Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 76390 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76390 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 306(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
The first thing she saw was her Gatorade bottle, lying helplessly next to a pair of murderously expensive-looking beach sandals.
Curse you, bottle. It should have known better than to slip out of her grasp!
Another moment, and the pricy footwear’s owner had bent down as he reached for the bottle. Daria caught sight of someone tall, long-limbed, and bare-chested.
The figure straightened.
Beautiful silky black hair, curling at the nape, so thick she wanted to sink her fingers in it and start to comb them.
Olive skin, such a contrast with her pale complexion, and she found herself wondering dizzily if he was that dark all over.
Sculpted body, with his broad shoulders, powerfully muscular arms, rock-hard chest, and washboard abs—-
The stranger looked up.
Daria gasped.
The sound had his furious brown eyes jerking up, and the stranger’s gaze instantly found and labeled Daria as the culprit.
She didn’t mind at all. In fact, she found herself praying that he was a cop. If he were, he could arrest her, and she’d go to him willingly.
They stared at each other for a long time.
You’re cruel, God, Daria thought with a mental sniff. The longer she looked at the beautiful stranger she had almost murdered, the more she was convinced this was all a test. It had to be. There was no other reason that God would suddenly place her in the presence of this perfection.
Daria lifted her chin. I won’t fail You, God.
WHAT DID PEOPLE DO on vacation aside from resting? It was a question that Nik Alexandropoulos had been struggling with since the day he arrived at Kyrillos Gazis’ pleasure island, and until now the answer managed to evade his normally cunning mind. Give him a stock market crisis to solve anytime, Nik thought, and he wouldn’t feel as lost as he felt now. But this whole goddamn vacation thing? How people could stand to spend days doing nothing was beyond him, and if not for the doctor ordering him to rest, Nik wouldn’t have ever bothered to figure it out.
An overseas trip had exposed Nik to a rather severe virus, requiring a week’s stay in the hospital for treatment. Upon his discharge, the doctor had given Nik an ultimatum. Take a month off from work or risk a life-threatening recurrence.
After just a week on the island, Nik’s days had fallen into a routine. He would wake up at four in the morning, work out in his hotel’s gym for an hour, take a shower, go for a run along the beach, and afterwards take a dip. All this he made sure to do before breakfast, which would then be followed by several hours of reading. The need to do more chafed at him, but Nik knew it would be the height of stupidity to ignore his doctor’s advice. And so he forced himself not to do anything after breakfast, since he was anything but stupid.
Or at least that was the plan until some goddamn idiot had thought of throwing a bottle at the side of his head, hard enough for Nik to temporarily feel like the world was spinning faster than it should around him.
“What the fuck?”
He closed his eyes, working hard to get his sense of equilibrium back. After, he touched the side of his head but was not reassured by the fact that he wasn’t bleeding. It could be worse, Nik thought grimly, with the bottle causing internal damage.
Bending down, Nik reached for the bottle, intending to have it scanned for fingerprints. Whoever threw this at him would pay. He would—-
A gasp interrupted his thoughts, and Nik’s head immediately lifted up.
A woman?
His attacker was a woman?
She was tall and long-legged, her dark hair wavy, her large gray eyes dominating her heart-shaped face. She also happened to be extremely voluptuous, her hot pink summer dress showing off curves that seemed by inspired by Nik’s own secret fantasies.
Staring at her, Nik found his fury receding in the wake of his lust. The strength of his reaction made him tense. Before this, his sexual appetites had always been under his control. How could this woman affect him so differently? Why did one look at this woman make him want to punish her, made him itch to set her on his lap and slap her plump bottom until it was a rosy shade of pink?
More disturbingly sexual thoughts consumed him, but even so Nik managed to remain still and unspeaking, his face expressionless as he waited for the apology due him. Although the woman’s lovely face was as unreadable as his, her eyes gave her away. It showed inner struggle, as if she was torn between two things.
The thought was bemusing. What the fuck did she have to be confused about? Say sorry or throw a bottle at him for the second time?
Finally, the woman shifted on her feet. Her gaze lifted up to meet his, the same time she raised her chin proudly, almost challengingly. He should find it disrespectful and offensive, but instead Nik found it...arousing.