At His Service: Her Boss the Hero: One Night With Her Boss / Her Very Special Boss / The Surgeon's Marriage Proposal. Alison Roberts

might be risking something else.’

      ‘We’ve agreed on the ground rules. It’s not going to interfere with your training and it’s not going to get messed up by one of us being stupid enough to think it’s real.’

      ‘That’s not what I meant. I’m talking about …’ Mikki closed her eyes. This was horribly clinical. ‘You know. Safe sex.’

      ‘Oh-h. Not a problem.’

      Mikki’s eyes snapped open. ‘You’re telling me you carry condoms on a survival training exercise?’

      Tama’s grin was unrepentant. ‘I’m a good Boy Scout. Always prepared. But, no, I don’t always carry them. This time I did.’

      Mikki opened her mouth, ready to express outrage at the implied expectation, but then she shut it again. She thought back to that moment in Josh’s room. That silent acknowledgement that had passed between them of the attraction and the opportunity that being alone together would provide.

      She stood up. ‘Seeing as you’re such a good Boy Scout,’ she said, with a very womanly smile. ‘You’ll know what to do to make this fire safe to leave, won’t you?’

      They held hands as they stumbled along a rough track that led to a primitive but sturdy wooden hut. There was a pot-belly stove opposite the door that made the interior deliciously warm in a very short period of time. They both took off their outer, waterproof garments and their balaclavas and gloves and boots.

      Leaving the door of the stove open provided a warm, glowing light. Enough to illuminate the narrow bunk beds built into both sides of the hut. Mikki looked at the width of the beds. She looked at the size of Tama and then she looked at the door.

      ‘There’s no chance anyone else will want to use this hut tonight, is there?’

      ‘If they did, they would have been here before nightfall, and that was quite a while ago now.’

      ‘Good.’

      Mikki pulled a mattress off a bunk and put it on the floor in front of where Tama was stoking up the stove. She added a second mattress beside it and the whole floor area was virtually covered.

      It was such an obvious move that Mikki felt embarrassed having completed it. She couldn’t look at Tama because the courage she’d found to let him know what she wanted had deserted her. Setting up bedding like this made her feel suddenly and horribly … cheap.

      It took only a small step for Tama to be close enough to touch her. He put his forefinger under her chin and used just enough pressure to make her lift her face and look up at him.

      She saw understanding in his gaze. Reassurance. And then he smiled that gorgeous crooked smile and bent his head to claim her lips with his own.

      They shouldn’t be doing this.

      Tama knew that, despite the arguments to the contrary he’d presented to Mikki last night.

      He also knew he couldn’t have continued resisting the temptation without repercussions. He’d been honest when he’d said that sexual frustration could interfere with their professional relationship more than any aftermath was likely to.

      Mikki held her arms up like a child as he helped her undress by pulling the tight thermal top from her body, but there was nothing childlike about the way she dropped her arms around his neck and then stood on tiptoe to offer him her mouth.

      Tama let his lips savour hers while his hands un-clipped her bra and then slid slowly forward to trace her ribs and find …

      Oh, God! He might have denied it so well he’d believed it but he’d been wanting to touch these small, perfect breasts since he’d first clapped eyes on them by the diving pool that day. He’d known how they would fit his hands. How firm and round they would feel. He hadn’t imagined what it would do to him to feel the tiny, hard nub of an aroused nipple on them, though. With a groan he had to abandon the sweetness of Mikki’s mouth and bend lower to explore with his tongue the place he’d just sensitised with his fingers.