“The chief of police, the judge, and the priest were hell-raisers? That’s sounds like the beginning of a joke.”
Emily nodded, still snickering. “My father likes to act all holier-than-thou, but Gigi admitted to me the other day that Harlan was no angel. Somehow that makes me like him a little better.”
She was still smiling, yet Ryan was struck again by the fact that she and her father didn’t get along. As much as Tag might aggravate Ryan or his brothers, they genuinely were one big, happy family. Nothing would ever change that. Not even his father having a fling with someone far too young.
He and Emily left the cave and the woods and strolled along the road again. Every now and again their shoulders would graze each other or her hand would oh-so-accidently brush against his, and like a kid, he had the unquenchable urge to hold her hand. He didn’t. But he wanted to.
Ten minutes later a red lighthouse came into view. It was short, as lighthouses went, maybe three stories tall, and it looked as if it had been out of commission for a very long time. A rusted ladder ran along one side, leading up to a small catwalk.
“Ready to see another glimpse into my checkered past?”
“Of course.”
“This is not the tour I was going to take Chloe on, by the way. I would have told her about all the times I rescued injured animals and how I collected wildflowers to press between the pages of my diary.”
“I get the impression that your diary might be a very entertaining read.”
“Count on it. Go on up that ladder.” She pointed at the rusty rungs.
“Me first?”
She pointed at her hips. “Dress.”
“Damn. There goes my chance to get a little peek.”
She might talk a big, wild game, but Emily Chambers still blushed every time he said anything the least bit suggestive. She just wasn’t as bad and bold as she seemed to think. He’d dated a few barracudas in his day, and Emily was nothing like them. She was nothing like any of the women he’d ever dated, come to think of it. What that meant he had yet to determine, but he wasn’t analyzing or second-guessing. He was just taking a walk with a girl and climbing up to the top of a lighthouse to see whatever he could see.
He got to the top and had to climb under the railing, and then he reached behind him to help Emily do the same, not that she seemed to need it. She popped up next to him and immediately looked into the center of the lighthouse where he imagined a big light used to be. Most of the surrounding windows were now broken, and inside the little room were hundreds of rocks scattered across the floor.
“Wow,” she gasped. “Looks like the kids have been busy.”
“Meaning what?”
She laughed and the wind caught her hair, whipping it around her head. She lifted her arms to catch it in both of her hands, which made the hemline of that dress lift several more inches up her thigh. A gentleman might not notice such a thing, but it was hard to miss. Those legs of hers went all the way up.
She kept her hair captured in one hand and lowered her other arm. “I’m not sure when the tradition started, but for my generation, if you lost your virginity, you were supposed to throw a rock in the center. Some kids even put their initials on there. Usually the boys. Girls like to be a little more discreet.”
Ryan looked down at all the stones again and saw that many of them did indeed have initials. Some even had two sets, indicating the couple, no doubt.
“Wow,” he said, nodding with respect and awe. “That is quite the shrine to premarital fornication. Is one of those stones yours?”
“Of course not,” she said, but her laughter indicated otherwise, and his urge to kiss her quadrupled. She moved around to the other side where the wind wasn’t quite so strong, and the setting sun was nearing the horizon. The sky was full of pinks and blues and even purple. If he’d seen those colors in a painting, he would have thought the artist overdid it, but it seemed to be an almost nightly occurrence here.
They leaned back against the one window that wasn’t broken, and a little bit of ledge provided a place to sit. Emily tugged the hemline of her dress down, proving her bad-girl persona was mostly exaggerated. Too bad. Too bad she wasn’t the type for a meaningless fling, but then again, the fact that she wasn’t the type made her that much more appealing. This was a bit of a problem, but he’d figure that out later. He was at the top of a lighthouse under a magical sky and next to a beautiful woman with a smile that was starting to make his heart ache. Shit. This really was a problem.
He turned his head to look at her, trying to think of ways to plead his case. Some way to dazzle and beguile her and make her glad that it was him she was here with. Something witty and persuasive, but she turned at precisely the same moment he did, with invitation in her eyes, and all he could come up with was, “God damn, I really want to kiss you.”
Her hesitation was a mere fraction of a second. “Me too,” she whispered.
It was all he needed to hear, and in an instant she was in his arms. He kissed her, hard, with no prelude, no artful negotiations or seductive machinations. Just hungry kisses that sent his mind spinning and his body following. She kissed him back with equal enthusiasm, with one hand on his chest and the other wrapped tightly around the back of his neck, pulling him closer. Her mouth was sweet, as sweet as he’d imagined, with lips so soft he could have fallen over the edge of that lighthouse and thought the sensation was just from her touch.
But then the hand against his chest pushed instead of pulled, the hand behind his head let go, and she leaned away with a breathless gasp.
“Um . . .” She pressed her lips together, as if to capture the kiss. “Um, yeah, I wanted to kiss you, too. Obviously.” Her short laugh was self-conscious now. “But you live in Sacramento.”
“What’s wrong with Sacramento?” Why was she talking about Sacramento?
“Nothing, it’s just that I live in San Antonio, and they’re really far apart. And your father is screwing my sister.” Her eyes met his, big and uncertain. “Sorry. That sounded really crass, but it’s also the truth. It just seems to make everything else a little more complicated, you know?”
Yes, he knew. He just didn’t care. No enough to stop kissing her. “Those are just details. We can talk about that stuff later.”
That hand on his chest stayed put. “I like you, Ryan. I really do, but the last time I got kissed at the top of this stupid lighthouse, I totally lost my head and made some really bad decisions. I shouldn’t have brought you up here.”