He’d towel-dried and slung on his dry tee shirt, but the swimming trunks were still on, clinging to his muscular thighs, and she had to steel herself not to look.
One glance and who knew what kind of unwelcome physical responses would be surging through her already heated body?
The electricity between them sizzled and she wasn’t going to do anything to ratchet it up further.
He fancied her... He wanted to touch her...to kiss...to make love...
Those words were now lodged in her head and how on earth was she going to get rid of them? There were only so many times she could keep telling herself that they weren’t suited. Maybe she had become reliant on her role of carer. Maybe she had hidden behind that role even when her mother had stopped needing her quite so much... Maybe,just maybe, she had become fearful of taking all those risks involved with dating guys andjust having fun.But, if things had to change, then surely not with a man who had‘heartbreaker’stamped all over his forehead! Her breathing was staccato, uneven, as she continued to flounder helplessly.
‘Drink?’
‘No!’
He’d moved to the ingenious wine bottle holder that was built into a concealed walnut drawer.
‘You’re not going to be able to get the boat back...’ She followed his movements with avid, treacherous concentration.
James paused, wine glass in one hand, and shot her a slow, lazy smile that made her toes curl. He’d cooled down and was obviously back in control of the situation. Was he sufficiently in control to realise that anything between them,anything, would be a disaster?
‘Oh, ye of little faith...’ He poured himself a glass of red and strolled towards her to sit on the banquette and pat the space next to him. ‘You didn’t answer my question,’ he prompted softly. ‘What situation?’
‘Huh?’ She ignored the space next to him and sidled to sit facing him instead. The soft lapping of water against the side of the boat was a barely discernible noise, morefeltthan heard. In here, the silence was thick with tension.
‘You said that anyonein your situationwould have been worried sick...’
Ellie noted the way he had tacked the wordsickonto his sentence, turning it into quite a different emotion.
‘Do you mean,’ he continued thoughtfully, ‘that anyone trapped on a boat would be worried if they ended up on it alone because they might be stranded at sea until someone came along and rescued them?’
‘Of course not! I’m not a helpless damsel in distress! If I were on this boat alone, I’m sure I would be able to somehow get it back to shore.’
‘Maybe, then,’ he mused, sipping his wine and looking at her with the same pensive expression that gave no guidance as to exactly what was going through his head, ‘you were concerned that, if your boss disappeared off to that great watery graveyard in the sky, your future as a highly paid worker bee might be on the line. I’ll admit there are few companies in London that could rival the working conditions at my place, not to mention the pay...’
‘That’s a crazy thing to say!’ She whitened, thoughts zooming to him involved in any kind of accident, feeling sick at the very thought. ‘That’s not why I was worried! I was worried because...because...’
‘Because,’ he murmured, looking at her steadily, his dark eyes boring straight into her, addling her, ‘you have feelings for me that go beyond the usual, predictable boss-secretary relationship, don’t you...’
It wasn’t a question, it was an assumption, and she opened her mouth to deny it but nothing emerged.
‘You’re attracted to me, whether you want to admit it or not. You’re as attracted to me as I am to you. Maybe we might not have said anything before, when we were in London, imprisoned in the routine and normality of my office there, but here we are.’
‘No,’ Ellie whispered weakly.
‘Alone...’ he continued with the remorseless determination of a battering ram. ‘In this Catamaran, out in the tropics, with nothing but the deep, dark ocean beneath us and the deep, dark skies above us...’
‘Stop, please.’ She barely recognised her voice. Gone was the no-nonsense firmness which represented the backbone of her relationship with him. In its place as a wavering, pleading hesitancy that exposed all her weaknesses.
He’d said that she had feelings for him.
He’d summed that up as meaning that she was physically attracted to him.
That wasn’t the whole story, though, was it? And therein lied the danger. But, sitting here, the danger was sidelined by the tremendous drag on her senses evoked by what he was saying and the way he was looking at her.
‘Come sit next to me.’
Ellie hesitated and he smiled, smelling victory, which instantly made her stiffen, even though her heart was pounding and there was a giddy pulsing in her veins.
‘We should be getting back.’
