Kerry wasn’t completely sure she’d heard him say it, but before she could check a pair of feet appeared on the stairs and an upturned palm was offered her way.
‘Come on up, sweet thing. I have a seat saved specially for you—Ro can just stay down there.’
‘And leave her with you? Don’t think so, pal.’
‘Ro?’ Picking on the nickname she’d previously ignored, she shot an amused glance at Ronan.
‘Don’t even think about adopting it. I can leave you stranded somewhere. Or with Johnnie—he’s famous with the ladies, so if you prefer…’
Placing her hand into John’s, she leaned back a little while walking up the steps. ‘I think I’ll stick with the devil I know.’
She’d always been a sucker for a mystery.
Ronan had spent half a day with her and he still didn’t get her. Not that he’d ever felt the need to place people in boxes so he knew where he stood in the world, but normally he was a good judge— he was worldly-wise, after all. But her he just didn’t get.
For starters he found it hard to believe someone like her didn’t have a load of friends who could’ve gone on holiday with her. Not that everyone could take three months off work to travel round the world, but still. That thought process then led him to wonder what she did that allowed her to take three months off work. She was a little mature for a student taking a gap. He put her early thirties maybe—though she could have passed for younger—but she had a maturity and intelligence to the way she spoke and acted that made him believe she had some life experience under her belt. People over the age of thirty were—calmer, he supposed. They knew what they wanted, were less worried about what people thought, more ‘together’.
And as the day progressed he couldn’t help wondering something else: how she’d managed to stay single when she looked the way she did. Because he wasn’t the only one looking at her as if she were the last female left on the planet, was he?
John flirted outrageously with her during the tour and although Kerry didn’t overly play up to it she hadn’t exactly discouraged him either; laughing that husky laugh of hers, her lips parting to draw in the odd gasp at his audacity when he made innuendos over the tannoy and then blushing adoringly straight after, eyes shining. And it had bugged Ronan, frankly. He didn’t want Johnnie-boy to be the one getting all those reactions.
Almost as if somewhere in his mind Ronan had claimed her as his for the day.
She made a small moaning sound beside him and stretched long, slender legs directly into his line of vision, so he turned his head to watch as she stretched the rest of her body. And had to stifle a groan when his body reacted in a very swift, very male way to what he saw—the woman should wear a warning!
She’d clasped the fingers of one hand around the wrist of the other before lifting her arms above her head and had her head tilted back, eyes closed as she let the sun warm her face. And the combined stretching of legs and arms had arched her spine off the bench, her breasts straining against the snug fit of her azure-blue vest-top.
‘I am so hot.’
Ronan couldn’t help but silently agree.
‘Is it normally this hot here this time of year?’
When she resumed a normal sitting position he just about managed to look at her face before she opened her eyes. ‘They’re having a heatwave. But it’s probably the humidity you’re feeling. We Irish aren’t used to it. You’ll adjust in a couple of days.’
‘A couple of days before I move on then— don’t s’pose you know what the weather is like in Canada?’
He cocked a brow and she smiled.
‘Okay—yes, you do.’ She rolled her eyes while reaching out for the iced water they’d bought from one of the street vendors who’d happily tossed it to the upper floor of the bus in exchange for a scrunched-up dollar bill thrown down at them. Something that had entertained her immensely at the time.
‘I keep forgetting this is all old hat for you. I must look like a little kid on Christmas morning.’
Yeah, she did. But he liked that about her. He’d soaked up some of her enthusiasm as she took in everything on the tour, and the number of times she’d gently set her fine-boned hand on his arm to get his attention before pointing at something or leaned across him to get a better photograph of the Flat Iron Building or the Courthouse or the Woolworth Building or City Hall had only added to his overall enjoyment.
Somewhere along the way he’d forgotten what it was like to feel so excited about everything. But, as good as it was to be reminded not to take things for granted just because he’d seen them a thousand times, it was also a little like poking an open wound with a stick; reminding him of the dark thoughts he’d been putting to the back of his mind the last few months—which had been a bit tough to take, and left him pensive.
What he needed was a way to lighten his mood, and to stop him obsessing about Kerry’s ‘hot’ body.
He turned his head and focussed on the kids playing in front of them. At the bottom end of the island of Manhattan, Battery Park was packed the way it always was, hundreds of tourists milling around filling in time while they took turns patiently waiting in the mile-long queue weaving its way along the concrete paths to the ferries for Ellis and Liberty Islands.
The kids between them and the incoming ferries had the right idea in the heat, Ronan reckoned—in fact…
He grinned, taking Kerry’s hand before standing up and tugging to get her off the bench. ‘C’mon.’
‘Where are—?’
‘You said you were hot, right?’
She resisted, dragging her feet while trying to open her bag and stow away her water, a curtain of hair hiding their destination until it was too late, ‘I did and I am but—’
She squeaked when the narrow fountain of water appeared directly in front of her feet, shooting high enough above her head to sprinkle her face on the downward journey. And Ronan chuckled at the look of surprise on her face, deliberately stepping back so another jet appeared beside them.
Kerry’s eyes narrowed.
He shrugged. ‘Cooler now, aren’t you?’
For a moment she simply glared at him. And then she caught him off guard by moving neatly to one side and tugging on his hand so he was stood pretty much directly over the next jet of water when it appeared.
Closing his eyes, he pursed his lips and shook his head hard to get the water off his hair. Then he opened his eyes, looked down to locate another of the metal rings, and when she tried to tug her hand free he closed his fingers tighter, hauling her forwards and smiling at her gasp as her breasts hit the wall of his chest.
She shook her hair out of her eyes, looked up at him with wide eyes and then laughed as he smirked and spun her—once, twice, in and out of several jets of cold water before releasing her without warning and swinging her out to arm’s length where she was promptly soaked from head to toe by fountains either side of her. Only then did he allow her fingers to slip free from his, deliberately slow so they touched fingertip to fingertip for a few seconds before both their arms dropped.
He prepared himself for outrage.
But before his captivated gaze she simply tilted her head to one side, quirked an arched brow, and deliberately skipped sideways underneath another jet.
Ronan laughed, feeling an inner lightness returning to his chest that’d been missing for longer than he cared to admit. So he made a sideways slide in the opposite direction to her skip—and got wet.
Kerry checked the ground, made a skip back and to her left and got wetter