Page 34 of Dr. Grump's Surprise Baby

It didn’t matter. She couldn’t pull away from him. Not after what he had just shared with her about his past. Dominic had been vulnerable with the first time — perhaps it had been the first time he’d been vulnerable with anybody. It had certainly been the first time in a good long while.

She reached for his face at the same moment as his hand came up to cup the back of her neck, and then there was no more thinking, only sensation. Only the warmth of his touch, the spicy clean scent of him, and then his mouth on hers as, finally, they kissed.

It felt inevitable, like finally allowing a tide to carry her out to sea. It felt like something that had been coming for a very long time, and she couldn’t regret having given into it, because she had never really had a choice.

“Shall I get a hotel room?” Dominic murmured, mouth against hers.

Emily knew what he was insinuating, knew it probably wasn’t a good idea, and knew that she hadn’t a hope of bringing herself to say no to him now.

“Yes,” she breathed.

CHAPTER 14

DOMINIC

Dominic cursed as his alarm went off, jerking him out of a pleasant slumber.

He felt as if he had been aware the whole time he’d slept of Emily’s body wrapped around his — and aware, too, that when he woke up and left lower consciousness, he would also have to leave her. This couldn’t last. Of course it couldn’t.

He looked over at her, lying naked in bed beside him. She was radiant. The morning sun coming through the window made her skin glow, and there was nothing he wanted more than to take her in his arms, pull the covers up over their heads, and stay here all day. His body already ached with the desire to do that, even though he knew it wasn’t an option.

She blinked, looked up at him, and smiled.

That smile. It made him feel like he was going into heart failure.

“Hey,” she murmured. “That was fun.”

He nodded and kissed her forehead. It was a pale shade of what he wanted to do with her, but he knew that once he started he would have a hard time stopping.

So he sat up and cleared his throat. “That alarm was a half-hour warning,” he said. “They’re going to be serving brunch downstairs. I’m guessing you don’t want to miss that.”

She searched his face for a moment, and he got the impression that she was looking for the right answer. It made him feel terrible, because he knew that she would have agreed to stay in bed if he had asked for that. And that was what he wanted.

And that was what he knew he couldn’t ask for.

It was so close to being within his grasp, but he couldn’t have it.

“You’re right,” she said. “We should get down to brunch. And we don’t want to miss out on the rest of the conference, either.”

“About what happened here,” he said. “I mean… do you want to talk about it?”

“We don’t have to,” she said softly. “I think we both know it has to be a one-time thing, right? We’re not going to let it get in the way of doing our jobs.”

“Right,” Dominic said.

He was sure it wasn’t going to be that simple. Staying away from Emily Swinton had never been simple.

But he also knew that she was right. He was glad she didn’t seem to view what had happened between them as a mistake, because he certainly didn’t think of it that way. But he also knew that it couldn’t be repeated. Thatwouldbe a mistake, and not one that he could permit.

He hunted around on the floor and eventually found the shirt he had been wearing the day before. He pulled it over his head.

Emily had pulled the blanket up and wrapped it around her body. “I can’t go back down to the conference in yesterday’s clothes,” she said.

“I can have a few things brought over,” he told her.

“Who do you know who’s going to bring things over to the hotel?” Emily asked. “Especially things for me?”

“The hotel staff can be discreet,” Dominic said. “Give me your size and I’ll call down and have them run out and pick up appropriate outfits for each of us.”

---