She couldn’t bear the embarrassment of it. Never, ever had she even initiated a kiss let alone knocked a man down on the sand and then jumped him.
She sent fervent thanks to King Neptune—or whatever had sent the wave that had douched them. Otherwise she might right now be rolling around in the shallows having passionate sex with Matt, right in full sight of anyone walking onto the beach. If only another convenient wave would just roll up and sweep her far, far away from here.
Frantically, she pulled her bodice up over her breasts, but there wasn’t much of her wedding dress left. She felt exposed and vulnerable, her nipples taut through the wet, silky fabric, the flush of arousal staining the creamy skin of her chest.
She dared a glance up at him. Despite his attempt at humor, Matt looked as uncomfortable as she felt. His eyes echoed the shock she knew he must see in hers.
He cleared his throat. Twice. “That shouldn’t have happened,” he growled.
She looked down at the sand, anywhere rather than at his face. “No,” she panted, “not… not a good idea.”
“Let’s forget it ever—”
“I usually don’t—”
This was only making things worse. A flush of humiliation warmed her cheeks. How could she possibly explain what had happened?
Matt wasn’t exactly rushing into the conversation either. He appeared as anxious to avoid her eyes as she was his. They both stared intently at the two flotation jackets bobbing around in the shallow waves, eager to look anywhere but at each other.
Matt lunged to grab one at the same time she did. Her hand grazed his and she snatched it away. Flushing deeper, she waded toward the other one, rescued his fanny pack and handed it to him at arm’s length.
She was still too shaken at the force of the passion that had overcome her to think straight. She prided herself on keeping her cool around men. She didn’t even kiss on a first date.
So what had happened to that self-control she’d spent so long nurturing? To come onto Matt—a guy she scarcely knew—like some kind of sex-crazed mermaid.
Her personal mantra sounded over and over in her head: you can’t trust lust. And wow was this lust with a capital L. Super Lust. Mega Lust. Giant-Size Special-Offer Lust.
But… was it really?
Could it have been fear? Shock? Delayed reaction?
Cristy tried to rationalize that mindless surge of longing that had overcome her. But as she remembered lying in the waves with Matt’s strong body covering hers, her nipples tightened and heat flooded her belly.
It was lust all right. And it frightened her. Really frightened her. Because it wasn’t the lust she couldn’t trust—it was herself.
Matt found it difficult to stay steady on his feet. He was reeling from the unexpected force of the passion Cristy’s kiss had unleashed, aching from its lack of fulfillment.
He wasn’t a wham-bang-thank-you-ma’am kind of guy. Sure, he’d tomcatted around in his younger days, but for the adult Matt sex was something to be shared with a special, steady partner. Yet he’d been ready to take this gorgeous stranger on the beach, oblivious to any possible consequences.
He’d been stunned when she’d pressed that lovely, ripe mouth to his. Stunned, surprised and powerless to do anything but respond. He’d wanted to kiss her from the moment she’d fallen against him in the elevator. But who would have thought Miss Perfect would be so passionate? So warm and pliant and wanton?
Never, ever, had a kiss ignited such strong feeling in him. That damn white charger had a lot to answer for.
Because what was more disturbing than the out-of-control passion, was the overwhelming surge of protectiveness he’d felt for Cristy as he’d held her in his arms. He didn’t want to feel that dangerous, potent blend of tenderness and passion. Not for a stranger. Certainly not for another man’s bride.
And yet… he was feeling it. He’d gone from terror as he’d struggled to keep her head above water; to urgent fear as he’d breathed life into her pale face; to overwhelming relief when she’d awoken, bewilderment clouding those beautiful blue eyes.
He forced in a few deep breaths as he tried to rationalize his feelings. Then picked up his panic bag and strapped it around his waist with hands that were not quite steady. His passion had been a natural reaction to fear. So, most probably, had hers when she realized she could have drowned.
Yeah, that’s what this feeling was. He’d encountered it before in his surf lifeguard days. Some kind of basic instinct. Survival and sex, they went together. Simple explanation. They were safe now so it would go away. In fact right this moment she was probably regretting her impulsive passion.
So why couldn’t he stop himself hungering for those creamy breasts that rose and fell in time to her quickened breathing as they threatened to fall from the top of her dress—or what was left of her dress? Why did he keep reliving how they’d felt pressed against his chest, the hardness of her nipples, the urgent pressing of her body to his?
The silky, sodden skirts clung to her thighs, outlining their slender shape. How he wanted to run his hands up her thighs and—
He dragged his eyes away. He’d be praying for another cold sea shower at this rate.
A second wave surged around his legs and he felt its force tugging on him, pulling him—and Cristy—back into the sea. He turned to face the shore. He’d had enough lifesaving heroics for the day.
“Come on,” he said to Cristy, his voice husky. He went to take her hand in his and then decided against it.
Touching Cristy was not a good idea. He’d play it nonchalant. Act as if the sex-games-in-the-surf scenario had never happened.
“Let’s move further up the beach, the tide’s coming in.” Relief flooded her face at his matter-of-fact tone of voice.
She stumbled after him onto dry sand. “What’s happened to the boat?” she asked.
The boat! How could he have forgotten his boat? Matt spun round on his heel in the sand and looked back out to sea.
His precious Wayfarer stood lodged on the reef, precarious prey to the waves that thrashed around her. There wasn’t a chance the boat wouldn’t be broken up when the forecast storm hit.
He felt sick at the thought but told himself she was only a boat. It was insured. Replaceable. All that counted was that he and Cristy were safe. He just hoped that the emergency beacon was operating so the coast guard would know where they were.
Cristy sneezed loudly. She was soaked through. So was he.
He had to get them to shelter.
Cristy was too overwhelmed to take in the reality of the situation. This morning preening herself for her wedding, this afternoon stranded on a tropical island with a virile stranger.
You can’t trust lust, she reminded herself as she watched Matt look out to his disabled boat. His wet, black T-shirt molded to his magnificently muscled body and his knit boxer shorts let neither the shape of his gorgeous buttocks nor the evidence of his recent arousal to the imagination.
He looked like he’d lost his best friend. A reassuring thought struck her: would he look so heartbroken if that was a stolen boat slowly breaking up on the reef? That look of possessive pride was a look men reserved exclusively for their boy-toys—car, boat, motorcycle. He was no boat thief.
She tore her eyes away from his impressive butt as she sneezed again. Surely she wasn’t going to catch cold?
She felt more than a little annoyed that her simple boat ride to an airport had ended up like this. And then she laughed. Out loud and a little hysterically. Hadn’t she leaped at the chance to come to Australia with her job because she’d thought her life was getting boring and predictable?
Matt turned to her and the look of concern on his face made her heart do a disconcerting flip. “Are you okay?” he asked.
“Fine,” she said. “I’m so sorry about your boat.”
She still found it difficult to meet his gaze so looked around her, eyes widening as she took in her surroundings. “But you sure chose a nice place to shipwre
ck us.”
Even in the gray light of the impending storm the island was spectacular, more unspoiled than Starlight, the resort island she had fled from. Here, palms leaned toward them, a riot of tropical growth encroached on the white, gritty sand that scratched the soles of her feet, and a mountain covered in lush greenery rose behind. In fact, she’d like to see a bit more of the place. But not right now.
Every muscle in her body ached and her torn, wet dress, sticky with salt water, clung uncomfortably to her thighs. What she wanted, above all else, was to check into a luxurious hotel room.
There she’d have a long, hot shower and wash all the salt and tangles from her hair. A meal would be good, too. She’d been too nervous this morning to have breakfast and her tummy was threatening to rumble. Room service was in order.
She licked her parched lips, the taste of salt still in her mouth. No, even before the shower, the first thing she’d do when she checked in would be to have a drink from the mini-bar. A long, cool drink. After she’d showered and eaten, she’d check out the hotel boutique. Even a sarong would be better than this ragged remnant of her bridal finery.
Only then would she worry about resuming her trip to the airport on Hibiscus Island.
“Which way is the hotel?” she asked Matt, hoping it wouldn’t be too long a hike.
His dark eyebrows rose. “Hotel?” he said. “This is an uninhabited island, Cristy. There’s no hotel.”
“You’re kidding me?”
Matt shook his head.
Cristy couldn’t keep the panic from her voice. “No hotel? But aren’t all the islands up here resorts?”
Matt shook his head and Cristy was suddenly aware that she was a foreigner, ignorant of the intricacies of Australian geography.
“Many of them are uninhabited. Like this one. This island is slated for development but—”
“So there are people living here?” Cristy’s voice rose in hope.
“When I said uninhabited I meant uninhabited.”
“You mean… we really are shipwrecked?”
Matt nodded. “Until a rescue party comes after us. And I’m sure that won’t be long,” he added reassuringly.
“Uh, how long?”
Matt shrugged, seeming not at all concerned. “A day or two maybe, when someone notices we’re missing. The beacon I stuck on the boat will lead them to us.”
A day or two stranded on an island alone with this handsome hunk who sent her hormones rocketing into orbit?
Cristy swallowed hard against an impulse to panic. Even harder against an impulse to give into the unholy excitement that surged through her at the thought of being alone with Matt.
Just him and her. And hardly any clothes.
“You mean we have to shelter in a cave or something?”
Matt laughed, but the sound did nothing to reassure her. “Not quite.”
“What do you mean, ‘not quite’?”
“Not far from here, there’s a surveyor’s hut. A survival shack. Basic accommodation for the guys who come here to survey the island and prepare reports for the resort developer who owns it. Fishermen sometimes use it, too.”
Cristy’s heart plunged to knee level. So much for her fantasies of a luxury hotel room. “A survival shack?”
Thank heaven she hadn’t confided in him her dreams of a shower and room service.
“I haven’t been here for a while but from memory it’s comfortable enough. Though I’m not sure how long since it’s been used.”
Cristy’s feet seemed rooted in the sand. No hotel, just some old shack? She sneezed again. She didn’t even have a tissue. Hang on, wasn’t there an antique lace handkerchief tucked in her frilly blue garter? Miriam—traitorous Miriam—had given both handkerchief and garter to her; the “something old” and “something blue” bits of her wedding regalia.
Cristy hauled the remnants of her skirt up to the top of her thigh, paused at Matt’s quick indrawn breath. She looked up but he abruptly turned away. She felt around her garter. Yes, here it was. A ridiculously small scrap of fine linen and lace. But of course it was soaking wet. She wrung it out. Maybe there’d be somewhere to dry it in the shack.
“Do you know where this survival shack is?” she asked. Although it was still only early afternoon, and the day was hot, the sky had darkened and the air felt heavy. She thought she heard the distant rumble of thunder.
Matt’s eyes narrowed as he looked around them. The sand led into rainforest-type growth, behind that the green-clad mountain reared above them. “Not far. Through the trees there.”
Peering through the undergrowth, Cristy could see the faint remnants of a track.
“C’mon,” Matt said, taking off toward it.
She hesitated, concerned about her tender, bare feet.
“Too tough for you?”
“No. You’re talking to a hippie chick here, remember. I camped wild with my parents all the time. Although it… uh, was quite some time ago.”
She’d wimped out enough for today. Fainting at the sight of a dolphin, for heaven’s sake, how would she ever live that one down?
Gamely, she struck out behind him. She winced as a sharp piece of coral jabbed into her foot. “Ouch!”
Matt laughed. He laughed!
“It’s okay,” she said hastily, pretending it didn’t hurt, taking another tentative step.
“It’s not okay with those city-tender feet,” Matt said. “You don’t want to get coral cuts. They’re easily infected. Let me—”
Uh uh. She wasn’t going to let him fool around with her feet again, not when she remembered how his touch on the boat had thrilled her. “I’m fine—”
“No you’re not,” said Matt, and she found herself swung into his arms.
Cristy struggled. She pounded her fists on his shoulders. She told him she didn’t like his cave man tactics.
Not for a moment did she think of the dangers of being stranded on a tropical island. The danger was right here as she fought the bliss of being held close by her fellow castaway as he carried her into the rainforest.
CHAPTER FIVE
Matt kicked open the door of the hut, conscious every second of the soft, delicious warmth of Cristy in his arms.
Why in hell had he thought it was a good idea to pick her up and carry her? Once she’d quit pummeling him, she’d snuggled in close. Her breasts pressed against his chest, her arms twined around his neck. That scent of roses from her was even headier now, sharpened with the tang of salt. He was intoxicated by her scent, aroused by her closeness.
Hell. He hadn’t stopped being aroused by her closeness since the surprising moment she’d climbed on top of him in the surf.
He carried her across the threshold of the hut. There was a canvas bed ahead of him and all he wanted to do was throw Cristy down on it, strip her of her remaining finery and gaze at her body before getting naked himself and—
But she squirmed out of his arms. “Why didn’t you tell me this place was so cute?” she asked, looking around her in delight at the one room, cabin-like structure.
He looked around him at the shabby, spartan furnishings, the primitive facilities. “Cute?”
“It’s like Snow White’s cottage in the woods—but without the gingerbread carvings.”
“Say again?” He couldn’t share her enthusiasm. It was just an old hut, something worthy only of demolition.
She tutted impatiently. “Didn’t you notice? The way all those big palm trees look like they’re protecting it? That gorgeous pink bougainvillea that climbs over the verandah. The corrugated iron roof. It’s so… so rustic.”
“It’s rustic all right,” said Matt dryly. “There’s not even a bathroom.”
“No bath—?” Cristy’s face clouded momentarily.
She looked around her. “I guess it’s not quite as cute inside as it is outside,” she conceded. “But it’s not nearly as bad as I thought it would be.”
Matt hadn’t been here for a while. “It’s not in bad shape,”
he admitted. “The tropics can be tough on uninhabited buildings; mould, insects, you know that kind of thing.”
“Insects?”
“Cockroaches, spiders, other creepy crawlies.”
“Spiders?”
Cristy blanched and Matt immediately felt shot by remorse at teasing her. She might have a spider phobia as well as a fear of sharks for all he knew.
Then the color rushed into her face and she tilted her chin defiantly. “You don’t scare me, Matt Slade. I won’t pretend I like spiders but I can assure you that I won’t faint at the sight of one.”
He laughed, enjoying her feistiness and glad she accepted the crude nature of their shelter in such good spirits. If Julia or one of her crowd had found herself in a situation like this they would be hysterical by now. Miss Perfect was continuing to surprise him—and he liked it.
“Now come on, stop teasing me about bugs,” she said. “I’m thirsty. Any chance of a drink in this place?”
Matt walked over to a wooden bench under the window where an old enamel bowl served as a sink. He turned on the ancient faucet. Nothing.
“I’ll check the tank connection,” he said.
“Tank connection? Pardon my ignorance, but what do you mean by that?”
“There’s a big tank outside that collects rain water. The connection to the hut has either been turned off, or it’s blocked by a dead frog.”
Again Matt observed the way Cristy’s struggles with her emotions showed on her face. This time, disbelief vied with wariness.
“Frogs. You’re kidding me, right?”
Barely able to suppress a laugh, Matt shook his head. “No. Frogs are attracted to the water in tanks and sometimes they’re unable to get out.”
Cristy obviously still wasn’t sure whether to take him seriously or not. She stood with her hands on her hips, unaware of how her stance made her breasts thrust outward.
Matt couldn’t help notice—again—how firm and round they were and remember how responsive they’d been to his touch. She was barely covered by her torn-off dress. He forced himself to look away as she spoke.
“You don’t scare me with that one, either. I’m not afraid of frogs. In fact I think they’re kinda sweet.”
The Castaway Bride Page 6