Sunset In Central Park (From Manhattan with Love 2)

“My mother was responsible for breaking up at least one marriage on that island. Alicia and Sam Becket. It was a hideous time.”

Matt had heard plenty of rumors about the Beckets’ unconventional marriage but he decided this wasn’t the time to mention it.

“Even if that’s true—and plenty would argue that you can’t break something sturdy—you are not your mother. You are not responsible for how she chooses to live her life. You’re not responsible now, and you weren’t responsible then.” He wished he could make her see that.

“Maybe you’re right and it would do me good to go back because I’ve built the place up into this horror island that Lucas Blade could very well put in one of his books, but part of me is—”

“Scared?”

“No! I’m not scared. I’m not that pathetic.” She gave him a furious look and then her shoulders drooped. “All right, I’m scared. Turns out I am that pathetic.”

“You’re not pathetic. You had a bad time and it’s left bad memories. We all tend to avoid things that bring us down.”

“What do you avoid?”

He finished his coffee. “I’m not good with hospitals. After all those visits with Paige—” He paused, fielding the images that rushed at him. “I walk through the door, smell that hospital smell, see medical staff with serious faces and white-faced relatives sipping disgusting coffee out of flimsy cups and I’m right back there, feeling the tension and seeing my parents’ attempt to cover up their anxiety. I can’t bear people talking about health and hospitals. I shut down. Close off.”

Sympathy darkened her eyes. “Those were bad times.”

“My point is that we all have things we’d rather avoid, Frankie. It doesn’t make us pathetic, it makes us human.”

“Well, I’m superhuman, and I’m not going. You’d have to drug me and tie me to the plane. I’ll look at your photos, I’ll talk about your apple orchard, but I’m not setting foot on Puffin Island.” She picked up her coffee and took a sip.

He watched her. “If you change your mind, let me know.”

“I’m not going to change my mind.”

He didn’t try and persuade her.

He’d planted a seed. Now he was going to let it grow. She was a coward. Not only because she was afraid to set foot on the island again, although that was definitely part of it, but also because she knew that going to the island with Matt would mean taking their relationship to the next level. And then it would end.

She didn’t want it to end.

Tonight was the most fun she could remember having, but underneath the laughter and the conversation had been a seam of shivery tension and excitement that made her breathless.

She could almost have believed in happy endings, except she knew better.

Frankie sat in the cab, watching glittering, nighttime New York slide past outside the windows like a glamorous movie set.

It was late, but the streets were as crowded as they were in the middle of the day.

She could have been people-watching, or thinking about Puffin Island and all the things Matt had said, but all she could think about was him. The powerful length of his thigh close to hers but n

ot quite touching, the width of his shoulders against the back of the seat.

The physical awareness was intense and unfamiliar. She didn’t understand how she could feel this way. He’d taken her hand a couple of times in the park while they were walking, that was all. But she was fast discovering that sexual awareness was rooted in more than just touch. It could be triggered by a smile, a word or a look, like the one he’d given her over dinner that had made her feel as if she was the only woman in the restaurant.

And she realized that the most deliciously arousing thing of all was how well he knew her.

It was as if he could see inside to all the parts of her she kept hidden. It should have felt scary, but instead it gave her a warm, excited buzz as if all the energy she usually directed into hiding who she was had suddenly been redirected.

She stole a glance at him and he turned his head and gave her a half smile. It was as if he understood everything she was thinking.

There had been a moment in the park where she’d been convinced he was going to kiss her, and then another moment on the bridge while the sun was setting. She’d almost gone up in flames with want and need, and when he hadn’t kissed her she’d been torn between relief that they’d postponed the moment when he was going to discover she was terribly bad at sex and frustration because she’d wanted him to kiss her so badly.

And now the nerves were back because she had no idea what happened next.

Her rulebook for relationships didn’t look like other people’s.