Authors: Ainslie Paton
“I’m sitting in a car about two hours out of Port Augusta.”
There was a long silence. Sean looked at the phone; hit the control to light the screen. Yeah, the call was still connected. “Stud?”
“You’re a stupid fucker.”
“I’m on leave. I can’t possibly be doing anything stupid.”
“Port fucking Augusta.”
“Yeah, nice this time of year.”
“You’re halfway to Perth.”
“No. I’m almost in Port Augusta. I’m on leave.”
“You could be on leave anywhere in world, mate. You should be on leave anywhere else in the world. You’re out. You know it. What the fuck are you doing?”
Another silence. Sean used it to listen out for Cait.
“I could just tell you the meeting is off and you could enjoy Port flamin’ Augusta.”
“Is it off?”
“No. Plane tickets have been acquired. It’s on. But, mate, you’re not. Too hot. Too over.”
Sean sucked in a breath and thanked his luck Stud wasn’t a cruel bastard. It was a chase the tail notion to go to Perth in the first place, at least the reason for the trip was still solid. “I know.”
“That’s why you’re sitting in a car halfway to Perth.”
“Yeah.”
“Stupid shit. Now tell me who.”
He played for time. “I’m on leave. I could have four willing slave girls in chains in this car and you can’t do a thing about it.” He’d have to tell Stud, but he wanted to check Cait wasn’t on her way back. He got out of the car and looked up the road. She was a tiny haze of sunlight and movement in the distance.
“Does Port Augusta have an airport?”
Sean laughed. “You’re all talk.”
“As are you, mate. What’s she involved with?”
It was almost impossible to pull one over Stud. He’d been at this too long to miss the signals. Still didn’t have to make it easy for him. “Who?”
“It’s a good thing we’re in different time zones, mate.”
“Was it the reference to a car that gave it away?”
“No, it was the intent to possess in that baritone of yours. What happened to sending her home when I called you? I can’t fucking believe she went with you. And since by now she’s sampled the possession, that she’s hung around.”
“No sampling. I needed a ride and she needed to get away.”
“You know I don’t believe either of those claims. But it does confirm something I’ve always wondered.”
“What?”
“Pencil dick.”
Sean laughed. He got back in the car, in the driver’s seat. “Since you’ve discovered my affliction, are you going to help me or not?”
Stud groaned. “Lay it on me. It’s not like I don’t have a full-scale undercover crime investigative team to run.”
He gave Stud the details while he adjusted the seat and the mirrors. The name of the business, Justin’s name and Cait’s suspicions about large scale tax evasion, which was probably fraud of some kind. Mostly what he wanted to know was who Justin was connected to and if there were any real grounds for Cait to be running scared.
“Not exactly our area. I’ll have to pull a favour. You owe me for this.”
“She’s scared, Stud.” He started the car. Then he remembered. He got out, opened the back door and found her towel. He got a bottle of water from the chiller. “I don’t know if I’ve got the whole story yet, but this is more than your average relationship gone bust deal.”
“What’s she to you anyway?”
“She’s my driver.”
“Right. Pencil dick.”
“You just like saying that when I’m yonks away and there’s no chance I can job you one.”
“
Moi
?” Stud laughed, using his broadest accent to mangle the French.
Sean eased the car back onto the road. Cait would be so pissed off at him for driving, she’d forget she’d cried in front of him and let him bully her into an argument. He’d rather deal with her anger than her sadness; feel sincere when he apologised for this small thing than fake it over what he’d forced her into. He wasn’t sorry for making her talk. Because the explosion had been every bit as good as he’d expected. Cait’s natural state wasn’t wallflower, pale and neutral. He’d had another glimpse of the person she was hiding. There was passion and strength and steel beneath the cool.
“Kennedy, you keep your head down. It’s not a big step from being on temporary leave to being on it permanently.”
Sean could see Cait clearly now. She was walking, long strides, her hands braced on her hips. “I hear you.”
What he heard was he should turn back now, or change direction or do anything but continue on to Perth, because hesitation was not Stud’s middle name. If he did the wrong thing here, Stud would bust him so hard he’d be lucky to be back in uniform.
“Yeah? You’ve probably got Mr Potato Head ears to go with that pencil dick.”
He was about to snap off some insult to Stud’s manhood when he realised he had bigger problems. Even though he was well back, she’d heard the car. “You’ve got my number. I’m going to curl up in a corner and cry now.” He hung up. Cait had started back towards him and she looked as though she could slice and dice him like a kitchen aid with her bare hands.
He pulled the handbrake on and got out. He held out the towel and the bottle of water.
She ignored them. “How can you be in law enforcement? You can’t stick to a single simple rule.”
“I wanted to save you the trouble of doubling back.”
“I—”
“Yeah, I know. You hate me.” He tossed her the water bottle and she caught it. He held out the towel and she took it.
“I was going to say I feel better.” That stopped his progress back around the car. “I’m not happy about what happened. How you pushed me, but I don’t know, maybe I needed to tell someone.” She looked drained. The peace offering of the towel and the water took the edge off her anger.
“I won’t push again like that, Cait. But I was worried about you. I don’t think you have a reason to be concerned about Justin. It sounds like common garden variety fraud. The worst that can happen is you’ll have to face a tax office investigation. That might get sticky, but I can help you get good counsel.” She watched him cautiously across the roof of the car. “If you want to talk I’m here. If there’s anything you’re genuinely frightened about you should tell me. I can help.”
He opened the passenger’s side front door.
“Sean.” There was a school teacher firmness to the way she said his name. There was still a chance he’d have to hitch into Port Augusta.
“If you even think about driving this car again I will leave you in the desert to die without a second thought.”
He got in the car. He hid his grin. It was good to know things between them were back to normal.
Port Augusta was the southern gateway to the Northern Territory. Which meant plenty of desert where you could leave a person to die of dehydration. Caitlyn should’ve found that a comforting thought. Macabre. Twisted. But oddly reassuring, like winning at who’d had the worse childhood.
She paced about her room at the Augusta Westside Motel. Sean was three doors down. They’d skipped lunch and rolled into town early, cruised the city centre, had a late afternoon snack and checked in here. All done with a gentle layer of polite consideration and respectful distance. The plan was to stay two nights. Sean was very clear about the fact she had two nights and a full day between them off. Time to do whatever she wanted without reference to him. He’d do his own thing. She wasn’t to worry.
She couldn’t sit down for worry.
Worry she might’ve interpreted him wrongly after all. It’d been a long and confusing day. But when she examined everything he’d done, she didn’t think she could possibly have it wrong.
He was interested in her. He cared.
Gah!
That was soft soaping it. He liked her. His eyes had nearly fallen out of his head when she’d come through the door in her gym gear that morning.
He wanted her.
Of course he’d retreated again. But this time his retreat was only a feint. Like the dodge he’d done when he made his getaway from the Red bikie. He’d retreated to draw her out. And out it had come. Nearly all of the truth.
How did he know she’d needed to talk? To tell someone what she’d been through. He was either truly supernatural at sussing people out or she’d learned nothing about being a sucker. She felt oddly light. Like she was the one who’d had bags of hair cut off, like she was the one who was shedding a hated skin.
It wasn’t quite the same as ripping off the bandaid, but it was close.
She ran a bath and got in. The idea was to read, enjoy her evening. She got through a chapter of Favel Parrett’s
Past the Shallows
and realised she had no idea what’d just happened to the two little boys on the boat. She needed to start again. She put the book aside. She looked through the water at her body. It was a copy of her mother’s. Slender, fine boned, but with well defined muscles. It was a body that gave her flexibility and grace and a strength that was surprising for her stature. Justin had called her cute. But her mum had been beautiful almost until the day she died, and when Cait looked in the mirror it was her mother’s face with her large eyes and high cheekbones, narrow chin and full lips that looked back.
Sean thought she was beautiful. He’d said it with words and he said it when he looked at her. She was lovely to him.
And the way he’d held her when the shameful waterworks came. Not like she was a child, falling apart. Not like she was incapable of supporting herself, but like he understood her need to lose control. Like he’d support her till it passed. There’d been nothing either parental and patronising, or grasping and sexual in the way he’d stroked her back. Nothing of the moment where he’d made her heart thud in her ears just by saying hello. It was entirely therapeutic and completely antiseptic, like a splint or corrective taping for a limb.
You had to trust a man who could do that on the same day he’d rooted you to the spot with the lust in his eyes.
He’d made himself a focus for her anger. Even getting behind the wheel. He didn’t do it because he was a rev-head who saw an opportunity to get his kicks. He’d driven at walking speed till he’d caught up with her. He’d done for her what she’d done for him. But she’d done it out of professional courtesy and a deepening fascinating for the man who was so much more than a bikie messenger boy.
What he’d done for her was personal.
She stood up and grabbed a well-laundered towel. Her body felt sensitive to its pile. Each swipe of the fabric reminded her of touches that would soothe, demand, excite. Sean’s touches.
She didn’t have it wrong. She wanted him as much as he wanted her. It was time to stop being so defensive, to stop running.
It was time to rip the bandaid off.
She dried her hair and let it fall loose around her shoulders. She cursed her meagre wardrobe with its lack of fit, lack of surprise. It couldn’t be helped. If things went the way she planned, she wouldn’t be wearing clothes long.
So what was that plan? Seduction: to give herself over to hot, heavy, thoughtless sex with an extraordinary man who made her senses spin in a way no one ever had. It was inappropriate, inadvisable, unprofessional, and as necessary as water to make life bloom in the desert.
Outside his room she could hear the TV. She checked herself. Was this really what she wanted? She knew she was vulnerable, and in a way, so was he. She could barely remember wanting anything more. Maybe for its sheer unexpectedness, or relief at her own audacity; her ability to act boldly again after months of being too scared to do anything but hang in the shadows. Or maybe because when that man looked at her he saw through her awful clothes, her fears and insecurities, and he still wanted her.
She knocked. The TV went off. He called, “Cait? Is that you? Hang on.” He opened the door, half dressed as usual. She let herself look, really look; without feeling shame for the first time. He was awe-inspiringly gorgeous. There was a direct connection between the way he stood there and the way her breathing changed. He was a magnet drawing oxygen out of her lungs, making her labour to drag more in, and each breath fanned out inside her body bringing with it a drug that infused her with nervous excitement.
A flicker of confusion crossed his brow. “Hey, did you come to offer me a dressing change?” He held the door in one hand and the doorframe in the opposite. His posture opened his body up to her study. Like architecture, like art. But there was no more, look but don’t touch.
“Can I come in?”
“Ah,” he hesitated. “Sure.” He dropped an arm, stepped aside, and she walked into the room. It was a replica of hers. He dragged a hand across his head as though he’d forgotten he’d lost the hair and it made her smile. He narrowed his eyes. “Is something wrong?”
“Yes.”
“What, tell me?”
“This is wrong. This,” she gestured between them, “you and me.”
He sighed. “I’m not apologising for pushing you today. You needed to talk.”
She shook her head. “That’s not it.” This was harder than she’d reckoned. She hadn’t thought this part through. He was supposed to know what she wanted. That’s what he was good at doing—intuiting. He was a freaking genius at it, so why was he being so dense now?
“What then?”
“You over there. Me over here.” She wasn’t sure she could say it out loud.
“What are you saying, Caity?”
“That I’m not here to offer to change your bandage.”
“I’m picking that up.”
She swallowed, her throat tight. “I’m here to offer you me.”
His eyes widened and his chest muscles flared, but his voice was orange flavoured caution. “Cait?”
She could feel her face burning. “Oh God.” She’d never tried to seduce a man before, why did she think it would be easy with a man who could see through her every motivation?
He closed the distance between them in two steps. He was soap and water and the sharp sting of menthol and she was thoroughly wrapped in him like a precious gift is wrapped in fine crisp paper and curling ribbon.
This was a different hug to the one in the dust. This one wasn’t comfortable. It was prickling with sudden heat and driving stabs of want. One of his arms was tight across her back, the other was tangled in her hair.