Six Naughty Nights: Love in Reverse, Book 2 (2 page)

His gaze fell to Charlie. “Is…is he mine?”

She swallowed. Then she gave a small nod.

His eyes came back to her cool, emotionless ones. How could she be so calm? A hundred different emotions roiled inside him, and he clenched his fists in an attempt to keep them in.
 

What a day to find out he’d fathered a child. He was going home at the weekend. He’d booked the flights, and his best mate was getting married in a week’s time—he had to be there. And after that, he had plans for his life. Things he wanted to do.
 

Bringing up a child wasn’t one of them.
 

He couldn’t think how to put his emotion into words. One day, he would have liked to have had a family. But not yet. His friends and family teased him constantly for being a Peter Pan. What would they say when they found out he had a son? Not that it appeared he had any choice in the matter. He was a father, whether he wanted to be one or not.

Nobody would blame him if he left the scene now to work things through with her. He hesitated. Then, behind him, someone screamed.
 

“Be careful.” He ran back to the window and climbed over the ledge into the building.

Chapter Two

When the emergency services finally persuaded Toby to stop, Esther was waiting for him.

She’d walked the short distance home to find her apartment devastated, sat there for a while looking up at it, and then wandered back to the tent that the firefighters and aid workers had set up as a central rescue point. She accepted a cup of coffee more out of politeness than anything, and fed Charlie bits of a ham sandwich as firefighters brought survivors out of the rubble and secured the area as much as they could.
 

Someone tried to get her to go with them to their house, but she refused politely and continued to sit on one of the fold-up chairs a volunteer had kindly donated. Charlie was unusually content to sit still, eyes wide at the sight of the firefighters and army personnel rushing around rescuing people.

She saw Toby from time to time over the next few hours, clearing piles of debris and helping injured people to safety. When they first turned up, the fire service had tried to get him to stay outside. He’d ignored them, though, and continued to help move beams and bricks to release those trapped. She guessed that eventually they must have decided they’d only be able to keep him out by restraining him, and that seemed pointless when he was obviously doing some good.

She rocked Charlie in her arms as he dozed, and accepted a blanket from one of the ambulance men and a drink from another as she waited for Toby to tire. It proved to be a long wait. She’d forgotten how tall, how strong he was. He must be six three or four, she thought as he emerged from the wreckage carrying a woman as if she weighed no more than a pile of blankets. He’d liked to lift Esther up to kiss her, wrapping her legs around his waist as he lowered his lips to hers. The memory made her shiver.

He’d been big three years ago, but he’d broadened even more since then, his muscles filling out the T-shirt that had been white when she first saw him standing at the checkout, although it was now almost completely black. His dark curly hair fell across his forehead in the same wild mop. The boyish good looks she remembered had matured into a rugged, bristled face, which nevertheless was still handsome enough to make her catch her breath. He tripped over bricks occasionally, proving to her that he’d gained no more coordination over his large feet than he’d had in Fiji. But that didn’t detract from the fact that he was movie-star gorgeous.

He was a carpenter and had used to live in the Northland. What was he doing here? Probably helping rebuild Christchurch after the earthquake the previous September, she thought sadly. The city had just started to get back on its feet. And now look what had happened.
 

A firefighter caught Toby’s arm and gestured toward the tent. He put his hands on his hips and nodded wearily before making his way over.

Pushing herself to her feet, she lifted Charlie higher in her arms. He stirred and woke, looking around blearily. Toby ducked under the flap at the top of the tent, stopping as he saw her. Pleasure and relief lit his tired face. “You’re here.” He walked over to them.

“You have the stamina of a steam engine.” She handed him a bottle of water. “Don’t you ever get tired?”

“When I get going, there’s no stopping me.” He winked, confirming he’d totally meant the double entendre, and laughed as she rolled her eyes. Taking a mouthful of water, he walked outside, swirled and spat, then drank half the bottle in one go. “Jeez. That’s the best drink I’ve had in, like, ever.”

“Do you want something to eat? There are sandwiches over there.”

“In a minute.” He wiped his mouth and came back to stand before them. “How are you two doing?”

“Okay.” She kissed Charlie’s curly hair where he nuzzled up against her. “We’re in one piece anyway.” She cleared her throat and met Toby’s big brown eyes, so like Charlie’s. “Thanks to you.”
 

Admitting she was in his debt wasn’t easy, but she was honest enough to accept that if he hadn’t helped her to get Charlie out of the trolley, the falling rubble would have buried them.

He said nothing for a moment. Her cheeks grew warm as his lips gradually curved. Was he thinking about Fiji? That moment when they met on the beach? The memory still made her heart pound, the attraction that had shot between them, sharp and powerful as an electric shock. She’d never felt anything like it before, or since. One-night stands had never been her thing, but she’d gone to bed with him willingly, and the sex had been so great that she’d returned to his room the next night, and the next. In fact they’d barely left the complex the entire fortnight.

His gaze moved to her lips.
He wants to kiss you again, Esther.
She remembered the way he’d pressed his lips to hers in the supermarket, under the table. Both of them had been covered in dust, grit in their mouths and their hearts still racing from the way the ground had ripped itself apart, and yet he’d managed to ignite something within her that had remained dormant for a long, long time.

“Bear,” Charlie said. He raised his head. “Did you find him?”

“Oh, sweetheart.” She kissed his forehead. “Toby’s been far too busy to look for Bear. People have to come first, honey. I’m sorry.” She bit her lip as Charlie’s eyes went glassy. He’d had Bear since he was born. Losing him somehow symbolised the whole futile situation and everything else they’d lost.

“Ah,” Toby said. “But I never go back on a promise.” He fumbled behind his back and pulled something out from the waistband of his jeans.
 

“Bear!” Charlie screamed, snatched the soft toy and buried his face in the grimy fur.

“Oh my God, how did you…” Her voice failed her.

“I knew he’d probably dropped him when I lifted him out of the trolley. Luckily there wasn’t too much debris in that part of the room.” Toby stroked Bear’s head. “I saw his paw sticking out from under a brick. I think he was trying to crawl to safety.”

Emotion washed over her, and she pressed shaking fingers to her lips. But she couldn’t stop the sob that escaped them.
 

Charlie raised his head, puzzled. “What’s up, Mummy?”

Toby smiled at him. “You want to come with me with for a sec? I’m starving and I think I can see chocolate bars over there.”

“Buttons?” Charlie asked, reaching out his arms as Toby took him from her.

“I don’t know—let’s go and find out.” He walked off, still talking to the boy, to investigate the food they had to offer.

Esther sank onto a nearby chair and buried her face in her hands, taking long, shaky breaths. How had he known the last thing she would have wanted was platitudes or attempts at physical comfort? If he’d tried to put his arms around her, she would have pushed him away.

She smoothed her hands over her cheeks, wiping away her tears, probably smearing black dust across her face. Across the tent, Toby and Charlie talked to one of the volunteers, discussing which chocolate bar was their favourite.
He’s going to be hyper all night if he eats that
. Then she smiled wryly. She could have been talking about either of them.
 

She watched them, a hand across her mouth as she tried to control her emotions. Charlie rarely went to strangers, and yet there he was, not even glancing around to see if she was nearby, happily taking chocolate from the giant whose white teeth shone in his filthy face. Had her son recognised on some subconscious level that Toby was his father?

Even if he hadn’t, why wouldn’t he trust Toby? Not only had the guy saved his life, he’d also gone on to rescue Bear. He was an old-fashioned hero, a white knight on a charger. The thought warmed her right through.

It also filled her with panic.

She stood as they came back, and took Charlie from Toby’s arms, even though both of them looked quite comfortable together. Charlie squirmed, but she tightened her arm around him, and he sagged against her. “Thank you,” she said formally to Toby.

He nodded. “Are you going home now?”

“That might be difficult.”

“Why?”

She hesitated, wishing she hadn’t said anything. “Don’t worry about it. It’s not your concern.”

He frowned. “What’s happened?”

“There was some damage,” she said reluctantly.

“Some?”

She said nothing.

He walked out into the early evening sunshine, stopped and beckoned with his head. “Show me.”

She went because she didn’t have the energy to argue with him, and because she didn’t know what she was going to do. They walked silently along the road, weaving amongst the bricks and piles of rubble. Charlie sucked quietly on chocolate buttons as they walked, his hands soon a mess of melted chocolate and dust, but she was too tired to say anything and let him grab her top with his sticky fingers.

As they walked, Toby took out his mobile phone. “I’d better let my mother know I’m okay,” he said, pressing buttons. But after a moment or two he sighed and tucked it back into his pocket. “I guess the system’s overloaded with everyone trying to call—I can’t get through.”

“Maybe give it half an hour.”

“Yeah.” They turned the corner, and Toby gasped. “Jeez.”

She pointed along the road, past where a huge crack had appeared, to a collapsed building at the end. “That’s my apartment.”

It looked like a doll’s house, as if someone had come along and lifted off the front panel to look inside it. The wall facing the street had disintegrated into a pile of wood and bricks in the middle of the road. Broken pipes and cables moved in the breeze, as if the body of a creature had been slit open to expose its innards.

“That was mine,” she said, indicating the top right room. She could just see Charlie’s broken cot and a heap of matchsticks that had been her wardrobe.

“Fucking hell.”

“Yeah.” She shivered, feeling like crying but refusing to give in to it.

He shook his head. “So what are you going to do tonight?”

“Don’t know. I lost my purse in the supermarket. But last year lots of people opened their houses to the homeless. I guess I’ll go back to the tent and see if someone can place us somewhere.”

“Don’t you have family nearby?”

“No.” She straightened her son’s soiled top. “Dad died while I was pregnant. It’s just me and Charlie now.”

For a moment, Toby said nothing. He stared at the panes of glass and broken wood in the streets. Then he said, “Come and stay with me. I have a small apartment—if it’s still there.”

She shook her head. “We’ll be okay. There’ll be somewhere we can—”

For the first time, he frowned. “If you really want, I’ll find somewhere else to sleep. But you and Charlie need a shower and a bed, and I have both.”

Charlie complained. She’d squeezed him too tightly. She loosened her grip, so tired she was almost asleep on her feet, but still protested, “I couldn’t. You’ve worked so hard. You need to rest and—”

“Esther.” He put his hands on his hips. “Don’t be so bloody ridiculous. I’m not having my son sleeping on the street. You’re coming with me.”
 

My son.
She bristled at Toby’s words, wanting to tell him that Charlie had had nobody but her since he was born—he didn’t need a father waltzing in and trying to shoehorn his way into their lives. She’d managed perfectly well for two and a half years and she could cope with this on her own.

But she bit her lip. Charlie
was
his son. There was no denying it. Maybe if she’d lied outright from the beginning and told him he wasn’t the father, she would have been able to tell him to get lost. But she hadn’t, so for better or for worse, Charlie’s father was now in the picture and legally Toby had a say in her son’s welfare.

Part of her was nervous about the inevitable conversation they would have, about why she hadn’t told him he had a child. When he’d asked if Charlie was his and she’d said yes, she’d waited for some sign of emotion—bad or good—but none had been forthcoming. Was he angry? She didn’t know him well enough to tell. In the two weeks they’d spent together, he’d come across as placid and playful, and she’d seen no sign of anything approaching a temper, but then there hadn’t been a situation that had called for it.