by Amy Andrews
But he was aware of her watching him, her hands fidgeting while she waited for his he-man move, and his brain came back online.
He strode into the bathroom and slowly shut the door. Her clothes were hanging on the back. And, yes, he had to admit, it was one of the larger Huntsman spiders he’d seen. He shook his head and grabbed her clothes. The spider scuttled to the top of the door, then onto the ceiling. He walked over to the bath/shower unit, stepped into the tub to open the window on the wall opposite the shower head so the poor creature could make its escape.
He turned to step out, his gaze falling on a scrap of material hanging on the shower-curtain rail. A silky-looking pink thong with a little diamanté twinkling at the front.
For a heartbeat there was nothing in his head but elevator music. Then there was a whole lot more.
None of it conducive to his sanity.
None of it conducive to going out there and facing her again.
‘Is it gone?’
Her voice sliced like a machete through the inappropriate images in his head and Kent dragged his transfixed gaze off Sadie’s underwear to the back of the door. He stepped out of the tub and had the door open in two strides.
‘Not yet,’ he said, thrusting her clothes at her and shutting the door behind him. ‘I opened the window. It’ll crawl out soon enough.’
Sadie blinked. ‘You did what?’ She clutched her clothes to her chest. ‘Are you nuts? You opened the window? So all his mates could join him?’ She took a step back. ‘What if it doesn’t go?’
It was the second time she’d questioned his mental faculties and, even if they weren’t already a little on the dicey side, her silky pink thong probably hadn’t helped. He wished she’d get dressed already. Damp strands of dark hair brushed creamy shoulders offsetting the natural rouge of her mouth and, frankly, insane had never looked so damn good.
Kent smiled patiently. ‘We’ll keep the door shut.’
‘What if it crawls back in here, under the door? What if it runs over my face in the middle of the night?’ She shuddered. ‘You do know human beings are supposed to swallow eight spiders in their lifetime, right?’
He clamped down on the urge to tell her there was no way she’d choke that sucker down and instead rolled his eyes. ‘I’m sure it’s looking for the fastest exit it can make, Sadie. It’s probably just trying to recover from the stroke it suffered when you screamed fit to wake the dead. I’m surprised the cops haven’t been called to investigate.’
Sadie shook her head mutinously. ‘I need it dead. I won’t be able to sleep knowing its alive and in here. And trust me, you do not want to be around me when I’m sleep deprived.’
‘Because you’re such a treat now?’
‘Please,’ she asked. ‘Please get rid of it.’
Kent knew he was doomed. He would have done just about anything that mouth was asking. Hell, he would have slain a dragon for her had there been one of those in the bathroom.
‘Fine.’
He stalked to his bed and unzipped a long side pocket of his backpack, pulling out a metal walking cane he’d brought along in case there was some serious hiking required to find the perfect shot. He adjusted its length, then returned to the bathroom, ignoring Sadie, who was watching the shut door with trepidation.
He kicked the door shut behind him to block out the view of her still-naked-beneath-the-towel stance, only to have her push it open again. ‘Oh, no, you don’t,’ she said from behind him. ‘I want to see it dead. I don’t want you coming back out here telling me it’s gone just to shut me up because you think I’m being neurotic.’
Kent turned. She was standing back a little from the doorway, her large grey eyes piercing him with a do-not-mess-with-me look.
Kent raised an eyebrow. ‘I see we have trust issues.’
Sadie glared at him. ‘My issues are none of your damn business. Just make it dead.’
Kent grinned at her prickliness as he turned back to locate the poor creature who’d had the supreme bad luck of choosing this particular room to explore. Although, seeing a naked Sadie Bliss had to have been some consolation.
It was crouched in the corner of the ceiling above the bath. ‘Come on, itsy-bitsy,’ he said as he approached the bath, the walking stick extended. ‘Time to move along.’
Sadie inched a little closer. ‘I said dead, damn it,’ she snapped from the doorway
‘Yeh, yeh, don’t get your knickers in a twist,’ he said as he positioned himself.
Bad. Word. Choice.
The diamanté from Sadie’s thong glimmered in the light and tantalised his peripheral vision.
Sadie’s gaze was drawn to it too. Oh, no! She hadn’t meant to leave it hanging there. She’d just forgotten everything the second itsy-bitsy decided to show.
What the hell must he be thinking?
‘Right,’ Kent said, pushing the rounded knob of the stick towards the spider. ‘Time to move along.’
‘What are you doing?’ she snapped again.
‘I’m not killing the spider, Sadie,’ he said as he gently swept it towards the open window.
Sadie gasped as the spider scuttled onto the end of the stick. She took a step back as she opened her mouth to warn Kent but in two seconds he’d dropped the stick from vertical to horizontal, the end with the spider poking out of the window. Once it hit the great outdoors the spider didn’t need any encouragement, practically leaping to its freedom.
Kent pulled the stick inside and took two strides to the window, pulling it shut. ‘There. Happy now?’ he asked as he turned around.
Sadie felt a sudden release of tension from her neck muscles as relief buzzed through her system. She might even have smiled had not her thong been dangling from the curtain rail just behind his head. It made her aware of their state of undress. Of his ripped naked chest. Of his perfect mouth surrounded by fascinating stubble.
Of how it would feel to kiss him.
She nodded instead, focusing only on him. ‘Thank you,’ she said, one hand at her throat, the other still clutching her clothes. ‘I’ll be able to sleep easy now.’
Kent grunted. With a vision of her in that towel and a pink thong, he certainly wouldn’t be.
He walked out of the bathroom, brushing past her on the way out. ‘Just get dressed, Sadie Bliss,’ he muttered and headed back to his beer.
When Sadie emerged from the bathroom a couple of minutes later the television was on and Kent was reclining against the bed head, still in just his jeans, his feet bare. Both his legs were out in front of him, his right ankle crossed over the left. He held his beer tucked close to his body, resting against his groin area. He was channel surfing.
He turned the volume down a little but deliberately didn’t look at her as he said, ‘I can turn it off if it’s going to keep you awake.’
She shook her head, ignoring the nice delineation of abdominal muscles and the fascinating trail of hair bisecting them. ‘No, it’s fine. I sleep like a log.’
Sadie lifted her backpack to the ground and pulled back the sheets. Uncaring that her hair was wet and tomorrow it would be a wild tangle, she slipped between them, enjoying their fresh clean feel and smell. Not even the rock-hard mattress spoilt the moment.
She half moaned, half sighed. ‘God, that feels good.’
Kent, still looking resolutely at the television screen didn’t bother to reply. It was bad enough her low moan completely destroyed his concentration.
‘Night,’ she said, pulling the sheets up to her chin, rolling away from him as she obeyed the dictates of her brain to shut her eyes and sleep.
Kent took a swig of his beer. He couldn’t believe that anyone could just fall instantly asleep. He turned his head to look at her, the steady rise and fall of the sheet seeming to indicate that Sadie Bliss could.
How he envied her that. He hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep since the accident. Before that even. Living in war zones was not conducive to the recommended eight hours. And these days he barely
got by on four or five.
A knock heralded the arrival of his food and he was grateful for something to do to fill up the long hours ahead.
Kent was relieved when Sadie finally moved five hours later. He was beginning to wonder if she’d lapsed into a coma. If it weren’t for her regular deep breathing and the occasional soft, snuffly snore, he’d have checked her pulse hours ago.
He, on the other hand, was still well and truly awake. He’d eaten his steak, drunk two more beers, ordered them some breakfast on a card he’d hung on the outside doorknob, gone through his camera gear again, fiddled with the air-conditioning thermostat several times trying to find a happy medium and consulted the map at least half a dozen times.
He’d watched some B-grade movie and reruns of eighties sit-coms for hours. And now he was flicking between channels, avoiding the twenty-four-hour news stations in favour of twenty-four-hour infomercials.
Sadie flopping onto her back was a welcome distraction. Her head had rolled his way, the light flickering from the television throwing her face into interesting relief. Her skin looked even paler in the glow and long shadows fell on her cheeks from her eyelashes. Her delectable full mouth also eerily pale in the ghostly television glow seemed pursed as if ready for action.
His gaze drifted down. The sheet had ridden low exposing her T-shirt. Her perfectly plain, high-necked, nothing remotely provocative T-shirt. Hell, she was even wearing a bra! But that didn’t obscure the fascinating bloom of her breasts, large and round and perfect, tenting the shirt, stretching it across their expanse. His eyes followed the line of the shirt as it fell again towards the flat of her ribs and the slight rise of her belly and he could just make out a thin strip of creamy skin before the sheet covered the rest of her.
His gaze drifted up again as he contemplated what she’d look like without the shirt. And the sheet. Would her nipples be pale too, like the rest of her, or would they be darker, closer to the colour of her mouth?
What would they taste like?
His groin stirred.
Then she moved, murmured something unintelligible, flung an arm above her head.
Kent looked away hurriedly.
What the hell was the matter with him? Perving on a woman whilst she slept? Imagining her naked. Like some oversexed teenager? Like some perverted stalker.
The number of things that were wrong with this scenario bought him to his feet. He rummaged through his bag, found some shorts and a T-shirt, dragged his shoes back on, grabbed the room key and headed out of the door.
Unlike Sydney, which never seemed to sleep, Cunnamulla at one in the morning was deserted. Nothing was open, no lights were on, no traffic rattled by as Kent launched himself into the cool night air with vigour. He pounded the pavements of the sleepy little town for an hour with only the occasional bark from a dog for company.
The physio had recommended he started light jogging as soon as the orthopod had cleared him five months ago and, like everything he did in life, Kent adopted it with gusto. It had helped to strengthen his right ankle significantly but it had also been a useful tool to cope with his insomnia. The accompanying exhaustion usually resulted in good quality sleep, unlike the other alternatives—alcohol and pills.
Beer and sleeping tablets certainly got him off to sleep very effectively but it was fitful and haunted by the things he could keep at bay during the day. The cries of Dwayne Johnson begging for his mother. The smell of jet fuel. The searing heat of nearby flames.
He seemed to wake more exhausted than he went to bed. And hung over to boot.
Running was far, far preferable.
Sadie was still sleeping soundly when he let himself back into the room. He barely looked at her as he headed for the bathroom. He shut the door, stripped off his clothes, turned the taps on and stepped into the spray. He closed his eyes, braced his outstretched arms against the wall, dropped his head, letting the water run over his neck for a while.
When he finally lifted his head and opened his eyes, the pink thong hanging from the curtain rail was the first thing he saw.
He turned the cold on full blast.
Sadie woke to a knock at the door at seven o’clock. She opened her eyes. A tray with empty plates, used cutlery and three beer bottles greeted her and beyond that was Kent. He was curled up in his bed, sound asleep. His face was relaxed, his cheekbones not so pronounced, the creases around his mouth smoothed out, his lips slack and innocent rather than distinct and wicked.
He looked much, much younger.
He was still shirtless, the sheet pulled low on his abdomen and twisted around his legs. His right leg from the knee down was exposed and her gaze came to rest on his grossly deformed ankle.
The knock came again and he stirred.
Sadie jumped out of bed. ‘Coming,’ she called walking past the still flickering television on her way to the door. She opened it to the woman from last night bearing a smile and a tray.
‘Good morning,’ she chirped. ‘Your breakfast.’
‘Oh,’ Sadie said, taking the laden tray. ‘Er, thank you.’
Kent woke to the voices and rolled onto his back. His eyes felt gritty. It had taken another hour of infomercials before he’d finally fallen asleep after his shower, but he was used to having to wake and be instantly ready so he vaulted upright instead.
Sadie backed into the room, pushing the door shut with her foot, and turned around. She met Kent’s bleary gaze. ‘You ordered this, I assume?’
He nodded. ‘Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.’ He patted the bed. ‘Put it here.’
Sadie plonked it where he indicated. She lifted the metallic covering on one of the plates. A full cooked breakfast greeted her—bacon, eggs, sausages, fried onions, tomatoes, and baked beans.
Her stomach growled at the waft of cooked meat and she started to salivate.
Her fat cells did too.
It looked so damn good. But she knew she couldn’t indulge. In just a few shorts days her pants were already looser. And she’d be seeing Leo soon.
She replaced the lid and picked up one of the pieces of perfectly browned toast. ‘Thanks,’ she said, nibbling at the dry corner.
Kent scrunched his face as he looked up at her. She was wearing some baggy yoga-style pants to go with her baggy T-shirt. It was the unsexiest get-up he’d seen in his life. But even it didn’t manage to keep the curvy figure beneath in check.
The curvy figure she was obviously trying to straighten out by depriving it of adequate nutrition. That was it? She was just going to eat one piece of dry toast?
‘You don’t want any more?’
‘I never eat much breakfast,’ Sadie lied as she bent over slightly and poured herself a cup of tea from the small metal teapot with a leaking lid. ‘Usually just need a cuppa and I’m good.’
Her gaze flicked to his momentarily but she quickly looked away. She didn’t expect or want him to know about the demons that drove her to this crash diet.
She doubted a he-man of his ilk would understand.
Their enforced proximity was bad enough without laying herself totally bare to him.
Kent watched as she pulled her gaze away and her hair swung back and forth across her shoulders at the activity. It was a tangle of waves this morning. As if she’d spent the night in a wind tunnel.
‘And I suppose you’re going to eat nothing but celery and salads again today?’
Sadie sat cross-legged on her bed, facing the television. A news show was on. ‘Carrots, actually,’ she said primly.
Kent stared at her for a moment, then shook his head. He was on a road trip with a rabbit. He’d never understood women who obsessed over what they perceived to be every figure flaw and every calorie they shoved in their mouths. He’d dated his share and they were, without exception, boring.
And Sadie not realising just how gorgeous she looked was nothing short of criminal. Was she anorexic?
Or just screwed up by one too many magazine covers?
K
ent eyed the piece of toast that she was nibbling, contemplating his next words carefully because he wanted to say them, to get involved in this juvenile silliness, about as much as he wanted to saw off the top of his head. But maybe she was like this because no one in her life had ever sat her down and told her that she had a smoking-hot body.
Although God alone knew what was wrong with men of her age today—were they blind or just incredibly stupid?
‘Look, this is nothing to do with me and you can eat...or not eat...whatever you want but—and I say this with absolutely no disrespect or sexual harassment or icky older-man creepiness in mind—your body is fine.’
Sadie blinked. If that was a compliment it could sure do with some work. And gave her an opportunity to steer the conversation away from what she was and wasn’t eating.
‘Wow. You really are rusty,’ she murmured.
Kent shot her an impatient look. ‘I’m not here to stroke your ego, Sadie Bliss.’ Or land himself in the middle of a lawsuit.
Or something else entirely inappropriate.
‘Well, that’s just as well because you’d be failing, Kent Nelson. You do know when you tell a woman her body is fine she interprets that as you’re okay but you could look better, right? Unless, of course, you prefix it. Mighty fine or damn fine work quite well.’
The sad truth was Sadie knew that none of those prefixes applied. A few years back, when she’d been with Leo, mighty fine had fitted the bill. Now she was just struggling to keep back the tide.
Kent stared at her. Did she really think he gave a rat’s arse about the female interpretation of fine? He shook his head. ‘I don’t suppose you have a clue how very much I don’t care about the word fine? You do know that there’s a whole heap of bad things happening out there in the world, right?’ he growled.
‘Really?’ she snapped, tired of his paternalistic carry-on. ‘I hadn’t noticed, being a journalist and all.’
