Книга - The Return Of Antonides

The Return Of Antonides
Anne McAllister

Amanda Cinelli


Crossing the line between love and hate…Widow Holly Halloran’s fresh start is only a plane ride away. Until Lukas Antonides—the man she hates but has never been able to forget—strides arrogantly back into her life…Lukas was her late husband’s best friend and he openly disapproved of Holly. Then one unforgettable night their acrimony ricocheted into the bedroom!Now the arrogant Greek is kicking the hornets’ nest again—by offering Holly a job. Holly agrees, determined not to let Lukas get beneath her surface this time. But as the tension mounts between them so too does that bubbling attraction of old…Praise for Anne McAllisterThe Virgin’s Proposition TOP PICK 4.5* RT Book ReviewThis is a beautifully crafted story that deftly balances tragedy, sexual tension and the sweetness of falling in love. The end is so well written and so perfect that it literally made this reviewer cry with joy.One-Night Mistress…Convenient Wife 4* RT Book ReviewThis engaging story has appealing characters. What's wonderful about this relationship is that through the passionate highs and disappointing lows these two continually communicate with each other.Antonides’ Forbidden Wife 4* RT Book ReviewThe familiar marriage-of-convenience plot spins into a heartwarming story of two people who discover each other after years apart. Readers will root for this engaging pair to find their way to each other sooner than later!









“I want to kiss you.” Lukas couldn’t stop the words—only knew them for the truth they were. “You know that, don’t you?”


Holly’s cheeks went red, and she shook her head rapidly. “No!” She took a quick breath. “Not a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“Because … because I said not.” She wouldn’t look at him.

“Afraid that I won’t follow through?” Lukas pressed. “Or that I will?”

She jerked away from him. “Stop it!” She crossed the room, put the desk between them.

“There’s something between us,” he told her. “Don’t tell me you don’t feel it.”


A bestselling two-time RITA


winner (with a further nine finalist titles), ANNE MCALLISTER has written nearly seventy books for Mills & Boon


Modern™ Romance, American Romance


, Desire™, Special Edition and single titles—which means she basically follows her characters no matter where they take her. She loves to travel, but at home she and her husband divide their time between Montana and Iowa. Anne loves to hear from readers. Contact her at: annemcallister.com (http://annemcallister.com)


The Return

of Antonides

Anne McAllister






www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


For Anne


Contents

Cover (#ue1c892f1-401b-5fc4-bac2-5dffcc8d13bc)

Introduction (#u20699d81-896b-5c13-984b-6e2a36bc5980)

About the Author (#u6655c473-ae74-5227-99d6-7bd992d81d8d)

Title Page (#u8783ed12-c084-5f87-96fc-76f52d5f05ee)

Dedication (#u10d4f206-43b1-5528-9272-89245abe63da)

CHAPTER ONE (#u3e3d04da-7ca1-59c5-af3a-09d2a933dc55)

CHAPTER TWO (#u65daab35-d687-5d0c-908c-b9f8a97f0f0d)

CHAPTER THREE (#u2fa97d1a-9fc3-51ff-83af-a788c07cd8c6)

CHAPTER FOUR (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)

Extract (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)


CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_21b7dbdf-8a22-5da9-8916-fbe937e1727e)

“GETTING MARRIED IS EXHAUSTING.” Althea Halloran Rivera Smith Moore collapsed into the back of the cab and closed her eyes, unmoving.

“Which is why you’re only supposed to do it once,” Holly said drily as she clambered in after her sister-in-law. She pulled the door shut and gave the driver her address in Brooklyn.

As the taxi edged back out into the late Saturday afternoon Midtown Manhattan traffic, Holly slumped back in against the seat. “Those dresses were horrible.” She shuddered just thinking about the pastel creations she’d tried on all day. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t worn identically repulsive bridesmaids’ dresses for Althea’s other weddings.

“This is the last time.” Althea put her hand over her heart. “I swear. I’m just too impulsive.”

In the eight years since Holly’s wedding to Althea’s brother Matt, Althea had marched up the aisle three times. And into divorce court each time shortly thereafter.

“But not anymore. This time is different,” Althea assured her. “Stig is different.”

Swedish professional hockey player Stig Mikkelsen had nothing at all in common with the aloof doctor, the extroverted stock broker and the pompous professor Althea had married previously. Stig had swept into Althea’s life six months ago, charmed her, teased her and refused to take no for an answer. He’d overturned her resolve never to walk down another aisle, and best of all, had somehow given Althea the greatest gift—helping her return to the sparkling, cheerful woman she had been before her three marital disasters.

For that alone, Holly blessed him. So when Althea began making wedding plans and asked Holly to be her “one and only bridesmaid, please, please, please!” Holly had gritted her teeth and agreed.

She’d even silently vowed—if necessary—to force herself into another stiff, ruffled, pastel cupcake of a dress. But even with just the two of them to please and all of Manhattan’s gauziest wonders to choose from, they hadn’t been able to find “the perfect bridesmaid’s dress.”

“Stig will know what we need. I’ll take him next time,” Althea said.

“He’s a nice guy,” Holly allowed. But if he went dress shopping with Althea, he should be nominated for sainthood.

“And he’s got teammates...” Althea shot her a speculative look. “Single ones.”

“No,” Holly said automatically. “Not interested.” She crossed her arms over her tote bag, holding it against her like a shield.

“You don’t even know what I was going to say!”

Holly arched a brow. “Don’t I?”

Althea had the grace to look a tiny bit abashed, then gave a little flounce and lifted her chin. “Some of them are very nice guys.”

“No doubt. I’m not interested.”

“You’re not even thirty years old! You have a whole life ahead of you!”

“I know.” There was nothing Holly was more aware of than how much of her life there still might be—and how flat and empty it was. She pressed her lips together and made herself stare at the cars they were passing.

Suddenly Althea’s hand was on her knee, giving it a sympathetic squeeze. “I know you miss him,” she said, her voice soft but thick with emotion. “We all miss him.”

Matt, she meant. Her brother. Holly’s husband. The center of Holly’s life.

Just thirty years old, Matthew David Halloran had had everything to live for. He was bright, witty, handsome, charming. A psychologist who worked mostly with children and teens, Matt had loved his work. He’d loved life.

He had loved hiking, skiing and camping. He’d loved astronomy and telescopes, basketball and hockey. He’d loved living in New York City, loved the fifth floor walk-up he and Holly had shared when they’d first moved to the city, loved the view across the river to Manhattan from the condo they’d recently bought in a trendy Brooklyn high-rise.

Most of all, Matt had loved his wife.

He’d told her so that Saturday morning two years and four months ago. He had bent down and kissed her sleepy smile as he’d gone out the door to play basketball with his buddies. “Love you, Hol’,” he’d murmured.

Holly had reached up from the bed she was still snuggled in and snagged his hand and kissed it. “You could show me,” she’d suggested with a sleepy smile.

Matt had given her a rueful grin. “Temptress.” Then he’d winked. “I’ll be home at noon. Hold that thought.”

It was the last thing he’d ever said to her. Two hours later Matt Halloran was dead. An aneurysm, they told her later. Unknown and undetected. A silent killer waiting for the moment to strike.

Going in for a lay-up at the end of the game, Matt had shot—and dropped to the floor.

Simultaneously the bottom had dropped out of Holly’s world.

At first she had been numb. Disbelieving. Not Matt. He couldn’t be dead. He hadn’t been sick. He was healthy as a horse. He was strong. Capable. He had his whole life ahead of him!

But it turned out that Holly was the one who had her life ahead of her—a life without Matt. A life she hadn’t planned on.

It hadn’t been easy. All she had wanted to do those first months was cry. She couldn’t because she had a class full of worried fifth graders to teach. They looked to her for guidance. They knew Matt because he and Holly took them to the marina on Saturdays to teach them canoeing and kayaking. They shared her grief and needed a role model for how to handle it.

Psychologist Matt would have been the first to tell her so.

So for them, Holly had stopped wallowing in misery. She’d wiped away her tears, pasted on her best smile and resolutely put one foot in front of the other again.

Eventually, life began to resemble something akin to normal, though for her it never would be again—not without Matt to share it.

But even though she had learned to cope, she wasn’t prepared when friends and family began trying to set her up with another man. Holly didn’t want another man! She wanted the man she’d had.

But ever since last summer Althea had been dropping hints. Holly’s brother, Greg, a lawyer in Boston, said he had a colleague she might like to meet. Even her mother, a longtime divorcee with not much good to say about men, had suggested she take a singles cruise. At Christmas Matt’s parents had begun telling her she needed to get on with her life, that Matt would want her to.

She’d always done everything Matt wanted her to. That was the problem!

“At least you’re dating Paul.”

“Yes.” A few months back, Holly had determined that the best way to deter meddling family and friends was to appear to have taken their advice and gone out. Charming, handsome, smart, a psychologist like Matt, Paul McDonald was like Matt. But he wasn’t Matt. So no danger to her at all. It just kept well-meaning relatives and friends off her back. And she knew she wasn’t leading Paul on. Long divorced, Paul was a complete cynic about marriage.

“If you married Paul,” Althea said, oblivious to Paul’s lack of interest, “you wouldn’t have to hare off across the world to sit on a coral atoll somewhere.” She gave Holly an indignant glare. “I can’t believe you’re even considering that!”

Joining the Peace Corps, she meant. Last fall, fed up with the emptiness of her life and admitting to herself at least that she needed to find a new purpose, a new focus, Holly had sent in her application. They had offered her a two-year teaching position on a small South Pacific island. She was to start preliminary training in Hawaii the second week in August.

“I’m not considering. I’m doing it,” she said now.

“Paul can’t talk you out of it?”

“No.”

“Someone should,” Althea grumbled. “You need a man who will make you sit up and take notice. Paul’s too nice. You need a challenge.” Abruptly, she sat up straight, a smile dawning on her lips. “Like Lukas Antonides.”

“What? Who?” Holly felt as if all the air had been sucked out of the universe. She was gasping as she stared at her sister-in-law. Where had that come from?

“You remember Lukas.” Althea was practically bouncing on the seat now, her cheeks definitely rosy.

Holly felt hers burning. Her whole body was several degrees warmer. “I remember Lukas.”

“You used to follow him around,” Althea said.

“I did not! I followed Matt!” It was Matt, damn him, who had followed Lukas around.

Lukas Antonides had become the neighborhood equivalent of the Pied Piper from the minute he’d moved in the year he and Matt were eleven and Holly was nine.

“Ah, Lukas.” Althea used her dreamy voice. “He was such a stud. He still is.”

“How do you know?” Holly said dampeningly. “He’s on the other side of the world.”

Lukas had spent the past half dozen years or so in Australia. Before that he’d been in Europe—Greece, Sweden, France. Not that she’d kept track of him. Matt had done that.

Since Matt’s death she hadn’t really known where Lukas was. She’d received a sympathy card simply signed “Lukas.” No personal remarks. Nothing—except the spiky black scrawl of his name—which was absolutely fine with her.

She hadn’t expected him at the funeral. It was too far to come. And thank God for that. She hadn’t had to deal with him along with everything else. For a dozen years now she hadn’t had to deal with him at all. So why was Althea bringing him up now, when he was off mining opals or wrangling kangaroos or doing whatever enthusiasm was grabbing him at the moment?

“He’s back,” Althea said. “Didn’t you see the article in What’s New!?”

Holly felt her stomach clench. “No.” It was the end of the school year. She didn’t have time to read anything except student papers. “What article?” What’s New! was a hot, upscale lifestyle magazine. Out of her league. She wouldn’t normally read it anyway.

Since getting engaged to Stig, Althea always read it. Sometimes she was even in it. Now she nodded eagerly. “Gorgeous article. Just like him.” She grinned. “He got the centerfold.”

“They don’t have centerfolds in What’s New!” But the image it conjured up made Holly’s cheeks flame.

Althea laughed. “The centerfold of the magazine. There’s a double-page spread of Lukas in his office. Big story about him and his foundation and the gallery he’s opening.”

“Foundation? Gallery? What gallery?”

“He’s opening a gallery for Australian, New Zealand and Pacific art here in New York. Big stuff in the local art community. And he’s heading up some charitable foundation.”

“Lukas?” If the gallery and the centerfold boggled her mind, the notion of Lukas heading up a charitable foundation sounded like a sign of the apocalypse.

“It’s in this week’s issue,” Althea went on. “He’s on the cover, too. Surprised it didn’t catch your eye. The gallery is in SoHo. They showed some of the art and sculpture in the article. Very trendy. It’s going to draw lots of interest.” Her grin widened. “So is Lukas.”

Holly folded her hands in her lap, staring straight ahead. “How nice.”

Althea made a tutting sound. “What do you have against Lukas? You were friends.”

“He was Matt’s friend,” Holly insisted.

Lukas’s move into the neighborhood had turned Holly’s life upside down. Until then she and Matt had been best friends. But once Lukas arrived, she’d been relegated to tag-along, particularly by Lukas.

Matt hadn’t ditched her completely. Solid, dependable, responsible Matt had always insisted that Holly was his friend. But when Lukas’s father took them out in his sailboat, she hadn’t been invited.

“Go play with Martha,” Lukas had said. It had been his answer to everything.

His twin sister, Martha, had spent hours drawing and sketching everything in sight. Holly couldn’t draw a stick figure without a ruler. She’d liked swimming and playing ball and catching frogs and riding bikes. She’d liked all the same things Matt did.

Except Lukas.

If Matt had always been as comfortable as her oldest shoes, Lukas was like walking on nails. Dangerous. Unpredictable. Fascinating in the way that, say, Bengal tigers were fascinating. And perversely, she’d never been able to ignore him.

If Lukas was back, she had yet another reason to be glad she was leaving.

“He’s made a fortune opal mining, apparently,” Althea told her. “And he’s parlayed it into successful businesses across the world. He’s got fingers in lots of pies, your Lukas.”

“He’s not my Lukas,” Holly said, unable to stop herself.

“Well, you should consider him,” Althea said, apparently seriously. “He’s handsomer than ever. Animal magnetism and all that.” Althea flapped a hand like a fan in front of her face. “Seriously hot.”

“Hotter than Stig?”

“No one’s hotter than Stig,” Althea said with a grin. “But Lukas is definitely loaded with sex appeal.”

“And knows it, too, I’m sure,” Holly said. He always had. Once he’d noticed the opposite sex, Lukas had gone through women like a shark went through minnows.

“Well, you should look him up—for old times’ sake,” Althea said firmly.

“I don’t think so.” Holly cast about for a change in subject, then realized happily that she didn’t need to. The taxi had just turned onto her street.

Althea shrugged. “Suit yourself. But I’d pick him over Paul any day of the week.”

“Be my guest.” Holly gathered up her sweater and tote bag.

“Nope. I’ve got my man.” Althea gave a smug, satisfied smile.

Once I had mine, too, Holly thought. She didn’t say it. There was no reason to make Althea feel guilty because she had found the love of her life and Holly had lost hers. “Hang on to him,” she advised, getting out her share of the taxi fare.

“Put that away. The taxi is on me. I’m sorry we didn’t find a dress. Maybe next Saturday...”

“Can’t. I’m going to be kayaking with the kids from school next Saturday.” She’d only missed going today because Althea had begged her.

“Then maybe I’ll take Stig. Do you trust me to do it on my own?”

Trust her? After Althea had dressed her like a cupcake with too much frosting three times before?

Wincing inwardly, Holly pasted on her best resilient-bridesmaid smile. “Of course I trust you. It’s your wedding. I’ll wear whatever you choose.”

Althea gave Holly a fierce hug. “You’re such a trouper, Hol’, hanging in with me through all my weddings.” She pulled back and looked at Holly with eyes the same flecked hazel as Matt’s. “I know it’s been tough. I know it’s been an awful two years. I know life will never be the same. It won’t be for any of us. But Matt would want you to be happy again. You know he would.”

Holly’s throat tightened and her eyes blurred, because yes, she knew Matt would want that, damn him. Matt had never focused on the downside. Whenever life had dealt him lemons or a broken leg—though it had actually been Lukas who’d dealt him that, she recalled—Matt had coped. He would expect her to do the same.

“The right guy will come along,” Althea assured Holly as she opened the cab door. “I know he will. Just like Stig did for me when I’d given up all hope.”

“Sure,” Holly humored her as she stepped out onto the curb and turned back to smile.

Althea grinned. “You never know. It might even be Lukas.”

* * *

Lukas Antonides used to feel at home in New York City. He used to be in tune with its speed, its noise, its color, its pace of life. Once upon a time he’d got energized by it. Now all he got was a headache.

Or maybe it wasn’t the city giving him a headache. Maybe it was the rest of his life.

Lukas thrived on hard work and taking charge. But he had always known that if he wanted to, he could simply pick up and walk away. He couldn’t walk away from the gallery—didn’t want to. But being everything to every artist and craftsperson who was counting on him—and the gallery—when for years he had resisted being responsible for anyone other than himself made his head pound.

Ordinarily, he loved hard physical labor. Throwing himself body and soul into whatever he was doing gave him energy. That was why he’d taken over the renovation of not only the gallery, but the rest of the offices and apartments in the cast-iron SoHo building he’d bought three months ago. But the gallery cut into the time he had for that, and getting behind where he thought he should be was causing a throb behind his eyes.

And then there was his mother who, since he’d got back from Australia, had been saying not so sotto voce, “Is she the one?” whenever he mentioned a woman’s name. He knew she was angling for another daughter-in-law. It was what Greek mothers did. He’d been spared before as there were other siblings to pressure. But they were all married now, busily providing the next generation.

Only he was still single.

“I’ll marry when I’m ready,” he’d told her flatly. He didn’t tell her that he didn’t see it happening. He’d long ago missed that boat.

But more than anything, he was sure the headache—the pounding behind his eyes, the throbbing that wouldn’t go away—was caused by the damned stalagmites of applications for grants by the MacClintock Foundation, which, for his sins, he was in charge of.

“Just a few more,” his secretary, Serafina, announced with dry irony, dropping another six-inch stack onto his desk.

Lukas groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose. The headache spiked. He wasn’t cut out for this sort of thing. He was an action man, not a paper-pusher. And Skeet MacClintock had known that!

But it hadn’t stopped the late Alexander “Skeet” MacClintock, Lukas’s cranky friend and opal-mining mentor, from guilting him into taking on the job of running the foundation and vetting the applicants. He’d known that Lukas wouldn’t be able to turn his back on Skeet’s plan for a foundation intended to “Give a guy—or gal—a hand. Or a push.”

Because once Skeet had given Lukas a hand. And this, damn it, was his way of pushing.

Lukas sighed and gave Sera a thin smile. “Thanks.”

“There are more,” Sera began.

“Spare me.”

Sera smiled. “You’ll get there.”

Lukas grunted. For all that he’d rather be anywhere else, he owed this to Skeet.

The old man, an ex-pat New Yorker like himself, had provided the grumbling, cantankerous steadiness that a young, hotheaded, quicksilver Lukas had needed six years ago. Not that Lukas had known it at the time.

He would have said they were just sharing digs in a dusty, blisteringly hot or perversely cold mining area in the outback. Skeet could have tossed him out. Lukas could have left at any time.

Often he had, taking jobs crewing on schooners or yachts. He’d leave for months, never promising to come back, never intending to. But for all his wanderlust and his tendency to jump from one thing to next, there was something about opal mining—about the possibilities and the sheer hard work—that energized him and simultaneously took the edge off his restlessness. For the first time in years, he had slept well at night.

He felt good. He and Skeet got along. Skeet never made any demands. Not even when he got sick. He just soldiered on. And at the end, he had only one request.

“Makin’ you my executor,” he’d rasped at Lukas during the last few days. “You take care of things...after.”

Lukas had wanted to deny furiously that there would be an “after,” that Skeet MacClintock would die and the world would go on. But Skeet was a realist. “Whaddya say?” Skeet’s faded blue eyes had bored into Lukas’s own.

By that time the old man had seemed more like a father to him than his own. Of course Lukas had said yes. How hard would it be? He’d only have to distribute the old man’s assets.

Skeet had plenty, though no one would ever have guessed from the Spartan underground digs he called home. Lukas only knew of Skeet’s business acumen because Skeet had helped him parlay his own mining assets into a considerable fortune.

Even so, he had never imagined the old man had a whole foundation up his sleeve—one offering monetary grants to New Yorkers who needed “someone to believe in them so they could dare to believe in themselves.”

Who’d have thought Skeet would have such a sentimental streak? Not Lukas. Though he should have expected there would be a stampede of New Yorkers eager to take advantage of it when the news spread.

He’d had a trickle of applications before the What’s New! article. But once it hit the stands, the postman began staggering in with bags and bags of mail.

That was when Serafina had proved her worth. A fiftysomething, no-nonsense mother of seven, Serafina Delgado could organize a battalion, deal with flaky artists and cantankerous sculptors and prioritize grant applications, all while answering the phone and keeping a smile on her face. Lukas, who didn’t multitask worth a damn, was impressed.

“Sort ’em out,” he’d instructed her. “Only give me the ones you think I really ought to consider.”

He would make the final decisions himself. Skeet’s instructions had been clear about that.

“How the hell will I know who needs support?” Lukas had demanded.

“You’ll know.” Skeet had grinned faintly from his hospital bed. “They’ll be the ones that remind you of me.”

That was why the old man had created the foundation in the first place, and Lukas knew it. Back when it mattered, when he was in his twenties, Skeet hadn’t believed in himself. Deeply in love with a wealthy young New York socialite, poor boy Skeet hadn’t felt he had anything to offer her besides his love. So he’d never dared propose.

“Didn’t believe enough in myself,” he had told Lukas one cold day last winter, fossicking through rubble for opals.

They didn’t have heart-to-hearts, never talked about much personal stuff at all. Only mining. Football. Beer. Skeet’s sudden veer in a personal direction should have warned Lukas things were changing.

“Don’t pay to doubt yourself,” Skeet had gone on. And Lukas learned that by the time Skeet had made something of himself and had gone back to pop the question, Millicent had married someone else.

“So, what? You want me to play matchmaker to New York City?” Lukas hadn’t been able to decide whether he was amused or appalled.

Skeet chuckled. “Not necessarily. But most folks got somethin’ they want to reach for and don’t quite got the guts to do.” He’d met Lukas’s gaze levelly. “Reckon you know that.”

Then it had been Lukas’s turn to look away. He’d never said, but he knew Skeet had seen through his indifferent dismissal to a past that Lukas had never really confronted once he’d walked away.

Now, determinedly, he shoved all the memories away again and forced himself to go back to reading the applications. It was the first week of June. The deadline for application submissions was two weeks away. Now he had thousands of them. Even with Sera sorting through them, he needed to read faster.

He stared at the paper in front of him until his eyes crossed...then shut...

“Grace called.”

Lukas’s head jerked up. “What?”

Sera stood in the doorway frowning at him. “She says to pick her up at her grandmother’s at a quarter to eight. Were you sleeping?”

“No. Of course not.” Though from the hands on the clock above the file cabinet he’d been closing his eyes for over half an hour. Now he tried not to let his jaw crack with a yawn. He’d winced, realizing he had forgotten all about Grace. She was Millicent’s granddaughter, and Lukas sometimes wondered if she were Skeet’s own attempt at matchmaking from beyond the grave. The old man had found out a bit about Millicent’s life over the years. Chances were he’d known about Grace. He raked a hand through his hair. “Why didn’t you put her through?”

“She said not to bother, to just give you the message.” Sera studied him narrowly. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” Lukas stifled another yawn. “Just bored.”

“Go meet Grace then,” Sera suggested with a grin. “You won’t be bored.”

“Can’t. Got to finish this.” He glanced at his watch. “Time for you to go home, though.”

“Soon. I have a few more applications to go through. You can do this,” she said briskly in her den-mother voice. Then she shut the door behind her.

Lukas stood and stretched, then paced the room, trying to muster some enthusiasm for dinner with Grace. He shouldn’t have to muster enthusiasm at all.

Grace was wonderful. His mother liked Grace. Sera liked Grace. Everyone liked Grace. Grace Marchand spoke five languages, had degrees in art history and museum conservation. She coordinated special exhibits for one of the city’s major art museums. She was blonde and blue-eyed and beautiful, looking a lot like her grandmother must have half a century ago. Skeet would have loved her.

Because of that, Lukas had taken her out several times since—to dinner, to a concert, some charity functions, a couple of command-performance family dinners. Grace was good company. She knew which fork to use, which was more than he often did. In his new more social role, he was grateful for that. But regardless of what Skeet might have been plotting or Lukas’s mother might be hoping, he wasn’t marrying her.

And now he really had come full circle because his head was throbbing again.

The door from the outer office opened once more, and Sera came in.

“I thought you were leaving?” Lukas said sharply.

Sera nodded. “On my way. Just finished the applications. There’s one that you should see.” She waved the envelope in her hand.

“I don’t want to see another application tonight.” He held out a hand to ward her off. “I’ve had it up to my eyeballs. Every person in New York City wants me to give them half a million dollars.”

“Not this lady.” Sera waved the envelope again. “She only wants half a boat!”

Lukas felt the words like a punch in the gut. “Half a—? What?”

Sera shrugged, grinning as she set the papers on his desk. “Half a boat. Can you believe it?”

Lukas crossed the room in three long strides and snatched up the papers from the desk. There was only one woman in the world who would ask him for half a boat—Holly.

Holly. After all these years. Lukas wasn’t bored anymore. His heart was pounding even as he stared at her signature at the bottom of a typed business letter on ivory paper.

Holly Montgomery Halloran. Firm, spiky, no-nonsense letters—just like the woman who had written them. He exhaled sharply just looking at her name. The letter had a letterhead from St. Brendan’s School, Brooklyn, New York. Where she taught. Matt had told him that a few years back. The letter was brief, but he didn’t have a chance to read it because with it, fluttering out of the envelope, came a photograph of a sailboat.

Lukas snatched it out of the air before it hit the floor and, staring at it, felt a mixture of pain and longing and loss as big as a rock-size gouge that there had been in the hull when he had last seen the boat in person. Someone—Matt—had repaired the hull. But the mast was still broken. Snapped right off, the way he remembered it. And there was still plenty of rotten wood. The boat needed work. A lot of work.

Lukas felt a tingle at the back of his neck and faint buzzing inside his head. He dropped into his chair and realized he wasn’t breathing.

“Yours?” Sera queried.

“Half.” Lukas dragged the word up from the depth of his being. It sounded rusty, as if he hadn’t said it in years.

Sera smiled. “Which half?”

There was no answer to that. He shook his head.

“I thought you must know her,” Sera said gently. “Holly?” Because, of course, Sera had read the letter.

“Yes.”

Sera waited, but when he didn’t say more, she nodded. “Right. Well, then,” she said more briskly. “Well, you deal with Holly and the boat. I’m off.”

Lukas didn’t look up. He waited until he heard the door shut. Then he picked up the letter, not seeing anything but the signature. Then he shut his eyes.

He didn’t need them to see Holly as clear as day.

He had a kaleidoscope of memories to choose from: Holly at nine, all elbows and skinned knees and attitude; Holly at thirteen, still coltish but suddenly curvy, running down the beach; Holly at fifteen, her swingy dark hair with auburn highlights, loose and luxuriant, her breasts a handful; Holly at seventeen, blue eyes soft with love as she’d looked adoringly at Matt; Holly at eighteen, blue eyes hard, accusing Lukas when Matt had broken his leg; and then, two weeks later, Holly on the night of her senior prom—beautiful and nervy, edgy and defiant. Then gentler, softer, laughing, smiling—at him for once.

And then Holly in the night, on his father’s boat, her eyes doubtful, then apprehensive, then wondering, and finally—

Lukas made a strangled sound deep in his throat.

He dropped the photo on the desk and, with unsteady fingers, picked up the letter—to read the first words he’d had from Holly Halloran in a dozen years.


CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_b8039d2b-192b-5a99-b005-a3e5035baec9)

WHERE THE HELL was she?

Lukas stood on the marina dock, hands on hips, squinting as he scanned the water, trying to pick Holly out of the Saturday-morning crowd of canoes and kayaks and pedal boats that were maneuvering in a sheltered basin on the banks of the Brooklyn side of the East River.

He should have been hanging drywall in one of the lofts above the gallery or helping set up the display cases in one of the artisans’ workshops. He should have, God save him, been reading more of the apparently endless supply of MacClintock grant applications.

Instead, he was here.

Because Holly was here.

Or so the principal of St. Brendan’s School had promised him.

Three days ago, as he’d read her stilted, determinedly impersonal letter requesting that he join her in making a gift to St. Brendan’s School of the sailboat he and Matt had intended to restore while they were in college, because she was “tying up loose ends before she left,” a tidal wave of long-suppressed memories and emotions had washed over him.

He could, of course, keep right on suppressing them. He’d had plenty of practice. So for all of thirty-six hours he’d tried to push Holly back in the box he’d deliberately shut a dozen years ago.

It was over, he’d told himself, which wasn’t quite the truth. The truth was, it had never really begun. And he should damned well leave it that way.

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t just sign the deed of gift she’d attached to the letter. He couldn’t just walk away. Truth to tell, the mere thought of Holly was the first thing to really energize him since he’d come home.

So on impulse, he had called St. Brendan’s and asked to speak to her.

Of course it had been the middle of the school day. Holly was teaching. The secretary offered to take a message.

Lukas said no. He could leave a message, but she wouldn’t call him back. He knew Holly. If she had wanted to talk to him, she would have given him her number in the letter. She’d have written to him on her own notepaper, not printed out an impersonal little message on a St. Brendan’s official letterhead.

He got the message: Holly still didn’t want anything to do with him.

But it didn’t mean she was going to get her way. He called back and spoke to the principal.

Father Morrison was pleasant and polite and had known instantly who Lukas was. “Matt spoke very highly of you.”

“Matt?” That was a surprise.

“He volunteered here. He and Holly taught extracurricular kayaking and canoeing. Matt wanted to teach the kids to sail. Right before he died, he told me he had a boat they could use. After... Well, I didn’t want to mention it to Holly. But she brought it up a few days ago, said she had written to you hoping you’d agree to make it a gift to the school.” The statement had been as much question as explanation.

“I want to talk to Holly,” Lukas said, deliberately not answering it. “I’ve just moved back from Australia. I don’t have her phone number.”

“And I can’t give it to you. Privacy, you know,” Father Morrison said apologetically. Then he added, “But you might run into her at the marina. She still goes there most Saturday mornings to teach the kids.”

“I might do that,” Lukas said. “Thanks, Father.”

So here he was pacing the dock, still unable to spot her. He hadn’t seen Holly since her wedding ten years ago. Every time he’d been back since—less than half a dozen times in the whole decade—he’d seen Matt, but never Holly.

She had been visiting her mother or at a bridal shower or taking books back to the library. Maybe it had been true. Certainly Matt seemed to think nothing of Holly’s excuses. But Matt didn’t know Holly was avoiding him.

Now Lukas jammed his hands into the pockets of his cargo shorts, annoyed that she was so hard to spot, more annoyed that he cared. His brain said there was no sense dusting things up after all this time. He probably wouldn’t even recognize her.

He’d recognize her.

He knew it as sure as he knew his own name.

A day hadn’t gone by that Holly hadn’t wiggled her way into his consciousness. She had been a burr in his skin for years, an itch he had wanted to scratch since he’d barely known that such itches existed.

A couple of days after his family had moved from the city out to the far reaches of Long Island, he had met Matt. They had been standing under a tree near his house, and Lukas had said his dad would take him and Matt sailing, that it would be cool to have a new best friend.

And suddenly a skinny, freckle-faced urchin dropped out of the tree between them and stuck her face in his. “You can’t be Matt’s best friend. I already am!” She’d kicked him in the shin. He’d pulled her braid. It had pretty much gone downhill from there.

Lukas had two sisters already. He didn’t need another girl in his life, especially one who insisted on dogging his and Matt’s footsteps day after day after day.

“I was here first!” she had insisted.

“Go away! Grow up!” Lukas had told her over and over when he wasn’t teasing her because he knew her face would get red and she would fight back.

But it was worse when she did grow up. She got curves—and breasts. She traded in her pigtails for a short shaggy haircut that accentuated her cheekbones rather than her freckles. She made her already huge blue eyes look even bigger with some well-placed eye shadow. She got her braces off, wore lipstick and sometimes actually smiled.

But never at him.

Except...sometimes, obliquely, Lukas thought she watched him the way he watched her.

But her focus was always on Matt. “I’m marrying Matt.” Holly had said that for years.

Hearing her, Lukas had scoffed. And at first Matt had rolled his eyes, too. But he had never been mortified by her declaration as Lukas would have been.

“That’s Holly,” he’d said and shrugged. Then, when he was fourteen, he told Lukas that he’d kissed her.

“Holly?” Lukas felt as if he’d been punched. “You kissed Holly?” Then, hopefully, he’d asked, “Was it gross?”

Matt’s face had turned bright red. “Nope.”

It couldn’t be different than kissing any other girl, Lukas had thought. So he’d done that. And then he’d kissed another. And another. He couldn’t believe Matt kept on kissing only Holly.

Then, Christmas of Holly’s senior year in high school, they’d got engaged.

“Engaged?” Lukas hadn’t believed his ears. It was ludicrous, he’d told Matt fervently. He’d told Holly the same thing. “You’re crazy,” he’d said. “How can you think about spending the rest of your life with one person? You’re not in love!”

But they hadn’t paid any attention to him. And when he’d tried to make it clear to Holly, well, let’s just say she hadn’t got the message. In fact, she’d hated him even more.

Then, when Matt was twenty-two and Holly just twenty, they had tied the knot.

Lukas had been on the other side of the world when he got Matt’s call to come home and be his best man.

“I’m in Thailand!” Lukas had objected. He’d been crewing on a schooner that summer, basking in sunny days, balmy nights and the charm of a bevy of intriguing, exotic women. He hadn’t been home for three years, had no intention of going to the wedding.

“There are planes,” Matt had said. “Get on one.”

Lukas had argued, but Matt was implacable. “You’re my best friend,” he’d insisted. “You’ve always been there, always had my back.”

The words had stabbed his conscience. “Fine,” he’d muttered. “I’ll come.”

He’d done it. Had even managed a toast to the happy couple at the reception. Then he’d got the hell out of there, lying about the departure time of the plane he had to catch. He’d been back in Thailand twenty-four hours later—back to his real life, back to being footloose and fancy-free. Matt could have marriage with its boredom and sameness.

Lukas had been telling himself that for a decade now. Today was no different, he thought as he shaded his eyes with his hand and squinted out across the water. It was just a matter of putting the past to rest.

And then he saw her.

One minute he was scanning the water where everyone pretty much looked alike paddling their canoes and kayaks and pedal boats in the confines of the marina. The next moment his gaze locked onto a woman in the back of a canoe out near the breakwater. There were two kids in front. And in the back there was Holly.

His heart kicked over in his chest. He didn’t know how he’d missed her before. There was, as always, a purposefulness about her. Everyone else was splashing and floundering. Holly was cutting through the water with ease and determination, as if she knew what she wanted and aimed to get it.

She hadn’t changed a bit.

He remembered when she hadn’t known how to paddle a canoe, and, taking advantage of that, Lukas had refused to let her come with him and Matt.

Her chin had jutted. Her eyes had flashed. “I’ll learn.”

He’d scoffed. “From who?”

It turned out his oldest brother, Elias, was no proof against big blue eyes. Elias had taught her, and the next time they went canoeing, Holly had come, too.

Suddenly there came a whistle from the car park. A man wearing a green St. Brendan’s T-shirt waved broadly. “Bring ’em in!”

With greater or lesser skill, the paddlers turned their canoes and kayaks and headed for shore. Lukas kept his eyes on Holly. He could see her talking to the students, giving instructions to back off a bit and let the earlier arrivals dock first.

She still hadn’t seen him, but she was close enough now that Lukas could study her more easily. Gone were the luxuriant dark waves she’d worn at her wedding. Now she had the same pixie-ish look she’d had as a child. Most of her face was hidden behind a pair of sunglasses and she wore a sun visor for shade, as well. The boy in the front of her canoe said something that made her laugh. And Lukas’s breath caught in his throat at the husky yet feminine sound.

“Gimme a hand, mister?”

Lukas looked down to see a kayak alongside the dock and two boys looking up at him. One held out a line to wrap around the cleat. Lukas crouched down to steady the kayak while the boys scrambled out. Then he helped them haul it out so they could carry it up to the waiting van. Out of the corner of his eye, he kept an eye on Holly’s canoe where she was talking to her students. She was still several feet away from the dock.

One by one, as the canoes and kayaks came up against the dock, Lukas helped them all until finally when he turned back there was just one canoe left.

Holly sat in the stern, unmoving, her sunglass-hidden gaze locked on him. No question that she’d seen him now.

Lukas straightened nonchalantly. “Holly,” he said casually. “Imagine meeting you here.”

The boy and girl in the canoe looked at him, surprised. Holly’s sunglasses hid her reaction. She still didn’t move as the two students brought the canoe against the tires lining the dock, and Lukas grabbed the bow to hold it for them.

The boy scrambled out, followed by the girl. Holly stayed where she was.

“Thanks, mister,” the boy said.

“You’re welcome.” Lukas had seen all the St. Brendan’s canoes now, and this one, with its deep, narrow hull, was far nicer and swifter than the wide-bottomed trio he’d helped pull out earlier. He let his gaze slide slowly over it, then brought it to rest on the woman who hadn’t moved. “Nice canoe. Yours, Holly?”

“How come you know Ms. Halloran?” the girl demanded.

“We grew up together—I’ve known Ms. Halloran since she was about your age.”

The boy’s brow furrowed, as if he couldn’t imagine either of them being that young. “You kiddin’?”

“Not kidding.” Lukas held up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”

“You were never a Boy Scout!” Holly blurted.

“Ah, she speaks,” Lukas drawled.

Her freckled cheeks were suddenly a deep red.

“I was a Cub Scout,” Lukas said, “when I was eight. You didn’t know me when I was eight.”

Holly gave a muffled grunt. She still didn’t move to get out.

And knowing her, she probably wouldn’t, unless Lukas forced the issue. “Nice to see you again, too, Hol’. It’s been a long time.” He held out a hand to help her out of the canoe, daring her to refuse it.

She muttered something under her breath that sounded like “Not long enough.”

And of course, she ignored his hand. Instead, she set the paddle on the dock and shoved herself up, trying to step sideways at the same time so as to avoid his outstretched hand.

In a flatter-bottomed canoe, it might have worked. In this one, she’d barely edged sideways when the canoe tipped.

“Oh!” she yelped. “Oh, hel—”

“Ms. Halloran!” The kids shrieked as Holly pitched, arms flailing into the water.

Lukas couldn’t hide the unholy grin that stretched across his face.

More kids came running. So did the men loading the canoes onto the trailer with St. Brendan’s van. Lukas didn’t move.

Holly sputtered to the surface, hair streaming, sunglasses gone, those all-too-memorable blue eyes shooting sparks in his direction. He still couldn’t stop grinning.

All around him kids clamored. “Ms. Halloran! Are you okay?”

“Ms. Halloran! You fell in!”

“You’re s’posed to stay in the center of the canoe, Ms. Halloran!”

One of the men who’d come from the van pushed past Lukas, a hand outstretched to help her. “Are you all right?”

“She’s fine,” Lukas said abruptly, stepping around the man and reaching to grasp her arm. He hauled her unceremoniously up onto the dock, steadying her with a hand against her back, aware of the warmth and suppleness of her body through her wet T-shirt even as she shivered. “Aren’t you fine?” She sure as hell looked fine, her nipples pebbling beneath the cotton of the shirt and her bra. He swallowed.

“Of course I’m fine,” she said brusquely, clearly unaware of the spectacle she presented as she turned to the students. “I slipped. We’ve all done it, haven’t we?”

At the fervent bobbing of heads, Holly grinned, shaking her hair out of her eyes. “So, I’m just today’s reminder. Do what I say, not what I just did. Now, let’s get the canoe out.” And with a deft move, she twisted out of Lukas’s grasp to haul the canoe up onto the dock.

If the T-shirt was a temptation, it was nothing compared to the way her shorts plastered to her rear end. Lukas’s mouth went dry. The other men and boys seemed to be appreciating the view, as well.

Stepping between Holly and her interested audience, Lukas wrested the canoe away from her, simultaneously snapping at one of the teachers. “Get her a towel. The rest of you, give me a hand.”

Everyone jumped to obey, and by the time Lukas and the boys wrestled the canoe onto the dock, Holly was wrapped in a towel.

The man who had provided it held out a hand to Lukas. “I’m Tom. Thanks for helping her out.”

Lukas grinned. “It has always been my pleasure to pull Holly out of the water.”

“Usually after you pushed me in,” Holly retorted.

Tom blinked. “You two know each other?”

“We’re old friends,” Lukas said.

“He’s an old friend of my husband’s,” Holly amended. “Lukas Antonides.”

Tom Williams beamed. “Great. He can take you home then.”

“I ride the bus!” Holly protested.

Tom raised doubtful brows at her sodden clothes and streaming hair. “They aren’t going to let you on like that.”

“I’ll take a taxi.”

Tom shook his head. “Not likely, Hol’.”

“It’s all right,” Lukas said. “I’ll take her.”

Tom beamed and grabbed Lukas’s hand, pumping it up and down again. “I wouldn’t want to leave her to get home on her own, and I’ve got to get these kids back to school. See you Monday, Hol’. Come on, gang.” He clapped two of the boys on the shoulder, then herded all the kids up to the van.

Holly didn’t speak until they were all out of earshot. Then she said, “I’m not going with you.”

“Right,” Lukas said. “You’re just going to stand here until you dry.”

He could hear her grinding her teeth. She didn’t look at him, just hugged her towel tighter and stared at the departing van. Lukas didn’t care. He stood there and drank in his fill of Holly Halloran.

It felt oddly like reaching an oasis after a lifetime of wandering in the desert. He had spent so many years determinedly not thinking about Holly that it was hard to believe she was actually here in front of him.

She was definitely no less eye-catching than she had ever been. Her bones were sharper now, her eyes set deeper. Tiny lines fanned out at the corners of them. From laughter? From sorrow? God knew she’d suffered that. Lukas wanted to reach out a finger and touch them.

No doubt he’d get a slap for his trouble. That wouldn’t have changed, either. Except once. Once she’d let him touch her.

“What are you doing here, Lukas?” Her voice cut across his memories, jerking him back to the present. She was looking at the Manhattan skyline, not at him. There was nothing inviting in her tone.

“You wrote me a letter,” Lukas reminded her.

Her fingers tightened on the towel wrapped across her breasts. “I sent you a deed of gift and asked you to sign it. Or to tell me if you wanted to keep the boat yourself.”

“I read that.”

“So, I repeat, what are you doing here?” The afternoon sun made her hair look more auburn than brown, like spun copper.

“I figured we could talk about it.” He paused. “I wanted to see you.”

Wanted to see if whatever he’d once felt was still there. It was perverse, he supposed, how Holly’s contrariness had always sharpened his senses. Going head-to-head with Holly always exhilarated him, made him feel alive. As a boy he hadn’t understood the subtext to their encounters, hadn’t yet connected the dots. It was all about attraction. His brain had finally recognized it at fifteen. His body had known it sooner—probably from the very moment he’d met her when he’d been shaken and stirred, both at once. He’d put it down to the suddenness of her tumbling out of the tree and confronting him. His heart had pounded and his pulse had raced the same way they were doing now.

The way they had the night he had incurred Holly’s everlasting wrath, the night he’d crossed the line.

And heaven help him, Lukas wanted to cross it again. He’d been gone for a dozen years, had dated more women than he could even remember, and they’d all paled in comparison to Holly. His best friend’s girl, and he’d never stopped comparing other women to her! He wanted to touch her again now, wanted to feel the softness of her skin and to trace her curves, to kiss her lips and still the chatter of her teeth. Good lord, her lips were blue!

“Come on,” he said abruptly. “Let’s get you home.”

“I don’t need you to—”

“Don’t be an idiot, Holly. I’m offering you a ride. Nothing else!”

For the moment.

For a dozen years he’d told himself that the past was past, that they’d all moved on, that what he’d felt was kid stuff, that he was well over her. After all, when he’d come back to New York, he hadn’t sought her out. He hadn’t even considered opening that door again. Not until Wednesday when he got Holly’s letter.

And when the door had opened anyway, he knew he had to see her again. But even this morning he had been convinced that everything he’d ever felt for Holly wouldn’t stand the test of time. She had been the dream girl of his past, the one girl against whom he’d measured all the others he’d met since.

But he really hadn’t expected to do more than make his peace with the past—with her. He expected to feel maybe a little nostalgia—and a twist of guilt.

But seeing her now, he knew it wasn’t going to be as simple as that. He felt the guilt, all right. But he didn’t feel nostalgia.

He felt as fierce an attraction as he’d ever felt. Some elemental connection that he’d never felt to another woman. He had a lot more experience now than he’d had back then.

Yes, she was obviously still holding a grudge. But he had to believe she’d changed, too, that she couldn’t hate him forever. Could she?

Lukas slanted a glance at the girl who had stirred his blood, at the woman apparently capable of stirring it still, and knew he was going to stick around and find out.

For all that he suspected he should, he couldn’t walk away.


CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_f33ab30a-c5ea-57d1-8635-24100816c955)

THE MINUTE SHE saw Lukas, Holly had felt her heart kick over in her chest. All the years of pretending he didn’t exist blew right out the window. It was like being eighteen again—young and intense and, above all, foolish.

And there was nowhere to run. Nowhere at all.

For years every time Holly remembered the night of her senior prom, she had done so with a bucket load of guilt—and a heart load of resentment.

It never should have happened, she told herself. And it was all her fault.

She should have been stronger. Firmer. She should have said no, right from the start, when Matt had broken his leg.

At least it hadn’t been her fault he’d broken his leg. That had, of course, been Lukas’s—just as every hair-raising, death-defyingly stupid thing Matt and Lukas had ever done could be laid squarely at Lukas’s door. In this case, two weeks before her prom, Lukas had persuaded Matt to climb Mount Katahdin in Maine.

Holly had not been invited.

She couldn’t have gone anyway because, while Matt and Lukas were sophomores in college and their schedules that Friday were free, Holly was a senior in high school with classes every day. Besides, it was the weekend she was getting her dress fitted for the prom, not to mention that her mother would have freaked out if Holly ever dreamed of going camping with two guys, even if one was her fiancé.

Lukas thought their engagement was idiotic. He had looked confused, then appalled when she had held out her hand to show off her ring. “What’s that?” he’d asked warily.

And when she’d said, “I’m engaged,” he’d stared at her in disbelief.

“To get married?”

“No, to wash windows.” Holly had rolled her eyes. “Of course to get married. What do you think?”

He had thought they were out of their minds, and he hadn’t hesitated to say so. He’d told Matt he was foreclosing on his options too early, that he had no idea what other women were on the planet, that he would never know what he was missing. He didn’t tell Holly anything. Obviously he considered Matt to be the one making the bad choice. She’d wanted to smack him.

But Matt—her dear, dependable Matt—had just laughed and said, “I’m not missing anyone important. I’ve got the only one who matters.” And he’d wrapped an arm around Holly’s shoulders, hauling her hard against him, the two of them presenting a solid wall of defiance in the face of Lukas’s scorn.

Only then had Lukas turned to Holly. “You can’t be serious.” His tone had said he wasn’t joking. Their gazes met and something flickered between them that Holly immediately suppressed. Attraction? Connection? She had never let herself examine it too closely. Lukas Antonides was far too powerful, too unpredictable—too intensely male—for Holly to handle.

“I love Matt,” she had said flatly. It was true. Matt was comfortable, predictable—every bit as male as Lukas, but without the intensity she found so unnerving.

Lukas hadn’t disputed it. But he hadn’t shut up, either. Over the following weeks he had told her she was too young. He’d questioned whether she knew her own mind.

Deliberately Holly had turned a deaf ear. “What do you care?” she’d asked.

If he’d said, “I love you,” what would she have done? Holly laughed at herself for just thinking it. Lukas love her? Ha! Lukas had been going through girls for years!

He’d scowled then. “I don’t want you making a mistake.”

“I’m not making a mistake.”

But Lukas didn’t seem to agree. As winter turned to spring, he’d found ways to keep them apart. In February he and Matt had bought the battered old sailboat in New Haven. It wasn’t seaworthy. It would have sunk in a bathtub, but Lukas had convinced Matt they could repair it.

“It will take months,” Holly had pointed out. And that would be if they worked on it every weekend, which would mean Matt would have less time for her.

“We can sail around the world after we graduate,” Lukas had gone on, undaunted.

“I’m getting married when I graduate,” Matt had reminded him.

Lukas had shrugged dismissively. “Who knows what will happen in a couple of years. You can at least help me work on it,” he’d said to Matt.

So, good friend that he was, every weekend that spring, Matt had worked with Lukas on the boat. Holly had barely seen him. The one weekend he had said he would come home turned out to be the weekend she was doing the final fittings on her prom dress.

“No problem,” Matt had said. “Lukas wants to go to Katahdin.”

Feeling hard done by, Holly had said shortly, “Let him.”

“He wants me to go, too. It’ll be a change from working on the boat. And you’re going to be busy anyway.”

So Matt had gone—and had broken his leg. Which was how Holly had ended up with Lukas as her date to her senior prom.

“I won’t go,” she’d told Matt. “No way.”

Matt had looked at her from his hospital bed, foggy-eyed with anesthetic. “Of course you have to go. You already have your dress,” he reminded her the day after he’d had half a dozen screws and a plate put in his left leg. “You’ve been counting on it.”

“I don’t mind staying home. Truly. Lukas doesn’t want to go with me. He doesn’t even like me.”

“Of course he likes you. He’s just...”

“Bossy? Opinionated? Wrong?”

And though she could still see the strain and pain on Matt’s face, he had laughed. “All of the above. It’s just the way he is. Ignore it. It’s your prom. And Lukas should take you,” he added grimly. “It was his idea to go climbing. He owes me.”

No doubt about that. But Holly was sure Lukas would refuse. She was stunned when he didn’t.

“Why?” she’d demanded suspiciously.

“Because he understands responsibility,” Matt said, looking completely serious.

She should have said no then. She hadn’t, telling herself that arguing with Matt would make him unhappy. It might also make him wonder why she was protesting so much. Holly wouldn’t even let herself think about why she was protesting so much.

She didn’t want to think about Lukas, about how when he wasn’t irritating her, the very sight of his muscular chest, lopsided grin and sun-tipped shaggy hair made her blood run hot in her veins.

It meant nothing. She was engaged to Matt.

Still, she wasn’t prepared two weeks later when she opened the door to Lukas, drop-dead gorgeous in a dark suit, pristine white shirt and deep red tie, for the impact of six feet of walking testosterone. The sheer animal magnetism of the man made all Holly’s female hormones flutter in appreciation while her brain screamed, No! No, no, no!

But she could hardly send him home. What would she tell Matt?

So she pasted her best proper smile on her face and tried to pretend she was completely indifferent. Yes, he was gorgeous. Yes, he smiled and chatted and charmed her mother. Yes, he brought her a corsage, which he fastened just above her left breast, standing far too close for comfort, so close that she could smell a hint of pine in his aftershave and see the tiny cut on his jaw where he’d nicked himself shaving.

She leaned toward it instinctively, then jerked back, practically getting herself stabbed by a florist’s pin in the process. “Sorry,” she muttered, mortified. “Sorry.”

He just smiled his engaging Lukas smile, the I’m-so-sexy one she had seen him turn on other girls but which until that moment he had, thank God, never turned on her.

“It looks good on you,” he said. It was a spray of tiny deep red roses. Delicate and aromatic. She drew a breath, trying to draw in the scent of roses to blot out the pine of his aftershave, to blot out Lukas.

But Lukas wouldn’t be blotted.

Worse, he unnerved her by being a perfect gentleman the whole time. He didn’t tease, he didn’t mock. He didn’t mention Matt or their engagement at all. He took her to dinner before the dance. It was expected. And Holly had thought they would go to one of the trendy upscale local places where most of her classmates went to see and be seen. But Lukas took her to a quiet romantic Italian place where he seemed to know everyone.

Holly couldn’t help looking surprised.

“We don’t have to go here,” Lukas said. “But I like it. It’s a little lower-key.”

Since when was Lukas lower-key? But Holly had nodded, glad they weren’t in the midst of a crowd. There might have been safety in numbers, but there would also have been lots of questions about what she was doing with Lukas, why she wasn’t with Matt.

They’d get asked at the dance, of course, but they wouldn’t become a conversation piece there. Holly didn’t want to be a conversation piece. “It’s fine,” she said. “I like it.” She managed her first real smile of the evening then, one that didn’t feel as if it had been welded to her lips.

Lukas smiled, too. Electricity arced between them—sharp and frighteningly genuine. “I’m glad,” Lukas said.

Holly wasn’t sure if she was glad or not. Tonight Lukas was everything Matt had assured her he would be: polite, charming, an easy conversationalist. When the waitress brought their menus, he didn’t tell her what she ought to order. He asked what she’d like to eat.

It was a sort of dream date—an intoxicating, heady experience. Unreal, almost. Holly kept waiting for him to revert to the Lukas she was accustomed to, but he never did.

At the dance, when she expected he would do his duty, dance once or twice with her, then disappear with the more interesting, flashier girls, he stayed by her side all evening. She wondered aloud whether he wouldn’t rather dance with other girls, but Lukas simply shook his head.

“I’m happy,” he said as the music started again. Without another word, he swept her into a dance while Holly’s mind spun and her body responded instinctively to Lukas’s powerful lead. One of her hands was gripped in his hard, warm fingers, more callused than Matt’s, rougher to the touch, giving her another tiny stab of awareness. Her other hand, resting on his shoulder beneath the smooth, dark wool of his suit coat, felt the shift and flex of strong muscles.

When she danced with Lukas, her eyes were on a level with his lips. Instinctively she licked hers and stumbled, red-faced, at where her thoughts were going.

“What’s wrong?” Lukas pulled her up and held her closer.

“N-nothing.” She tried to put space between them, averted her gaze from his lips. “What’re you doing?” she demanded as Lukas only drew her closer.

“It’s called leading.” The soft, almost teasing murmur in her ear sent a shiver to the base of her spine.

He led. She followed. Their bodies touched. The experience was nothing like the warm, slightly zingy buzz she experienced when she and Matt danced. No, each touch with Lukas felt electric, a shock to the system, a different sort of awareness altogether.

“Relax.” He breathed the word in her ear on a warm breath that did anything but relax her. She felt alert, aware, awake as she’d never been awake before. Expectant—though what she was expecting, she would not have dared to think.

Lukas didn’t say anything else, just moved with the music, drawing her with him, easing her closer. His hand slid to her hip, but went no farther. And gradually, unable to remain alert and wary every moment, Holly realized that she was relaxing. She found joy in the movement, in the rhythm, in the warm nearness of Lukas’s body. He made her feel oddly protected.

They danced almost every dance, far more than she ever would have with Matt, who much preferred to stand on the sidelines and watch while he talked sports with the guys. But Lukas danced. And eventually he began to talk, too, recounting what they had been accomplishing on the boat, then telling her what they had seen mountain climbing in Maine.

“So you don’t think breaking his leg is all we did.” His smile was wry.

Holly gave him a doubtful look, but she couldn’t help smiling and sharing a moment of rapport with Lukas. He asked her about her classes, and he surprised her by talking about his own courses.

“I don’t know what I want,” he said. “I just try things. See what I like. I’ve got geology this semester that is kind of cool. And—don’t laugh—but I like Latin. But what the hell do you do with Latin?” He shrugged. “What about you? What are you going to do?”

Holly, disarmed by Lukas liking Latin, found herself telling him about her own plans and dreams. “Nothing grandiose. I want to get married, have a family. I’ve always wanted kids.”

“Me, too,” Lukas said. Another surprise. “Not anytime soon, though,” he added quickly. “Not ready to settle down yet.”

She wasn’t at all surprised by that. “Before I have kids, though,” she went on, “I think I’ll teach.”

“You’ll be good at it,” Lukas said. And when she raised a questioning brow, he shrugged. “You should be able to handle a classroom. You always kept me in my place.” His wicked grin flashed, inviting her smile in return, and Holly did.

The whole evening was like that—Lukas attentive and fun to be with—a Lukas that once upon a time she had dared to imagine might lurk beneath his teasing, baiting, infuriating exterior. But if that Lukas ever even existed, he’d seemed far out of reach.

She shouldn’t even be thinking about him that way. She was engaged! She was going to marry Matt!

So she deliberately closed her eyes and tried to pretend that he was Matt. But the aftershave was wrong, the way he moved on the dance floor was smoother, easier. His height was wrong, too. She opened her eyes again at the feel of something feathery touching her forehead and saw Lukas’s lips so close they could kiss her brow. Holly sucked in a careful breath and shoved the thought away.

Why were there so many slow dances tonight?

Holly longed for something fast and furious to burn off her awareness, to give her some space. But when the next one was fast, it was no better. Seeing Lukas’s body shimmy and thrust to the music while she did the same, created something elemental, primeval, between them.

Holly tried to deny it. It was only dancing, she told herself. But their bodies were in sync, moving, shifting apart, coming together. And at the end Lukas grabbed her hand, then spun her out and reeled her back into his chest so that his body spooned against hers as he wrapped her in his arms.

“Oh!” Holly’s body was trembling, her heart hammering. His hands cradled her breasts. One of his legs had slid between her own. Holly tried to get her balance, to pull away. But her overheated body wanted nothing to do with that. She turned to stare breathlessly up at him.

Lukas was breathing hard, too. His cheeks were flushed, his forehead damp, his hair tousled across his forehead. Her fingers itched to brush it back, to feel its silkiness between her fingers. Deliberately, she knotted those fingers into fists.

“Hot work,” he muttered. “Let’s get something to drink.”

“Yes.” Before she went up in flames.

He got them each a soft drink, and they stood watching as the next dance began. It was a slow one again. Romantic. If they danced now, Lukas would pull her into his arms. Holly felt her body trembling.

“Let’s sit this one out.” Lukas’s voice was gruff.

“Yes.” Holly nodded and took a desperate gulp of soda, praying that it would cool her down. But nothing cooled her down that night. Amid the kaleidoscope of lights and sounds, of fast dances and slow, she was seduced by the moment, by the night. She told herself it wasn’t Lukas making her feel this way. But she had to admit he had made it a night to remember. He’d been the Lukas she’d dared to dream he could be.

When the prom ended, several friends were heading off together for a late meal. Had she been with Matt, no doubt they would have joined them. Holly expected Lukas to breathe a sigh of relief, bundle her into his car and take her straight home.

But when her friend Lucy called over, “Do you guys want to come to Woody’s?” Lukas had looked at her.

“Do you?”

She hadn’t expected that, and was ready to say no, sure he’d had enough of the evening, of her. But before she could answer at all, he went on. “That’s what you do on prom, isn’t it? Stay out till dawn?”

Stay out till dawn? With Lukas Antonides? An inappropriate flutter of anticipation tickled her. “Well, I—”

He raised a brow. “Would you go with Matt?”

“Sure, but—”

“We’ll come,” he said to Lucy. He slanted Holly a grin. “After all, I’m standing in for Matt.”

So they went to Woody’s, an upscale version of a fifties diner, full of her classmates, all laughing and talking, still on a high from the dance. Lukas, to her surprise, fit right in. He talked sports and surfing and sailboats with the guys. He was easy and charming to their dates.

They squashed into a booth with three other couples. Holly would have been comfortable with Matt shoved in next to her, would have relaxed when he slipped an arm around her. But when Lukas did it, she could feel every inch of the hard muscles of his arm. She was more aware of the heat of his body pressed hard against her than of anything anyone was saying.

She was sure Lukas wasn’t aware of her with the same intensity. His knee bumped hers, then finally settled against it, and he didn’t seem to notice. He kept right on talking to Sam, Lucy’s date, even as his fingers played with a strand of her hair. If she turned her head even slightly, her lips would brush his fingers. Holly shivered and looked straight ahead. It didn’t mean a thing. It was just Lukas. He didn’t mean anything by it.

But her whole body was thrumming with awareness by the time they left Woody’s. The noise subsided when the door shut behind them. The night breeze on her heated skin made Holly shiver.

“You’re cold,” Lukas said. “Here, have my jacket.” He made to shrug out of his coat.

Wear Lukas’s suit coat still warm from his body? Holly shook her head quickly. “N-no, thanks. I’m fine. It’s lovely out here, isn’t it?” She did a pirouette in the parking lot, looking up at the night sky, trying desperately to get her bearings, to get her feet on the ground.

Lukas glanced up briefly, then looked straight back at her. “Not as lovely as you.”

Holly stared at him in shock. Was she losing her hearing? Imagining things? “Was that a compliment?” she ventured.

“I can give them,” he said gruffly.

“Not to me.”

His mouth twisted. “Don’t let it go to your head.” Now he sounded more like the Lukas she’d always known, but perhaps just a little bit kinder. Then, like the gentleman he had never been until that night, Lukas opened the car door for her, then shut it once she got in.

“You know, one of the things I hated most about you—” she said when Lukas got in and shut the car door.

He had been about to put the key in the ignition. Instead, he stopped and looked at her, startled. Then a corner of his mouth quirked up. “Just one? I’m sure you have a whole long list.”

She did, but this was one she felt compelled to share. “Yes, but listening to you guys talking back there reminded me of this one.”

Lukas raised a brow, waiting for her to speak.

“I hated that you wouldn’t let me go sailing with you. You used to take Matt out with your dad and your brothers, but you wouldn’t take me.” She probably shouldn’t even be admitting that it had mattered.

Lukas looked thoughtful, then he nodded, put the key in the ignition and turned it. The car hummed to life, but he didn’t put it in gear immediately. Instead, he stared straight ahead in the dimly lit parking lot as if making up his mind about something. Deciding if he should apologize? That would definitely be un-Lukas-like.

Finally, he turned to her. “You want to go sailing? I could take you sailing.”

“When you and Matt get your boat finished?” Holly said with a tiny smile. “The twelfth of never?”

“No. Now.” There was a rough edge to his voice. And though it was dark in the car, Holly could feel his gaze on her as if he were touching her.

“Now?” she said doubtfully. “Tonight?”

“Don’t want to take the boat out in the dark. But when it starts to get light... How about that? We’ll end the night with a sail.” And he gave her one of those amazing Lukas Antonides grins that would have caused a saint to cave in to temptation.

Holly was no saint. Besides, it was just sailing, she told her sensible self, the one that was telling her to say no. He was, for once, being kind. It was Lukas’s way of making up for years of thwarting her. Was she supposed to throw it back in his face?

Besides, she did want to go sailing.

And with Lukas? Well, this had been Matt’s idea. Not hers.

* * *

He was playing with fire. Lukas knew it.

But he’d never been one to play it safe. And he hadn’t started this. It had been Matt insisting that he take Holly to the prom. What should he have done? Said no?

So he’d done it. He’d done everything Matt would have done—taken her to dinner, danced every dance with her, put his arm around her in a crowded restaurant to make more room for her friends. And if he had heightened his own desire with every touch, well, he could see desire in Holly, too.

He had seen the way she’d looked at him tonight. Her cheeks had been flushed, her nipples had become hard pebbles beneath the midnight silk she wore. Lukas was twenty years old, not a virgin. He knew something about the response of women’s bodies when they were aroused. Holly had been aroused. By him. And God knew he was aroused by her.

He should take her home. She was Matt’s girl. Not his. He had no right. But what if she was making a mistake marrying Matt? What if she wasn’t as in love with Matt—as committed—as she believed she was?

Don’t go there, Lukas told himself.

But he couldn’t bring himself to take her home. He’d offered her a sail. It wasn’t betraying Matt to take her for a sail. Lukas put the car in gear and headed toward the marina.

Halfway down the dark, narrow highway, Holly said, “I can’t.”

Lukas, shoulders tense, turned his head sharply. “Can’t what?”

“Go sailing! How can I in this dress?”

He breathed a sigh of relief. “No problem. There’s stuff on board. Shorts, T-shirts. Jackets. You can wear something of Martha’s. It’ll be fine.”

She swallowed. “Oh. Well, good.” She didn’t sound wholly convinced.

Lukas expected she would find another reason to call a halt to things. But as he kept driving, Holly was silent. She sat very still the rest of the way.

The marina parking lot was virtually deserted, allowing him to park next to the ramp leading to the dock. Some cars were still there because people had taken their boats out for the weekend. But no one was around. Lukas started to lead the way down the ramp, then realized that Holly had to pick her way carefully because she was wearing high heels.

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.

“You’re making me crazy,” he muttered at last and abruptly turned to swim back toward the beach.

“What?” Holly sputtered. “What’s wrong?” He could hear her splashing after him, but he didn’t wait. Lukas needed space. He needed distance. He needed to stop wanting what he couldn’t have. He didn’t stop moving until he was back on the boat.

Then he turned to see Holly hurrying up the beach and across the parking lot after him, her towel wrapped around her shoulders. Her teeth were chattering like castanets when she finally reached the boat.

“Why didn’t you say you were cold?” Lukas demanded. “You can take a shower.” He slipped down the steps below deck and jerked open the door to the head. “There’s plenty of hot water. Lots of towels. Get warm, I’ll be on deck.”

He changed swiftly into another pair of shorts and a sweatshirt, resolutely ignoring the sound of the shower and his imagination’s notion of Holly’s naked body beneath the spray. Instead, he made himself focus on getting the boat ready to go. He was checking the mainsail when he heard Holly’s footsteps.

“What did you mean?” she said. Her voice was quiet.

He turned around then. She was wearing shorts and a baggy sweatshirt of Martha’s that hit her midhip. They had never struck him as remotely sexy when Martha wore them. Put Holly in them and it was a different story. Lukas crouched down, showing sudden interest in the mast again, in case his interest in Holly was more obvious.

“You said I made you crazy.” She had climbed up on one of the benches and was almost on eye level with him.

Lukas shrugged awkwardly. Was he supposed to tell her he wanted her? That he was crazy with longing for her—and she was engaged to his best friend? He put a hand back and rubbed between his shoulder blades and said the only thing he could think of. “You always argue.”

“I didn’t argue tonight!”

He grunted. “Most times you argue.”

“So do you.”

Lukas scowled, unable to dispute that. He turned his attention back to the mast. “We can go soon. Should begin to get light in half an hour or so.”

He thought she might go away, look out to the east for signs of dawn. She didn’t. She watched him. Then she asked, “Why did you agree to take me to the prom?”

“You know why. Matt asked me to.” He flicked a quick glance up at her, then picked at a bit of loose brightwork with his thumb.

“Is that the only reason?”

His brows drew down, and he scowled at her. “Why else would I do it?”

Holly shrugged awkwardly. “I don’t know. I just...wondered. Sometimes...” She stopped and looked away, staring out across the dark water. “Never mind.”

Wondered what? Don’t stop there! But damn it, she did. She didn’t say anything else. And he couldn’t make himself ask. He and Holly never had heart-to-hearts. They never talked about things that mattered. And he wasn’t going to admit to anything when she wasn’t saying how she felt.

“That’s the only reason,” he said gruffly. “I’m just doing what Matt would do. What Matt wanted me to do.”

If he said it out loud firmly and flatly enough, would that make it true?

“Of course.” Holly’s voice was toneless. Was she convinced? Was she doubtful?

Did she want...him? Lukas rubbed his hand against the back of his neck, then he straightened, walked back to the cockpit and dropped lightly into it. Only one way to find out. He reached up and caught her hand, pulling her down off the bench to stand facing him.

“What?” Holly looked up at him, confused.

“What would you and Matt be doing now?”

Her eyes widened. “What do you mean?” She looked at him, confused and wary.

“You asked me a question. My turn to ask you one. I’m standing in for Matt, aren’t I? What would you and Matt be doing?”

He felt her fingers twist in his as she looked away. “How should I know?”

“Kissing?”

She didn’t answer, just pressed her lips together and refused to look at him.

“Kissing,” Lukas affirmed softly, leaning in, so close now that he caught another hint of that citrus scent.

Her fingers pulled out of his hands. He let go, but only to catch hold of her wrists, then slid both his hands up until they rested lightly just above her elbows, drawing her closer.

“So I haven’t been doing my job,” he said, keeping his voice even, although he felt the tension rising within.

He would burn in hell for this. He knew it, but he couldn’t help it. If she responded... If she wanted him, he would save her from making the biggest mistake of her life.

Holly flicked a quick glance up at him, then immediately looked away again, but it was too late. Lukas had seen a flicker of interest in that glance. He let go of her arms to touch her face, to turn it to look at him as he ran his thumbs along her jaw and slowly and deliberately lowered his mouth to hers.

Lukas’s brain fogged over. His body took over. He had no plan. Hell, he never had a plan. He went with his gut—and other even more interested portions of his anatomy—doing what came naturally, tracing her lips lightly with his tongue. Teasing, testing, tasting...

And Holly didn’t pull away.

The taste of Holly on his lips intoxicated him, made him tremble with the need that had been building all evening. Evening, hell, it had been building for years. From a time when he was too young to understand, some gut-level instinct deep inside him that he couldn’t begin to put a name to had zeroed in on her. He had wanted Holly before he’d barely known what such desire meant.





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