If You Can't Stand the Heat... (Harlequin Kiss) (4 page)

‘Your father...I like him...but, jeez, he can be a pain in the ass,’ Jack said.

‘So does that mean you don’t want to talk to me about him?’ Ellie asked, sounding hopeful and a great deal less nervous.

Jack half smiled as he shook his head. ‘Sorry...I do need to talk to you about him.’

He raked his hair off his face, thinking about the book. Ken’s fascinating story was all but finished; Mitch’s was progressing. Thank God he’d resisted all the collective pressure to get him to write his. Frankly, it would be like having his chest cracked open without anaesthetic.

He was such a hypocrite. He had no problems digging around other people’s psyches but was more than happy to leave his own alone.

Jack looked at Ellie, saw her still uncertain expression and was reminded that she was wary of having a strange man in her house. He couldn’t blame her.

‘And as for chasing you around your house? Apart from the fact that I am so whipped I couldn’t make a move on a corpse, it really isn’t my style.’

Ellie looked at him for a long moment and then her smile blossomed. It was the nicest punch to the heart he’d ever received.

TWO

Jack looked up
a lavender-lined driveway to the house beyond it. It was a modest two-storey with Old World charm, wooden bay windows and a deep veranda, nestled in a wild garden surrounded by a high brick wall. The driveway led up to a two-door garage. He didn’t do charming houses—hell, he didn’t do
houses
. He had a flat that he barely saw, boxes that were still unpacked, a fridge that was never stocked. In many ways his flat was just another hotel room: as impersonal, as bland. He wasn’t attached to any of his material possessions and he liked it that way.

Attachment was not an emotion he felt he needed to become better acquainted with...either to possessions or partners.

‘Nice place,’ Jack said as he walked up the stairs onto a covered veranda. Ellie took a set of keys from the back pocket of those tight shorts. It
was
nice—not for him, but nice—a charming house with loads of character.

‘The house was my grandmother’s. I inherited it from her.’

Jack glanced idly over his shoulder and his breath caught in his throat.
God, what a view!

‘Oh, that is just amazing,’ he said, curling his fingers around the wooden beam that supported the veranda’s roof. Looking out over the houses below, he could see a sweeping stretch of endless beach that showed the curve of the bay and the sleepy blue and green ocean.

‘Where are we, exactly?’ he asked.

Ellie moved to stand next to him. ‘On the False Bay coast. We’re about twenty minutes from the CBD of Cape Town, to the south. That bay is False Bay and you can see about thirty kilometres of beach from here. Kalk Bay is that way—’ she pointed ‘—and Muizenberg is up the coast.’

‘What are those brightly coloured boxes on the beach?’

‘Changing booths. Aren’t they fun? The beach is hugely popular, and if you look just north of the booths, at the tables and chairs under the black and white striped awning, that’s where we were—at Pari’s.’

‘It’s incredible.’

‘Your room looks out onto the beach and the bathroom has a view of the Muizenberg Mountain behind us. There are some great walks and biking trails in the nature reserve behind us.’

Ellie nudged one of two almost identical blond Labradors aside in an attempt to get close enough to the front door and shove her key in the lock. Pushing open the wooden door with its stained glass window insert, she gestured for Jack to come into the hall as she automatically hung her bag onto a decorative hook.

‘The bedrooms are upstairs. I presume that you’d like a shower? Something to eat? Drink?’

He probably reeked like an abandoned rubbish dump. ‘I’d kill for a shower.’

Jack had an impression of more bright colours and eclectic art as he followed Ellie up the wooden staircase. There was a short passage and then she opened the door to a guest bedroom: white and lavender linen on a double bed, pale walls and a ginger cat curled up on the royal purple throw.

‘Meet Chaos. The
en-suite
bathroom is through that door.’

Ellie picked up Chaos and cradled the cat like a baby. Jack scratched the cat behind its ears and Chaos blinked sleepily.

Jack thankfully dropped his backpack onto the wooden floor and sat down on the purple throw at the end of the bed while he waited for the dots behind his eyes to recede. Ellie walked to the window, pulled the curtain back and lifted the wooden sash to let some fresh air into the room.

He dimly heard Ellie ask again if he wanted something to drink and struggled to respond normally. He was enormously grateful when she left the room and he could shove his head between his knees and pull himself back from the brink of fainting.

Because obviously he’d prefer not to take the concept of falling at Ellie’s feet too literally.

* * *

Ellie skipped down the stairs, belted into the kitchen and yanked her mobile from her pocket.

Merri answered on the first ring. ‘I know that you’re upset with me about extending my maternity leave...’

‘Shut up! This is more important!’ Ellie hissed, keeping her voice low. ‘Mitchell sent me a man!’

Merri waited a beat before responding. ‘Your father is procuring men for you now? Are you
that
desperate? Oh, wait...yes, you are!’

‘You are so funny...not.’ Ellie shook her head. ‘No, you twit, I’m acting as a Cape Town B&B for his stray colleagues again, but this time he sent me Jack Chapman!’

‘The hottie war reporter?’ Merri replied, after taking a moment to make the connection. She sounded awed and—gratifyingly—a smidgeon jealous. ‘Well?’

‘Well, what?’

‘What’s he like?’ Merri demanded.

‘He’s reluctantly, cynically charming. Fascinating. And he has the envious ability to put people at ease. No wonder he’s an ace reporter.’ When low-key charm and fascination came wrapped up in such a pretty package it was doubly, mind-alteringly disarming.

‘Well, well, well...’ Merri drawled. ‘It sounds like he has made
quite
an impression! You sound...breathy.’

Breathy? No, she did not!

But why did she feel excited, shy, nervous and—dammit—scared all at the same time? Oh, she wasn’t scared of
him—
she knew instinctively, absolutely, that Jack was a gentleman down to his toes—but she was on a scalpel-edge because he was the first man in ages who had her nerve-endings humming and her sexual radar beeping. And if she told Merri
that
...

‘You’re attracted to him,’ Merri stated.

She hated it when Merri read her mind. ‘I’m not...it’s just a surprise. And even if I was...’

‘You are.’

‘He’s too sexy, too charming, has a crazy job that I loathe, and he’ll be gone in a day or two.’

‘Mmm, but he’s seriously hot. Check him out on the internet.’

‘Is that what you’re doing? Stop it and concentrate!’ She gave Merri—and herself—a mental slap. ‘I have more than enough to deal with without adding the complication of even
thinking
about attraction and sex and a good-looking face topping a sexy body! Besides, I’m not good at relationships and men.’

‘Because you’re still scared to risk giving your heart away and having to take it back, battered and bruised, when they ride off into the sunset?’

Merri tossed her own words back at her and Ellie grimaced.

‘Exactly! And a pretty face won’t change anything. My father and my ex put me through an emotional grinder and Jack Chapman has the potential to do the same...’

‘Well, that’s jumping the gun, since you’ve just met him, but I’ll bite. Why?’

‘Purely because I’m attracted to him!’ Ellie responded in a heated voice. ‘It’s an unwritten rule of my life that the men I find fascinating have an ability to wreak havoc in my life!’

They dropped in, kicked her heart around, ultimately decided that she wasn’t worth sticking around for and left.

Merri remained silent and after a while Ellie spoke again. ‘You agree with me, don’t you?’

‘No, don’t take my silence for agreement; I’m just in awe of your crazy.’ Merri sighed. ‘So, to sum up your rant: you are such a bum magnet when it comes to men that your rule of thumb is that if you find one attractive then you should run like hell? Avoid at all costs?’

‘You’ve nailed it,’ Ellie said glumly.

‘I want to see how you manage to do this when the man in question has moved his very hot self into your rather small house.’

Ellie disconnected her mobile on Merri’s hooting laughter. Really, with friends like her...

Returning to the spare bedroom with towels for his bathroom and a cold beer in her hands, Ellie heard a low groan and peeked through the crack in the door to look at Jack, still sitting on the edge of the bed, his hands gripping the bottom of his shirt, pale and sweating.

Hurrying into the room, she dumped the towels on the bed, handed him the beer and frowned. ‘Are you all right?’

Jack took a long, long drink from the bottle and rested the cold glass against his cheek. ‘Sure. Why?’

‘I noticed that you winced when you picked up your backpack. You took your time walking up the stairs, and now you’re as white as a sheet and your hands are shaking!’

Jack rubbed the back of his neck. ‘I’m a bit dinged up,’ he eventually admitted.

‘Uh-huh? How dinged up?’

‘Just a bit. I’ll survive.’ Jack put the almost empty beer bottle on the floor and gripped the edge of his shirt again.

Ellie watched him struggle to pull it up and shook her head at his white-rimmed mouth.

‘Can I help?’ she asked eventually.

‘I’ll get there,’ Jack muttered.

He couldn’t, and with a slight shake of her head she stepped closer to the bed, grabbed the edges of his T-shirt and helped him pull it over his head. A beautiful body was there—somewhere underneath the blue-black plate-sized bruises that looked like angry thunderclouds. He had a wicked vertical scar bisecting his chest that suggested a major operation at one time, and Ellie bit her lip when she walked around his knees to look at his back. She couldn’t stifle her horrified gasp. The damage on his back was even worse, and on his tanned skin she could see clear imprints of a heel here and the toe of a boot there.

‘What does the other guy look like?’ she asked, trying to be casual.

‘Guys. Not as bad as me, unfortunately.’ Jack balled his T-shirt in his hand and tossed it towards his rucksack. ‘The Somalians decided to give me something to remember them by.’

Jack sat on the edge of the bed, bent over and, using one hand and taking short breaths, undid the laces of his scuffed trainers. When they were loose enough, he toed them off.

Jack sent her a crooked grin that didn’t fool her for a second. ‘As you can see, all in working order.’

‘Anything broken?’

Jack shook his head. ‘I think they bruised a rib or two. I’ll live. I’ve had worse.’

Ellie shook her head. ‘Worse than this?’

‘A bullet does more damage,’ Jack said, standing up and slowly walking to the
en-suite
bathroom.

Ellie gasped. ‘You’ve been
shot
?’

‘Twice. Hurts like a bitch.’

Hearing water running in the basin, Ellie abruptly sat down. She was instantly catapulted back in time to when she’d spent a holiday with Mitchell and his mother—her grandmother Ginger—in London when she was fourteen. He’d run to Bosnia to do a ‘quick report’ and come back in an ambulance plane, shot in the thigh. He’d lost a lot of blood and spent a couple of days in the ICU.

It wasn’t her favourite holiday memory.

Jack didn’t seem to be particularly fazed about his injuries; like Mitchell he probably fed on danger and adrenalin...it made no sense to her.

‘You do realise that you could’ve died?’ Ellie said, wondering why she even bothered.

Jack walked back into the room, dried his face on a towel he’d picked up from the bed and shrugged. ‘Nah. They were lousy shots.’

Ellie sighed. She couldn’t understand why getting hurt, shot or putting yourself in danger wasn’t a bigger deterrent. She knew that Jack, like her father, preferred to work solo, shunning the protection of the army or the police, wanting to get the mood on the streets, the story from the locals. Such independence ratcheted up the danger quotient to the nth degree.

There was a reason why war reporting was rated as one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Were they dedicated to the job or just plain stupid? Right now, seeing those bruises, she couldn’t help but choose
stupid
.

‘So, before I go...do you want something to eat?’

Jack shook his head. ‘The pilot stood me a couple of burgers at the airport. Thanks, though.’

‘Okay, well, I’ll be downstairs if you need anything...’ Ellie couldn’t resist dropping her eyes to sneak a peek at his stomach. As she’d suspected, he had a gorgeous six-pack—but her attention was immediately diverted by a mucky, bloody sanitary pad held in place by the waistband of his jeans.

She pursed her lips. ‘And that?’

Jack glanced down and winced. With an enviable lack of modesty he flipped open the top two buttons of his jeans, pulled down the side of his boxer shorts and pulled off the pad. Ellie winced at the seeping, bloody, six-inch slash that bisected the artistic knife and broken heart tattoo on his hip.

‘Not too bad,’ Jack said, after prodding the wound with a blunt-edged finger.

‘What is that? A knife wound?’

‘Mmm. Psycho bastards.’

‘You sound so calm,’ Ellie said, her eyes wide.

‘I
am
calm. I’m always calm.’

Too calm
, she thought. ‘Jack, it needs stitches.’

‘This is minor, Ellie.’ Jack looked mutinous. ‘I’m going to give it a good scrub, slather it in the antiseptic I always carry with me and slap another pad on it.’

‘Who uses sanitary pads for
this
?’

‘It’s an army thing and it serves the purpose. I’m an old hand at doctoring myself.’

Ellie sighed when Jack turned away to rummage in his rucksack. He pulled out another sanitary pad, stripped the plastic away and slapped the clean pad onto his still bleeding wound. She saw his stubborn look and knew that he’d made up his mind. If she couldn’t get Jack to a hospital—he was six-two and built; how could she force him?—she’d have to trust him when he said that he was an old hand at patching himself up.