Read Online Grady's Wedding by Patricia McLinn - Free Book Online Page B

mind away from the thought. He waited until Leslie looked at him, a faint belligerence in her expression, then he let his eyes trail down her. Throat, curve of her breasts under the cotton shirt, slanted torso as she sat on one hip in order to tuck those long, slender legs to one side. From her bare feet, he started the return journey, noting this time that her right hand clenched the arm of the chair.
    When he reached her face again, he saw the expressive brows raised at him, the glint of anger in her eyes, and fought an urge to apologize.
    Too bad. He didn’t care. Better to focus on sexual flirting—something he knew a damn lot about—than to think about other things.
    * * * *
    After a swim the next morning, Bette retired to the shade of the porch, proclaiming an itchy sunburn was the last thing she needed. Grady started a ball going among the rest of them. When Paul added a Frisbee, their five-pointed catch became a real challenge, especially when the ball, the Frisbee and a wave converged on one person.
    Leslie felt something akin to relief that Grady seemed lighthearted, untroubled by whatever had caused, first, that odd moment on the porch and, later, that provocative survey of her. She’d been lost in her own thoughts—not of the cheeriest variety, either—when she’d caught his look.
    It had surprised her. First, because he looked at her the way she would expect a man with his lady-killer reputation to look at a woman. Then a second jolt because she was surprised—because it wasn’t something she would have expected from Grady, no matter what his reputation.
    Grady emerged, spluttering and streaming water from his body but triumphantly holding aloft the ball in one hand and Frisbee in the other.
    When she stopped laughing, Leslie announced she was going to sit out for a while. “I didn’t come to the ocean to spend all my time in the water.”
    “I’ll come with you,” Grady declared. “I didn’t come here to spend all my time drinking the water.”
    They slowly made their way to the shallows, pausing to brace for enthusiastic waves that broke around them.
    “Here comes one."
    Just as Grady spoke his warning, Leslie caught sight of a small boy a few feet in front of them. He didn’t look more than five; he seemed to be alone, and he was facing the oncoming waves with eyes wide and mouth open.
    “Look out!” she shouted as the wave hit her and rushed on toward the boy.
    The boy didn’t move, but the man next to her did. Halfway to the boy before the words were out of her mouth, he still couldn’t beat the wave.
    The force of the water caught the child, pulling him under and dragging him along in its race toward the shore. Leslie pushed her hair out of her face in time to see Grady scoop up the boy before he could be caught in the wave’s return trip.
    The child came up coughing the water he’d taken in. But in the seconds it took her to reach them, he’d cleared his lungs sufficiently to get down to the serious business of crying.
    Grady stood in water now placidly lapping his calves, holding the small body almost gingerly. The boy wasn’t as wary. He had his arms wrapped around Grady’s neck and held on with all his might.
    “Is he all right?”
    “I think so. I think he mostly got scrapes from being pulled along the bottom.”
    Leslie saw angry red marks on the tender skin and several scratches. “That and a huge scare.”
    “Brian! Oh my God, Brian!”
    They looked up to see a man and woman followed by an older boy racing toward them.
    “He’s all right,” Grady said, almost shouting to cover the distance and the panic. “He’s all right.”
    The man reached them first, splashing into the water and skidding to a halt.
    “Brian?” The boy lifted his head from where he’d buried it against Grady’s shoulder and stretched out his hands to his father without abating his crying.
    The woman arrived as they all reached the water’s edge.
    She ran shaking hands over the boy’s small