Treasures Lost, Treasures Found

the same room. He’d walked her there before, but then she’d have had her arm through his in that sweet way she had of joining them together. She’d have looked up and laughed at him over something that had happened that day. And she’d have kissed him, warm, long and lingeringly before the door would close behind her.
    Because her thoughts had run the same gamut, Kate turned to him while they were still outside the hotel. “Thank you, Ky.” She made a business out of shifting her purse strap on her arm. “There’s no need for you to go any further out of your way.”
    “No, there isn’t.” He’d have something to take home with him that night, he thought with sudden, fierce impatience. And he’d leave her something to take up to the room where they’d had one long, glorious night. “But then we’ve always looked at needs from different angles.” He cupped his hand around the back of her neck, holding firm as he felt her stiffen.
    “Don’t.” She didn’t back away. Kate told herself she didn’t back away because to do so would make her seem vulnerable. And she was, feeling those long hard fingers play against her skin again.
    “I think this is something you owe me,” he told her in a voice so quiet it shivered on the air. “Maybe something I owe myself.”
    He wasn’t gentle. That was deliberate. Somewhere inside him was a need to punish for what hadn’t been—or perhaps what had. The mouth he crushed on hers hungered, the arms he wrapped around her demanded. If she’d forgotten, he thought grimly, this would remind her. And remind her.
    With her arms trapped between them, he could feel her hands ball into tight fists. Let her hate him, loathe him. He’d rather that than cool politeness.
    But God she was sweet. Sweet and as delicate as one of the frothy waves that lapped and spread along the shoreline. Dimly, distantly, he knew he could drown in her without a murmur or complaint.
    She wanted it to be different. Oh, how she wanted it to be different so that she’d feel nothing. But she felt everything.
    The hard, impatient mouth that had always thrilled andbemused her—it was the same. The lean restless body that fit so unerringly against her—no different. The scent that clung to him, sea and salt—hadn’t changed. Always when he kissed her, there’d been the sounds of water or wind or gulls. That, too, remained constant. Behind them boats rocked gently in their slips, water against wood. A gull resting on pilings let out a long, lonely call. The light dimmed as the sun dropped closer to the sea. The flood of past feelings rose up to merge and mingle with the moment.
    She didn’t resist him. Kate had told herself she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of a struggle. But the command to her brain not to respond was lost in the thin clouds of dusk. She gave because she had to. She took because she had no choice.
    His tongue played over hers and her fists uncurled until Kate’s palms rested against his chest. So warm, so hard, so familiar. He kissed as he always had, with complete concentration, no inhibitions and little patience.
    Time tumbled back and she was young and in love and foolish. Why, she wondered while her head swam, should that make her want to weep?
    He had to let her go or he’d beg. Ky could feel it rising in him. He wasn’t fool enough to plead for what was already gone. He wasn’t strong enough to accept that he had to let go again. The tug-of-war going on inside him was fierce enough to make him moan. On the sound he pulled away from her, frustrated, infuriated, bewitched.
    Taking a moment, he stared down at her. Her look wasthe same, he realized—that half surprised, half speculative look she’d given him after their first kiss. It disoriented him. Whatever he’d sought to prove, Ky knew now he’d only proven that he was still as much enchanted with her as he’d ever been. He bit back an oath, instead, giving her a half-salute as he walked away.
    “Get eight hours of sleep,” he ordered without turning around.

Chapter 4
    S ome mornings the sun seemed to rise more slowly than others, as if nature wanted to show off her particular majesty just a bit longer. When she’d gone to bed, Kate had left her shades up knowing that the morning light would awaken her before the travel alarm beside her bed rang.
    She took the dawn as a gift to herself, something individual and personal. Standing at the window, she watched it bloom. The first quiet breeze of