she had deliberately dropped behind him in their trek up the dune. Her position, however, gave her a mouth-watering view of his rugged shoulders, tapering back and taut, muscular buttocks. Jefferson Parrish III might be a pain in the fanny, but he was also, Kate conceded, a world-class hunk.
“Kate?” He was waiting for an answer to his question.
“I’ll be—fine,” Kate muttered, blowing a sand fly out of her face. “Just get me back to my Jeep so I can drive home and forget this whole wretched afternoon!”
“You didn’t have to go into the water,” he said. “With the heavy surf, and you in all that padding, you should have known what would happen.”
“I wasn’t thinking about myself,” Kate snapped. “I was concerned about my daughter—and yours. And speaking of our daughters, how far ahead of us are they? Can you see them?”
“They’re just over the top of the dune. They’ll be fine.”
“Except that Flannery is probably filling your Ellen’s head with more of that fantasy nonsense—oh, I saw your face when Ellen said she’d heard the mermaids. Your expression was definitely not a pretty sight.”
“Here.” He reached back, caught her hand, and yanked her up to his own level on the dune. “I want to be able to talk to you without getting a kink in my neck,” he explained.
“So talk.” Kate feigned an indifferent shrug, her saltsoaked bra straps chafing her tender flesh. “See if you can tell me anything I haven’t already figured out.”
“I was hoping that chip on your shoulder had washed off in the ocean.”
“No such luck. But at least I’m willing to listen.”
“I’ll take that into account.” He climbed in silence for the next few steps, his fingers still gripping hers. His palm was as smooth as fine Italian leather—but then, Jefferson Parrish III had probably never lifted anything heavier than a cricket bat. Maybe that was how he’d broken that quirkily gorgeous nose of his.
“This probably sounds stuffy, but I don’t know how else to explain it,” he said, his free hand swinging her clown shoes, which he’d gallantly fished out of the surf. “We Parrishes are raised with certain values—ethics, if you will. We take pride in passing those values down from one generation to the next.”
Like congenital arrogance, Kate almost said, but she managed to bite back the words.
“Oh, I know what you’re thinking. But family tradition is a serious matter. I was raised the way my father was raised, and his father and grandfather before him—to value honesty and hard work, to do one’s best in every effort and to shun anything that smacks of falsehood or frivolity—”
“Such as fairy tales. And mermaids.”
“Exactly.”’He sounded so smug that Kate could have punched him.
“But Ellen’s just a little girl—”
“We raise our girls the same way. My older sister is a neurosurgeon. One of my aunts was a civil engineer. Another taught physics at Radcliffe—”
“And what if Ellen doesn’t want to become a surgeon or an engineer or a physicist?”
His penetrating scowl knotted the thick, dark brows above his steely eyes. “You’re missing the point, Kate. Ellen will be free to become whatever she chooses. But as her. father, it’s my duty to see that her choices are based on sound, realistic principles.”
“I see.” Kate wiped a sweat bead off her nose. Overhead a pair of gulls wheeled and cried in a giddy mating dance. “And what if Ellen makes mistakes?” she asked. “What then?”
“If I do my job as a parent, that’s unlikely to happen. Most mistakes, after all, are based on unrealistic expectations.”
“But hasn’t anyone in your family ever made a mistake? For heaven’s sake, haven’t you ever made a mistake?”
She felt his hand go rigid, then withdraw from hers as they rounded the top of the dune. “You ask too many questions, Kate Valera,” he said coldly. “Come on, let’s catch up with our daughters and get you back to your Jeep.”
Kate clung to her silence, keeping a tight rein on her emotions as they trooped down the leeward slope toward the house. Jeff Parrish was the last person who deserved her sympathy, she told herself. The man was too cocksure, too boastful of a family tradition that turned children into little automatons with no freedom to dream and imagine. Worse, he was raising his sensitive daughter to be a copy of his cold, success-driven self. The whole situation was deplorable!
So why, as her gaze outlined the back of his elegantly rugged head, was her mind flitting through visions of cradling that head in the warm furrow between her breasts while her fingers tunneled the rich, dark silver of his hair?…
Merciful heaven, maybe she was the one who needed a healthy dose of reality!
She could see the girls now. They were skipping down the slope of the dune, hand in hand, as if they’d been friends for years. And even that was odd, Kate reflected. Flannery had always been a loner, choosing the world of her own creative imagination over the company of other children. What would draw her to a shy child like Ellen Parrish?
But the answer made no difference, Kate reminded herself bitterly. After today’s fiasco, the two little girls would not be allowed to see each other again.
Mrs. Parrish had come out of the house. She strode across the lawn like a clipper under full sail, her purple dress fluttering in the afternoon breeze. Where the grass lost itself at the foot of the dune, she paused, wringing her hands in a classic portrait of agitation.
“Ellen!” she called. “Where have you been, child? Don’t you realize what bad manners it shows, wandering away from your little guests like that? If you want those nice young ladies to be your friends—”
“It’s all right, Mother.” Jeff had sprinted ahead to catch up with the girls, leaving Kate to trail in at her own pace. “I’ll speak with Ellen alone after she’s had a chance to think about what she did.” He turned on his daughter with an imperious frown. “Upstairs with you now, Ellen. You’re not to come down again until we’ve talked. Understand?”
“Can’t Flannery come with me?” Ellen clung to her new friend’s hand, eyes wide and imploring.
“I’m sorry, Ellen, but Flannery has to go home now.” Kate elected to play the meanie—anything to end this miserable farce and make her getaway.
“But she can come back tomorrow, can’t she?” Ellen persisted. “Oh, please let her come!”
“Go upstairs, Ellen.” Jeff’s eyes were granite slits. “Now.”
With a heartrending sob, Ellen broke her grip on Flannery’s hand and fled toward the house.
“Mom, can’t I—”
“Be still, Flannery, you’ve caused enough trouble for one afternoon.” Kate clasped her daughter’s shoulder. Then, struggling for dignity in her smeared makeup and waterlogged costume, she squared her chin and turned back toward
