Letters and Lace (The Ronan's Harbor Series) Read Online Free PDF Page A

against the side of hers, temple to temple, one throbbing pulse calling to the other. Sarah lifted her gaze, breaking the contact of their skin. The movement placed her mouth just a breath from his lips. She felt her old self hovering above this new creature she had become tonight. Without a second thought, Sarah acquiesced to the urges whirling within her. Her lips parted as his head bent forward, his mouth pressing onto hers in a kiss she felt to her toes. She didn’t even know his last name. She didn’t care. I don’t even know who the hell I am!
    ****
    Benny moved his mouth over hers, enjoying her taste, both sweet and spicy, a mingling dichotomy he guessed personified this Sarah person.
    He held her tight, her body melded against his. He felt her warmth and let it bathe him, dull his mind of any other thought than this. There’d be time later for warnings to trickle in, time to rationalize his behavior. But, for now, it was just the two of them, nothing before and nothing after. Just the dance. He curled her hand to his chest and pressed it close.
    His first regret arrived when the music ended. The world around them reappeared—the sounds of people talking, the staccato of appreciative, clapping hands. It was time to release his arms and let her go. He didn’t want to.
    She lifted her head from his shoulder and tendered him a shy smile, her full just-kissed lips closed. Her hazel eyes were filled with smokiness and an expression that went deep. Even at first glance he had seen that they were filled with a kind of knowing—as if all the experiences of her lifetime, and perhaps other lifetimes before, were written right there in the amber in their depths.
    Their parting felt awkward, disjointed. As they walked silently back to the bar, the next regret came hard. He knew this had been a bad idea. Very bad.
    Sure, he had liked her look the moment he’d laid eyes on her. She and her friend, Gigi, were an attractive pair. He knew immediately that the off-beat looking Gigi had given him “the eye.” And, truthfully, he didn’t mind her demonstrative flirtation, found her type interesting.
    But, there was something about Sarah, the unpretentious woman whose more conservative appearance did not pale in comparison to her friend. Her natural appeal was what drew him to act totally unlike himself, to go against his ironclad resolve.
    His brother Sal would laugh like hell if he had seen little brother Benny pretzeled around a virtual stranger in a beat-up little beach bar. Sal would have most likely slapped him on the back, given one of his raucous whoops, and told him to go get lucky.
    He watched Sarah as she walked ahead of him, her hips’ gentle sway a subtle sight with a not-so-subtle impact to his senses. He looked away.
    Benny didn’t approach this kind of woman, even when he found them attractive. He’d learned it never ended well. His marriage had been a quick disaster, like an earthquake that rocked a stable place in mere seconds before leaving it in shambles.
    In the years that followed, Benny had liked to go it alone. He’d had his share of one-nighters and brief encounters where he and a woman both had no expectations beyond the moment. That had been enough for him. Plenty.
    He hadn’t even wanted to come to this godforsaken place. This was the price he paid for giving into Sal’s cockamamie idea to go in on a flip property at the shore. Mr. Bigshot Captain of Glendale’s PD, Sal, was still working, so it became Benny’s job to do some clean-up work to the ramshackle house they’d bought. “Pretty it up just enough to unload it,” Sal had said.
    Wordlessly he and Sarah headed back to their parked drinks at the bar. Gigi and “Normie” greeted them. Benny nodded as though he were listening. What he was actually doing was imploring himself to get the hell out of there before the music started again.
    He really needed to close the book on this night and this woman. Yet all he could think of was their