Heidi watched him strike the coconut until it cracked open. “You’re getting to be…”
She was forced to curtail the compliment when he dribbled milk into her mouth, but some still trickled down her chin. Her heart leapt when he licked the drops from her skin. “Mmm,” he said when their eyes met, “salty.”
She saw hesitancy in his gaze. He wasn’t sure how she would react. The bitter Heidi who’d boarded theHeklain Sankt Thomas would have chastised him for his brazen act. She inhaled deeply, placed her hand on his bearded cheek and kissed his lips, tentatively, slowly, nervously.
He closed his eyes and nibbled her lower lip, then ran his tongue along it. “I’ve wanted to taste you since you first waved your pistol in my face,” he whispered. “However, if I put these coconuts down now, I’ll be tempted to do more than kiss you, and we might never get to the good news.”
Torsten had never known how to flirt. Maximiliano’s teasing made Heidi’s nipples tingle. “Slyngel,” she breathed.
“I don’t know that Danish word,” he admitted.
“It means rogue,scoundrel,” she replied.
“Ha!Pícaro. Of course, I’m a pirate.”
“But you weren’t always a pirate.”
He frowned. “No, but that’s a tale for another day. Now, we eat, then we get our meager possessions into the cave.”
She swallowed her disappointment, accepting a chunk of coconut meat.
* * *
Hauling their belongings up to the cave was challenging, and had to be accomplished in two trips. When the mattress was finally wedged into the tiny space, they both collapsed on it, breathing heavily.
“Much more comfortable,” Heidi said.
“Palatial,” he quipped. “Ready for your surprise?”
“I just want to sleep,” she confessed.
“Fine,” he said, getting to his feet. “I’ll go by myself. But you’ll be sorry.”
As he expected, she followed him out of the cave. He led the way to a spot where the waterfall was visible. “There, fresh water.”
She shaded her eyes. “But it’s out of reach.”
His anticipation grew. “Patience,querida.”
Five minutes later, they stood on a rock looking down at the pool. To his surprise, she seemed nervous. “We can swim in it,” he explained. “Be clean again.”
She shook her head. “It looks deep.”
She can’t swim.
“I’ll go first,” he said, shrugging off his jacket, then yanking his shirt over his head.
Her eyes widened when he untied the laces at his waist. “Perdóname, but I don’t intend to bathe in my clothes.”
“No, of course not,” she allowed, her gaze fixed on his chest.
He turned his back, divested himself of his pantaloons then slid off the smooth rock into the water. It came up to his waist. “It’s warm,” he exclaimed. “And I can stand up here. I’ll keep my back turned.”
The Pool
Heidi stared at Maximiliano’s broad back, disappointed with only a brief glimpse of his endearingly white backside and bronzed long legs before he slipped into the water.
She longed to remove her clothes and cleanse her body in the pool, but had always been afraid of deep water, and Maximiliano was completely naked. Old inhibitions about her body surfaced. He’d see how fat she really was if...