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The bright explosion of light wasn’t in her mind, Romy realised. It was real. The fireworks entertainment had started, bringing all the fundraiser guests out into the garden, only twenty metres from where she was half naked in a doorway with her legs wrapped around a Special Forces operative.
Chapter Eight (#ulink_a13d0d7d-b056-5165-afcf-21b53d67420a)
‘LET me down.’
Her voice was tight and cold where moments ago it had been hot and wet against his lips, moaning against his ear.
Clint lowered her carefully to the ground, using his body to shield her from the view of any other drunken idiots who might wander by. He was in no condition to turn around, anyway, so giving Romy a moment to pull herself together was a win for both of them.
What the hell had he done?
Her chest heaved with her gasping breath, highlighting her perfect cleavage a treat from his height. The shadowed curves begged him to worship them. That’s what he’d done. Let his hormones overrule his head. The thing he was trained never to do. Sex, alcohol, fear—none of which were supposed to affect his judgement or his precision.
Except it wasn’t only hormones. His heart was getting involved now, and where in his many years of training did anyone say anything about hearts?
‘I need to get out of here…’
Her face was pale, her hair and makeup dishevelled. No way could she go back in there tonight looking as if she’d been doing exactly what she had been. It was hard to tell what upset her more, getting hot and heavy with him…or being caught doing it.
‘Romy—’
She thrust both hands in front of his face. ‘Don’t, Clint.’
He stepped away. Her shields came up faster than on the Starship Enterprise.
‘I need a minute…’ Her breathing was erratic.
She pressed past him and his stupid, starving body still leapt at her touch. It hadn’t been that long surely? Did he have no resistance left whatsoever? Blinding flashes of colour went off above them. Each one painted her face a different shade of pale.
She started to stumble off. ‘I’ll meet you by the car.’
‘I’ll just go in and give our—’ she was gone before he’d finished ‘—apologies.’
He closed his eyes and punched both fists against the wall on a curse. He’d really screwed up this time. As if sharing his difficulty around strangers wasn’t stupid enough, he’d also pretty much mauled her in the back alley of a pub. Slammed her against the wall.
Nice. Real nice.
His straining body reminded him that he’d be buried deep inside her right now if they hadn’t been interrupted. He’d be coaxing tiny sounds out of her beautiful throat. It’s where they were heading. He was, anyway. Galloping there. And not just because he had three years of abstinence at his heels. He shook his head and called himself every name under the Australian sun. It satisfactorily dowsed the surge in his trousers so he could walk inside, find their host and make apologies. Absolutely the last thing he wanted to do, but exactly the sort of thing Romy would do if she was able.
And so he did it for her.
It meant forcing himself into a room crowded with faces he didn’t know, convinced he was marked with a giant B for bastard, and certain half the room knew what he’d just done to Romy Carvell out in the alley. Heat flamed under his choking tie.
He wasn’t an idiot. He saw how the townsfolk rallied to keep her occupied on the dance floor. It meant they’d accepted her as one of their own and even taken her under their collective wing. In a way they never had with him. Even Steve Lawson had fronted him when things got a bit tense out there.
And given that Sergeant Lawson was one of very few people authorised to know what he did for a living before coming home to WildSprings, that took some fairly big cojones on Steve’s part. But he’d done it for Romy. They all had.
What was it about her that had an entire town running interference? Trying to protect her.
Had him wanting to protect her…despite tonight’s complete stuff-up.
Romy marched up and down the rows of cars neatly parked on the football field behind the pub, breathing deeply. Even a town like Quendanup and the surrounding districts could turn up a big crowd when it wanted to. The dazzling fireworks show went on overhead and insects crash-darted into her, blinded by their attraction to the floodlights that kept the forty vehicles securely lit.
She stared at a large, fuzzy moth that plopped, exhausted, onto the dusty bonnet of a Land Cruiser. It flipped uselessly on singed wings and then lay twitching in the breeze. Stupid things—they’d fly themselves quite literally to death before they’d learn not to orbit the dazzling floodlights.
Remind you of anyone?
She kicked back into gear and resumed her manic pacing.
Just. Stay. Away. How hard could that be on a property as big as WildSprings? What kind of masochistic moth was she to keep putting herself within burning distance of Clint’s brilliant glow? He wasn’t obvious and showy like the almost-day football lights. He was darker, closer to an ultraviolet black light—harmless to the naked eye but irresistible to hapless moths passing by.
And entirely deadly.
Thoughts tumbled, unordered, through her mind. Was it wrong to want to march right up there and climb back into his strong arms? To discover what their two bodies would have felt like coming together? To give herself until midnight and only then face the real world?
Lord, it tempted her.
She’d been so disgustingly good her whole life. Restrained and reasonable and safe. The single blot on her copybook was that fateful night when the Colonel’s bullying had finally driven her to brand her body and then give away her innocence to a stranger. Both of which, as it transpired, were completely irrevocable.
And now this. Letting herself get involved with the most inappropriate man possible. Damaged, reclusive, military goods. The third stupid thing she’d done in her life. But at least this she had a hope of walking away from.
‘Ugh!’
Agony shot through her left foot as two inches of her three-inch Manolo sank to the side in the soft turf of the football field while the rest of her dropped like a stun-gun victim the other way. The delicate tangle of tendons and muscles in her ankle wrenched violently.
As if her night wasn’t ruined as it was—now her beautiful dress would have grass stains. And not from anything worth getting grass stains for! She rolled onto her side to slip her foot out of the trapped stiletto, and then pulled herself up against the bumper of a nearby 4WD, drawing her foot to her body and pressing her hands around her damaged ankle. Shocked tears welled dangerously.
You’re not seriously thinking about crying?
The Colonel’s voice again. Romy sucked in a series of deep breaths and looked around urgently for something to focus on. Studying the minute details of objects—anything—had always helped her head off the tears her father wouldn’t tolerate.
Light from the fireworks bounced in a beautiful spectrum off the broken headlight of the vehicle she was half hanging onto. Her arm looped around the roo bar and she pulled herself into a more upright position, ignoring the sharp stab in her leg. Any second now it would be a nasty throb and then a horrible ache.
She stared at the way the light fragmented and bounced off the many facets of the shattered headlight, depending on where she moved her head. Amazing how light worked. It really was very pretty. The wash in her eyes trebled the effect. She swiped at them with her free arm while hoisting herself further up into a sitting position on using the heavy 4WD for ballast. Sure enough, the tears eventually subsided.
Thanks for something, Colonel.
Romy reached down and slipped her remaining shoe off and tossed it over to its offending partner. Her ankle didn’t so much scream as moan.
Twisted, then, not broken.
As she prepared to pull herself up onto her good foot, the final fireworks of the evening went off with a loud crack. Thousands of bright embers showered earthwards like a supersize sparkling jellyfish, falling harmlessly to the ground and throwing a daylight-bright glow onto everything around her. One tire of the 4WD was right next to her face and the fireworks lit it perfectly. Romy stared, knowing exactly where she’d seen that distinctive tread before.
On a seldom-used track at WildSprings.
She shoved away from the roo bar in disgust and scrambled over to her shoes, ignoring the sharp protest of her injured ankle and knowing this was the same view that kangaroo would have taken to its grave. From below, the vehicle was all wheels, chrome and bug-encrusted grille. The tread marks at the scene had been so distinctive. There couldn’t possibly be two of them in the same district.
She scrabbled for her clutch purse, pulled out her mobile phone and called up the photo from the roo-strike site. It matched these tyres perfectly. She snapped a new one, this time of the tire itself, a second and third of the vehicle emblem and the broken headlight and finally the registration plate on the 4WD.
How she’d love to get her hands on whoever was driving roughshod through her park.
Her park? Ooh, that felt way too good on the lips.
She shoved her phone back into her clutch and started to push herself up, trying to right her legs from their awkward, splayed position. Like an obscene Barbie doll someone had tossed to the ground with its glamorous outfit all hiked high.
‘Romy, what the hell have you done?’ Clint appeared from nowhere and scooped her into a standing position, taking most of her weight. She tugged at her dress, desperate to restore some dignity. But, really, what was the point?
She opened her mouth, about to tell him about the 4WD and its tyres.
‘Seriously, can I not leave you alone for five minutes?’ he muttered, shaking his head.
She stiffened in his hold and her chest tightened up. Now that was classic Colonel. Would Clint never see her as anything other than an amusement to be humoured, comforted or rescued? Even after running his hands all over her in the alley?
He bent to lift her into his arms. All thought of the 4WD fled. ‘What are you doing?’ she cried, lurching away from him, balancing on one leg and counterbalancing with her clutch and her shoes in the other hand.
His handsome face frowned. ‘I’m going to carry you to the car.’
‘Like hell you are! I can get there myself.’
‘Really?’ He straightened and glared at her, all hints of desire gone. He glanced down where she held her damaged foot carefully off the ground. ‘Fine, knock yourself out.’
With my luck I probably will.
She braced her shoe hand on the bonnet of the 4WD and used it as a crutch, pitching away a metre. She regained her balance and then pushed herself forwards until she hit the front of the next car in line.
‘Romy, let me help. Please.’ He growled right behind her. ‘I’ll just pick you up.’
‘No.’ Her concentration frown was so intense it almost marred her view and she braced herself on the bonnet and then pushed off on her good foot.
This might actually work.
‘Then let me be your crutch…’
‘You’re too tall.’ She lunged towards the next car in the row and nearly missed, catching herself on the bad ankle. She wasn’t quick enough to swallow the cry.
‘For God’s sake, let me carry you.’ He was right there, hovering.
She couldn’t touch him again. Not without crying. ‘Clint, no! I need to do this by myself.’
Need to? Where had that come from? Damn.
He backed off—just a little—and let her go, shadowing close behind. It was excruciating in pain and speed but she would have dragged herself home with her fingernails to get her point across.
She was a capable woman. He needed to see her as one.
About halfway to her car she remembered the 4WD, and roughly three-quarters of the way there she decided not to tell him about it. She wanted to solve it first. Come to him with a resolution, not a problem. She had contacts in the police department who could run those plates on the quiet. Give her an idea of who was yahooing in the park.
She lurched onwards.
Finally, she reached her Honda, practically gasping with exhaustion. Clint stepped around in front of her, took one look at the unshed tears in her eyes and his lips thinned impossibly further. But his voice dropped down a measure.
‘Have you quite finished with the Xena: Warrior Princess act?’
She dashed at her lashes. ‘If you hadn’t been here I would have had to get myself to the car. Why would I do any different just because you are?’ Just because I’m dying for you to hold me.
His frown doubled. ‘If I wasn’t here, you wouldn’t have been aerating the pitch with your heels in the first place.’
True enough. Romy collapsed onto the passenger seat and swung her good leg in, then carefully lifted her damaged one beside it. ‘Do you mind driving?’
His expression answered for him. He crossed around to the front of the car and then slid in behind the wheel. The interior light faded as soon as his door closed and he turned the key she passed him too hard, double-jacking the motor.
She stiffened in her seat. She and anger didn’t play well. She’d spent a lifetime trying to avoid conflict with her father; she didn’t need it in her new life in the country. Sitting right beside her.
But it looked like conflict had found her.
They drove out of town in complete silence, not even the radio to provide some light relief. Simply breathing felt like wading through congealed molasses. She fixed her stare out into the inky darkness, trying to ignore Clint’s tangible simmer.
Failing.
Angry-Romy was all tuckered out. Being mad was too much work. Reasonable-Romy hopped from foot to foot in the wings, waiting for her chance to get a word in.
It came.
Running away from him without a word had been rude. She’d kissed him willingly. He hadn’t forced her to spear her hands through his hair or press her mouth to his throat. Those were her decisions. And she’d run because of the whole military thing—
Liar.
The little voice shocked a gasp out of her. Clint glanced sideways at her briefly through the darkened cabin, then tracked his attention back onto the road ahead.
Tell the truth, girl.
The Colonel. Relentless about honesty and personal responsibility. She frowned into the night. It was the truth! Wasn’t it? She took herself back to that darkened doorway, relived the feelings. Clint’s power, his confidence. The broad, hard contours of his shoulders. The short, sexy spikes of his newly cut hair. The way he’d shielded her with his body from prying eyes. She’d responded to all the parts of him that were classic military.
Her eyes rounded in the reflection of the side window as she realised. She hadn’t run from that part of him, she’d run towards it. Even in heels. The capable, military part of him was attractive to her on a primeval, fundamental level.
She blew out a confused breath. ‘The last time I had sex I got pregnant.’
Amazing, really, that he didn’t drive clear off the road. But his voice was tight when he finally spoke. ‘Excuse me?’
Romy took a deep breath. ‘It was also the first time I had sex. Which would pretty much make it the only time I’ve had sex.’ Oh, for crying out loud, she couldn’t even stop saying ‘sex’ around him.
He glanced over at her, confused. ‘You’ve had one sexual encounter in your life and you got pregnant out of it?’
She shrugged her shoulders, too casually. ‘I’m the reason young girls are warned about the first time, I guess.’
He glanced between the road and her. Twice. On a curse, he slammed the brakes and pulled off into a lay-by, cutting the motor and staring at her in the darkened car.
She returned the stare. Then she couldn’t stand it any longer. ‘For two years it was all about surviving my father, protecting my baby. After that I had a toddler to raise and food to scrounge together. By the time Leighton was at school I’d kind of…gone off the whole…romance thing.’
