Page 29 of Forbidden Hawaiian Nights
Two things happened at once. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut and…he kissed her.
He kissed her!
It was so unexpected that Mia’s eyes flew open in shock. His mouth on hers was a drug, obliterating everything. She felt the warm dart of his tongue against hers and she sighed, succumbed to the kiss, succumbed to something she realised she’d been fantasising about practically from the first moment she’d clapped eyes on him.
And nothing could have prepared her for how sweet it would be. How much she would want it to go on and on, for ever. There was no space inside her for fear.
The hand that been clutching the armrest crept up, tangling in that luxurious dark hair, and the other hand somehow managed to find the curve of his cheek.
She felt her breasts tingling, her nipples spiking against her bra, and she was wet, so wet, between her thighs.
He was cupping her face and playing with her ear with one finger. The tiny movements sent electric currents racing through her body, lighting up every part of her, as though she’d suddenly been plugged into a live socket.
Then just like that he pulled away and cold air filled the void.
It took a couple of seconds for Mia to snap out of her daze.
‘You should be all fine now,’ he murmured, sending her one last look before sitting back and finishing the glass of champagne.
‘All fine? What? Oh!’ Of course. He’d kissed her and she’d lost herself in it like a teenager in the full throes of adolescent lust. Her lips tingled from where his had been and every pore in her body was buzzing with energy. She wanted to touch her mouth with her hand, and she made sure she didn’t give in to any such temptation by firmly clasping them together on her lap.
She’d been terrified as the jet had soared at a vertical angle into the clouds and he’d kissed her to distract her from the terror. He’d seen it writ large on her face and he’d kindly gone for a swift remedy, and it had worked because she had yielded to that kiss and enjoyed every second of it.
Humiliation roared through her. She went hot, then cold, then she shook her head and rolled her eyes and cracked a smile.
‘I should thank you.’
Their eyes collided and for a few seconds Max remained silent, his expression veiled.
The last thing he’d considered doing when he’d hit Hawaii in search of his wayward sister was making an impromptu tour of islands he wasn’t remotely interested in visiting.
That said, the last thing he’d expected was a woman furiously digging her feet in and denying him the information he had travelled thousands of miles to obtain. And, from there, everything else had been a slow unravelling of life as he knew it.
What he did know was that he’d never felt more invested in having this woman.
It was a weakness. He knew that. He loathed the way it undermined his hard-headed logic, but it was an overpowering urge he couldn’t seem to fight.
He’d seen her today dressed in her usual ‘day at a building site’ uniform, and he’d smiled, because no one could accuse her of putting herself out to dress up for him.
Indeed, what she wore was an act of defiance.
He wondered how she would react if she knew just how sexy she was in shapeless cargo pants and a pair of flat sandals, with her hair tied back in a ponytail.
Her beauty was luminescent.
And his body had reacted accordingly. He’d breathed her in as she’d settled into the seat next to him and, of course, predictably, she had entertained him with her forthright, no-holds-barred, uninvited insights into his personal life.
Was it because he’d expected her mouthy, outspoken, full-frontal attack and her sudden panic on the plane had driven him to do what he’d been longing to do for days? Their eyes had met, he’d seen the utterly soft and vulnerable fear there and he’d thought of one thing and one thing only. Kissing her. Kissing that fear out of existence. Kissing her until she forgot everything but him.
She’d melted into him and her soft acquiescence had sent his libido shooting into the stratosphere. For the first time in his life, his self-control had been utterly and completely obliterated.
And that had scared the hell out of him.
It was one thing musing thoughtfully about breaking his own self-imposed rules about never mixing business with pleasure. It was one thing contemplating tasting the freedom of straying out of his comfort zone. It was quite another to discover that he just hadn’t been able to help himself. His body had taken the decision-making out of his hands, and that had never happened before.
Yet now, even as he sensed her withdrawing at speed, covering up the fact that she had enjoyed that kiss as much as he had, he itched to pull her right back into him and carry on where they had left off.
He could have her. In that moment, he had sensed her want, had known what he had suspected…
