by Helen Brooks
To hell with it. She picked up her knife and fork and tucked in. If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.
The steak and kidney pie was swiftly followed by apple crumble and custard, and by the coffee stage of the meal Rachel was sitting toasting her toes in front of the fire, listening to the merry group of walkers hollering out one Christmas carol after another. They were a lively bunch but tuneless.
The landlady had brought two brandies with the coffee, insisting they were the promised ‘warm-up’ drinks and on the house, and with her stomach full and the wine having taken the edge off her worry about the night ahead, Rachel felt almost mellow as she sipped the spirit.
‘Against all the odds, this is nice.’ Zac had taken off his jacket and loosened his tie, undoing the first couple of buttons of his shirt. It had caused her a few momentary problems at the time but her body had just about adjusted. She glanced at him as he spoke and the golden gaze was waiting for her.
Rachel smiled. ‘Yes, it is.’ They’d talked of amusing, inconsequential things during the meal, putting the previous tenseness behind them by unspoken mutual consent. If they could just stay here like this all night she’d be OK, she thought now with wry humour. But that double bed loomed large.
Zac swallowed the last of his brandy. ‘Fancy another?’ he offered, rising to his feet. ‘We haven’t got far to go to bed.’
Two glasses of wine and a brandy was really her limit, she’d never been able to drink alcohol at the same level as most of the other students at uni and her tolerance had got less since. Tonight, though, satisfyingly warm and replete, a spirit of recklessness took hold. ‘Lovely.’ She held out her glass.
‘That was said with the air of someone who’s stoking up some Dutch courage to face the trial ahead. Am I right?’
She frowned at him. ‘Don’t be silly, Zac.’
‘But you make me want to be silly, Rachel. To say silly things, to act silly, anything to shake that cool reserve of yours,’ he said mildly.
She stared at him open-mouthed, a part of her thrilled he imagined she could feel remotely cool around him. If he only knew… But she was so thankful he didn’t.
His lips twitched at her expression but he said nothing more, turning and walking to the bar with their empty brandy glasses. Rachel noticed the blonde walker immediately leave her group and make her way to his side, presumably on the pretext of ordering more drinks. She wanted to look away but something compelled her to watch. The girl said something to Zac to get his attention and, as he looked at her, did the full femme fatale thing, complete with fluttering eyelashes and pouty lips.
‘So what am I? Invisible?’ Rachel muttered to herself.
Zac’s reply was short and the next moment he’d taken their replenished glasses and was walking back to her. Rachel had a brief glimpse of a lovely but definitely disgruntled face before he handed her her drink, his body blocking her view.
It was the alcohol that must have loosened her tongue because normally she wouldn’t have dreamt of saying anything, but once he had sat down she found herself asking, ‘What did that girl at the bar say to you?’
‘Girl?’ he replied absently. ‘Oh, the girl. She wondered if we’d like to join them, that’s all.’
‘And you said no.’
‘Of course.’ His brows drew together. ‘Why? You don’t want to party with that lot, do you?’
About as much as swimming with sharks. ‘Not particularly, no,’ she answered carefully.
‘Good.’ The slight frown cleared. ‘The landlady’s just told me she’s put a couple of hot-water bottles in our bed to warm it through, although she’s quite sure it’s aired.’
The words, ‘our bed’ were all that registered.
‘Nice of her, wasn’t it?’ Zac murmured, leaning back in his chair and stretching his long legs out in front of him.
Allowing her hair to fall about her cheeks to hide the colour she knew was staining her face, Rachel twisted sideways and held out her hands to the glowing fire. ‘Very nice,’ she agreed expressionlessly. ‘She’s done her best to make us welcome.’
‘She asked if we wanted a cooked breakfast and I said yes. It’s served between eight and ten apparently but if we’re a bit late she said not to worry, they’re pretty flexible.’
Our bed. Hot-water bottles. Breakfast. The words ricocheted about her head. Altogether too cosy, too seductive. She forced herself to take a sip of the brandy and turn back to face him after the hot colour that flooded her cheeks subsided. He was lying back in his chair, eyes closed, one hand holding his glass and the other hanging loosely. The epitome of casual comfortableness. A man at ease with his surroundings and himself.
It was the first time she had been able to study him without the tawny eyes watching her. His dark hair gleamed blue-black in the subdued lighting, and his lashes were thick and long where they rested on the high chiselled cheekbones. Wasted on a man, she thought irrelevantly. The glow from the fire had picked out a tiny scar on his chin. It was paler than the rest of his tanned skin and Rachel wondered why she hadn’t noticed it before and how he’d got it. Playing some kind of sport probably, she decided. He was clearly a man who liked to keep fit. Did he work out? She let her eyes run over the broad muscled shoulders and down to the flat waistband of his trousers. Oh, yes. Not an ounce of fat on this body. He definitely was familiar with a gym.
When the tawny eyes opened to stare straight into hers, she blinked, but this time refused to blush. With what she considered admirable coolness in the circumstances, she said lightly, ‘It isn’t very polite to fall asleep on your dinner companion.’
He shifted in the chair, sitting straighter, and every nerve in her body responded. ‘I wasn’t asleep,’ he protested lazily. ‘Merely shutting my eyes for a moment.’
‘That’s what old men say when they take a snooze.’
‘I’m not an old man, Rachel.’ His voice was smoky, husky. ‘I’ll prove it if you like. Upstairs.’
She’d asked for that. From some unexpected but welcome reserve of strength she managed a tinkle of a laugh. ‘And if I don’t like? What then?’
‘Then I won’t,’ he said, perfectly seriously.
The faint, sexy Canadian burr that laced the deep voice caused a funny little shiver deep inside. She had to clear her throat before she came back with, ‘Regretfully, I’ll have to pass on your kind offer,’ but even to her own ears she didn’t quite carry off the light tone.
‘Believe me, the regret’s all mine.’
No, it wasn’t. She finished her brandy, needing the warmth it provided. It so wasn’t.
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘SO, HOW do we do this?’
‘What?’ They’d just come back to the room and Rachel knew nothing in her life thus far had prepared her for being in a bedroom with Zac Lawson on a dark winter’s night. A cat on a hot tin roof was nothing compared to how jumpy she felt.
‘The mechanics of getting ready for bed,’ Zac said patiently. ‘I don’t know about you but I’d like a shower so that’s a trip to the bathroom on the floor below. Do you want to go first?’
She didn’t know what she wanted. Well, she did, but it wasn’t helpful. Forcing her skittish mind into action, she thought swiftly. If she went first she could wash and brush her teeth, and then change into her pyjamas when Zac was having his shower. ‘Yes, please.’ She grabbed her toiletry bag and one of the towels the landlady had placed at the foot of the bed. ‘I’ll be as quick as I can.’
‘Take as long as you like. There’s no hurry.’
Zac had thrown himself on the bed and was lying with his hands beneath his head, surveying her with amused eyes. For once she was too flustered to be annoyed.
The bathroom turned out to be a huge, old-fashioned affair but charming in its own way. The cast-iron bath was an enormous thing on quaint little legs and Rachel gazed at it longingly. A long hot soak was just what she needed right now to relax tense, taut muscles. However, with Zac waiting for his turn, she contented
herself with a quick shower and was in and out within two minutes. After brushing her teeth and taking off her make-up, she surveyed her naked face in the mirror.
She looked clean and slightly pink. Wholesome. And she didn’t want to look wholesome. She wanted to exude sexiness like Jennie or possess the delicate, ethereal beauty of Susan. She shut her eyes tightly for a moment. But she didn’t. And growing up with two blonde bombshells of sisters, you’d have thought she’d be done crying for the moon. She was what she was and normally she was content with that. Her eyes opened. Tonight was different. She longed to be someone else tonight.
Zac was lying watching the news on the small TV the room boasted when she opened the door. ‘It’s pretty bad,’ he said, nodding at the picture of deep snow and abandoned cars on the screen. ‘And according to the forecast there’s no signs of it letting up yet. Looks like we could be stuck here for a couple of days. Still…’ he smiled wickedly ‘…the bed’s comfortable.’
No. Please, no. She might just about be able to get through one night without forgetting every principle she’d lived by for the last years, but two or three?
He had rolled off the bed onto his feet as he spoke; now he walked to where she was standing, still just inside the door. ‘Nice,’ he murmured softly, touching her flushed cheek with one finger and then tracing the outline of her mouth. ‘Like a scrubbed little girl all squeaky clean and ready for bed.’
Great. She’d been spot on in the bathroom, then.
He stroked the shining fall of her hair, his voice preoccupied when he breathed, ‘Is the water hot?’
‘The…the water? Oh, the water. Yes, it’s fine.’ Don’t stammer and stutter, she told herself in disgust. What’s the matter with you? Act your age, even if you don’t look it.
The matter was Zac. Her eyes had fastened of their own volition on the tiny scar on his chin and her senses registered the way the black stubble coming through avoided the spot. And he always smelt so good, she told herself helplessly as the strength seeped from her knees. Why did he always have to smell so good? All the odds were on his side.
She knew he was going to kiss her but when he did she still wasn’t ready for it. His lips were firm and confident against hers, moving with a leisurely expertise that made her tremble deep inside. His arms were round her and gently and repetitively his fingers began stroking her back, moving in light circles over her tense shoulders and down the concavity of her spine. It felt good, much too good, and as he deepened the kiss she kissed him back. Against her softness she felt the involuntary hardening of Zac’s body and experienced a moment’s primal pleasure that he wanted her. She wound herself closer instinctively.
When he finally broke the contact between them he was breathing heavily, his gaze narrowed and glittering as he stared down into her face. ‘You taste so good.’
Rachel swayed, then stepped back a pace out of his body warmth so she could think again. ‘Zac, I don’t—’
‘Sleep with a man you’ve only known for a day or two,’ he finished for her. ‘I know that, Rachel. I know the kind of woman you are.’ He raked his hair back from his forehead and took a visibly deep breath. ‘I’d better make that shower a cold one,’ he said with a wryness that would have made her smile if she’d hadn’t been feeling so wretched.
As it was, she stood quite still while he collected his towel and bag, and even after he’d left the room she remained where she was for a full minute before sitting down on the bed with a plump. She still wasn’t quite sure how she’d got herself into such a mess, she thought weakly. And a mess it was. From her teenage years she had always known she would have to be in love before she could allow total intimacy, and here she was serious considering sleeping with Zac in every sense of the word. It was a relief to admit it at last. And this a man who had told her quite clearly he would be gone shortly, back to Canada and his life and work there.
She made a sound in her throat, a cross between a moan and a groan, and then, aware the minutes were ticking by, jumped up and rummaged through her suitcase for her night things.
And it wasn’t as if she didn’t know what Zac—and the majority of the whole male species, come to it—was like. He wouldn’t need to be remotely fond of her to indulge in anything and everything—that was the difference between the sexes. Of course, not all men went in for one-night stands or casual sex, but with most men if it was there on offer, they’d take it.
Rachel stripped off her clothes with trembling fingers and pulled on her silk pyjamas, wishing she’d brought a pair with more covering power than the camisole top and shorts gave. Scrambling into bed, she pulled the covers up to her chin and found she was trembling uncontrollably. This was ridiculous; it was, it was absolutely ridiculous. In spite of herself, a nervous giggle escaped. In all her wildest dreams of spending the night with a man, this scenario had never occurred.
She strained her ears but could hear nothing outside the room. Tucked away as it was at the top of the inn and with thick solid walls to muffle any sound, it was its own little world. Her cold feet found one of the hot-water bottles and as the warmth slowly permeated her flesh, she found herself relaxing into the soft bed. Zac was right, it was comfortable.
What would Jennie and Susan say if they could see her now, stretched out in a big double bed and waiting for Zac? Again a hysterical squeak of laughter emerged, and she warned herself to get a grip. Laughing like a hyena was not attractive.
The news programme was now showing the rescue earlier that day of a horse and rider who’d ended up in a ditch. Apparently when they’d come to a gate, which the rider had leant forward to open, the horse had automatically taken a step backwards to allow the gate to swing open, but what it had thought to be solid ground, due to the snow had, in fact, been a deep ditch. Fortunately the rider had managed to spring to the side and clamber out without the horse—who’d ended up with all four legs sticking up in the air—kicking her. And after the horse had been tranquillised by a local vet, they’d managed to haul it out with a small crane, merely muddy and with a few cuts and bruises. But, the newscaster emphasised, the danger of the snow wasn’t to be underestimated. Keep warm, stay at home and don’t venture out.
Now they tell me. Rachel flexed her toes. This bout of snow had turned out to be positively lethal as far as she was concerned.
She was wide awake but cosily comfortable when Zac opened the bedroom door. Immediately her heart began to hammer in her ribcage and every muscle tightened. Not that he was undressed or looked any different from when he’d left the room, except his hair was damp and he hadn’t bothered to button his shirt. Actually, that made him very different. And infinitely more sexy, she thought desperately.
‘Look what Santa Claus has brought me this year,’ he drawled softly, the mocking tilt to his lips telling her he was fully aware of her wide eyes. ‘A very special bed-warmer.’
‘It’s not Christmas yet,’ she pointed out as he walked over to the bed, ‘and believe me, Zac, I’m not your bed-warmer.’
‘But you’re in my bed and you’re warm. That’s a good start.’
Rachel wanted to come back with some pithy retort but he chose that moment to take his shirt off and her mouth went as dry as a bone. She couldn’t take her eyes off his thickly muscled torso, the tight black curls on his chest narrowing to a thin line that disappeared into the waistband of his trousers. He was gorgeous, she thought helplessly. Gorgeous.
He sat down on the bed and pulled off his socks, throwing them onto the top of his suitcase, which was lying flat on the floor. Standing up once more, he unbuckled his belt and unzipped his trousers, and at that point Rachel came to her senses enough to look away. She’d been ogling him, she thought in horror, and then, as the trousers followed the socks, couldn’t resist a swift look under her eyelashes. He was wearing nothing but black boxer shorts and they were of the clinging kind. And he looked beyond good. Hard, powerful thighs, lithe, tanned legs and—as she’d expected—not an ounce of surplus fat anywhere.
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Her breathing was shallow and for the life of her she couldn’t swallow past the constriction in her throat. Staring at her hands clasped on top of the cover, she was incredibly grateful she was lying down because her oxygen supply was all but gone.
‘Slight problem in that I don’t wear pyjamas.’
She made the mistake of looking at him. He was grinning at her but the boxer shorts were still in place. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed.
‘I presume you’d rather I kept these on?’
She nodded because she knew if she tried to talk it would emerge as gobbledegook, and wouldn’t he just love that?
‘Sure?’ He stood there, practically naked, smiling at her.
Oh, but he had a body to die for. Which was why he was flaunting it with such magnificent unconcern presumably. ‘Yes,’ she squeaked. ‘I’m sure.’ Liar, a voice in her head accused.
‘OK.’ He padded across and turned off the light and the next moment he’d slid into bed beside her.
Rachel stiffened, as rigid as a board. She couldn’t help it. The light in the bedroom now came courtesy of the TV, and when Zac reached for the remote and switched it off, the room was bathed in darkness. She didn’t dare move, she didn’t dare even breathe as he settled himself more comfortably, his body touching hers for a heart-stopping moment.
‘Silk?’ he said after a few painful seconds had ticked by.
She cleared her throat and took a lungful of much-needed air. ‘Sorry?’ It emerged as a strangled croak.
‘Your nightwear. It felt like silk.’
She could tell his head had turned on the pillow to look at her, even though she couldn’t see him. Drawing on all her resources, she managed to say, fairly coherently, ‘It is.’
‘What colour?’ he murmured, very softly.
‘Sorry?’ she said again, although she’d heard him perfectly.
‘What colour is the silk? If I’m not allowed to see, the least you can do is describe what you’re wearing. Or would you rather I turn on the light and take a peek?’
