‘There is no you and me.’ She didn’t even sound as if she believed her own words. ‘And I don’t want there to be.’
‘Is that so?’
It took Nikhil all of his willpower not to throw her over his shoulder, carry her to her bed and prove to them both just how weak that declaration was. But he couldn’t. He wouldn’t.
He should never have come here.
He should have gone to the gym and gone several rounds with the punchbag, or run a decent half marathon on the treadmill, or even swum a couple of miles in one of the ship’s special lap pools.
Anything to expend energy—and frustration—and to stop himself from coming here.
He should leave now—only he didn’t. He stayed rooted to the spot, pretending that he didn’t sense his renowned self-control starting to slip away.
The roar grew in Nikhil’s head the longer he stood, looking at Isla. Watching the way her pulse jumped in her elegant neck, belying the calm exterior she was so desperately trying to present. That telling, hungry darkening in her glorious eyes. The way her breathing grew as choppy as the seas could around here.
She wanted him. Every bit as much as he wanted her.
Blood pooled in his sex, telling him what it wanted in no uncertain terms. His body at war with his brain. And there was nothing more to it than sex. There couldn’t be.
He wouldn’t allow there to be.
‘What do you want from me, Nikhil?’ she cried out suddenly.
‘Nothing,’ he rasped. ‘And too much.’
Then, before either of them could analyse that any further, he pressed her up against the wall of her cabin and claimed her mouth with his. And, even as she emitted a weak moan of protest, her arms came up to loop around his neck and press her soft, warm breasts against his chest, their peaks already hard, making his palms itch.
Making every inch of him itch. And ache. And need.
She was driving him crazy.
He lifted his hands to her head, taking it gently in his palms and tilting it so that he could better kiss her. He revelled in the way her lips parted when he slicked his tongue over them, inviting him inside, making them both want more.
He kissed her thoroughly, completely, the way he’d wanted to since...for ever. He finally permitted his hands to trail over her body, reacquainting himself with all those mouth-watering curves that haunted him each and every night.
It was sheer bliss to finally give into this dark need to reach around the back of his neck and take her hands, intertwining her fingers with his as he held them against the wall above her head, making her arch into him all the more.
Then, as he encircled both her wrists with one of his hands, he moved his other hand down to relearn the lines of her face, the long sweep of her back and the indent of her waist. All so strangely familiar, as though he’d caressed them a thousand times instead of just that one night.
Or as though he knew them by instinct.
The same instinct that made him lift his hand to the underside of her breast, the sublimity of her heart as it thundered wildly beneath his palm. Betraying her. Confirming everything that he already knew.
Walking his fingers slowly higher, Nikhil allowed his thumb to graze the hard peak, evident even through the material of her uniform. Her harsh intake of breath only fuelling the fires that much more as she let her head tip back to allow his mouth access to her neck, and that sensitive hollow at her throat. And he took full advantage.
It was impossible to resist any longer. He could feel the monster inside him rattling to be let out. To take what he wanted, when what he wanted was Isla. To hell with all his rules and boundaries; she’d been breaking them all from the moment they’d met, anyway.
Sliding his hand down her belly to her abdomen, and lower, Nikhil deftly unbuttoned her crisp white trousers and slid the zip down with a shocking, thrilling sound.
‘What...are you doing?’ Each word caught deliciously.
But Nikhil didn’t have time to dwell. He felt raw, and edgy. Primal. Even as he grazed his teeth over the smooth white of her throat, his fingers buried themselves in her heat. He could barely trust himself to think, let alone speak.
‘Giving you what you want,’ he managed to grate out.
She gasped softly. ‘What about you?’
‘Definitely what I want,’ he confessed harshly.