All too soon, they were at the final obstacle, their game almost over, and Archie hadn’t been quite as appalling as he’d remembered.
Still, Kasper knew it was a mistake the moment he moved behind her, her back against his chest, his arms skating down the length of hers, her delicate hands under his, all under the pretext of holding the golf club with her and allowing her to help him make his winning shot.
Until that moment it had been a good game. Simple, uncomplicated fun, a round of crazy golf on a balmy afternoon. They had exchanged banter and laughed and she had teased him, coughing and doing funny dances to try to put him off his shots, like a grown-up version of the Little Ant he had known. Her ploy hadn’t worked, his shots had been true each time. But occasionally he’d pretended her antics had put him off, making some melodramatic mishit that had only made her laugh all the more.
A genuine, throw-her-head-back laugh, which was surpassed only by the vivid sparkle in her glorious eyes. The more she did so, the more he yearned to make her do it more. The intense pleasure it gave him to be the person making her so outwardly happy had taken him back, made him forget who or where he was. It seduced him into focussing on Archie and himself together, simply playing crazy golf. Like when they’d been young, carefree, their whole lives ahead of them.
She’d played well but he’d played better. Of course he had. Because everything in life was a competition for him. And yet, right at that moment, he’d wanted them both to take that winning shot. He’d invited her to join him and she, without even thinking about it, had skipped almost girlishly to comply.
The moment his body had touched hers everything changed. The innocence of the moment was gone, replaced instead by something far more charged. Far more sensual. Only then did Kaspar admit it had been there all afternoon. Simmering quietly. Just waiting to catch them unawares.
He should move back. But he couldn’t. He could barely even breathe. His head was over her shoulder, his cheek brushing her ear as they both stared at the ball. Archie’s own breathing was shallow, fast, although he knew she was trying to fight it, desperately struggling to control it. He could take the shot, pretend he didn’t feel what she felt. But he was powerless to move. Rooted where he stood.
He turned his head, so very, very slightly it should have been imperceptible. But Archie noticed. She knew. Her head mirrored his, and now their mouths were an inch apart and the beast inside him was roaring with the compulsion to close the gap. His body wanting her with the same ferocity it had all those months ago.
He had to walk away.
Now.
CHAPTER TEN
KASPAR DROPPED HIS head but misjudged it. Or rather he judged it perfectly, his lips skimming the bare skin just above the neckline of her T-shirt. Archie shivered and he was lost.
Before he could think once, let alone twice, Kaspar tilted his head and then they were kissing as she pressed her back into him, their hands still holding the grip of the golf club and his feet still positioned on either side of hers.
He drank her in, her taste, her feel, her scent every bit as perfect as the recollection imprinted on his brain, and yet also a hundred times better. He remembered kissing every inch of her skin, tracing it with his fingertip, his mouth, his tongue, and as his body tightened against Archie’s perfect bottom, she pushed back against him, then gentlest of moans reaching his ears.
He almost lost it, there and then. A lifetime of being in complete control gone because no one else had ever got under his skin like this. No one but Archie. He would never know how he managed to pull his brain into focus, to remember where they were, or that he was meant to be easing Archie’s stress, not adding to it.
It took everything he had to wrench his mouth away. This was pure physical desire, nothing more. Nothing more. But if that was true then why was he still behind her, why were his arms still around hers, her hands still held under his?
If he didn’t stop now, he wasn’t sure he ever would. Somehow he found the strength to pull away.
The loss of contact was almost painful.
‘What was that for?’ Archie whispered, turning slowly to face him, her fingers hovering over her lips.
He wondered if her mouth burned for him as his did for her.
‘Call it my victory kiss.’ His attempt to sound casual fell far short of the mark. ‘Your forfeit.’
‘You didn’t win.’
Half teasing, half shaky, and entirely shocked. He knew exactly how she felt.
‘You’d better finish the game to prove it.’
‘I don’t give a damn about the game.’
He just gave a damn about her.
‘The game, Athari.’ She emitted a delicious growl.
All he really wanted was to haul her back into his arms and finish kissing her, thoroughly and completely. Even though it made absolutely no sense.
‘Right,’ he muttered eventually, stepping forward and taking the proffered club.
Stepping to the mark, he swung and hit. He barely even waited to see if it reached its mark. He knew it would.
‘Let’s go.’ He spun around and begun walking away, but he couldn’t help extending his arm behind him. Felt triumphant when she took his hand without a word.
He told himself it meant nothing, the way his chest constricted as her fingers entwined with his. He promised himself he’d let go as soon as they were back in the car.
But now they were back in the vehicle and he still hadn’t let go of her hand. He still couldn’t take his gaze off her sparkling eyes as he instructed his driver to finally take them home. He couldn’t shake the fact that the word home sounded somehow right, and natural, and easy, and perfect.
Archie stared right back at him, her gaze never leaving his for a moment, but he saw the hesitation on her face. Watched the way her tongue flicked out nervously to wet her lips.
‘Why are you looking at me like that?’
Uncertainty in her tone mingled with raw need. Kaspar gritted his teeth. It was a heady combination.
‘You realise that we kissed out there. Like a proper married couple.’
‘Imagine that,’ she tried to tease him, but her breathy tone belied her confidence.
Another Archie quality that he apparently found sexy as hell. Especially after the overly cocky women of his past. What had he ever seen in them? The answer was clear now. He hadn’t. They’d been the perfect choice for a man looking to keep himself emotionally unavailable because they’d never threatened to unravel his carefully crafted design. The construct that Archie had picked apart in a matter of months. Or, indeed, one heady weekend.
‘If people see us, recognise me with a woman looking as unambiguously pregnant as you look, your photo will be all over the papers. The internet. We might have kept things out of the media for now, but they will find out eventually and it will fire up their interest.’
‘So you’ll control it.’ She schooled her features. But it was too late, he’d seen that flash of contempt in her eyes. ‘You control anything you want to. You’re Kaspar Athari.’
Until a few months ago he might have believed her.
‘Not anything,’ he muttered. ‘I can’t control how I am when I’m with you.’
The words were out before he could swallow them back. Archie paused, as though momentarily unable to answer. Then her hand reached out, slowly, tentatively, giving him plenty of time to draw away. Had he wanted to. Her fingertips brushed his jaw. Gentle. Careful. But it fired him up nonetheless.
Before he could stop himself, he was lifting her through the air to settle her on his lap and her soft, startled cry even as she leaned instinctively into him, her arms slipping around his neck and her bottom nudging against the hottest, hardest part of him, only acted as an accelerant to the fire.
He closed the gap and allowed himself to taste her all over again, light and deep, languid
and demanding. Indulging in the feel, the scent, the breathy sounds of pleasure that were so essentially Archie when he plundered her mouth and pressed kisses into the creases at either corner. She quivered deliciously as he scorched a trail down her neck to the sensitive hollow where his lips, his tongue, his teeth all worked in harmony until she was breathing hard and wriggling on his lap. And he was aching, physically aching, for her.
His hands found their way to the hem of her T-shirt, hauling it over her head in one fluid movement, and as her hair tumbled back down and over her shoulders, he couldn’t help lifting one hand to wind it around his fist, pulling just the wrong side of gently to tilt her mouth back up to his and claim her all over again.
Archie pressed her chest to him. Hard nipples scraped urgently against him, even through his own thin shirt. She fumbled with the buttons, tugging them open and rubbing against him as though the skin-to-skin contact might somehow alleviate her longing. And Kaspar loved it. The way she acted out of pure desire. The feel and the taste, and what she wanted. The kind of women he’d been with before her had been too busy trying to show him how good they were and too hung up on the aesthetics of it.
He let his thumb graze one swollen peak with deliberate nonchalance, moving quickly away when she arched her back in order to repeat the action. She groaned softly.
‘Kaspar...’
‘What is it, Archie?’
He was amazed that he could managed to sound even a fraction as in control as he did.
‘You know what,’ she whispered, pushing her chest to his again.
‘Tell me,’ he rasped. ‘I want to hear it.’
She flushed slightly, but met his eyes boldly.
‘Touch me.’
It was like some exquisite torture, keeping his hands to himself. But he wanted to hear her say it. He thirsted to hear the longing in her tone, knowing that it was a need only he could sate for her.
For both of them.
‘Where?’ he demanded.
‘Anywhere,’ she whispered. ‘Everywhere.’
He couldn’t stand it any longer. Dropping his head back to the hollow, he kissed and teased.
‘Here?’
‘There,’ she agreed, tilting her head to one side to allow him better access. Taking his time, he made his way down her body, his fingertips hooking down the lace of her bra to free one perfect nipple.
‘Here?’
She gasped, and nodded, her head falling back slightly as he licked, sucked. And with every stroke of his tongue he stoked the fire and revelled in the way the flames roared within him. It was all he could do to stay where he was, lavishing attention on first one rosy peak and then the other. Then back again, as her breathing grew ever more shallow, catching in her throat.
And then he was sliding his hand up the bare skin of her thigh, the summery skirt puddling around her bottom as though only too happy to fall away for him. Archie moaned, a low, soft, long sound that seemed to wind its way through him and coil around his sex as potently as if it were her delicate hand. He reached the top of one thigh and then, his knuckles barely brushing her hot, molten core, he skimmed his way slowly down the other thigh.
‘You’re teasing me again,’ she moaned, burying her head in his shoulder.
Half a gasp, half a growl, but wholly frustration. Another shot fired through him.
‘I am,’ he managed, shocked at how difficult it suddenly seemed to speak.
Kaspar could stand it no longer. He ached for her. Physically ached. He wanted her. And she was his. He lifted his hand and slid it beneath the silky triangle of material.
Hot. Wet. So very ready for him.
He had never wanted anything more than he wanted her right now. It was time to claim her. Brand her as his. He would never want anyone the way he wanted Archie.
She froze at exactly the same moment he did.
What the hell was he thinking? She was pregnant. With his baby. And Catherine had said there could potentially be an issue. They couldn’t risk it. They couldn’t take that chance. Allowing himself to be driven by his desire, his emotion was exactly the kind of selfishness that his parents had exhibited time and again. He would not repeat their mistakes.
He would not let the fact that he shared their DNA make him like them.
‘This can’t happen,’ he growled, lifting her bodily of his lap and placing her as far across the back seat as he possibly could. Never more grateful for the privacy glass which concealed them from both the driver and the outside world.
She made a sound. It might have been a mutter of agreement but he didn’t care. He busied himself locating her clothes. Fastening his shirt.
‘That should never have started.’ He was aware that he was directing the fury he felt at himself towards Archie, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself. ‘You have the baby to consider.’
What the hell was wrong with him?
‘Dr Jarvis said occasional light sex is acceptable,’ she parroted. ‘It’s not as if we’re going at it every day.’
A flush raced up her cheek as though she could scarcely believe her own audacity. It was more of a turn-on than he was prepared to admit.
‘This can never happen again.’ Determined, Kaspar cut her off. ‘This will never happen again.’
But she was becoming emboldened.
‘Really? Because it seems that the more time we spend together, the more it’s inevitable.’
For a moment she actually sounded like it wasn’t such a bad thing. And he wanted too much to believe her. If he stayed, he was sure that he’d wind up letting her talk him into things when he ought to know better.
‘Then it seems clear to me that the only solution is to spend less time together.’
‘You’re going to stay at the hospital,’ she guessed, cutting in.
‘One of us has to take responsibility for this...thing between us.’
To his shock, she swung around, her eyes flashing with a fury he hadn’t seen in her since she’d been a little kid shut out of the more daring exploits he and Robbie had egged each other onto.
‘That’s not taking responsibility, Kaspar. That’s running away. It’s not something I thought I’d ever see you do.’
* * *
It was only when the car pulled into the drive of Kaspar’s oceanside home that Archie felt she could finally breathe again, let alone speak. Ever since her uncontrolled outburst the atmosphere in the car had pulsed with barely suppressed fury, but Kaspar hadn’t uttered a word to her.
If he had, she feared she might have melted from their molten ire. The urge to run inside and bolt the door was almost overwhelming, but if she did that then Kaspar would leave. She didn’t want him to.
So instead she folded her arms across her chest and summoned one last ounce of strength.
‘Don’t go, Kaspar. Not tonight.’
For a moment she thought he was going to ignore her, but then he turned his head, his eyes pinning her to the seat.
‘I have to.’
‘Please.’ She couldn’t say what passed between them, or what it meant, but she knew instinctively that he was going to stay. ‘Take me for a walk along the beach?’
* * *
Carefully, with his arm under her elbow, she made her way down the hillside to the beach, slipping her sandals off and spreading her toes in the soft sand. She tilted her face towards the warm setting sun and realised that in spite of everything she wasn’t unhappy, or lonely, or wishing she’d never got on that damned plane to America.
To Kaspar.
Because if she hadn’t got on that plane then she wouldn’t be here now, walking along the beach and realising that even if he never loved her the way she wanted him to, he would always love their child. Always fight for him or her.
‘Why are you so determined to fight your feelings for me, Kaspar? Whatever they
amount to. This isn’t just about the risk to the baby, is it? You’re scared to let go with me. Why?’
‘It’s for your benefit,’ he bit out.
‘What is it you think I need protecting from? You? In case you’ve forgotten, I know the other side of you. That kid who I think is more of the real you than you’ve ever allowed anyone else to see. A good, kind kid.’
‘Then your memory isn’t what you think it is,’ he mocked derisively.
‘It’s exactly what I think it is. Why haven’t you met someone before now, Kaspar? Had a family? You really will make a strong, good, supportive father.’
It took a little while for him to answer and, for several long moments, she wondered if he was ever going to answer her.
‘My mother is, in polite terms, an oxygen thief,’ he stated. ‘She always has been. My father was no better. So what does that make me? Their son. Their blood. The lethal mix of the worst of the both of them.’
‘I’ve said it before—you aren’t like them, Kaspar.’
‘You don’t know what I really am like.’
‘Maybe, but I don’t think you do either.’
It was a silent challenge and he could either ignore her or talk to her. She knew what she wanted him to do, but she tried not to let herself get too carried away.
‘I...don’t do emotion, Archie,’ he managed, at length. ‘I don’t connect with people. I’m not built that way. I know how destructive so-called relationships might be. How intense and violent and toxic. You say I’m not like them, but I’m still a product of them. I share their DNA and even if it wasn’t about nature, I was certainly around them long enough for it to be nurture.’
‘Is that why you’ve made a point, all these years, of never allowing yourself to get caught up with any one woman?’
‘It’s easier that way.’
‘It’s lonely,’ she refuted. ‘And it doesn’t suit you. You’re a decent guy, underneath all the playboy rubbish.’
The Surgeon's One-Night Baby Page 13