on its axis, electricity crackled like lightning, and the air around them turned to steam.

Finally he let her go, and, still holding her hands, stepped back to take a look at her.

“So what brings you out to this neck of the woods, Investigator?”

Mick smiled at him. “Somebody told me I needed to think about taking a vacation.”

“That’s it, huh?”

Her heart was beating way too fast. But she kept it light. “It was snowing in Detroit.”

“So you came here.”

“Silver linings,” she said.

He grinned. Standing there with his black hair shining in the sunlight, his handsome face alight with humor, his tall, broad-shouldered form tanned and muscular in island wear, he looked so wonderful, so familiar and dear, that her breath caught. And she suddenly didn’t feel like keeping it light anymore.

She looked at him very directly. “I’m in love with you,” she said, putting it on the line.

His grin faded, and his eyes turned serious. “I’m in love with you, too.”

Then he pulled her into his arms and kissed her again.

A little later, as they still stood on the beach wrapped in each other’s arms, he whispered in her ear, “Now just think, if I’d chosen some other crook’s house to rob on New Year’s Eve, we wouldn’t be here right now.”

Mick smiled.

Silver linings.

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