“That has a mind of its own. I don’t always listen.”

Mary’s hand dropped to his thigh. She nodded over the side. “The water’s kinda chilly, you know . . . if you need to cool off.” The woman loved to tease him.

Instead of asking the crew to lower the sail, he took Mary by the waist, not allowing her to put that damn wrap back on, and slid her close. “I have a better idea. How about you sit right here until this goes away so I don’t embarrass myself.”

She snuggled close. “Sometimes it’s nice to be a girl. We can be turned on and no one knows it.”

He glanced down the length of her body and let his fingers resting at her side squeeze her hip. “Your nipples are straining . . . and it’s not cold out here.”

He kept her arm from crossing over her chest. “Oh, no you don’t.”

“I am cold,” she told him.

“That was a lie.”

She shivered, but there wasn’t an inch of gooseflesh on her exposed skin.

Chapter Thirteen

Mary woke from her dream still feeling the roll of the ocean under her from the day she’d spent on the water with Glen. And she was aroused. Painfully.

They’d returned to the harbor, caught the charter back to the mainland, where they’d enjoyed a casual dinner before he drove her home.

He walked her to the door and kissed her like a lovestruck teenage kid, his hands just shy of rounding all the bases, before his strangled words ended their night.

And Mary, as improper as she could be at times, didn’t take matters into her own hands and pull him inside. Instead, she waved good-bye and ended the night with a cold shower of her own.

Only now, at two in the morning, she was hot and awake and completely frustrated. She flipped her pillow to the cool side, pounded it with her fist, and forced her thoughts away from the man whose smile made her body weep.

“I’m going to have a talk with that man if he doesn’t step up!” Dakota’s words first thing in the morning would have been appreciated if they weren’t being delivered so early.

“And what exactly would you say?”

Dakota was moving around really well on the crutches. Walt and Leo were having a little father/son time bonding on a Sunday morning so Dakota could get the weekend scoop at the crack of dawn.

“I’d tell him that you are not the one to make the first move.”

“I can make the first move.”

Dakota deflated that with a stare.

“I could if I wanted to.”

“How long have we known each other?” Dakota asked.

“Six years.”

“And how many times in those six years have you made the first move?”

She cringed. “I was raised by nuns.”

“It’s a wonder—”

“Oh my God, I forgot to tell you,” Mary interrupted her. “Mary Frances is dating.”

Dakota’s jaw dropped.

“I know! That’s exactly what my reaction was. Dating, Dakota. Like having coffee and pie with a widower.”

“Pie the night before and coffee in the morning kind of dating?”

Mary couldn’t help but wonder if it was her BFF’s influence that had her asking the same question earlier in the week.

“She denied that.”

“You asked her?”

“I was stunned. I asked her all kinds of things I probably shouldn’t have.”

“I wanna meet him,” Dakota announced. “What kind of guy dates an ex-nun? How old is Mary Frances?”

“Fifty-eight.”

“That’s not that old.”

“I know.”

Dakota dropped a hand over Mary’s. “She’s probably a fifty-eight-year-old virgin.”

That put things in a different perspective. “What a sad thought.”

“Tell me about the guy.”

Mary didn’t leave out one detail.

Glen didn’t call from twenty-five thousand feet, he texted instead. Your wrap was in the Jeep. Truth was, he’d “accidentally” left it on the floor when he’d handed her back her bag. He felt a little like a panty snatcher when he’d curled the material in his hand and smelled her most of the night.

You should probably toss it in the wash.

That is NOT going to happen.

It smells like suntan lotion.

It smells like you.

There was a dot, dot, dot on the screen, until finally . . . I like the image that jumped into my head.

So did he. I have to check my schedule about next weekend. When is a good time to call on Mondays?

Before two. Call my cell.

We’ll talk tomorrow.

Fly safe.

I always do, sweetheart.

“I’m leaving him.” Nina Golf sat across from Mary with her hands folded firmly in her lap, dark-rimmed sunglasses hiding the emotion in her eyes. “I can’t do this anymore.”

None of this was news to Mary, she’d seen it coming for months. Instead of saying those things out loud, she sat back and waited to see if Nina was going to open herself up.

“He’s too demanding. And crazy. He’s been over the edge ever since I started staying at Bev’s place.”

“Beverly is your single girlfriend?”

“Right.” Nina paused. “Just because she’s single doesn’t mean we’re out trolling for men every night. It isn’t like that.”

Mary waited . . .

“Jacob calls me a slut. I’m his wife. He shouldn’t call me names.”