Mandy realized with dawning horror just what his words implied. Oh, that was just lovely. He thought she was fat! Two and two in his head hadn’t equaled pregnancy. He thought she’d been hitting the dessert table too hard. Allison was right—men didn’t notice anything.

Except hard nipples.

“Turn around,” he said, clearly no idea he had offended her.

Bloody idiot.

She gave him her back. “Yes, the desserts are marvelous. You’re going to have to roll me onto the plane.”

A breeze kicked her hair across her lip, and she pried the strand off as she heard lotion squirt into Damien’s hand.

His chair squeaked as he scooted forward on it. “That’s good. You look better than when I first met you. I guess it was the flu, but you looked kind of thin. You seem healthier now.”

Fatter. That’s what he meant.

Mandy rolled her eyes behind her sunglasses. Then tensed when his hands landed on her shoulders, smooth and cool with lotion. Big hands, confident hands, that glided across her skin with strong strokes, his thumbs skimming along behind his fingers.

Damien had leaned over closer—she could hear his breathing, smell toothpaste and the coconut scent of the sunscreen. “And people think I’m tense. Relax, Mandy.”

He had no idea what he was asking of her. If she relaxed, really and truly relaxed, she’d sink in to his touch, sigh and moan and revel in the feeling of a man’s strong but gentle hands caressing her.

It was hell being stoic all the time, and she wasn’t even doing a very good job of it. And Damien was so gorgeous and competent and broad-shouldered, with those delectable baby blues.

He skimmed her spine, sending a shiver rolling through her and setting her inner thighs burning with desire.

She groaned, a long, low sound of abandonment.

Damien knew he was pushing into dangerous territory. Hell, he’d jumped into a fucking volcano.

His plan to avoid Mandy had just failed. And then some.

After shutting himself in his hotel room for two straight days, working like a fiend, and intermittently wondering what Mandy was doing, and what she was wearing, he’d needed some fresh air. It had been a happy coincidence that ten steps on the beach and he’d found Mandy lying in a chaise lounge, reading a magazine.

Except he supposed it didn’t count as a coincidence at all since he had the funny feeling he would have paced up and down the beach like an expectant father until he’d found her.

Even so, he hadn’t meant to put his hands on her. That had been an impulse. A stupid one. A head-up-his-ass impulse.

But she had looked so good.