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His eyebrows shot up; too late, he wished he hadn’t reacted. But that hotel was well-known to be a playground for the rich and famous. Certainly not somewhere the average ship’s officer might stay, not even a doctor, and the last thing he wanted to do was get involved with the monied crowd.
They, apparently, were more his brother’s crowd than his.
‘A farewell gift from my...friends,’ Isla said suddenly, as if reading his thoughts. Though he could tell she was holding something back. ‘We thought we’d push the boat out, if you’ll pardon the pun.’
He could understand that. Didn’t he do the same thing each year, when he booked twelve months ahead just to eat in Chile’s world-renowned Te Tinca restaurant?
Alone.
‘Ah. And they can’t spare you for an evening?’
So why was he now insisting on the stunning doctor accompanying him?
It had to be his way of avoiding Daksh.
‘I... They... I suppose they could,’ she hazarded after a moment. ‘Not a date, of course.’
‘Of course not,’ he demurred. ‘Well, Little Doc, shall we say seven-thirty? In this lobby.’
And then, before anything else could be said—or any more damage done—Nikhil turned around and strode away.
CHAPTER TWO
ISLA DIDN’T KNOW what had possessed her to agree to dinner with Nikhil.
Or at least that was what she tried to tell herself.
She could pretend that it was because of the text she’d received from her mother moments before Nikhil had asked her for that drink. Even as she’d been walking away from him, she’d seen the message demanding to know where she was. More than that, she’d been able to practically hear her mother’s excitement in every word, as Marianna had crowed about finding the most perfect new man for her to meet.
Isla shuddered, just as she had back then. The last thing she wanted was a blind date, or any date, really. Which was why her head had been calmly telling her to politely decline Nikhil’s offer, even whilst her skin had been on fire and her insides had been jostling as if her organs were playing a game of musi
cal chairs.
But then, instead of a refusal, she’d listened to that devilish voice in her head telling her that the best way to avoid being pressed into a blind date by her mother would be to tell her that she already had a date—with a First Officer, no less.
It was a logical solution. But, deep down, Isla suspected that her motives weren’t quite so logical. If she was honest, she might suspect that they had less to do with practicality and more to do with the way that Nikhil had made her body feel...alive.
Just by looking at her. There had been more chemistry between her and this relative stranger than she thought she’d ever felt with Brad.
And wasn’t that rather sad?
Certainly it explained why she was now standing in front of the mirror, trying to quash some unwanted thrill as she critically assessed her sixth outfit choice so far, like the kind of teenager she had never really been.
She might have spoken to Leo, but her former stepsister didn’t seem to have got back to the hotel either. Isla tried not to take that as fate giving her a naughty little push.
Staring at her outfit again, she heaved a sigh. She never dithered over her clothing choices. And her room had certainly never looked as though she’d emptied the contents of the closet onto her bed. That was for other girls. Just as the rich lipstick was, purchased barely two hours ago from the hotel’s extortionately priced boutique.
Ridiculous.
There was taking the opportunity to avoid a blind date set up by her mother, and then there was dressing up as though this dinner with Nikhil was a date in itself.
Well, it wasn’t happening.
Marching into the bathroom, she wiped the lipstick off her mouth and threw the tube into the bin and marched back out into the bedroom. Then she proceeded to quickly and neatly put all the clothes back onto the hangers and away, as though she could restore some order into her suddenly uncharacteristically topsy-turvy world.
And if her hands were shaking slightly, and her eyes kept flying to the clock to see that the digits had barely changed from the last time she’d checked, then at least no one else but her would ever know.
Finally, her room was clear again. Pristine. Ordered. The way she liked it. Isla checked the clock again. Five minutes had passed.
