Trade (10 page)

Even now, in the cold light of
day, she didn’t quite know what to do with the emotion it had churned up.

She shouldn’t be feeling attached.
Shouldn’t think this was more than a stolen moment in time between two people.
He’d charmed her, as he doubtless charmed every woman he slept with, but that
didn’t mean there would be more—once they got back to reality, they would be
over.

She had aches in areas that hadn’t
ached for a long time. And one unfamiliar ache in the center of her chest. She
placed a hand flat to the area just below her neck and rubbed.

The previous night he’d explored
every inch of her body in exquisite detail. If she were in one of their apartments,
she’d luxuriate in a long, hot shower, but as that wasn’t an option, the sea
would have to do.

She crawled out of the shelter,
and spread her arms. There was something wonderfully liberating about being
nude in paradise, but where was he? She glanced down the beach, then checked
the other direction. Maybe he’d gone to the lobster pot. The water bottle lay
in the shade, so she picked it up and took a long drink. Then she shoved her
hands through her hair, and walked into the waves.

If my mother could see me now
she’d have a heart attack.
In fact, if either of her conservative sisters
could see her splashing in the water without clothing, they’d be scandalized too.
A memory bloomed in her mind, when she was two or three, and had stripped off
her swimming costume to splash naked in the paddling pool in the back garden.
The feel of the water, the kiss of the sun, the pure enjoyment of the
experience had been spoiled by the arrival of her oldest sister, Caroline, who
had brought her fiancé home for the first time.

Caroline was repressed with a
capital R. Rather than bring her youngest sister a towel, and get her out of
the pool, she’d shrieked to their mother that Max was naked, she’d ranted about
how embarrassed she was by her sister’s behavior.

That was the first time Max felt
shame.

Caroline’s opinion wouldn’t have
shifted an inch today. Even if Sholto hadn’t joined Max on the island, if she’d
been totally alone, Caroline would have considered skinny-dipping somehow
dirty.

She walked further in. The swell
of the waves lifted her body and she took her feet up and let the water cradle
her. This was life. The real, honest, genuine life she wanted to live. One
where she could do what she wanted without the fear of censure from
disapproving eyes. Where no-one had the right to judge her for the choices she
made.

When she’d started the company,
she toyed with a couple of names before deciding on
Fantasies Made Real
.
She’d almost called it
Liberation
, because that was the gift she wanted
to give her clients. Meeting a new client, finding out what they wanted, deep
down in their soul, and helping them achieve it was a buzz her family would
never understand.

She loved them—of course she loved
them. But they couldn’t love the real her, not through the layers of
disapproval that colored every encounter.

The only one who didn’t judge, who
loved her unconditionally, was her father.

She took a deep breath, and dipped
her head beneath the waves. She hadn’t seen him for six months—hadn’t been able
to tell him what she was doing with her life, how much her new job excited and
fulfilled her.

Dad was old. He wouldn’t last
forever. When she left the island, she’d go visit.

Chapter Ten

The sand was hot beneath Sholto’s bare feet as he walked
back to the camp. He carried the lobster pot, complete with two large crabs,
and a couple of coconuts he’d collected on the way.

When he’d woken that morning, Max
had been wrapped around him like a clinging vine. Her chest pressed to his
back. Her arm was slung around him, and her hand was on his stomach. He was no
monk, he’d woken up with a woman before; he’d had a couple of long-term
relationships—if you could call six months long-term.

But neither of them had known as
much about him as Max did.

The first, Suzanne, had been a
fellow actor who also starred in the medical soap he’d been in. They played the
part of young actors breaking into Hollywood off camera, and hooking up had
suited both of their careers. Being involved and working together every day
made them a favorite of the gossip columnists, and they’d both shamelessly
exploited the opportunities that came their way as a result. They’d gone to
parties together. He’d slept over two or three times a week. She was gorgeous.
She was fun. But she never wanted to know more about him than he was willing to
share.

He should have felt something when
Suzanne replaced him with her new co-star leading man. Heartache, jealousy,
something other than relief. But he hadn’t. So for a couple of years he played
the field, had fun, and kept it light with a variety of beautiful women.

And then there’d been Ophelia. Old
Hollywood royalty. Her father was a Director, just like his father before him.
And Ophelia was a bright, new rising star in the directing firmament. He hadn’t
known who she was when she kissed him, open-mouthed, on the stroke of New Year
two years ago. But mellowed by whisky, and appreciative of her exotic beauty
and curves, he’d responded with enthusiasm, and put up no resistance when she
handed him her room key.

They’d dated for a couple of
months—a couple of crazy months. Role-play was her thing, and he’d been into it
for a while, until it got out of hand. She’d wanted him to be moody. Wanted him
passionate. But when she started to call him Marco, and had slapped him a
couple of times during sex, his passion had cooled pretty damned quick.

Digging deeper, she’d confessed
that the moment she saw him, she’d known he would be perfect for the edgy role
of a tortured gangster in her latest production. It was a great role, but not
one he wanted to live in real life.

When he’d walked out, it had been
to the accompanying crash of plates hitting the wall close to his head.

So when he woke that morning with
a throbbing hard-on, he fought against the urge to kiss her awake and have
spectacular morning sex, undraped Max’s arm, and escaped. The memory of her
face as she came filled his mind and kept him hard as he stacked wood for the
fire. He went to the stream to replenish their water supplies, his mind filled
with mental pictures of her standing nude in the clear water. They’d fucked
every conceivable way the previous night, but the hunger hadn’t abated, if
anything it had intensified.

He couldn’t even look at the
jackfruit tree without remembering how sexy her tits looked from above.

When all the chores were done,
he’d looked in on her sleeping form, and once again resisted the urge to climb
back in there and wake her with his tongue and his teeth.

Because wanting her was dangerous.

She knew the real him from their
days together in school. They’d been friends, once upon a time, before he
fucked it up.

And for years, he thought she’d
asked him to go to the dance with her because she was attracted to him, when
the truth was she was just being a friend, trying to save him from
humiliation—humiliation he’d delivered to her instead.

He was in danger of forgetting the
mission. Or rather his cock seemed to have decided on a new mission—that of
burying itself in Max at every possible opportunity—and the rest of him was
fast joining the revolt. So he’d backed up and gone for a run on the beach.

Today he needed to get away from
her to concentrate on the script. He needed to try and get into character, put
himself into the head of John Weatherly, and feel what he had felt finding himself
alone on the island. He needed to prepare for his next role, rather than living
the desire and turbulent emotion of his last one. But, fuck, the way she’d been
last night.

So hot, so loving, so giving.
Responsive to his every touch.

He’d wanted her so damned much, he’d
been sure that having her would take the edge off, would make it easier to be
around her without needing to touch her, to taste her.

But boy, did he have that wrong.
If anything, knowing how she looked in the throes of passion just made him long
to see her like that again.

The shelter was in view; surely
she was awake by now. He scratched the prickle of new stubble on his jaw, and glanced
across the beach, noting a track of footprints leading into the water.

His heart stopped.

“Max!” He dropped everything, and
ran to the body floating facedown in the waves.

*****

Max went from floating in the water, peering through the
depths, her fingers reaching for a pretty pink shell, to full-blown panic as
something gripped hard at her waist and propelled her to the surface.

Too many years, watching too many
shark movies, had her reacting instinctively, lashing out at her attacker with
fists and feet. It was only when the grip on her waist tightened, and she collided
with a warm, very human body, that the truth registered.

Not a shark.

Relief was instantly replaced by
anger. “What the hell?” She managed to get her feet onto the sea floor and
pushed Sholto with all her force. “What are you doing, you idiot!”

“Me?” His eyes glinted. The
overtight jawline notched a fraction tighter. “Get out of the water.” Not
content to just tell her, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her from the waves.

“You’re hurting me.” She tugged
against his iron grip.

Sholto’s gaze fell to her wrist,
and he loosened his fingers. He forced his fingers through his tousled hair.
His shoulders relaxed and his mouth twisted. “I thought you were dead. Or
drowning.”

“I was neither of those things.
Until you attacked me.”

“Attack?” His hands stretched
open, gesturing in the air in front of him wildly. “I was not fucking attacking
you, I was saving you.”

“Saving me from picking up a
shell.”

His gaze swept her, making her
acutely aware of her nakedness, and that fact that he was fully dressed. With
as much grace as she could muster, she crossed her arms, and strode up to the
shelter.

He followed, like a brooding,
black thundercloud ready to rain on her picnic.

She slipped on her bikini panties
and pulled her dress over her head, taking the opportunity to ignore him and
let her adrenaline rush subside. She’d never been so scared in her entire life.
But he’d thought she was in trouble. She should go easy on…

“Were you playing a trick on me?”

She swung around, eyes wide. “You
cannot be fucking serious.” Max planted her hands on her hips. “I didn’t even
know you were within shouting distance. And I don’t play games—especially
oh-look-I’m-dead-games. I can’t believe you just said that.”

“Well maybe I don’t know what you
might do.” He wasn’t as furious as before, but the expression on his face could
still only be described as a glower.

“I don’t have anything to
apologize for.”

A dark eyebrow edged upward. “I
don’t have anything to apologize for either.”

“You frightened me.”

“You frightened me first.”

They squared off opposite each
other like gunfighters. Max took a step back and looked away. Did he really
think she was the sort of person who would play a trick like that on a man, for
laughs? Or worse, to get a reaction? He must have known some pretty twisted
women.

He must have known a lot of women.

She’d spent the morning having
soft-focus lustful daydreams in which he played a starring role. A man she
really didn’t know very well at all. She’d thought she knew him when they were
teenagers, and she’d been wrong then too. The attempted rescue had been
shocking, but the discussion after it was another type of rescue.

Rescuing her before she made a
complete and utter fool of herself again by thinking there was any more than
hot sex between them.

She spotted his lobster pot on the
beach, next to a couple of coconuts. “Did you catch something?” She pitched her
voice casual, calm and vaguely friendly.

He gave her a disbelieving look.

She forced a smile.

He breathed deep. Closed his eyes.
Then opened them again. “I caught some crabs.”

“Great. Why don’t you get them,
and I’ll light the fire.” As Max arranged dry kindling, she was telling herself
she should walk away. While she gouged a notch in a piece of dry wood, and slid
the perfect stick into it, she tried to recapture the feeling of excitement at
being on the island, testing her survival skills alone. And when she flattened
her palms both sides of the stick, and rubbed rapidly enough to send a spark
into the dry leaves, she knew she was kidding herself.

“You got that going quickly.” He’d
come up behind her as she blew on the spark, teasing a tiny flame into life.

“Lots of practice.” She piled more
kindling on top, and added arid fiber ripped from a coconut husk.

He crouched next to her. Close
enough to touch. The scent of the sea clung to his hair, to his wet clothes. “I
don’t want to fight with you.” His voice was low and quiet.

Slanting her head to the side, she
cast him a glance. Then she couldn’t look away. His intense regard, as though he
was peering through the windows of her eyes down into the depths of her soul,
stole her breath. His gaze flickered to her lips, then back to her eyes. He was
going to kiss her, time stood still until he kissed her.

Heat.

“Your fingers—”

She jerked them away from the
flickering flame at the same moment as he reached to do the same thing.

“They’re okay.” But he brought her
hand to his mouth, and blew on her fingertips anyway. His tousled head bent
over her captured hand. He examined her fingers, checking for the truth of her
words.

Then he looked up. The corner of
his mouth tilted upward. “How are we going to stop fighting? Because you’re
always getting into trouble, and I’ve a hero complex.”

She wasn’t accident-prone. Had
been looking after herself for years, and didn’t need anyone to save her from
anything. Didn’t need—but quite liked—having a hero looking out for her,
however misguided.

“I guess we’ll have to work on it.”

He brought her hand to his mouth. “I
could start by kissing it better.” He kissed each fingertip, his gaze steady.

“That works.” Her voice was husky.
The plan to put some distance between them was quickly dissolving. She should
pull her hand away. They should talk. Instead, her hand lay in his, limp and
unresponsive. His to use as he would.

Sholto traced the tip of her index
finger with his lips, then sucked it into his mouth.

Her eyes closed on a prayer. Heat
curled in her stomach, a heat that had to be denied.

“I can’t think while you’re
touching me.” She eased her hand back. Placed it in her lap. And opened her
eyes.

*****

She’s the most infuriating woman in the world.

Yet he was drawn to her like the
waves to the shore. All the way back to the crabs he’d cast aside, Sholto ran through
the reasons they should stop this thing before it got completely out of
control.

As she bent over the fire, rubbing
the flames into life, totally concentrated on her task, he’d been unable to
think straight. Because he was imagining her paying his body such close,
dedicated attention.

When he’d seen her floating, apparently
lifeless, raw panic had raced through him. Up until then, he was in denial
about how vital she was to him. How irreplaceable. Faced with the loss of her,
he’d been frantic—desperately racing to close the distance between them, even
though he feared he was too late. He’d been wracked with pain so intense he
could barely breathe. In the grip of a frenzy to rewind time. To have her safe.

He’d been wrong, she hadn’t
drowned. But that didn’t matter. What mattered was what the thought of losing
her had done to him.

Now, she stared down at the hands
clasped in her lap, about to tell him something. “This whole situation is
artificial.” She didn’t look up. “You know the way people who’ve been kidnapped
form intense feelings for their captors? Stockholm Syndrome? We’re sort of like
that.”

Not like that.
“So are you
the kidnapper or the hostage? Because it seems to me that we’re in this
together.”

She chewed her bottom lip. “I
guess we’re both hostages.” She crossed her arms. “You know what I mean. If we’d
met in our real lives, and spent the night together, there’d be a cooling off
period. You’d go back to your house, I’d go back to mine, and maybe you’d call
me to set up another date in a couple of days. There’d be time to think—time to
bring some perspective.”

“You spent a month in a survival
situation with that Special Forces guy, but nothing like this happened, did it?”

“Abe Kingston?” Her eyes widened. “No.”

“So it’s not the situation, it’s
us. This isn’t about the island. It’s you and me. Being with you is different
than being with anyone else. I can’t stay away from you, even when I’m telling
myself I should.”

Her mouth softened. “I feel the
same way.”

“The way I see it, we can do one
of two things. We can give in to it, and spend every single moment together. We
can fuck all day, and curl around each other all night. Or we can try to cool
things down a little and force some space between us.” He stroked a hand over
her arm. “I’ve gotta tell you, I like the sound of the first option best, but I
have to prepare for this audition. I have to get into the headspace—and I can’t
do that if we’re together all the time.”