She stirred him up in a way that no other woman had ever done, electrifying him and challenging him in equal measure.
She swallowed. Hard. And her bashfulness was all the more bewitching.
‘I...don’t know anything of the sort.’
‘Then it appears I have no choice but to employ the only means to show you, pyar,’ he growled.
And then, as if he couldn’t make it any worse, he bent his head and kissed her.
* * *
Isla felt as though she was falling. Fast, and hard, with no idea what was at the bottom. And she couldn’t seem to bring herself to care.
She tried to cling to some last grain of reality, but it was slipping further away with every foot that she fell.
And she was plummeting.
How was it that this kiss was so different from any last night, when she thought that they’d spent the entire night kissing. And touching. And tasting. Yet this was something different again. More intense, somehow. As though neither of them wanted to give into temptation, and at the same time as if there was nowhere else either of them wanted to be.
She knew it was wrong—certainly on an intellectual level. Hadn’t they just been asserting—vociferously—their respective career choices? Hadn’t they both just agreed that private lives and professional lives were clear and distinct entities which had no business becoming complicated?
And yet here they were, complicating things in the most base, primal way possible. And as wrong as Isla knew it was, she couldn’t stop herself from wanting more.
Much more.
It was possibly the most thrilling, terrifying sensation that she had ever experienced. A complete loss of control, and a complete inability to care.
So long as Nikhil never stopped kissing her.
Isla was aware of nothing. And everything. Like his tongue gliding over her lips, parting them so effortlessly, and dipping so wickedly inside. Like his large hand, splayed against her back and holding her close, so deliciously close, to him. Like the way every inch of her body moulded itself, as if instinctively, to every inch of his.
It was like fire. More than that—an inferno, and she was dancing in the flames.
With every twist of his mouth against hers, and every tangle of his tongue, she made a tiny new sound in her throat. Greedy, eager, impatient. She hungered for him more than she’d hungered for anything. Even her job on this ship, it seemed.
But, rather than helping her to stop, the knowledge only made her feel that much more desperate. More daring. He made her feel glorious and proud, as if she could do anything. Even walk on the very water that encircled this ship.
If this was him keeping away from her, then she couldn’t say she was complaining. Though some part of her whispered that she should.
And then his hands were moving over her. Leisurely, lazy, yet still they scorched a path as they went, leaving her quivering with heat, and fresh need. Tracing the contours of her sides and the dip of her back he slowly—too slowly—began to pull her shirt out of her trousers.
She shivered with anticipation, and damn him if the devilish man didn’t smile. She could feel the curve of his mouth against her throat, kissing her in that oh-so-sensitive hollow below her ear.
‘Nikhil...’ His name escaped her mouth before she could stop it.
But, if anything, it only made him haul her to him even tighter. As if the sound of his name on her lips drove him on all the more.
Sliding his hands beneath the fabric, he traced a series of whorls higher—even higher—making her breath catch in her throat in her restlessness.
‘Patience, pyar,’ he told her.
But she didn’t miss the tautness in his voice—all the evidence she needed that he barely held onto his own patience. She couldn’t help it; she rolled her hips against him—then exulted when they both groaned softly.
And then, as he held her waist with one hand, he finally allowed the other to reach higher, nudging her breast aside and raking one thumb pad over her straining nipple.
Isla arched instinctively against him. She heard the low cry, but it took a moment to realise it was herself.
‘I’ve missed these.’ Nikhil’s voice rumbled through her, as dark as the inky ocean, and just as deep.