“Let’s go this way,” she said as they turned a corner and headed toward the meditation pool.
“I came here with my high school one year and fell in love with this part of the park,” she said as she took his hand and led him down the path.
While the other kids had rushed off to the larger terraced falls where they could wade down the steps to the pool below, she’d found the private meditation pool surrounded by cypress trees as a respite after the noise of the bus crowded with her friends. It was there that she would tell David about her son. Their sons.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” she asked as she led him to a spot where they could sit. The lights had come on across the park and the sun had begun to set as they had walked through the collection of fountains that covered part of the grounds.
“It is,” David said as he sat next to her. “It’s very peaceful.”
She looked around the area to see that very few people were remaining now. Now the time had come, she didn’t know where to start. She decided on the beginning when she’d first seen David in that waiting room over three years ago, or maybe more appropriate was to start with the ending of a young life that was taken too soon from this world.
Sarah turned toward David, noticing that instead of looking at the fountains he was staring at her.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“There’s nothing wrong,” David said as he moved closer to her. “It’s been a great day. There’s only one problem.”
“What problem?” Sarah asked. The only problem she was aware of was the fact that she was sitting talking nonsense with David when she should have been leveling with him.
“Sitting here surrounded by this beautiful park and earlier when we were at the stockyards, the only thing I’ve been able to think about is how much I’d like to kiss you,” David said. While his voice contained a teasing note, there was no laughter in his eyes.
She tried to make her mind concentrate on what he was saying, but all she could think about was the deep longing she could see in eyes that now appeared more of a smoky gray then their usual mix of green. She knew that feeling. She had felt it ever since he had touched her earlier that day as he had laid his warm hand against her. And before, when his innocent touches at the stable had sparked a long-forgotten desire in her.
“I don’t know if it’s the magic of tonight or something more, but I won’t cross that line if you don’t want me to,” David said as once more he rubbed the back of his neck.
Sarah couldn’t believe what David was saying. Did he feel it too? This connection that seemed to flicker to life every time they touched. His touch had sent her hormones into overdrive today, but she had thought it was only her feeling that way. How was she supposed to keep ignoring the desire she felt whenever he was close now that he had admitted his attraction for her?
“It’s okay, Sarah, if you’re not interested in taking things between us any further,” David said as he slid away from her.
Deep inside her a desire that had lain dormant protested against his withdrawal. She felt torn between what her body wanted and what her heart was telling her. She hadn’t been kissed since the morning she had kissed her husband goodbye for the last time as she had left for work. Even now with her body driving her to say yes, she felt the fear of the unknown bearing down on her.
But it’s only a kiss...one kiss. Would it be so bad to let yourself feel what it’s like to be alive for just one moment?
“Yes,” she said, the word coming out loud as it seemed to echo across the park. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Yes, I’d like you to kiss me.”
She felt stupid as she knotted her hands together in her lap. Could she feel any more awkward? She’d shared kisses only with Kolton and she wasn’t sure what it was that she was supposed to do right now. Then David moved in closer to her, closer than he had been earlier and everything suddenly felt okay. This was David, a man who she knew she could trust.
He hesitated a moment, then bent down and brushed his lips across hers before pulling back from her. His eyes opened and suddenly her own body was lit with the same fire she saw reflected in David’s eyes. The force of the desire that claimed her body had her wanting to take a step back, but the need that David had kindled with just one small kiss held her in place.
He pressed his lips against hers again, this time teasing until they parted for him. His tongue met hers and her breath caught. When his arms came up around her, she instinctively moved into them. She forgot the park, the water, the night sky that surrounded them now. There were only the two of them, their bodies straining to be closer. What had started as a simple kiss was quickly turning into much more.
Then she remembered why she’d brought him here.
Pulling away from him, she straightened her clothes. What had just happened? It had been a long time since she had been kissed, but even that couldn’t explain the way that kiss had made her feel. She had come here to tell David of her memory of that night in the waiting room and about her donating Cody’s organs and now instead, she had just complicated things even more. She
