Conquer the Memories

pulse suddenly erratically beating in his throat. Sonia was that power, and her feminine games had been driving him nuts. Tease and withdraw, tease and withdraw-they’d never played those kind of games with each other. Sonia was very subtle and had never played such immature tricks as trying to make him jealous of her former beaux. Exhibitionism. Chase. Tease.

If she thought she was actually getting away with something, she was terribly…right. Every male nerve ending would have been delighted to explode very early last night. All night long, he’d felt on the fragile edge of violence.

And this morning, if her choices of bulky T-shirt and sweatband were supposed to calm anyone-in-particular’s raging libido, they had certainly failed. Her breasts were well buried and her fanny hidden…and neither had anything to do with the essential desirability of Sonia. She was terribly mistaken if she thought they did.

“Craig? You’re up. I thought you’d sleep in this morning.” Sonia felt her heart skip a beat at the look of her husband bearing down on her like a great sleepy brown bear. Well. Not sleepy. She smiled a little uncertainly at the oddly intense expression radiating from his eyes, and then turned away. “Just sit down, you. I have a terrific breakfast planned. Melon, then ham and eggs…Won’t take more than a minute-it’s almost ready. Coffee and juice first…”

She whipped a steaming mug on the counter in front of him, then a small glass of orange juice.

“You’re up early,” he commented, as he slid onto the cushioned stool.

“The salt air,” she said breezily.

“And then, you went to sleep early last night, didn’t you?”

Such an innocuous question. Amazing that she felt instantly uneasy. “Um. Yes.” She turned quickly. The eggs were all whisked in a bowl, but she had yet to add pepper and cheese.

“You were extremely tired.”

“I certainly was,” she agreed, and whisked harder.

“Yet you seemed so wide awake. After our swim.”

The air in the cabin was stifling, surprising when the windows were all open and the morning was still cool. Craig’s voice was mild. Teasing, really. There was no reason to get nervous, she told herself. She’d woken up nervous enough. One could play with fire only so long…and then it had miraculously occurred to her that she could get burned as well. She had in mind starting out the day low-key, easy and…safe. Safe meaning attire that couldn’t possibly be a turn-on.

“Sleepiness just seemed to creep up on me all at once,” she said hurriedly, and bounced a fork and knife on the counter, tossing Craig a quick glance before pivoting back to the stove. That man had gorgeous shoulders. The hair on his chest curled every which way; it always had. And his eyes were very blue-too blue, too damned blue-for this early in the morning. She grabbed the spatula. “We’ve got a thousand things to do today.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Fishing, for one. We’ve got all the gear. And Mr. Bartholomew went on and on about the fish in these waters. Marlin and sailfish and snapper, even barracuda once we move out a little deeper. You know, though…” She slid his eggs on a plate and set it in front of him. “I wouldn’t mind a nice red snapper for dinner. Sailfish are another thing. I don’t want to risk catching one-every single time I see one mounted I get sick. They’re so beautiful…”

“Sit down, honey. If you don’t want breakfast yourself, at least have a cup of coffee.”

“I forgot your melon.”

“Sit.”

She perched obediently on the cushioned stool next to him, hugged her coffee mug in her hands and smiled brightly. Her husband was sending out calming, soothing vibrations. Which was very strange, because she felt increasingly unnerved. “If you don’t want to go fishing, we can explore the shore of the cove. We could take the dinghy. I’ll row in, you can row back,” she remarked magnanimously.

“You’ll row with the surf, and I fight the battle against the tide on the way back?”

“And if you’re really good, I’ll even let you make the picnic lunch.”

“One of us,” Craig mentioned, “is in an awfully lazy mood this morning.”

“Exactly,” Sonia agreed impishly. “We can gather shells and swim and lie around in the sand. There are palm trees out there just waiting to provide a little shade. Now, it may be the coast of Texas, but who’s carrying an atlas? It looks like the shoreline of a nice little deserted Pacific island.”

Craig chuckled, pushing back his plate. He turned and swung his leg around, hooking his bare foot on the rung of her stool. He watched as Sonia ever so unobtrusively tried to shift away from any physical contact, but between his leg and the teak bar she had nowhere to go.

That very small effort at withdrawal from her aroused a very pure, very basic, very male instinctive response in him. The same instinct that had nearly driven him over the edge the night before. His jeaned calf rubbed against Sonia’s bare one, and his wife’s chatter accelerated just slightly, like the increased rev of a motor.

“If you don’t want to do any of that, we could snorkel. There’s equipment in that locker on deck.”

“Yes,” he agreed.

“You’re supposed to be able to see all kinds of fish and things in the shallow waters.”

“Yes.”

Sonia could feel his eyes on her lips and throat and felt another dozen of her nerve endings zoom to life. He shouldn’t be looking at her like that now, for heaven’s sake. Couldn’t he see she was dressed like a derelict? And she was not going to succumb to those damn eyes. Not if he had in mind more one-sided loving. She had several days of specific activities planned to ensure that his libido was hot-wired solely on his own behalf.

Furthermore, she had the sneaky feeling he was deliberately trying to make conversation difficult. With utmost grace, she stood up, only to find that his other foot had captured the rung on the opposite side of her. She was pinned in. “I’ll do the dishes now,” she said cheerfully.

“In a minute. Finish your coffee.”

Her bottom despondently plopped back down on the stool. Nothing was going well. “Which would you like to do?” she asked brightly.

“The choices are fishing and snorkeling and picnicking on the beach in the cove?”

She picked up her mug, nodding. “Actually, we could probably do them all. We’re up early.”

“Very early,” he agreed.

His tone was still mild. One would think he was trying to soothe a fractious kitten. Sonia was not soothed. She took another hurried sip of coffee. “And if you don’t want to do any of those things-”

“I think you’re in the mood for a very busy day.”

She nodded, much more happily. It was the first sign that he was going to prove…tractable. “We take vacations so rarely. We may as well take advantage of every minute.”

“I agree.” Craig set down his mug. “We should take advantage of every minute. And I think we should do everything on your list. Tomorrow. Today we’re already busy.”

Her eyebrows lifted in surprise. “We’re already-?”

“We’re going to spend this day in bed, Sonia.”

A few drops of her coffee decided to leap right out of her cup. Craig took a napkin to mop it up.

“Finish your coffee, honey,” he said gently. He made every effort to keep his voice calm and soothing. It didn’t seem to be working. Sonia was both nervous and clearly…not in the mood. Huge green-blue eyes peered at him over her coffee cup.

His ethical system flew out the window. His unbudgeable, rocklike, irrefutable ethical system. No one and nothing had ever made Craig do anything he believed wasn’t right. And as much as he adored his Sonia, she was going to have to get in the mood. Two months of abstinence had just, very simply, combusted inside him with all the docility of nuclear fission.

Did he mean what she hoped he meant? Was he thinking of his pleasure for a welcome change?

Sonia licked dry lips. “Listen…”

“Finish your coffee. I want to go to bed.”

Rapidly, she raised the cup to her lips again. A disgraceful feeling of utter elation was trying to swamp her.