Aussie Rules (14 page)

So did her next bite when she caught sight of Bill Watkins coming in the front door, frown in place, eyes cold.

She'd written his check, it was on Dimi's desk, but that didn't mean she had to see him. She looked up into Char and Al's knowing glances.

“Quick,” Char said, pulling Mel through the kitchen. “Out my back door.”

Al waggled his brow at Char and murmured in her ear, “I'll take your back door, baby.”

Mel rolled her eyes but ducked beneath the counter and through the tiny kitchen toward the door that opened onto an alley behind the row of leased hangars. She blinked into the bright sunny day, running down the alley across the way and into the maintenance hangar, where she stopped to huff and puff for a moment. She really needed to exercise more.

“What are you doing?”

With a gasp, she whirled, and faced Ernest, who stood there with a scowl and a broom.

Great,
now
he was cleaning. “Nothing,” she said defensively.

“Ah, Jesus.” He took off his baseball cap and scratched his head. “You running from Bill again?”

“No, I—”

“Pathetic,” he grumbled, slamming his hat back on. “This never happened when Sally was here.”

“Really?” she answered a little hotly, but then again she
was
hot. “Because I remember lots of times having to wait for a paycheck, something you've never had to do with me in charge.”

He sighed. “I'm guessing you don't want to be found.”

“No,” she admitted, expecting him to say “too bad” and call Bill in here, exposing her for the fun of it.

Instead he jerked his head behind him. “Go on.”

She blinked at him. “What?”

“You hard of hearing now? I said go.”

Didn't need to tell her twice. She took off.

“And don't run like a girl!” he called after her.

She kicked it into gear, heading back outside, straight for the next hangar, where they kept their overnight clients' planes. With no one waiting on their plane, the hangar would be dark, cool, and blessedly empty except for boxes and boxes of old records they kept there, and probably lots of the spiders Ernest loved.

The door was locked. Fumbling with her key ring, she finally got the door open and slid inside, and then carefully locked herself in.

Then she turned to eye the space around her and crashed right into a hard, impenetrable chest.

M
el opened her mouth to scream but a hand clamped over it. An arm held her immobile. And in that beat of time, she recognized the wall of lean, hard strength, and gritted her teeth.

Bo
.

“Well, now, look at what I have here, all nice and breathless for already…”

She bit his palm, and with a hiss, he pulled his hand away from her mouth. But he didn't let go of her. With both of the hangar's big rolling doors closed and no lights on, she couldn't see him clearly, couldn't see anything but his tall, solid outline. In the still, musty air, she could smell oil and fuel, and something else. Something just as unfortunately pleasing.

Man. Her face was inches from his throat and she thought about biting him there as well but then he bent his head, putting their mouths a breath apart.

From deep inside her came a quiver, a little hopeful surge as her body said,
Oh, please, let's have him.
“Let me go.”

“You sure say that a lot,” he noted.

“You have your hands on me a lot.”

“Know what I think? I think you like me. In fact, I know it. So let's admit the rest. You want me. And as luck would have it, here I stand, ready and willing to let you take full advantage of my body.”

To go with that outrageous statement, he turned them both, pressing her back against the door, holding her there while his hands glided up her sides, grazing her ribs, the outside curves of her breasts, and just as she sputtered with his audacity, he slid his fingers in her hair, palming her head, holding her still as he lowered his mouth.

“Don't,” she whispered, still panting, from her run—or so she told herself—grateful now for the dark because he couldn't see her face, and the longing surely plastered all over it. She didn't understand that about herself, how she could want
him
of all people. “Don't even think about it.”

“Oh, I'm thinking,” he assured her in that honey of an Aussie voice, the voice that even now was coaxing her right out of her comfort zone.

“And more than thinking,” he warned her.

She shivered, then locked her knees. “Do anything, and you'll be walking funny tomorrow.”

Cocky to the bone, he laughed, then pressed that long, rangy, tough body even closer. “You sound all whispery and needy. Why's that, darlin'?”

“I was running!”

He gave a slight shake of his head and his nose grazed her jaw. “You want me. You want me bad.”

She went for a laugh but it sounded more like a moan. Damn it. She locked her weak knees. “You are so delusional.”

Now his lips actually skimmed her throat, and goose bumps rose over every inch of her body.

“Admit it,” he said.

“I have no idea how you fit inside any door with your big head.”

“You think
that
head is big…” He nudged his hips closer, rocking another part of him against her, right in the vee of her thighs.

Oh, God. Her knees wobbled again but she lifted her chin. “You are such a
boy
.”

“There is nothing boy about what I've got for you,” he assured her. “It's all man.”

“And it's all one-sided, you know.”

Another soft, knowing laugh. “Okay.” Another brush of his lips over her throat, then the spot where her neck met her shoulder. “You keep telling yourself that.” He stroked a hand up her ribs and cupped a breast. A thumb rasped over her nipple. A little sound escaped her lips before she could stop it, an unmistakable sound of desire that floated in the air between them.

Lifting his head, he met her gaze.

“I'm cold,” she lied.

“It's ninety degrees in here, Mel.” His thumb continued to tease her nipple. His other hand glided down her back, cupped her butt, and then dipped between her legs.

Her shocked gasp reverberated in the charged air of the silent hangar.

Echoed.

His fingers pressed on just the right spot and she actually whimpered for more.

“Yeah, you're just cold,” he rumbled softly in her ear. “Cold as ice. That's why you're melting into a little pool of longing at my touch.” Continuing to nibble along her collar bone, he murmured, “This is bound to happen, you know.”

Because she was afraid that was true, she got mad.
“Back off.”

Still holding her with his hands…God, those hands…He smiled wickedly down at her. “I'm telling you, it's a waste of time to fight it.” He stroked his fingers over the seam of her jeans, pressing in just…the…right…spot—

“Oomph,” escaped him when she stomped on his foot. “Okay,” he muttered, “you
can
fight it.”

She made a scramble for the door, then stopped short.
Aw, hell
.

“Just remembered what brought you here in the first place, huh?” he asked, sounding amused. “Who is it, Bill again?”

She put her hand to the door. “Damn it. Yeah.”

Turning to face him, she slid down until she could sit on the floor. “Why are
you
here?”

He sat next to her, companionably taking her hand in his as they prepared to wait. “I've told you. I want to know what happened to the Beechcraft and my father's money.”

“No, I mean
here
. In the hangar. Why are you here?”

His gaze slid to the boxes of old paperwork, and suddenly, she knew. “You've been snooping.”

He shrugged. “A bit.”

“Find anything?”

Another shrug of a broad shoulder.

She closed her eyes. “What's going to happen, Bo?”

“I'm going to talk to Sally, and if she can pay me back, she can have her deed and I'll be out of here ASAP. If by some miracle she has the plane, I'll be ecstatic. Either way, little'll change for you.”

Her stomach tightened, though she wasn't sure whether that was because she couldn't produce Sally, or because he'd said he'd be out of here ASAP. “We've got to have that staff meeting. Tell them.”

He looked at her with shocking gentleness. “If you're ready.”

It didn't escape her that this wasn't a power trip for him, he truly didn't care when and if people knew he was holding the deed, and more than her stomach quivered now—her heart as well. “You ever wake up and think,
How did I screw up so badly?”
she whispered.

A half-smile tugged at his mouth. “All the time, mate. All the time.”

 

They had the staff meeting at the café, where they'd been having their meetings once a month for years. But in all that time, Mel had never felt as nervous as she did now. Palms damp, stomach jangling, she looked around at everyone sitting at the table with her, surrounded by the sunshine-yellow walls, by Al's pics, the tempting scent of fresh cookies on the tray in front of her. “Thanks for staying a few minutes late.”

Ritchie looked at his watch. “Is this going to take long? I've got a hot date.”

“Yeah, with his own fist,” Kellan murmured beneath his breath, making Al crack up and Ritchie punch him in the arm. Danny separated them with a shove.

Ernest wasn't paying any attention, he was entering some notes in his spider book. Char was fussing with the cookies, adding more to the tray.

Dimi met Mel's gaze, drew a deep breath of her own, then put her hand over Char's. “Please,” she said softly. “Mel needs your attention.”

Mel drew a deep breath of her own and carefully didn't glance at Bo, standing just at her right. He'd been quiet, solemn, surprisingly free of quick wit and sarcasm, even going so far as to ask her if she was okay.

She wasn't.

But that wasn't his responsibility. “I have some things to clear up,” she said. “And it might seem confusing and unnerving, but I promise you, I'll do everything I can to make it all okay.” Another deep breath. “Bo…”—she hitched a shoulder in his direction—“isn't my ex.”

All eyes swiveled to Bo.

“Huh,” Ernest said.

Al scratched his head. “Makes sense.”

Because, naturally, in the real world, Mel wouldn't be able to get a guy like Bo. Great ego boost…

Ritchie looked at Bo. “Does this mean you don't hum when you…you know.”

Bo shook his head.

Char spoke a little breathlessly. “And you don't have a teeny, tiny—”

Again Bo shook his head.

“He's Eddie Black's son,” Mel said. “The man Sally fell in love with and went to Australia for ten years ago.”

Dimi clasped her fingers and stared down at them as her knuckles went white. Danny shifted closer to her and touched her arm, but she shook her head.

Ritchie and Kellan hadn't been around long enough to know Sally, but she'd been spoken about in such detail they thought of her as a legend. Eddie was definitely the bad guy in their eyes, and their mouths fell open as they stared at Bo.

“Why are you here?” Al asked him.

“I'm getting to that.” Mel looked at each of them, the people she'd come to care about and love, as if they were her own blood. “He's here because Sally deeded Eddie the airport before he died. Bo is holding that deed.”

Everyone let out a collective gasp.

“If that's true,” Al said, “what took ya so long to come here and claim your spoils?”

“The deed has been in my father's things all this time,” Bo answered. “But because I was in the military, I just recently found it.”

“You're Eddie's beneficiary, then?” Ernest asked.

“Yes.”

“What about your mother?”

Bo's mouth was grim, his eyes shadowed as they had been that one other time Mel had heard him discussing his mother.

“She's out of the picture,” Bo said.

Silence followed this as everyone digested the meaning of what they'd been told. Mel watched Bo, aware of something in his voice, a carefully banked emotion. He didn't give anything away, though, nor did he say what a disappointment all this had been, or what he'd expected to find: the Blacks's life savings, not to mention an extremely valuable—both monetarily and emotionally—1944 Beechcraft.

Dimi was watching him, too, and Mel knew she was shocked that he hadn't revealed Sally as a possible thief and con.

“How do you know the deed's legit?” Ernest asked.

“I checked,” Mel said.

“So you're, like, our boss now?” Ritchie asked.

“Look, I don't know exactly what will happen,” Bo told them. “But for now, yes, I hold the deed, and everyone's job stays the same. No one's getting sacked.”

“For now,” Dimi said faintly, and covered her mouth.

Danny wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Is Mel still manager?”

Bo looked at Mel. “If she wants to be.”

Mel looked at him right back. No, she couldn't just pretend everything was the same. “For now,” she said, eyes locked on his, “that might be more of a coposition.”

Everyone fell quiet again, a very strained quiet that spoke volumes of everyone's worry about Mel's job.

“Hey, costatus is good enough for me,” she told them, trying to lighten the mood. “I can fly more.”

Bo's eyes widened slightly, clearly surprised at her unexpected support.

“Maybe we could all get raises,” Ernest said slyly.

Bo smiled just as slyly. “Help me increase business, and you got it.”

“Increased business sounds good,” Al said, obviously trying to help smooth the transition. He squeezed Char's shoulders. “Hon?”

“I'm up for that, too.” She lifted the tray of cookies. “Why are there still cookies?”

Everyone dove in and began talking, but the tension remained, and Mel's cookie stuck in her throat.

 

After the meeting, everyone went their separate ways. Dimi tucked away her latest novel, removing it from beneath her keyboard to her bottom desk drawer. Then she turned off the computer. They'd had more customers today than in a long time, and it had been a good receivables day.

Thanks to Bo.

She gritted her teeth as she headed into the airport bathroom, but fact was fact: Bo might now be ruler of her world, and he was also good for business.

Not that it mattered, her safe, cozy, happy little world was done for.

How long would he keep her?

Her stomach dropped as she stared at herself in the mirror.
God
. She needed a drink, she was shaking for a damn drink.