The Trouble With Paradise (31 page)

“I’ve had a lot of firsts this week,” she said very quietly, her voice husky as her arms slid up his chest and around his neck, one of her hands sinking into his hair, her fingers tightening. “All life-changing firsts.”

Life-changing. He opened his mouth to ask her to clarify, but then her gaze dipped to his lips and he knew she wanted another kiss.

With their mouths already lined up, only a breath away, with her breasts smashed up against his chest, it was going to happen. But he forced himself to hold back a beat, to make sure he could, and it was just hard enough that he knew the truth. He wanted her more than he’d wanted any woman in a good long time.

Maybe ever.

The enforced wait had anticipation flowing through him, he slid his hands down her sides, barely grazing her breasts, her ribs, hooking his thumbs in the waistband of her skirt, which was clinging to her hips and legs like a second skin. He knew he had no right to this, but neither could he summon the strength to stop. “You should really walk away from me.”

Instead, she pressed her body to his. “Don’t say no,” she whispered.

Was she kidding? It’d have taken a bigger man than himself. He slid her skirt down her legs until it pooled at their feet on top of her bra.

She was wearing a tiny scrap of green silk with tinier yellow daisies embroidered on the edging, which for some reason made him smile.

“I know I don’t match. I’m not the most organized—”

When he tugged them off, she shut up. With the water hammering his back, he slid to his knees and pressed his mouth to her hip.

“Oh,” she breathed.

Her other hip.

Her fingers sinking in his hair. “What if someone comes?”

He ran his tongue along the edge of the cotton. “The only person who’s going to come is you.”

Her head thunked back against the tile as her fingers tightened in his hair, hard enough to make him wince, but instead he smiled. Smiled as he drew her into his mouth and made her cry out his name. Smiled while driving her over the edge and into his arms. Smiled as he stood up, lifted her up and thrust into her.

He couldn’t remember ever grinning as he took a woman before, and couldn’t have imagined it, but then her creamy heat surrounded him, pulled him in, and his amusement faded away. In its place came that ache in his chest. A physical pain.

“Christian,” she murmured, her hands cupping his face. Pressing her forehead to his, she panted softly as he moved within her. “I never knew—”

Him either. By her own admission, he had more experience than her when it came to sex, and he’d still had no idea. This wasn’t simple sex, and in a flash of clarity, he recognized it for what it was. Not just pure attraction. Not just companionship, or an adrenaline rush.

But he didn’t want to put a name to it.

Instead, he took her mouth and her body, and when she came apart for him with his name on her lips, he felt his already racing pulse kick into an even higher gear. Hell, his heart nearly burst out of his damn chest, especially when he thought about this being the last time. Because it hurt to even think the words he thought he’d wanted, he kissed her—a long, deep, wet kiss designed to make them both forget everything but what they did to each other, only even that backfired, because in the forgetting, he remembered how perfect it really was . . .

 

Dorie tossed back her wet hair and walked down the decadent upstairs hallway, marveling anew at the sharp contrast between the past few days with no luxuries, and now, surrounded by the most gorgeous house she’d ever seen. She caught sight of her own reflection in a long gilded mirror and stopped short. Her skin was glowing, her eyes sparkling. Seemed being shipwrecked agreed with her.

That, or the sex.

Actually, Christian. Christian agreed with her.

The hallway was wide, tiled, and cool, thanks to the lush plants and openness of the layout. The colors were definitely South Pacific, bright primary colors splashed on the walls. Everywhere there were plants, big and small, all moist and green and swaying in the light breeze provided by all the opened doorways and windows.

The balcony was lined in clear glass so that she could see down to the huge open room beneath. She came to a stop at the top of the stairs, aware that her body was still humming with carnal pleasure, and that most likely she wore a grin from ear to ear that screamed Just Satisfied.

Multiple times.

God, she felt alive, and had since Christian had pulled her into the shower and stripped her out of her clothes.

Actually, she’d felt this way from that first moment in Fiji when she’d stood watching him board the
Sun Song
, utterly at ease with himself and everything around him.

Being with him, especially when she was naked, was heaven. Leaving him, which she would do far too soon, was going to feel like hell on earth.

Later,
she told herself.
Go there later . . .

But she couldn’t help herself. She’d told him she could handle this, and logically, she understood. She did. They came from two entirely different worlds. Not to mention he lived on the complete other side of the planet, pretty much the definition of geographically undesirable.

But she had fallen anyway.

She had no idea how that could even happen after only a few days. Maybe it was because of the intensity of it all, and what they’d been through. Perhaps it had sped up the process. Regardless, fact was fact.

She loved him.

TWENTY-FIVE

Uh-oh,” Dorie whispered, staggered at the realization. She
loved
him. “Not good.”

“What’s not good?”

He’d come up behind her. She glanced at him in the mirror, wondering if what she’d been thinking was all over her face. When she’d left him only a few minutes ago, he’d been wearing nothing but a smile. Now he wore faded Levi’s and a T-shirt, his hair still wet and finger combed off his face. At the sight of him, her body gave one hopeful little shiver of anticipation because it wanted more of what he’d just given her.

Also not good.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” he asked.

“How am I looking at you?”

“I’m not sure,” he said slowly. “As if maybe you’re seeing something you’re not all that thrilled about.”

Well, she wasn’t all that thrilled that she’d gone and gotten her heart involved, because it was going to hurt. Big-time. “Christian, I—”

He pulled her around to face him and put a finger over her lips. “Wait. Listen.”

She cocked her head. “I don’t hear anything.”

“Exactly.” He walked past her. Three bedrooms, all opened and all empty.

“Where is everyone?”

“No clue.”

The silence, which she might have noticed before now if she hadn’t been in a sexual fog, was almost eerie. “Um, how long were we in that shower anyway?”

His eyes cut to hers, holding a flash of amusement.

“Just wondering,” she said, and felt her ears heat.

He stroked a finger over one of them, a rare smile crossing his lips, slow and soft and sexy, and—her heart leapt—filled with genuine affection and heat. “We weren’t that long.”

Together, they moved down the stairs and through the wide, open living room, to an adjoining room that looked like it had every entertainment setup known to man, complete with a wall of television sets, all on, several turned to sporting events from what Dorie assumed was across the world. Two huge side-by-side screens were showing American baseball. Surely this would have drawn Andy out of wherever he’d been, and yet the room, the entire house, reverberated with an undeniable silence.

“Weird,” she said.

“Very.” He looked around them. “Let’s—”

A scream pierced the air, and though Dorie took a second to process the shocking, startling sound, Christian did not. He was running before she could blink, and all she could do was follow him, through the house, down a hallway, and then another, through what looked like a library because of the miles and miles of shelves filled with books and more books.

But she was too busy keeping Christian in her sight to take in much. Without him, she knew she’d be hopelessly lost in the labyrinth of hallways, and she didn’t intend to get lost.

Not with the scream that had sounded like Cadence.

“This way.” Christian barreled through a set of double French doors that opened onto a wood deck, and a set of stairs that appeared to vanish into thin air.

Not vanish, she realized with a gulp as she blindly followed Christian, but led straight down at a dizzying pitch at least three hundred feet to the beach, and the deck.

She moved as quickly as she dared, but her sandals really had to go. Her purse banged into her hip, threatening her balance with every step. Halfway down, Christian pulled out his knife, which made breathing all but impossible, but she couldn’t concentrate on that when she could see what lay ahead, which had her nearly apoplectic with terror.

Michael’s boat was still docked. On the dock itself, his back to them, stood Denny. He was holding Cadence against him and gesturing to Brandy and Andy, who stood in front of him.

The knife he held gleamed in the sunlight.

“Stay back.” His words came over the water with an eerie clarity.

“Jesus, Denny,” Brandy said softly. “No wonder you can’t keep a woman.”

“I’m a man on the fucking edge!” he yelled at her. “You’re supposed to be sweet-talking me, not pissing me off!”

“I don’t—” But Brandy broke off, looking up at Christian as he flew down the stairs.

At her movement, Denny whipped around, and when he did, Cadence let out a loud, screeching “hi-yaaaaah” and karate-chopped him in the back of his neck.

His eyes went wide with surprise for one beat before they fluttered, revealing the whites rolling up. Letting go of Cadence, he hit the wood dock face-first.

Andy dove on top of him, presumably to hold him down, but Denny was out cold and not going anywhere.

Brandy grabbed the fallen knife. Christian skidded down the last step to the dock. “Are you hurt?” he asked Cadence.

Looking shell-shocked, she shook her head, then glanced down at Denny. “I almost gave up my penis embargo for you!” Then she kicked him in the butt.

Denny stirred and lifted his head. “Hey, that hurt!”

“So would that knife if you’d have used it on me!”

“Kick him again, honey,” Brandy directed. “Just for the hell of it.” She sneered down at Denny with disgust. “I should have known you were evil from the moment I saw you treat Bobby like your slave boy. A person who is rude to the hired help is not a nice person.”

Dorie got onto the dock and reached for Cadence, who looked like a good wind might knock her over.

“Thanks,” Cadence whispered, squeezing hard, her eyes a little wet.

“I wasn’t going to use the knife on you,” Denny said, still flat on the deck.

“How am I supposed to believe that when you used it on poor Bobby!”

Denny nearly choked. “I did not—” He tried to get up but Andy was sitting on him so he gave up. “Let me up!”

“Don’t think so.”

“Listen to me. I did not hurt Bobby. And I wasn’t going to hurt Cadence.”

“Still not letting you up,” Andy said.

“Goddamnit!”

Cadence let go of Dorie’s hand and crouched at Denny’s side. “Maybe you should just relax,” she suggested.

Denny didn’t look like he appreciated the irony. “I am telling you I did not use that knife on Bobby!”

“Then who did?” Cadence demanded.

Christian went very still, then whipped toward the boat. “Ethan.”

Ethan, who’d managed to get onto the
Elegance
unnoticed, had pushed off from the dock. Already a good hundred feet out, he started the small motor and lifted a hand in a wave. “Ahoy!” he yelled as he sailed away.

In Michael’s boat.

Without Michael.

Without any of them.

“Oh, Christ,” Andy said, his foot still on Denny’s back. “He’s the one who—”

“Goddamn, you’re brilliant.” Denny looked furious. “Now can you get off me so I can swim out there and nab his sorry ass?”

Andy removed his foot from Denny, but when Denny leapt to his feet and whipped around, Christian was still standing there, tall and tense, and very much in Denny’s way.

“Move, man.”

Christian didn’t budge, didn’t even blink as he spoke. “Someone needs to go after Ethan.” He put a hand on Denny’s chest when he moved to do just that. “Not you.”

Michael came down the stairs and absorbed the situation in one glance. “
Shit
, I’ll get help—” His hand went to his belt, but his face slackened in disbelief. “My radio’s gone.”

Denny laughed but it was mirthless. “Yeah. Ethan used to be a pickpocket.”

Michael swore, and turning, went running back up the stairs.