No Rescue (4 page)

Confronted with death, was she snatching at life or was this real? Could she trust the sense of hope and anticipation?

She saw a SUV pull up on the side street and suddenly she was a Sydney Rapunzel, waiting on the balcony for her handsome prince — or should that be, staying with the fairy-tale landscape, her handsome captain of the guards?

Tad got out, head tipping back to look up at the balcony. The streetlight shone on his hair and showed the dark suit he wore. This was a formal date. He even wore a tie.

‘I'll be down in a minute,' she called.

‘Buzz me up.' He strode to the entrance.

She dashed to the intercom panel by the door and pressed the open button. Then she didn't know what to do. Hover? Open the door and go collect her purse? The apartment block was small and super-safe and she had a policeman on the premises. The open door would be fine. She opened the door and smiled as Tad appeared at the top of the stairs.

He hadn't wasted any time. Nor did his eyes leave her as he walked along the corridor. If anything, his gaze grew more intent until he stopped a micrometre from her.

‘Hi.' It was breathless because she was incredibly turned on, but at least she managed to say something.

Tad didn't say anything. His mouth came down on hers and communication of a very different kind turned volatile. His hands on her body created paths of fire and need. ‘Like your dress.'

‘Uh-huh.' Her neck was arched, her throat bared to his kiss.

‘Can I take it off you?'

She pulled back enough to look at him.

A smidgen of teasing and a lot of heat looked back at her.
Yes, yes, yes!
‘You booked a table.'

‘We could cancel.'

But because he'd asked, all her doubts had a chance to jump in and muddle around. Her body knew what it wanted.
Yippee! Bed this way.
But her mind was snared by what she'd like to think was caution and common sense, when she had a sneaking suspicion it was just fear. This sort of attraction was a high stakes game. You could win everything or break your heart. She couldn't handle heartbreak.

‘Actually, I'm hungry.'

The heat dimmed and the smile in his blue-denim eyes turned wry. ‘Then you'd best fix your make-up.' He released her with a long, slow stroke of his hand down her spine. ‘I'll wait on the balcony.'

***

Sinbad's Inn managed the difficult feat of making kitsch stylish. Brass lamps with multi-coloured glass sides hung from the ceiling and bead curtains were strung along the walls. Tablecloths, though, were crisply white and the music was low and genuinely Turkish — or at least, Miri recognised it from the belly-dancing classes she'd taken a couple of years ago. Being situated harbour-side, the restaurant's lights reflected in the water. It had a festive atmosphere, excellent service and even better food. She was grateful for the elegance of her little black dress.

Across the table, Tad blended. His dark grey, almost black jacket emphasised the breadth of his shoulders and his white shirt contrasted with his tan and the fairness of his short-cut hair.

They had been mostly silent in the car. For Miri it had been too short a drive. She needed time to understand how she could lose her self-control so fast with this man. Even in the car, it was as if he exuded sex pheromones. Twice she'd been tempted to ask him to turn around, to drive her back to the apartment and to come upstairs with her. His hand on the gearstick reminded her of his hands on her: the confidence and sense of rightness.

She craved more of the feeling, that she could be wild, yet safe with him; that she could have fun, as her sister had advised. Let go of all her anxieties and be in the moment. Freedom had never been so enticing — or so scary. She questioned her own sanity to want him so much after knowing him only a day.

But sometimes you did just know.

She'd put a hand to her stomach, trying to control tummy flutters of nerves and desire.

Tad had noticed. The city lights and glow from the dashboard had shown the tautness of desire in his face as the car had abruptly accelerated.

The restaurant helped. The sexual tension remained, but it was constrained and given rules by the public space and the rituals of dining. Conversation became possible.

‘Where is your parents' bakery?'

‘Bankstown. We all live around there.'

‘All?'

‘Three brothers, my sister and me. Plus grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. Mum's Lebanese. Dad's fourth generation Australian, Irish-Catholic.'

She had to give him credit. He didn't blink at this introduction of a large extended family.

Instead, he snapped the head off a charcoal-grilled prawn and ate some of the marinated meat. ‘So you went home today.'

‘Yes, to pick up the dress.' Which he'd liked so much, while she'd liked how he'd demonstrated his approval. She smiled. ‘And I had some work in the studio.'

‘You're working?'

She blinked. ‘Yeah.'

‘I thought — never mind.'

Filling in the gaps was too easy. ‘You thought I'd opted out.' Tears at the zoo, a borrowed apartment. She could see how he'd come to that conclusion. But that wasn't her. ‘No. I'm keeping my commitments.' Keeping her photography business ticking over, even if she'd scaled back to just doing the essentials. She'd lost her enthusiasm for life. Meeting Tad had brought it back, brought colour into greyness.

To learn that he expected so little of her was demoralising. The spicy prawn she was eating lost all flavour.

Miri breathed through a cramp of panic. The mood had shifted. This wasn't the fun evening her sister had told her to relax and enjoy. Miri looked around, re-assessing the stylish kitsch setting and what it meant. Tad hadn't chosen a casual café or a large cheerful bar for their date. When she examined the scene with her photographer's eye, she saw how the restaurant's lighting established pools of intimacy at each table, encouraging conversation and confidences.

Sinbad's Inn hummed with energy. It had filled up, all the diners expensively dressed and exhibiting the controlled assurance of successful people. They were people with responsibilities and ambition. Tad fit right in.

But he didn't think she did. He thought she'd simply abandoned her responsibilities when hard times struck.

Or was she projecting her insecurities, her self-doubt, on to him? Judging him more harshly than he'd judged her?

He'd always treated her with kindness.

Suddenly the weight of responsibility that came with starting a relationship seemed crushing; it was not an adventure but a frightening ordeal. How could you possibly understand another person's perspective, their inner life?

‘A situation like you went through has consequences. Everyone handles them differently.' Tad explained his assumption; defended it. ‘I thought you were taking a break.'

‘I'm not.' She tried to soften her tone, and failed. She winced at the note of defensive anger.

‘Fair enough.' Too neutral. A policeman's voice, trained to defuse a situation.

Washing their fingers in a bowl of lemon-scented water was a good excuse to let the topic drop.

She leant a fraction sideways to allow the waiter to remove the remains of their entrée. ‘How was your day?' The white wine she'd chosen was smooth and light. She could fake the same conversation. She wanted to recapture the sexy magic with which they'd started the evening.

He sipped his beer. ‘I was stuck inside. It's the one downside to being a sergeant — paperwork and personnel issues. The numbers of guys who mess up their private lives then bring that chaos to work, you wouldn't believe.'

She concentrated on replacing her glass on the table. So much for light conversation. ‘I probably would.' An employer wouldn't have given her seven weeks to get her head together. Maybe Tad's assessment of her as walking away from responsibilities wasn't so far off the mark. The wine glass was on the table, but she couldn't release her grip on it. Her fingers were too tight. This was how the horrible spiral of misery that had stolen her life for the last few weeks had started, and then she'd retreated from people. But she didn't want to retreat from Tad. Her own voice came out neutral, flat. ‘There are advantages to being self-employed.'

He didn't appear to notice the apathy of her response. ‘Absolutely. You don't have to be responsible to, or for, idiots. There's a guy my age. We went through the academy together. Josh is never going to make sergeant. He won't get his head straight. I end up having to freaking counsel him. Insane. He keeps getting involved in dysfunctional relationships, then brings his anger to work when they blow up in his face.'

Dysfunctional relationships. Possibly not the best topic for their first formal date, but Tad was deep in his story, deep in whatever it was about it that had bothered him during the day. Evidently, where she processed her problems by silently fretting over them, like a true introvert, he dealt with issues by getting them out there.

Alternatively, he could be trying to give her a sense of his life as a policeman.

He barely paused in his tale when the waiter served their mains: steamed fish with lemon and parsley with a side of spring vegetables for her, and a rich fish stew for him.

The waiter placed a basket of warm bread between them and departed.

Tad speared a piece of octopus. ‘I sent Josh to counselling last time. He's got the therapy jargon now, but it hasn't changed how he acts. According to him, he's a “rescuer” and that's fine. He's happy with an unequal relationship. Apparently it's the women's fault either for accepting his help then moving on, or else defeating his best fixes and dragging him into drama and disaster.'

The steamed fish was beautifully cooked, lightly seasoned, delicious, but Miri's appetite had vanished. She stared at Tad as he ate and talked. His frustration with his work colleague came through loud and clear, but so too did the relevance of his concerns to their fledgling relationship. She forked up a flaked piece of fish and waited for him to see it.

‘Is the Snapper good?' he asked. ‘Dad supplies the restaurant.'

‘It's perfect.' She ate the forkful, then set the cutlery down. ‘Do you have that sort of relationship history? Is that what's eating you?'

‘Pardon?'

‘Do you have a history of being a rescuer?'

He stopped eating and focussed on her. A frown drew his eyebrows together. ‘That is not what's going on between you and me.'

‘No? You thought I wasn't working, that I was sitting on my bum indulging in a pity party.'

‘You were free to go to the zoo yesterday, to meet me for lunch today. What was I to think?'

‘That I'm an emotional mess.' She wasn't sure how she could feel both angry and defeated, but she did.

He stared at her a long moment, then took a swig of beer. A typical Aussie bloke manoeuvre to gain time and calm down.

She tapped her fingers on the edge of the table.

‘I don't think you're an emotional mess, but the real issue is, do you?'

The direct challenge slid under her guard. He'd always treated her kindly, gently, so that she'd forgotten his toughness.

He was a police sergeant, capable of compassion, but also of controlling a bunch of raw recruits or a crowd of drunken partygoers. ‘I'm not a rescuer. Not in my personal life. I'm thirty, Miri. Too old for playing games. What's between us could be good. I can be there for you while you sort out your head. Friends do that. But I can't sort out your head for you.'

Her stomach muscles were clenched tight enough to hurt. ‘Just to say it, I'm not looking for a handsome prince to rescue me.'

He winced. ‘And if you were, it wouldn't be me?' He'd caught the anger in her voice and his tone was rueful.

Had he also noticed her pain?

She picked up her cutlery, determined to finish the meal. She would not be a coward. Of all the things she'd regret, cowardice wouldn't be added to the list.

‘Where do we go from here?' he asked. The sexual tension that had shimmered between them was dead and gone, an arid desert. The Turkish music rose to a haunting lament.

‘I don't know.'

‘If ever there was a moron…' Tad lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling. He was alone. He'd thrown his jacket over a chair and kicked off his shoes. If he hadn't opened his big mouth and gone on and on about Josh and his damned rescuer complex, he'd be in Miri's bed and most definitely not alone.

He swore.

The hell of it was not being able to shake the sneaking suspicion that his subconscious had raised the topic on purpose. Did he want to be single all his life? No! But faced with a woman who made him think of the future — as well as sex — he'd panicked.

‘Well, you sure fixed that problem, mate.'

Miri hadn't been able to leave the restaurant fast enough. Although the reason hadn't been merely his choice of conversation.

His gut clenched and his fists curled as he recalled the look on her face, the expression of hurt and betrayal before the flicker of dark lashes against the soft skin of her face hid her eyes and the brave tilt of her chin rejected his words.

I don't think you're an emotional mess, but the real issue is, do you?

Regret ate at him, feeding his anger. Not that his observation or quietly voiced challenge was wrong, but that he'd been stupid and insensitive enough to fall into sergeant mode when he wanted to be her lover. A lover recognised and respected her strength and resilience and didn't provoke her hostility with an ill-timed attempt at character growth.

He'd seen her vulnerability at the zoo yesterday. He knew damn well he should have gone more carefully. Been sensitive.

Instead, they'd eaten the remainder of their meal in tense silence punctuated by jerky, gunfire attempts at conversation. Neither had wanted dessert. He'd paid the bill, driven her home, and when he'd attempted to walk her to her door…