Fire Me Up
Date: 2005-05-03 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Romance; Paranormal; Paranormal Romance; dragons; Fantasy; Urban Fantasy; Demons; Humor; Chick Lit; Magic
Description: Aisling Grey is back-and in more trouble than ever. She thought being a courier would be easy. It's not. She thought being a Guardian would come naturally. It doesn't. She thought she could get out of being a wyvern's mate. She can't. And she never thought she'd be irresistible to men. But she is.

Bird of Paradise

A Novella

Katie MacAlister

Praise for Katie MacAlister!

“Katie MacAlister has an easy voice that brims with wit and fun.”

—Mrs. Giggles from Everything Romantic

MacAlister has a “captivating voice and charming storytelling skills [and] impeccable style.”

— Inscriptions Magazine

“This story is a true romp. There is much to laugh at when reading this book and much to miss when it is over. A true ‘keeper.’”

— RT Book Reviews

“Sexy, feisty and clever.”

— Reader to Reader

Originally published 2003 in the Heat Wave anthology by Dorchester Publishing Copyright © Katie MacAlister, 2003, 2012

Smashwords Edition

All rights reserved

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the copyright owner of this book.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the author is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

Bird of Paradise

A Novella

Katie MacAlister

Praise for Katie MacAlister!

“Katie MacAlister has an easy voice that brims with wit and fun.”

—Mrs. Giggles from Everything Romantic

MacAlister has a “captivating voice and charming storytelling skills [and] impeccable style.”

— Inscriptions Magazine

“This story is a true romp. There is much to laugh at when reading this book and much to miss when it is over. A true ‘keeper.’”

— RT Book Reviews

“Sexy, feisty and clever.”

— Reader to Reader

Originally published 2003 in the Heat Wave anthology by Dorchester Publishing Copyright © Katie MacAlister, 2003, 2012

All rights reserved

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the copyright owner of this book.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the author is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

This novella was originally part of the Heat Wave anthology, published in 2003. All three novellas in the anthology—the other two were by Jennifer Archer and Sheridon Smythe—were written to take place at the same location, and using the same setting: a reality TV show.

Completists might want to have the anthology so as to read all three stories together, although each novella is a tale unto itself. Regardless if you read my novella, Bird of Paradise, when it was originally published, or if you’ve been waiting for it to be made available again, I hope you enjoy the story of Hero, Adam, and Jesus the cat.

Katie MacAlister

Chapter One

“I’m with you on the need for the air horn in case you are forced to slaughter innocent animals in the name of sport, and I completely agree with the earplugs for the roller disco night, but why in the name of John, Paul, and Ringo are you packing this monstrosity?” Gemma held up a voluminous purple-and-black beruffled, skirted, blousoned swimsuit.

Hero made a moue at both her friend’s words and the object held before her. “You left out George,”

she pointed out.

Gemma waggled the swimsuit at her.

Hero sighed and took the garment, folding it neatly and placing it back into the luggage. “You told me it was a crime against nature to go to the Caribbean without taking a swimsuit. That is a swimsuit.”

“I said take your swimsuit, Hero, not your grandmother’s,” Gemma replied, much more acidly than Hero thought warranted, but then, who was she to say? She was only Gemma’s best friend. Clearly her opinion counted for little in the Gemma scale of life. “That thing probably covers you from knees to elbows. You’ll drown the first time it gets wet. It’ll suck you right down to the briny depths. I know you think you’re too Rubenesque for a bikini—”

Hero snorted at the word Rubenesque. She knew her friend was trying not to hurt her feelings by using such phrases as prodigiously plump, but really! Rubenesque?

“—but that’s no reason to hide yourself. You’re lovely. You should be proud of who you are, not hide yourself behind all those layers of clothing.”

“I like my clothing,” Hero said with great dignity that was lost upon the other woman.

“Well, no one else does! Hero, when are you going to realize that despite being a few stone heavier than you’d like to be, you’re still attractive? Very attractive?”

“Gemma, give it up; we’ve been over it too many times before. I appreciate your vote of confidence, but I’m not at all comfortable wearing the type of clothes you do. I simply have to much flesh. An excess of flesh. Great, huge, vast stretches of it, in fact, which I prefer to keep covered decently so as not to frighten small children and the elderly. Now”—she held up two dresses—”which frock do you think for the fancy dinners—the navy or the ecru?”

Gemma plumped down on the bed next to the suitcase and frowned. “Neither, they both look like something my aunt Fran would wear to a convent in a blizzard during Lent. Hero, I don’t like to duff you over this, but here you have the perfect opportunity to look over a large herd of eligible
bachelors, and all you do is pack clothing guaranteed to keep you in purdah. You deserve better than that. You’re going to a tropical island! Sun! Men! Beautiful white beaches! Men in thongs!

Fruity drinks and pampering and fun!

Men walking around with nothing more on than a really nice tan and a wicked glint in their eyes! I want you to promise me that you’re seriously going to look at the men you’ll meet on Mystique Island.” Hero silently shoved several pairs of lacy underwear into the corners of the bag. “I shan’t be able to avoid looking at them, they are an integral part of my article.”

“Hero,” her friend said in a growl. “You know what I meant!” Hero rummaged around in the bottom of her wardrobe looking for a pair of sandals. “I do, but as I’m participating in this ridiculous dating show solely to do a story, Gem, I don’t feel your suggestion that I chat up the men in an attempt to find a potential husband deserves any comment. You know how important this article is to me.

Besides, those men are Americans. We both know what that means—
oversexed, egotistical, can’t-keep-their-willies-in-their-trousers types. Not the sort of bloke I’m looking to tie myself to forever.”

“You’re half American,” Gemma pointed out, removing the underwear and folding them tidily before replacing them.

“My point exactly. Mum got tangled up with a smooth-talking Yank engineer twenty-six years ago, and what was the outcome of that?” Hero tucked a pair of beige huaraches into the side of her bag and disappeared into the dingy bathroom to collect various sundries.

“You,” Gemma called after her.

“Correct.”

“Your parents were married.”

“But Dad was never home! He wasn’t happy at home; he wanted to wander the world. And now where is he? In Arizona with his new bit of crumpet, leaving Mum heartbroken.”

“So heartbroken that when he left she said, and I quote, ‘Good riddance to bad rubbish’?” Hero emerged from the bathroom to wave that comment away. “That’s merely a protective device so she doesn’t have to admit how hurt she is by Dad’s betrayal. Do you think I look to pale? Should I use tanning lotion?”

“Hero, your parents were married for almost twenty-five years. I think now is the time for you to get over their divorce and admit your problem isn’t American men.”

“No, my problem is to finish packing so I can make my flight to Mystique, thus ensuring that I’ll have
a story on how desperate Americans will do anything to find someone to date, which will, in turn, keep Stephen from giving me the sack and me from going on the dole because no one wants to hire a blackballed tabloid writer. That is my problem.” She held up a bronze bottle with a large yellow sun on it.

“Yea or nay on the tanning lotion?”

“Yea, you look whiter than a fish’s underbelly. And as for the other, you haven’t been blackballed, goose. You can’t really blame Stephen for putting you on probation after that last story, what you did was very much over the line.”

“Perhaps,” Hero mumbled as she flattened a roll of toilet tissue and added it to her suitcase. One never knew what one was going to find in the less civilized areas of the world. It was far better to be prepared than be obliged to use the local flora to tend to one’s personal needs.

“Perhaps? Perhaps your story claiming that one of the royal family had an alien love child was not so outrageous the outcry could be heard from here to John O’Groats? Perhaps you didn’t almost lose your job, only hanging on because you begged the publisher to give you another chance.

Perhaps, Hero?

Perhaps?”

Friends. There were times when she really had to wonder why she was cursed with them. She zipped up the sides of the suitcase and turned to face her oldest and dearest friend. “What do you want me to say, Gemma? That I was wrong to try to increase circulation and save Stephen from losing his livelihood?

That I was wrong to make up a story so patently false that only an idiot would believe it was true?

That I was wrong to call those very same people mindless boobs on the telly? Well, all right, I admit the last was not in the best interests of either my career or the Revue, but the first two—no.

Stephen knows full well it was my story that saved his paper, which makes it all that much more unreasonable that he should put me in the untenable position of having to turn in a fascinating story that will save my position without once using the words alien or love child. I ask you—can it be done? I have my doubts!” Gemma laughed and held up a lacy bra. “I don’t have any. You forgot this. Really, Hero, such scandalous smalls! For someone who looks so conservative on the outside, you wear the naughtiest knickers and bras!”

Hero snatched the item and unzipped the luggage just enough to stuff it inside. “If you’re quite finished ridiculing my choice of undergarments, perhaps you’ll assist me in applying the faux suntan.

I can’t imagine it will fool anyone, but I’d much prefer to not have the streaks and blotches that I’m sure will happen if I try to do the backside of me by myself.”

“No one will know your luscious golden tan came from a bottle,” Gemma vowed as she followed Hero into the bathroom. “You’ll dazzle every man there; just you wait and see. They’ll all be eating out of your hand by the time the first few weeks are up.”

Hero rolled her eyes. “For the last time, I’m not doing this to find a man! I’m simply trying to save my job.”

“So you say.”

“That’s all. It’s just an article. Nothing more.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Romance is definitely out of the question.”

“Mmm.”

“I certainly would not find myself attracted to an American.” Gemma started whistling as she applied the cream to Hero’s now bare back. Hero tried to focus on how bronze and un-fish’s-underbelly her skin would look, but other, less happy images invaded her thoughts. “And even if I were to find a man I fancied, I’m sure he’d be panting after one of those trim, tiny women who will no doubt be parading around with their fake breasts and toned thighs and pert bums with thongs stuck in between their cheeks and such.”

“Hero?”

“What?” Hero’s thoughts were dark with images of liposuctioned buttocks.

“Do you know what I think? You are setting yourself up for major trouble.”

“Trouble? By not wishing to become involved with an American? How is that trouble?”

“Your prejudice against Americans has nothing to do with the matter—I’m speaking of women who deny themselves love, women who repress their honest, loving, and demonstrative natures, women who decry relationships on pretenses of standards. Such women inevitably end up falling for a man, and hard.” Hero rolled her eyes “I’m nothing like that.”

“They snap, that’s what they do. They meet a man, they fall instantly and deeply in love, and voila!

Instant snappage.”

“You’re quite, quite mad, aren’t you?”

“They call it the Fatal Attraction syndrome, you know. One moment you’re a professional, intelligent
woman in control of your life, the next you’re completely obsessed with the man. It’s quite tragic, really, and since I don’t want to see you boiling up some poor innocent man’s rabbit, I am warning you now.”

“Obsessed,” Hero scoffed. “I’ve never been obsessed with a man in my life. I’m hardly likely to start now.”

“It’s not as if you’ve had a great deal of experience, love.”

“Just because you can count my relationships on one hand”—Gemma held up two fingers—”very well, just because I’ve only had two relationships of any duration—”

“A fortnight each, weren’t they?”

“—doesn’t mean I am naive and inexperienced. I can assure you that if and when I meet a man I’m interested in, I will not snap, not that I’m likely to meet him where I’m going.”

“Take heed, Hero! If you continue to deny yourself the natural expression of your affections, one day you’re going to find yourself suddenly unable to think of anything but a man you’ve just met. You’ll stalk him through crowds, you’ll feel insane jealousy when you see him with other women, you’ll concoct feeble excuses to seek him out because you must be near him; then, ultimately, you’ll end up—”

“Stabbed to death in a bathtub?” Hero asked.

“Possibly. I prefer to think that it’ll all end up happily, after your chosen man realizes that you’re not truly insane.”

“Thank you,” Hero replied, mollified.

“I’m sure it won’t take him any time to realize what the true problem is.” Hero cocked an eyebrow in question.

Gemma smiled. “You just need a right good shagging.”

Adam Fuller was beginning to fee martyred. Saint Adam: it had a nice ring to it.

“Don’t forget to take pictures of any man who looks like he’s hitting on Sally. And names, I want names. Names are important. You got that?”

“Names. Pictures. I have it.” He switched the black plastic cat carrier to his other hand and reached in his jacket pocket for the airplane ticket.

“I want to know what she does every minute of the day, and who she does it with. If she looks like
she’s having fun. I want to know that too. And don’t forget the pictures of the men she’s with. And their names.

Adam sighed.

“Who she had dinner with, who she dances with, who she does the stupid dating events with, who she smiles at—I particularly want to know that—who she talks to, who she—”

“I get the idea, Gar; you don’t have to beat it into me. You want me to watch her. I understand the job; you’ll just have to trust me to do it.”

Edgar Holliday, famed throughout the NFL for his thirty-yard passes rather than his intellectual capabilities, glowered at the tall man walking next to him. “This is important, Adam. Sally isn’t just any woman; she’s the woman. I’m going to marry her one day. She’s going to be the mother of my little quarterbacks. I love her! That’s why it’s important you keep your eye on her while she’s going through this difficult time.”

“Difficult time? Gar, she kicked you out and told you she never wanted to see you again.”

“She was mad at me because of that little thing with the cheerleader. It’s nothing. Women like Sally get emotional that way. Probably was her time of the month.”

“She got a restraining order against you. That doesn’t sound like PMS to me.”

“It’ll blow over,” Edgar said, supremely confident and utterly oblivious to the admiring looks sent his way as he and Adam strode through the busy airport. “It always does. She’ll take me back; you’ll see.”

“She said the only way she’d ever want to see you again was if you were hanging by your balls.”

“She’s just playing with me. That’s why I need you to tell me every damned thing she does while she’s on that TV show. It’s important.”

“I’ll watch her,” Adam agreed.

“Like a hawk?”

“Like a hawk. You’re worrying about nothing—this may be my first job as a private investigator, but I think I’ll be able to handle keeping an eye on one woman on a small tropical island.”

“I’m paying a lot of money for this,” Edgar reminded his friend. “It wasn’t pocket change buying off the TV show producer, not to mention the guy whose place you’re taking. And then there were the bribes to smuggle that monster of yours through customs. You think that comes cheap?” The two men approached the waiting area for the charter flight to the island. Adam said, “I know it isn’t, and

I’m sorry about having to bring Jesus, but I couldn’t leave him alone. Not after what he’s been through. Dr. Miller says his last suicide attempt could well have been fatal.”

“What sort of cat would try to kill himself by eating a box of crayons?”

“A depressed one with a very colorful litter box,” he answered, slapping gently at the gray paw that emerged, claws extended, out of a breathing hole on the side of the carrier. Jesus had already snagged three people while Adam waiting in line for his boarding pass; he had no desire to add Edgar’s expensive silk suit to the list of damages owed. “Dr. Miller says he’s lost his will to live, and if I don’t do something drastic, one of these days his suicide attempts will succeed. And since his depression is all my fault . . . “ Adam sighed again. “Well, that’s why I’m here.”

Edgar made no reply to that, just handed his friend a folder. “Here’s the details on the guy you’re replacing. There’s a flight booked under his name for you from Miami to Mystique Island. Read the information and then destroy it.”

Adam grinned. “You want me to eat it, just like the spies do?” Edgar considered the suggestion.

“That might not be a bad idea. I wouldn’t want Sally to find out what you’re really up to. She’s mad enough at me for bugging her office—she’d be really pissed about me hiring you to follow her during this dating show.” A sudden frown of suspicion blossomed between his thick brows. “Just because I want you to keep tabs on her doesn’t mean you can date her yourself.” Adam thought of the aggressive tiny blond woman who had been Edgar’s girlfriend and gave a mental shudder. “I wouldn’t think of it.”

“Is that right?” Edgar asked, still frowning. “You said that girl you lived with . . . Bethany . . . Betty

—”

“Brittany.”

“—left you, so why wouldn’t you think of Sally? She’s got everything, a hell of a lot more that that Brittany had. Sally is pretty and smart and goes at it like a mink in heat.”

“She also has an ex-boyfriend who is now my employer,” Adam drawled, nudging the cat carrier out of reach of a woman standing nearby.

Edgar’s eyes narrowed as he studied Adam. Tall, blue-eyed, dark haired, Adam looked exactly what he was—a clean-cut man with few vices and a somewhat quirky take on life. “Yeah, but you’re pretty good looking. For a guy.” he added. “Women must like you.” Brittany’s parting words as she had stormed out of his apartment still rang in Adam’s ears. He tried hard to look suave and sophisticated and drop-dead sexy, and not at all like a man whose twelve-year relationship had
ended because his significant other told him he was a lousy lover. “Regardless, the only interest I have in Sally is purely professional. So relax, I’ll call you later tonight, after I’ve had a chance to look over the situation.”

“Don’t forget to destroy the evidence,” Edgar warned. “Oh, hell, there she is. I have to leave so she doesn’t see me with you, but don’t you forget! Watch her but don’t date her! And get me names!

And pictures!”

Adam nodded, rescued a small tapestry-covered bag from the clutches of the gray arm extended from the carrier, and watched as his childhood friend, now employer, tried to make his huge self look invisible by skulking off through the crowd. Then he glanced casually over his shoulder to take note of where his quarry was, and was astounded to see her storming up to him with murderous look on her face. Even though she only reached his shoulder, he knew from the few times he’d met her that her petite size was misleading. Extremely misleading. He summoned a smile and tried to look as if he were not the possessor of a brand-new private detective’s license.

“Hi, Sally. Long time no see.”

“You!” she said in a snarl as she pushed past the people in line behind him to brandish a piece of paper clutched in her hand. “Is this true?”

Adam caught the name of a detective agency on the letterhead as she waved the paper under his nose.

“Is what true?”

“This bull! Is it true that Edgar hired you to spy on me while I’m in the Caribbean? Is it? Did you agree to this?”

Adam blanched. She had a detective of her own? Watching him? Why? “Er . . . “

“Because if it is, you can just turn around right now and go home,” Sally bellowed, crumpling up the paper in a manner that made Adam suspect she was envisioning his neck between her hands. Or worse.

“It’s outrageous! It’s ridiculous! I won’t have it, do you hear me?”

“I think just about everyone her heard you, Sally. Maybe we could talk about this—Jesus, no! Sorry, ma’am. It’s my cat; he’s a bit bored being in the carrier. Here’s your magazine back. It looks like he only tore off a little bit.”

“Look, Fuller, I don’t give a damn what Edgar hired you to do; you’re not doing it, OK? Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a plane to catch. You can go home.” Adam grabbed the cat carrier and followed

Sally to the back of the line, where she stood seething with fury and righteous indignation, “Sally, I don’t know how you found out about Gar hiring me, but you have to give me a break. I’ve been on unemployment for more than a year; this is the first paying job I’ve had since the dot-com went under. I promise I won’t get in the way. You won’t even know I’m there!”

“I won’t know you’re there all right.” Sally stared straight ahead, growling in a tone reminiscent of Jesus when he was eating a particularly succulent piece of chicken. “Because you won’t be there.

Go home, Adam.”

“I can’t,” Adam said quietly, trying to keep the pathetic pleading note out of his voice. “I have to go.

I’ve already put a down payment on Jesus’s surgery—there’s no way I can afford the rest of it if I don’t do this job. Besides, Gar promised to tell all his football buddies obsessed with their ex-girlfriends about me if he’s happy with my work. So have a little pity on me, Sally. I’ll take a few pictures, make a couple of notes—you won’t even see me.”

She turned to face him. The look in her eyes made him want to flinch, but he stood firm instead. He was a man, dammit, and he had a job to do, and it wasn’t like it was illegal or anything. He did flinch at that. Not very illegal, he amended. “Stay away from me, Fuller. If I even so much as see you, I’ll tell the show’s producer who you are and have him kick your ass all the way back to California.” Her threats were very effective; Adam had to give her that. She was mean as a jackal and twice as vicious. Adam tried to look tough in response. He scowled. He added the tiniest sneer to the scowl, then threw in an Elvis lip twitch for good measure. “You do your job, and I’ll do mine, babe.” The woman at the counter motioned for Sally to come forward. Sally ignored her for a moment, leveling her finger at Adam, then poking it in his chest. “Stay away from me, or else I’ll have your balls.

Understand?”

Adam straightened his shoulders and looked down his nose at the tiny blond jackal threatening him.

“I appreciate the offer, Sally, but I’m really not interested in you that way.” She snarled something anatomically impossible before turning her back on him. Unseen by her, Adam let out a low sigh of relief as she moved to hand in her boarding pass. It was too bad that she’d found him out before he’d even set foot on the blasted island, but perhaps it was better this way. Now he knew where he stood (on the edge of a very shaky bridge), and could go from there. Handling Sally would require kid gloves, but that was no problem. He’d just explain it all to her once she had calmed down. No, it wouldn’t be a hard job at all, he reflected a short time later as he tucked Jesus’s carrier under the airplane seat with an admonition for the cat to keep his claws to himself. All he needed to do was keep a low profile and all would be well.

Five hours later, as the chartered plane took off from Miami headed for Mystique Island, Adam
opened up the dossier on the man whose place he was taking an realized he was in deep trouble.

Incredibly deep trouble.

“Hi, I’m Teri,” a pert redhead sitting next to him had introduced herself a few minutes before.

“You’re going to be on the show too, huh? What’s your name?”

“Uh . . “ Adam regretted the three screwdrivers he’d had on the flight from California that had led to his sleeping through most of the flight. He blinked at the bright-eyed redhead. “Uh . . . I have to . . .

um . .

. I’ll be right back.”

He grabbed the dossier as he ran for the nearest bathroom, locking himself in to read up quickly on who he was supposed to be. He stared in horror at the words until they swam before his eyes.

If the passengers nearest the bathroom were surprised by the sudden, profound burst of cursing emanating from the bathroom, they did not express it. The did, however, look with some worry upon Adam as he emerged. He bared his teeth in what he hoped was a smile and muttered something about needing to get more roughage in his diet as he stalked back to his seat. He was going to kill Gar; that’s all there was to it. He’d have to kill him, there was just no other choice.

“Are you all right?” the redheaded woman asked with concern as he slumped into his seat muttering under his breath the variety of unpleasant things he wanted to do to his employer.

“Fine,” he choked, then took a deep breath and held out his hand. “Monday. My name is Monday.

Monday Marsh.”

“Monday?” she asked as she gave his hand one of those little feminine squeezes that women thought passed as a handshake. Her blue eyes suddenly grew round with surprise. “Your name is Monday?” Adam ground his teeth and nodded.

“Monday Marsh?”

The muscles in his jaw locked. He nodded again. “The Monday Marsh?” The woman’s voice was loud, strident, filling the whole dam airplane. His stomach tightened and wadded up into a tiny lead ball.

People around him started to murmur his supposed name, turning in their seats to look back at him.

He tried to make himself relax. If the muscles in his jaw tightened any more, his teeth would crack.

“The Monday Marsh who’s on the radio? You’re that Monday Marsh?”

“Yes,” he said, his voice as cutting as razor-edged gravel on bare fee. “I’m that Monday Marsh.”

“Wow!” the woman said under her breath, her eyes alight with wonder. “I can’t believe you’re sitting next to me. I listen to you all the time! I love your show! It’s the best sex advice I’ve ever heard! That time you told the couple in L.A. to bring in her sister to explore the dynamics of a ménage à trois—
that was such good advice! I loved your descriptions of the stuff they should do! I tried it with my boyfriend and his roommate, and it was the best sex I’ve ever had. You’re going to Mystique for the show! Are you the sex consultant or something? Are you giving classes? Do you take private students?” Adam ignored the hand caressing his thigh. “Yes, I’m going to Mystique, no, I’m not the consultant, and no, I’m not offering classes. I’m a”—he ground down another layer of enamel as he spat out the word

—”contestant.”

“He’s a contestant!” the woman sitting in front of him told her seat partner. Both women eyed him avidly. Adam had sudden and complete empathy with every celebrity who had ever felt hounded by the public. “Would you say it for us? You know, the thing you always say on your show!? The woman asked.

“Yes, say it,” Teri begged, her hand squeezing and caressing his leg through the thin linen of his pants. He shifted in his seat, uncomfortable at the looks he was getting, worried that Teri’s hand would go roving. He’d never been the focus of so many women’s attention—hell, he’d never been the focus of any woman’s attention aside from Brittany. She was his first and only girlfriend. He’d never even thought about another woman until she’d left him a few months ago.

“Monday Marsh? The nipple guy! Hey, many, say that thing you say,” a man two rows ahead stood up and called back to Adam.

“Say it, say it, say it!” The chant started up out of nowhere but quickly gained volume as word of who he was pretending to be passed among the passengers. Teri licked her lips as her hand slid toward his groin, her eyes sending him a blatant message of invitation.

“Say it, say it!”

Adam squirmed in his seat, unwilling to take the pretense any farther, unsure of how to stifle the attention he was receiving. He opened his mouth to yell out the truth, to end the farce before it went any farther, but a sharp pinprick of cat claws on his ankle reminded him why he was there.

“Say it! Say it! Say it!”

He disengaged Jesus’s claws from his sock, standing with reluctance to face the planeload of chanting people. From where Sally sat in the far rear he could see her smiling a mocking smile at
him.

“Say it!”

He straightened his shoulders.

“Say it!”

He lifted his chin.

“Say it!”

He sighed, and looked out into the faces of strangers, men and women he’d never met before, men and women who were gathering from around the country to participate in a six-week-long television show with the goal of finding someone special. Where had his life gone wrong? How had it all come down to this moment? He held up his hands for quiet. Instantly the voices were hushed, the silence expectant, a hundred or so people leaning forward to catch the words as they left his lips. Adam took a deep breath, swearing to himself that if he lived through this, he really would see to it that his name was put down for sainthood. “My friends, I am a contestant like the rest of you. I am here purely as an amateur, not as an expert in the field of sexuality. I ask that you not treat me any differently than anyone else on the show. I appreciate the request, but I’m sure no one here really wants to hear that silly catchphrase. Thank you.”

“Say it!” they roared back at him.

He sighed again, then gave in to the inevitable as gracefully as possible. “And then my nipples exploded in delight.”

The entire body of passengers, himself and Sally excepted, burst into ear-shattering cheers. Adam forced a smile onto his lips, gave a light bow to acknowledge the applause, and took his seat.

He really was going to have to kill Edgar.

Chapter Two

“Depraved, all of them. Nothing but a bunch of depraved steroid-riddled sex fiends,” Hero muttered to herself as she stood behind a large potted palm as the Mystique Island airport watching the men ogle the women. She was taking furtive photographs, unwilling to let anyone see her snapping their photos lest it lead to explanations she didn’t want to make. She took a picture of a particularly lustful leer on a man’s face, and corrected her statement. The men were ogling all the women but her, that is. Did she care? She did not! She had better things to do than allow a bunch of beefy, perfectly coiffed male American sex fiends to ogle her. She had some standards, after all. No matter what anyone else might think, she was not desperate; lots of women lived perfectly happy, successful lives without a man. She would simply be one of them. There was certainly nothing here to tempt her, no cause to be worried about Gemma’s dire prediction.

“Jesus, no!”

The hoarse whisper caught her attention as much as the person tugging on the back fringe of her blue-and-purple batik cotton wrap. She hastily punched random buttons to turn the digital camera off and stashed it in her purse before she spun around in time to see the fringe disappearing into the hole on the side of a black plastic box with a handle on the top. A man squatted next to the box, speaking to it quietly but firmly. “Let go of it, cat.”

Hero’s eyebrows rose. There was a cat in the box? Someone was bringing a cat to the island? She thought the television show had taken over the entire resort for the duration of the show—why on earth would a man bring his cat with him to a film dating show?

“How many times do I have to tell you not to grab at ladies’ dresses?” Her eyebrows arched higher as she looked down at the doubled-up figure of the man as he tugged her fringe out of the box. “Let go of it, damn you! I’ll buy you your own fringe later. Jesus, drop it!” A frown forced her eyebrows together. Honestly, American men! If they weren’t sex fiend oglers, they swore at innocent cats. She wanted nothing to do with them, absolutely nothing. The next few weeks were going to be sheer and utter hell.

Still she didn’t like to see a cat in trouble.

“Perhaps I can help.” She said as she knelt down carefully next to him, reaching for the material he was tugging out of the box. “I have a way with animals, and I’m very fond of cats.” The man looked up, blinking at her as she gasped in response, all the air in her lungs having suddenly disappeared.

Dear Lord, he was gorgeous. Oh, not in the conventional manner, but in a much more devastating way, a way that suddenly made her feel extremely conscious of the fact that she had given up far too early on the latest diet guaranteed to whisk away unwanted pounds. He was perfection, he was manliness personified, he was everything she’d ever loved in a man—short black hair, two ebony
swoops of eyebrows, lovely little laugh crinkles around dark blue eyes, a long nose that had a kink in the middle, and an indentation on either cheek that hinted at dimples. She swallowed hard, forcing herself to look away from him, suddenly aware that she was shaking.

Gemma was right! She had snapped!

“I’m sorry, Miss . . . er . . .”

“Hero,” she answered, trying to get a grip on herself. It was worse than she’d imagined, this snapping.

“Hero North.”

“I’m sorry, Miss North, but when my cat gets bored, he has a habit of grabbing at passing items. He doesn’t really mean any harm. I’ll have your wrap free in just a minute.” Hero nodded, not trusting herself to look at him. She’d never had this sort of reaction to anyone before; why on earth did she have to have it now! And with an American man, of all things! One who, a few minutes before, was probably drooling over all of the tanned, fit women around him. She had to get hold of herself before the horrible snapping did any more damage. Taking a deep breath to calm her wildly beating heart, she tugged gently on the fringe until a gray paw came into view in one of the carrier holes.

“Excellent. If you hold him like that, I’ll unsnag his claws from your dress.” Even his voice was sexy!

It was low and sensual and rumbled around, striking a chord deep within her. She watched his long fingers carefully unhook the tangled fringe from the cat’s claws. Maybe she hadn’t really snapped after all. Maybe she was just so lonely that any man was starting to look good.

Maybe there was nothing special about this one, other than his drop-dead-sexy voice and really nice fingers. Maybe thinking about all those sex fiends had triggered a hormonal moment. Surely she was better now. Surely this man was nothing special.

“There you go. I don’t think any damage is done, but if there is let me know and I’ll pay for your dress.”

She glanced at him as he released her fringe from the claw. Oh, Lord, she moaned to herself, it was worse than she first thought! His eyes were deep, deep blue, and the delightful laugh crinkles around them were evident as he smiled, and she was right: he did have the faintest dimples on either cheek. She just wanted to grab his head and kiss him. There was no hope for her now. All that was likely to be in her future were a few illicit weeks of pleasure before he moved on to another woman, leading to her eventual downfall to alcoholism, and quite probably insanity.

“Erm . . .” Oh, why had her brain chosen this moment to shut down? Why couldn’t she remember how to speak? Why did those glittering blue eyes peering into hers make her forget those things
said to people when you wanted to talk to them . . . words, that was it. Where had all her words gone?

He leaned his head slightly toward her. “Is there something the matter?”

“No. No, nothing. It’s just that I . . . erm . . . nothing. Thank you.” He nodded and stood up holding out his hand to help her to her feet. She stared at it stupidly for a moment, noticing his heart line curved up between his index and middle finger.

“You’re a romantic,” her mouth said before her brain could veto the inane comment.

That startled his almost-dimples back into hiding. “I beg your pardon?”

“Sorry, I did an article on palmistry last year.” She took his hand and got to her feet, mentally cursing at herself. Stupid, stupid, stupid! Here was a veritable oasis of a perfectly nice man in a desert of sex fiends, and she had to babble at him like an idiot. That was what snapping did to you: it turned you into a raving lunatic.

“Article? You’re a writer?” His head tipped a little to the side in question, his smile doing all sorts of squishy things to her insides.

Oh, Lord, now what had she done? “Writer? Me? I . . . eh . . . just dabble in it.

“Ah.” He looked at his hand. “How do you know I’m a romantic?” Her heart did a little somersault as she traced his heart line, her finger tingling with the heat of his palm. “That’s your hear line. The way it’s curved indicates that you have a romantic nature.”

“Ah,” he said again, the baby dimples back. “What else does it say?” She blinked at him, surprised he asked. Most men pooh-poohed having their palms read, but this one just stood there smiling at her with his nice eyes, and his almost dimples, and a cat whose arm was reaching out to snag other unwary travelers. A sudden spurt of hope came to life within her. Maybe she could turn her snappage into something good.

He obviously took her silence as reticence. “I’m sorry; you probably don’t want to be bothered with my hand. Forget I asked.”

“No, I love your hand,” she said hurriedly, then blushed at her words. “That is, it’s a very interesting hand. I’d like to read it for you.”

“Perhaps later, then?” he asked with a look in his eye that turned the little trickle of hope into something stronger. Unbidden, her heart started beating faster. He wanted her to read his palm?

Was he just being nice, making polite talk in the queue, or was he truly something special? Dared she hope that the wonderfully warm feeling his smile was spreading through her was reciprocated?

Could it possibly be he was interested in her, as well? Had he snapped, too?

“That would be lovely,” she managed to say without throwing herself on him. She allowed herself a moment of pride over her restraint, then immediately turned her thoughts toward more important matters.

Should she take the chance? Should she be bold and courageous, as Gemma had advised, when meeting a man who turned her crank? Her lips curved in response to his warm smile. She would.

She would take the chance. “Perhaps if you have an hour free this evening after the orientation, I could read your palm. It really is a fascinating art, taking into account all sorts of things, like the size and shape of your fingers, fingernails, lines on your palm, mounts, and such. You would be surprised, for instance, what a person’s thumb can reveal—”

“Excuse me,” the dishy man muttered, picking up his cat carrier in one hand and a suitcase in the other. “I see someone I have to speak with.”

Before she could blink he was off, hurrying down a dirty and dimly lit corridor leading out of the main customs area.

“Well, hell,” she muttered to herself, staring at the luggage at her feet, trying hard not to cry. All of the wispy dreams and hopes beginning to solidify under the influence of his intriguing presence were dashed, her heart leaden and aching with the knowledge that no man, not even one with nice eyes and a warm smile, could find her worth his time.

She picked up her bag and rejoined the crowd queued up for customs, mulling over the tragedy of a freshly snapped mind as she waited. Moving forward when the customs official beckoned her, she answered his questions without thinking, aware only of the devastating truth made crystal clear by the nice man’s sudden defection as soon as she stupidly opened herself up to him. When would she learn?

She blinked back a few tears of self-pity as the official stamped her passport, and started toward the outer reception area, where large groups of attractive men and women were chatting and flirting with one another. Avoiding the beautiful people, she retreated to the far corner, next to the corridor containing a line of offices. Her stomach roiled for a moment at the thought of what a personification of ugly duckling-ness she would make among the collective beauty of the other contestants; then her pride and determination and every ounce of fortitude within her surged to life. She turned her back on them and gazed down the corridor. So she had snapped and the snappee wasn’t interested in her, so what? She had a job to do, and by the saints, she’d do it, and do it so well that Stephen would have no choice but to offer her not only her job back, but also an immediate pay raise as well.

Wasn’t it an American who had said

“Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead?” Well, she’d take a page from his book and show Mr. Nice Eyes.

She didn’t give a fig for what he thought of her. She couldn’t have cared any less about his opinion.

She had no interest in him, none whatsoever, not even the slightest bit of curiosity about what it was he was doing skulking down at the distant end of the corridor, speaking with a man in a customs uniform, handing over not only his cat carrier, but what looked to be a large handful of money as well.

Every journalistic instinct within her stood up and screamed at the nervous, guilty looks he was casting around himself. Hero glanced over her shoulder at the crowd behind her. Several members of the television show staff were trying to round up contestants and herd them toward the shuttles that would take them to the resort proper, but there were far more people than space on the shuttles. She probably had at least ten minutes before she’d need to be back in the main area. Still undecided, she picked up her bag and looked back down the hallway to where the man was disappearing through an unmarked door.

She gnawed her lip for a second, then started down the corridor after him. She had no idea what was going on, but it looked to be the stuff that great stories were made of, so it could only be to her benefit to follow through on it.

She slipped through the door after the two men and found herself in a large room reminiscent of a warehouse, stacked from floor to ceiling with large wooden crates. She ignored them and headed toward where she heard voices, pausing to peer around a towering stack of crates marked Crescent Moon Resort.

The customs official signed a paper, then handed it to the blue-eyed man. “Here is the quarantine certificate. I’ll just add the stamps on the receipt, and you’ll be able to pass through without comment.” Quarantine? Hero vaguely remembered a note about pet quarantine in the literature about Mystique Island that came with her acceptance on the show. The man was smuggling his cat through quarantine?

What a personal interest story that would make! Not to mention it was highly, highly illegal. Hero grinned as she dug through her bag, her fingers closing tightly around the digital camera loaned to her by the newspaper. She hadn’t had much of a chance to use it yet, but knew from those prior experiences that it could be tricky. If she could just get a photo or two of Mr. Blue Eyes and the customs official doctoring the quarantine information, she’d be a very happy woman. Ah, but revenge was sweet.

Both men spotter her with the very first picture.

“Bugger and blast,” she said in a snarl at the camera as the flash went off, attracting their attention.

The customs official disappeared instantly, leaving Hero to face the irritated-looking man who stalked toward her.

“Hello again,” she said weakly, trying unsuccessfully to hide the camera behind her back. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“You were taking my picture,” the man accused her, and rightly so, she had to admit. His luscious black brows were drawn together in a frown that made him look even more adorable, if that were passible. Hero sighed to herself and promised a lecture to her libido at the earliest possible time.

“A picture? Why would I want to take a photo of you?” she asked, knowing innocence was not a brilliant subterfuge, but it was the best she could come up with under the constraints of a snapped mind.

“That’s what I’d like to know. You don’t work for Sally, do you?” He looked suspicious now, trying to see what she held behind her back.

“Sally? No, I don’t even know a Sally. My, look at these fascinating crates. I wonder what could be in them. Isn’t this a fascinating room? You know, I find the whole customs procedure simply fascinating.

The rules, the regulations, the officials . . . oh! That must be what you saw! I was taking a picture of a customs man who was absolutely—”

“Fascinating?” he asked.

Hero nodded, slapping an insincere smile on her face. “Yes! That’s it! He was fascinating. An now, if you’ll excuse me, I believe the shuttles are leaving for the resort. I’ll just dash out of your way and allow you to do whatever it was you were doing secreted away in this room with the customs official.

Ta!”

“One moment, if you please, Miss North.” The man’s hand shackled her free wrist as she turned to leave. “I’d like to see your camera.”

See it? Hero smiled wanly. “It’s just a camera, I assure you. Nothing special about it. Has a lens and a flash and all that.”

He pulled her toward him gently but firmly. “I’m afraid I can’t allow you to keep the film in your camera.”

“It’s a digital camera; it doesn’t have film,” Hero retorted, beginning to be incensed at his high-
handed manner. He set the cat carrier down and pulled her hand forward until the camera was between them. “You see? No film. Now please release me. I have things to do, and they don’t include standing in a room with a professional cat smuggler!”

“So you did follow me!” the man said, taking the camera from her. She snatched at it but he stepped back, fiddling with the knobs and buttons.

“That’s mine; you have no right to it! I must insist that you return it to me immediately!”

“You’re English,” he said, apropos of nothing.

“Yes, I am, as if that makes a difference to camera ownership. Give me back my property!”

“One moment.” He frowned, not even looking at her as he pressed buttons until his image appeared on the small screen. “There. I’ll just erase this picture—” Hero ground an objection between her teeth, furious that he was deleting her evidence, more determined than ever to have her revenge on him.

“It matters little whether I have a photo of you and that customs man falsifying quarantine documents,” she said airily as he handed the camera back to her. “I imagine both the television show producer and the head of customs will be most interested in what I witnessed here. I’m sure a quick look at your passport and the false papers for your cat will reveal everything.” She tucked the camera away in her bag and gave him a bright smile. “Good day!”

“Wait a minute; you can’t tell anyone about Jesus!” The man looked horrified at the thought.

“Jesus?” Had the man snapped, too?

“My cat.”

She blinked in surprise. “You named your cat Jesus? Isn’t that rather blasphemous?”

“It’s not intended to be blasphemous; it’s just the only name he answers to,” the man said, resignation written all over his face. He squatted down to release the door to the carrier.

“He answers to the name Jesus?”

“Yes,” the man said, pulling out a huge gray-and-white cat, attaching a thin leather leash onto his collar. “I think it’s because when most people see him, they say, ‘Jesus, that’s a cat?’ Somehow the name just stuck.”

Hero looked at the huge animal as it hobbled around. It was approximately the size and shape of a well-fed bulldog, was missing one eye, and had a pronounced limp. Altogether it was a very curious animal for a man to feel so strongly about that he dared risk imprisonment to smuggle it through
customs for a six-week visit. “I begin to see your point,” she murmured watching the cat as it investigated the nearby crates.

“Do you know what they’ll do to him if you turn us in?” the man asked. Hero squatted down when the animal limped over to her and smelled her shoes. She peered at his front.

“Is one of his legs shorter than the others?”

“Yes, he lost an inch and a half of bone on one leg when he was hit by a car. That’s how I found him, as a matter of fact, a stray lying by the side of the road after some bastard had mowed him down. The vet was going to take the leg off, but offered to do reconstructive surgery instead. As you can see, it wasn’t entirely successful.”

“Poor puss,” Hero cooed, stroking the cat as he rubbed against her, admiration for the sort of man who’d stop for a wounded cat—not to mention pay for its surgery—doing much to take the edge off her irritation with him. He might have named the cat inappropriately, but he evidently had a very soft heart. “I don’t think very many people would take in such an odd animal.” A rueful smile curled the man’s lips “I seem to have a habit of acquiring them. Back home I have a maniac pheasant who likes to chase cars, a parrot that speaks only Mandarin Chinese, two dogs that have six legs between them, and a pygmy goat that’s happiest when she’s playing on a swing set. Him I found about a year ago.”

Hero scratched behind the cat’s ears. He leaned into her and almost pushed her over. “He must have suffered terribly.”

“Yes, he has suffered, and he’ll suffer even more if you tell the officials what you saw.” The man’s eyes were dark with pleading. Despite her earlier vow of revenge, Hero couldn’t help but be affected by his obvious love for the huge cat. “I’m sure they wouldn’t harm him. They’d just put him quarantine for a few months. The animals are very well taken care of, I’m sure.”

“It would kill him,” the man argued, his eyes soft as he scratched behind the cat’s ear.

“Oh, you exaggerate. I’m sure it wouldn’t’ be fun for Jesus, but I hardly believe quarantine would kill him. I’m quite sure the attendants are fond of animals.”

“It’s not that,” he answered morosely, looking up and giving her the full benefit of his attention. Hero rocked back on her heels in response. Lord, but he was everything she could want in a man . . .

except for his proclivity for smuggling, that is. “Jesus is depressed. Suicidal, in fact. That’s why I’m here, in an attempt to cure his depression.”

“Really?” Hero stood up slowly as the cat strolled over to her luggage and began investigating it.

Her heart melted at the thought of a man who went to the trouble and expense he did just to find a
partner who would love and care for his cat. He truly was one in a million. If only he could look beyond appearances to see that such a woman didn’t have to come in a svelte, tanned package . . .

“I suppose you’re here to find him a mum?”

“What?” The man looked startled. “Oh . . . er . . . yes, that’s it. I’m here to find him a . . . mum. Yes.”

“That’s terribly affecting, but you know, I have to say . . . What is your name?” He stood up. Adam .

. . er . . . Monday.”

“Adamermonday? That’s an unusual name.” Then again his cat was named Jesus.

He looked intriguingly confused. “It’s just Monday. Monday Marsh. Although my friends call me Adam.”

Her eyebrows rose.

“It’s . . . ah . . . middle name,” he answered her silent question. “Prefer it. Over Monday.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Marsh. As I was saying, your story is very affecting, but these countries have quarantine laws for a reason. I believe they are in place to prevent the spread of rabies from areas where the disease has been eradicated. You can see that it’s not fair to the other animals on the island if your cat is allowed to bypass regulations.”

He pulled out a small sheet of paper. “Here’s his health certificate. The vet certifies that Jesus is free from any disease, rabies included.”

Hero looked at the sheet. “Oh. Well, yes, I can see where you might feel it was acceptable for you to bring your cat if he poses no threat, but still—”

“You don’t understand; I have no choice in this. He is deeply depressed and has had two suicide attempts already; I can’t leave him alone. His therapist says now is a very critical time for him.”

“Therapist?” Your cat has a therapist?” Hero glanced over at the cat that sat cleaning his face by licking his front paw and wiping it over his long white whiskers. She’d never heard of a suicidal cat.

“What on earth does a cat have to be depressed about?”

Adam glanced over to the cat, then leaned in toward her. “He’s been neutered,” he whispered.

“He has?” she whispered back.

He nodded.

She waited, but nothing more was forthcoming. “Are you trying to tell me that your cat is depressed
because you had him neutered?”

“Shh,” he hushed her, sending worried looks towards the cat, still involved in grooming himself.

“He’ll hear you. It’s bad enough without reminding him of the problem.” She eyed him from toes to nose. “I think you’re a very nice man.” He turned his attention from the cat to her, his eyes crinkling again as he smiled. “Do you?”

“Yes. Very nice.”

“Thank you. I like you as well.”

She opened her mouth to continue on, to tell him that although he was nice, he was quite obviously a candle or two short of a candelabrum when it came to his cat, but the words never formed.

Warmth on her cheeks heralded another blush. “You do?”

His smile deepened. “Yes.”

She couldn’t help herself; she had to ask. “Why?”

“You have an affinity for animals, you are curious about things other than yourself, you’re intelligent and honorable, but most of all—” He stopped suddenly, looking a bit embarrassed.

Hero wasn’t about to let him get away with that. He was bamming her, obviously, sweet-talking her so she wouldn’t tell the officials about his cat, but even with that knowledge, she wanted more.

“Most of all?” she prompted.

“You remind me of a statue. One of those Greek ones. A goddess.” She stared at him. He waved a hand toward her torso. “Your . . . er . . . shape.” Her shape? He thought her shape was reminiscent of a statue? Instantly the blush flooding her cheeks turned to a raging inferno. He was making fun of her, pointing out that she was the fleshy personification of fat ancient Greek women. A statue indeed! And after she was thinking such nice thoughts about him!

“I see,” she retorted, retrieving her purse from where Jesus the cat had dragged it over to a corner.

“Regardless, I fail to understand exactly how a cat can become suicidal because of a simple operation, but I will accept your word that it is so. If you will excuse me, I believe I will return to the rest of the contestants.”

“You’d be depressed too, if you had your balls lopped off,” Adam pointed out, his brow furrowed as he watched her gather up the rest of her things.

“I highly doubt that.”

“That’s because you’re a woman. You don’t understand the male attachment to our reproductive organs. They’re very important in our lives.”

“No doubt,” she ground out, refraining from adding that since most me thought with their penises, it only made sense that their testicles were ranked next in line in value. Unlike silly little things like manners and kindness and simple consideration for another human being.

“You seem to be mad at me all of a sudden,” Adam commented as he watched her wrestle with her bags. “Did I say something wrong?”

“Ha, ha” she laughed gaily, or as gaily as she could with her heart shattering into little pieces at his cruelty. A snapped mind and a broken heart—oh, what a lovely way to start off her stay in paradise.

“Ha, ha, ha, ha!”

She left the room, ignoring him as he called for her to wait and allow him to apologize for whatever it was he had said, hurrying past several curious guards to rejoin what remained of the contestants in the main lobby.

He followed her out a few minutes later, but she steadfastly refused to acknowledge him. The cat was back in his carrier, no doubt to facilitate his transfer to the resort. Even though more than half of the excited contestants had been spirited away to the main buildings, the crowd remaining was still sizeable.

Hero yanked her mind away from the contemplation of a pair of blue eyes and strolled through the outer doors to deposit her bag with the waiting luggage. Walking outside from the air-conditioned terminal was like entering into another world. The air slammed into her, a hot wall of humidity heavily scented with flowers. Greenery spilled onto the tarmac, the shrubs and bushed and trees alive with birdsong. Bright flashes of color flittered amid the branches, while high overhead sea birds—gulls and pelicans and terns—flew in lazy circles. Hero closed her eyes for a moment, soaking in the sensations of heat and noise and the smell of the tangy salt air and lush earth overlaying the more familiar scent of petrol fumes.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” a small blond woman standing next to her said, looking out into the dense foliage. “Just like the TV promos said it would be—sun and sea and beautiful scenery . . . it truly is paradise.”

Hero smiled her agreement.

“Or it would be if there weren’t a serpent slithering around to ruin everything.” The woman frowned over her should at someone. Hero followed her gaze and was more than a little surprised to find it focused on Adam. She looked back to the woman, her heart dropping as she took note of the heart-shaped face framed by thick, curly blond hair, a petite body obviously fit and well-toned, and casual
taupe linen trousers and a shirt that Hero suspected cost more than her entire wardrobe. If this woman was indicative of the competition, she was in very deep trouble indeed.

“A serpent?” she couldn’t help but ask.

The woman glanced back at where Adam and a large cluster of women were approaching before opening her purse and looking inside for something. “Stalker is more like it. Everywhere I go, he’s there.

Well, he’ll soon find out I mean what I say. Shoot, I don’t have anything to write on. Do you have a piece of paper I could use? My lawyer told me to keep notes on exactly what he does in case I want to sue him.”

Hero stared at her, shocked. Perhaps she was speaking about someone else. Adam might be a little off-kilter, but he didn’t seem to her to be the stuff that stalkers were made of. Slowly she reached into her purse and pulled out a small tablet of note paper she’d filched from work. “Erm . . .

you’re being stalked by someone on the show?”

The blond woman fluttered her hands dismissively, taking the notepad and nodding her head toward Adam. “That man, the one surrounding himself with all the women. I’ve warned him and warned him, but I know how this is going to end—I’ll have to have him removed from the island if he insists on perusing me.”

“He . . . he looks so nice,” Hero said softly, wishing she could take notes herself, but at the same time having difficulty resolving the woman’s claims with the warmhearted, animal-loving Adam.

Perhaps the woman was referring to someone else. “You are talking about that man, the tall one with the dark hair and blue eyes? Monday Marsh?”

The blonde snorted and pulled out a pen. “Monday Marsh. Oh, yes, I’m speaking of the tall man.

The one all the women are slobbering over, more fools they. The Sentinel-Revue,” she read off the notepad.

The blood drained from Hero’s face as she yanked her gaze back to the blonde beside her. Oh, Lord, what had she done?

The woman looked up, a frown on her lovely brow. “You’re a journalist? An English journalist?” Now what was she supposed to do? She could deny it, but any quick denial would sound suspicious.

She could admit the truth, but she knew full well that the Eden rules prohibited journalists from being contestants. She decided to tell the truth—with just a bit of judicious fibbing—the same fibbing that had gotten her on the show in the first place. “I was a journalist. My editor fired me for writing a silly story about the royal family. Now, I’m just . . . here.”

“Oh,” the woman said, piercing her with a shrewd glance before turning back to make her notes. “A word to the wise—if you decide to write a story after the show is finished, you’ll have to look no farther than our babe magnet over there for a very choice subject.” Hero turned to look, a frown on her brow. What was he doing with all those women? They were clinging onto his arms. Laughing and giggling and smiling pouting little smiles at him. She sidled up a bit closer to do a little covert eavesdropping.

“Oh, Monday, your insight about multiple orgasms is so on the money!” a lovely brunette cooed at him, batting her lashes in a manner that screamed wanton. Multiple orgasms? He was giving women advice about orgasms? “I have been multiorgasmic ever since you suggested incorporating the use of a vibrator in love-play. I just can’t believe I ever survived on only one orgasm during sex!”

“Oh, yes, me too,” another woman interrupted as the pack moved by her. “One is just so passé now!” Hero glared at Adam. How could she have been so misled by him? How could she have fallen for his Mr. Nice Guy story about his cat? How could she have snapped for a man who was clearly the United States Sex Fiend of the Year?

“I feel so much more in touch with my feminine side,” Yet another woman simpered, edging out a shorter woman to claim his arm as he stopped a few feet away from the shuttle sign, undoing the latch to the cat carrier. Adam, Hero noted sourly as he snapped the leash on Jesus to the stunned surprise of his audience, had adopted a little-boy-lost bashful look at the attention, no doubt carefully calculated to stimulate the women’s maternal need to mother him. Lord knew, if the size of their bosoms were anything to go by, their maternal instincts might well kill him.

What a rotter.

“Just listen to them,” the small blond woman said with a disgusted look at Adam and his groupies.

“Fawning all over him and that monstrous cat. It’s disgusting, isn’t it?”

“I’m not quite sure why, but evidently they feel grateful to him for their newly found multiorgasmic abilities,” Hero said dryly.

The woman next to her snorted. “If they only knew.”

Hero turned to her. “Knew what? Just who is he?”

The blonde studied her for a moment, then held out a tanned hand. “ My name is Sally Simmons.”

Sally? Sally? It couldn’t be a coincidence, not with her so obviously hostile to Adam. Hero wondered just why he had assumed she was working for Sally, and what the blonde’s history was with him.

Pushing her musing aside, she shook the offered hand. “Hero North.”

“Well, Hero North, what would you say if I were to tell you that Monday Marsh is the U.S.’s premier radio sex therapist?”

Hero goggled at her. “Sex therapist? He offers sexual advice on the radio? Where anyone can hear it?”

Sally nodded. “He has an extremely large following, particularly among women, as you can see.”

“And then my nipples exploded in delight!” Adam said suddenly. Hero turned to stare at him, her mouth hanging open in surprise. The women around him burst into laughter and applause, attracting the few remaining men from inside the terminal.

Dear Lord, what had she done? She’d snapped for an American sex maniac, one who discussed his nipples in public. With strangers. Along with orgasmic advice.

Three shuttles pulled up at that moment, fortuitously keeping Hero from contemplating the insanity that had gripped her. She followed Sally to the line of people queuing for the first bus, claiming a seat near the door. Sally sat at the front, Adam and Jesus, Hero could not help but note, remained with the swarm of women before the second shuttle. Just as the driver was about to close the doors, Adam leaped up the stairs and stood looking up and down the aisle, Jesus clasped to his chest. He glanced down at Hero. He noticed an empty seat next to her. Her heart started racing at the warmth in his blue eyes. Had he sought her out? Had he left his adoring, orgasmic fans to sit with her?

Could it be that he was looking for something not found in the shallow, vapid women who clung to him? Did he truly want . . . her?

“Hero,” he said with a sigh of relief. Her heart did a few jumping jacks. “Do you mind?” She scooted her purse out of the way and tried to look cool and unconcerned. “Not in the least.”

“Thank you.” He plopped the cat down on the seat next to her, and leaned forward over her. “He likes you; and he won’t be any trouble. Just don’t let him try to kill himself.” She looked down at her hand in complete and utter surprise. There was a leash in it. She looked at the seat next to her.

Jesus was considering her with his one good eye. She looked up. Adam had claimed the empty seat next to Sally, and was leaning close to her, arguing vehemently, if quietly. Bloody hell!

Pressure on her leg had her looking back at the cat. He curled up next to her, his huge head resting on her thigh. One side of his lip was curled under itself, exposing a fang.

He was drooling on her dress.

Chapter Three

“Orientation in the ballroom, ladies and gentlemen,” the TV show producer was saying, waving his clipboard at everyone as they emerged from the shuttles. “Your bags will be taken to your rooms.

Ballroom inside and to the left. Move along, please. We have a schedule to keep.” Adam retrieved Jesus from the Englishwoman, thanking her politely for watching the cat while he tried to plead his case with Sally. Hero seemed to be a bit peeved with him, although he couldn't understand why.

She'd said she liked cats, and Jesus had obviously taken to her, something he didn't do with many women. He was about to ask Hero if it was her first time in the Caribbean when the women he'd tried so hard to escape earlier pounced on him, driveling on about his cat, and how thrilled they were to meet him in person. He shot Hero a look begging for her help, or at the very least sympathy, but she didn't take pity on him, strolling on ahead without so much as a glance back at him.

She really was something, he thought to himself as he followed the crowd into a brightly lit ballroom.

Tall and statuesque with short, curly auburn hair, not to mention curves in places that would drive a monk mad, topped off with a charming English accent—why couldn't he have met her elsewhere?

Why did it have to be here, where she would be sure to be swarmed with men wanting to get closer to all those delicious curves? His eyes followed her as she took a seat at one of the tables near the back of the ballroom.

“Excuse me, will you, ladies? I see someone I know. Yes, yes, later, I promise we'll talk. Thank you all for the kind words.” He made his escape, hurrying toward the rear of the ballroom, his eyes on the tall Englishwoman. She was chatting happily with the woman next to her, a small woman with long blonde…

damn!

“Ladies,” he nodded as he pulled out the chair next to Hero. Both she and Sally turned gimlet eyes on him. He ignored the chilly reception and placed Jesus on the chair, taking the seat on the cat's far side. “I see we're just in time. Looks like they're about to start.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Crescent Moon Resort! Welcome to Eden!” A woman’s voice blared out from speakers in the ceiling, and the words, the ballroom suddenly burst to life. Huge arc lights lining the walls flashed on, making Adam and everyone at his table blink in response.

Cameramen poured out of the doorways, spacing themselves around the room, their heavy shoulder-mounted cameras pointing at the people seated at the tables, shadowed by men and women with sound equipment, microphones that followed the sweep of cameras. A number of other people emerged as well, each clutching a clipboard with the Eden TV show emblem blazoned on the front. On a small raised dais at the front of the room, several men in suits joined a couple of women
standing around a computer setup.

“Is everyone seated?” One of the women, a black woman with spiky hair and blood-red framed glasses asked, looking around the room. “Handlers, do we have everyone? Yes? Excellent.

Welcome, contestants, to Eden! My name is Dara Thompson, and I'm the executive producer of Eden. Standing to my left is the president of Hawkeye Productions, Mr. Michael Hawkins. Before Mike welcomes you and explains what will be happening in the next few weeks, I'd like to introduce someone who I'm sure you'll all recognize—the host of our show, the fabulous Rupert Asterisk!” The audience applauded while Adam wrestled his orientation packet from where Jesus had dragged it to his chair, returning the folder with one soggy, chewed upon corner to the table. He dug through his pocket until he found a well-gnawed catnip mouse, giving it to the cat, who promptly growled and pounced on it, holding it with his front paws and rolling onto his back to kick at the mouse with his back legs. Adam looked up to find Hero's serious grey eyes on him. He smiled at her. She started to smile in return, then suddenly shifted her gaze to the front of the room, where the show's host, the well-known diminutive actor/comedian was entertaining the crowd with somewhat bawdy jokes about Adam and Eve.

Adam smiled politely with the rest of the audience, but couldn't help but sneak a peek back to the woman sitting next to his cat.

She was studying Jesus’s mouse with a perplexed expression. He grinned, and leaned across the cat to whisper, “It's a sock. Actually, it's three socks sewn together. Sturdier that way. I made it myself.” Her eyes met his, tiny lines of puzzlement between her arched brows smoothing out as she blinked at him. “You make him toys?”

“I have to. He eats regular cat toys. This one will probably last a week or less before he guts it.” She watched Jesus chomping on the sock mouse's head. “You put whiskers on it?”

“Well, it is a mouse. They have whiskers, you know. I wouldn't want to cheat him out of a proper mouse.”

She looked at him as if he was the one with mouse whiskers; then suddenly her eyes warmed up and her enticing lips curved into a smile. It lit up her whole face and, more amazingly, seemed to light him up inside, as well. “You really are a very nice man despite everything.” Despite everything?

The warm glow her smile had started suddenly froze into a leaden lump of embarrassment. The women. She must have seen those blasted women hanging off him. Hell.

“I can't think of anyone else who would go to such trouble for a pet.” His heart started beating a bit faster at her praise. “He's not your average garden variety of pet, as you can see. He's had a hard life. A few toys are the least I can do to make up for what he's been through.” She looked like she was going to say something else, but the woman on the other side of him shushed them and
pointed toward the stage. Asterisk had been replaced by a tall man with slicked-back blonde hair who was explaining the basic rules of the contest.

“Now, as you all know, the show is divided into two-week sections. The first two weeks feature a variety of events and are intended to give you all a chance to find out how compatible you are with the contestants of the opposite sex. Each day of the first week you will have three dates: two during the day, and the third a group date at night. At the end of every day you will be required to go into the special video booths set up in the lobby. We call them the confession boxes.” The man waited for the polite laughter to die down. “The confession box is where points are awarded; if your date indicates he or she had a good time with you, and you say likewise, you both receive points for compatibility. If one of you states he or she did not enjoy the date…well, sorry, no points there. The second week you'll be paired off with those dates whom you've scored with—that's scored points, gentlemen. Anything else is up to you.” The man held up his hands as if absolving himself from any wrongdoing as the audience hooted and whistled at his double entendre. Adam rolled his eyes. If the women who had hounded him at the airport were anything to go by, there wasn't anyone here he would have even the slightest romantic interest in…

except perhaps the goddess sitting next to him. He slid his gaze toward Hero as the president continued.

“Couples rated compatible will be paired off, and judged on how well they work together. They'll be faced with a variety of challenges, all geared to give them a better understanding of what the other is really like. Successful couples will be awarded points while those of you not meant to be together will have the opportunity to pair up with someone else of your choice. At the end of the second week, the participants who have earned the most points will advance to the next round, leaving us to start the third week with only fifty bachelors and fifty bachelorettes. By the end of the sixth week, only one couple will be left to enjoy the grand prize of—say it with me—one million dollars and an around-the-world-trip for two. As you can tell from the number of your fellow contestants, the competition will be tough, but remember! The goal of the show is to find that special someone, not to rack up points, so be honest in the confession booth. We've all had enough bad dates not to want to repeat them just to accrue a few points, right?”

The audience groaned their agreement. Jesus tugged on his leash, standing with his front legs on the back of the chair, giving the cameraman who was filming him one of his silent meows. The cameraman grinned in delight, tightening the focus of his shot as the cat squinted his eye at the light atop the camera, batting at it with one massive paw.

“Show off,” Adam grumbled, glancing up to see if Hero was watching. She was, but the smile that had started such a warm glow within him had faded. She looked worried now, pensive, tapping a finger against lush lips as if she was considering his fitness for some role. A surge of lust slashed
through him, whispering to him exactly what role he'd like to perform with her.

“One final word and then I'll let you go all freshen up before dinner. You'll notice around you the cameramen and soundmen. They are here to capture your responses to your dates, as well as to film any interviews you might be requested to do with the illustrious Asterisk. Please do your best to pretend the camera crew is not present. We want your reactions to be as realistic and unstudied as possible. Be honest, be yourself, and above all, have fun here in our own little Eden!” Dara the executive producer had returned to the microphone with a few last minute announcements.

“Dinner tonight is the first of this week's group dates. Each table will be playing a few icebreaker games to allow you to get to know each other. Points will be awarded to tables whose members complete the events. There will be a cocktail get-to-know-you hour before in the south patio. The orientation packets handed to you as you came in include your room key and a map to the resort, as well as a list of amenities, Eden rules, et cetera. If you have any questions, feel free to ask any of the show's handlers.

They're the ones with the blue buttons and the wild looks in their eyes.” The crowd laughed and applauded the producer, chatting among themselves as they started filing out of the ballroom. Adam pulled Jesus back from where he was trying to climb onto Hero's lap.

“Sorry,” he said. “He really likes you. You ought to take that as a compliment—he doesn't like too many women. My vet thinks it was a woman who abused him as a kitten.”

“Abused him? How terrible. Poor Puss,” Hero said, stroking the cat's large head. Jesus made that peculiar rumbling deep in his chest that passed for purring, giving Adam a sly look out of his good eye.

Adam looked over Hero's head.

“Er…Sally, if I could speak to you for just a moment…”

“You do, and I'll tell that producer the truth about you,” Sally snarled as she gathered up her things and stalked off.

Adam was torn between going after her to beg her to not turn him in, and staying to talk to Hero. He sighed. There were Jesus's testicles to consider; duty had to win out. Feeling more a martyr than ever, he scooped up the cat from where he was making himself at home on Hero's lap. “I'm sorry about that; he really is a mooch when it comes to attention. I'll just take him off to my room and let him stretch his legs.”

“I see.” She didn't look like she saw anything she understood; she looked confused. Delightfully confused, he amended, gnawing on a delectable lower lip as she eyed him speculatively.

He glanced out the glass doors to the long palm-lined walk that ran the length of the resort, knowing he should leave, but wanting to stay. Large clusters of people were still visible, including the retreating form of Sally. He really needed to talk to her, to make her understand that he didn't pose any threat to her whatsoever, and to get her to agree not to expose him. But Hero was an irresistible lure—especially since her hesitant expression told him she wanted to say something, but hadn't yet mustered up the nerve.

He sighed again and gave in. He could find Sally later. Just once he wanted to do something for himself.

“Erm…Mr. Marsh—”

“Call me Adam,” he said, uncomfortably aware once again that she believed him to be someone he wasn't. He pushed that thought aside. There was nothing he could do about that now. Perhaps later…if he was allowed to have a later, that is.

“Adam, would it be possible to have a word in your ear? Privately?” She wanted to talk to him privately. How fitting that he should be right there, willing to be talked to.

Privately.

“Certainly. Er…let's see…” he juggled Jesus and his orientation packet for a moment, then set the cat down and rustled through the papers until he found a small brass key. “I'm in cabana seventeen.

According to the map, that's just beyond the fitness center. Where are you?” She held out a key.

“Cabana one-twenty-two, next to the croquet court.”

“You're closer. If you don't mind stopping to let Jesus do his business, I'll walk you there.”

“I don't mind in the least,” Hero said as they exited the ballroom. Long walkways lined with shrubs, small palms, and lots of flowers crisscrossed the main resort compound. Discreet signs pointed visitors to the various amenities. Adam and Hero turned right and headed toward the west side of the resort.

“To tell you the truth,” she admitted with a shy smile that tugged on his heart, “I'm a bit overwhelmed by the resort. It's lovelier than anyplace I've seen. The flowers alone are breathtaking, and the scenery…it really is just as I imagine the Garden of Eden to have been.” Adam paused and discreetly turned his back when Jesus disappeared under a low-growing shrub.

“It's a big muggy, but I expect we'll get used to that in time.” Dirt scattered on the paving stones before Adam's feet, kicked out from under the shrub. He shifted uncomfortably. Hero was dreamily looking off in the distance, past a line of coconut palms to where the roar and crash of the surf could
be heard pounding onto a rocky outcropping. More dirt splatted on the pathway. He brushed it aside with his foot, wondering what Hero wanted to talk to him about. A small pink and white orchid, roots still attached, was flung out from under the shrub onto the tops of his shoes. He tugged on the leash, smiling wolfishly at Hero as she turned to look at him.

“He likes flowers.”

Hero looked at the orchid Adam placed on the edge of the path.

“He does?” she asked with one eyebrow cocked in disbelief before turning back to gaze out toward the palms.

Adam fidgeted. He hated having to make chitchat. He never had been any good at it, and now here he was stuck with a woman who stirred his desire more than he'd felt in years, and his cat was evidently excavating to China. “Er…so, is this your first time in the Caribbean?”

“Yes.”

“Ah.”

He tugged a bit more persistently on the leash. The shrub trembled for a moment, a few twigs snapped sharply, and then a low, threatening growl heralded Jesus's arrival. Branches parted to reveal a feline rear end. The cat backed out of the leaves, rumbling softly to himself as he dragged a small piece of sky-blue cloth over to his owner, plopping his butt down on Adam's toes to present him with his find with a look of great satisfaction.

“What the hell…?” Adam wrestled the cloth from the cat's mouth and claws. “Let go of it, dammit!

Whatever it is, it's dirty. I don't want you to have it.” Hero watched in silence as he scooted the cat off his feet, squatting next to the animal, prying his mouth open to unhook the cloth from Jesus's sharp teeth.

Adam looked up. “I think there's a bit of retriever in him,” he joked weakly, mentally moaning to himself. This was just what he needed, for Jesus to act up and make him look like an idiot in front of the one woman he wanted to make a good impression on. “Give it to me, cat! Damn it, I'm not playing with you, give me the blasted thing!”

Jesus spat out the cloth and turned to Hero, standing on his back legs and patting her knees with his front paws, giving her his piteous silent meow and a look that would do a starving orphan facing eviction into a blizzard proud.

“Oh, you poor thing!” she crooned, clearly falling for his pathetic act. She bent down to scoop him up, staggering a little when she tried to straighten up with the full weight of him in her arms. She
recovered nicely, however, and glared at Adam over the cat's head. “You shouted at him!” Adam held up his hand. A torn and dirt-encrusted pair of women's sky blue underwear dangled from his fingers. “Yes, I did. I have a rule that he's not allowed to bring home strange women's panties. I'm silly that way.”

Her eyebrows went up. “You trained your cat to fetch knickers from women who are not strangers?”

“No, certainly not! He just likes them.”

The look of disbelief on her face said it all.

“I mean, he just likes to find things and retrieve them. It doesn't matter what the object is.” She continued to stare at him, making him feel as though he were in fourth grade and caught kissing Betty Sue Seymore behind the jungle gym. “Look, he's a strange cat; I have little control over him.

He likes to find things. I can count the number of times he's brought me panties on the fingers of one hand.” He thought for a moment. “Well, all right, two hands, but that's only because my girlfriend was living with me at the time and there were panties everywhere. I couldn't expect him to just ignore them, now could I?”

She pursed her lips, looked like she was going to argue the point, then shook her head and simply said, “I think, perhaps, we should let this particular subject drop.”

“I think you're right,” he agreed with no little sense of relief. What was it about this woman that made him feel like he were a gauche young man on his first serious date?

Hero frowned at the underwear, then down on Jesus's head. The cat's look of smug satisfaction at being held melted into one of innocence and feline sainthood. Adam was not amused. He tossed the underwear into a nearby trash receptacle and retrieved his cat, setting him on the ground. “Behave yourself and I'll let you have a can of sardines later.”

Jesus gave him a one-eyed, annoyed stare before leading the way down the path.

“He's limping quite heavily, don't you think you should carry him?” Hero asked as she strolled next to Adam, her eyes on the cat a few feet ahead of her. “His leg must be hurting.”

“Just ignore it, it's an act. He's fine. When his leg hurts, he lets me know.”

“How?” she asked, just as he knew she would.

“He bites me, “ Adam replied, enjoying the tantalizing scent of sun-warmed woman the soft ocean breeze carried his way. He breathed deeply, feeling the familiar prickles of arousal start to stir before he clamped down on the unwelcome sensation. What the hell was he doing? What sort of terrible things did it say about him that he was ready to take advantage of an innocent young
woman while pretending to be someone else? What had happened to honor and pride? Had he really sunk so low that he would even contemplate lying—by word or by deed, they were both the same—to someone he wanted to have a relationship with? Had it really come to this?

Hero's hand brushed his as they walked down the palm tree lined pathway toward a sweeping crescent of small cabanas lining a lush green lawn. Pure desire rippled through him at the contact.

“Yes, yes it has come to this,” he muttered as he stepped aside for her to open the door to the furthest most cabana.

“Did you say something?” she asked as she paused before the door.

“Nothing worth repeating.”

The small puzzled frown was back between her eyes, but she said nothing as she unlocked the door and entered the cabana. Jesus marched in after her, his whiskers twitching as he surveyed the room, locating the whereabouts of anything that might be of possible interest to him.

“Don't get too comfortable, this isn't our room,” Adam told him, unsnapping the leash before looking up at Hero. She was examining the room as well.

“This is quite nice, much nicer than I expected. Oh, I'm sorry, do please sit down. This won't take but a minute.” She pulled a suitcase off a wicker chair and waved him toward it.

“I don't suppose you asked me here in order to cast yourself into my manly arms and beg me to make you a woman tonight?” he asked with a smile that he sincerely hoped was not tinged with desperation.

Hero paused in the act of sitting down in the chair opposite his. “What?” He tried to make his smile friendly and reassuring, and not in the least bit that of a sex-starved man who finds himself in a room with the living personification of Aphrodite and Venus all rolled into one tempting package.

“That was a joke. A very poor one, I realize, but since you seemed to be a bit peeved with me earlier, and as my cat is probably even now sitting on your toilet playing in the water, I figured it might be called for.”

“I see.”

“Clearly it wasn't.”

“Perhaps not,” she agreed, her lovely grey eyes large with worry. She probably was concerned he'd pounce on her the second she looked away. He heaved a mental sigh. Wasn't this day turning out to be just jim dandy fine? First she caught him in the blatantly illegal act of smuggling his cat through quarantine; then said cat retrieved out a pair of underwear for him like he did that every day
of his life, and now that she had invited him into her cozy little cabana for two, he was acting like a sex maniac. Oh, yes, his life was turning out very well, indeed.

“I have a proposition to make you,” Hero interrupted the contemplation of recent events.

Adam sat up a bit straighter in his chair and casually crossed his legs so she wouldn't see just what sort of affect her nearness and the word proposition was having on him. He had to clear his throat before he could speak. “A proposition? What sort of proposition?” Dare he hope it involved their bared flesh and a fresh mango or two?

“It's like this—I have a reason, which I don't care to reveal just now, to wish to be present at least through the third and fourth weeks of the show, and not eliminated at the end of the second week. It is vitally important to me, you understand. I assume if you've gone to the time and trouble, not to mention the risk of possible imprisonment, of smuggling your cat into the country, you must also wish to see the whole show through as well.”

There was nothing he'd like more than to go home…assuming she'd like to come with him, but he supposed he shouldn't say that. He tried to look like he was anticipating a grand and glorious time on the island of Mystique, and nodded his head.

“Excellent. Simply put, I propose— A aaiiiiiiiiieeeeeeee! What the bloody hell is that ? ” Hero leaped from a sitting position straight onto the seat of her chair and did a horrified little dance as she pointed a shaking finger toward the bathroom. Framed perfectly in the doorway, Jesus strolled nonchalantly into the room with a small creature perched on his head.

Adam sighed again, this time aloud. Jesus was going to be the death of him, he really was. Or if not him specifically, at least of his romantic life. “It would appear my cat has found a friend.”

“But what is it? It's yellow! It looks poisonous!” Hero shrieked, still doing her fascinating little dance on the chair. Adam gave himself a moment to admire the flashes of leg that were visible as she bounced up and down, then turned his attention back to the cat, who had now wandered into the room and sat with his tail curled around his feet, looking for all the world like a feline version of Buddha.

One with a gecko on his head.

“Will it harm him? Where did he find it? Did he find it in my room? Oh, Lord, I'll have to have my room fumigated! I can't stay in a room with great herds of wildlife living in it!” Adam rose and walked over to the cat to take a closer look. “It's nothing poisonous, and fumigating wouldn't do anything.

It's just a house gecko, Hero, not a tarantula or anything that bites or is poisonous, although I did see a scorpion as we left the ballroom, so you might want to be wary about going around barefoot outside.”

“Eeeeeeek!” Hero screamed louder, and scrabbled onto the tiny round table that sat between the two wicker chairs. “Geckos! Scorpions! Tarantulas! No one said anything about them in the promotional literature!”

He stroked a finger down the yellowish brown back of the gecko. It was about three inches long, and looked back at him with shiny black unblinking eyes. “You just had to take on a hitchhiker, eh?”

Adam asked his cat softly, giving him a quick scratch behind his ear where the gecko's tail curled.

Jesus rumbled in reply. The gecko slowly blinked. Hero made distressed noises.

“Come here and meet the gecko,” Adam said as he turned, holding out his hand for her. “It won't hurt you, I promise. It's just a harmless little lizard that eats bugs. You'll be thankful to have him once you see how many insects he takes care of for you.”

Hero looked at him as if he'd ripped off all his clothing and painted his penis bright blue. “You expect me to touch it?”

The aforementioned penis twitched at the very thought of her words. He mentally pointed out to his genitals that she was referring to the gecko, not to them. “Yes, I expect you to touch it. Make friends with your house gecko, and he'll do right by you, that's what an old Bahamian once told me, and he was absolutely correct. Come on, I promise he won't do anything scary.” He wiggled the fingers of his outstretched hand at her. She looked at his hand like it was crawling with geckos and shook her head. He tsked, then grabbed her waist with both hands and swung her down off the table. She slid down his chest in a manner that made his not-painted-blue penis cheer with happiness.

Her knees seemed to buckle once her feet hit the ground, so he held onto her waist until she was steady. That was the excuse he gave himself; the truth was he just liked holding her close to him. A breeze from the window ruffled her auburn curls, sending the flowery scent of her to dance a tantalizing dance around him, stirring his libido to new heights. He regretted the morning's choice of bikini underwear, and made a mental note to wear boxers from that moment on.

“You lifted me down,” she said in breathy astonishment, her eyes wide with shock, her hands on his where they held her waist firmly.

“Yes,” he agreed, unwilling to let her go. She was warm and soft beneath his fingers, and he had the most overwhelming urge to let his fingers skim upwards, to feel the heat of her breasts against his palms.

“You're holding me.” Her eyes grew dark with emotion, but what emotion was it? Did he offend her, did she think he was a sex maniac, or was she feeling the same wild stir of attraction that was washing through him?

“I am.”

“Close,” she pointed out.

“Am I?”

“Yes.”

“Oh.”

A minute passed with the two of them just standing there, him holding onto her waist, both staring into the other's eyes. The muffled roar of the surf from the east side of the resort mingled with the jabber of birds and people as they strolled past the cabanas, laughing and talking excitedly. Inside, the room was quiet but for the loud beating of his heart.

“Do you want me to let you go?” Adam finally broke the silence to ask.

Her pupils flared. “It is probably for the best.”

He said nothing, his palms warm with the heat of her through the thin cotton of her dress. For some reason, he seemed unable to move his hands from her waist.

“I…it's very difficult to speak with you when we're standing this close,” she added.

“It is?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

The tip of her little pink tongue emerged to lick her bottom lip. Adam was possessed with the overwhelming desire to suck her lip into his mouth and taste it for himself. “You…erm…standing this close…”

“Yes?” The blush that swept up from her chest intrigued him. Did women still blush over something like a little physical contact? He eyed her rosy cheeks and bright eyes that held a hint of apology in them.

“It's a position people usually take when they are about to kiss each other.” He really had to let go of her, he knew that. Just standing so close to her, her thighs pressed against his, the tips of her breast brushing against his chest with every breath, he was hard as a rock. She really would think he was a maniac if she knew he was reacting to her so strongly.

“Would that be such a terrible thing?” he asked.

“Mmm?” She looked confused by the question.

“Kissing.”

Her eyes widened until she had a deer-in-the-headlights look. “You mean—” He couldn't stop himself, there was nothing in the world short of spontaneous combustion or global nuclear war that would keep him from doing what he had wanted to the second he saw her. His lips brushed hers gently, tentatively, more a soft lip embrace than an actual kiss. The feeling of her mouth on his left him burning with the need to claim it properly, but he knew instinctively that she was poised on the edge of flight, so he pulled back and smiled at her instead.

She stared at him in bewilderment as he released her waist, but captured her hand, tugging her over to where Jesus sat watching them interestedly.

“Look, it's just a gecko. It's not slimy or wet or anything, it's just a friendly little lizard that wants to eat the bugs in your room. He won't come near you, they're very shy of people. Most of them don't even come out until night.”

She continued to stare at him as he stroked the tips of her fingers lightly down the back of the gecko.

“You kissed me,” she finally said, then blushed even harder.

“Yes. Do I need to apologize?”

He was willing to bet he could fry an egg on the blush that was burning her cheeks.

“No,” she whispered, then looked down at where her fingertips rested on the gecko. “I still don't want it in my room,” she said in a stronger voice, slowly pulling her fingers from beneath his.

He grinned as he retook his seat. “I suspect that won't be an issue. Jesus seems to have found a friend, and until I can afford to pay for his new testicles, I'd just as soon he kept himself busy and his mind off his depression.”

Hero closed her eyes for a moment, opening them again to shake her head. “His new testicles?”

“Yes, I told you that I was saving for his operation.”

“But . . .” She looked at the cat as she sank into the chair opposite the tiny table. “Surely he's already had his operation?”

“Not that one, the next one. The one to implant his prosthetic testicles. It's a very expensive procedure.”

She stared at him with a curious look that was part disbelief, part amusement. “Prosthetic…

testicles?” He frowned at her. “You're going to laugh, aren't you? Every woman I've told about the prosthetic testicles laughs, even my vet's partner laughed, but I assure you it's no laughing matter to Jesus. His self-esteem is involved. It's a very delicate situation.”

She started to laugh. “I'm sorry, I have no intention of slighting your cat's testicles, or lack thereof.

It's just that…prosthetic testicles! Only a man would think of such a useless thing.”

“Useless! A man's balls aren't useless! They have a very specific purpose, and I don't mind telling you that we as a gender tend to be fond of them. We feel a definite lack if they are missing.”

“We weren't talking about your…erm…” she glanced at his lap and then quickly away.

He ground his teeth together for a moment before speaking. “You said you had a proposition for me?”

“Yes,” she said, her lips quivering slightly.

“What is it?” he asked crossly, trying to keep the scowl off his face.

Her lips twitched. “I will tell you, but I don't want you to be disappointed.”

“Disappointed?”

“Yes.” She lost the battle and began laughing. “It has nothing to do with tes…tes…testicles.”

Chapter Four

It took Hero a good five minutes to stop laughing. It didn't help that Adam had shot her such an accusatory look, or that he turned to his monster of a cat and balefully told him it was all his fault.

Wiping a few tears of hilarity back, she made an effort to get to the purpose of her proposal. “As I was saying, I intend on remaining through the duration of the show.”

He stopped scowling long enough to look curious. “Would you answer a personal question for me?”

She gazed into his blue eyes and felt her determination not to allow him to affect her any more begin to melt. Her fingers twitched, wanting to touch her lips, to see if they had been changed by the almost-not-there kiss that rocked her world; then she remembered the women. His groupies.

Indignation burned within her as she refortified her defenses against the sinfully handsome man opposite her. He probably kissed all of the groupies, too, no doubt as he was doing whatever he did to make them multiorgasmic. He probably did that on the plane to Mystique, she grumbled sourly to herself. He might appear to be a wonderful, warm, caring, handsome, ideal man who cared about animals and people, the truth was he was the biggest sex fiend of all. His nipples exploded in delight, indeed!

“A personal question? Possibly. What is it?”

“Why would an intelligent, pretty woman like yourself have to resort to a show like this to find a man?”

A warm kernel of pleasure formed and started to glow within her at his words. He thought she was intelligent and pretty? The growing warmth suddenly froze. Intelligent, yes, lots of men had called her that, but never pretty. He was just flattering her, he had to be. He was being nice to her because she knew his secret, and he didn't want her to tell it to anyone. She raised her chin and gave him what she hoped was a haughty glare. “My reasons for being here are my own, and move no importance to the proposition I wish to make to you. Simply put, I must be sure of making it at least to the second round, and since the first two weeks we are judged on compatibility with others, I find myself in the necessary position of offering you a deal.”

“What sort of a deal?” he asked, leaning back in his chair, looking mildly curious.

“One that will be mutually beneficial: I will agree to not tell the Eden people and the Mystique officials that you smuggled your cat through quarantine, and you—” She took a deep breath. “—
agree to be my date once a day for the next two weeks.”

The words didn't hurt nearly as much as she thought they would, at least, not until Adam's eyes narrowed on her.

“You'd turn us in?”

“Not if you help me,” she said miserably, feeling terribly guilty about blackmailing him, but seeing no other choice. It wasn't as if he really was a nice man. He wasn't. His nipples exploded on national radio every night. His appearance of niceness was all a sham, an act to make people believe he was the sort of man who'd care for a stray cat and adopt him when others would have ignored the animal, or had him put down.

Besides which, as the television show producer warned, the odds of making it past the first round of elimination were not good, especially for someone like her who so obviously stood out from the rest of the tanned, fit women. “One date per day, and positive comments each night in the confession booth should be adequate. That will leave you time to pursue Sally or any of the myriad other women who seem to wish to be with you, although I should warn you that Sally does not appear to be the least bit fond of you. You might wish to rethink your strategy with regard to your pursuit of her. She seems most adamant that you leave her alone.”

“I wish I could,” he ground through his teeth, looking like he wanted to do someone bodily harm.

Despite the gentleness of the kiss they shared earlier, she had a horrible suspicion it was herself he
was thinking of. No doubt he didn't appreciate her pointing out the fact that the woman he was smitten with wasn't interested in him. All of which would make his kissing her reprehensible, except it clearly wasn't intended as a sexual indicator. It was more of a sympathetic kiss, a kiss for a woman who posed no sexual threat, a kiss for a pathetic woman afraid of lizards, a…a pity kiss.

Oh, Lord, had it come to this? Pity kisses?

“I can't believe you'd turn us in. I thought you liked…er…Jesus,” he said with a hint of steel in his voice.

She pulled her mind from the abject misery that was her life, and reminded herself that she was strong and completely capable of living her life without him. Happily. “I do, but this is business.” One glossy eyebrow cocked at that.

“What I mean, of course, is that I take the dating situation very seriously, very seriously indeed, almost as if it were my business. Which, in a way, it is.”

“Let me see if I have this straight,” Adam said, frowning at her. “You are blackmailing me into being one of your dates each day?”

She flinched at the baldness of the statement, then told herself that blackmailers had no right to be so squeamish. “Yes.”

“Every day?”

“One per day will suffice, I believe.”

“At the conclusion of which, I am to report to the confession booth that we had a wonderful time together and are completely compatible in all ways, and that I hope to date you again the following day.”

“Well…whatever it will take to gain us the points. You might not have to lie quite so vehemently.

Perhaps just a little exaggeration will be required.”

He looked a bit perplexed. “Why do you think I'd have be lying by saying we had a wonderful date and I wanted to see you again?”

She stared at him in surprise. He really was a good actor. That or he believed she was so pathetic, he needed to bolster her ego a bit. Maybe he wasn't quite as hardened and jaded as he thought.

That pity kiss had certainly done a lot for her, at least until she recognized it for what it was.

But there was the issue of his nipples exploding all over the place, not to mention his hobby of making women multi-orgasmic.

She sighed, confused by the dichotomy of his character. There was a definite blaze of something in the depths of his blue eyes that didn't say he pitied her. It almost seemed as if desire lurked in the sapphire depths. She spent a moment in contemplation of what it would be like to stir such an emotion in him, then reminded herself that the proof was undeniable: he was a sex expert and no doubt knew how to simulate sexual interest. She couldn't allow herself to forget that she had him by the short and curlies, in that situation, he'd do anything, even pretending he desired her, in order to keep her mouth shut.

“It matters not,” she said briskly, determined to get his agreement on the proposition, “You can see that my plan will benefit you, as well as me. You will also garner points with each successful date we complete; thus you, too will make it to the second round. I have no doubt Sally will, as will most of your…erm… admirers.”

“My—oh, them.” He gave her a sheepish grin that turned her insides all soft and squidgy. How could such a sex fiend look so adorable? “I don't encourage them, you know. It's a bit embarrassing, to tell you the truth. I never have been one for attention.”

She was willing to wager he secretly loved it. All men loved to have women fawn upon them.

“Mmm. Perhaps them becoming a radio sex therapist wasn't the best career choice to have made?”

He looked downright uncomfortable, leaving her to wonder if what he said was true, that he honestly did not like the attention.

“About that…I…uh…hell. I can't tell you.”

She eyed him for a minute, then stood up and held out her hand. “Do we have an agreement?” He looked at her hand, then stood to wrap his long, warm fingers around hers. “I am completely at your mercy, as you well know,” he said stiffly, his eyes dark and unfathomable. “As such, I have no choice but to agree.”

The words cut through her like a hot knife. It was clear that he was only agreeing in order to remain a part of the show, not because he found any pleasure in the idea of dating her. Still, it was better he be honest about it than try to make her believe he really found her attractive.

She just wished that honesty didn't have to hurt so much.

“Thank you,” she told him, pulling her hand from his, aware of a profound sense of loss with the severing of physical contact.

He left shortly after that, taking his cat and the gecko (much to her relief) with him. She took a tepid shower, had a rest on a bed that was a bit too soft for her taste, and spent the remainder of the time
alternately reliving the wonderful feeling of being held by Adam as he kissed her, and remembering the simpering looks on the women's faces as they clung to his arms. Why had her mind chosen him to snap over, the one man who would have at least half the women on the island fighting for his attention? Well, at least she had his agreement to one date a day. He might not have chosen her of his own free will, but she suspected he was too much of a gentleman to ignore her during the dates themselves.

A few hours after the téte-a-téte, she headed off toward the ballroom and the evening group date.

Cameramen dotted the walkways, filming contestants as they emerged from their cabanas, talking and laughing together in groups as they meandered toward the main complex. Hero paused at the door when her name was called. She smiled as Sally, dressed in a slinky gold and black dress that left more of her exposed than covered, hailed her from the arm of a large, beefcakey man with no visible neck and skin-tight pants that looked like they'd been painted on him.

“Isn't this a wonderful place? How was your room? Mine looks over the salt-water pool. This is Greg, he's from Chicago.”

They exchanged pleasantries for a moment before Sally added, “Come sit with us at dinner, unless you have someone else you'd like to sit with.”

Hero looked over Sally's shoulder and noticed Adam and his cat bearing down on them, a grim look on his face. She knew she shouldn't say yes, she knew that although she liked Sally, it wasn't for the sake of a friendly face that she wanted to agree. She couldn't even begin to pretend to herself that her true motivation was not in the fact that wherever Sally went, Adam was sure to follow.

Since there was no use denying it, she might as well give in.

“I'd love to join you, if you truly don't mind,” she said with a grateful smile, and followed them past a barrage of cameramen into the brightly lit ballroom. It was a bit unnerving knowing that her every movement was likely to be caught on camera, a fact that had her checking obsessively in the small mirror in her bathroom to make sure that she didn't have a spot or something horrid hanging from her nose, or that the back of her tiered gauze skirt was tucked up into her knickers. She tried not to look at the cameras, and took a chair next to Greg. He was grinning right at one, flexing his thigh-sized arms.

He probably ate steroids for lunch.

A minute later Jesus was deposited on the chair next to her, Adam taking the seat beyond that.

“Evening everyone. Sally. Hero, you look lovely. Hi. Name's Marsh,” he said to Greg, leaning across Jesus and Hero to hold out his hand. “And you are…?”

She blinked at him as Greg introduced himself. Sally sent him a menacing glare, then ignored him, putting her hand on Greg's huge arm to draw his attention back to where she wanted it.

“Notice you have a cat,” Greg said casually, but casually in an I don't want you to see just how interested I am sort of way. Hero wondered if Greg, noticing Adam's interest in Sally, was preparing to go territorial.

Adam's lips twisted wryly. “He's a bit hard to ignore, but yes, he's my cat.”

“Brought him through quarantine, did you?”

Hero froze, not daring to look at Adam. How would he handle the question?

“Yes,” Adam drawled, apparently unconcerned. Hero let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding and glanced over at Adam. He was scratching the cat's chest, much to Jesus's satisfaction.

“Spent six months in there, poor old fellow.”

Greg tapped on the side of his plate with his fingernail. “Rather odd, isn't it, to put your cat through six months of quarantine for a six week vacation?”

Adam smiled, showing a great many white teeth. “Not odd at all. I'm hoping to settle in the area, and once your animal has cleared through one quarantine in these islands, they can travel to the others with immunity.”

“Huh. Is that so?” Greg replied, a shuttered look to his eyes.

Hero wondered if what Adam had said was true. It didn't sound right, but then, she knew he was lying. It might very well do as a cover story.

“So,” Adam said, smiling at her and not too noticeably changing the subject, “what's the game plan for this evening? Dinner and then a group date, eh? What sort of a date will it be, do you think?”

Hero nudged the small card in front of his plate toward him. “The card says tonight will be an icebreaker date. I imagine that means silly party games.” Two more people wandered over, introducing themselves. Sally greeted them, her smile almost as bright as the arc lights shining down on them. Immediately two cameramen honed in on them, one camera on Sally, the other on Jesus who was sitting at the table with a serious expression on his face, looking for all the world like a guest who had been invited to a dinner party. The gecko was still perched on his head.

Hero stared at it for a moment, then glanced up at Adam.

“Thought he needed a bit of sprucing up,” Adam whispered to her. “Jesus and I have our evening clothes on, so thought it was only right Gecko should fancy himself up, too.” She looked back to the cat. She had to admit Adam was right. The gecko did look much more festive with a bright red bow
around his neck. Jesus wore a different collar from the one she'd seen him in earlier.

That was plain brown leather—this one was hot pink with little black charms dangling from it. She looked closer.

“They're mice. Friend of mine made it for him just for the dinners,” Adam said. “Makes him feel like he's dressed up, too.”

She wanted to tell him that he was the only man on God's green earth who would think of his cat's feelings during a dinner date, but the camera was pointing at her now so she just smiled and murmured something non-committal.

Dinner was a bit of a trial. She realized midway through the escargot that the dinner in itself was an event—the food presented had to be the most challenging to eat politely in public. Each place setting had an appetizer fork, shellfish fork, salad fork, and main dinner fork, not to mention two spoons, two knives, and something that she thought was a tool to eat escargot, but might possibly be a gelding device. She giggled at that thought…until the snails were placed on her plate.

She slid a covert glance around the table. Everyone was laughing and eating and chatting quite amiably, and no one blinked an eye at the thought of eating escargot. Except Adam. He stared at his plate in horror, then looked up and caught her eye.

The urge to giggle was strong. “I'm from a working class family,” she leaned over Jesus to whisper.

“Where I come from, snails are destroyed in the garden, not eaten.” A look of profound relief lit his eyes. “Thank God for you. I thought I might actually have to eat them.”

“Do what I do when faced with something I don't wish to eat—say you're allergic to them.”

“I have a better idea,” he said with a wicked grin that lit all sorts of little fires inside of her. He picked up the gelding device and clamped it around a shell, then dug around inside until he pulled out the meat, and with a quick look to make sure no cameras were on him, placed the food on Jesus's plate. The cat sniffed at it, batted it around a bit with one heavy paw, then finally chewed on it with an indescribable expression on his face. Hero and Adam watched him carefully.

“He's going to spit it back up.”

“No he's not, he likes it. If he didn't like it, he'd knock it on the floor. There, you see? He ate it. Your turn.”

They got rid of most of their snails in that manner. By the end of the meal Jesus was curled up on his chair, looking sated and sleepy. The gecko, evidently warmed by the cat below him, was quiet as well.

Only occasionally did he rouse himself to flick his tongue, capturing an unwary moth or fly that flew too near the duo.

One cameraman or another was lurking around their table during the entire meal, making Hero feel even more nervous than she would in normal circumstances, but since most of the time the cameras were either on Sally, the three other women, or Jesus, she started to relax. Perhaps the party games wouldn't be so bad after all.

“Oh, how naïve I can be,” she muttered a short time later as she and ninety-nine other women paraded around two lines of chairs that had been placed back-to-back. Loud Caribbean music blared throughout the ballroom. Lights from the ring of cameramen around them caused beads of perspiration to form on her brow. “Naïve and downright stupid. Of all the silly things I agreed to do

—” The music stopped suddenly. She lunged for the nearest man, plopping herself down on his lap even as she excused her herself. “I do hope you don't mind if I—oh, I am sorry. I didn't realize that was your…

erm…yes. I'm sure it won't cause any permanent damage. You weren't planning on starting a family right away, were you?”

He didn't return her tentative smile.

Despite wishing she hadn't been so quick to find a free lap in the embarrassingly intimate game of musical chairs, she stayed perched on her unwilling host until the ten women unlucky enough to find themselves without men to sit on were excused, and another ten men and chairs were removed.

The music started again. She made it through three more excruciatingly embarrassing rounds, then finally was excused and returned to her table to watch the rest of the game with Adam's cat and the tablemates who were also unlucky enough to be caught without a man's lap to sit upon.

During the second round, in which the women sat on the chairs and the men raced around them, she was surprised to suddenly find Adam in front of her.

“Do you mind?” he asked with a wry smile.

Some of the smaller women, afraid of being squashed by larger male companions, had taken to scooting over to inhabit a tiny fraction of the chair, thus leaving the men room to park themselves on a corner, but Hero was no tiny woman. She filled her chair. During the two rounds before, both men who had claimed her had sat on her without the slightest qualm. She couldn't help but be a little touched that Adam asked permission first.

Then again, he was a very large man.

“No, be my guest,” she said, moving her hands from where her fingers were laced across her stomach. He sat down on her carefully.

“Am I too heavy?”

“No, although I will admit this is a novel experience for me.”

“Never had a man sit on you before, eh? What a sheltered life you must lead.” He grinned. She wanted to grin in response, but knew she shouldn't give in to his patently false charm.

But it was so very hard, especially when he was sitting sideways on her with a wicked glint in his eye, and an even more wicked grin curving those warm, soft lips. He looked like a rogue, a devil, a man who was the sort of trouble every woman loved. She doubted if very many people were allowed to see this Adam, the real Adam.

“I shouldn't humor you,” she told him sternly, feeling her own lips twitch.

“Sure you should. I love to be humored.”

“Heaven only knows if I do, it might make your nipples explode in delight.” The grin faded from his face. Hero wanted to kick herself the minute the words left her mouth. How stupid could she be?

With a few ill-chosen words she had reminded him of the true nature of their relationship—
blackmailer and blackmailee.

He opened his mouth to say something, but one of the show staff came up to tell her she had to relinquish her chair. She walked back to her table, reminding herself that this whole idea was hers, and she had no one to blame but herself.

It didn't help.

Adam lasted a few more rounds, giving her a curious look when he returned to the table, but other than asking her quietly if he had been too heavy for her, he said nothing.

Until the orange incident.

“I'm sure most of you are familiar with the orange game,” the Eden host, Asterisk, said a lead-in to the next event. Short, balding, famed for his comedic roles, he seemed to enjoy performing before the crowd of contestants, cracking all sorts of terrible puns and jokes riddled with double entendres that had the crowd howling and applauding wildly.

The cameras filmed every moment of it.

Asterisk held up an orange. “The object of this game is to pass the orange from one person to another

—without using your arms or hands, and without letting the orange touch the floor. Each table will form a line, man, woman, man, woman, and pass the orange from one person to another. Points will be awarded to each contestant who does not drop the orange. So here's your chance, ladies and gents, to get a head start on the point count. Ready? Maestro, mambo music please!” Loud pulsing music poured out from the speakers overhead. Cameramen and sound people moved into place as each table obediently formed a line. Hero stood behind Adam (who, to her surprise, did not hurry to take a place next to Sally), and in front of a man with a skull-and-crossbones earring and tattoos of flames licking up his wrists.

It was going to be a long night.

True be told, she admitted to herself a few minutes later, it was an amusing game. The first person in the line held the orange under her chin, while the man next to her more or less embraced her in order to get close enough to try to take it from her. She giggled as he nuzzled her neck, trying to capture the orange under his own chin, he laughed when she writhed against him, trying to push the orange toward his neck, the cameraman tightened his shot on the two in a seemingly very intimate embrace; and Hero watched it all with her breath caught in her throat. Her eyes turned to where Adam stood in front of her, applauding when the man finally retrieved the orange. She was going to have to take the orange from him. She was going to have to stand very close to him, her arms on his, her jaw brushing his to take the orange.

She had to be mad.

The next woman in line was Sally. She gave it a game shot, but dropped the orange. So did Greg, but Hero suspected that was because he had no neck to speak of, and thus no way to hold the orange. A short strawberry-blonde woman took up the orange next, and giggled in Adam's ear as he doubled over to try and retrieve the orange from her. With some careful maneuvering, he managed to get it without too much trouble, and turned to face Hero with the orange clamped between his chin and collarbone.

“You can do it; it's easy,” he encouraged her, his words somewhat slurred because he couldn't move his jaw. She stared into his glittering blue eyes for a moment, and wondered if the laughter she saw in there was directed at her, or at the silly situation. It didn't matter, she told herself as she stepped up to him, placing her hands on his arms as she leaned into his chest. All that mattered was that she get the points.

The points were everything. She couldn't afford to be left behind, not even with Adam as a ringer.

She had no idea what brand of aftershave he used, but she highly approved of it. The scent of him, part spicy aftershave, part something uniquely Adam, teased her senses as her jaw brushed his.

She angled her head to capture the orange under her chin, ignoring the fact that her breasts, pressed up against him, were on fire with the contact. His breath was hot and rapid in her ear as his hands came around her waist to steady her. She could see the pulse beat rapidly in his neck. The scent of him, the heat from his chest touching hers, the slight abrasion of his whiskery chin against her neck, and the nearness of his mouth to an ear suddenly turned into a highly erogenous spot almost undid her, but the flicker of light as the cameraman moved to a better angle reminded her that they were being filmed.

She bit back the desire to lick the pulse point on his neck and clamped her chin down on the orange.

Adam groaned slightly and lifted his head to release the orange, but her grip wasn't as good as she thought it was. The orange slid from beneath her chin and started to drop. She shrieked and slammed herself against Adam, rocking him backwards. He regained his balance, his hands tight on her arms.

“Of all the ignominious positions,” she grumbled into his chest. She was half crouched, the orange caught slightly above her breasts, pressed into his stomach.

“Are you all right?” Adam asked, his hands warm on her shoulders.

“Yes, fine, the bloody thing is on my…it's between my chest and your stomach.” The others in their line called out encouragement and advice.

“If you slide down slowly you should be able to catch it under your chin again,” Adam said, holding her firmly to him. She knew it was so the orange would not continue its downward path and not because he wanted her body pressed against his, but she couldn't help enjoy the contact.

“Is that the only way?”

“It'll be easy. Just move slowly,” he told her.

She nodded into his chest, took a grip on his waist, and started to slide slowly down him. She almost had it under her chin when Adam jerked and yelled, “Jesus, no!” The orange dropped six inches. She caught it by pressing it against Adam with her cheek. Breathing heavily with the effect of being so close to him, and the spurts of adrenaline that shot through her every time the orange dropped, she rolled her eye to the side to assess where she was.

Her face and the orange were pressed against his crotch.

“Oh, Lord,” she swore into his genitals, wondering if her life could get any worse.

“Jesus! Sit! No, damn it, that does not mean come here, it means sit! Sit!” A loud crash indicated a
chair was turned over, but it was the laughter and calls of the people at her table that told her what was going on behind her back. Adam had tied the cat's leash to the chair while he was participating in the games. Jesus didn't seem to mind since he was curled up asleep after his meal of snails, but evidently he had woken up and suddenly felt the need to join in the fun.

He dragged the chair over to where Hero was face-to-genitals with Adam. She sighed.

“Any brilliant ideas how I'm to get it now?” she asked him, her words slurred because of the orange pressed against her cheek. She absolutely refused to look at his crotch. She refused to notice how strained his zipper looked, or acknowledge that his fingers were biting into her arms and his breathing was just as erratic as hers.

“You're going to have to turn your face a little so you can get it under your chin,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Damn it cat, I told you not to come over here.”

She closed her eyes for a moment, ignoring the people laughing at her, at the cat, at everything, and tried very hard not to dwell on what turning her face toward Adam's groin was going to mean.

The points, she needed the points. The points were everything. She had to do this.

A hard head butted her hip where she knelt before Adam.

“Leave her alone, cat,” he growled above her. Jesus paid no mind his owner and rubbed himself along Hero's thigh in an obvious attempt to get her attention.

She ignored the cat as she warned Adam, “I'm going to take the orange now.” A second cameraman joined the first. She ignored them as well.

“Carefully,” Adam pleaded.

She smiled a grim little smile to herself and simultaneously rose a little and turned her face inward until her mouth was pressed against his belt, and the orange held firmly against her voice box. She lowered her chin carefully. Behind his zipper, Adam twitched. She stopped for a moment, feeling an answering twitch within herself, deep down where the heat pooled uncomfortably in her womanly parts.

Deciding it was best to pretend the twitches never happened, with careful movements she clasped the orange between her chin and chest and pulled slowly away from him. The orange remained solid under her chin. She gave a heartfelt sigh of relief, and with one hand on Adam's belt for balance, started to rise to her feet.

He jerked her head back, almost releasing the orange from her hold.

“What the…damn. Hold on a minute, your hair is tangled on my belt buckle. No, Jesus, leave her
alone—”

In the end it wasn’t her hair caught on his belt, or Jesus crawling over her in an attempt to get her to pet him, thereby tangling her legs in the leash that led to the chair he dragged behind him, it wasn't even the cameraman who squatted down in front of her, laughing so hard he had difficulty filming her as she crouched red-faced next to Adam's groin while he worked her hair free. It was a small, insignificant thing that caused her to drop the orange and lose fifty points she well needed.

The gecko evidently decided that as her head was higher than the cat's, it would provide a better vantage point for insect sighting. The little creature leaped off of the cat and scurried up her arm and onto her head before she realized what it was doing.

An hour later she sat in a chair outside her cabana on a wooden lounge, rubbing the sore spot on her head. Hopefully it wouldn't take long for her hair to grow back, but it wasn't really the loss of a shilling-sized clump of hair that pained her. No, it was the footage the cameramen had shot, no doubt gleefully, of her screaming and racing around the table batting ineffectually at her head while Adam chased after her, telling her to stand still so he could remove the gecko, finally achieving that goal when she tripped over Jesus and his chair, sprawling out on the ground in front of everyone with her dress hiked up almost to her bum. The TV audience would eat it up.

Her shoulders sagged until her head drooped down onto her hands. She didn't think life could get any worse, but she had no doubt it would. Fate was often like that.

Chapter Five

“Moonlight is the stuff that magic is made of,” Hero said decisively to no one in particular, which, considering she was sitting alone on a bench, was good. “It's romance, it's fantasy, it's excitement and mystery. Moonlight in the Caribbean—” She gazed out across the velvety croquet playing field, the rich green grass tinted black and silver by the waxing moon. She flexed her bare toes into the lawn, enjoying its coolness against the soles of her feet. It felt so good, she scooted off the bench and sat cross-legged on the ground, the grass tickling her bare legs. Absently plucking a piece of grass, she looked across the way to where a line of coconut palms rustled in the fragrant evening breeze, standing like guardians along a curved stretch of protected beach. The distant thunder of waves pounding onto the island was a muted undertone to air filled with soft noises of night birds and faint strains of Caribbean music from an open-air lounge on the far side of the resort, punctuated occasionally by a shriek and burst of laughter from the swimming pool next to the lounge.

She sighed and tossed the blade of grass away. “Moonlight in the Caribbean is the most romantic thing in the world, and should be outlawed when you're alone and have no one to enjoy it with and are feeling very sorry for yourself.” She looked around. The line of cabanas was uniformly dark except hers.

Evidently everyone had gone off to dance under the stars, or partake in the moonlight swim mentioned as part of the evening's after-hour activities.

Everyone but her. True, she had been asked. Adam, escorting her back to her cabana after the horrible orange incident, had said he'd heard several people were planning on enjoying a swim later, and would she be interested in joining them?

She blanched at the thought then, and she blanched now. Appearing in front of everyone in her swimsuit was not her idea of fun. Although she told herself she cared little what Adam thought about her

—nipple exploding womanizer that he was—she knew she was lying to herself. She did care, rot his hide.

And because she cared, she wasn't going to expose herself to the look of horror sure to be in his eyes when he caught sight of all her exposed flesh.

“Buck up, old girl,” she told herself. “This too shall pass. Just a couple of weeks and you'll be home and he'll be forgotten and everything will be the way it was.” With, she suspected, the exception of her heart. She greatly feared she was in danger of losing that particular organ to Adam. She wasn't happy about that idea, but as it was clearly the result of her snapped mind, there was little she
could do.

Other than repeatedly deny the attraction. And to reiterate his bad points to herself. And there was the matter of his fan club, as she'd taken to thinking of the women that seemed to chase after him everywhere.

“He's American,” she told her bare toes as they bobbed in time to the distant music. “Which is always a black mark. He's a smutmonger, too, giving sexual advice to women on the radio. And he has an obsession with a woman who clearly wants nothing to do with him. Not to mention the fact he enjoys discussing his nipples in public. No, he's quite obviously not at all the sort of man any decent woman would want to know. He's just too—oof!”

A large grey animal landed in her lap, slamming into chest and driving out all the air in her lungs.

“Jesus, down! Stop mauling Hero, you're getting dirt all over her.” Hero pushed the cat down until he was sitting on her legs, and glanced up at Adam, taking a deep breath to refill her lungs.

The breath strangled in her throat as he stopped before her. Her eyes bugged out a little at the sight of him. He was almost naked, wearing one of those skimpy little swimsuits that men in tropical climes seemed to favor. She'd never given them a thought before, but now she sent up fervent prayers of gratitude to whoever had the brilliant idea of allowing men to parade around in nothing but a bit of lycra.

Her eyes started at his bare feet and moved up over nice calves, cute little knees, and muscled thighs. Her gaze skittered over the lycra-covered bits, and continued up to a lovely tanned stomach, broad chest with just the right amount of chest hair swirling around two impudent nipples, and arms that were well-muscled without being grotesque.

“I'm sorry about this, he got away.” Adam slung the towel he held in one hand over a shoulder and held out a broken leash. “Are you all right? Did he hurt you?” She tried not to stare, but she couldn't help it. His dark hair was wet, slicked back from his brow, emphasizing the slight widow's peak that made her heart beat faster. Oh, who was she trying to fool, it was all of him that made her heart race.

“Hero?”

“I'm fine, thank you,” she finally said, tearing her gaze from him and looking down at the cat in her lap. The gecko, minus its party wear, was clinging to the cat's huge side. She stroked around it, shuddering with the memory of the beastly thing riding her head. “Jesus just knocked the breath from me.

You've been swimming?”

“Yes, you should have come with us, it was great.” He stared down at her for a moment, a smile flirting with the corners of his mouth. “Did we interrupt your meditation or something?” Really, if her heart beat any faster, she was going to pass out. She had to get a grip on herself, such a reaction was foolish and completely ridiculous. She tried to force herself to calm down as she purposely avoided looking at the bulge in his Speedos; heaven knew that wouldn't do anything toward keeping her calm. And she was nowhere near calm with were the hundreds of questions zipping through her mind: Was he going to sit with her? Had he left the swimming party because he missed her? Had he used his cat as a flimsy excuse to stop by and see her? Could it be that he left all those tanned, fit, attractive women just so he could be with her?

Had she completely lost her mind?

“No, it's nothing like that, I was just sitting here enjoying the evening. It's so lovely here, I almost can't believe it's real—the flowers and the ocean and everything. But the moon is so bright, and it's finally cooling down enough, so I thought I'd sit outside and soak in the local color. I can see why people come here for their honeymoons; it's very romantic. And peaceful.” He bent over to scoop up the cat from her lap, his fingers brushing her bare arm, sending little streaks of heat rippling up her flesh. “That it is. Well, I won't disturb your peace any longer. Good night.” With a flash of his teeth, he turned and strode off into the shadows of the croquet lawn. She stared after him with her mouth hanging open. He didn't want to stay and talk to her? He hadn't left the swimming party to be with her? He hadn't set up a broken leash as an excuse to stop by?

“Hell,” she swore, still staring into the inky blackness that had swallowed him up. “I didn't even get to admire his bum when he left!”

Tears started in the corners of her eyes at the rejection, but she blinked them back before they had a chance to start. “Don't be stupid, of course you mean nothing to him, and you want it that way.

He's a sex fiend, remember, and sex fiends are after only one thing. They are not interested in stable, long-term meaningful relationships. They just want steamy, wild, hot jungle sex, and you don't do that, so stop imagining what steamy, wild, hot jungle sex would be like with him and thank your lucky stars that you don't have to worry about a sex fiend pestering you.”

She sat lecturing herself for a good ten minutes, going over again her reasons for being there, his obvious many faults, and several excellent points regarding why a liaison with him—in the form of steamy, wild, hot jungle sex—would be a very bad thing.

It didn't do any good. She still felt like crying. What was wrong with her? Why couldn't she put him from her mind? Why was her silly heart so caught up in him when he was the epitome of everything she disliked in a man?

“And what's wrong with wanting steamy, wild, hot jungle sex?” she asked aloud, throwing a handful
of grass blades into the wind.

“Is that a trick question?” a deep voice asked from behind her. Her heart did a few somersaults in hearing it. Adam strolled over to her, now clad in a pair of black trousers and a thin linen shirt that caressed his torso like a lover's hands. “Are there multiple choice answers? Because honestly, I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting steamy jungle sex. Do you?” He sat down on the grass next to her, his long legs crossed at the ankle as he leaned back against the bench.

She stared at him. He came back?

“I left Jesus locked in the cabana as punishment for his bad manners. You're right; it is beautiful here.

And peaceful, too. Very peaceful.”

He came back? To sit with her?

“What I'm amazed at is how the scent of the flowers dominates despite the sea air.” He breathed in deeply, his eyes closing to appreciate the perfumed air better.

He came back to sit with her? Why had he come back to sit with her?

“Not that there's anything wrong with sea air. I like that too. I'm from a small town in the mountains of California, and I don't often get to the ocean.”

He came back! Surely that meant something!

Adam glanced at her, suddenly looking a bit uncomfortable. “I'm sorry, am I intruding on your quiet time? I'll leave if you like.”

Eeek! He was going to leave!

“No, please don't!” she said hurriedly, trying to gather her scattered wits, scolding herself for being rendered so hen-witted by a mere man. Except he wasn't a mere anything. “I'd like for you to stay.

That is to say, you're welcome to sit here. With me. I was…erm…I was just sitting here. Not doing anything, just sitting. So you're welcome to sit, too. Here. With me.”

Lord, what an idiot she sounded. She wouldn't be surprised if he left, but he didn't. He smiled. That smile ought to be bottled and sold, she mused to herself when she couldn't help but smile back at him. It was better than pheromones.

“Would you be adverse to doing a favor for me?”

She looked startled at his request. Adam cleared his throat nervously. “It has nothing to do with our
arrangement.”

“Oh?” Now she looked relieved.

He swallowed back his nervousness. The worst she could do was to say no. How bad could a little rejection be? His mind went to the scene a few months before when Brittany stormed out of their apartment.

It could be very bad.

“What is the favor?”

The moonlight glinted on her auburn curls, making them a glossy silver and black. His fingers itched to run through those soft curls, to clutch them and hold her head in a position where he could plunder that sweet mouth until he could plunder no more. Reluctantly, he dragged his mind back from thoughts of plundering, damning his lack of self-control. He had seen the startled look in her eye a few minutes back when she saw the reaction he had to her nearness. He had hoped getting into less obvious clothing would help the situation, but he was painfully aware that it hadn't. He was aroused and hard and hot and he wanted her like he'd never wanted anyone.

“Adam? The favor?”

“Eh? Oh, the favor.” He was mad, he was a lunatic, he was crazed and deranged for wanting to torment himself in this manner, but he had to ask her. She was smart, she was witty, she was everything every woman should be. Well, true, the blackmailing aspect to their relationship wasn't particularly desirable, but since he secretly approved of her plan to arrange for a date each day, that was a minor matter. Besides, there was no one else on the island whose opinion he was interested in, no one else he trusted to give him the truth.

Yeah, right, and pigs could fly. What was the use in lying to himself? He wanted her, pure and simple. “Would you be willing, purely for scientific reasons, to kiss me?” Her mouth dropped open a bit before she snapped it shut. “You want me to kiss you? For scientific reasons?”

“I realize it's a strange request, but I do have a reason for it.” Such as, she was an island of beauty and intelligence in a sea of bimbos. “My girlfriend left me a couple of months ago, and…well, we'd been together for a long time, so I haven't had an opportunity to kiss a lot of other women, and since she said I was a lousy lover, I thought maybe if you'd let me kiss you, you could evaluate me.”

“Evaluate you?” She looked a bit stunned about the eyes, but he didn't think she was offended by the request. At least, he hoped she wasn't offended. She was obviously already of the opinion that he was a lust-crazed slobbering mound of testosterone thanks to that stupid Monday Marsh catch phrase. Damn, he wished he could tell her the truth about himself. He hated lying to her, even if it
was indirectly. “You want me to evaluate how you kiss?”

Maybe it wasn't such a good idea. Maybe he didn't want her to tell him he had terrible kissing skills.

Maybe it would destroy him to know that he couldn't stir any passion in her. “Er…that's the idea,” he said hesitantly. “I thought maybe you could tell me if Brittany was right, or if she was just getting in a parting shot before she left.”

“But…you're a sex therapist. Why would anyone say an expert in sex was a poor lover?” Well, she had him there. He looked at her sitting next to him, all innocent and beautiful and smart and he knew he couldn't do it. He couldn't lie to her any longer. Hell, she already knew he was a cat smuggler, how much worse could it be to find out he was a private detective?

“That would be because I'm not really a sex therapist.”

“You're not?”

He shook his head. “I'm not Monday Marsh. My name is Adam Fuller. I'm a private investigator. A detective,” he said when he saw the question in her eyes. “I was hired to come to Mystique and pretend to be one of the contestants.”

A puzzled frown settled between her brows “You were hired to be a contestant? But . . . everyone acts as if they know who you are. I mean, who you are pretending to be.” She waved her hand about.

“That whole nipple thing.”

He sighed. “It's horrible, isn't it? My client, the man who hired me, paid off the real Monday Marsh so I could take his place. Turns out Marsh has agoraphobia or is terribly shy, or something along those lines. His producer was forcing him to do the show as a publicity stunt, so he leaped at the chance to get out of it when my client approached him. Gar bribed a couple of producers as well. I had no idea who I was supposed to impersonate until I was on the plane here, but I can tell you this—I will have my revenge on Gar one way or another.”

“Gar?”

“My friend. The one who hired me.”

“Oh.” Her fingers pleated the soft cotton of her skirt where it lay on her thigh. “But won't people be able to tell that you aren't this Marsh person?”

Adam's brows drew together in a faint frown. “I worried about that too, but no one has said anything so far. I guess hearing someone speak in person is different enough from the
radio that people are willing to accept any variations.”

“What exactly were you hired to do here?”

He gave her a wry smile. “I can't tell you. Confidential.”

“Would it have anything to do with Sally Simmons?”

He said nothing.

She nodded. “I see.” She played with her dress for a moment longer. “Why are you telling me this?

I'm already blackmailing you because of your cat, why would you tell me something else to put yourself in my power?”

Why indeed? “I trust you,” he shrugged. “You know the worst about me now anyway. It's certainly not illegal to be a private investigator.”

“No, but I imagine the Eden people wouldn't be happy to know what you've done.”

“Are you kidding? They'd love it. They'd save my denouement for the final episode. Anything to drive up ratings.” He covered her hand with his. “The truth is, Hero, I'm a terrible liar. I couldn't think of kissing you knowing there were untruths between us.”

Her eyes grew huge. “Untruths?”

He nodded. “I couldn't do that to you. I respect you too much.” He gave as short laugh. “Ironic, isn't it, that we only met this morning? And here I am babbling on about respecting you and—” His gaze dropped to her lips— “kissing you. For purely scientific reasons, as I said before. My hope is, of course, that you won't reveal this secret any more than Jesus's, but I feel I can trust you. You have a quality of honesty about you that I greatly admire.”

“Honesty?” she repeated, her eyes worried as she gnawed on her lower lip. “You think I'm honest?”

“I'm not often wrong about people,” he said with a teasing smile. “So now that you know the worst of me, what about it? Will you rate me?”

She blinked her big grey eyes at him a couple of times while she thought over what he had said. “All right.”

Hope—amongst other things—rose. “You're sure you wouldn't mind?” he asked, damning himself for giving her an out, but unwilling to force her into doing anything.

Her eyes were silver in the moonlight, warm silver with tiny black imperfections that caught him and
held him fast.

“No, I don't mind.” She smiled, a little worriedly, but still it was a smile. “I have always believed in furthering the knowledge of science.”

Slowly, Adam, he told himself, don't pounce on her. Give her the respect she's due. Go slowly.

Don't scare her. And for God's sake, don't let her see the desperation in your eyes!

“Right, then.”

“Right,” she said, her eyes dropping modestly. God, but he wanted to touch her, to taste her, to taste all of her. He bit down the sharp edge of his desire, and leaned toward her, his hands fisted into the grass to keep from grabbing her and pulling her under him.

Her breath was sweet on his lips, soft and warm and inviting. Her eyes were silver disks so beautiful it almost hurt to look into them. The soft floral scent of her skin merged with the heavier perfume of the night blooming flowers, causing little pinpricks of heat to form on his skin, then sink inward and head straight for his groin. His lips touched hers, teased them, withdrew, then returned to tease them again. Her eyes closed as he tasted her lips, nibbling gently on her lower lip until, with a moan that went deep into his chest, she opened her mouth for him.

She was paradise, she was heat, she was desire. He kissed her deeply, stroking his tongue against hers, and almost lost control when she returned the caress. He pulled back enough so he could see into her eyes. They were dreamy and filled with passion.

“Oh, Adam,” she sighed, then grabbed his head and pulled him down over herself. Adam fought his desire for a nanosecond, then gave in, doing what he wanted to do the first time he saw her, holding her head at the optimum angle, and diving into her mouth as if he was searching for buried treasure.

He growled into her mouth when she arched her body up against his, her breasts rubbing a heated friction against him, her skin warm and soft and infinitely inviting. He released the silken curls and slid his hands down, over the loose cotton jacket she wore over her dress, sliding it off her bare shoulders, stroking his hands down the satin of her arms.

She kindled a fire deep within him, burning brighter and brighter with each moment that he drank in her scent, touched the lush curves of her breasts that surely had to be created just for his hands, and tasted the rapture found when their mouths met. The sound of approaching voices sent a signal through the haze of desire and need and something much warmer that he didn't want to look too closely at. They were in a public place. He could not continue out here, in the open.

His lips parted reluctantly from hers as he rose back on an elbow, her fingers still entwined in his hair. The soft cotton of her dress molded to the contours of her body, driving from his mind any consideration about privacy or the need to stop. He traced a finger up the curve of her shoulder,
over to her breastbone, then down to the fragrant valley between her breasts. She stared back at him with heated eyes, her breath just as ragged and unsteady as his, her breasts heaving beneath the heat of his hand.

“Let me see you,” he said, his voice thick with wanting. He pushed the light dress jacket from her completely, his hands moving quickly to the buttons on the sleeveless dress she wore underneath.

“Dear God, you're beautiful. So beautiful. So sexy.”

“No,” she whispered, struggling to recapture the soft cotton jacket, tugging it back up her arms.

“What's wrong?” he asked, pausing with his hand on a button. A finger's breadth away the heavy curve of her breast lay beckoning him.

“I don't…I don't want you to…”

Pain cut through him. He withdrew his hand. “You don't want me to touch you?”

“No,” she moaned, her eyes brilliant with unshed tears. “It's not that, I don't want you to…”

“What?” he asked, almost desperate. “Kiss you? Touch your breasts? Make love to you?”

“See me!” she shouted, pushing hard on his chest, shoving him away so she could sit up and right her clothing.

What the hell?

“You don't want me to see what?” He looked around. “You don't want anyone to see us out here? I agree completely, and I apologize for starting it here, but I had no idea…well, I had no idea it would go this far. We can go inside to your cabana, if it will make you feel better.”

“No,” she said, buttoning up her dress and wiping at a tear that snaked down her cheek. “Not my cabana.”

“Mine, then,” he said, wincing at the note of desperation in his voice.

“No, you don't understand,” she argued, not looking at him as she got to her feet, then bent to put on her sandals. “We can't do this.”

He stood. “I had assumed because you were here that you had no impediments to a relationship. If that's so, it must be me that doesn't appeal to you. I guess I have my answer to the Brittany question.”

“Oh, no,” she said, turning to him, her face an agony of indecision and guilt and something that looked very much like desire. “It's not you. You are…your girlfriend was wrong, dead wrong. That
kiss was—indescribable. Wonderful. Marvelous. Rhapsody.”

Well, now he really was confused. He took her hand and rubbed his thumb over her knuckles. “I thought it was pretty damn good, myself. If it's not me, and you don't have someone else, then what exactly is the problem?”

Her silver-eyed gaze dropped as she pulled her hand from his. “I have to go now. Thank you for…

thank you.”

She turned and almost ran back to the door that let from the tiny patio to her cabana.

“Wait, Hero!” Adam started to follow her. Something was wrong, but he couldn't figure out what. If he could just get her to tell him, he could deal with whatever it was. “Why can't you—” She whirled around at her door. “Oh, you stupid man, don't you understand? It's me, not you. Look at me!” She waved her hand in the direction of her torso. “I'm not pretty or tan or trim or any of the things those other women are.”

He stopped, stunned at her words. She didn't think she was pretty? She was beautiful! She was a goddess personified! She was perfect!

“I'm not beautiful, and I'm not sexy, and I don't want you looking at me. There. Are you happy now? I hope so, because I don't think I can go over this explanation again. Thank you for the kiss, it was very nice. Good night.” She opened her door and stepped through it.

“Hero, just wait a min—”

The door slammed behind her.

“—ute.”

A lock clicked into place. He stood there for long minutes staring at her door, bewildered, confused, completely at a loss as to what to do to make her realize he didn't see her as anything but desirable and captivating.

He was in completely over his head, and hadn't the slightest idea what it was going to take to come to the surface.

“You're being unreasonable.”

“Shhh!”

“I am not.”

“SHHH!”

Hero's voice dropped to an almost inaudible whisper. “I simply do not wish to continue this discussion. Now may we watch the movie?”

Adam leaned close to her, his mouth next to her ear. Hero fought back a shudder of complete delight at his nearness. “Why won't you believe me when I tell you that I think you're beautiful?”

Hero smiled through gritted teeth as one of the cameramen turned to look at them. They were sitting in the back row of the theatre, a room equipped with rows of comfortable seats and a large wall-sized plasma-screen television, and she would be damned if she lost out points on her first official date simply because Adam insisted on driving her mad. As if the guilt riddling her because he thought her honest wasn't enough to do the job. That, or war between the need she felt to believe he truly admired her and the realization that he was just sweet-talking her to keep from revealing his secrets. Didn't he realize that she was nearly driven to insanity by the torture of having to sit next to him like this? The island paradise promised in the Eden promotional material felt more like purgatory to her.

“I'm not beautiful,” she murmured under her breath, her eyes on the cameramen in the room rather than the movie. “You don't have to say I am, it's not part of our agreement. You don't have to worry; I've already said I won't give you away.”

“That's not why I'm saying it,” he said, a disgruntled look on his face. She smiled wildly as a cameraman headed their way.

“Smile,” she hissed. “We're supposed to be compatible, remember?” He draped his arm over her shoulders. “We're going to have this out later, you and I,” he promised softly in her ear. She shivered at the feeling of his breath brushing her flesh, but said nothing. What was there to say?

She had made her bed, now she had to lie in it. Alone.

“That wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be,” Adam said later, as the movie ended. As it was a ladies' choice day, the women selected the men they wished to participate on that day's dates, both geared to please the female palate. Hero was obliged to pick Adam as her first date despite wishing she'd never thought up the grand idea of blackmailing him into helping her. “Then again, I never have minded chick flicks that much. Most of them are pretty good. Sorry Jesus ate your popcorn.” She strolled out of the theatre with the other people, intending on ducking behind a group to avoid speaking to him anymore, but he had other ideas. He tugged her behind a cluster of palms and pinned her back with a steely blue-eyed look. Jesus and his attendant gecko took advantage of the break to investigate the shrubberies.

“Come on, out with it.”

“Out with what?”'

“Whatever it is that you're holding in.”

She frowned at him and crossed her arms over her chest. “What makes you think I'm holding something in?”

“You won't talk to me, you wouldn't let me neck with you during the movie, and for some reason, you take offense when I tell you that you're beautiful.”

She shivered when he ran his thumb along her lower lip, and jerked her head away. “I don't have time to discuss the cruelty of pretending you enjoy someone's company for your own gain. Nor do I have time to explain the arrogance inherent in men that drives them into thinking that all women are putty in their hands with just a kiss or two. Be thankful I don't, because if I did have time, I would inform you in no uncertain terms that I found your ridiculous claims both hurtful and derogatory.”

“What ridiculous claims?” he asked, a frown pulling those two lovely eyebrows together.

“You should know, you were the one making them last night.” He stared at her for a minute. “Are you talking about the fact that I wanted to make love to you, or that I find you a sexy, intelligent woman who I'd like to know better? A lot better?” She stiffened. “I have to go. My next date is in fifteen minutes.” He glanced at his watch. “Fine. You can spend five minutes talking to me.”

“I don't wish to talk with you. Surely that is clear?”

“What's clear is that you have the erroneous idea that you're not attractive.” She waffled between the desire to grind her teeth in anger, and the urge to cry. The anger won out.

“Why are you doing this to me?”

“What?” He stepped back, surprised at her outburst.

“Why won't you be honest with me?”

“I have been honest with you.”

“You have not. You say those…those… nice things, but you don't really mean them, not in the sense you want me to think you do.”

He looked genuinely surprised. Obviously he did not realize she knew the truth behind his motivation. “Hero, what are you talking about?”

“I don't need your pity!” she yelled, shoving hard on his chest to push him back a couple of steps.

“I'm not so bloody pathetic that I need your pity kisses and your pretended interest and nice words meant to make me feel like I'm something I'm not. You might think that you're the only man who's ever felt sorry for me, but you're not. I'm an expert concerning men who deign to notice me, and I can tell you right now that I'm not grateful for your attention or your kisses, so you can bloody well bugger off and go annoy some other woman!”

“Is that what you think I'm doing?” Adam asked, his voice a low growl, his eyes blazing with emotion. He took a step closer to her, no doubt to try to intimidate her. “You think I'm just hitting on you to make myself feel better, is that it? You think I'm so shallow that I'm incapable of looking beyond the surface for something more meaningful? Or do you think I'm just interested in meaningless sex with any woman who'll spread her legs for me?”

Hero raised her chin and glared at him, tears of fury pooling in her eyes.

“You paint a nice picture of me, Hero.” His breath was warm on her face, his eyes hot enough to burn holes through her heart. “Is that what you really think?” She thought her heart would crumble under the influence of the pain in his eyes, but she had no choice. It was him or her, and she didn't think she could survive seeing pity in his eyes when he looked at her.

“I don't want to see you again,” she said, her throat aching with unshed tears. “Our agreement is cancelled. Please do not accost me again.”

“So I am to be tried and convicted without a hearing? Your faith in me is overwhelming, but then, I guess that's what I can expect from a woman who has to blackmail a man into dating her.” Hero turned away, her eyes closed against the pain of his words, pain she knew she deserved. She was the one who had lied to him; he had been honest, completely honest with her. Or had he? That was the worst of having a mind that had snapped, she could no longer tell what was the truth and what was not. Truth, her inner voice whispered— like whether she was pushing Adam away because he pitied her, or if her guilt was the real culprit.

Without another word to her, Adam rounded up Jesus and walked away. She watched him leave, tears rolling down her cheeks, a sob caught in her throat. He was right. What sort of woman had she become that she would not even give him a chance to defend himself?

“I am pathetic,” she whispered to herself as she dug through her purse for tissues to wipe the tears from her wet cheeks. “And I have just ruined my life, and my heart is destroyed, and I'll never be able to face Adam, and now I have to appear happy for a millions of viewers when I go on dates with other men who don't even come close to being as wonderful as the man I just drove off, and damn it all, I'm out of tissues!”

Down the far length of the pathway the tall figure of Simon, her date for the trip out to the bird
sanctuary, appeared and waved at her. A cameraman stood next to him.

“Bloody hell, what timing,” she grumbled, sniffing heavily and waving back. She dashed behind a tree and used a leaf to mop up both tears and nose, reappearing with what she hoped was a convincing smile.

It would never do to let the TV audience see that her heart was broken here in paradise.

Chapter Six

The following day was gentlemen's choice. Hero knew even before Adam and Jesus stalked across the crowded ballroom toward her that he was going to demand her as his date. What she didn't know was what she was going to do about it. Apologizing was out of the question, she had wounded his male ego the day before, which meant he was determined to prove her judgment of him was wrong. He would be all that much prone to saying romantic things, to flattering her, praising her, and quite probably attempting to kiss her.

Lord, she hoped so.

She drove that rogue thought from her brain, telling herself firmly that she might love him more than life itself, she might have a shattered mound of dust where her heart had been, not to mention the snapped-mind incident, but she would not tolerate mutiny. That still left the issue of what was she to do to stem the tide of affection he would no doubt be forced by his own sense of injustice to slather upon her.

“I know one thing . . .” she said to herself as Adam approached.

“Hero,” he said as he stopped before her, a surprisingly grim look on his face. “Ten o'clock. The fishing dock, Boat fifteen. Got it?”

“. . . I am not kissing you.”

Immediately his brilliant blue eyes looked at her lips. “Hell.” That was her thought exactly.

“Boat fifteen. Half an hour,” he said hoarsely, dragging his gaze from her lips to give her a heated look that left her knees melting into a puddle of water.

She summoned every last ounce of determination, and put it in one word. “No.” He frowned. “Now what?”

“No, I won't go on a date with you.” She made shooing motions with her hands.

He goggled at her. “Did you just shoo me away?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I told you—I'm not going on a date with you. I refuse your date.”

“You can't. It's my choice. I choose you. So there.”

“Ha!” she said as he started to walk away.

He froze and slowly turned around. “What did you say?”

“I said 'ha!' Disdainfully and with much scorn. And for your information, Mr. Adam Monday Marsh Fuller, I am not the sort of a woman who says 'ha!' disdainfully and with much scorn lightly. So there yourself!”

He glowered at her, positively glowered at her now. His jaw was tense and tight, his hands flexing as if they wanted to be around her neck, the words fired out through clenched teeth with all the warmth and friendliness of a bullet. “Boat fifteen. Fishing dock. One. Half. Hour.”

“In your dreams,” she called after his receding figure, using her favorite Americanism. She smiled smugly to herself for a moment, then turned to see the horrifying sight of a cameraman filming her.

Despite swearing she was never going to notice them, she simpered repulsively and waggled her fingers at the camera. “I was just joking,” she explained.

The cameraman leaned out from behind the camera lens and cocked an eyebrow at her.

She turned away and sighed. This was going to be another one of those days.

“Why are you doing this?” Hero demanded as she clambered aboard the fishing boat assigned to take out the sixteen people for date of the morning—fishing.

“We have an agreement,” he said without looking at her, bent over a struggling Jesus. The cat twisted, forcing a buckle to slip between Adam’s fingers. “Damn!”

“I cancelled our agreement, if you recall,” she said coldly. “I was quite clear about it.”

“Insultingly so,” he agreed, still bent over the cat, wrestling to organize a series of belts and buckles around the rotund furry body.

“I just want it understood that I am acceding to this date under protest.”

“Consider it understood.”

“I want it perfectly clear that the whole thing was your idea, and not mine.”

“I will hold myself entirely to blame for any consequences of the date if it will make you feel better.”

“Good.” She moved closer. “I apologize if I've insulted you. I simply wished to make myself clear.”

“Oh, you've succeeded there, have no fear,” he told the top of Jesus's head as he struggled to reach a recalcitrant buckle. “Stand still, cat!”

“Well…good. What is it you're doing to Jesus?”

Her lovely face came into view as she squatted next to him, stroking the cat on the top if his head.

“Putting his life jacket on. He's in a bit of a snit because I made him leave Gecko behind, and he's punishing me by refusing to wear his flotation device.” He glanced up at her, caught the ghost of a smile on her lips, and smiled in return. “The things I do for this cat, huh?” Her gaze dropped.

“Something like that.”

He got the last buckle snapped into place and stood up, straightening the lurid orange-and-blue feline life jacket and giving Jesus a pat on the shoulder. “Stiff upper lip, cat. Gecko will be waiting for you when you return.”

Adam slipped on a pair of mirrored sunglasses, smiled cheerfully at the camera when it was pointed at him, and spent the twenty-minute boat ride out to a secluded lagoon watching Hero. She scratched Jesus's ears, ignored the cameramen, and sat by herself at the back of the boat, staring into the water. She did everything, in fact, but look at him. That gave him the time to watch her, and to try to figure out how the devil he was going to straighten out the mess he'd made of things.

The ship pulled alongside some trees hanging over the water before he'd come to any conclusion.

“You're free to fish anywhere in the lagoon,” one of the show's assistants told them. “We have floats available if you want to do it from off shore.”

“Shore or float?” Adam asked Hero, holding out a fishing pole for her.

She grimaced. “Shore.”

“Shore it is.” He gathered up Jesus and the fishing gear, and slipped over the side of the boat, wading to shore to deposit the cat and gear on a shady rock. “Stay put.” Jesus gave him a disdainful one-eyed glare and proceeded to lick his hind end.

“You're next,” he said as he waded back to the boat where Hero was looking indecisively at the water.

Several other people were wading ashore, claiming spots up and down the lagoon. The camera crew and sound people carefully held their equipment above their heads as they headed for shore.

“What?” She looked up, startled at his words. “I'm next for what?” He stood next to the boat in waist-high water and held out his arms. “I'm the ferry to the shore. Put your arms around my neck.”

She stared at him, horror mingling with disbelief in her beautiful grey eyes. “You can't be serious!”

“Never more so. Come on, if we don't get to it, all the fish will be caught.” She wrung her hands.

“You can't carry me.”

“Why not?”

She looked around quickly, then leaned forward over the edge of the boat, allowing him a delicious view down her loose tunic. “I'm too heavy.”

He rolled his eyes. “You're not too heavy.”

“Shush!”

He lowered his voice. “Hero, you have three choices: you can stay on the boat and not get any points, or you can wade ashore yourself, or you can let me carry you the ten feet it'll take to put you on solid ground.”

She wrung her hands even harder, then raised her chin and reached for him, stepping over the rail of the boat to the outer ledge. “If you drop me I'll never forgive you,” she whispered as he slipped an arm behind her legs, swinging her away from the boat.

“You mean like this?” he asked as he released her for a moment.

“Adam!” she shrieked, clutching him, then scowling something fierce when he started laughing. He carried her to shore with her scolding him every step, and knew as he set her on the rock that whatever it took, whatever he had to say to convince her, whatever acts of bravery and heroism and valor she demanded he perform, he'd perform, all because he had to have her. She was the woman meant for him.

The problem was to get her to recognize that fact.

“So,” he asked a short while later, leaning back against the rock and watching the float on his line bob merrily in the waves. “This isn’t such a bad date, is it? Better than that horrible one yesterday.”

Hero look like she didn’t want to ask him, but she did. “The movie?”

“No, the other one. The shopping-for-shoes one. I don’t know what you did, but the woman who was with me insisted on modeling every single pair of shoes the shop had and asking for my opinion on each.

It was a horrible experience. I’ve never thought up so many adjectives in my life. How you women can take a simple act like buying a pair of shoes and turn it into a two hour torture session is beyond me.” His comments riled her up, just as he knew they would. “I quite enjoyed my afternoon date. The gentleman I was with had particularly good taste in espadrilles.”

“Honey, a man who spends two hours giving you advice on shoes has only one thing on his mind.”

She rustled around in the large purse she carried everywhere with her before looking up. “A shoe fetish?”

Adam shook his head, fighting a smile. “Let’s just say I bet he’s trying to get you somewhere—and it isn’t into a good pair of shoes. Hey, I think I have a nibble.”

“Oh really?” Hero pulled a small can out of her purse and turned to face the water. Adam leaped to his feet when a loud blast startled everything within, he was guessing, a five mile radius.

“What the hell is that?” he swore, dropping his fishing line and lunging for her.

She danced out of his reach, holding a small can with a white plastic horn behind her. “It’s my air horn.”

He was too quick for her. Snagging her arm and grabbing the air horn before she knew what he was doing.

“Your what?” He stared at it as people up and down the lagoon shouted and called to each other.

Adam yelled to a fast approaching Eden assistant that it was all right, just a mistake and nothing more. A cameraman and sound woman trailed after the assistant.

“Why on earth do you have an air horn?” Adam asked her before they were set upon with questions.

“You obviously have not noticed, but I’m a vegetarian.”

He stared at her. “I had noticed, and so…?”

“I do not eat fish. I do not condone the slaughter of fish for sporting purposes. Hence, the air horn to scare them away so you won’t catch them. I couldn’t possibly have the death of a fish on my conscious as a result of our date.”

He stuffed the air horn in the roomy pocket of his knee-length shorts, shaking his head and muttering to himself before turning a bright smile on the cameraman as he puffed his way up to them. He explained the mistake to the assistant, apologized, and tried to look like he was having a great time.

“You really are a terrible actor,” Hero told him once the crew had scurried off to film one of the couples who had fallen off their float and were floundering around in the water trying to retrieve the woman’s missing bikini top. “No one will believe you’re having a good time. You look like you want to strangle someone.”

“I wonder who that could be,” he said with a tight smile as he leaned back against the rock, forgetting the air horn he’d securely pocketed. The sudden sensation of an icy blast hitting his genitals coincided with another ear-shattering blast, causing him to jump at least three feet straight off the ground, and whirl around clutching at himself.

“Air horns gain their power from compressed carbon dioxide,” Hero said helpfully as she watched him fall to his knees, both hands cupped protectively over his groin. “I assume that sounded in the close proximity of flesh, you might feel a certain sensation of…shall we say discomfort?”

“You might say that,” Adam said, his voice sounding rather like he were chewing on gravel. “The words ‘henceforth not able to father any children’ also come to mind.” Hero giggled.

Adam relaxed despite his frozen testicles attempting to suck up inside his body. If she could giggle, he had a hope that all could be made right. All he had to do was to make her see herself through his eyes, to show her that she was beautiful and warm and smart, and that he had only the most honorable of intentions toward her.

In other words, he had to pull off a miracle.

He watched her wade knee-high in the sun-warmed water, laughing at his cat when Jesus followed her from the safety of dry land. Adam could only think of one way he was going to have his miracle.

“Sorry, old boy,” he said softly, smiling as Hero tossed a piece of seaweed to Jesus. “I think those prosthetic balls of yours are just going to have to wait a bit longer. This is even more important than restoring your manhood.”

Hero was ecstatic as she skipped down the stone path toward the ballroom. The last three days had been blissfully wonderful, all because of Adam. He had been attentive to her at every opportunity, sitting with her at dinner, laughing with her when they met during the day, teasing her, talking to her, and best of all, kissing her every night outside her cabana. He hadn't made love to her yet, but she knew it was inevitable. His constant, unfailing interest in her, his gentle patience, and unstinting devotion, had turned her anger and uncertainly toward him into something that made her heart soar.

Once or twice it occurred to her to wonder why he was spending every available moment with her and none following Sally—not to mention the question of just why he had been hired to follow Sally in the first place—but she pushed the question to the back of her mind. Sally had probably told him off again, and he was wisely keeping his distance. It certainly didn't seem to bother him, and Lord knew she was enjoying every second they spent together.

The truth was, she was most definitely in love.

Hero giggled like a schoolgirl; she was so eager to see Adam again, to have another date.

Everything was looking wonderful—her dates with other men were pleasant, but not thrilling, and both Adam and she had full points for every event, ensuring they'd make it to for the next round.

Every evening she sat up in her cabana and worked late into the night on her story, much happier with it after she changed the focus from poking fun at Yanks desperate for love to one that reflected the reality of dating in today's world, and the intrepid few who went the extra distance—like becoming a contestant on a reality dating show—
to find that special person, that someone marvelous enough to spend the rest of their lives with.

Someone like Adam.

Hero sighed happily, then giggled at her sigh, then giggled at her giggle as she raced into the ballroom. The announcement was being made about the day's events. She couldn't remember what was on the day's schedule for dates, but she was confident that as it was the gentlemen's choice, Adam would pick whichever date would allow them the most time together.

The show host, Asterisk, was doing his usual routine, relating some of the more memorable comments on the confession-booth tapes, making the audience laugh over amusing incidents during the previous day's dates—Hero's air horn adventure had even made it into his morning routine—and generally setting the crowd up for their day in paradise.

She stood to one side and searched the crowd for Adam, finally spotting him and Jesus at a table across the room. He was evidently watching for her, because he lifted his hand in greeting. She smiled in return, and leaned against the cool wall, watching without listening as the Eden producer expounded about some point or other. Whatever it was, it didn't matter. Nothing could possibly matter when she was so very happy.

“Hero?”

Sally's voice pulled her out of the daydream involving Adam and that big bed in her cabana. “Good morning, Sally. How are you?”

Sally looked nervous, chewing on her lower lip and casting a quick glance over her shoulder.

Evidently Hero had missed the whole of the morning announcements, because the men and women were separating into either side of the ballroom in preparation for pairing off for the day's dates.

“Hero, there's something I want to talk to you about. Something…well, something that I shouldn't have done.”

Hero's attention switched from admiring Adam as he approached to the smaller woman in front of her. “You didn't say anything to the television show people about Adam, did you?” Sally's frown deepened. “No. He's left me alone these last few days; I told him if he left me alone I wouldn't
expose him. This doesn’t have to do with me, not really, you see…oh, it's confusing…” Hero, relieved as soon as she knew Adam was in no danger, gazed over Sally's shoulder and smiled as Adam and Jesus strolled up. “I'd be happy to talk to you at lunch, Sally.”

“Morning Sally,” Adam said politely, his eyes only for Hero, even when Sally muttered something inaudible and moved off. A warm kernel of pleasure formed within her. How could she have ever doubted his sincerity? Oh, to be sure, he still had silly notions about her admitting she was attractive, but she hadn't once seen a look of distaste or pity on his face when he kissed her. “Hero, as always, you look lovely.”

She blushed gently and beamed at him as he chatted politely when they were joined by Phillip, a man she had dated the day before. Phillip was interested in another woman, and posed no threat to her peace of mind. He certainly wasn't anywhere near as fascinating as Adam.

“I thought you'd prefer the first one over the second, since we can take a lunch along,” Adam was saying to her. She dragged her mind back to the present and smiled. He was no doubt talking about the day's dates. Anything that would extend her time was all right by her!

“Absolutely,” she said under her breath, uncaring what she agreed to. Perhaps, she mused as she admired him as he talked to Phillip and another woman, sheepishly declining the opportunity to offer the woman advice on the best way to find her G-Spot, perhaps Adam was one of those men who liked fleshy women. There were some men like that, or so she had heard. She'd never met one, but Adam was unique.

If anyone would be able to overlook her obvious flaws in the body department, she was sure he would.

Adam grinned at the G-Spot woman and leaned his head toward her when she whispered something in his ear, causing him to laugh out loud.

A small doubt burst out from nowhere, dampening the pleasure that glowed within her. What if he wasn't the sort of man who liked women of abundant form? What if he just didn't realize exactly what she looked like beneath the loose gauze of her jackets and cotton dresses and voluminous skirts?

What if the sight of her body without clothes repulsed him? How would she survive such a devastating occurrence? A cold chill gripped her, making her almost sick to her stomach as she watched him from beneath her lashes. He was laughing with another woman now, one who was squatting next to Jesus and his gecko.

That woman was also fit.

“How about it Hero? Care to bowl with me this afternoon?” Phillip was asking her.

She smiled wanly, fighting down the uncertainty that roiled within her. There was only one thing she could do—she'd just have to make sure that Adam never saw her naked. If they made love—and she fervently hoped they would very soon—it would simply have to take place in the dark. “I'd love to, Phillip.”

“Great. Well, guess I'd better go get suited up. Nancy, I'll see you down at Boat fourteen.” The Jesus-stroking woman agreed, and said something about going to fetch her swim fins, then she, too, strolled out of the ballroom.

Adam took her arm and steered her out the double doors into the heat of the morning. “I thought rather than joining everyone else, we'd take advantage of Dead Man's Cove. I've already rented a sailboat, so if you go change now, I'll meet you down at the docks. We have the Calypso Sunset for the morning.” She blinked at him. Sailboat? Change? Maybe she should have been paying attention earlier rather than daydreaming about him.

“Don't forget your snorkel equipment,” he called as he turned down the path toward his row of cabanas.

Snorkel equipment? A wave of horror crashed over Hero, causing her to stagger for a moment.

Snorkel equipment? A sailboat? Change? As in…donning a swimsuit?

“Oh, dear God, no!” she moaned, blindly heading for her cabana. “He's going to see me in my swimsuit! What a ghastly turn of events!”

Chapter Seven

Hero was not one to face life's little trials with fluttering hands and cries of “Woe am I!” She had come prepared with supplies for horrific eventualities leading up to, and including, death and dismemberment, but in truth, she knew she'd rather face both than the epitome of horrors, the pinnacle of dread, the zenith of everything loathsome—appearing in public in her swimsuit.

With that repulsive thought in mind, she had purchased not one, not two, but three beach cover-ups, all of which modestly covered her swimsuit-clad body from breast to mid-calf. True, she reflected as she padded down the wooden dock, looking for the sailboat named Calypso Sunset, the cover-up was ventilated with hundreds of holes intended to keep its wearer cool, but she had critically examined herself in the mirror and couldn't see that any untoward expanses of her flesh were exposed.

Adam was already on board the sailboat, stowing a picnic basket. She greeted a petulant-looking Jesus, the cat once again peeved because he had been wrestled into a life jacket, as well as parted from his boon companion, and settled herself down to enjoying the unexpected pleasure of time spent with Adam at one of the resort's three secluded beaches that were reachable only by boat.

“Do you know how to sail?” Adam asked as he handed her a life vest.

“No, but it isn't that difficult, is it? Don't you just point the boat in the direction you want to go?”

Adam coughed what sounded suspiciously like the beginnings of a laugh, but he quickly regained control of his esophagus and explained the principles behind sailing, ordering Hero to sit with her hand on the tiller. Before she knew it, they were heading out of calm waters protected by a reef to the north side of the island.

Dolphins rode their bow, splashing and leaping ahead and alongside them with wild abandon. Hero leaned back, the wind ruffling her short hair, feeling an odd combination of peace and excitement at the day's outing. A short time later Adam pointed out their destination: a small, white-sand beach edging a corner of the wildlife sanctuary. It was lined with palms and dense vegetation that left a ten-yard wide swath of sand that stretched out into a small spit. Adam dropped anchor, carried the picnic basket, blankets, and Jesus to a shady spot at the base of the spit, then turned to wave at Hero.

“Come on, the water's only waist high. We can have a swim before lunch.”

“Hell,” she muttered quietly to herself, smiling and waving back at him. “I just knew this was going to happen. Well, make the best of it, Hero. You don't want to ruin this lovely time simply because you're too embarrassed to get in the water.”

“Is something wrong?” Adam called out to her, peeling off the t-shirt and cotton shorts he wore over his teensy-tiny blue swimsuit.

She closed her eyes at the sight of all of his marvelous tanned flesh, flesh that called to her, flesh that she craved to touch and taste and stroke. Oh, no, nothing was wrong. Nothing other than there was much too much Hero for her liking, and most of that dyed a bronze that she suddenly realized made her look as if she had a severe attack of jaundice.

“Just coming,” she said, opening her eyes to see him swimming toward her. “Eek! No, stop, go back!”

He paused midway to the boat and stood up. As he predicted, the water was only waist-high.

“What's wrong?”

“Nothing, I'm coming, you just have to…erm…turn around for a moment.”

“Turn around?” He frowned and started half swimming, half walking toward her. “Why? You've got your suit on under that, don't you?”

“Yes, but I have to take the cover-up off to get in the water. Please don't come any closer.” He ignored her and kept coming. “So?”

She would not die of embarrassment, she would not die of embarrassment…”If you don't mind, I do not want you watching when I get in the water.”

“I do mind,” he said, reaching the side of the boat, swaying slightly with the gentle roll of the waves.

“And it's about time we had this out. I don't know why you want to hide yourself from me, but you don't have to. There are no cameras here now, it's just you and me.”

“Yes, but—”

“I've told you I think you're beautiful, and you know what sort of an effect you have on me. It's about time you realized how stunning you are.”

Hero recalled rubbing up against him the prior evening when he kissed her good-night. Oh, she knew she had an effect on him, but… “Yes, but you haven't seen all of me. And I don't want you to, so please do the gentlemanly thing and turn around so I might get into the water.” Once she was in the water, she'd be safe. She'd be half covered. She just wouldn't go into the very shallow water, or she would paddle around until he had to go pee before streaking for the safety of the blanket he'd spread out and its accompanying stack of beach towels.

He squinted up at her, his hand shading his eyes against the bright sunlight. “You won't get in the
water unless I turn around?”

She nodded. He sighed pointedly, but turned around. Hero approached the ladder leading down the side of the sailboat into the water, peering at him suspiciously, but he remained looking in the opposite direction. Halfway down the latter she peeled the cover-up off, and jumped the rest of the way into the warm ocean.

“Now,” he said, turning around and wading toward her with a dangerous glint in his lovely blue eyes.

“You and I are going to have a little talk.”

“Talk?” she asked weakly, her knees melting under his gaze. “You want to talk?”

“In a manner of speaking,” he said in a growl, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her up to his chest seconds before his mouth descended upon hers.

Hero's senses swam. His tongue was so hot, so demanding, she could do nothing but moan softly against his lips, and open her mouth to him, allowing him to sink into her and fill her mind with the addictive taste of him; She wanted him, she wanted him not just then, but for the rest of her life.

The water was warm around them, but his hands were warmer, stroking the bare flesh of her shoulders and arms, smoothing a path down her back and around her sides, then up to where her breasts ached for his touch.

And still he kissed her.

Pressed against each other, they moved together in the waves, their bodies gently swaying with the rhythm of the water around them, but everywhere his body touched hers, she felt as if she were on fire.

Unable to stop herself, she let her fingers sculpt down the long planes of his back, reveling in the sensation of his sun warmed, sea-dampened skin that lay like velvet over thick ropes of muscles.

He was so beautiful, and she was so—”Stop!” she cried, suddenly pulling back from him, tearing herself from the hot lure of his mouth.

“No,” he said, his voice a low rumble that echoed deep within her, touching all of those magical little places that only a man could touch. He tangled the fingers of one hand into her wet hair, and tipped her head back until her lips were offered up as a sacrifice to their passion.

“You can't…I don't want…” The words came out jumbled in between gasps of air, but he had no mercy.

“Yes, you do, just as much I as I want to. Have you ever made love in the water, Hero?” Her eyes
widened as he leaned down to nip her lips. “I promise you it'll be something you won't soon forget.”

He took possession of her mouth once again, and this time it was too much. She couldn't keep fighting him, fighting the need that she had for him, fighting her love. With a groan that came from her soul, she dug her fingers into his shoulders and pushed his tongue from her mouth, only to invade his. He moaned as she writhed against him, tasting him, teasing him, nipping at his lips and sucking his tongue, aware that his hands were busy stripping the swimsuit from her upper body, but for once uncaring because she knew that as long as they stayed in the water, she would not be entirely exposed to his view.

“Oh, Hero, my beautiful Hero, how can you think you are anything but desirable?” Adam kissed a hot path down Hero's breastbone, setting her skin alight. “You are a goddess, meant to be worshiped and venerated.”

His hands tugged on her swimsuit until suddenly she stood free of it, her bare skin surrounded by warm water on the back side, and Adam on her front. He tossed the wet garment into the boat, and stifled her protest with his mouth.

Flames licked from his fingertips as they danced down her spine, the fire heightened, not extinguished by the soft caress of the sea on her sensitive flesh. His hands were everywhere, stroking her behind, swooping along the curves of her hips, teasing her breasts until her nipples were hard and aching in the heat of his palms.

“Talk to me,” he murmured in her ear as he kissed and suckled the spot behind her ear. Hero moaned in response. “Tell me what you're feeling.”

“Can’t. No air.”

He chuckled as he pulled away from her long enough to kiss her waiting lips once more. “I know the feeling. There doesn’t seem to be enough air on this beach, does there?” She frowned at him. “Why is it you can still talk while I’m completely witless? I must not be doing something right.”

“Oh, baby, you’re doing everything right,” he crooned, his fingers hard on her hips as he pulled her to him, plundering her mouth for another one of those brain-numbing kisses. She arched her back against him, her breasts rubbing sinuously against his wet chest, and realized what it was she was doing wrong.

“Honey, you couldn’t possibly be any beh…beh…behhuuuUUUUUUUUHHH!” She smiled at the look of astonishment and absolute bliss on Adam’s face as she stroked his Speedos, curling her fingers into the waistband and tugging them off. She could almost hear the boing as his penis

—more erect than she thought humanly possible, visions of the redwood forest coming immediately to mind—sprang free of the skimpy material.

“So, it wouldn’t please you at all if I did this?” she asked, grasping his heated length with both hands and mapping out every bump and contour.

“Haaaarng,” he groaned, swallowing hard.

He was so hard and soft at the same time, velvety smooth skin riding over steel. Hot steel. Hot steel that spasmed quite a bit.

“I suppose, then, you wouldn’t like it if I were to do this, either?” She reached lower, dipping at the knees to take his balls in her hand, gently scratching her nails along the tender flesh at the same time she took one insouciant brown nipple in her mouth.

“Gwaaahhnan,” he burbled, his eyes rolling up in his head as his hands spasmed helplessly. She bit gently, so very gently on his tiny little nipple nub, and was rewarded with his body going stiff.

“CONDOM!” he bellowed.

She blinked at him, then began patting herself down, just in case a condom magically appeared on her person. Alas, the condom fairies were busy elsewhere that day. “I don't have one!” she wailed.

“Boat!” Adam said, maintaining his hold on Hero as he lunged awkwardly toward the side of the boat. His arm flailed around in the net bag sitting on the seat, then emerged with a shiny silver packet in his hand.

“Hurrah!” applauded Hero, and leaned forward to grab the condom from him at the same time he leaned forward to apply the slippery bit of latex. There was an audible “thunk” as their heads cracked together.

“Oh, Adam, I'm so sorry,” Hero apologized, rubbing her forehead.

“Never mind that,” he snarled, “the condom's escaping! Quick, grab it!” Hero snagged the white object, then turned to apply it, but as his penis was wet, and the condom was slick with lubricant, and the beastly thing kept popping off him. All the while she was trying to get it on, Adam twitched, groaned, and sobbed pleas for her to finish before he died.

“Done!” she said at last, giving him a beatific smile.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his jaw tense and tight with strain.

“Pretty certain. Mostly certain. Maybe I should just check it—”

“Now!” he bellowed, startling her.

“Now?”

“Now!! ” He grabbed her by the hips and pulled her close to him and up in one smooth move. Her breasts rubbed on his wet chest, the heat of him suddenly sending the slow burn inside her into a raging inferno. She wrapped her legs around his waist, digging her heels into the hard muscle of his behind. She felt the hard, pointy bit of him probing her, bumping against her, nudging her everywhere but the spot she wanted him, craved him, needed him. He poked again, a whimper escaping from her mouth as the touch of him drove the inferno inside her into a veritable firestorm that threatened to burn her up on the spot.

“Lower,” she cried, almost sobbing with frustration. Why couldn’t the man aim properly? “No, up a little. To the left. No, too far, back to the right. Now you’re too high again—”

“For the love of God, woman, help me,” he pleaded, desperation mingling with desire and need and something that looked so much like love that it made her want to burst into God Save the Queen.

Help him? Help him? Of course! Why didn’t she think of that? She reached between them and placed him where he was guaranteed a heartfelt welcome, then slid her fingers into his wet hair and groaned her pleasure into his mouth as he sank into her.

They stood like that for a moment, savoring the sensation of being joined, but soon Adam was pounding into her hard and fast, all gentleness gone, but that was just fine with her. She dug her heels into his behind, urging him on, clenching all those inner muscles she rarely ever had a use for around him until she squeezed a moan of absolute ecstasy out of his adorably manly lips. She rocked against him, sobbing now with pleasure as the fire inside her burned scarlet, then white hot, knowing that she was going to explode into a thousand little fragments—sated and happy fragments to be sure, but still she was certain she was going to die from the rapture of their joining.

She didn’t die. She roared out his name so loud Adam was deaf in the ear nearest her mouth for a week, but he never once complained. The joy he found in her arms, in her eyes, just plain in her was more than enough compensation for something as meaningless as a functioning eardrum. Her body tightened and shuddered around him, driving him on to find his own moment of absolute pleasure, a moment that went beyond anything he’d known and entered the realm of mythic eroticism. He came hard, arching his back and pumping into her every drop of life he had to give, filling her with his heart and soul and love and anything else he thought she might want. He gave so much of himself, he wasn’t sure he there would be anything left of him, but when the world stopped spinning around him, when he regained enough of his wits to realize that he was standing waist deep in the Caribbean ocean, the woman he loved draped limp and wet over him, he knew that somehow, everything would be all right. He had Hero, nothing else mattered.

True, he staggered as he waded back to the beach, her arms and legs still wrapped around him, but
he figured she wouldn’t hold that against him. Not even Superman would have been able to walk straight after such an experience.

Hero stirred in his arms as he walked toward shore. “Did I die? Is this heaven?” He mustered together enough strength to move his grin muscles into place. “Not heaven, just paradise.”

She kissed a lazy line along his jaw. “Mmm. Paradise. With Adam. That must make me Eve?”

“Well…” He stopped long enough to kiss her silly. He loved her when she was silly. “I think there are some apples in the basket.”

“Good. You're going to need a lot of sustenance. Adam?”

“Hmm?”

She bit his chin gently. “That girlfriend of yours was dead wrong.” He looked down at the woman in his arms. “She was?”

“About you being a poor lover. You're not, you're very, very…. mmmrowr!” He grinned. He'd never been called mmmrowr before, with or without the implied italics. It felt good.

It felt damn good.

Hero suddenly pushed back from his chest, looking around them wildly. “What are you doing?” He grinned again. He loved her when she was bemused. “I’m carrying you to the blanket in the very best romantic hero tradition.”

She struggled against him, unwrapping her legs and trying to drop down his body. “No! The water’s only up to your knees! Stop!” Suddenly she went rigid, then slapped a hand over his eyes, her legs wrapping themselves around his hips again. “No, don’t stop! Take me to the towels!” He laughed out loud. He even loved her when she made no sense. “Baby, I can’t see where I’m going.”

“That’s not all you can’t see.”

He turned his head until her hand slid from his eyes, saying nothing until he stood holding her over the blanket.

“Hero—”

“I don’t suppose you’d care to bend down and let me grab a couple of those towels before you let go of me?”

She was clinging to him like a limpet. He felt a rumble of laughter start in his chest, but knew she would be offended if he laughed at something that she did not find funny. “No, I’m not going to let
you cover yourself up. Hero, I love you. I have since that first day when you ambushed me in the customs room. I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I don’t care what you look like. You’re beautiful to me, all of you, every last square inch of you, and if you’d just loosen the stranglehold you have on me, I’d be more than happy to show you just how much I worship you.”

She mumbled something into his neck.

“What?”

“There’s too many square inches of me.”

“No, baby, there’s not, there’s just the right amount,” he said, but knew when he felt the hot tears on his neck that it was going to take more than words to convince her. He sank to his knees on the blanket with her still clinging to him, draping a beach towel around the back of her until she grabbed the ends and pulled it around her front. She slid off his legs, looking anywhere but at him, trying to pull the towel down over her as she moved to the far edge of the blanket.

He wouldn’t let her.

“Here,” he said, pulling her back to him as he stretched out on the blanket. She frowned at him and clutched the towel closer.

“You’re not wearing anything.”

“I know.” He ran a fingertip along the curve of her breast before it disappeared into the towel.

Her breath hitched. “Don’t you think that’s a little risqué? What if someone should see you?”

“No one can see us.” He rubbed his leg against hers, leaning over her and throwing his heavy thigh over her legs.

She glanced over his shoulder. “Jesus is over there.”

“Jesus has seen me naked before.” He started nibbling on her neck, pushing aside her wet hair to taste the sensitive flesh beneath it.

“But…but…”

“Hero, you are the most beautiful woman in the world.”

She snorted.

“To me you are,” he said with a smile, then sat up and ran a palm down her smooth calf. “Look at your legs, look how shapely they are.”

“They’re stumpy,” she said with a mutinous glare. He bent down to kiss a path down one calf, pausing to nibble on her ankle, then kissing down the top of her foot until he reached her toes.

“I could never love a women with stumpy legs,” he murmured, sucking a toe into his mouth for a moment. She moaned. “Your legs are long and muscled, and you have stunningly gorgeous heels. I bet men fawn upon your heels all the time.”

She giggled as he turned back toward her.

“And your arms,” he said holding out one arm and kissing a wet trail up to her shoulder, “are pieces of art. They are the arms of the Venus de Milo.”

“The Venus de Milo doesn’t have arms,” she said—somewhat breathlessly, he noted, smiling to himself.

“That’s because no one else can have arms as lovely as you,” he murmured against her collarbone.

“But they have rivals to the title of loveliest limb, because those must go to your legs, particularly your thighs—”

She squealed and tried to push down the towel as he peeled it off her upper legs. “No, please, Adam, don’t!”

He bent over her legs, sliding a hand between her thighs, nibbling her soft flesh gently until she shuddered and allowed him to spread her legs. “Your thighs are almost perfect enough to be part of a sculpture, but not quite, because yours are warm and soft and inviting.

“They are?”

He heard the wistful tone in her voice and prayed she would learn to see herself as he saw her.

“Almost perfect,” he repeated, kneeling between her thighs as he tried to pull the towel from where she clutched it between her breasts. “Let me, baby.”

“No.”

“Please.”

“No.” Her eyes were filling with tears.

He kissed her long and deep. “Let me see you.”

Slowly he pried the towel from her fingers and laid it back, exposing her breasts, those glorious breasts, breasts that would make any man’s mouth water. “Oh, Hero, they’re exquisite,” he
murmured, his fingers stroking and caressing, then he paid homage to each pert rose-tipped nipple with his mouth.

“Exquisite,” she moaned, writhing against him, thrusting her breast into his mouth, screaming when he suckled hard. He paid due attention to the other breast, making her gasp with the pleasure, then kissed the warm valley between them as he slid down.

“But the best part of you. . .” He nudged the towel down.

“No!” She tried to grab it and cover herself up. He wouldn’t let her.

“The best part. . . “ He pushed the towel down until her belly button was exposed, pausing to lave it with his tongue. She jerked beneath him.

“No,” she whimpered, her hands fluttering in his hair.

“The very best part of you” —he brushed the remainder of the towel aside and gently bit her belly, sliding his hand up her inner thigh until he reached his own personal paradise. “Weeps tears of joy for me.”

He leaned down until his mouth was against her heated core, his nose inhaling the scent of her, the scent of him, their passion mingled into something earthy and salty and so essential he had to taste her.

She bucked beneath him so hard that he held her hips still, licking and nibbling her until her back bowed and she screamed his name.

He lay next to her, twining a finger in her damp hair until she was able to open her eyes.

“Now tell me I don’t find you beautiful.”

She slapped a hand on his chest and pushed him onto his back, looming over him with a scowl that would do a misanthrope proud.

“Just what do you mean by saying that my crotch is the best part of me? Whatever happened to loving my mind, hmmm? Whatever happened to my charming wit and my delightful sense of humor and all the other things you have been praising these last few days? There’s more to me than just my genitals, you know!”

He laughed and pulled her down over him, and kissed the disgruntled look right off her face. “I was wondering if you were going to say anything about that.”

“Oh, I’m going to do more than just say something about such a gross understatement of my many charms,” she said, a wicked look in her eye that warmed him to his toes. She leaned over to kiss
him, and squeezed a groan out of him as she wrapped her fingers around his penis. “I’m going to do much, much more than say something. I’m going to demand a penance.”

He tried to capture one of her ripe nipples in his mouth, but she squirmed out of his reach. “What sort of penance? Will it involve whipped cream? Handcuffs? You parading around me in naughty lingerie?” She sat back on her heels, then suddenly bent over him and flicked her tongue along the sensitive underside of his penis.

He stopped breathing.

“No,” she whispered, curling her fingers around him. “Your penance is that you’re going to have to make love to me again. Right now.”

“Such a taskmaster,” he sighed, then tried to grab her and pull her over him.

“No, no, not like that, anyone can make love like that,” she teased, getting to her feet and running toward the water. “We’re going to do it the hard way.”

“Oh, baby, you have no idea how hard it is,” he grinned as he jumped up and chased after her.

Jesus lay in a cool spot directly beneath a broad-leafed shrub and watched with interest as Adam hauled Hero to a spot next to the blanket.

“What do you mean, it’s poisonous? I thought you ate sea urchins? How can you eat something that’s poisonous?”

“It’s just a mild poison, Hero, on the spine. It's nothing serious. Here, stand on your one leg and let me look at your foot.”

Hero stood naked, tears pooling around her eyes, her wet hair streaming water down her back as he held her foot up and bent over it. The bottom of her foot stung, but that ominous word poison kept ringing through her head.

“It’s not bad at all—the spines barely punctured the skin— but even if we left right away it might start to swell up before we made it back to the resort.”

“I’ve been poisoned by a bloody sea urchin?” She couldn’t believe it. She had medications for every other eventuality, but who knew that treacherous little spiny things lurked under innocent patches of seaweed. She just thanked her lucky stars that she stepped on the little bugger after they had made love, not during. “What are we going to do? I don’t want to be poisoned, I just let you see me. All of me! It’s not fair that I should go through that and then die because of sadistic sea life lying in wait for me!”

“Hero—”Adam looked at her with an odd expression.

“What?”

“There is one thing I can do.”

“Well then do it,” she said, trying to peer over her shoulder to look behind at her foot.

“Sea-urchin spines can be dissolved with ammonia.”

“And you have some?”

“Well—”

“For the Lord’s sake, put it on! I don’t want to be puffy-footed; tonight is mambo night! I want to mambo with you! We could get at least two hundred points if we beat everyone else!” Keeping her injured foot of the ground, she hopped toward the picnic basket and gestured toward it. “Go ahead, get the ammonia and put it on my foot. I’m getting tired of standing like a flamingo.” Wry amusement and embarrassment mingled in his handsome eyes. “The ammonia isn’t in the picnic basket, it’s in uh . . .”

“Well?”

“My urine.”

She stared at him, her mouth hanging open slightly. “Your what?”

“Urine. Urine contains ammonia.”

She continued to stare, sure she must have misheard him. “You want to pee on my foot?” His lips twisted into a half smile. “They do it all the time down here. It’s very common.”

“You want to pee on my foot?”

“It’ll help dissolve any bit of spine that’s in the wound, and should keep it from swelling. We’ll get you back to the resort and let the medical people have a look at it then.”

“You want to pee on my foot?”

He sighed. “It’s the only thing I can do until we get back to the resort.” She glared at him for a moment, then turned her back and raised her foot until the sole was facing him. “I am going to pretend this is not happening. I am going to pretend that I am soaking my foot in warm water and Epsom salts. I am going to pretend—Good Lord, man, what are you, a camel? How much do you have in you?”

He carried her out to the boat a short time later, instructing her to keep her foot out of the water despite her inclination to wash it off in the warm salt water. With his help she shimmied one-footed into her swimsuit, then pulled the cover-up on and resumed her seat by the tiller while he fetched Jesus and the picnic things.

She thought that nothing could ruin such a fabulous, breathtakingly glorious, stupendously wonderful, marvelous, perfectly lovely day—lovely with only the minor exception of having had the love of her life pee all over her foot—but as she found out, even such a day of almost bliss as they had shared could be crushed until it resembled nothing so much as a stomped-upon sea urchin.

Chapter Seven

“I wonder what's going on over there?”

Adam looked when Hero pointed down the dock. He had just tied up the sailboat and was unloading Jesus and the picnic things, preparing to help Hero hobble to the resort infirmary, but stopped when he saw the group of television people coming toward him. They had the ubiquitous cameraman and sound person in tow, he noted.

Hero gnawed on her lip and hopped to the edge of the boat, allowing Adam to swing her over the side. She no longer had any doubts that he truly did find her attractive, and with that knowledge came the freedom to love him with every atom in her body. She leaned against him, wanting the warm contact touching him gave her. “Have we kept the boat out too long?”

“No.” He shook his head, snapping a leash on Jesus and handing it to her as he scooped up the blankets and towels, adding them to the picnic basket.

“They don't look very happy.” A twinge of guilt streaked through her at the sight of the Eden producer, her assistant, someone sweating profusely in a suit, and a cameraman headed straight for them.

She had meant to tell Adam the truth about her participation on the show during the sail home, but somehow they ended up kissing more than talking, and she just hadn't mustered up the nerve to tell him.

She would tonight, though. The first moment they were together alone, she'd explain about more or less losing her job, and having one last chance, and the need for her to keep her intentions quiet.

Surely he would understand.

He had told her the truth about himself even before he kissed her.

She pushed that niggling thought aside and smiled at the approaching people, Adam's arm strong around her waist.

“Adam Fuller.”

She felt Adam stiffen beside her and wondered why, then realized the show's producer used his real name, not the name he had assumed for the show.

“Hero North,” Dara Thompson said with a smile that most definitely did not reach her eyes. “How very fitting we should find you both together.”

“Is it?” Adam asked smoothly, his arm tightening around Hero. She had a horrible presentiment of
what was coming. “Well, I'm afraid that whatever you have to say to us is going to have to wait.

Hero stepped on a sea urchin and she needs medical attention.”

“I'm sorry to hear that,” Thompson said, her eyes expressing anything but concern. “This won't take a minute. Mr. Jenkins?”

The sweaty man in a suit oiled his way forward. “I'm Robert Jenkins, of Dowitcher, Prog, and Epile. I represent Hawkeye Productions, and the TV show Eden in particular. Mr. Fuller, we have here an affidavit from one Samuel Fife, producer, stating that he received payment of five thousand dollars in order to doctor a legitimate contestant's file in such a way as to admit you to the show in place of the contestant.”

Oh, Lord, they'd found Adam out. Hero slid a glance at him. He stood beside her, not gnashing his teeth or frothing at the mouth, or doing any of the things she would be doing in his place. Instead he looked mildly bored, as if nothing the horrible lawyer in the suit was saying was of any importance.

“Further investigation has revealed that you were party to the illegal act of smuggling a live animal onto the island despite the quarantine restrictions.”

Hero wanted to put her arms around Adam. They'd found out about Jesus, too?

“As you are aware, such an act carries with it not only a substantial fine, but a jail term, in addition to the destruction of the animal in question.”

“No,” Hero shouted, surprising everyone, including herself. “That's ridiculous, utterly ridiculous—”

The evil man held up his hand. “I will attend to you in a moment, Miss North.” He turned back to Adam, pulling out a handkerchief to mop his sweaty brow as he spoke. “Because of your actions, you have been disqualified from the competition. You have an hour to remove your things from the hospitality of the resort. Transportation will be provided to the Mystique Island Airport, whereupon officers of the Commonwealth will be waiting to discuss your violations of quarantine policy.” Hero stared in horror at the man.

“I understand,” Adam said, his voice rumbling around her, drawing her eyes to him. He looked nothing more than mildly annoyed. He understood? She didn't understand! And she certainly wasn't going to let some nasty little solicitor push Adam around.

“I believe that even on Mystique the accused is allowed to face his accuser,” Hero snapped at the man. “Just who exactly tattled on Adam?”

Jenkins turned to her. “Ah, Miss North. Who exposed Mr. Fuller is not at issue here.”

“Isn't it? I think it is, although it really is a moot point. There's only one other person here who
knows who Adam is—Sally Simmons.”

“Miss Simmons reluctantly verified information, yes, but she did not bring the initial complaint to our attention. That was done by a Mr. Gregory Barstow.”

Greg! Greg of the thigh-sized arms. Hero's eyes narrowed as she recalled him questioning Adam the night of the first dinner. And Sally knew she was a journalist—had she told that to Greg as well?

Hero couldn't help but being hurt, even though the man had said Sally was reluctant to verify the truth. She had liked Sally, how could she be so cruel to Adam?

“Miss North, I have here a copy of your application to participate on Eden, and a notarized statement concerning your background. Nowhere in it does it state that you are currently employed as an investigative journalist for a British newspaper.”

She felt Adam twitch next to her, and crossed her fingers behind her back, praying that she had the time to talk to him before he thought the worst of her. If it wasn't too late, that is…

“Would you like to explain this oversight?”

She raised her chin. “Explain it? No, I would not like to explain it, but I will nonetheless. I was employed by a newspaper, but as of three months ago, I was forced to take a leave of absence. I am no longer on the payroll of the Revue.”

“Do you deny that you applied for a spot on the show with the intention of using your experiences here in an article to be published by Sentinel-Revue at a later date?”

“That was my intention, yes.”

“And you willingly provided false information to the show's producers that would mislead them into believing your sole interest was in participating in the show in good faith?” What must Adam be thinking of her? She shuddered to think. “No. I did not provide false information.”

“You did not reveal your recent employment by a British tabloid known throughout England for its outrageous and often fantastical and inaccurate stories. You do not consider that providing false information?”

“I assume there is a point to this?” Hero asked, wanting to lean into Adam, but unsure of his reception to such a move. “My foot hurts. If you are going to throw me off the island, too, please say so now so that I might see the doctor before I have to leave.”

The man nodded, mopping at his face again. “You are also disqualified from the show. You have one hour to remove yourself from the Crescent Moon Resort. Further, you will be hearing from the Hawkeye Productions legal department regarding the falsifying of statements on your applications.”

Hero wanted to tell the man where he could stick is falsified statements, but the camera was on her and Adam, so she just smiled instead.

“Do you need me to carry you?” Adam asked as the group turned around and left without further word. Hero wanted to look at him, wanted to assess the damage the fact that she'd lied to him had done, but hadn't the nerve.

“No, I can walk,” she said, her head down.

“Hero.”

His hand on her arm stopped her.

“What?” she asked into his chest, ashamed and embarrassed and close to tears with the knowledge that her stupid plan had hurt the one man she loved more than anything else.

He raised her chin and looked down at her with eyes so blue they looked like the brightest sapphires.

“You could have told me.”

“I know. I'm sorry, so very sorry, Adam. I didn't mean to not tell you, but there never seemed to be a good time, and I didn't want you to think badly of me, and I didn't know how you feel… felt…and I was going to tell you tonight, but now you probably don't even want to hear me out—” He leaned forward until his breath was warm on her lips. “Honey, it would take more than a little thing like this to change how I feel about you.”

She blinked back her tears, shivering despite the warmth of the day. His eyes were so warm, so full of love, she wanted to do a few back flips down the dock despite the fact that their world was falling apart.

“It would? What would it take?”

His lips brushed hers in the sweetest kiss imaginable. “Oh, I don't know…global destruction? No, not even that could change my mind. You're the best thing that's ever happened to me, Hero. I love you now, I'll love you tomorrow, I'll love you always. You're my bright, beautiful goddess in my very own Eden.”

“Maybe I'll change my name to Eve,” she murmured, sucking on his lower lip, releasing it to add,

“But what about you? What will you do if you can't follow Sally? And what about Jesus?” They both looked down to where Jesus had plopped himself in the shade Hero provided, sitting with his one good front leg tucked under him, the other stretched out straight.

“We can't let those quarantine people take him and put him down. We can't!” Adam's eyes, heated with passion the moment before, turned to ice. “We won't. The only thing Jesus will have to sacrifice is his balls, and I already told him those were on hold when I decided to give up the job on Sally so I could court you. He'll be OK; his balls'll just have to wait until later, once I can scrape together enough to pay for the surgery.”

She touched his cheek. “Once we can scrape together enough for his surgery. It seems a shame he should lose his testicles a second time.”

He grinned at her, the grin fading a moment later. “Hero, I hate to do this to you, hate to start out our life together with something illegal hanging over our heads, but—”

“I have three hundred pounds in traveler's checks, and a Visa card. Will that be enough to bribe someone into taking us off the island?”

He laughed, pulling her against him, kissing her soundly. “With what I have, yes, it will be enough.

You know that Dominica is just a short hop away?”

“Dominica?”

Adam smiled and brushed a curl out of her eye. “It's a small island, one that doesn't have animal quarantine laws. I'll call Gar from there—if his past is anything to go by, he's probably already engaged to someone else—and apologize and send him back his money.”

Her smile answered his, love alight in her eyes. “Sounds marvelous,” she said under her breath, giving him one more kiss. “This has the makings of a great story! My editor will love it!” Adam laughed as he scooped her up in his arms. “Come along my little fugitive from justice. Jesus, heel.

We have a daring escape to plan.”

“Escape to paradise,” Hero sighed, snuggling against Adam, filled with love and hope and happiness, but most of all, filled with the knowledge that all her feelings were returned. “What a lovely headline that will make.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

For as long as she can remember, Katie MacAlister has loved reading. Growing up in a family where a weekly visit to the library was a given, Katie spent much of her time with her nose buried in a book.

Despite her love for novels, she didn’t think of writing them until she was contracted to write a non-fiction book about software. Since her editor refused to allow her to include either witty dialogue or love scenes in the software book, Katie swiftly resolved to switch to fiction, where she could indulge
in world building, tormenting characters, and falling madly in love with all her heroes.

Two years after she started writing novels, Katie sold her first romance, Noble Intentions. More than thirty books later, her novels have been translated into numerous languages, been recorded as audiobooks, received several awards, and are regulars on the New York Times, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly bestseller lists. She also writes for the young adult audience as Katie Maxwell.

Katie lives in the Pacific Northwest, and can often be found lurking around online. You can visit her at http://www.katiemacalister.com