Harlequin KISS November 2014 Box Set: Behind Closed Doors...Fired by Her FlingWho's Calling the Shots?Nine Month Countdown

by Anne Oliver

  She’d felt that chest beneath her fingertips, felt it pressed hard against her.

  But she hadn’t had a chance to look at it—the moonlight in Bali had certainly not been as generous as the Karijini sun.

  So she’d known he was broad, and hard, and ridiculously strong. But seeing him made it all new again. He was muscular, of course, but not in a stupid, body-builder way. There was still a leanness to him, a practicality—this man didn’t just lift weights, he was fit, agile, supple.

  He had a smattering of black hairs along his chest, but otherwise his skin was smooth. The occasional freckle dotted his lovely olive skin. His nipples were somehow darker than she expected. The ridges of his abdominal muscles deeper.

  His board shorts sat low on his hips. He had that muscular V thing going on, and her eyes followed in the direction it was pointing...

  Before she finally came to her senses and snapped her gaze back to his.

  His grin was broad, and his eyes sparkled.

  ‘So, Ivy—are you coming in?’

  It was the same question, but also different. Was his voice lower? More intimate?

  She took a deliberate step backwards, and promptly stepped onto his backpack, and the beach towels that Angus had pulled out for them.

  It was the pool. The damned pool’s fault for being so intimate and dreamily secluded.

  Still grinning, Angus walked to the metal ladder that provided access to the pool, although Ivy finally managed to drag her gaze away as he climbed in.

  Instead she turned her back, as pointless as that was, to pull off her top and shorts. She liked that Angus had bothered to read the sign beside the pool, and he hadn’t jumped in, as many others did. Ivy hadn’t read it today, but she knew what the first line said: Fern Pool is a special place.

  A place where you didn’t make loud noises or jump off the waterfalls. Where you respected your surroundings and the traditional owners of the land.

  It certainly shouldn’t be a place where she ogled a half-naked man.

  Her clothes neatly folded on top of Angus’s backpack, Ivy rolled her shoulders back, and took a handful of long, deep breaths.

  She told herself not to be self-conscious, although of course that was pointless. She could’ve been underwear-model thin and she still would’ve felt insecure around all of Angus’s bronzed perfection.

  And she certainly wasn’t underwear-model thin. But she was in her favourite black and white striped bikini, and if she breathed in her stomach was almost flat.

  Her hand rested on her still-normal-sized tummy.

  She’d forgotten again.

  Although this time, remembering that she was pregnant didn’t trigger a spiralling panic, or make her want to squeeze her eyes shut and wish just about everything away if she could just find a way to fix what she’d done.

  In fact, all it did was cause her to turn around, and to search for Angus in the water.

  The pool wasn’t large, but Ivy didn’t have to search far anyway. His forearms rested on the edge of the boardwalk as he floated in the water, watching her.

  ‘How long until the baby starts to move?’ he asked.

  ‘Ages,’ Ivy said. ‘Eighteen to twenty weeks, I think?’ Her lips quirked upwards. ‘I thought you were full bottle on all this pregnancy stuff?’

  He pushed away from the boardwalk, his eyes still on her. ‘Haven’t got to that chapter yet,’ he said. He flicked his hand through the water, sending a light spray of water in her direction. ‘I’ve noticed you’re still not swimming.’

  The drops of water that now decorated her feet were surprisingly cool, given the heat of the day. But then, down here, beneath the shade of the great fig, the light was diluted.

  ‘Although I’m not really complaining,’ Angus continued. He was treading water only metres from the ladder. Close enough that Ivy knew he was—and had been—checking her out.

  She blushed, which was just about her default reaction to Angus it seemed, but also found herself smiling. Almost as if she was enjoying his attention.

  Fern Pool romanticism was getting to her.

  That was enough to get her into the water quick smart.

  And it was cold. Cold enough that she gasped.

  But just as she had as a kid, she immediately ducked beneath the water to soak her hair.

  Better to get it over with quickly.

  Ivy and Mila had always agreed on that approach. While April had swum around shrieking about not getting her hair wet yet, which had been pretty much an engraved invitation for her sisters to splash her with as much water as possible.

  ‘What are you smiling about?’ Angus asked, treading water beside her as she tucked her hair behind her ears.

  ‘A nice memory,’ she said, and then filled him in.

  Angus rolled onto his back as she spoke, so he floated, staring up at the sky. ‘It doesn’t surprise me at all that you’ve always got straight to the point,’ he said.

  Except around Angus. Somehow, and sometimes, around Angus, being direct seemed impossible. Her words escaped her. Her brain seemed to escape her.

  ‘Do you have any brothers or sisters?’ Ivy asked.

  ‘No,’ Angus said. ‘Just Dad, and Mum, and me. We didn’t really travel as a family all that much. You’re lucky.’

  Ivy laughed. ‘We didn’t always think that coming up here was all that great. But Mum was all for multitasking on a holiday—coming up here meant a business trip and a family getaway. Although my sisters and I did go to the US a few times to visit my dad.’

  ‘The actor?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Ivy said, not surprised Angus knew that detail. Most people in Western Australia did—but then, a mining heiress didn’t elope with a handsome, if small-time, Hollywood actor and have nobody notice. ‘He left when I was pretty young, and we’ve never been close. He calls me on my birthday.’

  She followed Angus’s lead and stuck her legs and arms out so she could float on her back. Water lapped against her ears and she closed her eyes, enjoying the sensation of weightlessness.

  ‘Are you close to your parents?’ Ivy asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Angus said. ‘And no. I mean—’

  Ivy tilted her head so she could see him. He floated so close to her that if she reached out just a little bit further, their fingers would touch.

  ‘I was very close to my father, but he...died. And my mother has early-onset dementia, which is pretty awful really.’

  ‘Oh, that is awful,’ Ivy said, jackknifing from her back to swim to him. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  He’d done the same thing, but he didn’t wait for Ivy. Instead he swam away, in big, generous breast strokes, to the pair of tumbling waterfalls.

  But he stopped just short of where the falls hit the pool, and turned as he treaded water. ‘I wish we had travelled together as a family more. But my dad worked too hard. Every weekend he was at the shop. He had to be at the shop—at the furniture shop we owned. Even when he didn’t really need to be, he still thought he had to.’

  Angus wasn’t looking at her. His chin was tilted upwards, as if he was examining the thick, ropey branches of the fig tree that stretched towards the sky.

  ‘My mum’s like that,’ Ivy said.

  Now he looked at her. ‘You’re like that,’ he said.

  ‘I am not!’

  He simply raised an eyebrow.

  Ivy opened her mouth to argue, but realised it was pointless. The fact was she wasn’t very good at holidays. When she did go away, she kept one eye on her smartphone, and made damn sure she always had access to a Wi-Fi network.

  But she’d hated how her mother had never truly been present on family holidays. She couldn’t do that to her own child.

  ‘I’d like to take our baby on holidays when he or she is older,’
Angus said.

  ‘Me too,’ Ivy said. Then quickly added, ‘Not with you, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ he said, glancing at her with a smile. But there was a sadness to it, as if he was thinking of the family holidays he never had. Or the father he had lost.

  ‘How old were you?’ Ivy asked, ‘I mean, when your dad died?’

  ‘Seventeen,’ he said. ‘It was very sudden. I’d always thought I’d follow in his footsteps, continuing to run the family business or something. Although to be honest I hadn’t worried too much about it. I was at an age where all I cared about was playing footy on the weekend. Or hanging out with my mates. I’d never had to deal with the future before.’

  ‘So the army wasn’t a lifelong dream?’

  Another smile, but still without humour. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Part of it was the physical aspect of the job. When dad died, I started to really get into my weights, and fitness. It was a distraction, I guess. A focus. As mum started to get unwell not long after. So the sense of achievement from lifting heavier weights or running further, or faster...it was... I don’t know. Something. Something that wasn’t thinking about what I’d lost, and what I was losing.’ Angus wasn’t looking at Ivy now, his gaze again focused somewhere in the giant fig’s branches. ‘But now I think it was a lot about the structure. The formality. With my dad gone and mum not really my mum any more—it was kind of a relief to have a schedule and orders to work to. Later, I fell in love with the job, with the mateship, the teamwork, the tactics. But early on the job was like an anchor for me, something I could rely on.’

  ‘That’s a heck of a lot for a young man to deal with,’ Ivy said, her heart aching for a lost and grieving teenage Angus.

  He nodded. ‘Yeah,’ he agreed. ‘It was. Sometimes I wonder if—’ But his words trailed off, and he turned back to the cascading water. ‘Did you ever climb up behind the waterfall?’

  Ivy blinked at the abrupt change of subject, but didn’t push. Somehow she knew that Angus didn’t share that story easily. If at all. ‘All the time,’ Ivy said, her tone consciously upbeat. ‘It’s slippery, though.’

  He threw her an amused look, that sadness erased from his gaze.

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Ivy said, deadpan, as she swam up to the rocks. ‘I should’ve realised you did slippery-rock training in the SAS.’

  ‘Honey, you’d be amazed at what I can do,’ he replied, and then, right on cue, slipped a little as he hoisted his legs onto the lowest, moss-slick rocks.

  Ivy giggled, and Angus glared—but couldn’t hide his grin.

  The falls here were delicate in comparison to Fortescue, falling gently only about three metres from the protruding ledge of red rock above where they swam. Beyond the curtain of water, slabs of rock provided tiered seating of sorts, decorated with clumps of ferns.

  It had been a while, but Ivy remembered which rocks provided the best grip, and it only took her a few seconds to clamber past Angus and to settle into her favourite spot—directly behind the waterfall, the tumbling water blurring and distorting the world around her into indistinct reds, blues and greens.

  It didn’t take long for Angus to join her, seated to her right. He stretched his longer legs out in front of him, just as Ivy had, although his toes also touched the falls. The sound of the water echoed back here, but it would still be easy to hold a conversation.

  But they didn’t say a word.

  Instead, they both just sat silently together, not quite touching, looking through the waterfall.

  At first, Ivy itched to speak. To say something. Anything.

  But she couldn’t.

  Back here, on the other side of a blurry world, Ivy somehow knew that to talk would break this. Would break this moment, would destroy this unexpected sanctuary.

  So while at first she’d wanted to shatter the silence, to pop the bubble of this special place, in the end she couldn’t.

  All she could do was sit here, and breathe in the scent of ferns and moss, and lick drops of water from her lips.

  She’d propped her hands behind her, to balance herself on the rocks. Angus had done the same, but now he twisted slightly. Ivy turned to look at him, and his gaze locked with hers.

  The light was different back here, and his eyes seemed different too. The flecks of green more emerald, the hazel base more gold.

  As he looked at her he reached across his body, and skimmed the side of her thigh with his fingertips. His touch was impossibly, tinglingly light—and then it was gone.

  There wasn’t so much a question in his gaze. It was more he was simply waiting.

  Because he knew, as she knew, where this was going to end.

  But he needed to wait, because Ivy needed to wait.

  Ivy needed to hold onto whatever tatty remnants of control she might still have when it came to Angus for as long as possible. He’d said, last night, that she couldn’t control him.

  Well, she couldn’t control anything around Angus.

  And now, just like last night, she really didn’t want to. Despite everything.

  She let go of a breath she’d been unaware she was holding, and something in Angus’s expression shifted.

  His gaze dropped to her lips, and his hand went back to her thigh.

  But again, his touch was light.

  Ivy didn’t move. She couldn’t really, without the possibility of sliding back into the pool. But again, she really didn’t want to.

  Her gaze followed the trail of his fingers.

  Along the outside edge of her thigh, leaving a smattering of goose bumps.

  Up, over her hip, and around the knot on the side of her bikini bottoms.

  She was leaning back against her hands, so she was looking down her own body as his hand slid from her hip to lie, momentarily, flat against her belly.

  Her gaze darted to his face, but his attention remained on her stomach, his expression unreadable.

  Then he was on the move again, moving even more slowly now, tracing loops and circles along her ribs, beneath her breasts.

  Her breath was coming more quickly now; she could see her chest rising up and down as warmth and need swirled within her.

  Then, too quickly, his fingers moved up and over her bikini top, only brushing the swell of her breasts with the most frustratingly light movement.

  But she couldn’t protest, because words would end this.

  Ivy didn’t ever want this to end.

  Everything she had was focused on his touch. Her eyes fluttered shut.

  Over her collarbone. Across her shoulders. Up against the delicate, shivery cords of her neck.

  Along her jaw, tilting her chin. Slowly, slowly, upwards.

  His breath against her mouth. His hand sliding backwards and amongst her tangled hair.

  Then, finally, his lips on her lips. His mouth on her mouth.

  Cool, and firm, and tasting of the waterfall. Fresh, and perfect, and magical.

  It was the most tantalising of any of their kisses. The most delicate, the most careful, the least carnal.

  But it fitted this place.

  And Ivy was lost amongst their kiss. She touched him only with her mouth but it was more than enough. She kissed him slowly, he kissed her leisurely, as if they had for ever.

  Here, it felt as if they did.

  Then a splash tore them apart.

  A blokey laugh and then a yell: ‘Cannonball!’

  Through the waterfall heads bobbed in the water, and then a shape flew through the air.

  Another splash. More laughter.

  They had company.

  Angus was already on the move, and he turned to offer her his hand.

  She shook her head, and smiled. ‘No, I’ve got this.’

  As she swam towards the boardwalk, Ivy knew
that now was about when she should be feeling that familiar cloak of regret.

  But she didn’t.

  She couldn’t.

  Angus did help her climb up the ladder, and gave her hand a little tug when she stood on the boardwalk, to pull her close so he could kiss her quickly—but firmly—on the lips.

  Ivy knew what that was.

  A promise.

  And she shivered, despite the heat of the sun.

  NINE

  Ivy fell asleep on the drive back to the homestead.

  A combination of hours in the sun and early pregnancy fatigue.

  And also, probably, that delicious lethargy from being so very thoroughly kissed.

  She dreamed of that kiss, and of that place behind the waterfall.

  When Angus shook her gently awake after he’d brought the car to a stop, it felt only natural to reach for him. To curl her hands behind his neck and to pull his lips down to hers.

  But this was a totally different kiss from before.

  This kiss wasn’t slow, or gentle or restrained.

  And neither was Angus.

  There was a click as he released her seat belt, and then he was pulling her towards him, and then on top of him as he leant back in the driver’s seat. Ivy smiled as she straddled him, rising up on her knees so she could reach his mouth.

  His hands slid up to grip her butt, and then one slid upwards to reach beneath her top.

  She still wore her bikini, dry now after the walk back from Fern Pool. It only took one tug on the string at the back to loosen the top half, and Angus just shoved the fabric away as he filled his hands with her breasts.

  Ivy sighed into his mouth.

  Their kiss before had been unforgettable, but this—this rawness, this lack of restraint—she needed.

  And that need superseded any other emotion that did its best to wave manically at Ivy from somewhere within her subconscious.

  Because frankly Ivy knew that this was a bad idea.

  The same way it had been a bad idea in Bali, and it had been a bad idea last night.

  But that hadn’t been enough to stop her then, and it certainly wasn’t going to stop her now.