What Might Have Been by Kira Sinclair Page A

down his chest.
    Her breath touched him, moist and light, a tickle of sensation that drove him absolutely mad. She could reach out with her mouth, her fingers, anything. But she didn’t. She simply let the moist air through her tempting lips caress him.
    He strode across the orchard. They weren’t far from the house; he could see the faint lights from the up stairs windows, his room and hers. Four minutes, tops,and they’d be there together, taking up where they’d left off.
    â€œI can walk, you know.”
    It was almost the first thing she’d said to him from the moment she’d laid eyes on his naked body.
    â€œI’m not taking that chance. I let you down, you might run away.”
    Her body tensed in his arms but he had no idea why. Was she frightened? Angry? Disappointed?
    â€œAnd that would be bad?”
    There, in the single tremor on the last word, the only giveaway of the vulnerability she was excellent at hiding. He hated to see that vulnerability, a reminder of the terrible childhood he couldn’t change for her. There was one sure way to make it disappear…if only for a little while.
    Shifting his hold on her thighs, he slid a single finger beneath the edge of her nylon running shorts and thrilled at her muffled intake of breath.
    â€œVery bad.”
    He pushed into the house, the old front door banging against the wall with a protesting creak at their abrupt entry.
    â€œShh,” she hissed into his ear. “You’ll wake Gran.”
    Oh, wouldn’t that have been a sight. He was naked as the day he was born, his skin still damp and sticky from the water that hadn’t quite dried yet. Ainsley’s feet were streaked with mud, her breasts swinging free. And he was clomping them both through the house like a herd of buffalo.
    â€œShe sleeps like the dead.” He would know. He’d used that fact to his advantage many times in his misspent youth.
    â€œNot funny, Luke.”
    No, probably not. He strode up the stairs with her, skipping the noisy fourth stair just to avoid another pro test from her and made it to the hallway without so much as a sound coming from his grandmother’s room at the head of the stairs.
    He didn’t stop to ask; he simply strode into his own room and laid her gently across the bed.
    The covers were rumpled beneath her where he’d tossed and turned in the night. Pale white cotton sheets only emphasized the luster of her skin. She rarely wore makeup. She didn’t have to. Her skin seemed to glow from within, creamy and bronzed by the sun.
    She stretched out before him, and he was almost over whelmed with the realization that he was about to touch her again. For the past eight years, memories, dreams and sometimes nightmares had haunted him—the need for her had been so strong. Over those years no other woman had ever come close to what he’d had—what he wanted again—with Ainsley. He’d second-guessed his decisions, wondered whether the sacrifice he’d made was worth what he’d gained.
    In his heart he’d always thought the answer was no. But it hadn’t done him any good to acknowledge his mistake, not when she couldn’t be his anyway.
    But now, tonight, she was his. Completely and totally.No past. No twin brother to come between them. Nothing but the here and now.
    A flash of uncertainty crossed her face, making him realize he’d been staring too long.
    But she was so beautiful. He just couldn’t seem to find the words to tell her.
    She jolted sideways, fumbling in the covers to try and find a shield against him. He couldn’t have that. Sinking down beside her, he reached for the knotted sheet and pulled it out of her grasp before she could do anything with it.
    He leaned in; she retreated back, propped high on her elbows in the center of his bed. He followed.
    The chill of her skin registered. It should have been a balm to the sizzling heat, but it just made the