by Alison Kelly
‘The crew?’
‘Gunna and Debbie. Friends of mine who also work in the garage,’ he explained. ‘Oh, and you better put this on…’ he said, tossing a small object towards her and startling her reflexes into action. ‘I picked it up after I left your place last night.’
The guilt she felt on catching the small green leather jeweller’s case was cloying. It only intensified when she opened it to see an emerald cut diamond set in white gold. Oh, my! Her mind gasped, before common sense reminded her that it could only be a cubic zirconia. A diamond this size would have been out of the price range of any motor mechanic, much less one who’d probably already blown his budget paying off her outstanding bills. Still, she knew no stone set in eighteen-carat white gold would come cheap because practically every item of jewellery she’d ever bought had to be specially made and had cost ten to twenty per cent more than an identical yellow or rose gold piece she could have bought off the shelf.
‘It’s…it’s beautiful,’ she said with utter truthfulness. ‘But really, Reb, this wasn’t necessary—’
‘Yes, it was,’ he cut in. ‘There’ll be a minority of people who are going to think we’re getting married for exactly the reason we are—a one-night stand and a faulty condom. I don’t want to invite that sort of public speculation. People who know me know I wouldn’t shell out on a ring like that unless I’d lost both my heart and my mind,’ he said dryly. ‘And I’m damn sure none of your set would accept that you’d for settle some cheap and nasty engagement ring with a stone no one will notice.’
‘Are you saying I’m a show-off?’ she demanded.
He heaved a martyred sigh. ‘No, that’s not what I’m saying. But you can’t deny you have expensive tastes and that—’
‘Excuse me!’ she objected. ‘I have good taste, not expensive tastes.’
‘Whatever. Just put the ring on. If it doesn’t fit you can get it adjusted next time you go to Sydney to see your specialist.’
It fitted so perfectly that Amanda-Jayne felt a shiver go down her spine. Not only had he noted the fact that she didn’t wear yellow gold, but he’d bought a ring in exactly her size. Cubic zirconia or not, she’d have to phone her insurance company and increase her cover. It was bad enough that Reb had spent so much money for the sake of an engagement ring she’d only be wearing for a week or so, but if anything happened to it in that time she’d feel even more awful.
‘So, ready to head downstairs?’ he said, interrupting her study of the ring glittering on her finger.
She nodded, then smiled. ‘Reb, the ring really is beautiful. You’ve got good taste too.’
For a moment he stared at her with an intensity that had her legs starting to liquefy, then he spun on his heel and reefed open the door. ‘No,’ he grunted. ‘Unfortunately I’m turning out to have expensive tastes.’
CHAPTER FIVE
IT OCCURRED to Reb that in the time since confronting Amanda-Jayne in Sydney he’d become complacent about the more obvious differences between her and the people he regarded as his friends, because they fair dinkum slapped him in the face when he introduced her to Debbie! The contrasts between the two women went far beyond the physical contrast of Amanda-Jayne’s perfectly groomed elegance and Debbie’s work uniform of cut-off shorts and a polo shirt emblazoned with ‘BROWNE’S AUTO EMPORIUM.’
Though it was evident that Amanda-Jayne was uneasy about meeting his friends, she nevertheless pasted a smile on her face and was prepared to be pleasant and civil as good manners commanded; Debbie, however, barely raised her head from the invoices she was typing as they entered the garage office. Her patent lack of interest told him that not only had Savvy spread the word of Amanda-Jayne’s unexpected arrival, but that his friend wasn’t any happier with the current turn of events than she had been when he’d confirmed the rumours that he was responsible for Amanda-Jayne Vaughan’s pregnancy.
‘What?’ she’d shrieked. ‘I’d have thought you’d have more brains than to be suckered by some little rich chick out for a night on the wild side!’ She’d been even more succinct when he’d adlibbed the fabrication that the relationship between him and A.J. was more than that.
Any expectations that she’d be more accepting of the situation on meeting Amanda-Jayne were blasted into oblivion within seconds of him completing the introductions, when Debbie barely stopped chewing her gum to grunt a bored, ‘Hi,’ before reverting her attention to her desk and grumbling, ‘You better warn her not to dress like that every day, Reb. Around here grease isn’t any more impressed by beige linen than it is denim.’
‘It’s raw silk, actually.’ Amanda-Jayne’s tone was patronising to the point of painful. ‘But since I’m not the slightest bit impressed by grease I can assure you I’ll be giving it and anything intimately acquainted with it a wide berth.’
Mercifully, before Debbie had a chance to verbalise the contempt which that remark had put into her eyes, the bearded, heavily tattooed Gunna suddenly stalked into the office. Smelling of petrol and wearing enough oil to do a dozen lube jobs, he cheerfully announced, ‘Gidday, I’m Gunna,’ as he thrust a large grimy hand towards a startled A.J.
Reb deemed it to A.J.’s credit that she hesitated for only a nanosecond before accepting his mate’s hand into her own perfectly manicured one. ‘Er, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Gunther; I’m Amanda-Jayne Vaugh—’
‘It’s Gunna,’ the burly ex-biker-cum-mechanic interrupted.
‘Excuse me?’
‘The name’s Gunna…as in, gunna do this; gunna do that.’
The complete absence of any form of dawning comprehension on A.J.’s beautiful face had Reb torn between laughing and groaning. Unfortunately Debbie’s reaction wasn’t so indecisive and her raucous ridicule of Amanda-Jayne’s perplexity immediately transformed his ‘uptown fiancée’s’ expression into such regal indignation that Reb jumped into the firing line to prevent further verbal warfare.
‘By the way, I wanted you guys to be the first to know Amanda-Jayne and I are getting married.’ His words, however, didn’t so much promote peace as all-encompassing cataleptic silence.
Gunna was in danger of standing on his jaw. Debbie looked as if she’d inhaled her ever present chewing gum. And the woman who was supposedly wanting to marry him resembled someone sentenced to the electric chair.
Producing what he hoped was a convincing smile of pleasure, he dragged the obviously tense Amanda-Jayne to his side and gave her a warning squeeze. Taking the hint, she responded with a smile which captured the sort of self-conscious nervousness people probably expected from a newly engaged woman. Unfortunately, though, she didn’t quit while she was ahead and the image was shattered when she said in her usual crisp, precise diction, ‘We haven’t formalised any arrangements yet. However, naturally I’m favouring something tastefully understated rather than the grand affair people around here are probably anticipating, since…’ Her shoulders rose in a delicate shrug. ‘Well, you understand… Suffice to say I’m not going to have the luxury of ten months to decide what dinner service pattern to use at the reception.’
Not surprisingly Gunna and Debbie’s response to that was even slacker jaws and even more dumbfounded silence. Reb figured that Amanda-Jayne was doing her best, but he suspected that it was nervousness which had served to exaggerate her cultured upper-class tone and vocabulary to the point of making her seem even more bizarre to people whose experiences of wedding receptions were limited to the kegged beer and a backyard barbecue variety or a ‘smorgasbord spread’ catered by local women in the Scout hall. In a bid to ease the awkwardness of the moment he jokingly said that if choosing dinner china was that time-consuming they could all pretty well expect to be dining from nothing better than paper plates in four weeks’ time.
As ice-breakers went, his humour had gone down like the Titanic.
‘You’re marrying her in four weeks! Are you nuts?’ Debbie looked even more horrified than she sounded, but typically Gunna’s response cut to the chase with even
less tact.
‘Geez, Reb! What’s yer big hurry? Everyone already knows she’s up the duff.’
Amanda-Jayne’s face turned redder than her hair and Reb tightened his grip on her just in case rage, not embarrassment was the cause.
‘Gunna, we aren’t getting married just because she’s pregnant,’ he lied. ‘We’ve been thinking about it for a while. Haven’t we, sweetheart?’
At that point Amanda-Jayne looked even more surprised and bemused than his friends, but she must have studied drama at those posh schools she’d attended because before he knew what had hit him she’d kissed his cheek and given him the sexiest smile a man could imagine.
Damn, but that smile of hers had been hot enough to fry a man’s guts! he reflected. Of course so was the you-are-dead-meat glare she was currently nailing him with as she lowered herself onto the extreme left-hand side of the mattress.
‘If you so much as roll one millimetre onto my side of this bed,’ she warned, her whisky eyes narrowing, ‘your sex life is over for all time.’
‘Now there’s a comment that could be taken two ways…’
Amanda-Jayne wasn’t in the mood to be teased. ‘Yes. Seriously and very seriously.’
‘How about positively?’ he asked, his voice low. ‘Because that statement could be interpreted as meaning that if I’m a good boy on this occasion I’ll be rewarded on a future one…’ He turned a lazy grin on her. ‘Yeah, when you really analyse it, A.J., you have to concede those words hold more than a hint of sexual suggestion.’
‘I won’t concede any such thing! I assure you I was not trying to be one bit sexually suggestive!’ she huffed, rolling over to turn her back to him.
‘So what…? You always sleep in a seductive oversized T-shirt?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Then why do so tonight?’
‘Because I’ve got nothing else t—’
‘Aha! You like sleeping in the raw too, huh?’
‘No, I— What do you mean, too?’ she gasped, shock bringing her around to face him. ‘Are you saying you’re naked under that sheet?’
The grin he sent her was pure sin and so scrambled Amanda-Jayne’s tired brain and jumbled emotions that it took her a second to register his hands lowering the sheet. Then several more seconds to silently admire the expanse of bare chest being revealed by the action… Bereft of a solitary molecule of fat, its contoured muscular tone had her fisting her hands in an attempt to nullify the burning desire of her fingers to explore each and every one of those perfectly contoured muscles. Could the light spattering of dark curls which narrowed the lower the sheet travelled really be as soft as she rememb—? No!
In less than a heartbeat she’d leapt from the mattress and put as much distance between her and the bed as was possible while her mind belatedly fought to override her errant libido. She remembered nothing of that night. Nothing!
‘Hey, what’s wrong?’ Reb asked, his voice vibrating with amusement. ‘Last time you saw these boxer shorts you laughed and said they were sexy.’
‘Then that proves how drunk I was that night! Sober, I’d only ever consider a grown man wearing cartoon character underwear childish, not sexy,’ she retorted, refusing to turn from the window in the hope the Southerly breeze would cool her overheated skin.
Why was she letting herself overreact to everything this man said and did when he obviously got some sort of perverse pleasure out of ruffling her feathers? Not that he’d been the only unsettling element she’d encountered in the eight or so hours she’d been here!
Never had she been in such an alien, not to mention hostile environment and been unable to rely on her social skills to come to her aid. It had been her intention before arriving to grit her teeth and smile through whatever trials she might encounter in the few days she’d have to spend here, but she’d not even made it up the stairs to the apartment before Hell’s attack dog had eyed her as the chef’s special.
Once inside the apartment surly Savvy had started snarling and bitten her head off for walking into her bedroom without knocking—something she’d never have done except that when Reb had indicated the two bedroom doors and said, ‘That one is mine,’ Amanda-Jayne, blissfully ignorant of Savvy’s permanent resident status, had assumed the second was hers. Naturally, she’d apologised profusely, but because of the stupid agreement she’d made with Reb there wasn’t any way she could excuse her apparently rude behaviour to his cousin’s satisfaction and the girl, it seemed, held a grudge as a sponge did water.
‘I was only teasing you, A.J….’ Reb’s voice reached from across the room to drag her mind back to the most recent of the stress-inducing moments she’d had today. ‘Where’s your sense of humour?’
‘Obviously on a much higher level than yours.’
A masculine chuckle greeted her barb. ‘Fair enough. But you can’t stay up all night. Come back to bed. I won’t lay a hand on you.’
‘Oh, just go to sleep, will you? If I want to come to bed I will. If I don’t I won’t, okay?’
‘Fine, fine. Suit yourself. No need to bite my head off.’
Yeah? Well, no one had a reason to bite mine off either, but everyone had a go at doing it today! she thought bitterly.
No sooner had she recovered from the antisocial attitudes of Reb’s cousin and her oversized mutt than his employee friends had started in on her. Well, to be perfectly fair, the sinister-looking Gunna had proven relatively benign, but the gum-chewing Debbie had come out hissing and scratching without the slightest provocation. In fact such was her cattiness from the moment she’d laid eyes on her that Amanda-Jayne had assumed the pint-sized blonde with the guerilla-like personality must have been one of Reb’s discarded lovers.
When she’d said as much to Reb he’d laughed fit to burst and explained that Debbie was in a long-standing, stable, de-facto relationship with Gunna which had produced one child, and the pair were making no secret of the fact they were actively trying to have another. The notion of the grizzly-sized ex-biker mating with the elfin, albeit razor-tongued Debbie seemed almost as incomprehensible as the circumstances of their relationship to Amanda-Jayne. Not because it was unheard of within her social circle for couples to live together out of wedlock, but to have children without the security of an airtight pre-nuptial agreement and marriage was regarded as financial and social suicide.
That thought prompted her to wonder if Reb mightn’t be suspicious of the fact she’d not yet insisted on having a pre-nup drawn up. Her mistake in not pushing Anthony when he’d greeted her request for one with tearful accusations that she doubted his love had been rammed home when he’d run through her entire maternal inheritance just four years into their marriage. While she had no intention of marrying Reb, he didn’t know that, so therefore he’d probably be expecting her to ensure the security of her future funds…
Gnawing her lip, she pondered the dilemma. At most it wouldn’t take more than four days for the town gossip to get too much for Patricia to ignore. Four more days of being subjected to Reb Browne’s warped sense of humour and the open animosity of his nearest and dearest wouldn’t be easy, but she was confident she could handle it. Still…should she, for the sake of appearances, make a production of contacting her lawyers and having them draw up an agreement? On one hand it would be an utterly pointless exercise, but on the other it might just be the shove required to get Patricia into the game that much quicker.
Yes! She’d do it! The sooner Patricia was convinced her stepdaughter planned to marry Vaughan’s Landing’s resident bad boy, the sooner Amanda-Jayne could resume some semblance of her normal life. She expected Reb would be royally ticked off to discover that while he’d been smugly satisfied to hold all the aces she’d been biding her time with both the right and left bower and enough royalty in her hand to flat out euchre him! Not that she thought for a moment that he was the type of man to be a graceful loser in cards or anything else. No, undoubtedly he’d still insist on having some role in their child’s life, but w
ho knew? That didn’t necessarily have to be a bad thing. After all, apart from being a tad bossy and taking obvious delight in provoking her, he seemed a basically decent guy—even if he did have a smile and a body that had her remembering things that bordered on indecent—like how his hands had—
Whoa! No, no, no!
She wasn’t remembering anything! Nothing. Her mind was blank to last October the nineteenth. Completely and totally blank!
Taking a deep breath, she held it, willing her pulse to slow down. Repeating the action, she told herself she was exhausted, that was all. It had been a long, tiring couple of days both emotionally and physically; she needed to calm down and get a good night’s sleep. She glanced at the bed and the sleeping form already occupying half of it, then, with a resigned sigh, slowly tiptoed towards it.
The nearer she got, the more impressive the view of Reb’s smoothly muscular male back became; even in the darkness its deep even tan contrasted against the navy and white striped sheet. With effort she swallowed down a murmur of approval as hormonal excitement itched low in her belly.
‘So he’s got a great body,’ she muttered angrily to herself. ‘Get past it, Amanda-Jayne. Sex is not going to solve your problems.’
On that determined thought she slid beneath the sheets and willed herself to relax.
‘Course, since you’re already pregnant, sex isn’t gonna add to your problems either.’
She ricocheted bolt upright. ‘I thought you were asleep!’
He grinned. ‘Not the first time you’ve made that mistake.’
‘Maybe, but there’s no way I’m going to repeat the one I made immediately prior to that! So would you kindly just give up, shut up and let me get some sleep?’
‘Anything you say, A.J.’ His soft laugh both tempted and taunted her. ‘Sweet dreams.’
‘Go to hell.’ She pulled the pillow over her head, hugged it there for several seconds, then released it to add, ‘And my name is not A.J.!’
