by Dez Burke
But then she was startled by the sound of screeching tires and turned sharply to see a tall, familiar man spring from out of the driver’s seat, her name spilling from his lips.
“Kaycie!”
Nick. Here.
Those were the only two things she could process in her mind as she was struck with a sudden, inexplicable bolt of fear.
He’s found me! Damn! Wild thoughts flew through her head as she realized it must have been Rachel who told him. She should have known.
In a sudden spurt of panic, she dumped her shopping and the flowers and turned the other way to run. Running, always running. Her one aim always to evade that sharp feeling of dread that enveloped her senses from knowing Nick had come to get her back. She couldn’t let him catch her.
“Kaycie, stop!” Nick called out to her in a harsh, tortured voice. But Kaycie didn’t look back, hurtling forward on her choppy heels and quickly turning the corner. Then she tried to cross the road without looking both ways first and missed a moving motorcycle making straight for her.
The rider gave a shout but couldn’t stop in time. Kaycie couldn’t get back out of the way fast enough, and she was only able to let out a tiny scream as the motorcycle made impact and threw her to the ground.
The last thing she was aware of was of Nick’s voice yelling, “No!” before she sank into a dark, painful nothingness.
“KAYCIE...vita mia. Please. Wake up.”
Slowly regaining consciousness, Kaycie clung to the husky, familiar voice speaking so softly, calling her ‘his life’. She sighed, savoring the gentle hand stroking her knuckles even as she slowly, painstakingly blinked her heavy lids open.
The sight of Nick sitting right by her bed, his head bent over her hand clasped in his, made Kaycie’s heart constrict.
“Oh Nick,” she breathed, very softly. But he heard her, and his head jerked up instantly. His pained eyes brightened when he saw her looking wide-eyed at him.
“Kaycie, my darling, you’re okay!” Nick exclaimed, his grip on her hand tightening.
“Yeah, I think,” Kaycie said with a smile at the relief on his face. She suddenly became aware of her surroundings and realized she must be in some kind of private hospital room. Under the white and blue sheets, she noted that she was wearing only a light cotton hospital gown. The windows were open and it was daylight, and there were flowers all over the nearby drawers and shelves.
Kaycie was at a loss, not sure what had happened to her. “Nick...what am I doing here?” Her tone was anxious.
“You had an accident, tesoro,” Nick told her hoarsely. “Close to the hotel. That bike ran you down, remember?”
Kaycie frowned incomprehensively. “Remember what?”
Nick stared at her, squeezing that much harder on her hand and causing her to let out a small cry in surprise.
“I’m sorry,” he said, hastily loosening his grip. “But, you’re sure you don’t remember...anything?”
Kaycie’s eyes looked uncertain as she paused thoughtfully. “Well, we were supposed to be married...” This time her own fingers clutched tighter around his. “We did get married, didn’t we?”
Nick nodded, looking numb as he seemed unsure what to say.
“I remember now,” Kaycie said slowly. “We had this marvelous wedding, and then the reception with everything looking so perfect...But I can’t seem to recall anything after that. Nothing at all. Oh Nick, I’m scared,” she cried, and struggled to raise herself from the pillows on her elbows, but then the pain shattered through her whole body. Feeling faint, she gasped and then felt everywhere go black again.
NICK STARED UNSEEINGLY at the tiled floor as he listened to what the doctor was saying.
“It must have been the terrible shock of the accident...sudden trauma can do that to people. It has been known to happen, Mr. Vitale. Some memory loss can occur whereby the patient will blank out certain events – events that may cause them pain to remember. It’s generally a temporary condition. I suggest that you take it slowly and not try to force her to remember anything. It will all come back to her naturally, I’m sure. Just give it time...”
Time, thought Nick with bitterness. That’s exactly what he’d had to fight against these past several weeks since Kaycie disappeared from the wedding reception. Since then he’d endured different stages of torture. His first fear was that she’d been kidnapped – but soon he found out she must have run away because her overnight cases and some other items were found to have been missing.
He’d been half-frantic, half-enraged and had done all he could to find her, to hear from her own lips why she had done this to him. Nothing had prepared him for this; he hadn’t seen it coming. Day and night for the past five weeks he’d born the speculations of onlookers who’d had a field day over her disappearance.
If it hadn’t been for her parents informing him that they’d received a single phone call from Kaycie saying she was okay, but wouldn’t tell them where she was. Nick had wanted to smash anything and everything he could lay his hands on. One thing he didn’t stand for was being made a fool of and Kaycie had done just that.
He’d been itching to show her who was in charge and he swore that he’d teach her a lesson the first chance he got. He’d put the best people on the job to search for her but it had been like she’d dropped off the face of the earth. There were no credit card records and there was no way to track where she’d headed to and as the days went by and she didn’t contact him, it seemed impossible to ever find out anything about what had happened.
And then, just two days ago he’d received that call from Rachel who gave him the shocker that she’d run into Kaycie in Verona, Italy. He couldn’t believe she’d gone that far away. He’d thought that she was still in the country but now that he knew for sure she’d flown all the way to his home town almost made him feel like it was a slap in the face. He’d been so fucking furious it had been hard to see straight for a minute.
But during the flight over in his private jet, Nick’s rage had dissolved into the overwhelming desire to see her again. He needed to make sure she was okay. He couldn’t take the risk of losing Kaycie a second time. Not now that he’d finally realized how much she truly meant to him.
When he’d watched her getting hit by that motorcycle, it had added ten years to his life. He’d never forget the way his heart had stopped when she’d tumbled to the ground with the bike and rider toppling over her. Those moments were the worst of his life.
If she’d died...
“She’s going to be fine,” the doctor was reassuring him now. “Just a concussion, and a mild one at that. You’ll be allowed to take her home tomorrow. She’ll be out of supervision by then.”
Nick nodded tiredly and thanked the doctor before leaving his office. Nick hadn’t slept a wink since she was brought in yesterday, and now he thought of Kaycie’s beautiful face swathed with plaster and her body weak with pain. What the hell had gone wrong and why had she left? He’d been so sure things were going fine. What could have happened to turn him into her enemy?
He began to walk past the reception area, his intention being to get back to his hotel, freshen up and then take a nap before returning to the hospital. He didn’t intend to let Kaycie out of his sight for long.
He’d already informed her parents that though she’d been in an accident, she was going to be fine. Nick had felt guilt thinking how he’d been the cause of a lot of trouble for Kaycie; first she’d run away from her home because of him and then she’d almost gotten killed, another fault of his.
Sighing angrily to himself, he suddenly overheard a man ask the nurse at the front desk, “A friend of mine, Kaycie Hayes was admitted here yesterday. If I could...”
Before the man could even finish the sentence, Nick had spun him around and slammed him into the nearby wall. The guy was just as tall as him and only just that bit leaner, but he reacted fast enough to shove Nick’s grip off his shirt as both men came face to face. Nick was sure this was the man Rachel ha
d told him she’d seen with Kaycie; he fit the description to a ‘tee’.
“Who the hell are you?” Nick barked, his eyes murderous. The man, with cool dignity, straightened his shirt, his own face stormy.
“I should be asking you the same question,” was his gritted reply, which made Nick scowl darkly, barely conscious of the shocked looks they were getting from the hospital staff and other onlookers.
“I’m Nick Vitale, Kaycie’s husband,” Nick snarled.
“Oh, the husband she never wanted to see again?” the stranger said with a cutting smile. Nick winced, his expression suddenly bleak.
“Is that what she told you?” Nick asked dully. He shoved his hand back through his hair as he came to grips with the fact that something had gone wrong that day of the wedding – right from the time he’d left her side at the reception. Because that had been the last time he’d set eyes on her until yesterday.
What could have made her dump everything and just go for weeks on end, not even calling him to let him know where she was? He’d known Kaycie was a woman who had her own mind but he’d never have thought she would pull such a stunt just to spite him. He knew that he’d made her agree to the marriage against her will, and even now he loathed himself for using that method of persuasion. He never would have carried out his threat to destroy her investments but then he’d had to do what he could to get her. And now he wasn’t sure if he still had her, or if she was going to leave him again the first chance she got.
“She didn’t tell me in those exact words,” the other man was saying more calmly, as he watched the expressions flitting over Nick’s face. “But she did give me the impression that you hurt her pretty bad but then you should know better about that.”
No, I don’t, thought Nick to himself. How could he tell this guy he had no idea what he’d done to turn Kaycie against him?
“Look,” the man said, “I heard she was in an accident and that she was brought here. I need to know how she’s doing.”
Nick let out a ragged breath. “She’ll be fine. She had a slight concussion, nothing serious unless you take in the fact that a section of her life seems cut out due to the accident. From the time of our wedding reception until when she woke up lying in the hospital bed. She can’t remember a bit of it.” And then he looked away, squeezing his fingers to the bridge of his nose as he fought back despair. “Dios! She really must hate me. But for the life of me, I can’t figure out why.”
The man frowned thoughtfully. “If what you say about her memory loss is true, then I guess she wouldn’t remember me. So it might not be a good idea if I tried to see her. I really did need to make sure she was okay. But please, give her my regards. Tell her it is from a friend.”
Nick looked at him penetratingly and almost wished he didn’t need to ask but he just had to know.
“That’s all you two ever were?” he enquired with gruff reluctance. “Just friends?”
The man’s lips twisted. “Don’t worry, she never let me get that close. I guess you can figure out why. Well, Nick; you’ve got your second chance to win her back. That’s one special lady you almost lost so my advice to you? Don’t blow it again.”
Nick stared after him as the man walked out of the hospital. He’s right, thought Nick. Kaycie’s memory loss, no matter how temporary, was his opportunity to put things right; to start over. Make her see that he cared too much to let her go ever. He’d been such a fool to blackmail her into marrying him; he could have told her how he felt instead of taking the hard route.
And now he was going to do all in his power to win her trust so that even if she got her memory back, she’d find it in her heart to forgive him for whatever she’d found him guilty of in the first place.
KAYCIE SMILED UP AT Nick as he drew open her door to help her out of the car. Her grin broadened when he held on to her hand as they both climbed up the ornate steps to the front entrance of the villa. They’d flown out from Italy to Greece, where Nick had a sprawling white villa and where they’d originally planned to spend their honeymoon.
She’d been checked out of the hospital forty-eight hours ago and had been just as eager as Nick to make it to this dreamy location. The scene looked straight out of a storybook, all blue sea and gorgeous mountain slopes. The villa itself was a vision; she couldn’t wait to go inside.
“Really, Nick; you don’t have to treat me like glass,” Kaycie teased, as Nick carefully led her up the many steps, making sure she took each one slowly and not in bounds as she’d intended.
“I’m not going to break, you know...whoa!” Kaycie exclaimed as he suddenly swung her off her feet and into his arms as they reached the top step. “Nick!”
“Glass or not, you’re my bride and it’s been forever since I’ve been looking forward to doing this.” His lips touched hers briefly, yet the kiss was so sweet and hot that she clung to his shoulders to quell the dizzying sensation she felt.
When he drew his head back she was grinning, saying, “Oh well, get on with it then.”
Nick laughed at that and then dutifully carried her over the threshold. Kaycie gazed up into his handsome face, realizing this was the first time she was hearing him really laugh ever since she’d woken up and found him sitting beside her in the hospital room. She loved the flash of his even white teeth, the laugh lines that grooved beside his mouth and the devastatingly sexy crow’s feet that crinkled his eyes with humor.
She barely glanced around at her surroundings, not with Nick’s eyes pinned so piercingly to hers. He didn’t set her down until they’d passed the expansive, grandly designed foyer, and then into the living room with its amazing décor done in earthy, gorgeous tones.
“This, cara mia,” Nick told her with a flourish as he swung her gently around to take a look, “Is where we’ll be spending the next few weeks of our belated honeymoon. I’ve taken all the time off we need, and of course I called the caretaker beforehand to make sure everything was prepared for us. Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Kaycie conceded, warmed inside with all the care and affection Nick had shown her since her waking up from the accident. Impulsively, she linked her arms around his neck as she gazed up into his face. “I can’t remember much of the wedding, Nick, but I know that it was wonderful. And the reception as well, I...”
Kaycie stopped abruptly, and felt Nick go still. “Yes, Kaycie; the reception on the lawn in front of my father’s mansion...lots of friends and family – do you remember?”
Kaycie bit hard on her lip as she tried to cling to a prodding image, but then suddenly one particular element skidded through her mind; a tiny memory that made her shiver just recalling every bit of it.
Nick felt that slight quiver and held her more tightly. “What is it, Kaycie? What do you remember?”
Kaycie felt her neck grow warmer, and she swept her lashes down as she said shyly, “Well not that much, just...something naughty you said to me. About how you were going to make slow, endless love to me until I squirmed and begged you to stop – and then begged you not to. I remember thinking to myself now that’s one hell of a claim.” Kaycie’s eyes were dancing mischievously so he’d know she was messing with him.
But Nick took the challenge very seriously, his eyes blazing dark and smoldering as he asked with husky intent, “You have to be sure you’re up to it, my sweet wife.”
Kaycie felt an inward tremor at his half-warning tone. She gave him an impish smile as inside her deepest core, she pulsed with desire. “I am if you are.”
“Oh, you can believe I am. It’s all I’ve thought about since the very first time we met,” Nick told her deeply, before catching her lips in a heated kiss as he carried her up to their bedroom.
Chapter Thirteen
Their mutual desire was like a living entity pounding its heartbeat between them, binding them. For a long time there were no words. Their clothes fell away and soon their naked bodies glided against each other as they kissed, hands molding to flesh.
Linking their f
ingers, Nick stretched her arms wide apart on either side of her head. He thrust his tongue inside her mouth and Kaycie moaned louder, shuddering against him. He pulled his mouth away and whispered in her ear that hearing her moan like that was his favorite sound. He only made her shiver all the more, and he chuckled softly, sending her a rakish look before he tracked kisses along her jawline.
Kaycie gloried in the sensation of his lips on her skin; like a silken caress. She loved the way his virile, masculine body felt pressed against hers, especially his manhood which throbbed heavily against her stomach, hard and thick and almost fearsome in length.
She’d caught only a glimpse when he’d undressed and her throat had gone dry as lust and consternation had warred within her. She longed so deeply to have him inside her mouth, her pussy. But first, she let him take the lead, and purred when those knowing lips moved to her ear and he tugged gently on her lobe with his teeth. Hmmm, that felt so good, so intimate and sexy. But then he shifted much lower, gliding over her neck and straight to her breasts which instinctively thrust out further when she felt his breath skim her rounded orbs.
Kaycie helplessly stared down at his wavy head at her breast, and cried out when he sucked one dark nipple in his mouth. She bucked hard against him, rubbing herself into his hard, toned body and feeling the arousal turn her pussy slick.
He continued to roll the stiff, aroused tip into his mouth and then laved gently right before he bit down firmly, causing her to let out a shriek of delight. Nick groaned deeply, letting her wrists go as he lowered a hand to her cleft. Kaycie could feel her own juices coating his fingers as he stroked her firmly and then sought her clit within its hood, pinching it gently.
Scalded by pleasure, Kaycie screamed out his name. Damn but he knew just what to do to make her feel good. He danced his tongue around her aroused nipple while he angled two fingers deep inside her until he was massaging that spongy bundle of nerves while at the same time, he rubbed on her swollen clitoris with carnal intensity.
