“Yes, but only when you are ready and willing. I have no intention of rushing you into anything.”
She swallowed hard but did not take her gaze off him.
“Fine, pretend you are jaded and sophisticated.” He removed his shirt in one fluid motion and held back a chuckle when he heard her make a strangled sound, halfway between a kitten’s meow and a bird chirp, because she wasn’t used to seeing bared muscles or broad shoulders on a man. Her late husband was built more like a slender willow reed.
“All right, Fiona. Moment of truth. I’m taking off my trousers now. Are you going to stay stubborn and gawk at me? Pretend you are not going to silently shriek and panic? Or will you turn your back? Do it now.” He stared at her while undoing the first button of his falls, then the second.
Her face turned a brighter shade of red as she spun around to stare at the beach steps. “I am only looking away to protect your modesty.”
“Mine? I am not modest. Turn around if you want to look at me. I know you are dying of curiosity. But it will also be a shock to your senses.”
She huffed. “Pardon me while I yawn.”
Laughing, he took off his trousers and dove into the bracing sea.
“You can look now,” he called out once the water was above his waist. The water was clear, although hopefully roiled enough by the small waves breaking around him so as not to give her too much of a view. She wanted to appear brave, but in fact she was a skittish filly.
Perhaps he was treating her too much like an innocent, but this was what she was to some degree. She was not sophisticated about sexual matters, although she probably assumed she was, due to her almost twenty-year marriage.
But what had she and Shoreham done in all those years? It was clear to Rob that she understood almost nothing about men’s bodies. Shoreham had been her one and only, and obviously taught her very little. Nor had anyone touched her before marriage or after she’d lost her husband.
Was he being a prideful arse by worrying about showing her too muchmalenessall at once?
Fiona was no wilting daffodil. She wasn’t going to swoon or faint at the evidence of his masculinity.
But she was a thinker, and this was what she was going to do—think too much and then obsess over every detail.
She turned to watch him in the water and was now staring at him with the intensity of the sun.
Obviously, she was contemplating joining him.
“The water is quite splendid, Fiona.”
When she did not respond, he let the matter drop and swam the length of the cove and back. She probably studied his arse, the very same one she had powdered when he was a toddler.
One’s arse did not change much from infancy to adulthood. It was the package up front that mattered most.
“Look away, Fiona. I’m coming out now.”
“I don’t see why I should.”
“Are we going to play this game again?” He brushed back his wet hair to keep it off his face. “Fine, don’t turn around. Show mehow comfortable you are around a man’s naked body. Because I amverynaked, Fiona.”
And he knew she wasn’t comfortable at all. Shoreham must have come to her bundled to his throat.
“This final warning is a courtesy to you. As for myself, I don’t care if you look your fill.”
But he had not waded more than a step forward before she made another of those chirping bird sounds and turned away. She did not move away from his pile of clothing, however.
He stepped out of the water and closed the distance between them, bending to retrieve the trousers by her feet. Water dripped from his hair and body, and a little of it fell on her as he shook himself like a dog to wipe the excess moisture off before he—
She turned around and stared at him.
He did not think her eyes could grow wider.
Fortunately, he happened to have his trousers in his hand and covering his private parts. Not on, just held in front. “What are you doing, Fiona?”
“You sprayed me with seawater.”
