Free This Perfect Kiss by Christie Ridgway

the direction of the “island.” It wasn’t an island atall, really, but an undeveloped pocket of the canyon floor that wasn’t part of the golf course.
    Once they reached it, Iris scrambled out before he could help her, and Rory had to stab his paddle in the squishy pond bottom to keep both Jilly and himself from tumbling.
    She braced herself by gripping the rocking side and peered anxiously in the direction the little girl had taken. “Will she be all right?”
    He nodded. “My brother brings her here a lot. It was one of our favorite places when we were kids.”
    She half turned to straddle the bench and shaded her eyes with her hand to get a good look at him. “You grew up here?”
    He nodded and shifted his legs, his knee brushing her calf. She drew hastily away from him. “Believe it or not, my grandfather and whichever wife he was on were more stable than our parents,” he said. Which wasn’t saying much.
    About twice a year their mother had remembered she had sons, her timing based on an intricate formula that factored in the dates of the Paris couture shows and the state of her bank account. Their father’s visits had been even more irregular. Rory had never discovered a rhyme or reason to his selfishness. “Greg and I always lived here at Caidwater.”
    “And was it a good place to grow up?”
    Rory flinched, surprised. Most people assumed living in the opulence of the estate guaranteed a happy childhood. “No,” he said honestly. “That’s why I won’t regret taking Iris away from here.”
    Now Jilly flinched. She swung completely around on the seat. He shifted to accommodate her movement, so that suddenly she was facing him, both of her legs caged by his much longer ones. Her jeaned knee—decorated with a lipstick-red patch that read “GO WILD!”—pressed against the inside of his right thigh like a mouth. Heat arrowed to his groin.
    “You’re taking her away?” she asked.
    “Mm-hmm,” he said, staring at her face. “I live near San Francisco. In a few weeks we’ll leave southern California and Caidwater for good.” Up this close, he found himself fascinated by her skin.
    “You seem so eager.” She swallowed. “What, is this place haunted or something?”
    Rory’s eyebrows rose. “Maybe so,” he said slowly. By ghosts of scandals and betrayals. “But let’s not talk about that.”
    He watched her swallow again. “What do you want to talk about?” A dash of tiny freckles, just one shade golder than Jilly’s complexion, kissed each high cheekbone.
    Kisses. Now why the hell did he have to think of that? It made him focus on her mouth. Like the rest of her, it was unconventional. Jilly’s lower lip was full, almost puffy, while the upper one had only the shallowest of dips. Really, the greedy little thing had more than her share of sensitive nerve endings. It didn’t seem fair that Jilly would possess that riotous hair and those voluptuous breasts and a mouth just made for kissing, too.
    Made for him to kiss.
    Already half hard, he felt another flaming arrow burn toward his groin.
    He glanced around, aware they were completely private. No Iris, no possible way a telephoto lens could catch them here. Adisaster-proof opportunity. The sudden thought stunned him. Rory Kincaid, usually the soul of sober responsibility, was thinking about taking a kiss.
    A kiss from a woman as diminutive and delectable as Jilly Skye. One who was nothing like the cool, goal-oriented beauties who typically interested him. Instead, she was a knock-knock-joking, lunchpail-toting, mind-blowing combination of luscious, danger-ahead curves.
    But what would one kiss hurt? Not when Jilly was made for it. Not when that electricity was charging up again, those sparks lighting in the air between them without anything more than her kneecap against his inner thigh. He leaned forward.
    She leaned back.
    He almost smiled, the idea of kissing her sounding better and better, even if it made no more sense than before.