Cristy rolled her eyes heavenward but smiled as she did so. “White things. He brings me to paradise and tells me that the heavenly scent is from white things. Romance isn’t your strong point, is it?”
“I warned you,” he said, his voice gruff.
Cristy looked up at him, her eyes suddenly serious. “Yes, you did.” She was quiet and still for a moment. Then she reached up, placed her hands on his shoulders and brought her face close to his. “But I think you’ve got potential. Thank you for sharing this wonderful place with me. She kissed him lightly on his mouth and then stepped back. “Now c’mon. I want to swim. With you.”
She kicked off her flip-flops and ran to where the sand sloped into the water. He stared after her, his mouth warm from her kiss, his heart even warmer from her words.
She knew, without him telling her, how much this place meant to him. There was something special about Cristy Walters, something he was finding it harder and harder to fight.
She stopped and looked back over her shoulder at him, one foot poised cautiously above the surface of the pool. “Uh… this is fresh water isn’t it?”
He nodded.
She held her foot aloft. “No sharks?”
“Not a one.”
She placed her foot back on the sand. “What about crocodiles?”
He shook his head.
“Sam’s not lurking around?”
“Don’t see him.”
“Any other dangerous Australians I need to worry about?”
“Only me,” he said.
Her smile shone brighter than the sunbeams dancing from the waterfall and warmed his heart some more. “I’m not one itty bit afraid of you,” she said.
“Then I declare the waters safe in this particular part of paradise.”
“Good,” she said, and he grinned at the look of relief on her lovely face.
She took another step forward and then stopped.
“Now what’s the matter?” he asked. “There’ll be fish in there. But they shouldn’t nibble your toes. If one does, grab it. It’ll beat canned beans for lunch.”
She wrinkled up her nose in a way he was beginning to find dangerously endearing. “It isn’t that. This dress. Those buttons.”
Her smile was slow and seductive and Matt knew with a shudder of anticipation that he was receiving her loud and clear. This time he’d be allowed to complete the job of undressing her.
Within seconds he had her buttons undone. The dress slid off of her, she stepped out of it and tossed it aside then twisted around to face him, gorgeous in her near nakedness.
What a perfect body she had—curvy in the right places, slender where she should be. Standing there with the waterfall behind her, her beauty was as much of the scene as the spectacular display of nature. With her wild blond hair tumbling over her beautiful, rounded breasts she was his mermaid fantasy come true—the only thing short of perfection the dark bruises discoloring her hip and thigh from where she’d fallen when the bed collapsed.
He was ready to take her—right now.
All that remained of her clothing was that pesky thong.
Matt stared.
A thong with a small, shiny packet tucked inside?
“I brought along the condoms and I didn’t know where else to put them,” she said.
Matt laughed and reached into the waistband of his undershorts. “Snap!” he said, flourishing an identical packet.
“Great minds think alike,” said Cristy, laughing. “Talk about safer than safe.”
Then her laughter died away and she sobered. “Matt, before we… we go any further, it… it’s really important to me that we use protection.”
She bit her bottom lip—that lovely, pouting lip he ached to kiss and suck and nip. “I’ll just tell you why in a hurry because I know you don’t like heavy stuff.”
Her eyes were cast downward. “A long time ago I didn’t—use protection that is—and I got pregnant. My boyfriend didn’t want to know about it. I was only young and it… it was a terrible time.”
“Did you—?”
She looked back up at him, her eyes veiled with remembered pain. “I miscarried. I knew it was for the best but that didn’t make it any easier. I… I’m just asking you to be careful.”
A multitude of emotions swept through him: compassion for Cristy; anger for her irresponsible lover; but most of all a deep, overpowering compulsion to hold her and look after her and reassure he that he would never hurt her. Never betray her trust.
But how could he make promises he might not be in a position to keep? That darn white charger was up to his tricks again.
He drew Cristy’s luscious nakedness into his arms, hoping she could feel something of what he found impossible to say. The sudden thought of this woman ripe with his child flashed through his mind and his heart swelled with an unaccustomed fierce joy.
No! In the real world away from the island she was promised to another man. In no position to make promises to him. No matter what she said, she continued to wear that damn ring. The best he could do was to honor her wishes to keep her safe. “I’ll be careful Cristy. I promise you,” he said, his voice hoarse.
He kissed her. She kissed him back with passion, her lips parting under his, her tongue darting in to mate with his. She wound her arms around him and pressed her soft, wonderful body to his, the hard tips of her nipples thrusting against him. He groaned at the want that flooded through him.
She pulled away from his kiss and darted hot little kisses along his jaw and down his throat. She tugged at his T-shirt and he helped her to slide it off him, then take off his undershorts.
Once he was naked she stood back to look at him, her eyes glinting with desire, her cheeks flushed, her mouth swollen from his kisses. “You are beyond wonderful,” she whispered.
“So are you. And I want you.”
Her eyes darted downward to his erection. “That’s very obvious,” she said, smiling, and she pushed close to him again, caressing his chest, twining her fingers through his chest hair. He covered her breasts with his hands and she gasped her pleasure as he rolled the stiff nipples in his fingers.
Then she slid her hands down over his hips until she reached his erection. He went still with anticipation as she stroked and caressed him. But when she went to kneel and take him in her mouth he pulled her up to him to face him.
“No,” he uttered in a voice harsh with need.
“I want to give you pleasure,” she whispered. “I owe you one, remember.”
“You are giving me pleasure. And I told you—I’m not keeping score. I want to be inside you. With you. Together.”
He slid his hand over the gentle swell of her belly and under the edge of her thong. She gasped as his fingers explored her, found her wet and ready for him.
“I want you, too,” she whispered as he slid off her thong, picked out the condoms and tore one open. She took it from him and rolled it on to him, making the act of protection a caress.
Their breathing was urgent and ragged, the only sound save the muted thunder of the falls and the occasional splash of a fish as it broke the surface of the water.
He groaned as he drew her close to him and effortlessly picked her up. She wound her legs around him and he gripped her under her bottom. She gasped as he nudged at her entrance then slid into her moist, warm readiness. Then he walked her into the water.
“This isn’t quite what I meant by a swim,” Cristy moaned softly as she moved her hips against him.
“But better, hmm?” he murmured, as he thrust into her, slowly, rhythmically, concentrating on her pleasure as much as his own.
He felt overwhelmed at how special she was and, as their bodies joined, he felt that they became one not just with each other but with this perfect place; that their rhythm was one with the ripples of the water and the rushing of the wind in the treetops.
The creamy skin of Cristy’s breast was flushed and warm. She moaned and sighed her pleasure and his own grew with increasing
urgency. He could feel her tighten around him, trembling and shuddering and he knew her release was near. “Come with me,” he urged as he thrust deeper into her.
“Yes,” she moaned. “Yes!”
She flung her head back and cried out her ecstasy at the same moment he shouted the pounding excitement of his climax, a release so powerful that Matt expected to see the water froth and boil around them as their cries of fulfillment echoed around their own, private paradise.
Cristy fell still and he cradled her in his arms as her breathing returned to normal, her heartbeat to its regular pace. Then he swam with her to the waterfall and stood with her at its edges, letting the water pound over their shoulders and necks, laughing at the exhilaration of it, kissing and stroking and starting to want her all over again.
As she swam toward shore, Matt swimming right beside her, his body nudging her with every stroke, Cristy thought she had never felt such fulfillment. Yet how could she feel so satisfied and want him again so soon?
But she did.
They reached the shallows. “Stop,” she ordered. She slid her arms around him and kissed him slowly, sensuously, probing his mouth with the tip of her tongue, sighing her pleasure at the taste of him, the solid feel of him as she pressed her body to his, breast to chest, thigh to thigh, softness to unmistakable hardness.
“More?” he whispered huskily, caressing her back and down to her bottom with knowing hands.
“Uh huh,” she murmured, pushing him gently backward into the shallow water, kissing along the line of his jaw, licking and sucking his nipples until he groaned his need and then riding him fast and hard until they climaxed together in an explosion of rapture.
Exhausted then, she managed to crawl back up onto the sand and out of the sun, and let herself be cradled against Matt’s chest as she fell into a deep, satisfied sleep.
Shipwreck just didn’t get any better than this.
CHAPTER EIGHT
For a frightening moment when Matt awoke, he didn’t know where he was. He sat up suddenly, disoriented, shaking his head to try and make some sense of his surroundings.
Then he remembered, and was flooded with contentment and happiness. And total, utter sexual satisfaction. He stretched out his long, powerful naked limbs. Where was Cristy?
She sat at a little distance away under the shade of a large tree fern. He was disappointed to see she’d gotten back into her dress, covering that lush body he’d taken such pleasure in exploring. Man, she was hot. No mermaid fantasy had prepared him for the passionate reality of making love to his gorgeous fellow castaway.
She sat with her knees drawn up against her chest and her arms wrapped tightly around them as she gazed toward the waterfall. Was she regretting that amazing sex on the sand? Or totting up with her accountant’s mind the orgasms they’d shared?
Matt pulled on his undershorts and walked over to her—not certain of the reception he might get. For all the passion that had flared between them, he still didn’t know as much about her as he’d like to.
But she looked up and smiled a greeting that lit up her eyes and lightened his heart. With her hair all tousled and without a trace of makeup, her creamy skin still slightly reddened from the contact with his beard, she looked far more beautiful than she had even as a pristine bride.
He felt a surge of fierce, primal possessiveness—a runaway bride she might be, but now he had branded her his woman.
He sat down beside her and reached out for her hand, kissed it and then tucked it warmly into his. “You look deep in thought,” he said.
“I am.” She entwined her fingers with his and then looked straight ahead of her again. She seemed preoccupied. “I can’t stop thinking about Seth.”
“Seth?”
Here they’d just shared the most incredible sex he’d ever experienced and she was thinking not about him but about the old bird guy?
Over his incredulousness, Matt felt a twang of what he was forced to recognize was jealousy. “You’re thinking about Seth?” He was unable to mask his disbelief.
He could see a faraway look in her eyes. “Yes. Just think. He must have come here. To this spot, I mean. It’s so perfect. Can you imagine being here all alone, with no one to share it with? No human, that is—I’m not counting that mini dinosaur, Sam.”
Matt cleared his throat. “That was his choice.”
“I know. But I wonder if he sat here in this very place thinking about his wife and longing for her.”
Matt shifted uncomfortably on the sand. Here came the soppy stuff again. “He might have done.”
“I’m sure he must have done.”
Should he tell her? Or would it turn her even more sentimental? He cleared his throat. Something told him she’d want to know the story.
“They say when they found him, he was clutching a photo of his wife and daughter to his heart.”
She turned to face him. “Found him?” Her voice had a slight tremor. “You mean…?”
“Yeah. Peacefully lying in the clearing where he knew the monthly boat from the big island would find him.”
Cristy sniffed and took a deep, ragged breath. “Oh, how romantic. And how sad.”
She sniffed, crinkling up her straight little nose. Not tears again. He was itching already.
She tightened her grip on his hand, her eyes luminous. “That’s so beautiful. Doesn’t it make you wonder about who is really special in your life? If we were shipwrecked here forever, who would you miss the most?”
I’d be quite happy just to be with you. Just you. For always. The thought came unbidden—and unwanted—but Matt knew with a moment of sudden, terrifying clarity, that it was true.
But he didn’t speak the thought out loud. He didn’t even want to think it. He shrugged his shoulders. “It’s not something I could say I’ve given mind space to.”
Cristy smiled a slow smile. “You know, neither have I? Why don’t we give it some thought now?”
Matt groaned. This was getting heavier by the second. And dangerously soppy. “Do I have to?”
Cristy’s lips curved in a mischievous smile. “Yes. I insist. You start. Tell me, who you would miss the most if you were stranded on this island forever?”
Women! Couldn’t they ever be happy just to sit in silence? No, they always had to talk, to analyze, to try and find out what was going on in a guy’s mind. When that guy just wanted to keep his private thoughts to himself.
“C’mon now,” she prompted. “Who would you miss?”
“No one,” he said bluntly, disentangling his hand from hers. He wanted out of this conversation.
“I don’t believe you.”
Matt groaned. She wasn’t going to give up. “If you insist.” He paused to think. “I’d miss who I miss the most when I’m on my boat.”
Cristy’s eyes sparked with interest. “Really? Tell me,” she ordered. He almost felt mean about leading her on. Almost.
“Jake.”
Was that relief he saw flooding her eyes? Relief that he hadn’t said a woman’s name?
“A friend? Another brother?”
“I don’t have another brother. Or a sister for that matter. “Jake is my dog. A black Labrador with floppy ears and great big feet. That’s who I’d miss the most.”
Matt knew he lied, both to Cristy and to himself. Danny was the one he’d miss but he couldn’t let himself admit that. Not after what he’d done to his brother. What his brother had done to him.
“Your dog?” Cristy was wide-eyed. And patently disbelieving.
Matt grinned at her reaction. “You heard me right. My best mate Jake. He gets seasick so I couldn’t take him with me on Wayfarer.”
“You’re not serious? A seasick dog?”
“He’s a great dog. Only he lacks the canine equivalent of sea legs. Which doesn’t make him first-mate material. He’s staying with a friend while I’m away—though I Skype with him when I can.”
“You Skype with your dog?” Her voice was underscored with disbel
ief.
Of course he Skyped with his dog. He genuinely missed Jake. “That you ask that question tells me you don’t have a dog.”
“No, I don’t, though I’d love to have one. I didn’t grow up with dogs. My parents are vegan and they couldn’t cope with the idea of having to feed meat to a dog.”
“You’re kidding me?”
She shook her head. “All I could have was a rabbit. A vegetarian rabbit. And since I left the commune I’ve lived in apartments where pets weren’t allowed.”
“That’s sad. I hate being without my dog.” He paused, intrigued by the look on her face. “You didn’t like the commune, did you?”
“I hated it.”
He was surprised by the vehemence that brought a frown to her forehead and an agitated heaving of her breasts where they swelled over the top of her dress.
“Well, maybe not hated it,” she amended. “But I sure didn’t want to be there. I was fourteen when my parents dragged me away from my friends and my school to go live with a load of drop outs.”
“I would have thought that was an adventure when I was fourteen.”
“Well I didn’t. I liked my San Francisco suburban life just the way it was. I’ll never forget my first day at my new school. I turned up in my mom’s homespun and my dad’s homemade sandals. He hadn’t quite got the hang of them and I tripped going into assembly. Just like these darn flip flops.”
He was tempted to laugh but fought against the impulse. “Was that so bad?”
“It seemed bad then. Everyone laughed. And it didn’t get much better. While the other kids were chowing down on turkey at Thanksgiving, I was gagging on nut roast.”
This time Matt couldn’t stifle his laughter and she glared at him. “It wasn’t funny. Teenagers want to conform, not stand out from everyone. I got out of the commune as soon as I could and I’ve never gone back.”
“You mean you don’t see your parents?”
“Of course I do. When I can catch them between their travels.”
“They travel a lot?”
“That’s the irony of it all. Dad’s handcrafted furniture he sold became so fashionable they can afford to trip around seeking enlightenment wherever they want.”
The Castaway Bride Page 11
