by Annie O'Neil
And just like that, any fears she’d still had slipped away, leaving yet more room in her heart for Alex.
“Hang on a minute.” He drew a finger along her jawline then dipped in for a deep, hungry kiss before jogging out of the bathroom.
He returned with a chair.
“To put us on an even keel.”
She beamed. The man thought of everything.
He placed the kitchen chair he’d been using in his office opposite hers. Hers still had the wheels on it. He reached between her legs and pulled her to him so that his legs flanked hers. It was brusque and urgent. Mr. Protocol wasn’t anywhere in sight. He was a hot, red-blooded male and when she saw the desire burning in his eyes, for the first time in her life she felt truly beautiful.
All his attention was focused on her as if the rest of the world had ceased to exist. He noticed which of his touches elicited a soft sigh, a wriggle of approbation, a low moan for more.
Her entire body felt alight with the need to be closer. To touch him. To put her hands on his bare skin.
She put her hand on his chest and said, “My turn.”
She took her time unbuttoning his shirt, shifting her hands along his chest...smooth and muscled with just a scattering of hair around each of his nipples. Nipples she couldn’t resist dipping toward and giving a saucy lick and swirl with her tongue. When she felt the vibration of his moan shift down his torso as she trailed her fingers along the center of his six-pack, she smiled. So this was what it felt like to love someone on an even playing field. You gave. You took. You shared. You pleasured.
A potent flash of sensuality snapped through her like a whiplash. “Stand up,” she commanded playfully.
A little to her astonishment, he did. His trousers were plastered to his legs and right there in front of her was the taut, pronounced proof of his longing for her. He gasped when she reached out and pressed her hands against it, then leant forward, pressing her lips to the fabric as she undid the top button of his trousers then slowly worked her way down the full length of his fly until in one sharp move she yanked all the fabric in between her and his potency down his muscular legs.
“Step out of them,” she said, her eyes glued to his erection.
He did.
She reached out and curled her finger along the top of his erection, enjoying the silky wet sensation of his response to her touch followed by another throaty moan.
“What are you doing to me, woman?”
She flashed him a naughty grin. “I’m hoping you’ll give me the pleasure of making love to you.”
She slipped first her hand, then her mouth down the length of him and lost herself in giving him the same amount of pleasure he had given her.
“Please...” He eventually pulled back when she could tell he was approaching a climax. “I want to wait. I want to be inside you.”
He crouched down, cupped her face in his hands and kissed her as if it were their first and last moment on earth. By the time they’d finished it felt as if the world was somewhere brand spanking new and it had been created just for the two of them. A place to share and love. Heal. Nurture. Grow.
But right at this exact moment? What she wanted more than anything was to see exactly how long she could bear to keep fighting the urge to wrap herself around Alex’s waist again and be lowered onto the solid length of his erection to bring that ever-deepening ache between her legs and his to a mutually satisfying release.
A grin crept onto her lips as she felt the water turn a bit cooler.
“What do you think about moving this party to somewhere a little more...dry?”
He looked down at her, laughed, turned off the taps and grabbed a couple of huge white bath towels sitting on a bench just outside the shower. Not only had they drained the hot-water tank, they were both in danger of getting prune skin. She looked at him, his green eyes twinkling, his body all strong and solid and beautiful. Yeah. He’d even look good with prune skin. It was then and there she knew she definitely wanted to grow old with him. The revelation, instead of blindsiding her, emboldened her.
A man she could not only admire professionally but laugh with in the midst of one of the most intensely sexual moments of her life?
“Come here, you.” He pulled her to him again, gently this time, and wrapped her in a thick towel. He rose and tucked one round his waist, beads of water still wending their way along his chest. He lifted her up and carried her to his room and laid her on the bed, looking at her as if she were the most precious thing he’d ever come across.
By the time Alex had carried her into his bedroom, remembered he didn’t have any protection, thrown her a medical journal to keep her company while he hot-tailed it over to the clinic to get some condoms, and come back again she had a full-on case of the giggles.
She nestled beneath the dark navy duvet as he shrugged off his long winter coat to reveal first his bathrobe and then, after she gave a sotto voce wolf whistle, he sexy danced it off to reveal his towel and then that scrumptious male body of his. This was a side of Alex she could get used to seeing much more of.
She almost wished she still had her prostheses on so she could sexy dance them off as well. Almost. Because knowing Alex desired her with or without them was more than enough to fill her heart to bursting.
She made a silent promise to herself to try not get too attached to him, but when he pounced on her and started tickling and kissing her, she felt like a naughty teenager and a screen siren all wrapped into one. More than that, she felt loved. Desired. The whole nine yards.
He switched the light off and stretched out alongside her, taking his lazy time as he brushed his fingers lightly over her breasts, her belly and then dipped into the sweet, hot, curves between her legs as he simultaneously lowered his tongue onto her taut nipple and lightly grazed it with his teeth.
“You are a saucy devil,” she whispered as her body hummed and arched at each and every touch. He was good at this. Ridiculously good.
“As long as you’re happy.”
She could barely form words she was so happy. When he slipped first one finger and then two into the soft folds between her legs she could barely control herself.
“My turn.”
With athletic grace she’d never felt before, she rolled over and straddled him, knees cinched at his hips, shifting herself against the solid length of his desire. The look in his eyes turned feral and when she put her hands down to touch the rigid heat of him, she felt pearls of his desire rise to the surface. She snapped her fingers. “Now.”
Miraculously he knew what she meant and reached across and grabbed a condom, ripped it open and placed it atop his erection. She helped him slip it down the length of him and when she’d moved his hands to her hips, she slowly, teasingly, lowered herself onto him.
They both groaned with the ache of pent-up desire as he filled her. This was what it meant to make love. This was what passion should be about. Fast and slow. Deep and rich. Heightened awareness allowing them to tap into the ever-changing rhythms of their desire until, at long last, they lost themselves to passion and an explosion of pleasure brought them together in a way neither of them had ever imagined possible.
Later, when she’d unpeeled her ability to speak from the ceiling and returned it to her body, she nuzzled in even closer to Alex and stretched an arm across his chest. “That was amazing.”
“No.” He felt him shake his head against the pillow then kiss the top of her head as he absently played with her hair. “That was out of this world.”
Then, as if they’d done it a thousand times before, they both drifted off to sleep.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ALEX REGRETTED LEAVING Maggie on her own to wake up. What had he been thinking, putting her back in her room while she’d slept? Had it really bothered him that Jake might find them together?
He stared at his hands as if
they would give him the answer.
Nope. Nothing there.
He leant back in his chair, praying for some sort of explanation to come to him. A reason why he had fled his own home before the sun had come up.
The truth hit him fast and furious.
He loved her.
He loved her and it scared the living daylights out of him. It scared him because loving Maggie meant, for the first time in six years, he would be looking forward, not back. Hoping, not dwelling. Living an entirely different life than the one he’d planned so carefully when he’d built this clinic.
He pressed his fingers into his temples, willing himself to get back up and go to the house and tell her. Tell her that he loved her. That he might not be a hundred percent into the handstands on horseback thing, but that the only way he wanted to go through life was with her on one side and Jake on the other.
He pressed his feet to the floor and tried to get up.
No good.
There was something missing from the equation. Something he had yet to identify.
He had love. He had the perfect woman.
What he needed now...was permission. And he knew exactly who he should be talking to.
* * *
Maggie entered the main door of the clinic with a dramatic little twirl as she pushed the door shut against the wind and light snowfall.
Happy, happy, happy.
When she’d woken up she had been in her own room, probably so Jake didn’t find her in his daddy’s bed. Alex must’ve carried her in there during her REM phase because she didn’t remember a thing. He’d placed a chair by her bed with her “work” prosthetics on it, the ones with the gym shoes she favored, along with a fresh pile of clothes still warm from the dryer. Perfect. Just like him.
“Close that door! You’ll let Jack Frost in and I’m not built for cold.”
Maggie pushed the door shut behind her and beamed at Marlee. Wasn’t Marlee great?
“It’s seriously wintry out there.” She and Marlee stared out the window at the deepening snow. Thank goodness the clinic’s ground crew kept the paths clear. She’d have to remember to keep some crutches or a walking stick to hand just in case they grew slick with ice. Then again...sigh...she could always get a piggy-back from her new boyfriend.
Was he her boyfriend? Her heart did a whirly pop followed by a high-speed can-can. Her brain went on a little sing-song. She had a boyfriend.
Or maybe...her stomach lurched...
This wasn’t history repeating itself, was it?
He left you breakfast. Jerks who leave a girl to stew in her own insecurities don’t provide her with breakfast.
“Don’t look so horrified, honey. It’s snow! It don’t bite.” Marlee grinned at her and Maggie did her best to return a smile without also spilling her guts. “We don’t like to do things by halves here on Maple Island, do we, Doc?”
Maggie followed Marlee’s gaze and saw Alex heading straight toward her. A fluttering of butterfly wings brushed against all the spots she wished they wouldn’t.
“Good morning, Miss Green,” Alex said in that slightly strangled Robot Man voice of his. “I was just—”
What? You were just what?
Her stomach lurched again. He looked a lot like he was pretending he hadn’t slept with her last night.
“Morning! I was just...” She flicked her thumb in a random direction, trying to cover the fact she had actually been looking for him. Wanted to thank him for the breakfast he’d set out for her.
Everything about him pinged out at her in vivid detail... The clarity of his green eyes. The fact there was a little smattering of freckles just where he buttoned his shirt up... Her eyes dropped....it was buttoned up to the top again. That simple gesture sent her into a tailspin. Did this mean he didn’t feel the same way about her as she did about him? As lovely as it had been—as extraordinary as it had been—there was no way she could stay on the island if Alex didn’t love her, too.
What did she want? For him to unbutton his shirt down to his belly button?
A surge of frustration caught in her throat. She had turned a corner. She was ready. Ready to love someone again. Ready to love Alex. And here she was, standing in the clinic foyer of the man she loved, praying he felt the same way.
“Maggie?” Marlee and Alex were both staring at her now.
“Yes! Right. I’m just going to go get my wetsuit.” She gestured toward Alex’s house, although she knew perfectly well she’d left it hanging in the pool’s changing room. Her heart wasn’t the only thing that was short-circuiting. Her brain was just one big fog of white noise drowning out every single beautiful moment of the night she’d thought would be the start of her new eternity.
“Wait a minute.” Marlee looked between the pair of them. “You’re still staying with Alex?” If Marlee had been a dog, her ears would’ve been standing right up and her tail would’ve been going at high speed. Marlee, Maggie had learnt early on, loved a bit of gossip.
“Whoa!” she heard herself whinny as a flush crept up her neck. “Dr. Kirkland here was a little concerned about me staying up in the barn apartment without there being any other means of escape than the stairs.”
“But that thing’s been set up with an elevator for over a week now.” Marlee turned to Alex with an expression of utter bewilderment.
What?
“Surprise,” Alex said weakly, his fingers doing a very, very bad version of jazz hands.
She could’ve moved out over a week ago and he hadn’t said anything? She’d have sworn he wasn’t the type of man to keep things from her.
So maybe that meant he did love her. Or perhaps she was hoping he did when he actually had another reason for not telling her about it.
This time it was Alex’s turn to color. Not in an obvious way. But if shifting his feet back and forth and refusing to make eye contact was his version of blushing, he was doing it in spades.
“There were still a few things I wanted the boys down at the volunteer fire station to check.”
Was it a cover or was he asking her to move out?
Didn’t he know how she felt about him?
Course not. You haven’t told him.
Argh! She did handstands on moving horses, for heaven’s sake, and she couldn’t tell the man he’d won her heart pretty much the first time she’d laid eyes on him?
Marlee persisted. “I can get the boys down here this morning if you’d said.” She reached for the phone and as one Alex and Maggie said, “No!”
They turned to one another, appalled.
Marlee began to busy herself with some invisible dust on the countertop.
The front door pushed open and Dr. Rafael Valdez walked in, brushing snow off his shoulders. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?” He looked fresh and alert, ready to start by hitting the ground running on his first day at the clinic.
Alex grunted something indecipherable and nodded.
Marlee started wittering on about coffee and would Rafael like to have one. She knew they liked it dark and hot in Spain, so she could make a pot special. “Can I get either of you two anything?”
Maggie shook her head. She wouldn’t need caffeine today. Or for the next month of Sundays. She’d be running on adrenaline from here on out because she needed to get a new job, a new home, and a new life as fast as humanly possible.
Or you could tell Alex you love him and see if he feels the same way about you. Like a grown-up.
Marlee took the moment’s awkward silence to usher Dr. Valdez to the staffroom.
Fleur Miller clinked into Reception, still using her crutches, despite the fact Maggie knew Alex had been encouraging her not to use them.
“Maggie.” Alex took a step toward Fleur. “You remember Miss Miller from our rounds, don’t you?”
“Yes. I remember lots of things.”
<
br /> Like whether or not her boyfriend/not boyfriend had told her there had been an empty apartment sitting there waiting for her to move in to over a week ago.
She softened. There was also the fact that, only a few hours ago, they’d held one another so closely she could feel his heartbeat.
She rattled off the details of Fleur’s dancing injury and the rehab program she had been on.
Alex looked genuinely perplexed at her curt tone.
“Maggie, is everything all right?”
“Course. Why wouldn’t it be?”
Then she circled back to the far more relevant question. Why hadn’t he asked her to move out of his house days ago?
Because he just might feel the same way you do, nitwit. He surely wasn’t just trying to get you into bed...
All of this—the insecurity, the panic, the weirdness—this was all her. The man had made her breakfast, for crying out loud. With chia seeds. He hated chia seeds.
He wasn’t a bells and whistles kind of guy. What had she expected? A full-blown parade celebrating the fact she’d finally made love with someone who seemed to genuinely care for her?
Everyone was staring at her.
Too many thoughts. Too much to think about. She scrunched her eyes tight and gave them a rub. She was going to have to figure out a way to act normally. Not jump on the man and insist he spend the rest of his life with her right in front of everyone. He’d be mortified. She wanted him to love her, not panic about his life being a three-ring circus every five seconds.
She fixed her attention on Fleur.
“How long have you been using those?” Maggie knew she still sounded grumpy. Knew she lacked her usual charm. Tough. She was trying to dig herself out of an emotional avalanche and could really do with some alone time but, oh, well. They were here now.
Fleur glared at her and tightened her grip on the crutches. “I need them.”
Maggie thumbed through the notes on her tablet. “No, you don’t. Not if you’ve been here since before Christmas. You should at least have graduated to a cane—or nothing by now.”
