The way he spoke, low and deep, had her mind going to all sorts of wicked places, imagining what pleasures he could provide. She curled her nails into her palms to distract herself from her sinful thoughts.
“I don’t doubt your abilities.” Erica fought to keep her voice calm. “But I also don’t understand why you can’t just drop me off on one of our stops.” The yacht was scheduled to make at least one stop each day of the tour. “I’m sure another boat can pick me up and take me back to Thira.”
“Why are you so anxious to get back to the port?” he asked with a small lift of his scarred eyebrow. “Is there some Sir Galahad waiting there with wine and flowers to sweep you off your feet and into his bed?”
“Hardly that.” Erica laughed at his overblown language, his sincere tone. “I want to go to the movie theater.”
“Come again?”
“The outdoor movie theater in Kamari. That’s where I want to go. Sunday is the last-night showing for my friend’s film. I wanted to see it under the stars on Santorini.”
“Ah. That is a great disappointment indeed.” He lightly touched her arm, and she shivered. “The stars here on the boat are just as bright,” he said. “And you will be here with new friends, enjoying a delicious Greek meal while the ocean lulls you into pleasure. Doesn’t that make up for your loss of the stars in Kamari?”
“Not really.”
A smile flashed across his beautiful face. “You are a hard woman,” he said.
“No. I just know what I want.”
“It is possible to want and to receive many things,” he said. “Please, we don’t mean to trouble you with our little mix-up, but it really is not possible to do what you say. We need to follow the rules and the manifest.” He touched her arm again, a light brush of his fingertips over her sensitive flesh.
Nikolas had to know what he was doing, his effect on her. But despite being aware of his ploy, Erica still found herself charmed by him, by his accent, his lean brown body close to hers and the smell of his clean sweat under the bright sun. She’d had no idea she was this much of a sucker for a pretty face.
“Okay,” she said. “Fine. I guess I’ll just have to deal with it.”
Nikolas smiled again. “You will be offered even greater pleasures than those Kamari stars,” he said. “I promise.”
Erica laughed. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” she said.
“I never do.” A serious look settled over his features. His eyes drifted over her face, her throat, then the subtle swell of her breasts under the tank top. “Come—sit back here with me where you will have the best view of the sea and our entrance to the volcano.”
He guided her to a high perch on top of the boat. It was the sundeck on top of the pilothouse, according to Nikolas. Two men already sat on the sturdy platform, arms braced on the wooden railing, their legs dangling above the deck at least fifteen feet below them. One was the crew member Erica had noticed earlier, the one with black wavy hair and pale eyes. The young men looked up when Erica and Nikolas arrived.
“Sit, please,” Nikolas invited with a wave of his hand.
She sat next to the young men, who had resumed their conversation in Greek after acknowledging Nikolas. They looked down at the passengers on the boat and laughed. Erica could only imagine the things they were saying.
Nikolas spoke to the two men, gestured to Erica and said her name. The young men looked at her with speculation, sizing up the tank top and shorts she wore, her natural hair and the designer shades on her face. They seemed to miss nothing.
Erica noticed the second young man, who was short with black hair and eyes and skin almost as dark as Nikolas’s, say something to Nikolas that made his companion laugh. Nikolas shrugged, smiled mysteriously, then said something that triggered laughter again and a round of hand slaps.
Yeah, boys and their games. Erica rolled her eyes.
He dropped down into a crouch next to her, filling her senses with his scent: salty sweat and sunscreen. “I have to go back to work for a moment, but enjoy the view. I will return shortly.” After a brief nod and look that begged an agreement from her, he left.
Erica sighed, shaking her head. What are you doing up here? she asked herself.
As Nikolas walked away, the shorter man greeted her in English and introduced himself as Cyrus and his companion as Max. He then proceeded to flirt with her, telling her about all the secret places around the islands he could show her.
“Ease off, Cyrus. Don’t push up on the girl. You know she belongs to Nikolas.”
Erica looked up in surprise at Max. His English sounded French accented rather than Greek. His flat, pale eyes lightly touched Erica before lifting away to stare out to sea.
“I don’t belong to anybody,” she said.
“Good,” Max said. “Because Lani would be pissed.”
“Who would be pissed?” Nikolas appeared on the platform, stepping off the ladder leading from the deck below with the grace of a large cat, his wild curls blowing in the wind. His eyes moved possessively over Erica, reinforcing what his friend had said.
“Lani,” Max said with a short laugh.
Nikolas winced and looked guilty for a moment, then shot Max the finger. He sat down at Erica’s side, his sun-warmed body pressing against hers from shoulder to knee. Did he really have to sit that close? She shifted next to him, trying to ignore the sparks of attraction flaring between them.
Erica cleared her throat. “Who’s Lani?” She met Nikolas’s eyes. The longer she looked at him, the more uncomfortable he seemed. Then he finally shrugged.
“She’s a woman on the boat. Another one of the crew.”
Erica stared at him, not understanding. The only two female crew members were Celandine and the captain. Unless they had another woman stashed belowdecks someplace. Erica frowned. “Who are you talking about?”
“She tells the passengers to call her Celandine. You know, the woman you were talking to earlier.”
Seriously? Erica bit the inside of her cheek to stop herself from saying something rude. “And you’re...involved with her?”
Footsteps sounded above the noise of the breeze flapping through the sails; then the blonde appeared. Celandine. Lani. She swept a single glance at the scene on the platform and pursed her lips.
“The captain wants you, Niko,” she said.
As the woman stood above them, with her tanned skin gleaming in the bright sun and her C-cup breasts straining against her pink V-neck tank top, Erica felt a fleeting bite of jealousy. Well, maybe not so fleeting. She could easily dismiss the blonde’s looks as watered-down and uninteresting, but if this was what Nikolas liked, then why the hell was he interested in her?
Nikolas squeezed Erica’s shoulder. “I’ll see you soon.” Then he got to his feet, preparing to follow after Lani, who had already disappeared down the ladder.
“Don’t bother,” she said coolly. “I think our little romance has already run its course.”
The two men sitting near them laughed. The one who’d revealed Lani’s significance laughed the loudest.
“So quickly, American Princess?” Nikolas’s eyes sparkled with humor. “The guys will never let me live this down.”
Erica didn’t bother responding. She stood up, walked past Nikolas and left the platform, climbing carefully down the chrome ladder until she was dropping onto the lower level with the other passengers. The seat she’d shared with the Japanese couple was already taken, so she stood up near the side of the boat, holding on to the edge as the vessel bounded over the bright blue water.
Men. Everywhere they were the same. She seethed at the Greek man’s gall in courting her when he obviously had another woman. And one on the boat at that. If nothing else, he had a lot of damn balls.
The boat slowed down as it made its way toward an islan
d jagged with black rocks. The contrast between the shimmering water and the obsidian rocks was gorgeous. The rocks glimmered in the sun, both swallowing the light and reflecting it. She imagined they were hot to the touch, burning if she dared to get too close. Against her will, her eyes moved to where Nikolas had been.
A feminine voice on the intercom announced that the boat was docking at the volcanoes, the first part of their trip. These were the remnants of the active volcanoes that had formed Santorini and created the scattered and beautiful set of islands that drew hoards of tourists every year. The voice advised everyone to carry water and to not lose their tour guide since there would be at least three other boats and six other guides giving a tour of the impressive island of volcanoes.
Erica went down to her cabin, put on her bikini under her clothes and packed her small backpack with everything she might need out there—water, two apples, sunscreen, lip balm and her camera. Before she went back up on deck, she retied the laces on her tennis shoes to get ready for what was sure to be a long and exhausting walk up the mountainside. She’d spent most of the past three years in classrooms and lecture halls at the university, not nearly enough of it in the gym. She just hoped she wouldn’t pass out and embarrass herself.
The boat docked, and, in short order, all the passengers unloaded onto the weathered dock. There was already another boat there, smaller than the Agape but packed with three times as many people. Those people swarmed the dock, chatting in more languages than Erica could recognize.
She pulled her sunglasses from the top of her head. Already she felt a different kind of heat as she stood on the volcanic island with her fellow travelers. Lani stepped in front.
“Follow me, everyone. We go through those gates there.” The blonde pointed to a narrow opening fitted with a turnstile and guarded by two people in khaki shirts and shorts. The opening was under a roughly built gazebo so the workers wouldn’t die from sunstroke, Erica imagined. Damn, it was hot. And she wasn’t even standing on the black volcanic rocks yet. A long line formed to go through the turnstile.
“The price is three euros, everyone,” Lani said. “Get your money ready so we can get through the queue as quickly as possible.”
Erica rummaged in her pockets for the money. People jostled her good-naturedly as she made her way through the line and eventually through the narrow opening where the attendant took her money. Finally, she was on the other side with the group from the Agape. Standing nearby and holding up a clipboard, Lani was waiting patiently for everyone else to catch up with her. Erica quietly brought up the rear; then they were off.
As she started walking with the group, someone bumped her shoulder. She stepped away to stare down at the gorgeous stretch of ocean and the boats lined up on the docks like beautiful handmaidens awaiting the hoard’s pleasure. She moved to the side to give the person more room. Then she was bumped again. Irritated, Erica looked up with a sharp word ready on her lips. Instead, her mouth fell open. The person bumping into her was Nikolas.
Chapter Three
Erica almost swallowed her tongue. He was shirtless, and his muscled brown skin glistened from some sort of oil. From the scent, it might have been suntan lotion, but she wasn’t sure. All she knew was that suddenly she was overcome with the urge to touch him, to run her fingers over the muscles of his chest, the rippled wall of his abs, to see if he was as hard as he looked.
Even as she watched him, she was aware of other women watching and appreciating him, too. The cutoff shorts hung low on his hips, showing off the hard V of muscle, the flat plane leading down into his shorts. The bulge at the front of the shorts was indecently obvious. And Erica wasn’t ashamed to think about unbuttoning that single button and following the plane of skin to where it led.
She jammed her hands into her shorts pockets.
“What are you doing here?” she asked him. “Shouldn’t you be on the boat bothering someone else?”
“You’re the one I want to bother right now,” he said, completely unrepentant.
Erica shook her head. “Just leave me alone, okay? I don’t mess with other women’s property.”
“I belong only to myself, beautiful girl.”
She rolled her eyes and walked away from him to follow Lani up the steep side of the black mountain. Was it her imagination, or did the Greek woman look at her with murder in her eyes? Erica made a dismissive noise and looked away from the blonde. As she walked, rocks tumbled under her feet, some sharp and dangerous-looking. Heat radiated from the dark rocks, washing over her skin, her face. Was this what people feared when they thought of hell? A sweltering landscape where a beautiful man tempted her with his nearness and his woman looked at her like she wanted to kill?
Lani was talking about the volcanoes, which one was active, the dates each one had last erupted, but Erica barely heard a word she said. Nikolas kept step with her, distracting her with his presence.
Compared with the current emanating from his body next to hers, the warmth from the rocks was nothing. She fumbled in her bag for a bottle of water, unscrewed the top and put the bottle gratefully to her lips. The water flowed over her tongue and down her throat like ambrosia. Fresh, faintly cool. Necessary.
Nikolas gestured to the canvas messenger bag slung across his shoulder. “If you run out, I have some here, too.”
“No, thanks,” she said. “I’ll be fine.”
He only shrugged, a smile on his face. Then he stepped even closer. Quiet time was over.
“So listen, American beauty.” His voice was deep and rough, effortlessly seducing her. “I mean to keep my bargain with you from earlier. I promised this trip would be fun. You won’t regret a single moment.”
“I already regret meeting you,” she muttered and looked up ahead to Lani, whose back was turned.
Her feet crunched over the dark rocks. To her left was a humbling view of the bright water, the boats and a steep drop down the black cliff. To the right, the high cliff and a view of one of the volcanic craters.
“You don’t regret meeting me, Erica. No one ever does.” His eyes sparkled with amusement.
He effortlessly climbed beside her, his feet clad in dust-covered tennis shoes keeping step with her own. She stumbled. Instantly, Nikolas was there. He caught her, set her upright and carried on as if nothing had happened.
“You may not believe it, but this is one of my favorite spots on the trip. Some people may think it would be the warm springs or even the visit to the Frenchman’s castle. But I much prefer this.”
He gestured to the wide black island and the crater releasing its steam into the air. “The intensity of it, you know?”
Erica turned away from him. But she couldn’t help but consider his words. Yes, the part of the tour she had anticipated the most was the warm springs with the mud baths. The waters of the Aegean were cold, a chilly seventy degrees even now in the height of summer. She looked forward to swimming in warmer waters that did not make her teeth chatter on initial entry or make her nipples stiffen painfully under her bathing suit. But as she studied her surroundings, the sultriness of the island, the crunch of the rocks underfoot, the sun like an intent lover looming above, biting into her bare shoulders and back, she felt the intensity Nikolas talked about.
He looked down at her with wonder. “You understand what I’m talking about, don’t you?”
She nodded. “I do.”
But she didn’t want to feel any sort of accord with him. She wanted to dismiss this would-be cheater from her life as if he’d never been in it. And that should be relatively simple, right?
You just met him five minutes ago! Her inner voice chided her for her weakness. But he wasn’t easy to ignore by any means. Already, she felt affected even in the most simple and elemental way by him, by his passion for the volcanic island. By his incredible body. Erica stiffened her shoulders and walked on.
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The path narrowed until everyone could only walk single file. The air crackled with the sound of shoes struggling for purchase on the rocky and narrow slope leading up. As she walked, she felt Nikolas’s presence behind her, heard his breath, felt it at the back of her neck.
“Stop following me so closely!” she snapped.
But he only chuckled and seemed to stand even closer to her, his body a distraction, a furnace that she longed to press her face and entire body against.
Jerk.
She hated it when pretty people took advantage of their looks. And she generally didn’t trust people who were so gorgeous that the whole world noticed and loved them. Nikolas was like that. No one could ignore a man with that face or that body. Even his personality bubbled hot and wild under those gorgeous looks, making him just about irresistible to anyone who liked men. Although Erica suspected that some lesbians might be tempted to test him just on sight alone. If he actually talked to them, tried to charm them, their sexuality would be questioned for sure.
Erica giggled at the ridiculous monologue going on inside her head. Then she realized that she might be suffering from the slightest touch of sunstroke. She slowed down. At the top of the hill, she stepped to the side and let the others pass by her. Her breath was coming quickly. Her head swam.
Nikolas was instantly at her side. He guided her to sit down on a rock jutting up from the soil. As she stumbled to sit down with his help, she noticed some people looking at her with vague curiosity, but all of them walked on.
“You probably should have worn a hat,” he said with a faint smile.
“But you’re not wearing one.”
“Yes, because I have the stamina of a god.” His face was serious as he rummaged in his bag for a bottle of water and a face towel. He wet the towel and patted her face with it, then draped it over her neck. Erica sighed with the simple pleasure and relief of the cool rag on her burning skin. Nikolas put the bottle of water to her mouth. As she drank, he hovered over her, his body providing shade for her face.
Dim the Lights: Islands of DesireLiquid ChocolateHer Wild and Sexy Nights Page 2