Tina Beckett – One Night With Dr Nikolaides: One Night with Dr Nikolaides (страница 14)

She wheeled round and stumbled back a few steps. Being so close, inhaling his scent—amazingly pure and clean after such a long day—was suddenly too much.

“Why are you being so nice to me?”

Theo actually looked shocked at her question. “Why shouldn’t I be?”

Cailey was about to launch into a rather detailed explanation of exactly why this was all rather peculiar when he closed the space between them and put a finger to her lips.

“Cailey mou. I’ve always felt we had a connection, you and I. Don’t you know that?”

She shook her head against his finger, fighting the urge to open her lips and draw it into her mouth. Any connection they’d had had been more master and servant than anything. She’d grown up working in his house. Scrubbing, cooking and cleaning alongside her mother, who had spent her entire adult life serving as the Nikolaides housekeeper.

Sure, she’d played with Erianthe when they were kids, and sometimes with Theo when he and his gang were in the mood to torture or tolerate his kid sister, but a connection...? She’d thought that kiss they’d shared all those years ago had been a dare. A cruel one at that. For it had been only a day later when she’d overheard him telling his friends he’d never marry a housemaid.

She was surprised to see him looking hurt. Genuinely hurt. Furrowed brow. Eyes narrowing. A sharp intake of breath. The whole caboodle.

“Not in the strictest sense,” she whispered against his finger.

“We’re peas in a pod. You must know that. And today, working together, wasn’t that proof?”

“No. It only proves we work well together. Our lives...we’re so different.”

She wanted to hear him say it. Say he’d held himself apart from her because of her background. That he’d soared where she had failed even to get into medical school, let alone become a doctor.

“You are different from me,” he said, lowering his head until his lips whispered against hers. “You’re better.”

Before she could craft a single lucid thought they were kissing. Softly at first. Not tentatively, as a pair of teenagers might have approached their first kiss, more as if each touch, each moment they were sharing, spoke to the fact that they had belonged together all along.

Simply kissing him was an erotic pleasure on its own. The short walk to Theo’s house had given his lips a slight tang of the sea. Emboldened by his sure touch, Cailey swept her tongue along Theo’s lower lip, a trill of excitement following in the wake of his moan of approbation.

The kisses grew in strength and depth. Theo pulled her closer to him, his lips parting to taste and explore her mouth. The hunger and fatigue they’d felt on leaving the clinic were swept into the dark shadows as light and energy grew within each of them like a living force of its own.

Undiluted sexual attraction flared hot and bright within her, the flames licking at her belly, her breasts, her inner thighs, as if it had been waiting for exactly this moment to present itself. Molten, age-old, pent-up, magically realized and released desire.

CHAPTER EIGHT

“COME, KOUKLA MOU.”

Theo pulled one of the candles off its stand and took Cailey by the hand. He led her to a doorway on the far side of the living room, barely knowing where his energy was coming from. A stress release after such an intense day? A primal need to remind himself of his mortal ability to weather such an extreme act of nature?

Or was it something much more simple? Like fate?

He turned to her and released the riot of curls from the wooden hairclip barely managing to hold her inky black hair in place. She flushed and looked to the floor as silky waves cascaded around her shoulders.

“Are you sure this is what you want?” His voice sounded hoarse. A sure sign that his emotions had taken over.

She turned her head and gave looked at him askance. It was a look that said, Are you?

“Thee mou... I’ve thought about you—about this—all day. I just want you to be sure. If this is your first time—”

She cut him off with a shake of her head. “This isn’t my first time. But...”

He swept his fingers along her face. “But what? You can talk to me, Cailey.”

She looked him straight in the eye and said, “You’re the first man I ever wanted.”

Her words roiled through him like molten lava.

“Come here, you.”

He tugged her to him, blood pounding through his veins, powering the need to taste, touch, taunt...and fulfil her every desire.

Cailey tutted playfully. “I’ve waited twenty-seven years for this...let’s take it slow.”

She pushed his hands down, then began with trembling fingers to unbutton his shirt.

He lifted her hands to his lips and kissed each of her fingertips. “Don’t be scared. It’s only me.”

Her cheeks pinkened. “That’s precisely why I’m shaking, you fool.”

“I don’t frighten you, do I?” He almost laughed at the absurdity of it.

“No.” She shook her head. “It’s how I feel about you that frightens me.”

She looked so vulnerable the only thing he could do was pull her to him and whisper into her ear that she could trust him. He meant it, too. And couldn’t imagine making the promise to anyone else.

“How do I know?”

He held her away, so he could look her straight in the eye as he said, “Because I feel exactly the same way as you do.”

“What? Excited, terrified and itching to get naked all at once?”

He laughed softly. “That about captures it.”

She tipped her head to the side, as if ascertaining whether he meant it. “You’re not quite who I thought you were, Theo Nikolaides.”

“Oh? And who exactly did you think I was?”

She shook her head, “I’m not really sure anymore, but...” She lowered her lashes then opened her eyes with a teasing flash of a smile. “Do you think we should just go for it?”

“I think that’s a most excellent idea.” He laughed again, before weaving his fingers through hers. “Come on.” He led her to the big sprawling bed he’d indulged himself with when he’d bought the place. “Let’s spend as long as we need to get to know one another all over again.”

She held her ground. “Sorry. Just one more little thing. Can we have a no-strings-attached rule? Like, what goes on at the earthquake...stays at the earthquake?”

“If you wish.” He shot her a sidelong look. “Unless it’s to keep this a secret from a boyfriend back in London?”

“No.” She sucked in a quick breath. “No boyfriend. Just big brothers...and a mother who seems to find out everything anyhow and...well...your father.”

“My father?” He barely recognized his own voice it had hollowed out so quickly. “What’s he got to do with anything?”

“I don’t really think he likes me.”

“Well, I don’t like him very much.” The bastard. If he’d so much as said a single word to her...

Cailey’s eyes widened. “Really?”

“Really.”

He flicked a switch in his head. He didn’t want to be talking about his father right now. Or anyone else, for that matter.

“C’mere, you.” He pulled her over to the bed and straddled her before pressing his lips gently to hers. “What goes on at the earthquake...stays at the earthquake.”

He took Cailey’s hands and put them back on his chest as he dipped his lips to hers for another deep, erotically charged kiss. Feeling her breasts press up into his chest, her nipples taut with anticipation, sent a surge of blazing heat straight to his groin.

He gave the hem of her scrubs top a gentle tug. “May I?”

She nodded, her eyes sparkling in the candlelight.

He slowly lifted her top up and off her, his fingers lightly grazing the bands of lace cupping her breasts as he did so. By God she was beautiful. Olive skin. Full breasts. Dark nipples, taut and tempting.

He put the top on a chair by the bed and knelt in front of her. Unable to resist, he softly cupped her breasts, relishing the sensation of lace and warm skin as Cailey wove her fingers through his hair and tugged his head back for an urgent kiss.

Enough with the niceties, her kiss told him. It’s time to get down to business.

All he could absorb in his overwrought brain was that he wanted more. To touch. Caress. Give her every ounce of pleasure he could.

He curved an arm around her waist and pulled her to him, his fingers cupping one of her breasts as he licked the other one through the gossamer lace barely containing it. He shifted the fabric to one side and gave her nipple a hot, wet lick. Her fingers dug into his hair again, giving him all the permission he needed to continue. Swirling, tasting, touching, caressing...

He forced himself to adopt a more luxurious pace, relishing the soft shudders of approbation as Cailey’s body reeled and recovered from the erotic journey of his tongue and lips across her breasts, down to her belly. Shifting across her hips. Making the most of the luscious dips and curves along the way before lowering his lips to her waistline.