New Arrivals: Surprise Baby for Him: The Cattleman's Adopted Family / The Soldier's Homecoming / Marriage for Baby. Melissa McClone
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his lips, with his tongue, with his teeth, wringing soft sighs from her, and tiny, tiny moans…before he took the kiss deeper, hungrier, wilder…making her feel like a goddess…
Goddess of the rock pool.
She felt this could go on for ever and getting wilder and wilder, spinning out of control, until she tumbled into the water with him, and swam naked. Made love beneath the waterfall.
‘Do you fancy a swim?’ Seth murmured into her mouth and his eyes were heavy-lidded and hot as he searched her face.
‘You can read my mind,’ she whispered, totally, totally lost in longing.
She reached for the hem of her T-shirt and hauled it over her head and Seth groaned softly. His hands were trembling as he touched her breasts.
With a cry, Amy began to tug his shirt free from his jeans. She’d never been so turned on, so drowning in desire.
But then, at the worst possible moment, like a distant echo from a past life, Seth said one word.
‘Bella.’
What?
Her mind was too crazed to comprehend. Her eyes were closed, her breath trapped in desperate anticipation of his touch.
‘What about Bella?’ he said.
Oh, good grief.
She couldn’t believe she’d been so carried away that she’d forgotten Bella. Completely.
Seth’s groan morphed into a shaky laugh. ‘I don’t suppose we can leave her with Ming for a little longer?’
A little longer. How long was that?
Too long, surely.
If only…
With a heavy sigh, Seth gathered Amy close, pressed his lips to her forehead. His hands rubbed her bare arms, muddling her thoughts, making her yearn to throw off her responsibilities.
But how could she be so weak?
She sighed. ‘Poor Ming will probably be demented by now. Bella has the attention span of a goldfish. I suppose we’d better head back and rescue him.’
‘I was afraid you’d say that.’
His reluctance to leave was flattering, but with a good-humoured chuckle he released her and he bent down and retrieved her T-shirt from the rock at their feet.
He helped her into it, then enfolded her to him one more time, flooding her with happiness.
As they went back along the track and up the stone stairs the wild happiness strummed Amy’s nerve endings and she had to stop herself from skipping.
She wasn’t sure if this second kiss had been another reckless moment, or the start of something quite, quite wonderful…but exquisite thrills zapped through her like a riff on an electric guitar, and she was too happy to spoil the blissful sensations by analysing them too much.
Seth watched Amy disappear into the house to relieve Ming of his babysitting duties, and then, as sanity returned, let out his breath on an anguished sigh.
He’d totally lost it, lost himself in the sexy sweetness of Amy’s kiss. He’d come within a hair’s breadth of dragging her into that pool and taking things beyond the point of no return.
Kissing Amy was fast becoming a dangerous addiction.
But it was madness.
He should never have started this. He should have been stronger, should have had the sense to remember Bella before he made a move on Amy.
He’d set out this morning with the best of intentions, but he’d lost his perspective at some point during the conversation about Rachel and his uncle. He’d kept the details of their story to himself for so long, and it had been damned difficult to talk about what had happened, but Amy had been so incredibly sympathetic, so understanding.
She really did understand. She’d experienced the same black hole of grief. She’d been living there, in that same painful, guilty place.
She knew.
He’d felt a soul-deep connection, and when he’d told her she was lovely, he hadn’t only been talking about her dark chocolate eyes, or her lovely smile, or her exceptionally lovely legs. Looking at Amy was a source of constant delight, but he couldn’t ignore her warmth and sympathy, or her courage for taking on the responsibility of Bella.
The fact that these qualities all came wrapped in such a sweet, sexy package was a miracle.
Amy had looked so right standing there beside the rock pool and he’d almost hoodwinked himself into thinking that she belonged there.
Fool.
He shouldn’t have started another kiss; should have been stronger. Amy hadn’t been flirting. Hell, if she’d been flirting, the kiss could have been excused. But she’d been deadly serious when she’d turned to him.
She’d been asking him to take a leap of faith.
And Seth had no faith.
He’d lost his faith years ago in hard and bitter lessons, and he knew damn well that no amount of loving could overcome the problems posed by this remote lifestyle.
All faith in such rosy dreams had been shattered by his mother, by Jennifer, and by what had happened when Rachel turned up…
Seth’s die had been cast then, just as Amy’s had. They had separate responsibilities now. He had no choice but to keep Serenity going. He owed it to his uncle to stay here, and Amy had no choice but to return to Melbourne and to raise Rachel’s daughter there, surrounded by family, schools, playgroups, ballet classes—everything a little girl needed.
He had no right to dally in kisses, or to toy with Amy’s emotions.
For the rest of her stay, he had to remember that. Her sweetness and softness were out of bounds.
Hell, he’d already kissed her twice.
Twice.
Two mistakes.
He couldn’t afford a third.
AMY was unhappily aware of how very quiet Seth was as they set off later that morning to explore Serenity in his four-wheel drive.
They were travelling west and ahead of them the sky was leaden and thick with grey clouds. ‘Looks like the rain’s coming back,’ she said.
Seth merely nodded, but she told herself he was concentrating on the narrow, winding track that quite quickly emerged from lush rainforest into open eucalypt bushland and then to grassy plains.
Now, she could see big mobs of Serenity’s cattle dotting the wide, flat paddocks. The animals were huge, pale cream and grey with droopy ears and humps on their shoulders.
‘What kind of cows are they?’ she asked.
‘Brahmans. That’s the best breed for the tropics.’
‘So…do you ride horses and do all those wonderful cowboy stunts?’
‘What cowboy stunts?’ His eyes held a glint of amusement that suggested he was only pretending to be insulted.
‘Oh, you know—throwing a lasso around some poor unsuspecting cow, or turning your horse on a five-cent piece.’
He spared her a small smile. ‘You mean the incredibly valuable stock-handling skills that come after years and years of hard practice?’
‘Well…yes. Have you been through all the years of practice?’
‘Sure.’