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Charlie was like those pulsing lights. He had lured her in, pulling her close, and part of her had wanted to be pulled closer. Closeness was what she craved more than anything.

It was an age-old longing.

A wistful yearning for someone to look inside her and like what they saw.

Always before she had found the hope of it too weighty even to think about. Instead it had been easier to end things quickly and start from scratch again.

But things with Charlie had moved so fast there had been no time to blink. And it didn’t help losing the one person who had held all the broken pieces of her together.

That was why she was feeling like this now. She was just looking to fill the empty space, letting her desire to be loved override common sense.

So what if Charlie had held her while she cried? Or bought her dresses? Or even offered her a job? He was a good man.

In a lot of ways he was like her sister. He took responsibility for things, for people. Look at how he had stepped up for his family after his father’s death. And, like he said, she was part of that family now.

Probably that too was a reason for why she was feeling like this. Even when their father had still been living with them they had really never been a family. They had shared the same house, but he had been autonomous, orbiting his daughters and only interacting with them when necessary.

Della had been both sister and mother to her, so to suddenly find herself invited into this ready-made dynastic family was mind-blowing for Dora. And it was the blur of these new and sudden changes to her life that was making her feel things, good and bad, that she wasn’t used to feeling, that she had never allowed herself to feel.

But she would get used to it—to all of it—and then, when she was more in control of everything, she would be fine.

Looking up at the fluttering red sails, she sighed.

It was being on this damned boat...it was just so stupidly romantic.

‘Hey.’

She turned her head, her heart jumping. Blinking in the daylight, Charlie was standing on the deck, his dark hair tousled, the top button of his trousers unbuttoned so that the waistband hung low, revealing the toned muscles of his stomach.

‘Hey, yourself,’ she said, holding herself perfectly still.

He looked too beautiful, too impossibly sexy to be real, and that he should be here with her felt so improbable that she was suddenly scared to move in case he might disappear like a mirage.

She watched as he walked slowly towards her, not bothering to hide the hunger she knew was showing on her face. Desire was good. Desire was allowed. Both of them had agreed to that, and she could see her own desire mirrored in his dark gaze.

He stopped in front of her, his eyes drifting down over her body in a way that made her stomach start to clench and unclench.

‘I borrowed your shirt. You don’t mind, do you?’

‘Not at all. It looks a lot better on you than me.’

That was debatable, she thought. But before she could reply he caught her arm and pulled her against him, forking his fingers through her hair and capturing her mouth softly with his. The gentleness of his kiss made her lean into the warmth of his body.

Lifting his head, he breathed out unsteadily. ‘Why didn’t you wake me?’

She shrugged. ‘I didn’t want to. You looked so sweet.’

He grimaced. ‘Babies are sweet. And puppies.’

Pressing her hands against the smooth contours of his chest, she smiled. ‘Well, we agreed to be honest with one another—and, honestly, you looked sweet.’

His arm tightened around her waist. ‘You do know it’s a good hour to swim back to shore from here?’

Tilting her head to the side, she stared up at him. ‘You pirates are all the same—so thin-skinned and image-conscious.’

‘Know a lot of pirates, do you?’

She felt his hand flex against her skin. ‘None, actually.’ She gave a faint smile. ‘In fact, Della used to say I always picked pushovers.’

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