Her Outback Rescuer

by Marion Lennox

  ‘Pull what?’ He was already devising ways and means but he wanted to see what she’d come up with.

  ‘Do you have a knife, soldier boy?’

  ‘Yes.’ Of course he did. A knife that did everything.

  ‘Job done,’ she said in satisfaction. ‘I’d volunteer my trousers but there’s my dignity to consider—and there’s also no need. We have backpacks. We slice strips and knot.’

  ‘Did they teach rope-making in ballet school?’ he demanded, astounded.

  She giggled. ‘Buster training,’ she said. ‘Our foster parents said he had to sleep outside and our bedroom was upstairs. Knotting sheets is harder than you think, so we chopped Rachel’s hold all. We tied knots every eighteen inches and it made an awesome ladder. What are we waiting for?’

  What indeed?

  Nothing, except that he needed to look at her—just look—before he took her backpack and started slicing.

  * * *

  Hugo was far better at rope-making than she was, Amy admitted. And faster. He stripped out the lining. He cut the toughened outer fabric into strips. He tested each strip for strength, then knotted them together with knots that were truly impressive. No granny knots for Hugo Thurston. This guy was a commando and it showed.

  She glanced over to the mother wallaby.

  ‘Don’t be afraid,’ she told her. ‘The cavalry’s here in the shape of the Australian Armed Forces.’

  ‘The Australian Armed Forces don’t go much for lowering ballerinas into crevices to pull out wallabies,’ Hugo retorted.

  ‘Then their training’s lacking.’ She tugged at the rope. ‘This is really strong. I can’t slide, though.’

  ‘You won’t slide. You’ll belay yourself down like a climber. You loop your wrist round like this and hold, then do the same with your next wrist. Use the knots. Take some of your weight onto your feet before you change wrists.’

  ‘Like a professional.’

  He gave a grim smile. ‘Right. We do this professionally or not at all. When you get down, use my backpack for the joey. Zip him up and tie him to our rope. I’ll bring him up before you.’

  ‘See,’ she said admiringly, speaking to the mother wallaby again. ‘I bet he’s good at war games, too.’

  ‘And you’ll use my shirt,’ he said, tugging it off and tossing it to the bottom of the crevice. ‘Don’t try and catch him with your bare hands. Cover him and bundle him into the pack before he knows what’s hit him.’

  She could. This was an excellent plan.

  So if it was an excellent plan, why was she suddenly breathless?

  Because Hugo Thurston had taken off his shirt. Because Hugo Thurston was naked from the waist up.

  She’d seen men’s bodies before. Of course she had. She’d had boyfriends, and she’d danced with near-naked men.

  None like this.

  For Hugh Thurston did not have a ballet dancer’s body. This man was pure warrior. He was toned for hard living, every muscle built for a purpose. He was lean and brown and sinewy, hard and...ripped.

  It was a body to take a woman’s breath away.

  There was a scar running from his left armpit around and under his ribs. It was pale against his tan. The compulsion to touch it was almost irresistible.

  She couldn’t resist. She reached out, feeling the strength of his body, feeling the faint jerk of a reaction as her skin touched his.

  ‘Hugo...’ she breathed and he caught her hand. ‘I...I’m sorry. But...what happened?’

  ‘It’s my warrior wound,’ he said and grinned. ‘Every warrior has one.’

  ‘Wh...what?’ She was totally disconcerted. She had no business to be asking. She had no business to be touching.

  He had no business to be grinning—but he was.

  ‘You want the truth? I fell off my scooter when I was eight, and I was carrying a drink bottle. But if you knew the stories I’ve told—how much it adds to my street cred...’

  He was still smiling. She wanted to smile back, but her eyes were still caught by his. He was still holding her hand.

  He was so close...

  ‘A warrior,’ he said softly, still smiling, ‘does not allow himself to be deflected from his duty by reminiscing about past wounds. We have a wallaby to save. You want a drum roll before we send you into battle?’

  And somehow, finally, she managed to smile back.

  ‘Don’t drop me,’ she managed.

  ‘I won’t let you go,’ he said and she felt something jolt inside her.

  He was talking about the rope. He was talking about what was happening now.

  But suddenly, urgently, and really, really stupidly, she wanted him to be talking about a whole lot more.

  * * *

  Lowering Amy down the crevice was simple. Amy was nimble and strong—and light enough for Hugo to hold her easily.

  She didn’t mess around. She was down the crevice in seconds.

  The joey backed to the furthermost point and trembled.

  ‘You can’t stay here,’ she told him. ‘Look at the bones down here. Ugh.’

  Hugo had pulled the rope back up. He attached his backpack and lowered it.

  She set it up, open mouthed. All she had to do was catch the joey and pop him in. Easier said than done. The base of the crevice was maybe twenty feet long, eight feet wide.

  When Hugo planned this he’d assumed the joey would be weak, maybe even injured, surely shocked to stillness by his ordeal. But this was no shrinking joey. As Amy approached, he leaped high and fast, so high he landed behind her.

  Amy whirled and swore.

  Uh oh. This was no easy task, Hugo thought. Catching a wild creature...

  For the first time, he thought they might not succeed.

  But Amy hadn’t hesitated. The joey was right at the end of the crevice. Amy carried the shirt towards it slowly, slowly, then, just as he thought the joey would leap again, she crouched and stilled.

  ‘Amy...’

  ‘Hush,’ she said. ‘We have all the time in the world.’

  He hushed.

  Amy didn’t move. She was totally focused.

  His shirt was in her hands and slowly, slowly she extended her hands so the shirt was stretched full like a flag.

  Every time the joey twitched, she stopped.

  The shirt was out full. She waited.

  She waited.

  The joey inched forward a tiny bit, imperceptibly moving away from the rock wall, as if readying for another jump.

  But Amy jumped first. Her body was like a spring. She flew through the air and the shirt was bundled over the joey before he knew what hit him. He was wrapped and inside the backpack and secure before Hugo even figured what she’d done. She looped the rope through the backpack handles and stood back. Grinning up at him.

  ‘What’s keeping you?’ she asked.

  What, indeed? It had been some sort of ballet move or Tae Kwon Do or something. He’d never seen such a jump.

  She was waiting for him to raise one joey. Holding the backpack steady.

  He hauled the backpack up, then let the rope down again. ‘Your turn,’ he told her. ‘Put your foot in the loop and I’ll pull.’

  ‘Let the joey go first. He needs his mother.’

  ‘Not until you’re back up. You need to see this reunion. Besides, with two of us here, the hawk up there’s less likely to swoop.’ The hawk was hardly likely to swoop just with Hugo, but he wasn’t saying that. After such a move, Amy de
served to see mother and baby reunited.

  ‘Let the rope down again, then,’ Amy said, sounding exasperated. ‘Don’t forget Rachel’s list. We have important stuff to be getting on with.’

  He laughed. He lowered the rope and she stepped into the loop and hung on. ‘Are you sure you can you pull?’ she asked, sounding dubious. ‘I’m heavier than I look.’

  He snorted and pulled.

  He tugged her up until she caught the edges of the ledge. Then he caught both her hands, tugging her over, making her safe.

  The temptation to keep on holding was almost irresistible, but this wasn’t the time. Once she was steady, she headed straight for the bulging backpack.

  ‘Take him closer to his mum, into the shade,’ he urged.

  The adult wallaby had hardly moved. She let Amy come to within a few feet, backing a little, but not much.

  Hugo held back. Amy had done the work. He was more than content to watch.

  She unzipped the top. The joey’s head came out as if it was peering from a pouch. He peered at Amy, and then he swivelled, searching for what he needed most.

  He saw his mother and in one frantic scramble and one huge bound he reached her.

  Seconds later he was in his mother’s pouch, and mother and baby were melting further into the shadows, where the wind-stunted trees gave cover, where no hawk could see, much less find and swoop.

  They were safe.

  Home.

  ‘You’d think,’ Amy said cautiously, blinking—blinking really hard in fact—‘they could have said thank you.’

  ‘I think we can take it as read.’ He strolled over and squatted beside her on the ground. ‘Well done, you.’

  ‘It was your knots,’ she said and blinked even harder.

  How was a man to cope with a blinking ballerina?

  How could a man not?

  He touched her cheek and she turned to him. She was trying very hard to smile. She was trying very hard not to cry.

  ‘We’ve done our hawk out of his dinner,’ she managed and he grinned.

  ‘We’ll leave him a beef sandwich. Or do you think he’d like egg and lettuce?’

  ‘Oh, Hugo,’ she said and her voice broke. ‘Oh, it’s magic. This place... Grandma always said it was magic and it is. I wish Rachel could see what we’ve just done.’

  For answer he tugged his phone from his pocket and flipped it open. Here were photos of the joey. Photos of a girl making a flying leap with shirt in outstretched hands. Photos of a joey scrambling into his mother’s pouch.

  ‘Your wish is my command, my lady,’ he said. ‘It’s not just creepy guys on trains who carry cameras. The paparazzi have nothing on me.’

  ‘Oh, Hugo,’ she breathed, and she smiled and smiled, and it was too much. Smiling through tears had to be his very favourite emotion. Or it was now. Actually, he’d never thought of it until now, but now it definitely was.

  And what to do with this very new, very favourite emotion?

  He did what any sane man would do in this position.

  He put down his phone. He cupped her face in his hands—and he kissed her.

  * * *

  He’d kissed her before, to fluster her, to give her a reason for hiding in his cabin, for purely practical reasons.

  That kiss hadn’t turned out practical. It had turned out hot. And now, when he kissed for kissing’s sake, because he really wanted to kiss her, because she was adorable and smart and cute and irresistible, the heat was turned up a thousandfold.

  Maybe the heat had been there all day, simmering, steaming, coming to the boil.

  Maybe now...

  Maybe what the heck. He was kissing her and it felt as if his brain was fusing.

  She felt amazing. She felt...as if she was a part of him. His woman.

  What sort of thought was that? He knew. It was a thought as primeval as time itself, as basic and as needy.

  He wanted her and he wanted her now.

  He had her. She was melting into his arms. Her mouth was opening to welcome his. Her arms were wrapping themselves around him to hold him tight.

  She wanted him as much as he wanted her?

  All his life, Hugo Thurston had stayed aloof. His parents’ emotional dramas had overplayed his right from the start. How could a five-year-old have a tantrum when his mother had louder ones? He’d learned early that his emotions were irrelevant. He’d learned to hate the tears, the screaming, even the over-the-top excitement and joy that turned the other way without warning. He’d joined the army and thought he’d never succumb.

  Enter one slip of a dancer and he’d succumbed.

  There’d been women in his life; of course there had. He’d played fair with them, been honest, enjoyed them—and he’d never let them close.

  The women he’d dated were the same breed. They’d used him for companionship or immediate need. He’d enjoyed kissing them.

  He’d never felt a kiss like this.

  If he hadn’t known the heat of battle, he might have thought this was adrenalin, victory from saving the joey, but he’d been in far more adrenalin-filled situations than this.

  If he hadn’t dated beautiful women he would have said it was desire, but he had.

  No. Quit it with the analysis. What he had, right here, right now, was something he’d never experienced and might never experience again.

  He was kissing Amy Cotton, and he was loving it.

  He felt like a kid kissing for the first time. This first brush of lips, this fierce realisation that here was a whole world of which he knew nothing, this sudden blast of pure, white heat.

  This tenderness...

  That’s what caught him. The fact that he held her in his arms, his mouth claimed hers, the heat was there, but this wasn’t a fierce, adrenalin-fed, winner-take-all type of kiss. This was the sweetest of discoveries, the sensation that the woman in his arms was something, someone, who he’d never known existed; had never known could exist.

  Her arms were holding him fast. She was kissing him with a fierceness that matched his, but with a tenderness, too, and it was as if he was being bestowed a gift without price.

  What price a gift from Amy? How could a woman like this be wanting him?

  Stop asking questions. Just savour. Savour the softness of her mouth. Savour the way her breasts moulded to his chest. Savour the way her body clung, curved, folded into his as if she was truly home.

  To hold such a woman...

  Could he hold such a woman?

  If he held her, he’d hurt her. Of course he would; how could he not? A woman as soft as this, as luscious, as lovely—his world would take her and destroy her and spit out what remained.

  Shut up, he told himself fiercely. Don’t think it now. Just let yourself feel.

  For this moment forget you’re a soldier. Forget you’re a Thurston. You’re loving Amy Cotton and nothing else matters in the world.

  * * *

  And Amy... Maybe if he had his shirt on she might retain some level of control, but why would she want to? Hugo’s kiss was blasting her into a dimension she hadn’t known existed. Her body no longer belonged to her. Her mind no longer belonged to her. She felt herself fold into him, melt into him, and her brain was dissolving into a white hot mist.

  Hugo...

  It was the one word she could form in her over-heating brain, and even then she couldn’t say it. She could only think it, over and over, like a mantra, as she clung, as she kissed, as s
he responded to the raw, aching need she felt surge from this man.

  He needed her. This was no primitive response to a situation where man and woman were thrown together—or maybe it was, but it was far, far more.

  She’d watched his wariness, the way he stood apart from the moment they’d met him on the train, his whole being declaring he was a man who worked in isolation. But right here, right now, there was no isolation at all. She could make love to him right here, she thought, and a part of her exulted in the thought.

  It would be her power driving what happened.

  Her need?

  Was she crazy?

  If only he had his shirt on. His mouth was driving her wild but her hands were holding him and the heat, the strength, the feel of his naked skin was driving her wild. She wanted to be closer. Closer...

  Things were spiralling, spiralling...

  If this man wanted her...

  His mouth broke from hers, and she heard herself murmur his name. ‘Hugo...’

  It came out a plea.

  ‘We can’t...’ he whispered but his voice was ragged with desire and they both knew they could.

  Or maybe... maybe they couldn’t.

  ‘Did you see the hawk? Do these things attack humans?’

  Company. They’d been alone all day but suddenly they weren’t.

  Hugo stilled and looked outward, and Amy could have wept in frustration. They were in the shadows, well hidden, but outside a group of tourists was clambering up the scree.

  ‘Hey, the view here’s amazing. Honey, you gotta see this... Oh, my...’ The voice turned to disgust. ‘Someone’s left their garbage here. Of all the sacrilegious... We should report it to the rangers. These guys should be shot.’

  ‘It looks like someone’s been chopping up a backpack.’ The unknown Honey sounded doubtful. ‘Look, there’s a rope. Maybe someone fell. Just check there’s no one down there.’

  Silence while the crevice was checked.

  ‘No one,’ Honey decreed at last, sounding a tad disappointed. ‘But someone should report it to the ranger anyway. They ought to board pits like this up. Anything could happen.’