Mark of a Good Man Read Online Free Page B

and other types of commercialism. It’s holding its own, and quite authentically so.”
    His statements generated spurts of anxiety in Amber. She stirred uneasily in her seat, but knew she dared not respond to his comments that paralleled hers so closely. She’d learned a great deal about him during dinner. He was the youngest of four children—all boys. His American father had met and married his Bajan mother while on the island on business. They’d decided to raise their four sons on Barbados. Mark didn’t say it, but it seemed his family was wealthy since he and his siblings all attended private high schools in the States. He was a graduate of Princeton and had attended flight school in Texas. He liked the States, but said he felt most at home in the Caribbean. And now he was sharing his love for Dulcina and his desire to settle down here with her.
    She didn’t want to hear about it. She didn’t want to have anything in common with him. She hadn’t even asked him which airline he worked for, or where he was living at the moment. She didn’t want to know.
    “Would you like to go for a walk, Amber?”
    Amber’s gaze wandered off over the top of the palm trees. The sky was a canopy of sparkling diamonds inviting her to revel in its magic one last time. “I guess. A walk would be nice. I have to enjoy as much of this enchantment as I can. There are no moonlit beaches in New York City.”
    “That’s why I love the islands. You can be on a beach in minutes.” He left his seat and came around to her side of the table to help her from her chair.
    “Or live on one,” she concurred, taking his hand.
    He turned her around, pulled her against his chest, and wrapped his arms about her slender body. He gazed deeply into her eyes. “Would you mind if I kissed you, Amber Nolan?”
    Amber’s tongue darted from inside her mouth and trailed quite lethargically across her lips. It was a reflex motion in response to the sudden draining of fluids from her throat, upward. Her lower body, on the other hand, pulsed with life and excitement from the heavy flood of fluids heading south to settle, quite disturbingly, between the apex of her trembling thighs.
    Mark apparently took her dumbfounded behavior as an invitation, and lowed his dark head.
    Amber closed her eyes and moaned as the smooth moist flesh of his lips brushed hers, causing a tingling sensation to course down her body. She had no idea if her moan was one of protest or acquiescence. Mark obviously took it as the latter. He tightened his arms about her and bent his knees slightly, aligning their sexes so perfectly together, the shock of his arousal pressing into her feminine softness elicited a hard gasp from Amber’s throat.
    Mark’s tongue took the opportunity to slide its way into the sweet cavern of her mouth. Her tongue met his, intending to stop the invasion, but like a palm branch in a tropical breeze, it wavered and bowed to the will and strength of its pursuer. As Mark deepened the kiss, Amber could do nothing but give herself freely to the moment. He was sucking the fight right out of her.
    She wound her arms around his neck and kissed him with a hunger that belied the outward calm she’d been displaying since she’d met him. Forgotten were her inhibitions, her vow not to become involved with any man, much less a pilot, her oath not to wear her heart on her sleeve anymore as their tongues danced around each other—capturing, releasing, fluttering, and teasing until the muffled sounds coming from their throats seemed to become one with Marley’s One Love, One Heart …
    Yes, she wanted to get together with him tonight, and feel alright.
    “Amber…”
    A delicious shudder skittered through her body as he spoke her name. No one had ever said her name with such passion, such eroticism.
    “So delicious,” Mark whispered as his lips left her mouth to trail across her cheek, over her chin, and down to the softness of her neck where he nibbled at her pulsing