His slight smile is pensive, cryptic. “Both, I suppose.”
“Someday, Nick, you can tell me why that is.” I see the flicker of surprise in his gaze as I serve his words from our breakfast this morning back to him now. He doesn’t answer me, of course. “Did you ever doubt you’d be able to get your boat one day? Or at ten years old were you just a younger version of this driven, relentless man I’m looking at now?”
His mouth curves in an unrepentant smile. “What do you think?”
I laugh, shaking my head. “Nothing has ever been out of reach for the indomitable Dominic Baine. Is that it?”
“Nothing that I truly want, no.”
Including me. Although he doesn’t say the words, there is no mistaking the message in his darkening eyes. And I cannot deny the current of awareness that arrows through me as he holds my gaze.
He stands up and steps over to join me at the helm. His nearness unnerves me. At the same time, it sends my senses scattering with the giddy anticipation of his touch.
“Come a bit starboard now,” he instructs me, calmly letting me know I’m neglecting my post. “Yes, there you go. That’s my girl,” he says as I adjust the wheel. “Eyes up front.”
I nod, watching our course and the ribbon “telltale” on the sail to keep us moving in the right direction. Nick moves behind me, resting his hands on my shoulders. I sigh the instant I feel his hands sweep aside my long ponytail. I moan when his mouth presses warmly against the back of my neck.
“I want to take you somewhere new tonight,” he murmurs. “But only if you want to go there with me. And only if you trust me.”
On its own, the statement shouldn’t make my pulse throb with desire. But coupled with Nick’s smoldering gaze and growling voice, it’s edged with sensual promise. I swallow, my heart kicking into a faster tempo as his hands move down my sides, then around to caress my breasts.
“If you want to return to a safe port tonight instead, tell me now, baby.”
“N-no.” My denial is a shaky sigh, followed by a soft cry as Nick’s hands slide down the front of my body and into the V of my legs. He starts gathering my skirt, lifting it above my knees, up over my thighs. “Nick . . . you can’t—”
“Just a touch,” he says, sweeping aside the lace of my panties and finding my sex. He fingers me deeply, making me squirm with pleasure. “Jesus, you’re drenched. So snug and hot. I can’t get enough of this pussy. And now I need to make you come.”
Before I can protest—before I can even attempt to refuse him—he strokes me relentlessly from my clit to the cleft of my ass. Lifting my foot onto the edge of the cockpit bench beside me, he spreads me open and fills my sex with his fingers.
“Oh my God.”
Nervously, I glance at the smattering of other boats in the bay with us. There is no one close enough to see what we’re doing, but the delicious risk of people seeing Nick’s hand between my legs as I steer a million dollars’ worth of luxury watercraft toward the open Atlantic is a thrill I never expected.
My vision blurs as pleasure spikes through me with every wicked flick of his thumb and deep plunge of his fingers. He shows me no mercy, though I hardly expect that from him anymore. No more than I can expect myself to resist him. I fall willingly, happily, into the vortex of sensation he’s stoking within me.
It’s all I can do to keep my hands on the wheel and my eyes on our course. My limbs feel boneless, but Nick’s bare chest and strong body at my back keep me rooted, centered, safe.
And he doesn’t let up until I come.
Not until a cry of release tears loose from my throat and flies up into the billowing sails in a scream.
Chapter 30
As night falls, Nick navigates the boat into Florida Bay where we moor about a mile out from what he informs me is Islamorada in the Keys. After so many hours on the water, it feels good to pause and take down the sails for a while. I’m exhausted for a variety of reasons, but I’ve never felt more alive.
“Hungry?” Nick asks, bringing me down to the galley with him where I discover the provisions he’d purchased back in Miami include a loaf of fresh bread, a bottle of white wine, and the basics for a romantic dinner for two. I watch him gather a box of pasta, olive oil, plum tomatoes, zucchini, a small container of grated parmesan cheese, and a clove of garlic. “Pasta primavera sound all right to you?”
“Sounds perfect.”
He hands me the bottle of Pinot Grigio then pulls a corkscrew out of a drawer. “Glasses are behind you in the cabinet. You pour the wine. I’ve got dinner handled.”