Page 18 of Forged By Sacrifice

When we got out several yards from the boat, Mac stopped and motioned for me to do the same. We did the minimum that was necessary to float, and pretty soon, I could see the turtles moving down below in the clear water. Most were about the size of a toddler, but some were smaller. Some were cruising around the bottom. Some swimming. It shouldn’t have felt like a life-changing experience, and yet it almost was. Like the Earth had rotated into a new position around me. Like I’d learned something spectacular when I’d actually learned nothing.

We watched for a while, and then Mac flipped over onto his back, floating, looking up at the clear sky. I joined him. The blue of the sky was faded and pale compared to the sea around us—almost white—making me miss my contacts that were almost this same pale shade. We’d left so quickly this morning that I hadn’t put any of them in.

Eventually, the coolness of the water started to take over the heat of my body, and I shivered. I flipped over and headed back toward the boat. When I pulled myself out of the water, Mac was right behind me. I grabbed my towel, rubbing away some of the water. I looked up to see he was watching me; the way my hands and the towel traced over my body, and I froze in the midst of an action that I hadn’t intended to be a sexual one, but yet, he was suddenly making me feel was that and much more.

He came up close, and I dropped the towel as his body touched mine, the heat searing its way back into my cool one. His hand went to my arm, his fingers and palm dancing over my skin and up to my shoulder, before journeying to my neck, where it stilled.

“I’d really like to kiss you,” he said quietly.

I looked into his eyes that were the color of the sky and the sea all rolled into one. His face was so gorgeous, with its day-old stubble and square planes, that it was like looking at a piece of art you’d never expected to see up close in person.

“I’d really like you to kiss me, too. But let’s face it, it isn’t a good idea,” I answered back, unable to deny the attraction that existed between the two of us from the moment we’d met in my salon two years ago, regardless of the relationship I’d just left behind.

His head inclined in silent agreement. It wasn’t a good idea. Disappointment curled through me even as I knew it was better this way.

His hand moved to caress my cheek. Gently. Soothing.

“Can I ask why you think it’s a bad idea?” he inquired.

His voice had turned a notch deeper in blatant desire, making my heart pound against my chest in a heavy beat that denied my words. I ached to kiss him. To feel those almost too-perfect lips against my own. To feel the strength that poured from him, in muscle and character, reaching out to touch my soul.

“Ava and Eli,” I said quietly. “Awkwardness later.”

He nodded again, that new and unfamiliar feeling of disappointment reaching up into my throat at his action. My body didn’t want him to nod, but my brain was still ruling my movements.

“One kiss,” he muttered, a finger traveled to my lips, caressing the bottom one with a gentle touch like the one he’d used on the tomatoes the day before. Surprising. Sexy. My breath escaped in a gasp that sounded almost like a moan.

And then his lips were on mine, just like the touch, gentle and yet full of heat, longing filling us both, desire escaping from us and mingling in an excursion that felt like heartbreak and loneliness and promises that would never be. The gentleness gave way to a fierceness that was as unexpected as the gentleness had been. His hand went to my lower back, pulling me toward him tighter so that our bodies and curves joined in a way that felt like opposite ends of magnets finally clicking together. Parallel forces drawn, as if by physics itself.

My hands went to his shoulders, finding their way to the wet hair at the nape of his neck, twisting so that our lips were pushed closer, tighter, harder together. It was the best kiss I’d ever received in my life. I’d had many kisses—fewer partners—but lots of exploratory kisses. None matched the intensity of this one kiss, not even Jared’s sexy smoothness. None that made my soul want to completely disregard the screaming in my brain.

The lack of air forced our lips apart, our lungs giving way to that need to breathe and involuntarily separating us in a way our souls wouldn’t have done.

We both breathed in heavily. He looked down into my eyes, his sea-colored ones full of the desire that was still coursing through us both. Our bodies were still tucked together. Only our lips had moved away. It felt as if I was looking for something in Mac that I’d never looked for in any of my male partners. I wanted something more than desire to be there.

It was ridiculous. And that had me pulling away completely, not trusting anything my senses were telling me. He let me pull away, but his eyes went from my lips, to my chest that was still beating wildly, back to my lips, and then up to my eyes, lingering there.

“I like your real color,” he said.

Then, he left me, going down below with a muttered comment about changing. My heart slowly settled from its wild beat, but my emotions were still high. They were wrapped in the dream of the kiss and our day. Emotions that were untested. Unproven. Unreal.

I picked up the towel from where I’d dropped it and went up onto the bow to lie down, letting the sun soak into my already overheated body. The body that had lost the shiver from the cold waters with a kiss. It wasn’t until I’d lain there for a few moments that I realized Mac had never told me why he thought kissing me was a mistake. And that one thought jolted me back to reality more than any other thing could.

Mac

SIMPLE MAN

"Boy, don't you worry, you'll find yourself

Follow your heart and nothing else.”

Performed by Lynyrd Skynyrd

Written by Rossington / Van Zant

The Salty Dog was filled with locals and tourists in the height of the holiday week as I poured beers from the tap for Eli. I wasn’t able to make the mixed drinks, but I could still help while Ava felt like cr?crud. Andy and Lacey?the prior owners of the bar?were usually the ones who filled in when Eli and Ava needed it, but they wouldn’t be back into town until the next day.

Eli was all business as a couple of female tourists flirted relentlessly with him. He wasn’t being rude, but I wondered if he even recognized that they were flirting with him. His love for Ava often had him in a cloud of No-man's-land when it came to things like that. I moseyed up to the women and flashed them my best Mac smile.

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