Born Wild

there with you after,” hiccup, “I nearly drowned!”

“You don’t have to go down there with me. I can do it on my own, and—”

“Th-that’s not it,” she cried. “I’m n-n-not supposed to be scared of the water. It’s my,” hiccup, “my job!” Turning to wrap her arms around his neck, she choked on another sob when he immediately hugged her close. Hugged her up all tight and secure against his warm, solid chest, instinctively trying to sooth her, protect her. Being so nice. Being…Billy.

Oh, God! What had she done? Why hadn’t she been tougher twelve years ago? Why hadn’t she told her father to go screw himself when he kept after her about Blake? If she had, she’d have never betrayed Billy and she wouldn’t be in this mess right now. If she’d only remained strong, remained true, her whole life would be different.

What was that old chaos theory about a butterfly flapping its wings and setting into motion a series of events that resulted in a hurricane? Well, her decision to submit to her father’s wishes was like the flapping of that butterfly’s wings. And now she was experiencing the hurricane. She wished, oh, how she wished she could blame it on something or someone else, but it had been her decision, so this was all her fault…

And, holy cow, she was so tired. So tired. And so scared. And so unbelievably sorry for…for everything.

“Okay,” Billy murmured next to her ear, his deep voice calm and capable-sounding. “You’re not really scared of the water. You’re just exhausted.” She opened her mouth to refute his claim but snapped it shut when she realized he might be right. She was exhausted. Exhausted and defeated. “Which means you’re going straight to bed.”

“Wh-what about the rope?” she asked.

“In case you’ve forgotten, I’m a highly trained Navy SEAL. This little problem is exactly that. A little problem. And once I take care of it, by myself,” he stressed, “everything will be perfectly fine.”

Perfectly fine. Ha! Was he delusional? Nothing was perfectly fine. Everything was perfectly wretched, and see! Defeated. She was completely defeated. Which was…pathetic. And so not the kind of woman she’d been working hard to become.

Another wracking sob shook her shoulders despite her best efforts to hold it back, and Billy held her tighter.

“Hey now,” he crooned. “It’s okay. I know things look really bad and everything feels really disastrous right now. But you just need some good, solid sleep. You’ll feel better in the morning. Things will look better in the morning. I promise.”

She tried to nod. Unfortunately the gesture just elicited a wet-sounding whimper.

You are such a loser, Eve! A pathetic, wimpy, spineless, pathetic loser. Did I mention pathetic?

“All right,” he said. “I can see we’ve reached an impasse here. So, up you go.” He bent to wrap an arm beneath her knees, then hoisted her up against his chest with the ease of the supremely fit.

“I can w-walk,” she protested, her nose buried in the crook of this wonderfully solid shoulder.

“Shh,” he murmured, turning sideways so he could squeeze them down the stairs leading to the small cabin. “I know you can walk, sweetheart. You can do whatever you set your mind to.” No. No, she couldn’t. Because she’d set her mind to winning him back, but so far she’d managed diddly-squat. Sure, he was being nice to her now, but that’s only because she was having some sort of nervous breakdown and he was Billy. Loyal Billy. Courageous Billy. Trustworthy Billy. Sweet Billy. Kicking someone when they were down wasn’t in his nature. But that didn’t change the fact that her betrayal had cut him so deeply that even now, all these years later, he still had a hard time even agreeing to be her friend.

Maybe…Someday…The two words he’d mumbled back in BKI’s onsite gym tumbled through her head like a couple of hot, thorny boulders, making her tears flow faster.

See? A loser! A sorry, pathetic loser!

“Come on, Eve,” he begged. Peripherally she knew he was shuffling past the compact galley and the small table and booth toward the lone berth. “You’ve got to stop that. You’re breaking my heart.”

Oh, great. As if she hadn’t done enough of that already!

“I’m s-s-sorry!” she wailed, now crying so hard her bones were rattling, so hard her lungs felt like they were trying to crawl out of her throat. “I never wanted to-to hurt you!”

“I know, sweetheart,” he said, gently placing her on the mattress, dragging a pillow under her head and flipping one side of the blue and green coverlet over her. “I know you didn’t. Just take a couple of breaths, okay? Can you do that for me?”

Could she do that for him? Was he serious? If asked her to jump off the John Hancock building, she’d happily pioneer unassisted human flight. But he wasn’t asking her to jump off the John Hancock building, was he? He was only asking her to calm down, to take some breaths. Which she could do. Which she would do…

Fighting with everything she had, fighting for him like she should have fought for him years ago, she raked in a couple of ragged breaths through her stuffy nose. Then sucked in another through her mouth for good measure. It helped. Miraculously, her lungs once more settled into her chest. But when she raised her eyes to Billy’s face, she had to bite her lip to keep from losing it all over again.

His intent brown eyes—his beautiful brown eyes—watched her with care and kindness and…and sympathy. Holy Mother Mary, a sob the size of Lake Michigan itself threatened to choke her. But she held it back.

“I-I’m okay,” she sputtered, her stomach quivering so hard she thought she’d be sick. By the way he twisted his lips—his beautiful lips—it was obvious he didn’t believe her. “Really,” she assured him, her breath hitching only slightly this time. “R-really I am.”

“You’ve always been a terrible liar,” he told her, smiling gently. And his expression was so warm. So warm and understanding and…and his nearness…all that tan skin covered in all those star tattoos was overwhelmingly intoxicating, and—

“B-Billy, please,” she begged him for…what? To take pity on her? To love her? To make love to her.

And just the thought had everything inside her screeching to a halt. Except for her heart. Her heart was pounding against her ribs so fiercely she was surprised her oversized T-shirt wasn’t fluttering.

“That’s better,” he said, mistaking her stillness for calmness. Lord knew she was anything but calm. Because her grief and fear and sense of defeat had morphed into something else, something she’d been told grief and fear and defeat often morphed into, though she’d never experienced the phenomenon herself.

The French referred to it so eloquently as convoitise de la chair. But in the far more suburban English it was known simply as…lust…

And how was that possible? How could a mental switch just flip like that?

“I’m going to run up, cut that rope from the propeller, reset the auto-pilot, and then make us some PB and Js,” he said, reaching forward to squeeze her knee. The touch of his big palm—his hands were rough from years loading and cleaning weapons, arming and disarming explosives, battle-hardened hands, if you will—set her on fire as surely as a lit match touching a pool of kerosene.

“O-okay,” she told him, licking her suddenly dry lips.

“Okay,” he repeated, offering her a wink that caused his thick lashes to cast a faint shadow on his cheek.

When he turned to shuffle back down the length of the cabin, she pushed up on one elbow to watch him go, her breaths coming short and fast. The muscles of his broad back bunched beside the deep divot of his spine, his big, sturdy shoulders rolled slightly with each step, and his butt? Well, not to put it too crudely, but his mama must’ve been a baker because holy smokes did she ever make the perfect set of buns!

Geez Louise and praise be to good genetics and squat thrusts!

Thrusts. Gulp. Just the word brought to mind carnal images. Images of Billy above