Passionate Protectors?

by Anne Mather

  Dammit! He couldn’t stand around waiting for coffee, he had to go and find her. Demand that she return with him. He’d promised himself they would spend the day in his studio working, even if his aroused libido said differently. As far as he was concerned it was essential that he demonstrate—intimate relationship or no—that he was more than willing to help her forge an artistic career. It was a point of honour for him. Such a talent should never be wasted and he would personally see to it that she got every bit of tutelage and guidance to help her make her mark.

  But first things first. Right now he had to see her and talk to her. Nothing had ever seemed more imperative. He didn’t even pause to ask himself why. Instead, he went to his wardrobe, yanked open the doors and rifled through his clothing for something clean to wear before hitting the shower with a vengeance.

  The heady, painfully evocative fragrance of Nick Brand’s designer aftershave wafted round Penny’s bright modern living room like the strong redolence of sweat in a male locker room after a football game. Megan’s stomach kept somersaulting like a trapeze artist gone mad every time she sensed it. Painful memories surfaced and melded with the present as she nervously eyed the man who’d so clearly made himself at home on Penny’s cushion-laden couch.

  In appearance, Nick Brand was as handsome and confident as ever in his stylish but sober designer suit—if a little older. In fact his greying temples had come as a bit of a surprise, but his brown hair was as professionally styled as always, giving the distinct impression that he didn’t skimp on his hairdressing bills. Unsurprisingly his expression was totally at ease as he sat absorbing his surroundings—insolent—almost. As if he were king of his castle and everyone else around him mere peasants.

  Nothing much had changed then. He still thought he was better than everyone else.

  Megan swallowed hard, trying not to let him see how shaken she was to see him. This man had hurt her enough without her giving him more ammunition to use against her. Right now, his insipid blue eyes were clearly striving to affect warmth, when she knew from bitter experience there was none to be had. On the third finger of his left hand his wedding ring—a single diamond set in platinum, made to complement the one he had bought for Megan—winked back at her as if to mock her.

  What on earth? Megan’s heart slammed against her ribs as she contemplated the raw fact that he was still wearing it. Just what was he playing at? Their divorce had come through a year ago. There was no reason on earth why he should still be wearing his ring. And why had he shown up out of the blue like this, without warning? He had to be up to something, but what? She’d barely recovered from the shock of finding him at the door just five minutes after she’d got back from Kyle’s—let alone had time to ponder the reason for his visit.

  Well, she wondered now. Her hands visibly shook as she placed the mug of coffee she had stupidly offered to make him into his hands. Even though she’d made changes in some things, she still found it extremely difficult to be anything other than polite. Other women would probably have slammed the door firmly shut in his face, but Megan wasn’t as brave. In Nick’s presence she reverted to a scared and lonely little girl, and there was no one who despised the fact more than herself.

  ‘Thanks, darling. You still make the best cup of coffee out of anyone I know.’

  The slick compliment, so easily paid, made Megan sick to her stomach. She twisted her hands in front of her long Indian skirt and glanced angrily down at the floor, garnering her courage. She remembered what Kyle had told her—that if she was staying stuck in old behaviour, it was her choice.

  ‘You didn’t come here to pay me compliments, that’s for sure.’ She raised her chin a little, dark eyes darting to the door as if mentally willing him to get up and leave. ‘I’ve got a friend coming round in a minute, so please tell me what you came for and then go.’

  The lie didn’t come easily to her, but she had to resort to such a device out of sheer self-protection. She was on her own, and if past knowledge of Nick’s volatile personality was anything to go by she had to be prepared for almost anything. Penny wasn’t expected back until the evening and Kyle—well, Kyle…

  Her mind drifted momentarily away from Nick. Her heart soared and fell almost simultaneously at the thought of the man in whose strong passionate arms she had spent the night. What had he thought when he woke to find her gone? Had he been angry? Would he ever want to speak to her again?

  She had been overwhelmed when she’d woken to find herself in his bed, and felt almost faint with embarrassment when she remembered how unrestrained and wild she’d been in his arms. How reckless. They hadn’t used protection. What if she got pregnant? Don’t be stupid, Megan. There wasn’t any possibility of that. Not given what the doctor had said after her accident. Anyway, all she had been able to think about that morning was making herself scarce as quickly as possible so that she wouldn’t have to face possible regret or embarrassment on Kyle’s part if he so much as indicated it had all been a dreadful mistake…

  ‘I like paying you compliments,’ Nick said smoothly now, bringing her sharply back to the present as he languidly crossed one immaculately suited leg over another.

  His gaze travelled up and down her body as if he had the right, and even though she despised the sexual glint employed quite deliberately in his examination of her Megan was glad the she had swapped the revealing red halter-top she’d been wearing for an old comfy ivory sweater that had seen better days. She would have felt vulnerable as hell in the scantier clothing.

  ‘Don’t!’ Megan’s voice cracked in anguish. All of a sudden her resolve not to show even the smallest weakness to this man faltered and crumbled as long-held pain and sheer despair washed over her. He had no right showing up at Penny’s flat, intimidating her with his slickly patronising compliments and his paper-thin veneer of friendliness. She wanted him gone. If she never saw him again in this life she would fall down on her knees and thank God.

  Startled by the hot rush of tears that welled in her eyes, Megan smoothed her hands nervously up and down the soft material of her skirt. ‘You’re playing games with me, Nick, and you know it. The difference is, I don’t have to stand here and put up with it any more. We’re divorced, in case you’d forgotten. You moved in with one of my closest friends, remember?’

  ‘I must have been mad.’

  To her shock, Nick rose from the couch, put his coffee down on a small side table next to a carved wooden figure of a laughing Buddha, then stood regarding her with a disquieting pensiveness that made all the hairs stand up on the back of her neck.

  Megan felt a trickle of perspiration slide down her spine. Her senses were assailed by the too liberally applied cologne, by the distinct aura of restlessness and threat her ex-husband wore around him like a force-field. What had she been thinking of allowing him to come in?

  ‘Nick, I don’t know what you’re suggesting, but—’

  ‘I must have needed my head tested to get involved with a neurotic like Claire. She’s nothing like you, Megan. Nothing like my dark and beguiling wife. I even call her by your name when we make love, do you know that?’

  ‘I don’t want to know that…and I’m not your wife!’

  With a shaky hand, Megan looped some glossy strands of hair behind her ear as her whole body went numb with fear. Had Nick been drinking? She surreptitiously sniffed the air, shocked when she detected the lingering odour of whisky mingling with his aftershave. It was God knows what time in the morning and he’d been drinking already. Why hadn’t she detected it before? Where was her mind? Where was her common sense, for God’s sake? When Nick drank, he was prone to become slightly unhinged. He’d been drinking the night he had pushed her down the stairs. If he’d been sober then maybe he would have thought twice about committing such a terrible act…

  ‘I think you’d better go, Nick.’ Megan was stunned she was able to get the words out. Her own voice sounded strange and disembodied to her ears, but it was hard to talk across a mouth that had tu
rned into a desert. She watched him smile at her suggestion, her blood running cold when he threw back his head and laughed as if she’d said something horrendously funny. It made him look ugly. Ugly and threatening.

  ‘Don’t be silly, darling. I’m not going anywhere until we discuss my little proposition.’

  ‘I’m asking you to leave. No, forget that. I’m telling you to leave! I don’t want to hear any of your propositions, little or otherwise!’ In an instant Megan was at the door, holding it open, her heart thumping fit to burst. Please, God, she prayed. Let him go. Make him leave now and I swear I’ll never make such a stupid, stupid mistake again…

  ‘I’m no good without you, Meg.’ In the centre of her friend’s comfortable living room, Nick swept an impatient hand through his carefully styled gelled hair, carelessly dislodging its slick arrangement, his pale eyes darting back and forth from Megan as if he couldn’t quite get a grip on his tumbling thoughts.

  Megan was secretly surprised. She’d never seen him quite so untogether. Apart from the terrible night when she’d broken her leg—he’d come apart then.

  ‘You’re the only woman who’s ever really understood me. All the others ever did was make demands…All so bloody hard to please…including Claire. She walked out on me, did you know? I was stupid to let you go, Meg. I want another chance. That’s what I came to talk to you about.’

  ‘Another chance?’ Megan felt her mouth move, sensed the betraying wobble of her more vulnerable lower lip, registered the numb glide of a tear coursing slowly down her cheek. ‘Are you mad?’

  His expression hardened at that, a treacherous glint of malice flashing in his eyes that he was either too careless or too slow to disguise. Megan’s hand gripped the metal door handle and she felt her palm go weakly moist.

  ‘I didn’t mean to push you down the stairs, but you know it was partly your fault,’ he said petulantly, jaw jutting forward.

  Megan licked the salty tang of tears from her lip, mentally willing her limbs to stop shaking. As if to compound her effort, a torturous spasm of pain shot up her injured leg and burned as though she’d just come into contact with a branding iron. She reached out her free hand to rub at it through her skirt.

  ‘My fault? You left me with an injury I’ll probably carry for the rest of my life, Nick. How was it my fault? Explain to me. I certainly didn’t throw myself down the stairs! I know I’m a little slow to catch on, but humour me, will you?’

  ‘You can be a bitch sometimes, Megan…I had to teach you a lesson.’ His words distinctly slurred now, he advanced menacingly towards her.

  Alerted and afraid, Megan slid behind the door and slammed it shut. With pounding heart she negotiated the stairs, her gaze fixed on the landing below and the front door with its grey frosted windows. With each difficult tread her skin prickled as though it was burning, her mind racing with fear at the thought of what Nick might do to her if he caught her.

  Behind her she heard him swear profusely, all veneer of politeness gone as he wrenched open the door and began to pursue her. Megan threw herself on the mercy of the banisters, holding on for dear life as she launched herself downwards, her gaze fixed determinedly on the front door. Miraculously she reached it before Nick, her fingers fumbling with the latch in a bid to open it, crying out as she did so.

  Practically at the same moment she was overwhelmed by the sour smell of Nick’s breath, and felt his hand on her flesh as he wrenched her arm sickeningly backwards.

  ‘Just what the hell is going on here?’

  It all happened in a blink. One moment Megan was certain Nick was going to kill her, the next he was pressed up against the outside brick wall, his expression unflatteringly distorted as Kyle shoved his face angrily into his, his hands gripping the other man roughly by the lapels of his expensive designer suit, rage written all over him.

  ‘Kyle!’

  He glanced at her as she rubbed at the arm Nick had grabbed so brutally, his hazel eyes pained and angry at the same time, his trademark tousled dark hair carelessly grazing the broad battered leather shoulders of his jacket. In all her life Megan had never seen a more welcome sight. She was almost dizzy with relief.

  Pound for pound, there was probably little difference between the darker man and Nick, but then Kyle’s weight was mostly lean, hard muscle, while her ex-husband was clearly not in such good shape. The drinking had begun to take its toll, and the extra poundage had mostly gathered round his middle, where his suit jacket strained tellingly against the pressure. In the pallid light of the morning Megan saw for the first time the tell-tale lines of strain and over-indulgence beneath his eyes, the slightly grey pallor to his skin.

  She was furious with him for scaring her so badly, for hurting her yet again. But weaving through her anger and pain was a helpless kind of pity, too. For all his flash posturing and imagined superiority, Nick was clearly a man who had lost his way. Even more than that—a man who clearly needed to get help, and fast, before he hurt another woman as badly as he’d hurt Megan.

  ‘Did he hurt you?’ Kyle’s voice was thick with fury as he glanced at Megan. He registered the surprise and shock in the liquid depths of her melting brown eyes, saw the way her beautiful hair tumbled in wild disarray down her back, the lack of colour in her cheeks, and felt curiously weak. As if someone had punched him in the middle of his solar plexus and momentarily deprived him of oxygen.

  He didn’t wait for her reply. Instead his grim gaze swung back to the pale, perspiring, slightly paunchy excuse for a male he was presently helping to get acquainted with the rough end of a brick wall. His grip tightened on the pure wool lapels of the stylish suit—not just to prevent him from escaping but also because he was certain if he let go he would slug the other man so hard he’d never get up off the ground again.

  ‘Usually I act before I think, so all I can conclude is that today must be your lucky day, or else there’d be an ambulance on the way by now.’

  As if to emphasise his point, Kyle shoved Nick harder against the wall and glared bluntly into his eyes. He nearly turned away when the distasteful smell of heavily imbibed alcohol practically made him heave.

  ‘I may be jumping to conclusions here, but I presume you must be the infamous ex-husband. Am I right?’

  Nick swore. Megan slumped against the doorframe, chilled to the bone. With a shaky sigh she crossed her arms in front of her chest.

  ‘It’s none of your bloody business. Just take your goddamn hands off of me, will you? This is an expensive suit and you’re creasing it.’

  ‘Is that a fact?’

  Megan saw the revealing throb of the muscle in Kyle’s cheek and automatically turned away. If Nick got off with a creased suit he could count himself very lucky indeed, because right now the anger emanating from Kyle was a living, tangible thing that would surely strike fear into the heart of even the most foolhardy swaggerer.

  ‘Go inside, Megan.’

  The whiplash command made her straighten.

  ‘Let him go, Kyle. He’s drunk.’

  The look Kyle directed at her in reply made her quake inside. Ice floes were less cold…

  ‘I said, go inside—and stay inside!’

  Glancing pityingly at Nick, Megan turned resignedly away to comply. Nick was a grown man. He could take care of himself. If he couldn’t—then he only had himself to blame for the predicament he found himself in. Suddenly she didn’t have the energy to fight his corner as well as her own.

  A good fifteen minutes passed before Kyle followed her inside. Fifteen minutes during which Megan anxiously paced the floor, rubbed frantically at the pain in her leg, speared her hands umpteen times through her already dishevelled hair and generally came undone. Her ears strained for sounds of a scuffle or a fight, her gaze keeping the telephone firmly in her sight in case she had to call for some sort of assistance.

  When Kyle finally appeared at the door, the expression on his fiercely handsome face ominous as approaching thunder, Megan thought she would faint with re
lief. He didn’t appear hurt, thank God. He just looked big and powerful, commanding the room with the sheer force of raw energy that seemed to crackle around him. The black leather jacket and tight black jeans he wore made him look like some dark avenging angel, while his eyes—his eyes all but ate up the distance between them with the wild untrammelled hunger that was in them.

  ‘Are you all right?’ He ground out the words as though it pained him to even ask the question.

  Megan nodded, then stared down blindly at the carpet, her vision blurring as emotion assaulted her on all sides. He shouldn’t look at her like that. She didn’t deserve to have him look at her like that when Nick could so easily have struck out in temper and hurt him somehow. Just the thought made her feel slightly nauseous. But she wanted to know if Nick was okay, too, part of her needing assurance that he wasn’t lying bleeding in a gutter somewhere. Not because the whole idea was pathetic and appalling, but because she didn’t want Kyle to get into trouble because he’d come to her defence.

  ‘He’s not hurt,’ he said, as though reading her mind. ‘If that’s what you’re worried about. I hardly laid a finger on him. I didn’t have to.’ His jaw clenched and unclenched with the effort it was costing him to remain composed. Megan raised her head just in time to witness the raw glint of profound fury in his golden gaze.

  ‘We had a little “talk,” Nick and I. He won’t be bothering you again. If he so much as comes within ten feet of you, next time he really will need an ambulance.’

  Instead of reassuring her, his words ignited her temper. Megan grasped the back of a plump oversized armchair as she pinned him with a furious dark-eyed glare of her own.