Australian Escape: Her Hottest Summer Yet / The Heat of the Night

FOUR

Avery woke to an insistent buzzing. Groaning, she scrunched one eye open to find herself in a strange room. A strange bed. Peering through narrowed eyes, she saw the pillow beside her was undisturbed. That was something, at least.

She let her senses stretch a mite and slowly the day before came back to her... Green Island. Jonah. Sunburn. Jonah. Cocktail. Jonah. And lusting. Oodles of coconut-scented lusting. And Jonah.

And she rolled over to bury her face in a pillow.

When the buzzing started up again, she realised it was the hotel phone. She smacked her hand around the bedside table till she found it. “Hello?” Her voice sounded as if she’d swallowed a bucket of sand.

The laughter that followed needed no introduction.

“Don’t. Please. It hurts.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Jonah rumbled, his voice even deeper through the phone. “How long till you can be ready to leave?”

“A week?”

She felt the smile. Felt it slink across her skin and settle in her belly. “Half an hour.”

“I’ll meet you in Reception in forty-five minutes. And don’t forget the sunscreen. Australian. Factor thirty. Buy some from the resort shop.”

“Where are we going?”

“Home,” he said, then hung up.

Avery heaved herself upright and squinted against the sunshine pouring through the curtain-free windows. The scent of sea air was fresh and sharp, the swoosh of the water nearby like a lullaby. It was a fantasy, with—thanks to rum—glimpses of hell. But it sure wasn’t home.

Home was blaring horns and sidewalks teeming with life, not all of it human. City lights so bright you could barely see the stars. It was keeping your handbag close and your frenemies closer. It was freezing in New York right now. And heading into night. The storefronts filled with the first hints at hopeful spring fashion even while the locals scurried by in scarves and boots and coats to keep out the chill.

As soon as she turned on her phone it beeped. Her mother had sent a message at some point, as if she could sense her beloved daughter was about to have less than positive thoughts.

Hello, my darling! I hope you are having a fabulous time. When you get a moment could you please send me Freddy Horgendaas’s number as I have had a most brilliant idea. I miss you more than you can know. xXx

Freddy was a most brilliant cake-maker, famous for his wildly risqué creations. Avery pressed finger and thumb into her eye sockets, glad anew she wouldn’t be there when her mother revealed a cake in the shape of her father’s private parts with a whopping great knife stuck right in the centre.

She sent the number with the heading ‘Freddy Deets’ knowing the lack of a complete sentence would make her mother twitch. It wasn’t a no. More like passive aggression. But for her it was definitely a move in the right direction.

Forty minutes later—showered and changed into the still-damp bikini she’d found on the bathroom floor—she made a quick stop to the resort gift shop where she picked up an oversized It’s Easy Being Green! T-shirt, a fisherman’s hat, and flip-flops to replace the shoes she’d somehow lost along the way, and slathered herself in Australian sunscreen and handed her key in to the day staff at Reception.

The girls behind the desk chattered about the shock of Claudia’s and Luke’s parents suddenly heading off into the middle of nowhere, and asked how Claudia was coping. Avery said her friend was coping just great, all the while thinking shock and coping were pretty loaded words. Making a deal with herself to pin Claude down asap, Avery still knew the moment Jonah had arrived, for she might as well have turned invisible to the two women behind the desk.

“Hi, Jonah!” the girls sing-songed.

“Morning, ladies,” he said from behind her, his deep Australian drawl hooking into that place behind Avery’s belly button it always seemed to catch. Then to Avery, “Ready to go?”

And the girls’ eyes turned to her in amazement and envy.

Avery shook her head infinitesimally—I get the lust, believe me, but don’t panic, he’s not the guy for me.

Then she turned, all that denial ringing in her head as it got a load of the man who’d arrived to take her away.

It shouldn’t have been a surprise that Jonah was still unshaven, and yet the sight of all that manly stubble first thing in the morning did the strangest things to her constitution. As did the warm brown of his skin against the navy blue shirt, and the strong calves beneath his long shorts, and the crystal-clear grey eyes.

“Shall we?” he asked.

We shall, she thought.

“Bye, Jonah!” the girls called.

Avery, who was by then five steps ahead of Jonah, rolled her eyes.

When they hit sunlight, she stopped, not knowing which way to go.

“What time’s the boat?”

“No boat today. Not for us anyway.” And then his hand strayed to her lower back, burning like a brand as he guided her along the path, leaving nothing between his searing touch but the cotton of her T-shirt and her still-damp swimmers.

“This way,” he said, guiding her with the slightest pressure as he eased her through a gate marked Private then down a sandy path beneath the shade of a small forest, and back out into the sunshine where a jetty poked out into the blinding blue sea. And perched on a big square at the end—

“A helicopter?” A pretty one too, with the Charter North logo emblazed across the side.

“It was brought here this morning on a charter. They don’t need it back till four. Quickest way off the island.”

“No, thanks,” she said, crossing her arms across her chest, “I’ll wait for the boat.”

“You sure?” he asked, his eyes dropping to where her crossed arms had created a little faux cleavage. Her next breath in was difficult. “It’ll be a good eight hours from now, the sea rocking you back and forth, all that noise from a bunch of very tired kids after a long hot day at the beach—”

Avery held up a hand to shush him as she swallowed down the heave of anticipatory post-cocktail seasickness rising up in her stomach. “Yes, thank you. I get your point. So where’s our pilot?”

At the twist of his smile, she knew.

Before she could object, Jonah’s hands were at her waist, shoving her forward. Her self-preservation instincts actually propelled her away from his touch and towards the contraption as if it were the lesser danger.

When he hoisted her up, she scrambled into her seat with less grace than she’d have liked. And then suddenly he was there, his silhouette blocking out the sun, the scent of him—soap and sea and so much man—sliding inside her senses, the back of his knuckles scraping the T-shirt across her belly...

Oh, he was plugging her in.

“That feels good,” she said. Then, cheeks going from sunburned to scorched in half a second flat, added, “The belt feels good. Fine. Nice and tight.” Nice and tight?

A muscle in Jonah’s cheek twitched, then without another word he passed her a set of headphones, slid some over his dark curls, flipped some dials, chatted to a flight-control tower, and soon they were off, with Avery’s stomach trailing about ten feet below.

It didn’t help that Jonah seemed content to simply fly, sunlight slanting across the strong planes of his face, his big thighs spread out over his seat.

Three minutes into the flight Avery nearly whooped with relief when she found a subject that didn’t carry some unintentional double entendre. She waved a hand Jonah’s way.

He tapped her headphones. Right.

“I hope you found someone to look after your dog,” she said, her voice tinny in her ears. “I was thinking about it before I fell asleep last night. I mean, since it was my fault you couldn’t go home to him last night.”

“Hull’ll be fine.”

Hull. It suited the huge wolfish beast. Like something a Viking might call his best friend.

Then Jonah added, “But he’s not my dog.”

“Oh. But I thought... Claude said—”

“He’s not my dog.”

Okay, then.

An age later Jonah’s voice came to her, deep and echoey through the headphones. “Want to know what I was thinking about when I finally fell asleep?”

Yes... But she was meant to be getting better at saying no. And this seemed like a really good chance to practise. “No,” she lied, her voice flat even as her heart rate shot through the roof.

He shot her a look. Grey eyes hooded, lazy with heat. And the smile that curved at his mouth was predatory. “I’m going to tell you anyway.”

Oh, hell.

“I wondered how long it will be before I have to throw myself between you and a drop bear.”

Avery wasn’t fast enough to hide the smile that tugged at her mouth. Or slow enough not to notice that his gaze dropped to her mouth and stayed. “I may be a tourist, Jonah, but I’m not an idiot. There’s no such thing as a drop bear.”

His eyes—thankfully—slid back to hers. “Claudia tipped you off, eh?”

“She is fabulous that way.”

At mention of her friend another option occurred to her! Sitting up straighter, she turned in her seat as much as she could, ignoring the zing that travelled up her leg as her knee brushed against his.

“Speaking of Claudia,” she said. Here goes. “She thinks you’re hot.”

A rise of an eyebrow showed his surprise. “Really?” And for a moment she thought she had him. Then he had to go and ask, “What do you think?”

Her stomach clenched as if taking a direct hit. “That’s irrelevant.”

“Not to me.”

“Why do you even care?”

His next look was flat, intent, no holds barred. “If you don’t know that yet, Ms Shaw, then I’m afraid that fancy education of yours was a complete waste.”

She tried to blink. To think. To come up with some fabulous retort that would send him yelping back into his man cave. But the pull of those eyes, that face, that voice, basking in the wholly masculine scent of him filling the tiny cabin, she couldn’t come up with a pronoun, much less an entire sentence.

And the longer the silence built, the less chance she had of getting herself off the hook.

It took for him to break eye contact—when a gust of wind picked them up and rocked them about—for her to drag her eyes away.

With skill and haste, he slipped them above the air stream and into calmer air space. While her stomach still felt as if it were tripping and falling. All because of a little innocent flirting.

Only it didn’t feel innocent. It felt like Jonah was staking a claim.

But he scared the bejesus out of her. Not him so much; the swiftness of her attraction to him. It was fierce. And kind of wild. And she was the woman who calmed the waters. Not the kind who ever went chasing storms.

Even while she knew she was about to admit she understood exactly what Jonah meant, she said, “I told you—I’m interested in someone else.” Considering becoming interested, anyway.

Then, as if it just didn’t matter, he said, “You didn’t answer my question.”

“Because it’s a ridiculous question!”

“You brought it up.”

So she had. How had this suddenly gone so wrong?

Avery risked a glance to find Jonah’s eyes back on her mouth. His jaw was tight, his breaths slow and deep. And his deep grey eyes made their way back to hers.

“Good Lord, Jonah, first the girls at the hotel were all swoony over you—”

“You noticed?” The smile was back. And a sheen of perspiration prickled all over her skin.

She held up a hand to block his face from sight. “Then Claude mentions in passing that she thinks you’re a ‘supreme example of Australian manhood—’”

His laughter at that echoed through the tiny space till her toes curled. But still she forged on.

“You really need me to be in the line-up too? Are you really that egotistical?”

“No, Avery. I’m really that interested. I want to hear you admit you’re as attracted to me as I think you are,” he said, and not for a second did he take his eyes from hers.

If she hadn’t been strapped up like a Thanksgiving turkey she’d have been on him like cranberry sauce. But she was, and she couldn’t. And the conversation had become such a hot mess, Avery wished she could go back in time. Perhaps to the very beginning when all that mattered in life was sleep, food, and a safe place in which to hide from pesky dinosaurs.

“You want to know what I want?” she asked, proud of the fact that her voice wasn’t quavering all over the place. “What I want is for you to keep your eyes on the sky! No matter what you think of my survival skills, I have no intention of dying today.”

She waited, all air stuck in her lungs, for him to say something like I’d rather keep my eyes on you. But he merely smiled. As if he knew that she was a big fat liar. Deep down in the dark places inside her that she avoided at all costs. The place where Pollyanna had been born: always positive, not a bother, things would get better, they would! No wonder she worked in PR.

When Jonah’s smile only grew, she muttered, “Oh, shut up.”

“I didn’t say a thing.”

“Well, stop thinking. It doesn’t suit you.”

The smile turned into a laugh—huh-huh-huh. Then, easy as you please, he shifted eyes front and left her alone for the rest of the flight.

Disappointment and temptation rode her in equal measure, so much so she clenched her fists and let herself have a good internal scream. Because she didn’t need this, feeling all breathless and weightless with all the hot flushes and the like. Avery wasn’t looking for sparks. Sparks were incendiary. Their sole purpose was to start fires. And fire burned.

She couldn’t have been more relieved when the helicopter finally came to rest on a helipad at the end of a jetty belonging to one of the bigger resorts just north of Crescent Cove.

Even better when she saw Claudia waving as if Avery had been rescued from some deserted island.

And, bless his shiny black shoes, there was Luke, leaning against the Tropicana Nights shuttle bus in the car park at the far end of the jetty. Tall, and handsome, with half an eye on his phone.

Hull was there too. The beast sat apart, upright on a cluster of rocks in the shadow of a tilting palm tree at the end of the jetty. Not Jonah’s dog? Maybe somebody should tell the dog that.

Avery managed to get herself unstrapped without help. But getting down was another matter.

Strong hands at her waist, Jonah dropped her to the ground. She didn’t dare breathe as all that hard muscle and sun-drenched skin imprinted itself upon her and good. The second her feet hit terra firma, she peeled herself away.

“Here’s hoping that’s the last time you feel the need to come to my salvation.”

Jonah didn’t second that thought. In fact, even as he stood there, like some big hot, muscly statue, the look in his eyes told her he wasn’t on the same page at all. With a shake of her head, she turned and walked away.

“Avery,” he called.

She scrunched her eyes tight a second, held her breath. And when she looked back, she saw he was holding out her missing shoes.

Meaning at some point after he’d dropped her at the Tea Tree he must have gone looking for them. Which was actually...really...nice.

She walked to him, hating every second of it. And when she slid her fingers into the straps, her fingers brushed his. And there was the spark. Hard, fast, debilitating.

Their eyes met. One corner of his sexy mouth lifted. Deny that, he said without saying anything at all. And her heart thumped so hard against her ribs she dared not look down in case it was leaving a mark.

“Aaaaaveryyyy!” Claudia’s voice carried on the air.

Jonah’s eyes followed the sound, and lit up with an easygoing smile, one not fuelled with sex appeal and intent. When his eyes once again found hers, he caught her staring. And the next smile was all sex, all intent, all for her.

“Don’t say it,” she said, walking backwards, using her dangly sandals as a shield. “Don’t even think it. The end.”

And then she turned, looped her arm through Claudia’s and swung her away from the crazy-making guy at her back.

“You okay?” Claude asked. “You looked all flushed.”

“Sunburn,” Avery deadpanned. Then bumped shoulders with her friend. “Now did you guys really drive out here just to get me?”

“Of course we did. When Jonah rang to say you’d nearly been eaten by a giant squid I had to find out the real story!”

“Funny man,” she mumbled, “that friend of yours.”

“Seems he’s becoming quite the friend of yours. I’ve never been on his chopper before. Not once.”

Avery turned back to find Jonah leaning on his helicopter watching her. The big wolf dog now sitting at his heels was watching her too.

“What is with the dog anyway?” she asked, distracting Claudia. “Jonah says it’s not his.”

“And yet there they are, their own private little wolf pack. It’s kind of romantic really, in a tragic, Heathcliffian loner-type way.”

“Except instead of cold, wet, English moors he wanders a sunny Aussie beach?”

“Exactly.”

“Not quite so tragic, then.”

Claude grinned. “If you’re going to wander anywhere the rest of your days, might as well be here.”

Avery opened her mouth to ask if there’d been a “Catherine” to send him wandering the moors/beach in the first place. Then snapped it shut tight. Jonah North was none of her business. Hopefully she could get through the rest of her holiday without tripping over the guy or she’d go back home even more tightly wound than when she left.