-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Contents: 123456789101112131415 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chapter 1 ^ｻ November, The Beginning Driven by the storm, the waves of the gulf roared shoreward. Streaks of red and purple lingered low between sky and rolling water. Mary Elizabeth thought about walking out into that darkness, deeper and deeper, until it bore her up and carried her away. There would be an end to it. No more struggling. Thundering onto the sloping beach before her, the surging waves warred with the blackness of the ruby-smudged twilight.Elizabethlet a handful of powdery white sand sift from her fingers as she stared at the sky. Only the toss of white spray relieved the deepening purple. A lifting up, weightless. The way it had been when she'd learned to float in these sunshine-clear waters as a child. She could feel how it would be, that lovely, lulling weightlessness葉he power of the storm surrounding her, sweeping her out to that thin line marking the curve of earth into space, sweeping her into peace. No more pain. So easy. So tempting, that floating away to sunshine. Her head would be a small dot in the vastness for a long time, and then it would disappear while the waves rolled on forever. Letting her thoughts drift, she inhaled the salty air blowing around her. Cold and filled with the taste of the gulf, that air stung her lips, her eyes, and burned her lungs. She coughed. And coughed once more, convulsively, as she breathed shallowly against the tearing pain in her lungs. She ground her hand into the beach, fighting for breath. Grit scratched her skin as she pressed her palm even harder into the wet sand beside her, focusing her fluttering thoughts. A froth of foam as cold as the windy blasts tickled her toes. She coughed hard, chest muscles straining. When she could finally breathe, she rested her head on her bent knees, exhausted. Retreating, the wave abandoned a curl of seaweed at her feet. Reaching toward the prickly strand, she felt it slip through her fingers on the next wave. That was how it would be. Just an easy sliding away. She was so tired, and there would be no more pain. Nothing, in fact, ever again. That, too. Never again to have Sullivan's eyes light up as he saw her, his smile erase the loneliness from his face and dull the aching in her heart. Sand blew into her eyes. Sullivan. Hungry-eyed Sullivan with his guarded smile that warmed all the cold, frightened places deep inside her. Elizabethsighed and lifted her head, watching the waves crash ever closer in the deepening darkness, her thoughts circling endlessly around Sullivan. She kept her gaze on that far distant horizon until it vanished, leaving before her only the billowing night and the onrushing tide. When the water was ankle high and her jeans soggy with sand, she shook herself out of her reverie. Shivering and coughing, she wriggled her toes, burrowing them under the sand. They looked like small, bleached prunes in the cloudy water. She laughed as she watched her feet disappear. Here she was, fanny-deep in water and shoveling her feet under the sand so she wouldn't be cold. A laugh bubbled up again as the black humor of her situation struck her. How simple life was, really. If cold, the body sought heat. If hungry, food. The body's needs were basic. Survival. Love. If you were lucky. Burying her ankles in the murky sand, she thought, too, about cowardice and fear, about the balance of pain and joy. She couldn't remember one single time in her life when she'd ever flung caution to the winds. Not even the night Charlie, the town's self-designated bad boy, had roared up to her porch on his motorcycle and flashed his wicked grin, daring her to come for a ride. With the smell of orange blossoms rising up all around her in the night air, she'd longed to fly out of her house and shriek down the driveway with him, wind whipping her hair back from her face, her arms tight around him. Her heart racing, she had hesitated, nudging the edge of the door with her foot, Charlie's devil-may-care grin pulling her forward. She'd finally shaken her head. But underneath, oh, underneath, how she'd longed to taste the promise of Charlie's smile. Now she wrapped her arms tightly around herself. Who'd have ever thought Charlie would become a banker? All those times she'd let life pass her by. Until Sullivan Barnett, who seldom smiled and who wasn't anything like Charlie. Cynical and intense, Sullivan was everything Charlie had only pretended to be. She rinsed her sandy fingers in the eddies around her feet. Sullivan, storming into her life, never giving her a chance to hover in the shadows, wearing down her defenses with his need forher. Oh, Sullivan, she thought with something approaching despair, what in the world am I going to do about you? Drizzle from the scudding clouds mingled with spray. Sullivan had promised he'd return tonight. Turning her back to the storm, not wanting to hope,Elizabethstruggled to her feet. She'd sworn right from the beginning she'd never become dependent on him. Not fair. A tiny part of her acknowledged that she didn't want to do that to herself, either. Equal was okay. Helpless wasn't, not in her book of rules, at least. Coughing and shivering, longing for Sullivan with every breath she fought for, she sank to her knees in the surf, head bowed, her breath rasping in the whipping wind and spray. Coming out onto the deck of the beach house, Sullivan saw her hunched over at the water's edge, her thin figure unmoving and blurry in the wavering dark. A sick dread sent him vaulting over the railing. As he grabbed the rough wood, a splinter drove into his thumb, but he hurried to her, his heart hammering. His shoes crunched on the sand, echoing the thud of his heart, and she must have heard him, sensed him,something, because, still on her knees, she turned and lifted her hand to shove her blowing hair back from her pale face. Sour bile rose in his mouth, but Sullivan slowed his steps. She wouldn't want to see his terror. Making his way to her against the gusting wind, he worked the sliver out with his fingers and dropped it to the sand, all the time watching her, her wind-tossed hair gleaming in the fitful light, the shimmering curve of her throat, the pale shine of her cheek turning to him. His eyes never left her, and his hunger for her, powerful enough to rend him in two, frightened him. With her, he was whole. Without her. Hooking his shaking hands in his back pockets, hiding his fear, he sauntered up. "Damn it, Lizzie," he drawled, watching her pivot slowly. "Had a hell of a time getting your door open. Thing's warped to kingdom come and back. Why don't you let me put up a new one?" He saw the exhaustion in her drooping posture and with an effort kept his mouth shut. "Hello to you, too, Sullivan." Her smile was strained, but her low tone was still sassy. He wanted to grab her out of the damned water, wrap her in blankets and carry her all the way back to her house, but he knew she wouldn't thank him if he did. Instead, pulling her out of the whirlpool of surf and steadying her, he patted her rear end through her sopping jeans and forced a grin. "Still a kid at heart, huh, Lizzie? Can't stay out of puddles." He tugged at her pocket, which was stuffed with shells. "Bet you couldn't wait to shimmy out of your Sunday best when you were a little girl." She smiled, her mouth a sweet arc, and the ever-present tightness in his chest loosened and let him pretend that they had forever. "All those lights." He drew her closer, surrounding her with his arms, his chest, trying to warm her. In the semidarkness he saw the blue-gray shadows under her eyes, but he plowed on. "Hell, I could see your house halfway down the island." He rubbed at the goose bumps on her arms. "Place is lit up like a Christmas tree." He heard the harshness in his voice, the edginess curling his syllables. A fragile weight, she leaned against him, and his heart beat heavy and slow with grief. "So, Lizzie, here you are. Windows wide open, lights blazing・ He anchored her hair with his palms, stepping so close he could feel her breath on his neck, hear the rasp and effort as she spoke. "Myelectric bill, Sullivan, not yours. I don't like the dark." Her voice was as soft as her fine hair blowing in the storm, touching him and making him ache in the loneliest part of his soul. "And don't call me Lizzie." Her mouth pursed, she added, "I don't like that." "I know. Why do you think I do it?" He rubbed her nose with his, his forehead lingering on her cheek, which felt cold against his heat. As he swung her up like a child into his arms, her sandy toes grazed his thigh. A yearning as old as man and woman slashed through him. "Lizzie, Lizzie, Lizzie," he taunted, whisking her cheeks with his chin. "Mean, you are, Sullivan Barnett." She stuck out her tongue. Giving in to his craving, he trailed his lips down the line of her throat and skimmed the edge of her small ear as he turned to the beach house. "Damn straight. Meanest coot in town. But never to you, Lizzie." Repeating her name like a mantra, he stroked the bristle on his chin against her nose. "No?" She brushed back a strand of unruly brown hair at his neck. He shivered at her light touch and turned his mouth to her seeking fingers. "Never to you." He kissed the tip of her thumb. "But mean, even so." Futilely she blotted at the rain on his face. He...
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