hell, he was only human.
“Thanks, I’ll remember that,” she replied, voice cool as the drink he’d fancied earlier, especially with the ice in her eyes to chill it.
She curled her fingers round the handle, pulling it closer.
“Let me get that for you.”
“No problem, it has wheels.” She flicked a catch on the curve of the red monstrosity and conjured up a handle. The laptop case still in his hand was written off by a raised brow that made him feel roughly the same size. “Shouldn’t you be saving your own luggage before it disappears?”
He recognized a dismissal when he heard it. His carrier still where he’d abandoned it, he picked it up and realized she must have been watching him, as well. At least he’d been savvy enough not to damage the laptop. Gorgeous she may be, but he’d long ago given up abandoning his gear in a lost cause, or given the IT engineers who’d invented its programs cause for complaint.
That given, why did that look she’d shot him earlier still rankle? For sure, he wouldn’t disappoint her in the sack, but what man wanted to be needed just for the sex?
He joined the tail-end passengers, all too caught up in their own affairs to react to the contretemps. But on his way to the terminal, he noticed her shades in the gutter and picked them up. He wouldn’t mind another close-up of those cool blue eyes.
A vision startled him with its clarity. A hank of black hair twisting round one hand, to pull her closer, the other sliding under her crop top, bringing an end to another ice age.
Hell, a guy could dream, couldn’t he? That and no more.
Time to scrape the bottom of the barrel and see what floated to the surface.
Waiting at the boarding gate, the thought of how close she’d come to losing the package in her care bathed Ngaire in cold sweat. It was worth a fortune. The fear of not living up to the trust placed in her yawned at the back of her mind like a bottomless pit waiting for her to trip. By now it had been checked in and was secreted in the plane’s hold, safe while no one suspected its nature. The attempted theft today had to be a coincidence. She’d told no one but Leena of her plans. And her best friend would never let her down, not even for the million dollars Paul Savage had brandished under Ngaire’s nose. Savage thought her a fool for turning it down. Like a spoiled child he couldn’t imagine not getting his own way, yet Savage was as every bit an outlaw as the ones who once held up coaches saying, “Your money or your life.”
She’d chosen life. The money didn’t come into it.
Taking a long, cooling drink of orange juice, she scanned the passengers for the guy in the black-and-white shirt but couldn’t see him. So, why bother?
“Yeah, yeah,” she chided herself, knowing his features had made her heart jolt at first glance. One of those things you read about but never in a million years expected to happen.
Disillusionment had come hard on the heels of the first thrill spiking low in her belly. He was no different from all the rest.
Sure, she could take care of herself. She was a hapkido master, for heaven’s sake. No fragile rosebud ready for picking.
Then again, she yearned for just one man to treat her like that bud, even after discovering her talent. Was that why she hadn’t set him right when he’d patronized her attempt to regain her luggage? Annoying, yes, but she couldn’t have it both ways.
Even as he’d been telling her off, “You want to watch it, lady,” the timbre of his voice had made her shiver with desire. You mean lust, don’tcha? She’d been careful not to let it show and now she was kicking herself for pouting like a spoiled brat.
For real, the thief hadn’t been quite so certain her stance was all show and no substance. She’d caught a flicker of fear in his eyes as she faced up to him. Her rescuer had been the mugger’s last straw, sending his fat, sturdy legs into a Road-runner windmill.
The guy who’d made her heart leap from her breast would be in no doubt of her abilities by now, if she’d had to carry through and taken the bozo out. Shooting herself in the foot again by losing any chance of seeing a look in his eye that said she was special. Not superwoman special. Just the ordinary, everyday meeting of minds, attraction, desire and falling in love.
Foolish, when she’d never see him again. But for a moment, she’d looked, and wanted something more than the same old, same old. Her relationships all took a predictable cycle.
Me man, you wo…man.
Then bring out the role confusion. Me man, you…?
She was five-four and could down a two-hundred-and-fifty pound man with a flick of her wrist. What did she need a man for?
Ngaire had never yet come out with “Duh? Sex, dummy!” But she’d wanted to.
Surely there was one man in the world she couldn’t intimidate?
What she needed was someone with X-ray vision. Someone who could see through her soft black cotton do bock uniform pants and tunic to the flesh-and-blood woman underneath.
She remembered when their eyes met, how the crush scrambling to find their gear had melted away. For a brief moment there had been only her, only him.
Then she’d caught his fight-or-flight reaction. Ngaire knew the sensation well, adrenaline pumping hard, flowing out to the nerve endings and the body’s response. She never felt so alive as when she was afraid of death. And these days that was every time she let her mind wander.
He’d hesitated, sending her gratification on a steep downward slide weighed by chagrin.
So, she’d been wrong before and she’d be wrong again. No sense in putting herself through the wringer for a guy she’d exchanged less than a dozen words with. She’d never see him again.
“Mind if I sit here?”
Scratch the last statement.
He was here, and he wanted to sit at her table.
His eyes narrowed and the words, dark and dangerous took on new meaning. Ngaire’s heart began practicing rolls and break falls, beating its little self up against the barrier of her sternum. Stay cool. Remember, he hadn’t survived the cut in the macho stakes. She looked around, counted four empty tables. “No worries, help yourself.”
She’d known he was tall, but until he sat opposite she hadn’t had the pleasure of assessing the width of his shoulders. They made his chair look as if it came out of a kindergarten classroom. She could tell that every last bit of him, narrow waist and hips, broad chest, were in perfect proportion. And that was only the bits she could see. Maybe she should stop staring at him as if she’d escaped from someplace surrounded by high walls and barbed wire.
He’d bought a beer. The hands carrying it were large, palms wide, fingers long, blunt-tipped and workmanlike as he set down a dewy bottle already dripping rings onto the table. “Glad to see you’re none the worse for your adventure.”
“It was nothing, thanks to you. And there’s nothing to get over. I’ve had worse experiences.” Memory plucked a knife out of the past and laced it with pain.
Now,
