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They were warm, his lips, but still, and for a long, dreadful moment she thought she’d done the wrong thing—totally wrecked whatever it was they had.
Or didn’t have…
Then his lips responded and he turned his body, reaching out to draw her close, to hold her in an iron clasp while his lips devoured hers, feasting on them—a starving man finding food…
Her heat matched his, burning in her body, lips opening, tongues tangling, little moans coming from one or other of them, maybe both, Emma didn’t know.
She only knew that this was what she’d wanted, yet hadn’t wanted, what she’d missed, but hadn’t wanted to miss.
The engine noise of an approaching car broke them apart, and they both straightened in their seats, both looking through the windscreen now, panting slightly.
The car passed and Marty started the engine of his vehicle, pulling carefully back onto the road.
Emma re-buckled her seatbelt, too confused to speak, hardly daring to look at the man who’d aroused such fire in her.
But was it only fire?
Need?
Lust?
Or something more?
Fire and need would be okay. Maybe even lust. They could have an affair, try to keep it quiet. They spent so much time together anyway, maybe it would go unnoticed…
Except by her father, who would be the one minding the boys while she was with Marty, which would mean putting more responsibility on him when she was trying to free him up to live his own life.
‘I can’t have an affair.’
She blurted out the end result of all her torturous thoughts as Marty pulled up outside her house.
‘It wouldn’t be fair on Dad. Especially now when he’s just begun to have a little bit of social life himself.’
Marty turned towards her, one side of his mouth lifting in a rueful smile.
‘I was about to say the same thing,’ he said, reaching out to cup her cheek in one hand and rub his thumb across her undoubtedly swollen lips. ‘I couldn’t do that to you. Couldn’t have you join the list as “another one of Marty’s women” because you are way, way more than that to me.’
He shook his head, not smiling now.
‘So, we’re stuck, aren’t we?’
Unless it wasn’t an affair, the treacherous voice in Emma’s head whispered, and it was her turn to shake her head. Getting married again was a sensible, practical idea for her and she had no doubt she’d grow to love the man she married.
In time…
But the thing she didn’t want was passion, because that way heartbreak lay…
Yet whatever it was that had flared between her and Marty was definitely passion, the kind, she feared, that would deepen and spread like wildfire through her body, steal the heart she’d have to grow again, and fill her life.
Which meant commitment—the one thing Marty didn’t want.
She leaned across and kissed his cheek.
‘Thanks for the lift,’ she said, and slid out of the car.
* * *
Marty drove home, his body throbbing, his mind in turmoil as anger at his foolish action raged back and forth.
He’d stopped the car because the urge to kiss the woman he’d been with—to hold her in his arms and feel her body against his and, yes, to kiss her senseless—had been so strong he’d feared he’d have an accident if he’d kept driving.
Had it been Mark’s offer to drive Emma home that had lit the touch-paper?
Or had it happened earlier when he’d walked back to the chopper and seen her sitting in the doorway—watching him. Something he couldn’t read in her eyes. Something he couldn’t read yet still excited him.
Then she’d told him about her husband—about Simon’s death—had poured out her heart to him and he’d…
What?
Whatever, he’d stopped the car to cool down—to get his head together—and the damn woman had kissed him.
Not just kissed him but responded to his kisses with white-hot fire that had burned through his body like a fever.
Which left him where exactly?
Apart from frustrated as hell…
He’d just have to avoid her whenever possible, quite easy, really, a lot of his flights didn’t involve a doctor…
He remembered her little boys, their hands placed so trustingly in his when they’d gone for ice cream, and he thought his heart might break.
But his sudden surge of temper just before that happy moment had reminded him genetics ruled.
Okay, so he probably wouldn’t have hit the bloke for smacking his kid, even without Emma’s touch on his arm, but he’d wanted to…
Yet hadn’t Emma said, even after seeing that, that she’d trust him more than anyone with her boys?
Could he get past the so hated, yet still so vivid image of his father’s raised arm, his mother falling with the baby…
