Carla Cassidy - Under The Boardwalk

“Our lives have taken us in completely different directions.” Nikki sighed again, suddenly weary.

“Nikki, I never forgot you. I can still remember the taste of your skin, the texture of it. I still remember each and every time we made love, each and every time you whispered my name.” He placed his hands on her shoulders. “Tell me you don’t think about those nights under the boardwalk. Look at me and tell me you don’t remember how right we felt together.”

She drew upon the anger that was just beneath the surface. She thought of her joyous letter to him, answered by an envelope of money.

She looked into his eyes and lied. “Never,” she said firmly.

CARLA CASSIDY is an award-winning author who has written more than seventy books. In 1995 she won Best Silhouette Romance of 1995 from Romantic Times BOOKclub for Anything for Danny. In 1998 she also won a Career Achievement Award from Romantic Times BOOKclub for best Innovative Series, and her 1998 release Pregnant with His Child… was both a nominee for Best Silhouette Romance from Romantic Times BOOKclub and a RITA® Award nominee in the Best Traditional category. She has been a professional cheerleader, an actress and a singer/dancer in a show band before settling into her true love…writing.

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Nine

Ten

She tossed restlessly on the narrow bed…waiting, anticipating…knowing he would come before the moon reached its zenith, before the sand lost the last of the heat of the day.

She sat up as she heard the familiar brush of fingers against her window screen. Heart thudding loudly, she left the bed, raised the screen and reached for his hand, knowing it would be there to help her over the sill.

Gazing at him, she swallowed a joyous burst of laughter, noting how the moonlight stroked his bold, handsome features. Without warning, she turned and ran across the sand dunes, toward the thundering waves of the ocean. She heard his laughter behind her and echoed it with her own.

Before she reached the tumbling waves, she paused only long enough to strip off the cotton nightgown. Then, naked and free, she dived into the waves. The cold water forced a gasp from her as it drove the air from her lungs. She surfaced, looking back to where he stood on the shore. He, too, had taken off his clothes, but she knew no matter how she coaxed he wouldn’t venture into the icy waves.

As she swam, her gaze went often to him, the brilliant moonlight glistening on his darkly tanned, well-muscled build. He stood patiently, waiting for her to tire and seek the warmth of his embrace.

When she finally returned to the shore, he scooped her up in his arms and carried her to the darkened shadows beneath the boardwalk. Once there, he lay her gently on the sand, her body shifting to accommodate his as the sand beneath her displaced and molded to her form.

With the pounding rhythm of the waves ringing in her ears, he took her, his mouth tasting the saltiness of the ocean’s tears, their bodies moving together as naturally as the waves meeting the shore.

Afterward, they remained in each other’s arms. “Forever,” he whispered to her.

“Forever,” she echoed, and with the passion and confidence of youth, there was no doubt in her mind that they would indeed be lovers forever.

Nicolette Young danced the three marionettes across the stage, smiling in satisfaction as she heard the laughter of the audience above the tape-recorded music. The giraffes always brought down the house, which was why Nikki always saved them for the finale. There was something so ridiculous about a trio of giraffes moving in sync to the latest popular rap song, that the audience couldn’t help but laugh and clap their hands in appreciation.

Nikki looked over the top of the black curtain that hid her from the audience’s view. Her gaze moved across the people sitting on the chairs, pleased to see new faces, testimony to the tourist season’s having once again arrived.

She hoped the boardwalk had a good year. The past two seasons had not been so great. The country was in the middle of a recession and fewer people were taking vacations. Those who did, didn’t choose to make Land’s End, the boardwalk in Oceanview, New Jersey, one of their stops.

She continued to peruse the audience, her hands automatically performing marionette magic.

Then she saw him. A dull roaring resounded in her ears. She faltered, the three giraffes on stage doing impromptu nosedives. The audience laughed, assuming it was all part of the act.

Nikki immediately recovered, her hands continuing the crazy dance through sheer habit, while her mind went momentarily blank as she stared at the man who was a specter from her past.

Why hasn’t he aged? she wondered wildly as she gazed at his handsome, sharply defined features. Like the picture of Dorian Gray, Greyson Blakemore looked exactly as he had the last time she’d seen him almost seven years ago.

His hair was the same midnight black, although shorter than she remembered. She knew his eyes would be smoldering chunks of charcoal, eyes that had always managed to heat her from within by a single glance.

What’s he doing here? What could he possibly want? All kinds of questions popped into her mind, whirling around with dizzying speed.

So much time had passed, so many memories burned in her brain…good memories, bittersweet ones…and ones that tormented her. She shook herself, surprised to realize that unconsciously she’d managed to end the show by rote. She punched the button that drew the curtain across the front of the stage, vaguely aware of her tape-recorded voice announcing the time of the next performance.

She carefully pulled the giraffe marionettes over the top of the backdrop and hung them on the holders where they would be ready for the following show. She was vaguely conscious of the sounds of shuffling feet, youthful chattering as the audience exited the theater.

Her mind was curiously numb, her thoughts confused as she straightened each thin wire on each puppet with meticulous care. Had she remembered to lock her front door when she’d left that morning? Maybe it hadn’t been him at all, only somebody who resembled Grey. Had she shut off the coffeemaker before leaving the house earlier? Perhaps he had only been a figment of her imagination.

“Nikki?”

The low deep voice came from the audience side of the stage. Nikki closed her eyes, a shiver dancing up her spine. Was it possible that a figment of her imagination had vocal chords?

“Nicolette Richards?”

Ah yes, it was Greyson, all right. Nobody else had ever been able to say her name in quite the way he did, a way which always stirred something deep within her.

Taking a deep breath, she stepped out from behind the stage and faced the man she’d once loved, the man who had betrayed her in the worst possible way.