Page 74 of Leave a Mark
Again, Lee laughed. “I wouldn’t expect anything less.”
“Good,” she said, turning away from him and effectively ending the conversation. They’d moved to the edge of the treeline, almost in open water, and she leaned back against the short canvas seat and stared up at the sky. “It’s really beautiful out here.”
“There’s a lot more to see.”
Wren sunk down low in her seat, stretching her legs out in front of her. Victor took the opportunity to climb up her body and collapse on her stomach. Wren giggled and hugged him to her. Her orange vest rode up under her chin.
“Please let me take this off,” she begged, pulling at the life jacket. “I swear, if we tip over, I won’t drown.”
“Fine. I’ve never tipped over, anyway.” He reached up and unbuckled his own jacket.
“Thank God,” she muttered.
He watched her wriggle out of the orange preserver, and then he reached forward. “Here, I’ll take it.”
She passed it back to him, and Lee turned to stuff both vests under the bungee cords at the stern of the kayak. When he faced forward again, he found Wren slipping off her plaid button-down.
The slim straps of her bikini top hid only a little of her back, and the rest was bare to him. He swallowed at the sight of her lovely skin — the most perfect of canvases for the art she wore.
The bougainvillea he’d seen on her upper arms spilled over her shoulders too, and hummingbirds seemed to flit from blossom to blossom in search of nectar. Under her left shoulder blade, a Red-winged Blackbird — as vivid and lifelike as any of the birds in the rookery — entered the scene, flying up from her posterior ribs. The bird was followed, in the distance, by one of his brothers. The perspective was perfect, and Lee realized they were from the same flock he’d first seen when Wren was stretched out before him on the operating table.
“Remarkable,” he whispered. The more skin she showed him, the more he wanted to see. What did the kayak’s seatback hide? What images lay against her heart? What did she look like when every stitch of clothing was tossed aside?
Lee’s shifted himself in his shorts, his desire charging far ahead of his opportunity. He had no doubt that he could spend days pouring over the ink on her skin. In truth, he was impatient to do just that. Of course, studying it wouldn’t be enough. He’d need to trace over each line with his fingers. Run his tongue over every curve. And do it all over again until he had her every inch memorized.
As though he could feel the sun on her shoulders, Lee began to grow hot. He plucked the buttons of his own shirt and peeled it off.
The motion caught Wren’s attention, and she glanced back. “You should put some sunscreen on your tat—” Her words stuttered and came to a halt as her eyes ran down his front and took in the obvious state of affairs in his shorts, but she recovered quickly enough. “—your tattoo… um… I have some.”
She reached forward and dug into her bag while Lee flushed. If she knew he thought she was the sexiest woman he’d ever seen, that was fine with him, but he didn’t want to offend her.
“Here,” she said, tossing a tube of Coppertone SPF 50 back to him. “Pass it back when you’re done.”
“SPF 50?” he teased, opening the tube and squirting some in his hand.
“I told you. I burn easily,” she said. As if on cue, she pulled on her light blue floppy hat, and a shadow fell over her perfect shoulders. “Besides, sun exposure fades tattoos. As much as I love my tats, I don’t want to have to retouch them every few years.”
“I love your tats, too,” he vowed.
Wren looked back over her shoulder. “Really?” she asked, sounding surprised. And the smile she gave him echoed her surprise.
“God, yes,” he said, smearing sunscreen over the key. “They’re stunning. Freakin’ amazing.”
“Not just freaky?” she asked, eyeing him under the spill of her hat.
Lee could see that her smile hid the truth. She was proud of her artwork, but it set her apart. People probably stared at her all the time, and some of their stares may have been ugly.
“Not freaky. Fabulous,” he promised. “The most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.”
Wren looked away, but he could still see her profile. “You’re dangerous.”
“I’m safe. I swear.”
Lee was dying to touch her.
As if she read his mind, Wren reached her hands back.
He dropped the sunscreen and clasped them.
