Читать книгу His Heir, Her Honour / Meddling With A Millionaire: His Heir, Her Honour - Catherine Mann - Страница 11

The airplane phone rang and rang and rang, jarring Lilah from her dazed stare out the window at the distant mountain peaks below. She started to walk across to answer the phone before the jangling disturbed Carlos’s catnap, but he bolted upright in the reclined lounger and snagged the receiver.

“Speak,” he barked into the phone in his normal gruff fashion.

Some parts of his blunt personality were still all too familiar.

He scrubbed a hand over his eyes, his groggy look clearing in a flash as he transformed back to the alert surgeon, the intense man she knew from work. He returned his seat to the upright position. After a few clipped responses of “good,” “excellent” and “keep me posted” rumbling from him, he disconnected the call.

Unbuckling, he stood with an almost disguised wince and started toward her. “Apparently Nancy figured out my plans to fly out from a note Wanda had jotted on her desk. If that’s the case, then Nancy knows nothing more about our travel plans than the airport location.”

Lilah thumbed the brass casing around the window, polishing a nonexistent smudge. “It’s a relief to know we don’t have to worry about Nancy waiting for us when we land in Vail.”

“We can move on to the vacation part of our plans with a clear mind.” He glanced at his watch. “Sorry to have napped so long. You must be hungry. Our steward can bring a light snack or supper even. Whatever you wish, I’ll make it happen.”

“How about a double bacon cheeseburger with a mint chocolate chip milkshake?” she asked, only half joking. She was learning just how tenacious pregnancy cravings can be.

He reached for the call button. “I’ll see what he can put together.”

Resting her hand on his wrist, she stopped him. “I was kidding. Really, I’m not hungry yet. I just need to stretch my legs. The seats are fabulous—” as was everything on this top-of-the-line private craft “—but my back hurts if I sit too long.”

His brow furrowed as he studied her. Muscular shoulders encased in warm black wool called to her fingers until everything else faded. Her mouth went dry. Carlos’s gaze fell to her mouth and she couldn’t stop her tongue from teasing along her lips. His nostrils flared with awareness.

She and he had a sensual connection, without question. But there was no emotional connection of any substance. Right? As long as she remembered that, she should be able to protect her heart.

His hand settled at the base of her spine, as if already testing her resolve. She started to inch away, but he pressed ever so slightly, ever so perfectly, against the spot that ached. Again, she reminded herself the physical was different from the emotions. Why should she deny herself the comfort—the undiluted pleasure—of his touch?

His fingers circled with deepening pressure and she sighed. A hint of a moan hitched a ride on the gusty breath making its way up her throat.

While massaging in increasingly larger circles, he reached past her to slide open the shade further to improve the view of the clusters of city lights below. “How much does your back hurt?”

“Just a little … right there.”

His intuitive touch gave her pause as she realized just how he knew what to do. He lived in constant pain without a complaint.

Straightening, she inched aside. “It’s nothing I can’t handle.”

He followed, his hands never leaving her body. “There’s no need for you to handle it all. I’m trying to be nice, so stop arguing. Doctor’s orders.”

“Okay, then.” She began to offer to rub his back in return and then almost gasped.

An urge to laugh followed, chased by a bittersweet sense of how special this would have been had it happened the morning after they’d been together. Or if he’d apologized nicely yesterday for being a jerk these past months, providing a perfectly logical explanation for his behavior.

But she wasn’t whimsical. She was practical. Therefore she would enjoy this blasted backrub to the fullest. It was about the physical, nothing to do with her emotions.

Talking, however, would help keep her grounded more in reality and less in the sensual play of his fingers working tension from knotted muscles. “We haven’t gotten to talk since boarding. Is the plane yours?”

“My family owns controlling interest in a small charter company,” he answered softly from behind her, his subtle accent curling around each word and into her. “It’s an investment that also enables us to fly wherever we wish with minimal discussion of our plans.”

“No one knows your itinerary.”

“That’s the idea. I’ve been able to lead a relatively normal life at the hospital since my identity became public. You run a tight ship and I appreciate that. But out in the real world, I need to be careful.”

Which explained why he was especially concerned to find Nancy waiting for them. Her shoulders rose with tension. He skimmed upward to cup them, rubbing until they lowered again. Relaxation radiated through her as he became some kind of medical magician.

“That’s better. Just let go,” he said, his mouth closer to her ear this time.

Unable to resist, she soaked in the heat of his breath against her neck, inhaled the peppermint scent of his toothpaste. What would it be like if he were telling her to “just let go” while they were doing other, more intimately pleasurable things?

She dragged her attention off his command in her ear and scrambled for something coherent to say.

“You’ve got a family-owned air taxi service for the rich and famous.” She traced the teakwood encircling the portal, brass edging gleaming. She’d ridden with her father in similar crafts as a kid. Of course, thinking about her dad was worse than thinking of Nancy.

“Actually,” Carlos’s thumbs pressed between her shoulder blades with intuitive precision that sent waves of pleasure radiating outward, “Enrique—my father—diversified the company a few years ago so that when the planes are not in use for the needs of our family and our associates, they are used on call for search-and-rescue emergencies.”

“Your father sounds like quite a philanthropist.” Different from what she’d expected from a recluse monarch. “He sounds like you.”

His hands stilled for the first time. “You’re the first to say that.”

“How would you describe your father?” She glanced back at him, catching a hint of tensed jaw before his face became a smooth, handsome mask again.

Carlos stared past her, through the portal, his massage resuming. “He’s ill.”

Not at all what she expected him to say. She tried to turn toward him but his touch became steely for the first time as he held her in place without hurting her, but unmistakably insistent.

Accepting his wishes to keep his face hidden from her, she gripped the window as clouds obscured the specks of light below. “I’m very sorry to hear that. What’s wrong with him?”

“His liver is failing,” he answered, his voice emotionless other than a thickening of his accent. “During the escape from San Rinaldo, he spent a lot of time on the run in poor living conditions.”

She’d read the basics about the coup in San Rinaldo, but there weren’t many details available. Hearing the event from Carlos, envisioning the terror the Medinas—Carlos—must have experienced, made her chest go tight with pain for them.

“How awful that must have been for your family. I can’t even begin to imagine.”

“It was not an easy time in our lives,” he understated simply. He stroked her shoulders, down her arms, never missing a beat even when his breathing became heavier against her hair. “We were not with him. My mother, my brothers and I went a different escape route once the rebels attacked. My father didn’t want to risk us being captured with him so he attempted to make them follow him instead.”

The picture unfolding in her mind was beyond imagining, but he seemed unwilling to take any comfort from her. Hell, he wouldn’t even let her look at him.

“How old were you?”

“Thirteen,” he answered starkly.

He traced up her arms again and stopped at the back of her dress. He slid a finger inside along her neck, just under the zipper, stroking one vertebra at a time. His sensuous touch was at such odds with their stark discussion, but then Carlos had always been a huge contradiction. The compassionate surgeon, gruff professional.

Tender lover, reserved friend.

And he clearly wanted to keep things on a physical level rather than emotional. How perfect since she’d thought the same thing herself not too long ago. Her head lolled forward and his hand tucked under the cashmere, fanning along either side of her spine, kneading nerve endings.

The zipper parted, only an inch, but still she gasped at the boldness of his move. Cool air brushed the tiny patch of bared flesh a second before his knuckles warmed her skin.

“Shhh,” he coaxed. “I’m not doing anything other than rubbing your back to make the trip more comfortable.”

She laughed softly. “Do you think I’m foolish?”

“Let me rephrase,” he said against her ear. “I will not do anything more unless you ask.”

Her heart stuttered at the image that conjured and the sensual power that gave her. What would it be like to claim the toe-curling bliss he could give her so easily?

So dispassionately?

She forced her thoughts to disengage from the path, dismayed to think he could pull away from her as smoothly as he could set her whole body to flame. No amount of temptation could lure her into that dangerous terrain. She wouldn’t be his next Nancy Wolcott, sprinting to the shelter of her little hatchback car in the rain while Carlos watched with his cool, unmoved gaze.

“Well, take note then, Carlos, because I won’t ask for more from you.” She was only willing to let the physical side go so far. For now? Until when?

“That sounds like a challenge.”

She turned slightly, meeting his eyes, their mouths so close every word was almost a kiss. “Do you really promise not to do anything more?”

With the full power of his intense dark gaze staring at her with frank honesty and desire, there was no mistaking what he wanted. He wasn’t thinking of any woman but her.

“You have my word. Tell me to stop and I will, without hesitation.” His low, husky vow vibrated the air between them.

“Then by all means,” she said, her voice breathier than she would have liked to admit, “continue what you were doing.”

She could handle this.

Carefully, she turned her back to him again, her breasts prickling with awareness as she wondered how far this game between them would go. His hands spread and the zipper parted further link by link. The top of her dress stayed on even as cool recycled air swooshed over her back. He worked his way south to her waist, thumbs circling along small but persistent knots of tension and strain.

Down, down farther still, he went until massaging almost at the base of her spine, his skillful fingers teasing along the top of her bikini panties. His hands spanned all the way across her lower back, then wrapped forward to rub lightly against her hip bones.

Her dress eased precariously forward, until she crossed her arms to hold it in place. Yet she couldn’t bring herself to tell him to stop. The pressure of his hands so intimately close to where she really wanted, needed, him to touch her only served to stoke the ache hotter.

They played with fire here and she knew it. Yet she trusted him when he said he wouldn’t take this further without her permission. So she surrendered to the sensations washing over her.

The man had the art of touch mastered. The glide of his hands on her back soothed and stirred at the same time, the healer and the infuriating prince.

Oh God, it had been so long since she’d had a man’s touch on her, his touch. Her body soaked up the gentle rasp of his callused fingers, his every move so precise as he explored her, relaxed her, totally in tune as to exactly where she needed his care.

According to the pregnancy books she’d read, the backaches would only grow worse, as if in some cosmic prelude to labor. Nerves pattered in her chest as her mind fast-forwarded, anxiety intensifying at the notion of facing that day alone.

“Shhh,” Carlos whispered in her ear. His hands skimmed around to her rib cage and pulled her back against him. “Whatever you’re thinking about. Don’t. You’re tensing up again. As much as I’m enjoying having my hands on you, I hate to think my efforts here have been for nothing.”

His hands rested right below her breasts, so close her nipples peaked against her bra, tight and needy. As he stepped closer, his body against her back, the rigid length of him pressed to her spine with unmistakable arousal. She longed to writhe against him and tempt him higher, harder. How she burned to lift his palms to cover her breasts, to ease the ache with the warm pressure of him.

It was just physical, she reminded herself. Heaven knew she wasn’t too happy with the man himself right now. But her willpower was beginning to wane.

She cuffed her fingers around his wrists and shifted his touch an inch lower. “I think it’s time to call a halt to this.”

Just that fast, his hands slid away. Not a word, not even a hint of a protest from him. However, her body shouted loud and clear over the loss of his touch. Her skin tightened, tingly and hot with awareness. Dragging in breaths that did nothing to steady her racing heart, she held her dress in place and faced him.

His features were taut, his eyes as molten as his dark cable sweater.

“We both—” Her voice shook and she steadied the betraying tremble before continuing, “We both know I’m attracted to you, and it’s a safe bet to say you’re attracted to me as well. I also know I can want you while not liking you very much. However, I’m not so sure that jumping each other is the wisest move—”

“Whoa, hold on there.” He held up his hands while keeping them well off her. “I have no intention of seducing you.”

“Oh.” The guy sure knew how to take the wind out of a girl’s sails. “Then what the hell was that erotic massage all about?”

He lowered his hands, still not so much as brushing her, while outlining her shape, her breasts, waist, hips, around and stopping an inch away from curving her bottom. “To put you at ease and reassure you of my self-control. You can enjoy what I’m about to do because you don’t have to keep up your guard.”

His confidence was unmistakable, the luxury cabin echoing with the regal sense of surety in his every word. Even in casual jeans and a sweater, this man was royal born, destined to lead, and right now she very much wanted to follow wherever he led.

A simple sway would bring her flush against him. Breathe, she reminded herself. Breathe. “And what exactly are you about to do?”

He grinned ever so slightly at her words, his predatory look lifting the hairs on her arms. “I’m going to kiss you.”