The House On Burra Burra Lane (21 page)

He let her down in the doorframe to the living room. She put her hands over her ears. An army had trained its machine guns onto the roof and fired. Blasting sounds of hail on metal echoed in her head like a war.

‘You fool, Sammy,’ Ethan said, bending to her, shouting in her ear. ‘You shouldn’t have been standing there, the roof was off!’ In that second a thunderous noise grated around them. It shock-waved through her body, an excruciating, tearing sound of timber and metal, grating and crashing in a tornado of noise.

‘Make it stop!’

‘It’s the shed, it’s not the house.’ Ethan grabbed her jacket, yanked her into him. ‘You’re safe now. It’s nearly done.’

She hid her face against his chest, trying to suffocate her trembling.

The noise lessened. It didn’t stop, it thundered on but sounded farther away.

‘I can’t find Duke,’ she said.

‘He’ll be hiding somewhere, he’ll be fine.’ Ethan’s arms tightened around her.

Poor Duke, stuck outside in this. If she kept saying it over and over in her head, like a prayer, maybe he would get through, all on his own.
Be lucky, Duke.

She forced herself from the comfort of the man holding her, pushing away from him. ‘I can’t bear standing here. I want to do something.’

‘Not yet.’ He dragged her back. ‘Don’t worry about anything now.’

There was too much to worry about. It would have to be dealt with, pointless worrying until she knew what had been damaged. Another few minutes and it would be over. The sun would come out and slide down a rainbow. There’d be a lot of flooding though. The new troughs in her kitchen garden would be nothing but mud drowning the gravel path; they hadn’t rebuilt the boundary wall yet.

She looked up at Ethan. ‘Why did you come here?’ He was crazy to have driven through this.

‘Just as well I did.’

He was grim. Moody.

They stood for minutes, no words. The hail had stopped, it was rain lashing her house now. The sound of it hitting the metal roof wasn’t as frightening as the hailstones, but it still resonated like a marching band of angry soldiers looking for the next fight.

The wind was cold, blowing through the open kitchen windows, taking a tour of her house. The kitchen was flooded; she could see it from across the hallway, water seeping into the hall and soaking the carpet.

‘How did you drive through this?’ Perhaps he’d dragged himself from Morelly’s bed, and that’s what had put him in a foul temper.

‘I managed.’

Felt he had to help her, the city woman with a pile of tools she didn’t need, and no idea how to save the chickens.

She jolted. ‘My chickens!’

‘For God’s sake, Sammy, be still.’

The tightness in her chest was a destructive anger, a little mean too. ‘Don’t tell me what to do.’

‘You’re soaked.’ He let her go, pulled his big oilskin coat from his shoulders. ‘Take that jacket off.’ He shrugged off a fleecy inner lining jacket and gripped it between his thighs as he put his oilskin back on.

Sammy wrenched the lightweight jacket from her shoulders, and shivered as Ethan swung the fleece around her. Then he paused, gazed down.

Sammy peered at his hooded eyes. He’d gone still. She glanced down at herself, and held her breath. Her clothing was soaked and sticking to her body, showing the outline of her nakedness.

She hunched her shoulders beneath the fleece, hiding her breasts and their pointy nipples. She wasn’t wearing underwear, she’d got dressed in a hurry, anxious about her property and her animals.

‘Do you think the shed has collapsed?’ she asked quietly, letting the warmth of the fleece calm her. If Ethan hadn’t come she’d have been smashed under the shed.

He shook his head. ‘Probably not completely. Nothing we can’t mend.’

She lifted her face. ‘I’m sorry I shouted at you. I was so shocked I couldn’t move from the shed. I thought my house might catch on fire. I knew I had to switch the electricity off but I couldn’t move.’

He gazed down at her. ‘I know. I turned the electricity off when I was looking for you. It’s alright now.’

He’d come to find her. He’d come to help her. What was she supposed to feel about that?

‘I was scared,’ he said.

His eyes were dark, measuring the depth of hers, looking for something.

She opened her mouth, about to ask him where Julia was, then snapped it closed tightly. It wasn’t any of her business. ‘I’m okay,’ she said instead, thinking he needed to see her restored to her normal self.

‘And what about us, Sammy? Are we okay?’

He stood quietly, but tension radiated from him. He swallowed, opened his mouth to speak.

She looked away.

‘Are we?’ he asked.

Don’t, she begged him silently. Don’t say anything more.

‘Why were you so mad at me yesterday?’

She didn’t answer but wanted to shout at him. Shove him fiercely away; two hands on his chest and one big push. Instead, she threw herself against him.

He caught her.

She pressed her face to his chest. Inhaled the smell of him, and scrunched her eyes tightly closed.

‘Why were you mad at me?’ he asked again.

He was doing the friend thing. He had to make things better between them. He didn’t like discord. Or did he already know why she was mad at him?

Thunder crashed and she startled. ‘Don’t ask me that. It’s up to you what you want.’ She groaned. Should have kept her mouth closed. Should have stayed away from this solid chest that smelled of ice and wind.

‘Sammy? Answer me.’

If she kept her voice low he might not hear her through the noise of the storm. If she just breathed it, it would be spoken. Out. Gone from her. And she needed to voice it aloud. ‘I don’t want you to go out with Julia.’ It was less than a whisper, and muffled in the cloth of his shirt and an oilskin pocket.

‘I don’t want to either.’

He’d heard her. Her stupid heart should be hammered to smithereens. Never knew when to stop giving, always wanted to give.

He lowered his face to hers, his mouth by her cheek. ‘There’s someone else I want to be with.’

She kept her face pressed to him, took a breath and shivered inside his fleece.

‘You might know her.’

She shook her head, face still buried in the cloth of his shirt.

He shifted, loosened his grip on her a little. ‘She’s beautiful.’

She looked up then, and knew she wouldn’t be able to look away.

‘I want to look after her too much, and she doesn’t like that. She’s independent.’ His mouth came so close to her cheek his breath warmed her skin. ‘I want to hold her hand,’ he whispered. ‘I want her to walk with me awhile.’

She sucked at her bottom lip, bit it.

‘She has three lonely freckles on her nose.’ He lifted a hand, touched the hair at the nape of her neck. ‘And her hair curls after the rain.’

Tears welled in her eyes.

‘Do you hear me?’ he said. ‘She’s irresistible, and I fell for her.’

‘You’re the irresistible one, not me.’ She clamped her mouth closed, furious that she’d spoken from the heart.

‘Am I? Is that what you think?’

He offered so much more than her. He had strength and safety to rely on, and eyes that engaged a person, and skills that helped people. She wanted to tell him so, wanted him to know how fine a man he was and that she would try not to be angry with him. That she’d give good, sensible friendship. But the words that came from her mouth spoke only of her wish to take. ‘I want you to kiss me again.’

He touched her nose with his thumb, slid it gently down and away. He cupped her face with both hands. ‘They’re still there,’ he said. ‘All this time, I didn’t know if they were real.’ He bent and placed his mouth on hers.

All the fractious sounds around her disappeared. A stream of comfort trickled through her body. He smelled cold but his body was warm and his mouth heated pleasure. Much more than a brief touch, it was a deep kiss. His chin rasped against hers as he brushed his mouth to her cheek and came back to give more pleasure to her lips. If she could only stay like this, she’d be content to purr in his arms until the end of time.

‘Sammy.’ He only lifted his mouth a little way, but compensated for the loss by putting his arms around her. ‘Will you walk with me awhile?’

‘I don’t understand.’ She missed his mouth already. She gazed at it, willing it back to hers.

‘I don’t deserve it,’ he said, ‘but I want to walk with you across fields, show you animals, fish the river with you, and catch a hold of some of your joy.’

Uneasiness pulsated through her, cautioning her. ‘There’s an awful lot of nonsense beneath my joy, Ethan. You’ve seen it. I don’t want to trip you up with that.’ She’d been told so often that she gave nothing but frustration. Nobody had recognised her sensitivity about that.

‘There’s that head talking again,’ he said. ‘What does your heart want?’

Nobody recognised her … except Ethan. He understood her. ‘We’ll lose our way.’

‘Walk with me.’

‘If we do this, we can’t go back to what it was before.’ She shook her head, denying it for them both. ‘We can’t be friends again. I won’t be able to handle that.’

He watched her, waiting, she knew, for her thoughts to still. He was giving her time, which meant he’d already thought it through for himself.

‘Can we go back now?’ he asked at last, catching her very thought.

They were moving away from friendship. It would never be the same between them. She had no knowledge of where it would take them, but her need was there inside her, wrapped around her heart.

He kissed her again, insistent but gentle. She softened into it.

‘I want to make love with you,’ he murmured.

She pulled away from him, took a step back.

He swore softly. ‘Is that too much?’ He watched her, with his studied look, the one that showed how skilled he was at waiting.

How could he want her? She trembled. This was her foe, her enemy. Her worst nightmare, and it was happening whilst she was next to the man she wanted.

He pulled her into him, nestled her body against him. ‘Let me take you to bed, Sammy. Let me show you.’

The want of him spread through her. It rippled like a heat wave down her spine. She lifted her arms, wound them around his neck and pressed against him.

‘I’ve never wanted anyone like this, Ethan.’

He swept her in his arms. ‘That’s all I need to know.’ He lifted her and turned to the staircase.

H
e’d come for her. Dashing through the storm. Telling her what he wanted from her.

They were halfway up the stairs before Sammy fully realised how much control he’d taken, and how fast. She snatched at the collar of his coat. His hold on her tightened. He knew where to go, which room. He nudged the door open with his shoulder and walked into her bedroom.

The daylight was lost, it was twilight inside the house and out. The curtains were drawn back, but no sunlight shone through the window, just the barest grey light, resting on the furniture and the bed in a lustre of silkiness.

Her heartbeat picked up, beating irrationally. She wasn’t inexperienced, but with the immediacy of intimacy, the vulnerability that had unnerved her, and the surprise of Ethan— she felt rushed; pushed into something advancing on her too quickly. She hadn’t prepared, hadn’t had time to talk herself out of her nerves at being with him. She stiffened, pressed her face to the warm skin of his neck.

‘It’s alright,’ he said softly.

He let her go, holding her as her body slipped from his arms.

‘Sorry,’ she said, her voice catching.

‘What for?’ he kissed her throat, her chin, her earlobe.

She angled her face until her mouth found his, and kissed him. A single, soft kiss.

‘I won’t rush you,’ he said. ‘I just wanted to get you here.’ He watched her for a moment, absorbed, concentrated, as though looking at her for the first time. Then he gave her the comforting gift of his kiss. His mouth firm, his body protective as he explored with his tongue. His heartbeat was pulsing in his chest as powerfully as her own.

A surge of jealousy flared through her at the thought of him with another, doing this to any other woman. She wound her arms around his neck, and claimed him. Wet and warm; he tasted of hailstones. She seared herself to him. Wanted to see and touch every part of him.

He pressed a hand to the curvature of her spine, pulled her close. Her hands fluttered behind his neck, fingers itching to stroke him—and a lightning-speed uncertainly stilling her.

‘Sammy,’ he said, his breath fanning her mouth as he spoke her name over and over. He held her with care, his tender movements grounding her. ‘Sammy … I want you too.’

He knew. He understood.

She startled when he released her and shrugged the coat from his shoulders. It fell to the floor with a thud.

She inhaled, unable to settle the rushing sensations, the mind-numbing reality of being with him; of him wanting her.

Without his coat, he smelled even more like the outdoors. Hay, woodchips, leather, varnishing oil somewhere on his clothing, and a subtle scent of male skin and honest sweat.

The blue of his eyes, like pools of deep water, drew her in as he slid the fleece from her shoulders. He undid the top stud of her wet shirt, then the next, his broad fingers sure and nimble with the tiny poppers.

Her breath rose high in her chest. She grabbed his hands, stopped him.

He paused, and looked into her eyes.

She’d never been shy about sex before, but this was Ethan. He was everything to her, and she didn’t know how to stop herself from showing him the levels of her need or her impatience. Her thoughts were jumpy, and her muscles were tense. She wanted him to think her beautiful, and calm, and prepared.

He watched her, waiting for her.

‘I’m nervous,’ she explained, her voice betraying that. ‘And a little desperate.’ She smiled, hoped he’d understand and give her muddled brain time to settle into the darkened day, and the sweet, sexual ambiance of the new scents between them.

‘I’ll take away your nerves,’ he said quietly. He smiled, mouth closed, gaze deepening. ‘But I’d like it if you stayed a little desperate.’