Heidi Rice - Vows They Can't Escape

She was a pragmatist now—a shrewd, focused career woman. One melodramatic swoon brought on by starvation and exhaustion and stress didn’t change that. Thank goodness she wasn’t enough of a ninny to be looking for love to complete her life any more. Because it was complete enough already.

Maybe there was a tiny tug of regret at the thought of that young man who had come to her father’s estate looking for her, only to be turned away. But the fact that he’d come to the worst possible conclusion proved he’d never truly understood her. How could he ever have believed she would abort their child?

‘I appreciate your advice, Doctor,’ she replied, as the man packed the last of his paraphernalia into his bag. ‘I’ll make sure I grab something to eat at the airport and get some sleep on the plane.’

No doubt she’d sleep like the dead, given the emotional upheaval she’d just endured.

She glanced at her watch and stood up, steadying herself against the sofa when a feeling of weightlessness made her head spin.

‘You’re flying back tonight?’ The doctor frowned at her again, as if she’d just thrown a tantrum.

‘Yes, at seven,’ she replied. She only had an hour before boarding closed on her flight to Heathrow. ‘So I should get going.’

The elderly man’s grave expression became decidedly condescending. ‘I wouldn’t advise catching a transatlantic flight tonight. You need to give yourself some time to recover. You’ve just had a full-blown anxiety attack.’

‘A...what?’ she yelped, far too aware of Dane’s overbearing presence in her peripheral vision as he listened to every word. ‘It wasn’t an anxiety attack. It was just a bit of light-headedness.’

‘Mr Redmond said you became very emotional, then collapsed, and that you were out for over a minute. That’s more than light-headedness.’

‘Right...well, thanks for your opinion, Doctor.’ As if she cared what ‘Mr Redmond’ had to say on the subject.

‘You’re welcome, Ms Carmichael.’

She hung back as Dane showed Dr Epstein out, silently fuming at the subtle put-down. And the fact Dane had witnessed it. And the even bigger problem that she was going to have to wait now until the doctor had taken the lift down before she could leave herself. Which would mean spending torturous minutes alone with Dane while trying to avoid the parade of circus elephants crammed into his palatial penthouse apartment with them.

She didn’t want to talk about their past, her so-called anxiety attack, or any of the other ten-ton pachyderms that might be up for discussion.

However nonchalant she’d tried to be with Dr Epstein, she didn’t feel 100 per cent. She was shattered. The last few days had been stressful—more stressful than she’d wanted to admit. And the revelations that had come during their argument downstairs hadn’t exactly reduced her stress levels.

And, while she was playing Truth or Dare with herself, she might as well also admit that being in Dane’s office had been unsettling enough.

Being alone with him in his apartment was worse.

She shrugged into the jacket she’d taken off while Dr Epstein took her blood pressure. Time to make a dignified and speedy exit.

‘Where’s my briefcase?’ she asked, her voice more high-pitched than she would have liked, as Dane walked back towards her.

‘My office.’

He leaned against the steel banister of a staircase leading to a mezzanine level and crossed his arms over that wide chest. His stance looked relaxed. She wasn’t fooled.

‘I couldn’t scoop it up,’ he continued, his silent censure doing nothing for the pulse punching her throat, ‘because I had my hands full scooping up you.’

‘I’ll get it on my way out,’ she said, deliberately ignoring the sarcasm while marching towards the elevator.

He unfolded his arms and stepped into her path. ‘That’s not what the doctor ordered.’

‘He’s not my doctor,’ she announced, distracted by the pectoral muscles outlined by creased white cotton. ‘And I don’t take orders.’

His sensual lips flattened into a stubborn line and his jaw hardened, drawing her attention back to the dent in his chin.

She bit into her tongue, assaulted by the sudden urge to lick that masculine dip.

What the heck?

She tried to sidestep him. He stepped with her, forcing her to butt into the wall o’ pecs. Awareness shot up her spine as she took a hasty step back.

‘Get out of my way.’

‘Red, chill out.’

She caught a glimpse of concern, her pulse spiking uncomfortably at his casual use of the old nickname.

‘I will not chill out. I have a flight to catch.’ She sounded shrill, but she was starting to feel light-headed again. If she did another smackdown in front of him the last of her dignity would be in shreds.

‘You’re shaking.’

‘I’m not shaking.’

Of course she was shaking. He was standing too close, crowding her, engulfing her in that subtly sexy scent. Even though he wasn’t touching her she could feel him everywhere—in her tender breasts, her ragged breathing and in the hotspot between her thighs which was about to spontaneously combust. Basically, her body had reverted to its default position whenever Dane Redmond was within a ten-mile radius.

‘Unless you’ve got a chopper handy, you’ve already missed your flight,’ he observed, doing that sounding reasonable thing again, which made her sound hysterical. ‘Midtown traffic is a bitch at this time of day. No way are you going to make it to JFK in under an hour.’

‘Then I’ll wait at the airport for another flight.’

‘Why not hang out here and catch a flight out tomorrow like Epstein suggested?’

With him? In his apartment? Alone? Was he bonkers?

‘No, thank you.’

She tried to shift round him again. A restraining hand cupped her elbow and electricity zapped up her arm.

She yanked free, the banked heat in his cool blue gaze almost as disturbing as what he said next.

‘How about I apologise?’

‘What for?’

Was he serious? Dane had been the original never-give-in-never-surrender guy back in the day. She’d never seen him back down or apologise for anything.

‘For yelling at you in my office. About stuff that doesn’t matter any more.’

It was the last thing she had expected. But as she searched his expression she could see he meant it.

It was an olive branch. She wanted to snatch it and run straight for the moral high ground. But the tug of regret in the pit of her stomach chose that precise moment to give a sharp yank.

‘You don’t have to apologise for speaking your mind. But, if you insist, I should apologise, too,’ she continued. ‘You’re right. I should have consulted you about...about the abortion.’

The lie tasted sour—a betrayal of the tiny life she’d once yearned to hold in her arms. But this was the only way to finally release them both from all those foolish dreams.

‘Hell, Red. You don’t have to apologise for that.’

He scrubbed his hands over his scalp, the frustrated gesture bringing an old memory to the surface of running her hands over the soft bristles while they lay together on the deck of the pocket cruiser, her body pleasantly numb with afterglow from the first time they’d made love.

She pressed tingling palms against the fabric of her skirt, trying to erase the picture in her head, but the unguarded memory continued to play out—one agonising sensation at a time. Goosebumps pebbling her arms from the warm breeze off the ocean...the base of her thumb stinging from the affectionate nip as he bit into the tender flesh.

‘You sure you’re okay? I didn’t hurt you? You’re so small and delicate...’

‘I get why you did it,’ Dane continued, as the erotic memory played havoc with her senses. ‘You weren’t ready to be a mom, and I would have been a disaster as a dad.’