She headed for the stairs, mentally cursing the new, too-tight sandals that were about as practical for shoes as thongs were for undies. At the bottom of the stairs, she stepped onto the sand. Her feet sank like cement.
Screw the shoes.
She slipped them off and left them, along with her purse, on a stair. She hadn’t walked barefoot on the beach in years. Embarrassing, really, to think how close she was to the Pacific, yet the last time she’d been to the ocean had been aeons ago in Jersey.
Underneath the pier, the hazy daylight shifted into layered grays. Wisps of fog hovered in the air and clung to the pilings. More sensed than seen were the shadowy figures of surfers and boogie-boarders bobbing on the distant, swelling waves.
“Found it!” called out Coyote, his tall, dark form emerging through the mist.
Her breath caught at the sight of him. Even in this surreal world, his skin still had that warm, brown glow. He’d rolled up the sleeves of his beige chambray shirt, the color almost stark against his muscled, suntanned forearms. Strands of black hair fell rakishly across his forehead. She’d once heard him say he was half Kumeyaay, the band of Native Americans who’d thrived in the San Diego area centuries ago. The Times had recently run a series of articles on local tribes, and she recalled how, in the late eighteenth century, the invading Spaniards had described the Kumeyaay as fine in stature and affable, but rebellious. They’d refused to be forced laborers and had openly revolted. Eventually, they were punished with expulsion from their ancestral homes.
She understood how it felt to leave one’s home and forced to adapt to a new lifestyle, a new community. For all their differences, she and Coyote shared something profound and fundamental.
The loss of roots.
He walked toward her, sniffing the open bottle. “Smells like…nothing.”
“Told you.”
He gave her a teasing smile. “Not like a woman to carry a bottle of something that’s nothing.”
“It’s a long story.”
“If it’s anything like your taste in books, I bet it’s a very interesting story.”
Heat flooded her cheeks. “You read it?”
“Bound in Brasilia? Yes. Well, the first four or so chapters. I bought it on the way home last night and read it after I went to bed.”
A hot wave swept over her as she imagined Coyote lying in bed doing anything.
He touched his finger to the vial opening and tipped the bottle slightly. “Is it a breath freshener?”
“It’s bogus.”
“Bogus?”
No way she was going to tell Coyote about the smarmy little man and his fabricated story of a lust potion and jaguars and sex and sex and…
She curled her toes in the sand as though that helped ground her. “Bogus, nothing, nada. All the same meaning.”
“And you’re carrying around nada because—?”
Oh, sure, she could just hear herself explaining this one. Well, it appears this weird little man dropped a vial of lust potion into Zoe’s purse, which she later discovered and handed over to Ethan who has connections to the police crime lab. It’s rumored unsuspecting tourists in dire need of a sex fix have been plunking down good money for this tap water, so it seemed wise to have the evidence analyzed. How did I end up with some? Oh, I got a wild hair and filched it.
“You’re right, it’s breath freshener,” she lied. “I’ve had it so long, it’s probably lost its minty taste.”
He righted the bottle, a drop of the liquid on his forefinger. “Let’s see. Stick out your tongue.”
She shook her head. “This is ridic—”
“You say that too much. You need to trust more.” He gave her a look. “And play more.”
The way he said play caused a flame of hot, ripe need to sputter to life within her.
She stuck out her tongue.
“Adventurous, I like that,” he teased, touching her tongue, lightly, with his finger.
She paused, tasting it. “Like I said, nothing—”
Her words halted as a subtle tingling started on the very tip of her tongue. Warm, as though she’d tasted a potent spice, or a chili, yet the heat wasn’t painful. On the contrary, it was pleasurable. Intensely so.
The sensation filled her mouth, raced down her throat, flooded her chest. She sucked in a breath, surprised how the chilly air instantly warmed upon entering her body. The tingling spread from her chest to her fingers, down her legs to her toes, until her entire body felt consumed with heat. A cascade of smells followed, crowding her senses—the ocean, fried foods from the pier café, Coyote’s masculine scent.
Oh, yes, his scent.
That was the most powerful. Soap from his morning shower, the natural musk of his skin, a splash of his earthy cologne. The sum total basic, shameless and teasing. Just like the man.
“Kathryn?”
She hadn’t realized she’d closed her eyes. She had some difficulty opening them, as though awakening from a trance. When she finally did, she stared into his eyes, mesmerized. Had she ever noticed how black, fathomless, shiny they were? Like polished obsidian.
“Are you all right?” Concern creased his features.
His rich, deep voice resonated through her.
“Everything,” she murmured huskily, “is wonderful. You’re wonderful.”
He looked taken aback, even as a grin slow-danced across his face. “Uh, thank you. You’re wonderful, too.”
“Mmmmmmm.”
One side of his mouth still curled in a sexy grin, he suddenly looked down at his hand. “Whatever that nothing in this bottle was, it’s a warm nothing.” He flexed his fingers. “I swear the feeling’s traveling up my arm.”
She nodded, half taking in his words, more absorbed with her own carnal thoughts. Such as how his skin, all deliciously brown and sun kissed, turned her on. How would it feel to press her lips against that skin? To lick, rub, bite, devour? Just thinking about it was like holding a match to an already fuel-drenched libido. Erotic thoughts and ideas ignited, fired and exploded in her mind, heating her trembling body, accelerating her heartbeat until she swore if she didn’t do something, now, she’d implode.
“Come here, Coyote,” she whispered, picking out one of the more deliciously wanton fantasies. “Let’s play a game.”
4
COYOTE STOOD stock-still. Words raced and tumbled and plummeted through his mind, but not a damn one made it out of his mouth.
She wants to play a game.
Not that he hadn’t had his share of lively propositions before. Or indulged in some imaginative romps. Life, after all, was a feast and most poor fools were starving to death.
No, what left him speechless was how Kathryn had managed to sidestep the first, and often awkward, steps of the mating dance and waltzed straight to the heart of the matter. Let’s play a game. No cajoling, intimations, suggestions—none of the push-and-pull doublespeak that typically went on between a man and a woman. It was refreshing, and frankly damn sexy, to hear