Seduction by the Book (11 page)

But now that he was uncovered, the temptation to run her palm down the flat of his belly, following the lines of hair to points beyond the waistband of his undershorts proved overwhelming. She felt a little wicked touching him as he slept, but she was fascinated and delighted.

His muscles jumped under her hand. And when she eased her fingers below his waistband, she noticed his shaft stirring, lifting, coming to life and growing solid.

Her fingers began to itch, craving the feel of him. Another inch and…

Nick's hand snaked out and grabbed her wrist, pulling her hand away from its destination. “Don't,” he growled. “Teasing is unbecoming in a married woman. Don't push me too far.”

“I wasn't…I…I've changed my mind, Nick. I think we should…now. I mean, we're married and…”

“Annie,” he whispered. “I thought a lot about what you said last night, and you were right. We need more time. I want us to be friends first. I want us to know everything about each other before we lose ourselves to the sexual side of each other again. It's the right way to begin a life together.”

“But…”

“Was I crowding you in this bed?” he interrupted. “When we get back to the island, I'll set myself up in the guest room next to the master bedroom if you need the bed to yourself. Until…we're ready.”

“No. That's okay,” she murmured quickly. The disappointment raged in her body, while her head told her that this was all for the best. “You weren't crowding me. I think I can manage to be adult enough to stay on my own side of an oversized king bed.”

He brightened and sat up. “Are you hungry?”

She lowered her chin, not able to look into his brilliant blue eyes, afraid that he would see her disappointment and need. “I guess so.”

His fingers touched her cheek, slid under her chin
and lifted it. “Annie, you must know I want you. That hasn't changed. Let's just give each other a break. We'll know when the time is right. We have our whole lives.”

“Okay, Nick. If you think so.”

She'd agreed because his argument sounded a lot more rational than she was feeling at the moment. But deep down a tiny bud of anger blossomed in her gut. Once more he had controlled what they did and had made the decision without her. Which hurt, even if she
had
been the first one to make the stupid suggestion.

“Come on,” he chided her. “Let's eat and then I'll call the pilot and we'll go home. A honeymoon bungalow is no place for two people who are just trying to get to know each other. We'll be better off returning to work and getting on with out lives.”

The thought of going back to see the dolphins made her happy. She had a place there and friends and was in charge.

“Yes, let's do that.” She turned over and began to crawl out of the bed.

“Oh, and Annie…” he said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

“Yes?”

“Three. And it's heavy construction and real estate finance.”

“What?” She shook her head and turned to see him grinning at her.

“I've always wanted three kids,” he said with a chuckle. “Two girls and a boy. And for six generations my family has specialized in financing and building roads, bridges and dams all over the world.”

She couldn't help giggling at his strained attempt to
make friends. The damn man was just too adorable to stay mad.

“Well, it's not everything,” he said, suddenly sober. “But it's a start. Maybe this will turn out to be easier than we think.”

And quicker, Annie prayed. Please God make them be “friends” in a hurry.

T
he next two weeks became the slowest fourteen days of her entire life. Annie was beginning to question every decision she'd ever made.

It wouldn't be so frustrating if she and Nick were actually becoming friends. Or, if she could figure out a way to get him to cross the invisible line he'd drawn down the middle of their bed.

But no… From the minute they had returned to the island, Nick went right back to working sixteen-hour days on his rebuilding-after-the-hurricane campaign.

He'd managed to finish the construction on the guest quarters in a week. Her old suite of rooms was already redecorated. But stood empty. The same as her bed.

Currently, Nick was striving to build new housing to replace some of the islanders' shacks, lost to the hurricane. He managed to leave the house before she awoke
every morning and didn't return until Annie was fast asleep at night. They barely spoke to each other.

Sighing, Annie sat on the cliff steps and emptied the sand from her deck shoes. She admired him for being so industrious and responsible. But she would give anything to get another glimpse of the private Nick. The one who could be so intense it was scary.

She felt like she was drying up from loneliness. Thirsty for a smile, a laugh, a touch and a kiss.

In some ways, though, her life was better than ever. She should be thankful that the morning sickness seemed to have released its hold on her. And she was exceedingly grateful her health was good, at least.

She'd always imagined that she would have no trouble being pregnant. She came from good Irish stock whose women popped out babies and went back to work in the potato fields the very next day. Her mother delivered seven kids with ease, and two of her sisters had so far had four children between them without hardly batting an eyelash.

Annie took her vitamins and ate right, if way too much, and exercised regularly. She felt wonderful.

And she was miserable.

She hadn't yet told her family that she was expecting. Though two days ago, she'd finally screwed up enough nerve to tell her mother that she and Nick were married.

Maeve Riley's long stunned silence after the announcement had said everything. But Annie still had to listen for another hour while her mother cried and stormed and tried everything in her repertoire to make Annie feel guilty for not inviting the family and for not having the ceremony in a church.

Annie did feel guilty, sort of. And she would try to work up an apology someday in the future when she wasn't so darned desperate to get her husband back onto her side of the bed. Really she would.

“Hello, Annie,” Elizabeth's voice said from behind her. “Are you all done for the day at such an early hour? You're not feeling sick are you?”

Annie turned to her mother-in-law and grinned. “The research team has everything quite well in hand. There's not much for me to do anymore except keep the books.”

“That's good,” Elizabeth said with a smile. “Would you like to go shopping with me, then? We could hop over to St. Thomas for the afternoon, if you'd like.”

Shoving her shoes back on, Annie stood. “No thanks.” She took her mother-in-law's arm and leaned in to whisper conspiratorially. “Can you keep a secret?”

“From Nick? Perhaps. It would depend on the nature of the secret.”

“It's nothing bad. I'm not in any trouble or anything.” She made up her mind to let Elizabeth in on the secret pleasure she had discovered recently. She'd been dying to tell someone.

“I'm…” There was nothing to do but come out with it. “Well, I've been taking sailing lessons.”

Elizabeth raised her eyebrows. “I take it my son is unaware of these lessons.”

“I haven't told him,” Annie mumbled as she felt the shame flame her face. “I knew he wouldn't like the idea.

“But I'm finding I love everything about sailing,” she rushed on. “The thrill of turning into the wind and feeling it catch the sails. The speed as you cut through the water. It's all wonderful.”

Elizabeth smiled but sadness filled her eyes. “You sound just like Nicholas did when he was ten and first discovered his own love of sailing.”

Annie was petrified that Elizabeth would tell Nick her secret. It would be a major setback to making her husband a friend. And to finally having him want her again.

“Don't tell him just yet, please?” she begged. “Nick is so…uh…controlling. He'd never let me continue, and it gives me so much pleasure.” And at some point, when she was more of an expert, Annie wanted to convince Nick to come sailing with her. She knew she could help him through it.

Her mother-in-law reached out a hand and tenderly pushed a wind-blown strand of hair back from her face. “Come inside with me a moment. I'd like to tell you something.”

When they were seated in the pool house's front room, Elizabeth took her hand across the tiny table. “I think I owe you an explanation about my son. About what drives him to be who he is.”

The older woman sounded so serious, for a moment Annie was afraid to hear what she had to say. But she sat still and waited.

“When I was about your age,” Elizabeth began. “I met a man who was dashing and exciting…but unfortunately had no family and absolutely no money or prospects. My family did not approve, but I was in love.

“I deliberately lied to my young man and let myself become pregnant with his child so my family would have to let us marry,” she continued.

Annie drew her hand away and began to shake her head.

“I know that's not what you did, dear. I'm not accusing you of anything.” Elizabeth frowned. “In my own roundabout way, I'm trying to make you understand…about my husband…Nicholas's father…and about their relationship.

“You see, my husband cared for me, but he always felt that my family hated him…thought he was beneath them. It wasn't true, but there was nothing I could do to change his mind. He accepted a job from my father and set to work proving he was worthy of being in the family.”

Annie sat back in her chair and tried to listen with her heart instead of her mind.

“He worked such long hours that I never saw him. I think he was always a little perturbed that I had lied to him as well. Whatever it was that drove him, by the time Nicholas arrived, we were like strangers. My husband's every waking minute had become devoted to the business.”

Annie didn't like the sound of this story and found she was holding her breath.

Elizabeth sighed. “I'm ashamed to say, Nicholas never knew love at home. Oh, I told him I loved him, surely. But he never saw how love should be between a man a woman. His mother and father were merely civil to one another.

“My dashing lover had become a controlling, unemotional stranger to his family,” Elizabeth said sadly. “As Nicholas grew, he tried to find a way to get under his father's shell, but he never could break through.” Elizabeth's eyes welled up. “We both tried.”

“Why did you stay with a man like that?”

“I loved him,” she answered simply. “What's more, I always felt he needed me somehow. And…I suppose I have never forgiven myself for the trickery. I'd thought I'd done it out of love, but I was really being selfish. It wasn't his fault our lives turned out the way they did.”

Annie dashed the tears off her cheeks. “I'm glad you told me. I understand Nick a little better now.”

“No, dear heart. That wasn't my main point.” Elizabeth took her hand again. “I meant this story to be a warning…a lesson in what not to do. Nothing good can come from lies. And the worst thing you can do in your marriage is to allow Nicholas to become a controlling stranger. That will be his first impulse, it's what he's always known.”

She leaned over and placed a soft kiss against Annie's forehead. “My son is warm and generous and full of love he doesn't yet know how to show. If you allow him to keep it bottled inside, the two of you will never find happiness together.

“Don't make my mistakes, Annie,” she whispered. “Shake some good sense into your dashing lover. Before it's too late for you both.”

 

Nick raised his face to the sun and laughed, really laughed for the first time in years. What a glorious day.

Racing his Jeep along the north shore road in the bright golden haze of late afternoon sun, he headed toward the marina. Not entirely positive why Annie had called and asked him to meet her at that place, he was absolutely sure of her motives. He knew she had something to tell him.

And he couldn't wait to see her face when he told her
about his new surprise in return. They were about to have the breakthrough in their relationship that he'd been praying for. Finally.

His darling Annie had actually called her family and told them about their marriage. He knew because her mother had called him yesterday and asked to come for a visit. The plane he'd sent to bring her family would be arriving within the next half hour.

Annie. She must have decided that she was actually happy to be married to him and intended to stay married. He'd begun to wonder if that would ever happen. The fear that she would leave him had kept him frozen and away from her. He couldn't bear the thought of losing her.

A glint of sunlight bounced off the deep blue of the ocean and suddenly sent him spiraling back in time to another day when he'd been traveling this road to meet his wife at the marina. The worst day of his life.

The memories came fast and strong, blinding him to his current situation and putting him right back there.

Nick had been trying for days to hide his anger at Christina. He could feel the bile forming in his throat even now. But on this sunny day things would be different.

He would demand that Christina learn to sail, it was the one thing that still gave him pleasure and he was positive it would be the one thing they could do together that would repair the marriage. And they must repair the marriage. She simply could not leave him.

His father would never approve of a divorce, would never forgive him if Christina left. Their marriage had been the one thing that he'd done to win his father's
favor. To have even a small sense that his father really cared.

As Nick drove around the last bend in the road, the marina and boats came into full view. The sight of them brought him back to the present with a thud.

This was the last place he would've come voluntarily. He hated seeing the boats. It gave him a niggling sense of foreboding to think of meeting Annie here. But he tried to push aside his old misgivings and forget the pain.

Today was the day he and Annie would finally come together as man and wife. There was no time for old ghosts.

He caught his first sight of her, and his breath stuck in his throat. Annie was standing on the deck of a sloop, and she was turning the boom and dropping the sail.

No! He pulled into the parking space, jammed the transmission into Park and made a dash to the dock.

“Annie,” he yelled, as he ran up next to the boat. “Get off of there. What the hell do you think you're doing? Come away, now!”

She turned, blinked a couple of times and finally climbed out of the boat. Walking up the dock toward him, she smiled but the look in her eyes was wary and vulnerable.

“Hello, Nick,” she said calmly. “Thank you for coming.”

He grabbed her by the arm and dragged her down the dock, farther away from the boats. “Why are you here? You know how I feel about boats and sailing.”

Annie tugged her arm free of his grip and stopped walking. “I've been taking sailing lessons. I didn't want to hide it from you anymore.”

When he began to protest, she interrupted him, “I love sailing, Nick. It makes me feel so free, like a bird, skimming over the water. I know now why you loved it, and I was hoping…”

She took a breath and straightened her shoulders. “Despite your old fears and guilt, I thought maybe you would consider going back to it so we could sail together. I'll be with you, to help you find your way back.”

He couldn't talk, couldn't breathe. Just stared at her. He remained mute and shook his head in shock.

“Your mother tells me you were once the best sailor in the Caribbean. Teach me to be the best, too.”

The panic doubled him over and he put his arm across his waist to keep from collapsing. “My God, Annie. How could you ask such a thing of me? I thought we were getting to know each other, but this shows me you know nothing about me at all.”

“Nick… Please…” She reached out and put a tender, warm hand on his arm.

The fierce longing for her that stayed constantly buried right under his skin drove him over an edge. He dragged her closer and took her lips with a force that might've surprised him any other time. After all these weeks of denying themselves, they responded to each other with shivering, sobbing passion.

He didn't care where they were. Didn't care who might be watching. He only cared that Annie clung to him, pressed her breasts against his chest and swivelled her hips against his groin, begging him silently for what they both needed so desperately.

“Nick!” A bellowing voice came from over his shoulder. “It's great to see you down here again.”

Annie froze, and Nick raised his head in a daze. “Hello, Bellamy,” he managed. He had to get them both away from here to be alone. “If you'll excuse us, my wife and I need to talk. I'll catch up with you another time.”

Dragging Annie by the hand, Nick put them both in his Jeep and took off. He didn't stop driving until the marina was far behind them. Then he pulled off the road and idled the engine.

When he turned to Annie, her expression was unfocused and dazed. It made his heart flip over with a thump, his stomach sour, and his own eyes blur with a sheen of tears.

“Annie, please listen to me,” he said roughly. “I'm not ready for this yet. And…and it makes me sick to think of you going out on the sea right now. Don't…don't…”