her kicking legs, or the feel of her corn silk hair beneath his arm at her back. Hell, he tried not to inhale her spellbinding scent.
He took her farther from the castle this time, set her down easy, and let her go without a commanding order. But like a horny teen high on hormones, he caught her eye and imagined a game of sex for sport, her on his team, and on that treacherous thought, he headed back to the castle.
“You’re making a mistake,” she called after him. “I can be a team player. I can even be the cheerleader. Give me an O .”
The castle doors shut on the sight of her, cheerleading arms in the air, breasts pointing his way. King’s heart raced faster and louder than the wind’s newest wail. What the? He thinks of sex as a team sport, and she says she can be a team player? A cheerleader? Give me an O for . . . orgasm ? He freaking wished. Talk about scary, like fate, or kismet, or . . . disaster. Sex for sport with that one would be like sailing on the Titanic .
Meanwhile, the wail now cut through his headache like a saber, nearly but not quite eclipsing his crew’s renewed bickering. “Son of a sea witch!”
His foreman came up to him. “There’s something about that woman.”
“Yeah,” King snapped. “She’s stacked. Great rack, nice ass. Dime a dozen. What’s your point?”
Curt rubbed his nose to hide his grin, and King cursed himself for showing his colors.
“The air seems to change when she comes in,” Curt said. “The place feels . . . sociable. Even the wind quiets down . . . like it wants her here. And the crew? Did you see them working together for a couple’a minutes there? Both times?”
“Impossible.” King frowned.
“Bet you a day’s pay.”
To add to Curt’s challenge, the wind wailed louder than King remembered, even as a boy when it scared the starch out of him, until he realized that the castle, or its wind, or both, wouldn’t hurt him, which it/they/she didn’t . . . until he became a man.
The howl now became so strident, dust streamed from the age-ravaged ceiling, sending the crew running for cover. What kind of wind could rattle a ceiling in a structure with granite walls three feet thick?
King eyed the castle doors, swore, and went after the sexy interloper, wishing to hell he wasn’t glad for the excuse to get her back, however ludicrously lame.
----
Chapter Three
FROM the shadow of the castle, King admired the sway of her fine ass as the goddess made her way toward the cement steps leading to the dock at their base, sunshine filtering through her blonde hair like a halo. How to get her back inside when he’d made such a point of throwing her out? She turned, hearing his footsteps, and backed away as fast as he approached.
When he picked up his pace, the seductress in scarlet ran, stopped short of heading down the steps, and he plowed into her. Afraid she’d take a tumble, he pulled her from the edge of the stairs and lost his balance.
He fell back, and she landed on top of him . . . all their contrasting parts in sync, his rising to the occasion.
“Withering witch balls,” she said, raising herself on her arms and looking down at him. “Killing me is not the answer, and neither is groping my—” She reared back and scrambled off him. “ That’s not the answer, either!”
He got up as quick as she did. “Uh, sorry,” he said. “I’m a man. It’s a reflex. What can I say? It has nothing to do with you.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Well, it does, because you’re . . . you’re . . . bootylicious?”
“You just keep the compliments coming, don’t’cha?”
He raised his hands. “I can’t seem to stop myself.”
“Your big mouth, clumsy gorilla feet, and that loose cannon you keep in your pants should be registered as lethal weapons.”
King coughed to hide his amusement, as foreign as a fishbone in his throat, which didn’t keep him from admiring the angry rise and fall of her breasts.
The small skiff motoring toward Salem