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mingling with her tears. Yet there was a reason for his reluctance, he realized, studying her bedraggled appearance. There was something vaguely distasteful about making love to a woman who looked like a refugee from a shipwreck. He would feel, however absurdly, as if he were taking advantage of her.
    When she tightened her arms around his neck, Kyle caught her wrists and held them away. “Not so fast. I don’t like to rush things.”
    “Very well, Captain. But I would prefer that it didn’t take all night.”
    Whatever happened, Kyle wondered, to sighs and endearments and sweet murmurings, the rituals every woman craved? Feeling annoyed by her cool impatience, he rolled off her and got to his feet. “I’m quite capable,” he said curtly, pulling her up after him, “of entertaining a lady, Miss Markham. And I’m willing to lay bail you won’t have any cause for complaint when I’m done.”
    With the ease of long practice, he divested Selena of her wrapper and tossed it onto higher ground, out of reach of the lapping waves, and held out his hand to her. When she seemed reluctant to take it, he wondered if she was going to change her mind.
    Selena was indeed having second thoughts about her rash proposal. And she was very much afraid that if Captain Ramsey delayed any longer, she would lose her nerve. Revenge on Avery was hardly an admirable motive, after all. And Kyle Ramsey did look a good deal more intimidating when he was towering over her in all his masculine glory. He was half-naked again, wearing canvas breeches that were cut off at the knee, but nothing else.
    “What do you intend to do?” she asked warily, eyeing his powerful, fluidly muscled shoulders and feeling a strange fluttering in her stomach.
    “I mean to wash you off. I don’t want a mouthful of sand.”
    Selena wondered why he should be concerned about getting sand in his mouth, but she didn’t allow herself to ask as he led her into the surf.
    The water was warm and welcoming, the gentle swells sending her muslin nightdress swirling around her thighs. Kyle waded out hip-deep and turned to her. Feeling his intent gaze studying her face, Selena took a deep breath and waited.
    His movements, surprisingly, were as gentle as the waves as he scooped up a large handful to let it spill over her hair and shoulders. The warm salt water ran between her breasts, soaking the thin gauze covering once again, outlining shapely peaks that were high and firm, fuller than her wraithlike slenderness indicated. When his gaze dropped to her breasts, Selena quelled the instinctive urge to cover them. She felt indecently exposed without a corset and could feel her nipples growing tight and puckered, whether due to the breeze blowing off the sea or to Kyle Ramsey’s warm regard, she wasn’t sure.
    “Now your turn,” he murmured when he finished his ministrations. His voice was suddenly husky, as warm and sensuous as the water he poured over her.
    Realizing that he wanted her to reciprocate, Selena hesitantly complied, stretching to reach him because he was so tall. Yet as she bathed him, rinsing the sand from the sleek muscles of his arms and shoulders, she found herself staring in fascination at the dark sprinkling of hair that covered his broad, bare chest. The slight furring narrowed as it reached his flat abdomen and dipped below the waistband of his breeches—
    “You act as if you’re afraid to touch me.”
    His observation brought color rushing to Selena’s cheeks. She
was
afraid to touch his powerful bronzed body, yet she was also determined not to let Kyle Ramsey know it. “Of course not, Captain,” she said more breathlessly than she intended. Bracing herself, she dribbled a thin stream of seawater on his chest and reached out to brush the resultant droplets away, stroking him quite deliberately. The feel of him was just as masculine as she expected it to be, iron-hard flesh and sinews beneath damp, silky skin. But she didn’t expect him to capture