Can’t. Can’t.
Can’t think. Can’t talk. The pounding intensified, splintering pain through her skull and hammering at her temples. Shudders racked her body as the heat increased until her skin felt it would be forever blistered.
He spoke more words, maybe even shouted them. She couldn’t tell. Could barely even make out his face as it swam before her as a flesh-colored fog. Could barely even see the ground as it came at her as a blur of grass and walkway.
Ooh…this was going to hurt.
“Help,” a thin voice Claire loathed to think was hers cried out.
He said something else. A curse she could tell, as she closed her eyes and waited for impact, going only by the intensity of his voice. Another of the same followed, and then his hands were there. His mercifully strong hands grabbed hold of her arms and brought her descending body to an abrupt halt. One of those hands came behind her knees and he swung her up into his arms, holding her gently against his solid chest as he had last night. Then he’d moved her toward her greatest fear. Now he moved her to safety. He took them so goddamned easily into the cabin that she would have wept with envy if tears of terror weren’t already streaming down her face.
He laid her on the couch and moved into the kitchen, returning with a damp washcloth in seconds. She could mostly make out his face now. Sympathy was back, brimming in his pale blue eyes as he sank down on the edge of the couch and applied the cool cloth to her forehead. “You’re okay, sweetheart.”
A hysterical laugh rolled out of her at the irony of his comment. She wasn’t feeling sweet, not by a long shot. She was feeling furious as hell and like her body would go up in flames. At least the tears had stopped.
“Not okay. Burning.” Strength slowly returning, Claire forced her hands to the hem of her sweater and pulled it up to her neck. The inside air wasn’t exactly cool but even the moderate temperature was a relief to her fevered flesh. He brought the washcloth a couple of inches above her chest, wringing out the excess water, and she sighed with the blissful contact.
Smiling, he moved the cloth over her skin, tracing the contours of her breasts above her bra. “You’re fine. Just like I said you would be.”
Damn that smile. She could see his face picture perfect now, and the last thing she wanted was him breaking out that sexilicious chin cleft. It made the idea of closing her eyes and giving herself into his care far too appealing. She couldn’t trust him like that, not when he’d been the source of her misery.
She let his ministrations continue another minute as she regained full control of her body. Anger surged higher with each step toward normalcy. Her mind finally clear and the heat mostly gone, she jerked the washcloth from his hand. “Don’t you touch me, you dick. And don’t you ever kiss me again.”
He came to his feet. No quick bolt off the couch, but a leisurely stand that was accompanied by the broadening of his smile. “I take it the sex is off?”
The sex?
How could he even think about sex at a time like this? When she was lying on his couch with her shirt pulled up to her throat, her nipples taut from the stroke of the cool washcloth and pressing hard against her bra cups. And he was standing next to her with only his jeans on, probably sporting a semi from that little impromptu grinding she’d done outside his door. Both of them breathing hard…
Claire’s nipples tingled as the decadent image painted itself in her mind. She sighed in understanding. He sighed back, a sound as amused as it was rough with arousal.
All the fight drained out of her as the truth of the guilty party returned. Erin’s fault. All of this was Erin’s fault. He was only doing his job by trying to desensitize her to the outside world. Whoever he was.
Ah, God. She’d almost slept with him and she didn’t even know his name. During those first couple of crazy years of college, she wouldn’t have cared. Now she didn’t find the thought of sleeping with a virtual stranger—one who presented himself well, at least—to be desperate or slutty; rather, it was one more awesome step for Women’s Lib. Still, a first name would be nice.
Pushing her sweater down, she swung her feet to the floor and moved into a sitting position. “What’s your name?”
“Chris.”
“Well, Chris, what happened to talking to your boss?”
His smile vanished. “Right. I should get to that.” He went into the bedroom. He emerged a few seconds later, pulling a navy sweatshirt over his head.
Claire mourned the loss of the stellar view of his chest and torso even as she told herself it was a good thing. After what happened at his door, she could totally see him using her lust for his body against her for the next three weeks.
Going to a closet near the door, he grabbed a pair of tennis shoes and shoved his feet into them. Twisting the front doorknob, he glanced back at her. Her belly fluttered with the idea he would already try more of that desensitizing crap. Then her sex gave a fluttering of its own with the idea that he would use another sex-her-up approach.
In the end, he didn’t do either, just tossed out a teasing grin. “I should be back in a half hour or so. Don’t go too far without me.”
Chris started down the quarter-mile stretch of beach that led from his cabin to Ecstasy’s main office area. The trail through the woods would have been a lot quicker, but it also would have been devoid of the breeze, and his body needed a thorough cooling. His claim to Claire about talking to the boss had been just that; a claim for the sake of escaping her “murderer” comment. The truth was Treah had taken off for the Pacific opening yesterday morning. Even so, Chris was hoping this venture to the office would pay off as more than a reprieve for his mind and body.
Typically, at least one of the guys could be found hanging out in the meeting room, which doubled as a rec center for everything from Texas Hold ’Em tournaments during their off week to more intimate gatherings when the women were on the island. None of the men seemed liable to be stealing money from the resort, so Chris would start in on his covert interrogations with the most available of them.
Chris reached the set of docks that harbored the boats used both for bringing clients to the island and taking them out on pleasure cruises during their stay. Once the weather grew a little warmer, cabanas and a volleyball net would be placed in the sandy stretch of land in front of the docks. The beachfront was deserted for now, a fact he took comfort in as he veered toward the office, set thirty-plus yards off from the water to help ensure safety during hurricane season.
Arriving at the tan, two-story building—the second floor of which Treah, and lately Gwen, called home—he pulled open the meeting-room screen door. Ted Henner, one of the more recent healing recruits, was inside. The young blond guy sat kicked back in a folding chair, feet on the seat of a chair at the table across from him and his attention on the golf tournament playing on one of the wall-mounted TVs. Since Treah figured doing without certain luxuries meant they’d have more desire to stay focused on their clients, the lower-seniority coaches lacked for televisions in their cabins.
Chris went to the coffeemaker on the opposite side of the room. Shelley kept a fresh pot on throughout the day and, while he’d never been much of an afternoon coffee drinker, he helped himself to a cup. If nothing else, it would be something to do with his hands instead of fidgeting like an idiot when he attempted to search out Ted for information via the small talk he’d always sucked at.
He
