Anne McAllister - Luxury Escapes - A Mistake, A Prince and A Pregnancy / Hired by Her Husband / Captured and Crowned

It was getting so bad that she was starting to wonder exactly why she was denying herself what she so desperately wanted.

Imminent heartbreak, possible abandonment, the loss of all of your independence and hard-earned self-worth!

Her practical self remembered all of the reasons. It was the wanton little hussy that had control over her erogenous zones that seemed to forget.

Thankfully her morning sickness had abated. If she couldn’t have some measure of relief from the constant arousal that kept her in a perpetual state of heightened awareness, then at least she wasn’t also spending most of the morning with her head in the toilet.

Even now she felt restless, her body humming just from the knowledge that Maximo was down the hall working in his own office.

He’d been so good to her since they’d come to the island. He’d been kind and attentive and taken care of anything she could possibly need. He was playing the part of doting, but platonic, fiancé just perfectly. It was as if he was doing it on purpose to make her life miserable.

She stretched and tried to shake off the electric feeling of arousal that seemed to have attached itself to her every nerve ending. Her skin felt as if it was too tight for her body, and everything inside of her felt as if it might jump out and escape at any moment.

What she needed was some physical exertion. Badly. She’d been feeling so awful since she’d gotten pregnant that she hadn’t worked out at all. Maybe that was why she felt so jittery. She’d had no outlet for her energy; none of the release that a good bout of exercise always gave her.

It was way too easy to imagine ways she and Max might find some physical release together.

Walking out of the office and down the hall to her room, she made the decision to get out of the house and get some air. Maybe breathing in the stale atmosphere of the villa was chipping away at her common sense. Except the villa smelled wonderful and there was nothing stale about it, but hey, a girl needed her excuses.

She rifled through her belongings until she found a swimsuit that Maximo had had sent over to Maris a few days after they’d arrived. It was brief … shockingly so. The black, stretchy fabric didn’t have enough yardage to swaddle a newborn, and yet it was intended to cover a grown woman’s curves. And hers had only become more ample as her pregnancy progressed.

Her breasts were always a little full for her petite frame, but now they just made everything she wore seem indecent. The swimsuit was an extreme example of that.

She tried to ignore her reflection in the mirror, tried not to focus on her pale flesh spilling over the midnight fabric of the miniscule top. Sighing, she grabbed a towel and wrapped it firmly around herself, hiding her new, extra-lush curves and her burgeoning tummy, before padding down to the large Olympic-size pool.

Thankfully the pool area, like the rest of the villa, and the rest of the island, was extremely private. Large flowering bushes had been planted around the perimeter of the pool, just high enough to guard against curious eyes, but low enough to leave the view of the ocean visible.

Alison slid beneath the surface of the water, sighing as its coolness washed over her heated skin. She began to swim laps, reveling in the chance to burn off some of her restless energy. To let her mind go blank so that she could just forget about Maximo, even just for a moment.

When she reached the edge of the pool she gripped the cement lip, wiping the droplets of water from her face.

“You swim well.”

A sensual shiver shot through the length of her body. Would that voice never stop affecting her this way? Would she ever be able to just find Maximo’s presence … boring? Every day?

She looked up, her eyes widening as she took in the muscular legs, partially revealed by his board shorts, and, her eyes widened further, the broad expanse of his well-defined chest.

“Thank you,” she said tightly, swimming away from that end up the pool and moving to the ladder that hung over the side. “I was on the team in high school.” She climbed out of the water and grabbed her towel quickly, trying to cover the acres of bare skin that were on display thanks to her ridiculous swimsuit.

She turned to face him and her eyes were immediately drawn back to his superbly masculine chest. Good Lord, but he was one hot man. All hard muscle with just the right amount of dark chest hair sprinkled over his golden skin. Just enough to remind her how much of a man he was. As if she needed reminding. What she needed was to forget.

“So you swam in high school?”

She nodded, sitting on the lounger chair that was positioned beneath a palm tree shading the patio area. “I did a lot of things in high school. Swimming. The debate team. I worked on the school newspaper. Anything and everything to earn extra credit.”

“Let me guess … you had a 4.0 GPA?”

She shrugged. “I was capable of it so anything less would have been a failure. I needed to earn scholarships so that I could go to school.”

“Your parents didn’t offer to pay for your schooling?” He crossed his arms over his chest, the motion creating a fascinating play of muscle that she was powerless to look away from.

“My mother couldn’t have afforded it. When my …” She didn’t know why she was telling him anything, and yet it seemed so easy to talk to him. She wanted to talk to him, wanted to keep him there with her. She cleared her throat. “When my father left things became difficult for us financially. My mother didn’t have the means, or the drive, to earn a living for us.”

He lowered his dark eyebrows and rubbed a hand over his jaw, his skin rasping against the black stubble that was starting to grow. “Your father didn’t pay child support?”

“We didn’t even know where he was. He walked out the door one day and never came back. I haven’t heard from him in fifteen years.”

“That must have been hard.”

“Yes. It was harder for my mother, though. She just kind of self-destructed after he left. Kimberly was gone, and then Dad was, too, and she just didn’t seem to have it in her to keep going. So she sank instead. She nearly took me with her.”

He sat in the chair next to hers and leaned close, the musky scent of him teasing her senses. “Is that why you’re so independent?”

“I had to be. People aren’t going to take care of you—they’re going to take care of themselves. I just learned that at an earlier age than some. But I survived. I made my own way. My own success.”

“But there is no shame in accepting help from others.”

“That’s quite something coming from you. When was the last time you accepted help?”

A slow smile curved his lips. “I can’t remember.”

“I didn’t think so.”

“But some people need more help than others,” he said, a shadow passing over his face for a moment.

“I don’t believe that. Some people wallow rather than moving forward.”

“Is that what you think? That your mother should have tried harder?”

She nodded emphatically. “Yes. That’s what I think. You can’t just self-destruct because somebody leaves you in the lurch. It’s never a good idea to depend on someone like that. You become so accustomed to leaning on them that you get weak, and then when they leave, when they fail you, you won’t be able to stand on your own anymore because you’ve lost all of your own strength. And everybody fails at some point.”

His eyes darkened. “Yes. And some damage is irreparable.”

“Yes,” she said softly, thinking of the void left by Kimberly, by her father and then, even though she’d still been there physically, by her mother. “That’s why I don’t need people.”