the rock. Bending her knees, she squatted at the edge, moving easily in her usual baggy uniform, this time a pair of carpenter’s pants three sizes too big and a long-sleeved T-shirt that could have fit him.
He hunkered beside her, taking in the little world created by the low tide. Sea stars, a scuttling hermit crab, little silver fish he couldn’t name. Colorful anemones were doing their thing, waving their tentacles as a way to draw their prey toward their mouths.
“Oops! Watch out!” a voice called from behind them, and they both turned, just in time to avoid a collision with a bowlegged toddler chasing a rubber ball. The red orb landed in the tide pool with a splash, and Gage saved the kidlet from taking the same path by hooking an arm around the little boy’s waist.
“Thank you,” said a woman, a mere breath behind him. Her hair was the same auburn as the child’s and she immediately plucked him from Gage’s hold. “Jamie! You need to listen to Mommy,” she scolded her son, who was practicing for teenhood by pretending she didn’t exist. “Thank you,” she repeated, then thanked Skye, too, who retrieved the ball from the water and handed it over.
“Adorable,” Gage commented, watching as the young mother headed off, the little guy on her hip.
“Which one?”
He frowned at Skye, but she was back to perusing the tide pool. “I don’t look at every woman as possible...date material. I was talking about the boy.”
“I guess I didn’t suspect you thought much about little kids.”
“I’ve got three nephews and a niece. I like them a lot.”
She glanced at him. “But you don’t want children of your own.”
“I’d be a piss-poor parent, what with all the travel and the nature of the job,” Gage said. “What about you?”
With careful footsteps, she picked her way over to the next pool. “I had the best childhood ever, here at the cove. Sure, I wanted to pass that on.”
Wanted. Past tense. Gage walked up behind her, giving in to the urge to run his palm along the warm surface of her sleek, long braid. “But not now?”
She crouched low, still looking into the water and not at him. “Maybe if I could make babies like sea anemones. Some of them just divide in half to reproduce.”
“Well, shoot. That takes all the fun out of it.”
“If you say so.” She ran her fingertips over the surface of the pool, then released a little sigh. “I wish...”
He hunkered beside her again, and made another near-ghostly pass at her braid. She twitched a little but didn’t protest. “You wish?” he prompted.
“I’d like to feel normal again,” she confessed under her breath. Then her already pink cheeks went red from embarrassment as she flicked him a glance. “Forget I said that, okay?”
“Why? Of course you’d like to feel normal again.” He hesitated, wondering if now was the time to bring up a maybe-touchy subject. “Skye...I’d like to help.”
“What?” She shot him a second glance.
“I’d like to help you get over your...aversion.”
Her color deepened. “I wasn’t begging for a volunteer.”
“It’s an offer. An offer to see if I can help you past this.”
“I don’t need your pity,” she said, shaking her head.
“That’s not what I feel for you, Skye.” What he did feel was tenderness, consideration and...and an odd, almost vital need. Maybe it was arrogant of him, but he thought he could do something for her. He needed to try to do something for her.
“What would you get out of it?” she grumbled.
“I liked kissing you.”
Now she stared straight into the tide pool as if it held the mysteries of the universe...or because it was a convenient way to avoid his eyes. “You told me you wouldn’t do that again.”
“I said it would have to be your idea,” he corrected. “But let’s take kissing off the table for now. Just come back with me to No. 9. I have something there you should see.”
“Is it porn? I never liked porn.”
He laughed. “No, it’s not porn. Your opinion of me is very low, by the way. I don’t pull out the porn until the third, maybe fourth date.”
When she rolled her eyes, he laughed again and then curled his fingers around her elbow to lift her to her feet. “What do you have to lose?”
“My self-respect.”
He bent close to her ears. “Or your self-restraint. Give yourself a chance to let go a little, Skye.” His fingers went to work on the band at the end of her