Sympathy for the Devil (International Bad Boys Book 4) by Kelly Hunter Read Free Book Online Page B

else.
    They watched the light roll out over the ocean for a while. Three bands of light and then a gap, another three bands and then a gap, and repeat. A different pattern for every lighthouse along the coast.
    “I missed it, you know. When I left,” she offered quietly. “This place and the people in it. I didn’t think I would.”
    “Did you find what you were looking for?”
    “When it came to photography, I found everything I’d been looking for and more. Teachers. Opportunity. Fulfilment. That part worked out just fine.”
    “And the rest?”
    “The rest covers a lot of ground. I’ve met fascinating people, but it’s a superficial world. I have a handful of friends. Not sure how far they’d carry me if I fell.”
    “Yeah, that one often requires family.”
    “I’ve always envied you yours.”
    “You have one too.”
    “I know.” A smaller unit altogether. “And it’s a beauty.”
    “How bad is he, Bree?”
    Her father. He didn’t need to say it. “Not good. But he hasn’t given up and neither will we.”
    “You need anything you call me.” Caleb’s unflinching support all but broke her.
    “So what about you?” She stared out over the water and tried to make sense of him. The boy he’d one been and the man he now was. “Have you ever felt the urge to leave the bay?”
    “I’ve been away at times. I’ve scuba-dived the world over and I still run wreck-diving trips throughout Micronesia. I worked a fishing boat in the North Sea for a year when I was twenty. Cruelest sea I’ve ever seen. I worked an oil rig in the Bering Sea. Most dangerous diving I’ve ever done, but the pay was good and it got us the equipment we needed to start building bigger boats.”
    “You went all over?” She didn’t understand it. “You were always just going to . . . stay.”
    “I know. At eighteen, I thought I’d never leave, but I couldn’t always find what I wanted here. Sometimes I had to change direction.” He shrugged. “The difference between you and me is that I always come home.”
    She’d underestimated him all those years ago. She hadn’t contemplated the ways in which he might use the family business as a base and branch out from there. “You’re kind of impressive. I never thought you’d leave.”
    “I always kept the sea.”
    “So that’s your anchor?”
    He nodded.
    “I didn’t know you very well back then, did I?”
    “I’m not going to hold it against you.” He turned to look at her and she melted beneath the intensity of his gaze. “Sometimes I knew what I wanted, but not how to get it—you fell into that category. Oftentimes, I could have used a bit more maturity in order to see all the options available to me.”
    “Could be I’m still in need of maturity,” Bree offered quietly, and let the serenity of the night help her choose her next words. “I came back here thinking that you wouldn’t want me anywhere near you. You tried to tell me differently this morning, but I wasn’t listening. Tonight I’m listening more.”
    “You still carrying those regrets?”
    “For the way I treated you and Cutter all those years ago? Yeah. They’re old companions.”
    “You should lose them. I may have mentioned that this morning too—when you weren’t listening.”
    “I’ll work on it.” The trouble with old regrets was that they knew where to find you no matter where you might be. “May I ask you a question?”
    He nodded, his eyes dark and hooded.
    “When you look back on that night, what do you see? What do you believe happened?”
    He hesitated before answering. He turned his gaze from her to the ocean. “I see ships bells and a girl in the moonlight who reached out and took what she wanted and got lost in the moment . . . with me.”
    “Romantic.”
    “’Course I am. I whisk a pretty girl away from a night of trivia and up to a secluded lighthouse and now I’m about to kiss her. That’s very romantic.”
    “You want to kiss me?”
    “Did I mention