Birdsong at dawn had woken them both at the same time. Without a word, he had drawn her into his arms and they’d made love again, slowly and languorously. She’d been more than half-asleep, drifting deliciously on a sea of sensual sensation.
Was there a difference between having sex and making love? If so, she thought she might have discovered it last night. No, she corrected herself, Matt had helped her discover it.
No wonder he was sleeping so soundly. The term “sexual athlete” had been coined for him.
Fascinated, she watched the steady rise and fall of his powerful, muscled chest. Awake he seemed invincible. In sleep, he looked younger, less tough, even a little vulnerable. She ached to know him better, discover the man behind the emotional armor he wore.
He’d enjoyed the sex as much as she had. She’d swear to that. But did he feel in any way as happy and fulfilled as she did? As swept by the feeling that they had shared something very, very special?
And if he did, would she ever know about it?
His words reverberated through her head: I’m not the settling-down type.
She might be starting to think about love but that didn’t mean he was.
He shifted a little and she held herself very still until she was sure he was asleep. Then she gave herself over again to the luxury of admiring him.
What did she like most about his face? It was impossible to single out a feature. Together they combined to form a face she found beyond handsome. And already—she caught her breath in realization—dangerously dear.
She longed to trace the contours of his forehead, his cheekbones, his dark eyebrows, down his nose and to his mouth. His top lip was a little uneven, giving it a devastating sensuality.
She trembled at the memory of how his mouth felt on her body. Right now she’d like to trail her finger along his lips, inviting him to nip it with his teeth and draw it into his mouth, to suck it and play with it with his tongue.
But she didn’t want to risk waking him up. It was too delicious to simply watch him in this utterly private moment when there was no one else in this world but her and him.
A shaft of early morning sun filtered through the cobweb-cornered window and fell across his body, putting reddish glints in his dark hair. What would it be like to wake every morning to his face so close to hers? To sleep every night with his body and hers entwined?
It was an appealing thought and she found herself longing for it to be true. Impossible when he’d made it so clear he wasn’t looking for commitment. She willed herself to remember his features, to save up every detail against the time they would leave this island and go their separate ways.
They’d known each other for less than two days; she found it amazing that his face could be already imprinted on her dreams. And his scent. She breathed in the familiar sandalwood, blended now with the musk of their lovemaking.
Then jumped, aghast, as he slowly murmured, “I’m awake, you know.”
His eyes were still shut, his dark lashes a fan against his cheek. How long had he known she was scrutinizing him?
He opened his eyes. “A dreadful thundering sound woke me up,” he said, very seriously.
She looked anxiously up toward the window. “Another storm?”
“No.” Taking her by surprise, he sat up, pushed her back down on the floor and laid his head against her stomach. He kissed her navel, the growth of his beard scratchy on her skin. “It was coming from here.”
“Oh!”
Unused to such intimacy she didn’t know whether to be embarrassed or to take offence. Mortified, she held herself rigid. “I’m so sorry.”
Matt kissed her tummy again, sat up and laughed. “No need to be. You’re obviously as hungry as I am.”
She sat up too but she couldn’t look him in the eye.
He tilted her chin up so she had to meet his gaze. His eyes were warm with laughter. “Hey, I’m only teasing you.”
“Again.” Her voice came out a little shaky.
“You’re not used to being teased, are you?”
“Not true. I grew up with two brothers, remember.”
“I mean by a man. A lover.”
She shook her head and was glad that the hair fell across her face. “I… I guess not.”
The kind of men she’d dated weren’t the kind of men who’d make jokes about rumbling tummies. And she wouldn’t let them get close enough to dare.
He pushed the hair away from her face. “I tell you what. You can tease me if I snore. Deal?”
She blinked and stared at him.
“You snore?”
“Yeah. I snore. If I’ve got a cold or I’ve been drinking red wine.”
Was he for real? She wasn’t sure how to take such a personal admission. His grin made him look like a little boy trying very hard to make amends for being naughty.
She couldn’t help but smile in response. “Deal. But I guess there won’t be any problem here as there’s no red wine. Not even any grapes to squish.”
She didn’t want to think ahead to other times, other places, where red wine would be available but she might not be there to hear Matt snore.
“I wish you hadn’t made me think about red wine. I can’t face any more coconut milk,” he said.
“Me neither. Or chocolate. What wouldn’t I give for scrambled eggs and toast, dripping with butter.”
“Bacon and eggs for me with fried tomatoes on the side.”
“And coffee.”
“Don’t torture me.”
She sighed. “I guess we’ll have to make do with frog-free water.”
“And mangoes.”
She remembered what their mango breakfast had led to the day before and shivered with remembered pleasure.
Matt dropped a kiss on her bare shoulder. “Maybe we’ll do better for lunch.”
She started. “What do you mean? D’you think we’ll be rescued today?”
He shrugged. “Could be. I wouldn’t count on it. The emergency beacon should work with the boat submerged, but it could have been damaged when Wayfarer smashed against the rocks.”
Cristy wasn’t counting on rescue at all. Despite her hunger, lack of clothes and proximity to prehistoric reptiles, she felt the longer she could stay here on the island with him the better.
Matt got up. “We’ll have to light a big fire as a beacon to help the emergency services find us. It’s clearer around the other side of the island. We’ll search out some dry wood and set up a fire there.”
Cristy nodded, masking her disappointment that he so obviously didn’t share her hope of prolonging their time together on the island. She nearly asked did they have to build that fire but thought better of it. She didn’t want to look as though she were throwing herself at him. That would be way too humiliating.
She swallowed as she felt her stomach threatening to rumble again. “So what did you mean about lunch?”
“We’ll catch something for lunch.”
“Catch? You mean, like hunt?”
He nodded.
“And… and kill?”
“That’s the idea.”
“What… uh… what did you have in mind?”
“There are lizards. Or snakes.”
She shuddered. “No thanks.”
“Or a wild bird.”
“Not one of Seth’s parrots! You couldn’t.”
“I thought you might say that.” Matt laughed and she knew he was teasing her again. “I thought more along the lines of a fish.”
She nodded. “Yes. Fish would be good. I’d be happy with fish.”
Matt watched Cristy as she washed mango juice from her face with water from the ancient faucet over the enamel basin. Then she started to comb out the tangles in her hair with her fingers so her hair fell in a glorious tumble around her shoulders.
That newly-thawed part of his heart hurt at the beauty of her. Was she getting the message of how he felt about her? Was letting his body do the talking working out?
He’d never be
fore experienced lovemaking like they’d shared. Surely she must be aware of how rare that level of sexual connection was between a man and a woman the first time.
“Let me do that,” he said, closing the distance between them.
He stood behind her and picked up the soft mass of her hair. Her fragrance filled his nostrils—roses and the heady scent of a sexually active woman.
Slowly he wove his fingers through her hair, across her scalp and then through its length before sliding his hands down her bare shoulders. He did it again, and then again more slowly. He felt her tremble at his touch. Was she ready for more body talk?
She twisted around to face him. Her eyes were wide and incredibly blue in the morning light that filtered through into the hut. Her mouth was swollen from last night’s countless kisses. “I… I should find a piece of string or something and tie it back.”
“Don’t,” he said, brushing her mouth with his. “I like your hair just the way it is.”
Cristy took in a deep breath and her breasts rose above the top of the sheet she’d tied around her. At any moment her nipples would be in view. His body was ready for more talk.
“I’ll leave it loose, then,” she murmured.
“Good,” he said. He ran his hand over the dark growth on his chin. “I just wish I could shave.”
“I like it. It’s sexy.” She reached out and stroked along his jaw. “I’ll keep my hair loose if you keep the beard.”
He captured her hand and kissed it. “So I don’t need to go out and search for a sharp shell to use as a razor?”
“Please don’t. Designer stubble suits you.”
“It doesn’t hurt you?”
“Hurt me?”
“I mean beard rash.”
“No. I like the roughness of your beard against my skin. It… it feels good.”
Her cheeks flushed pink. Matt found it charming the way she blushed so readily. Though she was as passionate and responsive as he could hope for, there was something about the way she hesitated sometimes that made him doubt she’d had a lot of experience. He was surprised at how much he liked the thought that he was awakening her to a new world of sexual pleasure.
He nuzzled against the delectable smoothness of her neck. “You mean like this?”
She gasped. “Yes.”
He kissed his way towards her breast. “Like this?”
“Mmm.”
Intending to tickle her nipples with his tongue, he tugged at where she’d tucked in the sheet across her breasts; it fell open and fell toward the dusty floor. She grabbed at it and snatched it to her. “Careful! I’m going to wear that today.”
The moment was lost. The body dialogue ceased in concern over what she was to wear. He sucked in a deep breath. Typical female. But that was okay. Sex was important, very important, but he didn’t want her to think his only interest in her was physical.
Matt looked across to where her wedding dress—or what remained of it—hung on a hook behind the door. “You’re not wearing that?”
“It’s not really very comfortable if we’re going hunting.”
Matt looked down at the sheet. “I can’t imagine this is, either. So why wear anything at all?”
Her eyes widened. “You mean—?”
“I mean go naked.”
“Naked?” Her voice rose to a little squeak.
“Nude, bare, in the buff.”
“Air clad?”
“All that.”
“I… I’m not so sure.”
Matt laughed at her timidity. “You ain’t got nuthin’ I haven’t already seen.”
She blushed even pinker. “That… that’s true.”
“And there’s absolutely no one else around.”
He stepped out of the black undershorts he’d donned for their mango breakfast. “I’m game if you are,” he said. “I often go naked on the boat. There’s nothing like the feeling.”
“I’ve never… I’ve never even sunbathed topless.”
Good. He didn’t want the eyes of the world—of other men—on her luscious body. That sight was for him and him alone.
But would she ever be truly naked while her finger still bore that damn diamond ring?
The sight of Matt wearing nothing but flip-flops and the panic bag slung around his middle should have made Cristy laugh. But it didn’t. The black belt just emphasized the leanness of his hips, the perfection of his butt, the sheer virility of him.
As she walked beside him along the beach she couldn’t stop herself from taking sideways glances to admire him. His body was perfect enough for him to star in an underpants advertisement above Times Square.
But no photograph could do him justice. Because his appeal wasn’t just to do with his chiseled face or the size of his muscles. He was Matt and unique—unlike any man she’d ever met before.
She felt overwhelmed by the knowledge that this magnificent male was her lover, no matter how temporarily. Her mother was very into fate and karma. What lucky fate had led her into being shipwrecked with Matt?
But there was one problem. Did Matt being naked mean she’d spend the entire day in a state of arousal? Although she was developing deeper feelings for him she still felt overwhelmed with lust with a capital L every time she looked at him.
Lost in admiring the play of his muscles under that eagle tattoo, and noting that, even though he said he skippered his boat in the nude, his butt wasn’t as tanned as the rest of him, she bumped into him when he stopped. He steadied her with a hand on her shoulder. “Well, what do you think?”
She looked around her. Another perfect day in paradise with the sea gleaming turquoise, the coral sand an almost blinding white. “What can I say? It’s too beautiful for words.”
“I meant, going naked.”
He was so at ease in his own skin. So confident. While she still had to resist the urge to cover her important bits with her hands when he looked at her. “I… well… the jury is still out. As I told you, I’m not used to strutting my stuff with no clothes on.”
His voice was rich with suggestion. “But you like it?”
Did she like walking around naked in broad daylight with a gorgeous man, also in the nude? Her job, her relationship with Howard, her life away from the commune had been ruled by convention. A convention she’d wanted—or thought she’d wanted until now.
She thought out loud. “I can see the appeal. I like the feel of the breeze on my skin, the freedom of walking without skirts or pants to hinder me. Yes, I like it.” She certainly liked being without that butt-floss thong.
Matt’s eyes narrowed in appreciation both, she thought, of her and of his surroundings. “Well here’s certainly the place to enjoy that freedom.”
“I sure as heck couldn’t do it working twenty-four/seven in a corporate office.”
“I can see you setting out for that office wearing only high-heeled shoes and a briefcase. With no one else to admire you but me.”
“Shame that couldn’t happen in the real world,” she teased.
“Huh, the real world,” said Matt disparagingly. He waved an arm around him to the wild beauty of the island. “This is the real world. The way it was meant to be. Untouched.”
“So we’re like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden?”
Matt’s eyes darkened. “You could say that. Only we’ve already given in to temptation.”
And Adam and Eve were in love, Cristy thought, but couldn’t say out loud.
He pulled her to him. “There’s just one problem with this going naked thing. Every time I look at you I want to make love to you.”
“And that’s a problem?” she asked, provocatively sliding her arms around him. “If so, I’m afraid I’ve got the same one.”
“So what do you suggest we do about it?” He nuzzled into her neck and she gasped, her nipples tingling with awareness.
“Well… we could go back and get our clothes…”
“Not a good idea.”
“Or we could give into temptation a
gain.”
He kissed her then pulled back. “But then we won’t get anything else done. No fish. No fire.”
“Well, fire of a different kind.”
He growled. “You are a sexy woman.”
She liked it when he told her she was sexy. “Just call me Eve,” she murmured, pressing herself against him and feeling the proof of his arousal. But as she did her tummy rumbled loudly. “Oh no! Not again,” she cried, overcome with embarrassment.
Matt threw back his head and laughed. “Are you trying to tell me something?”
Cristy should have felt annoyed but she didn’t; after a minute she could see the humor too. “Out of my control, I’m afraid. Maybe that’s why Eve couldn’t resist the apple. She was starved.”
Still laughing, Matt took her hand. “Come on, let’s go fishing. I’m not very good at resisting temptation where you’re concerned.”
Matt knew Cristy was sexy, he knew she was smart and—in her own way—courageous. What he hadn’t expected was that she would be such good fun.
He had taken her to the estuary where the mouth of the fresh-water river joined the sea. She made collecting driftwood for the bonfire into a game. She dared him to find the best pieces, gave silly awards for finding the piece that most resembled a vegetable or an animal or a human body part. Then she raced him to the edge of the water to cool off.
And as she played she lost her self-consciousness about being naked. She was as delightful as she was beautiful. As he fell more and more under her spell, he found himself wondering if there could be a future for them.
He carried a handful of kindling-size twigs over to where they’d built the fire.
“That’s the finishing touch,” he said, as he stood back to admire the carefully constructed pyre. He went over to where he’d placed the panic bag and took out a box of matches, unwrapping them from their waterproof casing.
“I’ll give you the honor of lighting it,” he said to Cristy.
The laughter died from her eyes and she didn’t take the matchbox from him. She looked down at the sand. “I… I almost don’t want to light it. Don’t… don’t want to be rescued.”
Matt swallowed. Hard. This was his chance to say something. To tell her that he, too, didn’t want to leave the island. Leave her. But that he would be irresponsible if he didn’t make some attempt to contact the emergency services.
The Castaway Bride Page 13