Читать книгу Dreaming Of... Australia - Annie West - Страница 16

THE universe wanted her to resolve this, clearly.

If it didn’t, it would have left well enough alone and allowed her to just walk out of that café and never see Sam Gregory again outside of her dreams. Now here he was, in the rock-hard flesh, leaning casually on the counter of the airport coffee lounge with his back to her, wearing a light, earthy sweater and sinfully snug jeans.

Her throat tightened just slightly. It had to be a bad thing that she knew him so instantly from behind.

The weeks of separation hadn’t done a thing to scrub him from her mind. If anything the passage of time had only exaggerated him in her subconscious. And six days of anticipation since she’d agreed to the State Government’s request hadn’t helped her to be ready for this moment.

If anything they’d made it worse.

She stopped just a few safe feet from him, suppressed her natural urge to get closer, and took a deep, confident breath. ‘Sam.’

Nothing.

She stared at his oblivious back. His broad shoulders shifted just slightly and his right foot tapped on the edge of the counter’s kick-bar. She caught a flash of a white wire poking from his ear.

Was he … dancing?

While her stomach ate itself from the inside? Clearly this wasn’t as big a deal for him.

She cleared her throat and laid her fingers on his warm bicep to get his attention.

He jerked with surprise, then turned and smiled at her, yanking earphones from his ears. He quieted the tinny tsss-tsss with the press of a button in his pocket.

Warm eyes rained down on her and her stomach tumbled in on itself. ‘You came. I wasn’t convinced you’d actually show up.’

She almost hadn’t. Should she be trusted with Sam on an interstate flight? Spending her days in close confines with him? Staying in the same hotel? He hadn’t got any worse smelling since she’d last seen him, and the texture of his sweater screamed touch me.

She tucked her hands behind her back before she experimented to see if the front of it was as soft as the back. ‘Your department was responsible for saving my life and it cost them a lot in equipment and manpower. Coming along on this promotional tour is the least I can do to repay them.’

Even if it put her heart at significant risk.

He took her carry-on bag from her and turned for the check-in area. ‘Apparently we made quite a splash with the public that day in Canberra. My boss’s boss wanted this.’

‘You didn’t?’

He chuckled. ‘More time in the spotlight? No, thanks.’ Then his eyes found hers. ‘But I’m not sorry I get to see you again. I hope to handle myself a bit better this time around.’

Aimee frowned. Straight back into awkward territory. Oh, well, since they were already here … She took a quiet breath and asked as casually as she could, ‘Melissa not with you?’

Was it wrong that she wanted him to say yes almost as much as she hoped he’d say no? Having his wife along would solve an awful lot of problems.

‘Ah … Three days away from work is more than she could swing. Some imminent breakthrough on an ice shelf project.’

‘A what?’

‘She works for the Australian Antarctic Division. She’s been studying fracture patterns in ice shelves.’

He’d said Melissa was smart. Foolishly, she hadn’t believed him. She’d thought it was just what people said about their spouses. ‘At least I can bring my work with me. Transcription goes wherever I do.’ She looked around anxiously for inspiration. ‘So … We’ll be talking to schools?’

Talking to schoolkids was another tick in the pro column for coming along: the opportunity to share what she’d discovered about herself during that twenty-four hours on the mountainside. She’d needed quite a few ‘pros’ to outweigh the big three-lettered ‘con’ scrawled in the other column.

S.A.M.

‘I think so. And some Victorian volunteer groups. Their Parks and Search and Rescue services are separate up there.’

‘So this is about more than just publicity?’

‘Not for the department, but for me I look forward to the chance to talk to others in the field. Share expertise. Bring something new back to my team.’

‘Sounds like we’ll be busy.’ If there was a God.

‘I think there’ll be some down time.’ His blue eyes seemed to turn luminous.

Oh. Great.

Aimee struggled to generate small talk until their flight was ready for boarding. Then getting on the plane and seated and into the air knocked off a good thirty minutes. She busied herself with the in-flight magazine, flicking pages she wasn’t reading. It helped keep her from thinking about the way Sam’s thigh pressed into hers in the tight seating. And how she was going to survive three days up close with him.

He leaned over the armrest. ‘You know, we could probably use this time to get to know each other better.’

If eyes could get whiplash hers would have needed that neck brace he’d once given her. ‘What?’ she choked, half afraid of the answer. But only half.

‘For your book. We never did finish that interview.’

Oh. ‘No. I kind of blew that on my last question.’

His lips twisted. ‘What question? I thought we were forgetting that. Do you have your recorder?’

She slipped it out of her handbag a little too keenly. When had she started so thoroughly hiding behind her job? She wanted Sam in her book, no question, but she could do it without his wife being in it. Leaping in on his marriage hadn’t been premeditated, but her subconscious had definitely acted with intent.

Now Sam was buying into her folly. But, as gift horses went, he was a pretty good-looking one.

‘You’re sure about this? I’ll need to ask you about Melissa.’

He took a breath. ‘Why don’t we start there? Get it out of the way? I promise not to be reactive.’

A non-reactive man? Another novelty. Assuming he could pull it off. She lowered her food tray, sat the recorder on it gently and pressed the red button.

‘How old were you when you married?’ she asked over the hum of the jet engines.

‘Twenty-one.’

Wow. That made her feel like an old spinster at twenty-five. ‘Young. Is that a Catholic thing?’

‘It’s a Gregory thing. We don’t believe in wasting time.’

His smile was gentle, and she grew aware of how big he was in the cramped seat next to her. Her heart kicked up She shook her head to stay focussed. ‘How did you even know who you were at twenty-one, let alone each other?’

‘I knew. Plus Mel had been a fixture in my family for a long time because of her friendship with my brother.’ He studied the digital recorder and didn’t quite meet her eyes, making her wonder if there was more to that story.

‘How does she feel about the work you do?’

Pained creases appeared above his brow. ‘It bothers her. The hours. The disruption to our routine. She’s a creature of habit.’

‘You being at such risk?’

She’d never seen eyelashes flinch, but Sam’s did. ‘She doesn’t like thinking she could be widowed. The financial uncertainty. I get that.’

The warm glow inside her responded to the misery in his voice. Defending his wife was automatic. Could he hear what he was admitting? Melissa wasn’t worried about losing him, only her husband, and apparently a large chunk of the household income. ‘You never considered giving up the Search and Rescue stuff?’

He lifted his eyes. ‘When we have kids. Yes.’

‘Which haven’t come?’

She knew it was a mistake before the words even left her mouth, but he didn’t react. Not the way he had to her suggestion his marriage wasn’t solid. This time it was totally unconscious—a deep pain in his eyes. It hurt her to see it. She shifted tangent smoothly.

‘You live in Hobart?’

He picked up the new direction gratefully. ‘Mel’s work has its head office there, so it was a necessary move for her research.’

Necessary. Word choices like that often led her to the true grit in someone’s story. If only she had the courage to pursue it. On anyone else she wouldn’t have hesitated … But every urge she had to dig into Sam’s life suddenly felt loaded and a bit wrong. She hedged instead. ‘Quite an achievement, given her young age.’

‘She was so excited the day she told me she’d been successfully promoted. It had been a long time since I’d seen her so animated.’

‘You were happy to move? Away from your family?’

The look he gave her was pointed. And conflicted. ‘We both thought it would be a good idea for us to … start our own lives. Somewhere different.’

‘Must have been tough.’ And there must have been another reason.

The plane engines were too loud to waste effort with empty words. He just nodded.

‘But you had each other. That’s something.’

His nod continued, shadows lingering around his gaze. But then they cleared as if by conscious effort. He came fully back to the present. She grew almost uncomfortable under his steady regard as his eyes lifted.

‘You’re very easy to talk to, Aimee.’

The compliment warmed her and filled her body with helium. But she wasn’t about to take it to heart. She couldn’t afford to. ‘People say that. I guess it’s because you have no emotional stake in me. Like talking to a bartender.’

He snorted. ‘You don’t go to many bars, obviously.’

She wrinkled her nose. ‘No, not many. Does that not happen?’

‘Not outside of the movies.’

‘Oh.’

‘Besides, it’s not exactly true, Aimee.’ Blue heat simmered.

‘What’s not?’

‘We’re hardly strangers,’ he said. ‘We’ve been through a lot. I … we’re friends. Aren’t we? No matter how unconventional our meeting was.’

She hesitated to speak, fearing that if she opened her mouth the echo of her hard-hammering heart would come out instead of words. She nodded.

‘So it’s not true that I have no emotional stake in you at all.’

Her breath caught around the thumping in her chest. What in the world was she supposed to say to that?

‘Plus there’s …’ His hooded gaze was crowded with every thought running through his mind as he deliberated. He reached out and turned off the mini recorder. ‘The Kiss.’

Mortified warmth flared through her whole body. Had she really expected the topic to never to come up? She’d spent a lot of time analysing that kiss these past months, reliving it. And though she’d had a hard time regretting giving in to the impulse—even once she knew about the existence of Mrs Gregory—she was sorry for the way she’d forced it on him.

But she’d never expected it to earn uppercase status in his mind. The Kiss. And she’d really never expected him to raise it so openly.

She struggled for the right words. ‘That was my fault, Sam.’

‘I wasn’t chasing an apology. But I think we need to talk about it. Get it out of the way.’

Really? She just wanted to pretend it had never happened. ‘I’m not sure examining it is going to explain it. I was overwhelmed with fear and you were the one keeping me sane. I just needed the … human contact.’

Did she get any points for half-truths? Or did she lose one for the half she was hiding?

‘Aimee, you don’t need to justify why you did it.’

She frowned. ‘Then why raise it?’

He glanced around them at the half-empty plane and then leaned in. ‘Because it’s stayed with me.’

She stared at him, her breath thinning. Her mental oxygen mask dropped down. ‘Stayed?’

‘I was on the job. You were hurting. I totally understand why you did it. But what I don’t understand …’ his blue eyes pierced hers ‘… is why I let you.’

Her tongue threatened to stick so firmly to her palate that it would be impossible to speak. She was sitting on a plane, heading for a hotel in a different city with a married man she’d non-consensually kissed, taking about said kiss….

She squirmed. ‘I didn’t really give you much option—’

‘You were tied to your seat. I could have moved out of your reach easily. Why didn’t I?’ His stare burned into her. ‘And why haven’t I forgotten it?’

It was hardly going to be uncontrollable lust—for a woman covered in blood and dirt and soaked in her own urine. She stared at him and shook her head: silent, lost.

The chief steward’s even tones streamed out of the overhead speakers, advising passengers that they were commencing their descent into Melbourne. She had no idea what he expected. So she did the only appropriate thing.

She brushed it off with a hollow laugh.

‘A mystery for the ages!’

His eyes narrowed. ‘It doesn’t bother you?’

Time to lie! ‘It bothers me that I did it. I’m embarrassed, of course.’

‘But that’s all?’

Time to run! She unclasped her seatbelt. ‘I’m just going to … Before we land. I’ll be right back.’

But before she’d made it to the next row she heard him behind her. ‘We’re going to have to talk about it at some point, Aimee.’

She fled. Down the aisle and into the toilet before the seatbelt light came on. She made the most undignified exit of her life from the most excruciating conversation of her life about the most unforgettable kiss of her life.

She slid the ‘engaged’ knob into place as if it would save her life.

Sam watched the little unisex toilet symbol flick from green to red and he sighed. Pretty appropriate, really. The little man represented him and the little woman represented Aimee. It only took one conversation to push the two of them from an amiable green to a cautionary red.

Red for embarrassment. Red for anger. Red for incendiary.

Take your pick.

The two of them existed perpetually on the edge of an inflammatory zone. His pulse was still pounding. The chemistry between them hadn’t eased off since that day at the awards ceremony. He rubbed his thigh where it tingled from pressing against hers. All that unspent tension had to go somewhere.

Even after weeks apart it was still live.

Simmering. Just waiting for an excuse to flare up.

Enough to rattle both of them. Enough that he’d forgotten himself and started a conversation that he’d have been better off not having. So why had he started it? Was he so desperate to forge a connection between them? Or was it because it was the only legitimate way he could relive that moment? The moment on the rock-face when Aimee went from being his patient to something more meaningful.

Something she wasn’t asking to be.

Something he couldn’t let her be.

But he did enjoy riling her. The colour that flared in her cheeks … The glitter of her eyes … The defiant toss of her hair …

He adjusted his position in the cramped economy seat as his body celebrated the image.

Or maybe he just regressed to being nine years old in her presence and stirring her up was the equivalent of pulling her plaits to get noticed.

Maybe he really was that lame.

Either way, he needed to get a handle on it. They had three intensive days of promotion to get through, and they weren’t going to be any easier if he kept teasing her into hiding. They were both adults, and now colleagues. This was officially a work trip. Attraction or not, if he couldn’t count on his own best judgement then he’d have to count on his professionalism to get him through.

He glanced at the little red symbol above the bathroom again.

Assuming she ever came out.