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She peered over the dash, her stunned gaze taking in the enormous edifice of stone, wood, granite and stained glass at the bottom of the driveway.
Turrets and towers and gables decorated with rococo flourishes soared into the cloudless sky like something conjured up during Sleeping Beauty’s one-hundred-year sleep. The riotous tumble of hedgerows and flowering scrubs, awash with blooming rosebuds, hugged a wide curving staircase that led up to a giant arched doorway.
Had Nate actually described this place as a house? The man certainly knew how to do understatement.
No way was that a house. Fairy-tale castle didn’t even begin to cover it. The glorious jumble of architectural styles from bygone eras looked like the Emerald City, Prince Charming’s Palace and the Fortress of Solitude all rolled into one.
Tess’s heart began to pound against her ribcage. It was totally and utterly mad, and yet at the same time totally and utterly magnificent.
Sputtering to a stop in the circular driveway behind a huge black SUV, Tess climbed out in a trance, her breathing speeding up again.
The scent of bougainvillea and seawater perfumed the breeze as she scanned the area. Apart from the Jeep, which had to be Nate’s, there was no sign of the man himself. As she studied the sleek, discreet and defiantly masculine mode of transport, then gawped at his childhood home again, her curiosity was piqued.
How the heck could he have grown up in a place like this and become so serious and intense? The man didn’t appear to have a frivolous bone in his body—except where sex in confined spaces was concerned—and yet this place had about as much gravity as Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.
Swinging round in a circle to take in the rest of the estate, and imagining how much fun she would have had running wild in a place like this as a child, she turned towards the cliffs—and let out another staggered gasp.
The estate’s landscaped gardens dipped down the hill towards a spectacular infinity pool perched on the cliff edge and shielded from the sea by a series of fanciful Grecian arches. Tess couldn’t quite contain her grin as she crossed the manicured lawn to get a better view. Thankfully, she’d worn a simple T-shirt, jeans and trainers combo for the trip so she didn’t have to worry about breaking an ankle.
As she got closer she made out a marble statue of Poseidon cavorting with a mermaid lover in the centre of the pool, their sculpted forms gloriously naked. The cerulean blue water sparkled and gleamed in the glare of the late-afternoon sunlight. Tess shielded her eyes to gaze past the cliffs towards the tumbling breakers hitting the coastline below, then stumbled to a stop, her heartbeat rising back up her throat as two hands appeared at the far side of the pool. A dark head emerged, swiftly followed by a tanned and nearly nude male body as the swimmer levered himself out of the water in one fluid movement and stood dripping on the marble tiles.
Nate.
Tess recognised him instantly, even though she’d never seen him with so few clothes on before. The broad shoulders, the imposing height, the lean waist and long legs were unmistakeable. As were the swift, controlled and economical movements as he leaned over to grab a towel draped across one of the marble water nymphs at the edge of the pool.
Despite the tremble of reaction and the trickle of sweat pooling between her breasts, Tess couldn’t drag her gaze away from him.
The short black trunks he wore clung to muscular thighs but did nothing to disguise the display of bunching muscles and flexing sinews as he rubbed the towel over his head. Having made his short hair stick up in spikes, he concentrated on working the towel in efficient strokes down his arms and over his bare chest—and Tess’s knees began to shake. The low hum of desire turned into the insistent punch of red-hot lust.
I’m toast!
Nate Graystone had the most magnificent body she’d ever seen. His gloriously masculine physique more perfectly formed than the Sea God lounging on the central plinth. And to think he’d been hiding all that under a business suit.
She cleared her throat, struggling to draw an even breath, and Nate’s head came up. He straightened, and faced her, as his gaze locked on hers.
Tess’s lungs seized to a halt, the heat flaring in her abdomen and shooting up to make her nipples thrust into hard aching peaks against her T-shirt as she took in the full glory of him. And two errant thoughts flashed through her mind at the exact same moment. Despite having made a baby with this man, she had never seen him completely naked... And she really, really wanted to.
Her gaze edged down, inexorably drawn towards the clinging black trunks and the impressive bulge beneath—and the place between her thighs went molten.
Her pulse pummelled her eardrums, drowning out the distant roar of the surf, the hungry cry of a seagull and the whispered words of caution. Her heart wasn’t just beating double time now, it was about to explode right out of her chest. She rubbed the heel of her hand between her breasts, trying to kickstart her lungs before she died from the adrenaline rush, as he slung the towel around his neck and strolled towards her.
With each step he took, every pulse point in her body pounded harder and faster. And suddenly the decision she’d made not to sleep with him again seemed a lot less doable.
‘Hello, Tess, so you finally made it,’ came a gruff voice from a million miles away as he drew level, the hint of censure in his tone not nearly as disturbing as the way his voice seemed to rake over her sensitised skin like sandpaper. ‘Sorry, I wasn’t out front to meet you. But you were late and it’s hot, so I took a swim.’
‘No problem,’ she croaked.
Except that I’m about to swallow my own tongue if you don’t put some clothes on.
She coughed, struggling not to fixate on the fascinating happy trail of hair that bisected an iron-hard six-pack and disappeared beneath the low-slung waistband of those damn trunks. She forced her eyes to his face. Surely there ought to be a law against a man with that much heft wearing stretch fabric.
The low hum built in her throat as she tried to think of something sensible to say, while she was in the early stages of a cardiac arrest.
Then the Greek god looked past her shoulder, cursed sharply and murmured: ‘Please tell me you didn’t take Highway One in that heap of junk?’
She glanced back at her car, concentrating on the sting of irritation in the hope that it would douse the firestorm of lust. Why did that tone always manage to make her feel as if she were fourteen years old again and sitting in her father’s study waiting to be chastised for her latest misdemeanor?
‘That heap of junk got me here just fine,’ she said with only a minor hint of breathlessness.
