Read At Last for Free Online Page B

pulling back against Kevin’s forward march.
    It didn’t even slow Kevin’s progress. So she tried yelling. “Kevin! Stop! Now!”
    He turned to look at her, bewildered. “What?”
    “You’re dragging me like I’m a dog...or a two-year-old!”
    “So?” His face was sober, not a hint of a smile.
    “So stop it!”
    “Can’t,” he said turning to start walking again. Susan could feel her bare feet plowing through the hot sand. “If I leave you to your own devices, we’ll be cooped up in the room the entire two weeks, and you’ll just lie in that damn bed all day.” He stopped and turned to face her. “Now what kinda friend would that make me if I let that happen?”
    “The kind of friend I ever call back again,” Susan said, waving that off. “The kind who understands sometimes that’s exactly what a woman needs. To just lie around and mope for a while.”
    Kevin stared into Susan’s eyes for a still, thoughtful moment, then smiled. “Nah, nobody’d wanna do that!” And he turned again to charge across the beach, dragging her once more.
    “At least tell me where you’re taking me.” Susan gave up with putting on the brakes--it wasn’t doing a bit of good. And between the jogging and trying to pull back on Kevin’s procession, she was getting winded.
    Kevin stopped, and Susan fell against his shoulder, staggering to gain her balance after the abrupt stop.
    “We’re here.”
    Susan leaned over, gasping for breath, looking around her and not registering the significance of where they were. All she saw was more beach. It was nice, but nothing special, certainly not surprising. . “So...where is ‘here’?”
    He didn’t answer her, so she looked up to him from her stooped position and saw he was staring at the sky. She stood up straight and followed his gaze, searching for what Kevin was looking at, and with a jolt, she found it. High in the flawless tropical sky floated a bright red paraglider, a cable running from it down to a gleaming white speedboat cutting through the ocean froth.
    It looked pretty, like a kite--but then it hit Susan what Kevin was planning.
    “No way!” she bellowed as she turned and tried to bolt back up the beach to the safety of the hotel.
    But Kevin still had hold of her wrist, and even though he wasn’t squeezing very hard, it was enough to keep her right where he stood.
    “This isn’t fair!” she whined, pulling hard, crouching down and pulling to get herself free with every ounce of her strength. “You outweigh me by a hundred pounds!”
    “Ninety pounds, maybe...you’ve gained some the last five years.”
    What an asshole! Didn’t he know how paranoid she’d been the whole last year about her weight? Some best friend he was, not even listening to her as she groused about all the dieting she’d had to do just to fit into her wedding dress. Just the thought of that dress made her see red, a volcano of molten anger surged up through her veins. She flopped on the sand and shoved her feet against the side of Kevin’s leg, pulling wildly to get free.
    “Let go of me, you muscle-bound troglodyte!”
    The look on Kevin’s face as he looked down on Susan was bemused, which made her all the more enraged. He shrugged and released her wrist, sending her crashing back into the soft, hot, white sand with a sudden huff of expelled air.
    Susan lay there, looking at the big blue sky, the blissful looking paraglider sailing through the silky air currents with such ease. Kevin dropped down beside her, stretching out and gazing up with her.
    “I’m afraid of heights,” Susan said in a flat, trembling voice.
    “I remember.”
    Susan turned her head. “Then, what the hell?”
    Kevin’s face was serene, still, and he started smiling that irritating smile again. “What better way to take your mind off your troubles than to face your greatest fear?”
    It sounded like it should be a line in a movie. One of those life-affirming movies, starring Jack Nicholson or Meryl