There's Something About a Rebel-

by Anne Oliver

  ‘What, you’d have him drop by on his way home from vacation and find no boat? No Lissa? No way of knowing where you were?’

  She shook her head. ‘He’d never drop in without phoning ahead. It’s called communication.’

  ‘You weren’t doing a very good job of communicating with him, then, were you?’

  ‘What about you? Did you communicate with me about this first?’

  ‘You were shopping.’

  She lifted her head and glared at him. ‘So?’

  ‘I didn’t want to have this conversation with you over the phone.’

  ‘I told you I was going to let him know.’

  ‘When? He loves you and you left him out of the loop.’

  She knew, and it stopped her in her tracks. Worse, it had taken Blake to point it out. ‘That still doesn’t give you the right to go over my head or mess with my affairs.’

  What exactly had he told Jared? Had the two of them discussed her as if she didn’t have a voice—or a brain? It made her want to slap something. Or someone.

  ‘So you had a chat about Lissa’s lapsed insurance too, then? The boat’s state of disrepair? Did you tell him you own it?’

  She stopped because she’d run out of breath. He wasn’t attempting to deny her accusations. He was waiting for her to finish her little tirade. Calmly. Rationally. Only a tic in his jaw betrayed him.

  ‘The boat’s gone,’ he said coolly. ‘I’ve decided there’s no point telling him my father sold it twice over. I assume Jared has insurance to cover it. He can make his own decisions about whether or not to replace it.’

  Oh. ‘That’s very—’

  ‘I told him what happened,’ he continued, in the same unhurried voice. ‘And that you were safe and unharmed and with me.’

  With me. Why did those words claw so at her belly? She tightened her stomach muscles against the odd sensation and said, ‘Nothing about our business arrangement?’

  One eyebrow rose. ‘You and I have an agreement.’

  She nodded. She felt small. Really small. She’d jumped in feet first without thinking, without seeking clarification.

  He went on, ‘But it doesn’t mean you keep him in the dark about it for much longer.’

  What about that kiss? Did he intend not keeping him in the dark about that too? Oh, she did so not want to think about him talking guy talk with Jared about that. She comforted herself with the knowledge that they were mates, she was Jared’s sister and Blake wasn’t likely to spill that piece of information to her brother. Still, guys were guys.

  And to think she’d been tempted to kiss him again. Only to make him feel better.

  And he’d wanted to kiss her, it had been as obvious as the horn on a rhinoceros. And then at the last second he’d suddenly remembered he’d phoned Jared? He’d have known she’d react to that. It was almost as if he’d been looking for a reason, any reason at all, not to give in to that sexual hum between them.

  She rubbed her arms to ward off a sudden chill. She should be relieved he’d put a stop to it. After all, she’d told him only hours ago that they were moving too fast.

  ‘Okay.’ She worked hard to keep her voice reasonable when what she wanted to do was yell why did he have to be so remote? As if he’d flicked a damn switch. ‘But I wish you’d told me before you rushed into it. I’d intended phoning him this evening.’

  ‘You still can.’ His disbelieving look negated the barely there nod, making her feel like a kid again, and then he was walking away, cutting their conversation short with, ‘It’s late. Where’s your gear?’

  They didn’t speak as they piled everything into his rented SUV. On the short drive home she pressed her lips together tight to stop the words she wanted to say spilling out: Frustratingly Infuriatingly Complicated Gorgeous Man.

  When he pulled into the kerb outside the house, she glared straight ahead. ‘I’ve changed my mind,’ she murmured. ‘I think I hate you after all.’

  ‘I’ll try to take it in my stride.’

  They unloaded the car, both avoiding the other. When it was done, he muttered something about checking his emails and she saw him heading to a room off the living area that looked like a study. Or a cave. And he was damn well going to shut himself in there.

  ‘Hang on.’

  When he didn’t stop, she caught up, planted herself in front of him, then waited until he looked down and at least acknowledged her. ‘If you don’t want to kiss me, you don’t need to fake some spur-of-the-moment excuse to push me away. I’m a big girl these days, I can cope.’

  He stood unmoving for a few unsteady heartbeats. ‘Be very careful what you say to me right now, Lissa.’ His husky warning sounded more like a promise than a threat.

  But his non-committal expression just plain got to her. Did he have to be so … lone wolf? It made her want to push and prod until she got a reaction. Any reaction. She wanted to understand the demons she saw in his eyes in an unguarded moment. She wanted to understand why.

  She pushed harder. ‘I can handle rejection, I can handle disappointments. I can handle y …’ She trailed off at his unforgiving stare, realising she’d let her mouth run roughshod over her thoughts, and took a step back, away from the intensity battering her.

  His nostrils flared, his jaw clenched and something deeper than indigo flickered hotly in the depths of his eyes. He stepped forward, crowding in on her. Now she saw gold flecks among the blue in his gaze. Alive, like a flame. Raw and hot and primitive. For a brief moment he looked like a stranger—or that dangerous lone wolf—and instinctively she took another step back.

  ‘You think you can handle me?’ His hands shot out and his fingers curled around her upper arms, his thighs bumping hers as he walked her backwards with him until her spine came up against the wall. His unrelenting gaze didn’t waver from hers.

  He dragged her against him and kissed her. Hard. No time to react as his body flexed against hers, unyielding and unforgiving while his hands fisted tightly in her hair.

  Then, before she knew it, he lifted his head to mutter against her shocked lips, ‘You’re not ready for what I’d like to do to you.’

  The images his harsh words invoked sent a thrill pulsing through her. It throbbed low and heavy between her legs.

  He untangled his hands from her hair and backed off. Without the support of his body, she slumped against the wall, dazed and dizzy and not a little delirious.

  She knew her eyes were too wide, her breath too choppy, her limbs too trembly. She’d blown it, she could tell, and she saw a muscle twitch in his left jaw, felt him grow distant as he watched her through half-lidded eyes.

  ‘And what would that be, that you’d like to do that I’m not ready for?’

  His Adam’s apple bobbed, his hands fisted at his sides and she swore the air vibrated with shared images. Blake pushing her back against the wall, tearing away her clothes with impatient fingers until she stood naked and trembling with need. Using his hands and mouth and tongue to bring pleasure to every square centimetre of quivering flesh, then ploughing into her where she stood.

  Dull colour sprinted high along his cheekbones as if he’d been having the same thought. ‘That’d be a mistake.’

  She licked lips gone dry. ‘How do you know it would?’

  He shook his head but she could see she’d put a dent in that composure. ‘I suggest you go upstairs and get some sleep.’ Turning on his heel, he walked away.

  ‘The night is young,’ she called to his retreating back with a brightness she didn’t feel. She watched him walk to his cave, his shoulders tense, his strides long and swift. ‘I think I’ll go to that party after all.’ She said it loud enough for him to hear as he reached the door. He hesitated before closing it behind him with a firm click.

  She sighed, a weird cocktail of frustration and satisfaction simmering through her. She’d had no intention of going anywhere but he didn’t need to know that.

  Forget the way he’d stalked off, she’d got to him. Rattled his
cage. Woken the primitive man beneath the civilised exterior. A quiver of excitement jagged down her spine. Was she really ready for that?

  But she wasn’t the only one with something to fear, something to hide. And what would stop a man like Blake from acting on their obvious attraction?

  His own code of honour. His integrity. She’d seen it in action. More than once. Her fingers tightened into fists. Damn the gossip-mongers. He didn’t deserve to be talked about that way.

  But the man clearly didn’t do emotion. Never had. And she’d never understood how he and Jared had got along so well. Back then she’d been too young to question it, but not too young to imagine herself offering him solace any way she knew how.

  There was pain too, recent and raw in his shadowed eyes. And he was alone here with no support base. She couldn’t begin to understand how someone dealt with that. He could try and block her out but she was going to reach him eventually. No one should be an island.

  Someone was playing the harmonica. Blake pressed the heels of his palms to his eyeballs as the familiar childhood sound drifted over the pool’s still blue water and through the open window.

  Tipped back as far as the recliner would go, he lay in the study’s darkness while a bevy of hammers battered away at the back of his skull. Darth Vader and Luke were fighting their alltime classic laser battle inside his eyeballs. The nausea was still at the high-tide mark.

  Had Lissa gone partying? Probably, after that scene against the wall. He’d had to get rid of her—it was that or lose his pride. Throwing up at a woman’s feet was never going to be a good look.

  The tune switched to a country and western ballad he remembered playing as a kid. It had been an old distraction. He’d taught himself to play harmonica while he waited alone for his mother to come back from one of her endless meetings. A foster home would have offered more. Lissa’s mention of her tonight had brought the memories back and reminded him why he didn’t allow emotion to clutter his life.

  His father had been no better at the parenting game. Predictably he’d tired of the marriage and lived a separate life under this very roof. But by some miracle they’d conceived Blake. What a joke.

  He’d learned early on not to depend on others for emotional or any other kind of support. Janine had reinforced that learning in his late teens. Love equals vulnerability.

  Women looking for more than the casual date soon discovered he wasn’t that kind of guy. As long as they were on the same wavelength he was happy to indulge whatever games they wanted to play, but the moment he got a glimpse of those stars in their eyes he was off.

  And now there was Lissa.

  Too young, too inexperienced, too-delicate Lissa. He hadn’t missed the flicker of real fear in her eyes when he’d backed her up against the wall just now and guilt sat uncomfortably alongside the roiling in his gut.

  Definitely off-limits to guys like him.

  The strip of golden sand was strewn with shells, driftwood and dead palm leaves where the rainforest met the sea. The heavy pounding at the back of his skull was gunfire and the sound of his boots on the hard-packed sand.

  Blake looked over his shoulder.

  Torque crouched on the sand, frozen.

  Blake dodging bullets. Dragging him across the beach. Torque’s cry as he fell, knocking him off balance. Rocks coming up to meet him as he fell.

  ‘Blake. Blake, wake up.’

  He jerked awake like a panic-stricken diver out of oxygen. Lissa’s voice, her tone calm but firm and instantly grounding. A wave of relief flooded over him as his eyes blinked open. Ghostly light from the muted TV screen lit the living room.

  He was on the couch and she was perched on the arm rest, watching him with concern in those pretty eyes. He remembered coming out here, unable to find sleep in the study.

  Relief quickly turned to a storm of humiliation and he started to lift his head, which felt like a ripe watermelon. How long had she been watching him?

  ‘You okay?’

  Her cool light fingers on his brow both soothed and embarrassed. A bloody rerun of last night.

  He pushed her arm away. ‘Yeah.’ His mouth was dust dry. He didn’t know if it was the result of being caught napping or the sight of her in nothing but that wispy white nightdress. In the TV’s soft glow he could see the outline of her nipples against the sheer fabric.

  He closed his eyes and imagined diving back into the cool, dark ocean.

  ‘Are you still in pain?’

  His eyes blinked open again. She was looking at his pack of prescription painkillers on the coffee table.

  ‘No.’ Not the kind of pain you’re referring to. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘You didn’t sound fine.’

  He swore silently to himself. Had he called out? Made an idiot of himself? Ignoring the vague residual dizziness, he pushed up, set his feet on the floor and said, ‘How was the party? I didn’t hear you come in.’ He hadn’t realised how he felt about her enjoying herself until he heard the sarcastic edge to his voice.

  ‘If you didn’t go, you’ll never know.’ She passed him a tumbler of water. ‘Seems like you need this more than I do.’

  He gulped half of it down, returned the glass to her. ‘Thanks.’

  Obviously in no hurry to go upstairs, she curled her feet beneath her and sipped at the water. ‘Something horrible happened to bring you back to Oz after all this time. I’ve been wondering what.’

  Right now he wondered the same thing about his choice of location to recuperate. He could have gone to Acapulco or Hawaii. Found some warm and willing local girl to recuperate with. But for some reason he’d yet to fathom, because it certainly wasn’t for the love of family, he’d decided to return to Australia.

  Bad things happened but he didn’t want to talk about it. Not with the party girl who saw the world through a rainbow prism. What the hell would she know about real life? How could she ever understand what he did or why he did it? Nor did he want her to know. God knew, he wanted to protect her from all that.

  And yet … he’d never had someone like Lissa interested enough in his life to ask. Maybe because he’d never been around a woman long enough. A strange warm sensation settled somewhere in the region of his heart.

  ‘I’m not going to pretend I didn’t hear you in your sleep. Post-traumatic stress isn’t something to be ashamed of. Perhaps I could help,’ she finished softly.

  ‘Post-traumatic stress?’ A rough laugh rasped up his throat. ‘You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. I get the occasional migraine, so what?’ He pushed off the couch and headed for the stairs.

  ‘Maybe you should let others do some looking out for you for a change,’ she said behind him.

  He reached the first step, didn’t stop. ‘With you around why would I need to?’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  LISSA barely paused to breathe in the front garden’s tropical scents as she stepped outside. The warm Mooloolaba morning wrapped around her but she barely noticed. A gazillion thoughts were running through her mind—not Blake and that kiss that had turned her inside out last night.

  Although she did spare more than a passing thought for his nightmares. His haunted groans in the dark of night had chilled her to the bone. But unless and until he was willing to talk, what could she do? She shook her head. And he’d called her stubborn?

  So for now Blake’s living room was top priority. The living room was her focus. She had furniture and soft furnishings to select and order, paint to choose.

  But she glanced down at the unfamiliar sharp staccato on the paved garden path and slowed to admire her sassy red sling-backs. Nice. They brought a smile to her lips. She’d not bought a thing for over three months. Even if they were only bargain basement, they were shiny and brand spanking new.

  ‘Lissa.’

  She heard her name spoken in that deep sexy drawl and saw Blake coming through the front gate. No sign of last night’s terrors in those azure eyes. As he jogged across the lawn towards her ever
y other thought flew out of her mind.

  She came to a halt, her pulse doing a blip at the blinding sight of all that exposed bronzed skin. His upper arms gleamed with sweat, his navy blue vest-top was dark and damp. Short shorts revealed tanned, toned muscular thighs peppered with dark masculine hair.

  Last night he’d pressed those thighs against hers.

  She forgot she was on a mission. Forgot she had no time to waste, no time to linger over mere distractions. Even if the distraction was Blake Everett, with his musky scent wafting towards her. He looked like some sort of divine being sent from above. She blew out a heartfelt breath. Her shoes weren’t the only things worth a second look around here.

  ‘Wait up, I’m coming with you.’ He was watching her as he approached and she knew by the way his eyes suddenly darkened that he was thinking about last night too. You ‘re not ready for what I’d like to do to you.

  Until he’d walked off.

  Dragging her gaze away, she lifted her chin. His loss. ‘No time,’ she told him. She didn’t want him with her, reminding her of whatever shared delights he’d decided she wasn’t ready for and taking her mind off what she needed to buy. She keyed the remote to raise the roller door, then unlocked her car and tossed her bag on the front passenger seat.

  ‘Are you sure that’s all?’ He studied her far too astutely while he lifted a bottle of water to his lips.

  ‘What else would it—?’

  ‘Blake?’

  Lissa turned at the interruption to see Gilda from next door slipping through the front gate.

  ‘Blake?’ she called again. ‘It is you!’

  ‘Gilda Matilda!’ His face broke into a broad relaxed smile, something he hadn’t bestowed on Lissa, she noted with a curious feeling in the pit of her stomach as he changed direction and jogged towards the woman.

  Flawlessly made-up, their neighbour wore a stunning white sundress that no doubt came from some exclusive European collection. Lissa, in her new off-the-rack red skirt and cream jacket, instantly felt outclassed.

  Blake leaned down, dropped a kiss on her cheek. ‘You’re still living here, I see.’