Suddenly Kendall didn’t care if anyone saw them. The fact that they were close enough to hear people partying on the beach only made it hotter as Alex wedged his hands beneath her ass and dragged his tongue over her as if savoring her taste. She laced her fingers through his hair and arched up to meet his mouth. “Anyone could walk over.”
“Yeah,” he rumbled against her clit. “And they’d think I’m the luckiest bastard in the world to get to taste your sweet pussy.”
She moaned. “Alex.”
“Would you make me stop?”
It took her several long seconds to understand the question. “If someone sees us?”
He held her gaze as he gave her pussy another long lick. “Yeah. If they walked up, would you make me stop?”
“No.” She spread her legs wider. “No, I wouldn’t. I don’t want you to ever stop.”
“I won’t. Not until you come for me again.”
And then there was no more talking. He drove her pleasure higher with a ruthlessness Alex had never displayed before. Kendall could do nothing but cling to him and the hammock and let him take her for this ride. He shoved her into an orgasm that bowed her back and had her clamping her hand over her mouth to keep from crying out. Too good. Everything with him was too good. It defied explanation.
He rested his forehead against her stomach, breathing just as hard as she was. “Have dinner with me.”
She blinked up at the sunlight filtering through the trees overhead. “I had dinner with you last night.”
“I don’t mean like that. I mean…” He took a slow inhale and an even slower exhale. “Considering our circumstances, it seems weird as shit to ask you out on a date, but that’s what I’m doing.”
A date.
Now was the time to reestablish boundaries, to remind them both that this could never last past the point when the ship docked in New York again. That the only reasonable and realistic outcome ended with them back in their respective lives with absolutely no overlap. That even trying long distance just set them both up for angst and heartbreak.
There was only one problem.
She didn’t feel like being reasonable right now. She wanted the fantasy Alex wove around her. More, she wanted time with him. All the time with him she could possibly have. “Yes. I’d love to have a date with you.”
He carefully retied her swimsuit bottoms and held out a hand. “Let’s start now.”
* * *
Alex wasn’t sure what he intended when he told Kendall they’d start their date now, but he hadn’t expected to end up on a pair of kayaks out in the water inside of twenty minutes. It wasn’t that he had a problem with water. He didn’t. He just had a problem with all the shit that lived in water. But she’d grinned at him and he’d been completely incapable of saying no.
“What’s your grandfather like?”
He paddled steadily, keeping pace with her as she sent her kayak coasting across the top of the water. “He’s a cranky old bastard, but he’s one of the best men I’ve ever known.” Alex could just leave it at that, but he found himself elaborating. “My parents weren’t a good match. Shouldn’t have been together. Sure as fuck shouldn’t have procreated. Their marriage imploded when I was a kid and my mom took off right after. My dad lasted until I was thirteen, but he never planned on staying in Dawson’s Creek. Pop is his dad and he took me in. It wasn’t easy on either of us, but we figured it out eventually.”
He very carefully didn’t look at her. Pity was the last thing he wanted, and Kendall had too good a heart not to feel it for the kid he’d been. Abandoned by both his parents. If it wasn’t for Pop, Alex would have ended up on a bad road, a thousand times worse than the wild years he’d had while he was acting out. At least he’d had a safety net in place. A lot of kids who shared similar situations didn’t even have that.
“My parents died when I was nine.”
That got his attention. They both stopped paddling and he finally looked at her. No pity in those green eyes. Just a deep understanding, a shared trauma. “I’m sorry.”
“I ended up in a similar situation to you—my grandmother took over. And I had my sisters even if none of us ever quite fit into the small town I grew up in. Except maybe Gretchen. I think she could fit in anywhere. She’s one of those stories that shouldn’t be real. Still in love with her high school sweetheart after nearly fifteen years, married for ten of them.”
There were times when he was younger when he would have killed to have a sibling. Someone who lived through the same shit, someone who would have his back no matter what. It wasn’t until Alex got older that he realized not all sibling relationships were healthy. He’d survived and flourished despite his background. If there were more of them, no telling if his theoretical siblings would have done the same.