Читать книгу The Firefighter - Susan Lyons - Страница 8

Wearily I shuffle down the hospital corridor in a pair of paper slippers, carrying the bounty given to me by a kind nurse. A face cloth, towel, comb, toothbrush and toothpaste. There are no showers for ER patients, but I can sponge off the soot in the toilet.

I’ve discovered toilet is the word the blunt Aussies use for a restroom. Why do you go there? To pee, mostly. So, call it what it is.

Except, right now my dehydrated body is less interested in peeing than in getting clean. I stand at a sink and stare into the mirror. The face staring back makes me wince.

I’d rather not spend my first morning in Australia in the emergency room, but then, I have nowhere else to go. The only person I know here is Nana, who’s been admitted and is sleeping peacefully after having her leg set. They’ll keep her today and tonight, under observation. The break’s no problem, but she breathed more smoke than I did, and she’s older. More vulnerable. But everyone’s assured me she should be fine, so I’m hugely relieved.

Along with guilty. She was my responsibility. I shouldn’t have fallen asleep without checking to see that she was okay.

If I can find some place to go, they’ll discharge me now. They tested my carbon monoxide level, and, good girl that I am, I passed that test like I’ve passed every other test in my life. Even so, I look like crap and feel seriously grubby.

I start the water running, balance hot and cold, fill the basin. Then I dunk my head and use antibacterial liquid soap to wash my hair and face. I towel myself, then comb my hair and fluff it up with my fingers. The color’s okay, a ruddy shade of brown that looks like nutmeg. But it’s short, fine and limp. Even with my expensive cut, it’ll go flat in no time without styling gel.

My gingery lashes cry out for mascara and my eyes, the same Wedgewood blue as Nana’s, look like they’ve had a rough night. Thank God I at least have great bone structure.

I give my reflection a tired smile, then use the face cloth to give myself a sponge bath.

Okay, now I’m ready to tackle my future.

No purse, wallet, credit cards, passport or other ID. No clothes except the revealing hospital gown and silly slippers.

The logical thing would be to wait until offices open and phone the lawyer who’s handling Auntie Bet’s estate.

Pride overrules logic. I can’t let this be his first impression of me. I’m here in my professional capacity as a lawyer, to handle Nana’s affairs. I want to meet the Aussie solicitor looking like a businesswoman, not a waif.

That leaves Nana’s friends in Clifton Beach.

But she’d hoped to surprise Trev. She hadn’t told her “mates” when we were coming, wanting a day to rest up from travel and get herself prettied up. I don’t want to spoil her fun. The woman’s going to be in a cast for the next few weeks; she deserves every moment of fun she can wring out of life.

So, I’ll have to phone home and ask my family to wire money to a bank.

Nana and I had called them yesterday to say we’d arrived safely. Now I’ll have to confess that I, the person they’d entrusted with her well-being, almost let her burn to death.

I step into the bustling corridor and head in search of a phone. Just which family member will I select? Doesn’t matter, the news will spread like wildfire.

Fire. The very thought makes me shiver.

“Hey, Tash McKendrick. ’Ow ya goin’?” a male voice calls from behind me.

Behind? Quickly I spin around, grabbing the back of my gown with my free hand and pulling the edges together. Too little, too late, I fear.

And how did he recognize me anyway? Not to mention, know my name?

I’d have recognized him anywhere. God knows how, since all I’d seen was a few inches of face, but I know this is my firefighter.

His eyes are blue. Brighter and more vivid than mine. Summer sky blue, against tanned skin. And his hair’s glossy black, damp, a little longer than I’d guess is typical for a firefighter.

The man is even better looking than I’d first thought. He’s the kind of guy who looks equally good in a tux and in casual clothes such as he’s wearing now: jeans, a blue T-shirt worn un-tucked, some kind of rucksack slung over his shoulder. Tooled cowboy boots.

Hmm. Interesting. Cowboy by day, firefighter by night?

“You feelin’ all right?” he asks, and on him that Aussie drawl sounds incredibly sexy.

His question makes me realize I’ve again gone off into a trance, just looking at him. I flush, from head to toe, as I gaze into those eyes and, yes, it happens again.

Another moment, like last night. A spark leaping back and forth, ready to ignite.

Wow, is this what they call chemistry?

I absolutely will not say, “I want you.” At least not in words. So I clear my throat and find neutral ones. “Yes, I’m fine, thanks. They’re discharging me.” Swallowing smoke has made me hoarse, but the effect’s not bad. I’ve got that Dietrich thing going on.

I glance away from the intensity of his eyes and come back to reality. We’re in the middle of a busy hospital corridor. A couple of nurses forget their hurry, though, and dawdle by with their gazes fixed on my companion like he’s an oasis in a desert.

Or a firefighter, in the middle of a blazing fire.

Which reminds me…“You saved my life.” I stick out my hand. “Thank you.”

He gives an easy smile. “No worries.” Takes my hand, holds it, then something’s flowing back and forth between our linked hands. Something fizzy as champagne that makes my entire body zing with awareness.

Thank God the hospital gown is baggy because I know my nipples have beaded. Could use a pair of panties though, if he hangs onto my hand any longer. This man definitely makes me hot.

He’s grinning a lazy, suggestive smile. “Can’t say it was too much hardship, carrying you out of that house.” His gaze flicks down, then up again. Nearly naked. That’s what he means.

This man actually likes my body. He doesn’t even seem put off by my un-madeup face and unflattering gown.

And there’s one thing I know for sure. This is a guy who can afford to be picky when it comes to women. I can just imagine the way they must throw themselves at him.

Speaking of which, it’s probably time to disengage my hand from his. Which I do, reluctantly. “Not that it’s not, uh, nice to see you, but why are you here?”

“C’mon, let’s get out of people’s way.” Clearly he knows his way around the hospital because he’s soon found us a curtained-off cubicle that’s empty. “I checked at the front desk and they say your grandmother’s coming along nicely.”

“She is.” And how sweet of him to ask about her.

“The house didn’t do so well, sorry to say.” He drops a shoulder to let the rucksack slide off, and I dart a glance to his left hand. No ring. He pulls something out of the bag.

At first I haven’t a clue what it is, this blackened, twisted lump. Then…“My purse.”

“Your ID didn’t make it through the fire. You’ll want to replace your credit cards, passport, driver’s license.”

I don’t want to touch the purse. “The house is really bad?” No one at the hospital has been able to answer that question.

His eyes soften with sympathy. “Looks like it’ll be a tossup, whether to restore it or tear it down and start over. Sorry, we did all we could.”

I realize he must have just come off shift, after fighting to save Nana’s house. “Thank you.” But God, what a mess.

“Neighbors said you and your grandmother just arrived last night?”

“Yes. She inherited the place from her sister. We were going to…” Well, we hadn’t resolved what to do with it. Could we sell a burned-out wreck?

“You got a solicitor here?” he asks.

I draw myself up a little straighter. “I am a lawyer.”

His eyes crinkle in a quick smile. “No offense. Just meant, if a solicitor was handling the estate, there’d be adequate insurance coverage.”

“There is. I’ve seen the policy.”

“So you shouldn’t suffer any financial loss.” He grimaces. “Just lots and lots of inconvenience.”

“Yeah,” I agree gloomily.

“You don’t want this?” He holds up the purse again.

It had been navy, like a lawyer’s purse should be. But the leather had been the softest, finest imaginable. I’d paid a lot for it. One of those feminine indulgences like my silk lingerie that reminds me I’m a woman.

It can be replaced. Like the house. Like my passport and credit cards. My clothes, jewelry, everything I’d brought with me that I loved. The important thing is, Nana and I will be okay.

I can’t tear my eyes away from my purse. If the man who held it in his big, long-fingered hands hadn’t come along when he did, Nana and I would be in much the same shape as it was.

For the first time, it really sinks in that we could have died.

The trembling begins in my hands, moves up my arms, then my whole body’s shaking and my eyes are filling and overflowing.

“Hey, now.” He sounds alarmed, but the next thing I know, he’s reached out and gathered me in.

My shaking arms wrap around him and cling. Tears pour down my cheeks.

“It’s okay,” he says. “Everything’s going to be okay.”

He’s right. We could have died, and the fact that we didn’t makes everything else—the losses, the inconvenience and hassles—trivial. Unable to speak, I nod, the movement brushing my nose against his soft T-shirt. Making me aware of the warm, hard muscles underneath.

“I d-don’t do this,” I manage to gulp out between sobs. “I’m n-not the emotional type.”

“Can see that,” he says dryly. Then, “It’s shock. Everyone reacts differently.”

The tears are easing. Emotion spent, relaxing against him, I become aware of the way my senses drink him in. A tangy soapy scent that tells me he showered recently, those fantastic muscles against my cheek. Cautiously my hands move on his back, exploring, finding another set of impressive muscles.

His body stiffens for a moment, then relaxes and now his hands begin to roam. Down my back. One slips inside the opening of the gown and touches—no, caresses—my bare skin just above my waist.

I suck in a breath. Let myself move a little deeper into his arms.

Bring my belly up against the front of his jeans and press, feel him respond.

So’s my pussy, not to mention my tits and pretty much every other square centimeter of skin. God knows how I moved so quickly from tears to super-arousal. Maybe it’s that life-and-death thing.

But he’s feeling it too. His cock’s rigid against me and under my cheek his chest is heaving. He lets out a soft groan.

I turn him on?

This really is an upside-down land, where a man like this reacts to a girl like me as if he’s been on a desert island for the last ten years, and I’m the first woman he sees when he gets off.

Not that I’m complaining. My ego is loving it.

“You don’t mean this,” he mutters. “It’s not me, it’s just reaction. From the fire.”

“And what are you reacting to? The fire as well?” I raise my head so I can see his face. He’s a firefighter, so maybe fire’s a turn-on.

His dark cheeks are flushed, his eyes blazing. “God no. You. Just you. But I shouldn’t. You’re vulnerable.”

Vulnerable? The fire, my tears, of course he’d think that. But he’s also the hottest man I’ve ever seen, and the only one who’s looked at me this way. Yes, I could have died last night. And that means, if there was ever a time for carpe diem, this is it. I’m going to seize the day.

And the man.

“Not vulnerable,” I tell him. “Horny. For you.”

He gives another groan, then as if he can’t help himself reaches down, cups my bottom in both hands through the gown and pulls me up even harder against his erection. I wriggle against it, wishing we were both naked.

Want you. My whole body is saying it, and his is answering back.

“You’re not going to turn me down,” I tell him.

He gives a choked laugh. “Nope. Be a fool to do that.” He starts to bend down for a kiss, then suddenly straightens. “Crap, we can’t do this here.”

Oh God, we’re still in the hospital. I’d lost all sense of my surroundings but now I hear voices on the other side of the screen. Did they hear us too? Hear me proclaim my horniness?

I flush. “No, not here.”

We both loosen our grip until we’re holding each other lightly, bodies barely touching. Staring into each other’s eyes. This is a dream, it must be, for him to look at me with this hunger.

“But we’re definitely gonna do it,” he says, and it’s not a question.

“Oh, yeah, we’re gonna do it.” A shiver of pure lust ripples through me.

“Then let’s get out of here.”

“Yes!” Then reality sets in. “Oh no, there’s paperwork to sign, and I need to check on Nana, leave a phone number.” I bury my face in my hands. “God, I don’t have a phone. Or clothes, or any money.”

He grabs one of my hands and tugs it away from my face. “No worries. Let’s go do it.”

“Do…it?”

A wicked grin, a slanting wink. “I like the way your mind works, Tash McKendrick, but I meant the paperwork.”

With a start, I realize something. “I don’t even know your name.”

“I’m Mick Donovan.” He grins widely, squeezes my hand. “G’day, Tash, and welcome to Oz. How’dya like it so far?”

His smile is infectious so I give him one back. “It’s been an adventure.”

“You ain’t seen nothing yet.”

His words prove truer than I’d anticipated. I hadn’t figured that, half an hour later, I’d be roaring down the wrong side of the road on the back of a silver Ducati motorbike, my arms wrapped tightly around Mick’s lean waist.

Wearing pajamas, a bathrobe, hospital slippers and a motorcycle helmet.

This is definitely not my Vancouver lawyer image.

On the other hand, I’m in the land Down Under, where not a soul knows me. The thought is amazingly liberating. So’s the rush of wind. And the knowledge that Mick Donovan wants me.

It’s like I came out of that fire a new woman. A sexy, attractive one.

A gutsy, probably insane, one.

The old Tash would never take off with a man she didn’t know. Wear PJs in public. She’d never prioritize sex ahead of arranging for replacement credit cards.

The fire must’ve fried a few brain cells because at the moment I don’t give a damn about where I’ll sleep tonight and how I’ll acquire a decent set of clothes. Once I’d reassured myself that if anything happened with Nana the hospital would phone Mick’s cell phone—or mobile, as they call them here—I had only one thought in my head. To get naked with Mick.

From everything I’ve seen and felt, I know he’s going to have an amazing body. I wrap my arms tighter around him, snuggle closer against his T-shirted back, feel his muscles flex in response. My nipples perk up under the cotton pajama top, and the throbbing of the bike between my thighs is giving my pussy ideas.

To distract myself, I concentrate on the scenery. Where is he taking me?

From the hospital in Cairns he’s headed into a residential neighborhood. Older homes sit side by side with modern apartments, and there are enough exotic flowering trees and shrubs to tell me I’m in the tropics. Not that the warmth of the October sunshine wouldn’t have been enough clue.

Mick pulls up in front of a red brick building that looks like it might be a fourplex, with two units up and two down.

Awkward in the clothes the hospital gave me, I scramble off the bike. My body’s definitely achy and my skin feels as dry as I imagine the Outback must be. Any chance Mick stocks body lotion?

“Come down with cold feet?” He looks concerned. Disappointed.

Have I? No, I just got distracted by the strange scenery and my aches and pains. Now that those blue eyes are focused on me, I know perfectly well why I’m here. And it has nothing to do with cold anything!

I shake my head. “D’you realize this is my first morning in Australia? I’ve been here less than a day.”

“Then let one of the locals make you welcome.” He reaches for my hand.

I take it eagerly, my aches dying away as a transfusion of Mick vitality surges into me.

Or is that lust?

He takes me around the outside of the building to the back, where I get a quick glimpse of a courtyard garden with flowering plants and a water feature with a nude cherub, then he points to a flight of steps to the second story. “You live here?” I ask, wondering about that cherub.

“Rent the flat above the landlady,” he says. “She’s a sweet old duck.” He winks. “Pretty much deaf, too.”

And why would I care if she was deaf? Does he think I’m a screamer?

If so, he’s going to be disappointed. I’m a good enough lover—I know all the moves—but I’m not one for raking my nails down a man’s back and screeching like a banshee.

The stairs are narrow and he starts up ahead of me, with an animal-like grace. He thrusts open the door, grabs one of my hands, pulls me inside and then we’re kissing.

For a first kiss it’s—OH MY GOD.

Usually there’s some fumbling, testing, trying to find the right angle. Wondering how soon to open. Figuring out if the other person’s a sucker, nibbler, slobberer.

Mick is—I have to say it again. OH MY GOD. Perfection.

He has the best lips imaginable. Soft but firm. Gentle but utterly masculine. He teases, sucks one corner of my mouth. Lazily, like he has all day. But he pulls me close, very close, and his erection is talking a whole different, more urgent, story. My pussy’s an eager audience.

His seductive lips flirt across my top lip, suck the bottom one, then his tongue licks the seam between them.

I’m so lost in the sensations, I don’t even know if I’m responding or just standing there in a state of bliss, letting myself be kissed.