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‘I play,’ he protested.
‘Lawson, you haven’t been on a date in I don’t know how long. Well over a year. What happened to the love-them-and-leave-them Lawson I knew when I was growing up? What’s the matter with you?’
‘I became a father.’
Vic rolled her eyes. ‘Yeah, sure, but you didn’t die, Lawson. There was a great-looking woman making eyes at you and you were completely oblivious.’
‘I’m out of practice.’
She shook her head.
‘I’m…busy.’ God, he sounded pathetic. ‘I have Matilda to think about, after all.’
Vic rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, please! Your kid is dying to be a flower girl again. You could marry the archetypal wicked stepmother and she couldn’t care less as long as she got to throw rose petals at her feet.’
Lawson laughed. Matilda had been rather transparent in her attempts to marry him off since his sister got married a few months back.
He shrugged. ‘You know how hard it is with kids to form relationships. It takes a really understanding person. Someone selfless. And that’s hardly a fair ask.’
Vic nodded. She did know. None of her boyfriends had understood her commitment to her family. They said they did, paid lip service to it, but when push came to shove, and she had to cancel yet another date because the twins were sick or her father had been called out, they never stuck around.
Hell, Lance had even gone one step further and looked elsewhere when she wasn’t around to service his needs.
So she could certainly sympathise with Lawson. At least he could get some comfort from the fact that he’d had a life first. That was something she couldn’t claim.
She glanced at him. They were closer now than they’d been earlier. He looked all brooding and intense and so all she wanted to do was lay her head on his shoulder and go to sleep. To forget about her responsibilities for a night and have someone look after her for once.
Obviously the wine had gone to her head.
She yawned and sat her empty glass down on the coffee table. She hiccupped and then laughed. ‘Wow, I think I’m a little tipsy.’
Lawson raised an eyebrow. She’d had two glasses of wine in a couple of hours—hardly excessive. ‘I didn’t realise you were such a cheap date.’
Vic nodded, shutting her eyes. ‘I’ll probably have an almighty headache in the morning.’
Lawson’s gaze was drawn to the way her lashes grazed her cheeks. ‘I’ll call you a cab to take you home.’
Her eyes fluttered open. Home? No, she wasn’t ready for that. She didn’t want to leave. Not yet. Here with Lawson she could just be herself. She wasn’t ready to go back to reality. ‘Do you think it would it be okay to crash here?’
Lawson hesitated. He wasn’t sure why—it just didn’t feel…appropriate. Which was ridiculous. It wasn’t the first time she’d bunked down here. Most times she watched Matilda for him she usually slept the night on his couch. Lawson wavered. He knew it should be cut and dried but for some reason it wasn’t. He became aware of their closeness and consciously sat up straighter.
Vic frowned at her partner’s continuing silence, searching for another reason to stay. ‘Please, Lawson. The last thing Dad needs on top of a son who nearly bled to death in the kitchen today is an inebriated daughter.’
‘You’re hardly inebriated, Victoria.’
She dismissed his observation with a wave of her hand. ‘I have two teenage brothers, remember? I have to set a good example for them.’
If anyone knew the extent of Victoria’s sacrifices for her brothers it was Lawson. But even so they occasionally slapped him in the face. Victoria hadn’t had a normal childhood or teenage years. She hadn’t had a chance to rebel or experiment like a lot of teenagers, as he had.
Which was probably why two glasses of wine on top of three night shifts had gone straight to her head.
She’d had her hands full helping her dad bring up two babies and run the house. Even when she’d done her paramedic training in Brisbane she’d commuted every day for three years. No wonder she was counting the days down until her life could begin.
Vic watched as Lawson hesitated. A funny thought drifted through her head and with the alcohol blunting her inhibitions she spoke it without further analysis. ‘I promise not to try and seduce you.’
Lawson almost choked on his tongue, which developed into a coughing fit. He leapt to his feet. ‘Not funny, Victoria,’ he rasped when he’d regained his breath.
Vic laughed. She supposed not. Although the idea was seriously tempting here in the half-light after two glasses of wine. What would happen if she took her crush one step further?
‘You are my partner,’ Lawson continued. ‘I have known your father for twenty years. I have a child. You are leaving in ninety days.’
Vic laughed. ‘Yeah, yeah. Relax, Lawson, I’m only joking.’
Lawson rolled his eyes as his heart rate settled. ‘Bloody hell,’ he muttered, heading for his bedroom. ‘Take my bed. I’ll have the couch.’
‘Oh, no, no, no,’ she protested, following him. ‘It’s okay. I’m smaller. I always sleep on the couch. The couch is fine.’
Lawson stopped just inside his door and turned, not expecting her to be so close. He took a step back, narrowly avoiding a collision. ‘My room has black-out blinds. I have a feeling you may need them in the morning. Plus Tilly will be up at the crack of dawn and I doubt that’s something you want to experience with a thumping head.’
Vic couldn’t fault his thinking. ‘Okay then. You’ve sold me.’
They stood for a moment looking at each other. ‘Well,’ Lawson said, stepping to the left. Victoria moved at the same time in the same direction. She gave a half-laugh and stepped to the right as Lawson also dodged right. He laughed this time and grabbed her by the shoulders, holding her in place as he stepped around her.
‘Goodnight,’ he said on his way out of the door.
Vic turned. ‘Lawson?’
He swung around. ‘Yes?’
‘I don’t suppose you have something I can take to cut the headache off at the pass?’
Lawson chuckled. ‘Sure. I’ll get it.’
Vic watched him leave, slipped out of her jeans and then lifted her top over her head. She pulled his bed covers back and gratefully crawled beneath. Lawson’s bed felt like a feather duvet floating on a cloud. But then anything that allowed her to recline would have felt as soft—even a bed of nails. The alcohol and a mere four hours’ sleep enveloped her and she shut her eyes surrendering to the bliss of being horizontal.
Not even her weird-o-meter, which was blaring loudly, was enough to rouse her. The vague feeling that being in Lawson’s bed was blurring their professional and friendship boundaries nagged at the peripheries of her rapidly dwindling consciousness, just out of her grasp. Hell, she’d never even been in his bedroom before. It was…intimate. Not something friends, colleagues, did. Certainly not something they did.
Lawson entered the darkened room a few minutes later with a glass of water and two headache pills. Some ambient light from the street outside filtered through his curtains and he looked down at her, the covers pulled up to her chin, her hair loose on his pillows.
‘Victoria?’
She stirred as his voice floated towards her. ‘Mmm?’
He sat on the side of the bed. ‘Here.’
Vic prised open an eye and saw the white tablets on the palm of his hand. Sleep clawed at her bones, making them heavy and resistant, but she pushed through it, sitting up. She drew her knees to her chest and downed the pills gratefully along with the entire glass of water.
‘Thanks, Lawson.’ She handed him back the glass. ‘For everything. For coming to my rescue with Ryan. And the company tonight. And the bed. And the tablets.’
Lawson watched as the sheet slipped a little to reveal a red bra strap before she hiked it back up again. He looked away quickly. ‘What are partners for?’
Vic smiled and stroked her cheek against the sheet covering her knees. ‘I like the smell of your sheets,’ she murmured.
He grimaced. ‘Sorry, I should change them.’
‘No, they’re fine,’ she dismissed. The bed was all she needed—sheets were a luxury. ‘They smell like you.’
Lawson’s breath caught in his chest. ‘Oh? And how do I smell?’
Vic sighed, closing her eyes, inhaling his essence again. ‘Like Matilda’s strawberry-shortcake soap I buy her every Christmas and that great aftershave you wear.’
Lawson’s belly clenched. She noticed his aftershave ?
‘And freshly cut grass.’
Lawson laughed as the tension inside him uncoiled a little. ‘Grass?’
‘Yeah, you know. Earthy. Male.’
‘Well, thank you. I think.’ And he laughed again.
Vic lifted her head off her knees. She liked hearing him laugh. He didn’t do it often enough. The light coming in through the window illuminated his face, emphasising his masculinity and highlighting his scar. Curiosity and no doubt the effects of alcohol had her crossing a line she’d never crossed before.
She lifted a hand and touched her finger to it, tracing it from just under his nose across his lips and down his chin. Lawson stopped laughing and pulled away from her as if she’d trekked a burning match across his face.
‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured, dropping her hand. ‘I was just curious. You never talk about it and Dad’s warned me it’s a touchy subject but…I don’t know…blame the Shiraz…’
Lawson made a conscious effort to relax his jaw. ‘No. It’s okay. It happened a long time ago when I was in a different place in my life that I don’t like to dwell on.’
Vic nodded. ‘Of course.’ But she was curiously hurt by his reluctance to share it with her. They were partners and yet sometimes she felt as if she didn’t know him at all. God knew, he knew everything there was to know about her.
Lawson felt a spike of guilt lance him at her downcast face. ‘I was in an accident. When I was sixteen. My home life was…unhappy. We moved around a lot and my father liked to drink. One night some mates were going on a late-night high-speed joyride with some older guy they knew who had this souped-up car and I thought, Why not? The car crashed. The driver died. Everyone was seriously injured. I had facial and chest injuries and had to be cut out of the vehicle. I spent nearly three months in hospital.’
Vic gasped. ‘I’m so sorry.’
Lawson shrugged. ‘I was trapped for two hours. This paramedic stayed with me the entire time. I’ve never forgotten it.’
‘Is that why you became one?’
Lawson nodded. ‘If it hadn’t been for that crash, I don’t know where I would have ended up.’ He’d certainly been heading for a dead-end job and a chip on his shoulder.
Vic felt a rush of incredible tenderness for the man and heartache for the teenager he’d been. She’d always known her partner was a complex human being with a rough childhood, but this put him in a whole new light. She couldn’t bear that he’d been through so much pain.
She touched his scar again and this time, though he flinched, he allowed it. Then, she wasn’t sure why, maybe it was the alcohol, maybe it was the whole emotional upheaval of the day, she leaned forward and pressed her mouth to it, the desire to kiss it better too powerful to resist. ‘Poor Lawson,’ she whispered.
Lawson sat very still, her lips at his chin. He shut his eyes as the fleeting press of her lips stirred desires he’d long ago forgotten existed. She was so close. Her warm breath wrapped his gut in seductive tendrils.
He only had to shift slightly and he could claim her mouth. He didn’t move as the battle raged within him. He wanted to kiss her so badly he was salivating. Like a starving man being led into a bakery. But she’d been drinking. And she was his partner. His much younger partner whom he’d known since she was in pigtails. And she was leaving.
Vic liked the spikiness of his stubble against her lips and this close to him she got to smell all those aromas she’d told him about but with the added mix of his warm male skin. The room was utterly silent except for their breath and even in her tipsy state she was hyperaware of a very weird vibe settling around them.
Lawson dragged in a breath. This was so screwed up and he wasn’t going to add to it by doing something totally unforgivable. With a mammoth effort he sat back from her.
‘Go to sleep, Victoria. It’s been a long day.’ He stood and reached over to pull the blind down. ‘When you wake up it’ll only be eighty-nine more sleeps.’
Vic smiled at the thought as she slid down into the bed and snuggled into the sheets, sighing as her eyes drifted shut. ‘Night, Lawson. Sweet dreams.’
Lawson watched her for a few seconds before turning on his heel. Sweet dreams? Was she kidding? Something had shifted between them tonight, the boundaries had moved, and with the imprint of her lips still scorching his chin he’d be lucky if he ever slept again.
Chapter Three
LAWSON woke to a finger lifting his eyelid. ‘Daddy, why are you sleeping on the couch?’
Considering he’d not long closed it, Lawson almost groaned out loud. ‘Morning, Tilly.’ It took a superhuman effort but he managed to force the other one open. He glanced at the clock. Three minutes to six. This time he did groan.
Why couldn’t his daughter have been one of those kids that he’d heard mothers talking about at school? The ones that required a crowbar to lever them from their beds?
‘Did you fall asleep watching TV?’
Lawson sat up. His chest was bare and he’d undone the top two buttons of his fly. He rubbed his hands across his face. ‘No, Victoria is sleeping in my bed.’
Matilda’s face lit up like Guy Fawkes Night. ‘Vic’s here?’ She jumped up and down clapping, making little happy noises at the back of her throat.
He winced as her excited reaction bordered on a squeal. ‘Shh.’ He placed his fingers on Matilda’s lips. ’She’s…not well.’
‘Can I go wake her up, Daddy?’
‘No, you may not.’ He ruffled his daughter’s blonde curls, the only thing she’d inherited from her mother. The rest was all him. ‘She had a big day yesterday with Ryan. She needs her sleep.’
Matilda’s enthusiasm waned. ‘Will she be awake before I leave for school?’
Lawson prised himself out of the lounge and stretched his back out as he rose. ‘I doubt it.’ If she was anywhere near as tired as he’d been last night, as he was right now, she’d probably be in his bed all week. His thoughts drifted to her innocent sort-of kiss last night before he could put it firmly from his mind.
‘Phooey.’ Matilda pouted. ‘I wanted to ask her how many more sleeps it is.’
‘Eighty-nine.’ The answer fell from his lips automatically. He’d been privy to the countdown for the past twelve months. It was as if the numbers had been engraved on his soul.
Matilda put her skinny arms around her father’s waist. ‘I’m going to miss her, Daddy.’
Lawson smiled down at his daughter. ‘We all will, Tilly.’ He hugged her for a moment, his mind drifting to that kiss again. That non-kiss kiss. Or whatever the hell it was. ‘Come on, let’s get breakfast.’
For the next couple of hours he and Matilda went about their usual morning routine. Not that there was anything usual about it with Victoria sleeping soundly in his bed the entire time. He’d tried to keep Tilly’s noise to a minimum but sometimes that was like trying to keep a wave on the sand. Especially when his daughter’s motives weren’t exactly pure. Despite Tilly’s best efforts, Victoria kept sleeping.
When it came time to take Matilda to school he picked up his shirt where he’d discarded it last night, right next to Victoria’s shoes, and threw it back on. It was creased but it wasn’t as if he had to get out of the car and it beat the alternative—tiptoeing into his room to retrieve a fresh one.
Tilly chatted non-stop on the drive to school about her teacher and her spelling and the excursion coming up in a few weeks’ time. She reminded him of Victoria, who also seemed to think silences were there to be filled.
‘Have you got the tuck-shop bags I did up for you?’ he asked.
Matilda nodded. ‘And the excursion forms. Don’t forget to ask Vic’s dad for some time off next week to come and see me play my recorder at assembly.’
Lawson nodded. He handed her the library book that had been due back yesterday and he’d turned the house upside down looking for after they’d got back from the hospital, finally locating it in the hammock outside.
‘Can Maddy come over this afternoon? We’re doing our pirate project together and she doesn’t have any Internet at her house.’
Lawson groaned inwardly. He was so tired he could sleep for a week. The last thing he wanted was the presence of giggling Maddy. ‘Sure. I’ll check with her mum before pick-up this afternoon. I think her number’s on the phone tree on the fridge.’
He pulled into the set-down zone in front of the school and Tilly kissed his cheek. ‘You’re the best.’
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