Total pages in book: 163
Estimated words: 157491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 157491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 787(@200wpm)___ 630(@250wpm)___ 525(@300wpm)
“Hugh!” I yell, my emotions a ball of anger and relief. “You’re know you supposed find out how deep a pool is before hurling yourself in.” Shielding my eyes with my hand, I watch as Hugh plunges back under the water like a seal, pretending not to hear. “The little—”
“It’s my fault.” I almost startle as I find Niko at my side. He’s wearing his sunglasses now, but I still sense the sweep of his gaze. “We talked about pool safety when we got back from the beach.”
“You’re not going to be one of those stepfathers, are you?” I return hotly, swinging around to face him. My heart still hammering at Hugh’s recklessness, not to mention I still feel wrong footed about the conversation I’d overheard. But not so much that I don’t note the way his brows retract at that one pertinent word.
“What kind of stepfather is that?” He doesn’t bother to hide his amusement.
“The kind who tries to win favor by playing friend,” I snipe, folding my arms across my chest.
“So you don’t think I should buy Arsenal Football Club?” Niko returns, challenging my ridiculousness. “Milaya, you know me better than that.”
“Do I? I thought I knew you once.”
“Peanut,” he suddenly growls. “I can’t wait to see what you’re hiding under this.” His gaze flits over my body, everywhere it touches, it burns, and he steps suddenly closer, his hands curling around my hips. At the contact, my insides bloom, my body reacts with such treachery as his thumbs make a slow sweep of my hips over the thin cotton sarong. He’s so close I can smell the base notes of his cologne, oud wood, rich and heady. I find I have to resist the urge to melt against him because a shirtless Niko is a sight to behold, and a low growling Niko is a temptation like nothing else. But temptation is base and carnal and wholly selfish, and the attraction I’m fighting right now has other flavors. Listening in to his conversation with Hugh and Archie has muddied my thoughts, has complicated things. He spoke with sense and compassion and he handled Hugh’s worries with such delicate diplomacy. Niko Vanyin might not be husband material but it’s a crying shame he isn’t a father.
“Red and,”—his eyes dip, his finger and thumb begin to pull on one string—“brief.”
Was a word ever enunciated so wickedly?
“You’ll have to keep imagining,” I retort with supreme effort as I press my hand to the center of his chest. I make as though to push him away when his hands tighten on my hips, “because I have no intention of taking it—”
That’s as far as I get, unless you count the very undignified squeal I make the moment before I hit the water.
34
Van
The children’s delighted cheers sound through my waterlogged ears. I hadn’t pushed Isla into the pool, I’d launched both of us in.
“You!” She breaks the water’s surface, swiping her hair from her face. Using the flat of her hand, she sends a wave of water my way. “Horrible, rotten—” But she can’t stop the tilt of her lips. Isla isn’t the precious type and add in her sons whooping approvals and I know she won’t stay cross very long.
“You know me better than to issue a dare, darling.” Ducking under the surface, I slick back my hair.
“I did no such thing!” she splutters.
“You said you had no intention of taking it.”
“Off!” she splutters, pink cheeked and gorgeous. “I have no intention of taking off my sarong.”
“Ah, my mistake,” I reply through a smile. “Anyway, a dunking might be preferable to the alternative.” We’re both treading water, her reluctant smile an echo of my unrepentant one. “I was very close to kissing you.”
“You wouldn’t.” Her eyes flick to the other end of the pool where the boys have stopped hollering.
“Didn’t you hear? I have their permission.”
“You’re not kissing me in front of my children, Van.”
“You shouldn’t have said that,” I say, moving closer.
“What are you going to do? Make me wet twice?”
“Is that a dare?”
I laugh loudly when she splutters, “I didn’t mean—”
God, I love her disconcerted expression and, as she blinks, sunlight glistening from waterdrops balanced on her spiked lashes force a memory to the forefront of my brain. The bathroom was bathed in sunlight and my fingers wrinkled as I’d held out my hand to help her from the bath. The floor was covered with water and bubbles that had poured over the side from when she’d ridden me. One foot on the floor, the other in the bath, she slipped, her body crashing against mine. Hardened nipples and bathroom cool skin flush from thigh to chest. It had been moments since I’d had her and I wanted her again. But it was more than that. I wanted her heart—needed her bone deep. I think that was the moment I knew we were meant for forever. And it feels like it happened yesterday, not years ago. I still feel the same now. It’s as though loving her altered my DNA somehow.