mind, I could write in hieroglyphics. “We’re in the middle of the desert.”
“You asked.”
Not that it had ever occurred to me she might say no. “What are you doing? I thought you were just going to say ‘a nice dinner’ or something.”
“This is payback. For all the women you sweet-talked with a line or batted those eyes or flexed one of your gorgeous pecs at, and they just melted into your bed. Sweet, sweet payback.” She put her head back on her seat, giggling. “Just admit that not even the legendary Brynner Carson can fix everything, and we can go eat Bambi.”
“Bambi,” I said through gritted teeth, “was a deer. Which are also tasty.” Fine. She wanted a boat ride in the middle of the desert? I’d give her one.
We drove nearly two hours to the reservoir, stopping only for Grace to grab a change of clothes in a department store, while I ran to a bank to withdraw money. It turns out “I’d like to rent your boat for the night, here’s thirty-thousand dollars” will get you a nice boat, a cabin cruiser with bunks for eight. Such a ship belonged on the sea.
Once I’d gotten us pushed out from the dock, onto the lake, Grace tapped me on the shoulder. “You forgot to ask about dinner.”
“Come again?” I hadn’t forgotten. I just didn’t eat on boats because if I ate dinner, I’d lose my dinner.
She stood up on tiptoes and whispered in my ear, “I want cannelloni. On the boat.”
I just about pulled my hair out. “Couldn’t you have told me that before we got in the water?”
“You didn’t ask. This is for every woman you ever ordered for without checking the menu.” Grace patted me on the back and took a seat in her deck chair. She’d changed into a sleeveless top and white shorts, with a wide brim straw hat.
“Those women liked what I ordered them. I never had one complaint, ever.” Finding an Italian place where I could bribe the delivery guy to meet me at the dock took another hour and a half. As I finished the order, a terrible fear came over me. “Grace.”
She took off her sun hat and turned to look. “Yes?”
“What kind of wine do you like?”
Her mouth dropped open in a perfect O. “Chardonnay, please. You’re learning.”
I was. And I wasn’t done yet. “Grace.”
When she twisted those sleek white shoulders to look at me, I seriously considered tossing her off the boat, innocent look and all. “Yes?”
“Dessert?”
She put a hand to her chin, thinking. “Cheesecake, please. With chocolate drizzle.”
Never let it be said a Carson couldn’t learn his lesson.
She ate on the deck, then we cruised the reservoir for hours so Grace could lean out at the bow and feel the wind on her face. When the moon rose, I dragged a couple of mattresses up on deck to lie on and look at the stars.
And I wondered how I’d missed this in life. Why I only found this here, now. But at least it was real. After midnight, I rose and went downstairs to get a blanket for Grace. When I turned from the bed, she was standing on the stairs. “You forgot something.”
I sighed, counting the steps to the deck. Yeah, I could carry her up and toss her in the water in ten seconds flat. The Virgin Mary herself wouldn’t blame me at that point. In fact, she might give me a hand with Grace’s feet. “What is it? Just tell me.”
She stepped down the last step and pressed herself body close. “Make love to me.”
“But—”
She covered my lips with hers, then took a breath. “Less talk. More sex.”
I dropped the blanket I’d been holding, folded my arms around her, one hand at the base of her back, the other caressing the line of her chin, and kissed her.
One kiss, or many, it began and ended, stopped and started in between breaths, until Grace turned her head, and tickled my earlobe with her tongue. She held on to my hips, keeping me close enough to feel each shift of her body as she rocked against me.
I buried my nose in her hair, breathing in the scent of sweat and perfume, deodorant and desire, and cautiously placed a hand on her breast, rubbing the side swell from the top of her shoulder and circling her nipple.
And she shuddered, her body going rigid against me for just a moment. And then her hand slipped lower, tugging at my