over mango cheesecake before, Dev reflected as he watched Taylor eat her dessert. Her tongue flicked out to catch a crumb of crust, and his pulse bumped for a moment.
It had been doing that a lot in the past couple of hours.
Dev Carson considered himself smart, tough, ambitious and focused. When he decided to go after something—or someone—he was usually successful. What he wanted, he got.
And he wanted Taylor DeWitt in the worst way. At first, it had been a game: embarrass her a little, have some fun flirting. Somehow over the course of the day and evening, she’d become an unendurable temptation, a prospect of pleasure that drummed through his mind.
Watching her eat had been a revelation. Unlike most women, she didn’t pick at her food but dug in with enthusiasm and little hums of satisfaction. She sampled every exotic dish offered at the show-cooking buffet, experiencing it with an exquisite pleasure that had him imagining what she would look like in the throes of orgasm. After he’d taken her there.
Taylor pushed her plate away. “That was fabulous.”
“You looked like you were enjoying it.”
“Especially since someone else is doing the cooking and cleaning. But I’m stuffed. If I don’t move soon, you’re going to have to carry me to my room.”
Now that was a prospect with some possibilities, he thought. “Just say the word.”
Taylor laughed. “I think I can walk for now, I just need to be encouraged a bit.”
Dev rose and held out his hand. “I can help with that.”
The sultry strains of Latin music floated into the night sky as they approached the open-air theater area. Soft light filtered down onto the dance floor, where couples swayed to the slow, hypnotic beat from the band.
Dev took her hand. “Dance with me?”
Taylor lifted a brow. “Fred, I thought you’d never ask.”
“You laugh, but prepare to be amazed and humbled.”
“Another one of the things you’ve picked up since you’ve been here?”
“I like to consider myself a multifaceted individual.”
He led her down the steps and onto the polished wood floor. Taylor looked at the couples nestled together. Anticipation sent a sharp thrill through her, then he swept her in toward him, unexpectedly close.
She’d expected the classic clinch and shuffle of the high school slow dance, but he surprised her, capturing one of her hands in his and pressing his other against the small of her back. The heat spread through the thin silk of her dress, making her catch her breath.
Making her melt against him.
“I don’t know how to dance like this,” she said unsteadily, clutching at his shoulder with her free hand. His hard, rounded shoulder. “I only ever learned to shuffle around.”
“It’s a rumba,” he murmured in her ear, “a standard box step. Just hold on and follow me.”
The guitar moaned low and soft over the clicking tropical rhythm of a hollow woodblock. An exotic woman dressed in fiery red stepped up to the microphone and began to croon in Spanish, a passionate tale of what Taylor figured was no doubt doomed lovers.
Moving in time with Dev’s body was immensely seductive. She felt the muscles of his thighs flex against hers. She looked up and found her gaze snared by his, the green shadowed in the dim lighting. He brought their clasped hands in close to their bodies, pressing her against him. The call of the guitar drifted up into the sky.
THEY STROLLED DOWN the shadowed path that wound through the jungle toward the beach. Dev tangled his fingers with Taylor’s. “I couldn’t believe it when I first got down here,” he murmured. “I thought I’d walked into another world. Home was gone.” It hadn’t been quite as easy as that, if he was honest. It had taken days in the hot sun, hours of swimming with the schools of bright fish in the tranquil blue depths of the reefs to erase the memory of finding his fiancée with another man. No matter that he’d known deep down they were a bad match, the betrayal had scored his pride. To smooth it over, he’d flirted with a couple of the beach babes but something had felt wrong each time. Each time, he’d ducked out with a simple kiss good-night.
Somehow, he didn’t see himself doing that with Taylor.
They followed the trail out of the lush plantings to circle around the edge of the pool, now glowing pale turquoise. At this hour, the area was deserted, the guests all up at the theater area dancing and watching the show. They had the beach to themselves.
A vivid red hibiscus blossom, fallen from its bush, lay on the pavement. Dev stopped to pick it up. Turning to Taylor, he tucked it behind her ear. “Now you look like an island girl.”
“You’re the one who looks like an islander, with that tan and the batik and the shells…”
He fingered them. “The clerk at the hotel store threw them in when I bought my trunks.”
“I don’t have to ask if she was a she,” Taylor said dryly.
“She was indeed, and also about sixteen. Not my style.”
“You’re not into giggling Mark Anthony fans?”
“I’m not into girls.” His eyes darkened. “I’m more interested in women.”
Taylor swallowed and the silence stretched out for a beat, then two. In the darkness, the crude stone heads of the showers had a brooding, almost menacing cast, like vengeful gods come down to earth. Beyond, Dev could hear the hiss of the waves. He reached out and caught her hand again. “Let’s go out by the water.”
The moonlit beach was dotted with the shadowed bulk of palms. They slipped off their shoes and stepped onto the sand. Away from people and noise, Taylor could hear the small rustles of the night creatures going about their business. To one side, a crab scuttled into a stand of mangrove. And the waves grew louder.
Dev led her past the palm trees and onto the dock. Their feet made hollow thumps as they walked along the creosote coated planks. Thick ropes swung from squat posts, making only a passing pretense at security. It didn’t matter, really; in such shallow, warm water, a person falling in could hardly get hurt. Out on the end of the dock, a red light atop a tall post winked out to sea.
The water stretched away from them black and fathomless. Far in the distance, on the coast of the mainland, a few lights glimmered. Above them, stars painted their patterns on a midnight velvet sky.
Dev looked up at them. “The stars are different down here, have you noticed?” Somehow, that had been the thing that had finally allowed him to let go the frustration and betrayal, that sense of being somewhere different. He’d come out to the dock at night a lot those first weeks. Gradually, the peace had seeped into his soul. “That was the first thing I looked for down here, the Southern Cross.” He pointed. “You can barely see it on the horizon.”
Taylor stepped close to him and he felt the soft swell of her breasts brush against his arm. “Where?”
He moved so that she was in front of him and
