Free The Bride Wore Blue by Cindy Gerard

in the neck locked in hormonal overload. And if I recall, I saved your sorry self once back then, too.”
    “Well, at least I let you think you did.”
    She angled him a suspicious look, stilling the hand she’d been working through her hair to fluff and dry it. “You mean you really didn’t have a cramp that day I dove into the bay after you?”
    He grinned sweetly. Angels should look so innocent.
    “You toad,” she sputtered, grudgingly accepting that he’d duped her all those years ago.
    “Sorry,” he said, without one speck of remorse. “But a guy had to do what a guy had to do. And it was heaven.” He exhaled on a wistful sigh. “There I was—tucked safely in your arms as you swam me back to shore.” He caught the towel she threw at him, chuckled and let his head fall lazily back against the sofa cushion. “And the mouth-tomouth, well, I almost embarrassed myself over that.”
    “You really were a jerk, Hazzard,” she said, but with a fondness in her voice that undercut her exasperation.
    He let his head loll to the side, toward her. His gaze sought hers, the intensity in his eyes heightened by firelight and lightning flashes. “And you really were a beauty. Still are.” He paused, genuine regret darkening his eyes again. “But even though I’d still try just about anything to get close to you, I’d never intentionally hurt you. I never meant for you to go out in that tonight.”
    “I know,” she said, turning way, uncomfortable with his intentions, certain of his sincerity. “I’m fine. Nothing was hurt, okay?”
    He grunted. “Nothing but my image. And maybe my pride.”
    “Ah, well. Time has managed to dispel the ’real men don’t eat quiche’ stigma. Maybe we’ll break the pink bathrobe barrier soon, too.”
    He smiled crookedly and resumed his study of the fire.
    “So, did you get warmed up?”
    He took a careful sip of his hot cocoa. “Working on it.”
    “And the plane? Is it all right?” she asked rather than let the silence infuse them again with intimate thoughts and impossible options.
    “She will be. She took a nasty gouge in the right float before I got her beached, but she’ll ride out the storm okay where she is.”
    “Far be it from me to question your priorities, but why is that wreck so important to you?”
    His eyes filled with affection and pride. “Remember Hank Townsend?”
    She furrowed her brow but shook her head when she couldn’t connect with the name.
    “Old Hank was just about the best walleye guide between the Cities and Alaska. He was also one of the nicest old guys and one of the biggest characters I’d ever met. The first time I was ever airborne it was with Hank in that plane. It was that flight that turned me on to flying. And that little plane that gave me my first thrill.”
    He paused. A shadow of regret darkened his face. “When I heard that Hank had died a few years back, I made a trip up from the Cities to pay my respects to his kids and ended up buying the plane from them. She and I have been together ever since.”
    There was a certain sweetness about him as he told her the story. An innocence of spirit and purity of heart that tugged at feelings deep inside. Feelings she’d thought she’d lost and would be better off without, she told herself grimly, just as the lights went out.
    “I’ve been waiting for that,” she said, making to rise from the sofa and light the lamps.
    A hand on her shoulder stayed her.
    “Stay put,” he said softly. “We don’t need the lamps. The fire glow works for me.”
    It was working for her, too—too well. The dancing flames lent a subtle intimacy to a moment that eclipsed even the isolation inherent in the romantic scenario of one woman and one man alone in a cabin in the woods.
    Even so, she let him coax her to settle back onto the sofa. “You mentioned the Cities. Were you living there then?” she asked, not, she told herself, because she was interested in his life, but to establish a