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He went back and swept her up into his arms.
“Lukas!” She wriggled against him.
His half arousal went to full-on just like that. His jaw tightened. “You want me to drop you? Stop squirming!”
“I can walk,” Holly protested.
No. He wasn’t relinquishing her now. He strode down the ramp, getting a faceful of hair and a breath of citrus shampoo for his effort. “Hold still!”
“I am!”
She was. He was the one who was moving, causing her body to rub against his. Lukas swallowed a groan. By the time they got to the boat and he let her slide down his body to put her feet on the deck, he was in a state of temptation and torture both. It was worse to let her go.
“Martha’s stuff is below,” he said gruffly, leading the way down to the galley where he pointed to one of the tiny bunk rooms. “Put on a bathing suit. We can go for a swim.”
Holly looked at him, startled. “Swim?”
“There’s a beach just on the other side of the shop.” Lukas jerked his head in that direction. “We’ve got a couple of hours to kill before it starts to get light.” He could think of other more pleasurable ways of killing that time, but he knew better. He needed cold water. Lots of it. Now.
He thought she would object, but after a second’s hesitation, Holly nodded. “Good idea.”
When she disappeared into one room, he went into the other and stripped off his clothes, grateful for the cool night air on overheated skin. Then he dragged on a pair of board shorts and went back up on deck where he stood staring up at the sky, his body rock hard from a combination of desire and tension, as he wondered again what the hell he was doing with his best friend’s girl.
“Just doing what he asked me to do,” Lukas muttered aloud. Matt would have kept her out all night, he reminded himself. It was what you did after prom. It was a tradition. Matt wouldn’t have taken her for a sail, though. Matt had nothing to take her for a sail in.
No, Matt and Holly would have been doing something else entirely. Lukas cracked his knuckles fiercely, trying to avoid thinking about Matt and Holly making love when he so badly wanted to do it himself.
It was almost a relief when Holly climbed back up the steps. Except the sight of her—even in Martha’s sensible one-piece maillot—was enough to cause his self-control to slip another notch. Even the fact that she had a towel draped over her shoulders with the ends hanging down in front shielding her breasts from view didn’t help. Her long legs were bare and tempting in the moonlight.
Lukas sucked in a breath and jumped back onto the dock without waiting for her. “Come on,” he said over his shoulder and headed back toward the parking lot and the beach on the other side of the closed shop as fast as he could.
The whole place was deserted. But the moon and the lights in the parking lot illuminated the steps so that finding their way down to the beach was easy enough. He walked ahead, needing the space, only stopping to wait for her at the edge of the water.
She didn’t come. Instead, when he looked back, Holly had spread her towel and was sitting down.
“Sunbathing?” Lukas, self-control fraying badly, couldn’t keep the edge from his voice.
“Guess so.” Holly pulled her knees up toward her breasts and wrapped her arms around her shins. “Don’t let me stop you. Go on in.”
Lukas stared at her. What the hell was she playing at? Maybe she knew he was coming undone and was giving him a wide berth. “Suit yourself,” he growled. Then he turned and ran, flinging himself under the incoming wave.
The shock of the cold Atlantic in the middle of an early May night had the desired effect. By the time he broke the surface, he breathed a little easier. A glance back told him that Holly had stood up and was walking to the water’s edge. He caught a glimpse of a long, lissome shape in the moonlight. Then she began to run into the water. He heard a shriek, then she dove under—and surfaced bare inches from him.
So much for dampened ardor. Lukas swallowed a groan.
“It’s freezing!” Her teeth were chattering.
He resisted wrapping his arms around her. “You’ll warm up. Come on. Let’s swim.” He took off, swimming away from her as he’d always done, never letting her catch him. And Holly swam after him.
Minutes passed. Half an hour. They did laps. They swam in lazy circles. Lukas finally slowed a bit to allow her to come alongside where she did the sidestroke, all the while keeping her eyes on him.
Lukas couldn’t take his eyes off her. He should say something about Matt. Something to deflect his awareness, but nothing deflected his awareness of the girl swimming mere feet away. It reminded his fevered brain of one of those nature films they had showed in school, the ones that euphemistically described the mating rituals of exotic maritime animals. Not a useful train of thought. But apparently the only train of thought he had. It was all he could do not to reach for her.
