“Enjoying the view?” he inquired lightly, not the least bit embarrassed by her blatant inspection.
Gracie, however, was humiliated at being caught. She tried feigning innocence. “Excuse me?”
“I asked if you were enjoying the view.”
“Um, sure,” she mumbled. “The water’s lovely this time of day.”
He glanced at her with that same tolerant amusement she found so infuriating. “Darlin’, if you were looking at the water, you’d know a storm’s brewing. It’s choppy as the dickens out there.”
She glanced at the Potomac. Sure enough, it was churning with whitecapped waves. “So it is,” she acknowledged. “If a storm’s rolling in, I guess you’d better hurry home before it breaks.”
“I’m not scared of a little thunder and lightning.” He peered intently at her. “Are you?”
“Of course not,” she denied a little too vehemently, unable to hide the shudder that washed over her.
His eyes widened. “You are, aren’t you?”
“I said I wasn’t.”
“It’s just a little bowling going on up in the heavens,” he offered.
Gracie wasn’t going to be placated with that particular tale. She’d heard that one and more as she’d cowered in her bed as a child with the blankets pulled over her head. For reasons she’d never been able to fathom, storms had always terrified her. It was a weakness she hated in herself and wasn’t about to admit to.
“I’ll protect you,” Kevin promised, just as the first rumble of thunder sounded in the distance.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, feigning nonchalance. “It’s just a silly old thunderstorm.”
“Then why did you just turn white as a sheet?”
“Must have been something in the coffeecake.”
“Gracie, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about. Everybody’s scared of something. Storms shake up a lot of people.”
“I am not scared,” she protested, then shivered unmistakably when lightning slashed through the rapidly darkening sky. The air was charged with electricity. She could practically taste it in the air, feel it in the prickling of her skin. She quickened her pace. She really, really wanted to be safely inside when this sucker broke, preferably inside a windowless closet.
Kevin kept pace with her easily over the last block, but instead of dashing for his car as the first scattered fat drops of rain fell, he followed her inside.
“You don’t have to stay,” Gracie insisted. “I’ll be fine.”
“You have any wine?” he asked, ignoring her protest.
“In the wine rack in the pantry,” she said, more grateful than she liked that he wasn’t leaving despite her protests.
“Candles?”
She chuckled. “I’m glad to see your priorities are in order. First wine, then candles.”
“Where are they, sweetface?”
She couldn’t recall for the life of her. “I think I saw some in the drawer by the stove.”
He rummaged around in there for a minute, then held up a package of birthday candles. “I doubt these will last long. What about an oil lamp?”
She should have remembered that in the first place. After the first storm of the season, which had caught her off guard and lasted less than an hour, she’d searched high and low until she found one so it would be ready for the next such occasion. “In the living room.”
“Any oil in it?”
“Yes. I saw to that right away.”
“Matches?”
“Right beside it. There’s a flashlight there, too.”
“Good.”
She worried over the implications of all the preparations. “Kevin, are you expecting the power to go out?”
“It’s not a given, but I wouldn’t bet against it.”
Gracie sighed.
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll be right here. We’ll be safe and cozy. Do you have any cards?”
“Cards?”
“You know, playing cards. It’s either that or cuddling on the sofa.”
She trembled at the choice, almost opted for the more dangerous one, the one that guaranteed the storm outside would pass by unnoticed. Eventually, though, common sense ruled. “I’ll hunt for cards.”
Kevin grinned. “Too bad. Cuddling’s a lot more distracting, especially if it leads to something more.”
Oh, yes, Gracie thought. She’d bet her dream house on that. She practically tore the kitchen apart looking for a deck of cards. She finally found an old, grease-stained poker deck in the back of a drawer.
They were playing their first hand when the rain began in earnest. This wasn’t the soft rain of spring. It was a hard, driving rain, accompanied by increasingly loud crashes of thunder and brighter slashes of lightning.
The power went a half hour later with a cracking sound, the explosion of a nearby transformer, Kevin assessed. Though it was still daylight—or should have been—the sky was so dark with rolling clouds, it could have been late evening.
Even so, Kevin laid down his next bet before getting the oil lamp and lighting it. The man had the concentration and competitive instincts of a cardsharp.
“Where’d you learn to play like this?” Gracie asked when she lost the fifth straight hand, either because the cards were all falling his way or because she wasn’t paying nearly enough attention to the ones she’d been dealt.
“Family hobby,” Kevin said, dealing the next hand.
“You come from a family of poker players?”
“It’s not a career, darlin’. Like I said, it’s a hobby.” He gestured toward the pile of cards in front of her. “Pick up your hand.”
Gracie picked up the cards and looked them over, then discarded two, accepting two more in return. Nothing, absolutely nothing. Not even a piddly little pair. Even so, she bet to win. Kevin wasn’t fooled. He raised her bet.
“Do you all take your hobbies so seriously?” she asked.
“Yep,” he said, as he spread a full house onto the table and raked in yet another pot.
“Do you think it’s fair, then, to be taking advantage of a rank amateur?”
“Absolutely. I almost never win at home. Those people play for blood. Took me for five bucks and change the other night.”
Gracie grinned. “That much, huh?
