The word conjured a scenario he was better off not dwelling on but his lips tingled nonetheless. He ogled her spectacular rear without apology while she dragged out a box with assorted medication and pulled out a tube.
‘This should …’ She turned, catching him staring. He did not look away. It was the best view he’d seen in a long time. The colour in her cheeks intensified, bleeding into her throat. She thrust the tube at him, then, as if mortally afraid of skin contact, set it on the table beside them. ‘There you go.’
‘Thanks.’
She hesitated, as if finding the last minute or so discomforting in the extreme and determined to banish it from her mind, then said, ‘Your long complicated story. I’m listening.’
He let out a slow breath, then said, ‘Tomorrow I’ll go back to Surfers, sort it out with Dad then discuss it with Jared. It’ll be okay,’ he assured her. He’d reimburse his old friend for the money he’d paid and help Melissa—Lissa—find alternative accommodation.
‘It’ll be okay, how? Jared purchased the boat when your father sold the home in Surfers and moved south. New South Wales, I think … No one knows exactly …’
It didn’t come as a surprise. He acknowledged being left to discover the news about his father’s apparent disappearance through another party with a shrug. ‘I guess I already knew that.’
He’d paid his father cash for the boat the day he left Australia, but he’d not actually signed anything … and the paperwork had never followed as promised.
When Blake had rung to query it, he discovered the phones had been disconnected and the emails began bouncing back … The old man hadn’t been above using his son to suit his own purposes. Again, no surprise there.
‘So … am I right then in assuming you own the house too?’ She waved a hand towards the window. Outside, the predicted storm had set in. The rain had turned into a downpour, partially obscuring the view and pelting the roof and decking.
He nodded. He’d purchased what had been the family’s luxury holiday house when he’d bought the houseboat. He’d gone through the bank to finance the deal and had the land title for that, at least, safely locked away.
‘So why opt for the houseboat tonight when you have a more than adequate alternative?’ she asked with a frown.
Despite having employed a service to stock the fridge and air the linen, he’d been unable to find the relaxation he needed to recuperate in the house. Too much space, too many rooms. Too many memories.
He’d lugged an old army bedroll he’d found in storage down to the waterfront hoping the familiar marine environment and solitude would help with the infernal headaches he’d suffered since the accident that had brought him back to Australia. Seemed he’d lucked out in both instances there too.
‘I was hoping to catch up on some sleep.’ He’d not expected to find a bed mate.
Her eyes widened, a hint of panic in their depths as they met his. ‘But since I’m here already, you’re going back up to the house, right?’
That had been his initial intention. Except. now his immediate plans for the night had been dashed he found he wasn’t as tired as he’d thought and in no immediate hurry to bid the lovely Lissa Sanderson goodnight.
No, that wasn’t quite correct, he decided. His body was telling him to stay and get reacquainted, to absorb that feminine scent until his pores were saturated, to touch her arm again and feel that soft skin against his. His body had very definite ideas about where it wanted the evening to go.
His head was saying something else entirely.
His head didn’t lead him astray. His diving team knew his reputation for remaining cool under pressure even in the most perilous situations.
Women were more likely to describe him as emotionally detached right before they slammed a door of some description in his face.
Either way, that was why he was good at his job and why he knew that Lissa Sanderson with her feminine curves and clear-eyed gaze that seemed to know exactly where his thoughts were going was trouble best avoided. For both parties.
Steeling himself for a restless night, he focused on that gaze. ‘Okay, I’ll leave you in peace. For now.’
‘For now?’ She stared at him, eyes huge and incredulous. ‘This is my home.’ Desperation scored her voice. ‘You don’t understand … I need this place.’
‘Calm down, for heaven’s sake.’ Women. Always overreacting. ‘We’ll sort something out.’ He glanced about him for the first time, remembering how the boat had looked years ago when his father had owned it. When Blake had lived on it.
Now a blue couch sagging beneath the weight of a jumble of boxes—some open, others taped shut—sat where there’d once been a leather lounge suite. Except for the addition of a microwave, the galley remained unchanged. If you didn’t count the slather of paperwork on the bench. His gaze snagged on a final notice for payment for something or other attached to the fridge door with a magnet. None of his business.
Every square centimetre of the boat was crammed with stuff. Canvases against the wall beside an old tin of artists’ brushes, another of charcoals and pencils. The bunk beds beyond were covered in swatches of fabric, colour palettes, magazines, wallpaper books. How did anyone live amidst such chaos?
Maybe it was the calming floral scents that pervaded the air or the potted herbs on a shelf near the window, but somewhere beneath the domestic carnage the place had a. comfortable cosiness. He’d not experienced anything like it since he’d been a youngster living with his mum, and wondered grimly if he could find sleep here after all.
He should leave the area entirely. Find somewhere else to rent along the coast somewhere while he was in Oz and forget he’d ever seen Melissa Sanderson. Solitude was what he wanted. What he craved until he felt halfway sane again.
A steady drip nearby diverted his attention, a silver teardrop followed quickly by another against the light, and he glanced up. Obviously the leak had been there for some time judging by the half-full container beneath it. He’d been too preoccupied with everything else to notice. Now he scanned other damp patches. ‘How long’s this been going on?’
She glanced up at the ceiling, then away. ‘Not long. I can manage, it’s nothing.’ Instantly defensive.
Interesting. If he remembered correctly, the young Melissa had been anything but independent. Or so it had seemed. ‘Nothing? Look up, sweet cheeks. If water gets into that light socket there we’ve got a problem.’
He saw her glance up, then frown. Clearly she hadn’t noticed the extent of the damage. He looked at the puddle near her feet lapping around the base of the fridge. ‘Don’t you know electricity and water don’t mix?’
‘Of course I do,’ she snapped. ‘And it’s I’ve got a problem, not we.’
He shook his head. ‘Right now I don’t care whose problem it is, the boat’s unsafe—for any number of reasons.’ Now he’d seen the potential disaster he couldn’t in all good conscience just leave her here to fend for herself and go back to bed, could he?
As if to
