She thought about everything Connor had told her about his father, flashing next to the letters Isabel had written him and the way she'd reacted to seeing the faded pages again on the bar stool in the diner. Ginger hadn't even met the man, and yet, strangely, she felt that she knew him so well already.

“I'm so sorry, Mr. MacKenzie. He's out, but I promise to let him know the minute he walks in that you called.”

“Please,” Connor's father said, “just tell him I'm coming. I'm taking the red-eye out of San Francisco.”

He abruptly hung up and she held on to the phone for several moments before realizing she was staring blankly out at the sun setting over the lake through the kitchen window, the receiver still in her hand. How, she wondered, was Connor going to react to his father's arrival?

No question, Isabel was going to freak. Instead of three weeks to prepare she'd have eight hours.

Ginger called the diner, but when no one picked up she knew they must be running like crazy tonight.

She was about to leave a message telling her friend to call. Tonight. Whenever. But just as she was about to hang up, she decided, no, it wasn't fair not to just spit it out.

“Andrew's coming, Isabel. He's taking the red-eye out tonight. I figured you'd want to know.”

She left the same message on Isabel's home phone, and then, as she hung up the phone for what felt like the millionth time, she saw a flash of light out on the beach in front of the house.

Someone was out there with a flashlight. Looking out the window, she recognized the dark figure as Connor, but couldn't figure out what he was dragging behind him. A hose, she quickly guessed, although she couldn't figure out why.

A couple of minutes later when she got down to the sand she had to speak loudly to be heard over the sound of water spraying out of the hose.

“Connor? Why are you hosing down the boat?

“They're shooting the fireworks off tonight.”

She knew July fifth was the makeup day for fireworks if it rained on the Fourth. Still, she didn't understand what any of that had to do with what he was doing right now.

“But everything is still wet from the storm. It didn't stop raining until late this morning.”

“You can never be too careful.”

Finally, she got it. For all that he was trying to pretend everything was fine, that he could roll with the punches, no problem, he couldn't let go.

Fire hadn't just burned his hands. It was as if it were burning him up from the inside too.

She knew exactly what she needed to do to help him, had known all along that he needed her to help him accept what had happened. “You got a lot of phone calls while you were gone.”

“Who from?”

As easy as his voice seemed, she couldn't miss the slight change in the tenor of his voice.

“Your brother called again, wanted to let you know your friends from the crew would be calling soon. And they did call, Connor. So many of them I can't keep track of their names, but I wrote them down. Your mother left a message too.” She paused. “And your father, he called again too.”

She waited for him to respond, but when all he did was nod and continue spraying water over the already soaked wood and canvas, she said, “He wanted me to tell you he's coming here. On the red-eye. He'll be here tomorrow.”

“You've got to be kidding me?”

Finally, a reaction. “Turn the hose off, Connor. Talk to me. Please.”

He did put the hose down, and she was filled with hope that maybe, just maybe, he was finally ready to take his first step toward healing.

“Come swimming with me, Ginger.”

Her head spun at the abrupt switch, but also from being pulled back into his arms. Because now that she knew she loved him everything felt so different.

Bigger. Sweeter. A hundred times more intense.

A thousand times more frightening.

“Swimming?” she asked stupidly.

“Night swimming. Right now. Here. In the dark, beneath the fireworks.”

She tried to shake her head, tried to put voice to the word no. Sex wouldn't solve anything for him. But his hands were already on her body, stripping her down, and his mouth was on hers, taking, giving, and she couldn't help but go with him. And then her fingers were moving too, pulling at his clothes, wanting them off faster, wanting nothing between them, to be as close to him as she could possibly be.

Sliding his fingers through hers, he took her over to the edge of the dock.

“Ready to jump, sweetheart?”

It was the sweetheart that did her in, that took any chance of protest away from her. And then they were jumping through the warm evening air before splashing in and and going under, the cool water taking what was left of her breath away.

And still, the water had nothing on Connor who had taken her breath away from the first moment she'd met him.

Connor was doing everything he could to drown in her, to keeping losing himself in the softness of her skin, the taste of her mouth, the feel of her tongue against his.

And still, minute by minute, he could feel himself spiraling out of control, like a rope that was unwinding from the inside out, strangling his guts in the threads as it spun faster and faster.

It was taking everything he had to keep it together.

All his life, his instincts had been to get moving, to use blood and sweat to work through the kinks. But this was one hell of a kink. And right now, the only thing that made sense was to go to a place where all that mattered was sensation. Where his only goal was to take Ginger higher, to use his hands and mouth to make her soft and yielding beneath him, to hear her crying out his name as she came.

He pulled her out deep enough in the lake where he could stand, but she had to wrap her legs around him to stay above the water. She wrapped her arms around his neck and he didn't kiss her hard, not this time. He wanted this moment to last forever, wanted the rest of the world to stay the hell away.

Only here, with Ginger, as her tongue slipped and slid against his, did he feel the deep ache inside begin to recede.

Only here, as her hands moved to cup his face, did he let himself accept that being with her was more than just great sex, that he was shaking from the power of their connection.

Only here, in the dark, cold water, as Ginger took him inside in a gasp of pleasure, and he let himself fall completely into her, could he see any light at all.

Chapter Fourteen