Remi’s mouth tightened and her eyes narrowed a little. “Yeah. I’m just an outsider.” She lifted her chin. “But if you hurt Jase…” She paused as if she wasn’t sure what kind of threat to use. Kyla felt her lips twitch. The little pipsqueak wasn’t exactly scary. Kyla almost laughed, but inside she also felt a pang of…what was that? Envy? That Jase had someone looking out for him like that? Jase, the last person in the world who needed protecting.
Or…maybe…everyone needed someone to look out for them. It was kind of sweet. Which almost made Kyla roll her eyes. And also feel a little burn of jealousy deep inside.
Stupid.
She smiled at Remi. “Don’t worry.”
The guys were coming back, wading through the shallow water, hair dripping. Tag lifted both hands to his head to sleek his hair back and the pose showed off his perfect shape, wide shoulders and chest tapering down to narrow hips. His board shorts rode so low on his hips it verged on indecent and Kyla couldn’t drag her eyes away from there. Then Tag hooked his thumbs in the wet shorts and tugged them a little higher. She blinked.
Jase grabbed Remi and wrapped her in a big wet hug that made her squeal. “Oh my god, you’re cold! You’re getting me all wet.”
He laughed and picked her up and started walking back towards his parents’ cottage. Kyla watched them go, then turned back to see Tag, Matt and Logan exchanging glances.
“There they go again,” Logan said. “Besides Mom and Dad, they’re the only ones with their own bedroom.”
“Where’d Jess go?” Scott asked.
“She took Emily and Caleb back to the cottage. Caleb needed a diaper change.”
“Better go see if she needs any help.” Scott and Michael both headed for the cottage.
“I’m hungry,” Logan said. “Let’s go find some lunch.” He and Matt started walking down the beach too. “Coming, Tag?”
“Yeah. In a minute.” He held the towel in his hands and stood next to Kyla. “How’re you feeling today?”
“Good.”
They were alone on the beach. Around the rocky point that separated the public beach from the cottages, the public beach was probably filling up with people, beach blankets and umbrellas, but here nobody else was out yet.
“You coming skiing later?” He rubbed the towel slowly over his chest.
“Sure.”
“Mom’s planning a game night tonight at our place. You’re all invited.”
Kyla nodded. “Cool. Just like old times.”
“Yeah.”
She studied him, his tanned skin gleaming in the bright sun, remembering the game nights of the past, how competitive he and his brothers were. And how competitive she was and how they’d had cut-throat games of Monopoly and Rummikub and Trivial Pursuit. She watched a drop of water slide down the side of his neck, then lower, slowly trickling down his chest. She wanted to go up on her tiptoes and lick that drop of water.
Heat suffused her body, and not from the noon sun overhead. Flashes of her dreams returned, hot glimpses of Tag naked, underneath her, on top of her. She swallowed. She lifted her gaze to his face and the heat in his eyes had her breath stalling. Tension arced between them as they stood there eyeing each other. When he looked at her mouth, her eyes went heavy-lidded and her heart began to thud.
“Oh man,” he said. He swiped the towel across his forehead, breaking the eye contact. She blinked. “Kyla.”
“What?”
“Don’t look at me like that.”
“Um…like what?” As if she needed to ask. She wanted to eat him up. But did it show that much?
He looked her in the eye again. “Your brothers would kill me.”
Her breath came in choppy little pants. Her insides went hot and liquid. “What am I supposed to say to that?” she said, her voice breathy. “We’re not teenagers anymore.”
“No. We’re not.” They were both remembering the last time this had happened. A long time ago. Heat built hotter between them.
She was used to going after what she wanted. She had a plan for her career and she worked to make things happen. If she wanted Tag, why couldn’t she have him?
Last time he’d tried to make a joke of it. As if he didn’t want her. This time, older, wiser, more experienced, she could tell he did. Was he really going to let their families stand in the way of what they both wanted?
“My brothers have no say in who I…” She stopped. They’d been tiptoeing around it and when it came to saying it outright, she found she couldn’t.
He smiled, that sexy lift of his wide mouth that melted her. She couldn’t breathe. Her body thrummed with sexual tension. “Think about it, Mac,” he said, his voice low and raspy. “We may not be teenagers but we’re here with our families. Every bed in both our cottages is occupied. You’re sharing a room with a three-year-old. I’m sharing a room with Matt.”
She couldn’t get air into her lungs and her heart thudded wildly against her ribs. She opened her mouth to tell him that she was very good at solving problems when she heard a little voice calling, “Auntie Kywa!”
She turned to see Emily appear on the path through the poplar trees edging the beach. “Shit,” she muttered under her breath, but she plastered on a smile and reached for her niece as she hurtled toward her. She lifted her and propped her on her hip. “What’s up, doodle bug?”
“Gwamma said to tell you we’re having lunch.”
“Okey dokey. I’m hungry.” She met Tag’s smiling eyes. “I’ll see you later.”
“Yeah.”
Holy hell, this was crazy. What had gotten her suddenly so hot and horny, dreaming about sex when she was asleep, thinking about it when she was awake and practically ready to jump Tag right there on the beach? She pondered this as she carried a chattering Emily back to the cottage. It must be all pent up inside her or something, another effect of working too much. She needed to do something about it. But geez, even if she wanted to take care of things herself, privacy was a definite issue, as Tag had so accurately pointed out. Damn.
Tag walked back to his parents’ cottage along the beach rather than follow Kyla and take the shortcut through the fence between the two properties. Jesus. He swiped perspiration from his brow that had nothing to do with the sun.
When she’d looked at him like that, with hungry, hot eyes, blood had rushed to his groin and his heart had pounded in his ears. If Emily hadn’t shown up just then, he and Kyla would be rolling around in the sand.
He kicked the sand. What the hell was going on? Yeah, years ago he and Kyla had had a little heat happening, but he hadn’t let anything come of it, although it had come pretty close that one night. So why after all this time was the heat even…hotter?
She was sexy as hell, that was why. As a teenager she’d changed from skinny kid with braces who tagged along with them and got in their way to a real girl with breasts and the sweetest ass, soft lips, silky dark hair and sultry brown eyes…he closed his eyes briefly as he headed up the path to the cottage. Now she was even hotter, a woman with the sexiest smile he’d ever seen, intelligence gleaming in those dark eyes along with lust.
There was no way they could do anything. That would be just crazy. Her brothers would kill him. Wouldn’t they?
Waterskiing would take his mind off that.
But when Kyla showed up on the dock in a tiny little black bikini, waterskiing did not distract him from thinking about sex. And Kyla. And sex with Kyla. Holy hell. His gaze tracked down her body, from the round curves revealed in the V of the little halter top, to a bikini bottom that was so small he couldn’t help but wonder about what was beneath it and the wax job she must have recently had, ’cause, whoa.