by Valerie Parv
“He isn’t worth it.”
As a ranger Tom was duty-bound to protect the vulnerable, probably why he’d watched over her last night, she rationalized. Still, his explosive assertion warmed her. “I know he isn’t. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.”
“Good. Drink your coffee while I clean up, then we’ll have breakfast and decide your next step.”
“I’ve told you, it’s not your problem. I’ll find a way to get the tape of evidence back from Jamal and to my father.”
“Are you always this difficult first thing in the morning?”
Only when she’d been aroused to dizzying heights then abruptly rejected the night before, she thought furiously. “It’s early for me,” she said.
He frowned. “It’s after eight-thirty. Perhaps you’d prefer breakfast on a tray and your bath scattered with rose petals?”
His offer was so close to the way she’d started her day in Q’aresh that her face heated. “Sarcasm doesn’t become you,” she snapped.
“It’s the best I can do right now, Princess. Drink your coffee.”
He turned on his heel. A few minutes later she heard a door slam and a shower running. She lay back. A few hours’ sleep had done little to alleviate her exhaustion. Tom’s contradictory behavior was also wearing. Telling herself he was only doing his job didn’t explain the kissing, or the strength of his effect on her.
With a sigh she got up. A change of clothes was out of the question, and she didn’t feel greatly refreshed by the time she’d showered and dressed again and found her way to the kitchen. While showering, she’d made up her mind to ask him to take her to town, supposedly to buy clothes, but in reality so she could slip away rather than put him and his family at any more risk. She already knew he wouldn’t agree. So she wouldn’t tell him.
He must have finished showering. His office door was closed and she heard the murmur of his voice on the phone. She looked around. His comment about serving her breakfast in bed rankled. Time to show him she wasn’t completely useless.
His refrigerator yielded eggs and milk, bread and butter. She located an electric toaster and popped the slices in to toast while she whipped all the eggs she could find into a fury with some of the milk and pepper from a grinder.
She began to hum to herself. Why did people make such a fuss about cooking? It wasn’t all that hard. She had never scrambled eggs before but she’d seen servants do it. Nothing to it.
Saucepans hung from a stainless-steel rack above an electric stove. Choosing a small pan, she set it on a burner and turned the heat to high, then continued beating the eggs. When they looked sufficiently frothy, she poured the mixture into the saucepan, the sizzling sound encouraging. A few drops spilled onto the burner and she wrinkled her nose at the un-appetizing smell, but decided it would soon burn off.
The burning smell wasn’t only coming from the spilled eggs, she discovered as smoke drifted across her vision. The toast was burning. She grabbed the toaster and turned it over, trying to shake the bread loose, but her reward was a loud bang. Flames licked at the charcoal slices. With a screech of alarm she dropped the appliance.
“What in the devil…”
Tom stormed into the room just as the eggs surged over the rim of the saucepan and onto the floor like lava from an erupting volcano. She reached for the handle but his command stopped her. “Don’t touch that, you’ll scald yourself.”
He snapped off the burner and the volcano subsided. Stepping over the mess on the floor, he turned off the toaster at the power point and hauled it back onto the counter by the cable, his expression grim. “First rule of accidents in kitchens, turn off the power.”
“I knew that.” She tried to sound as if it would have been her next move.
“Yeah, right.” A slice of toast continued to smolder on the charred linoleum and he stomped on it. “I wasn’t far off the mark with the rose-petal bath, was I?”
Refusing to answer, she wrapped her arms around herself, appalled at the devastation a few minutes could cause. “Maybe I should have started with something easier.”
“Like McDonald’s,” he said, the laugher in his voice taking any sting out of the suggestion. He dumped the ruined saucepan into the sink and filled it with water. A cloud of steam hissed from it. Then he took her arm. “Come on.”
“Don’t you want me to clean this up first?”
“If your cleaning skills are on a par with your cooking, I might not have a house left. I’ll do it later. Let’s go.”
“Go where?”
“Somewhere they can cook breakfast without needing the fire department on standby.”
She had wanted him to take her to town, but not because she was spoiled and useless. “If I could change my background, I would,” she threw at him.
He gave her a long, assessing look. “Sweetheart, that makes two of us.”
A short time later she emerged from her room with her hair coiled into a chignon, and the ranger’s hat he’d loaned her jammed over her eyes. “How do I look?”
He considered. “Like a princess disguised as a ranger.”
“Be serious.”
He was being serious. No man in his right mind could mistake her slight figure for a man’s. An undernourished boy, perhaps. He handed her a pair of dark glasses and she perched them on her nose. “A bit better. From now on you’re Nudge, a high-school kid doing work experience with me because you want to be a ranger when you grow up.”
She didn’t like that part, he saw as her mouth thinned. When had he started to read her moods so easily? She walked toward the hall mirror to check her appearance, her narrow hips swaying in the snug jeans. No boy could pull off that walk, he thought, feeling himself heat up all over again.
Last night she’d shown him how grown-up she was, tempting him to break every rule in his book. He still wasn’t sure how he’d found the strength to resist, but he’d need every bit of it to prevent a repeat. Shara was everything he’d dreamed of in a woman. Too bad he was more like her nightmare.
He followed her. “Put some of this on.”
Turning from the mirror, she inspected the bottle he handed her. “Aftershave?”
“To disguise your perfume.”
She looked at him, puzzled. “I’m not wearing any.”
He was close enough to smell it in her hair. Soft, feminine, faintly flowery. Could it be Shara herself? He had to stop himself from inhaling deeply, and said brusquely, “Use the aftershave.”
They were almost ready to leave the house, when she balked. “Last night when I was using the phone in your study, I couldn’t help seeing the photos lying on your desk. The style of the rock art in them looks familiar. I meant to tell you in case it’s useful.”
“But we got sidetracked, I know.” If he went into the office with her now, it was likely to happen again. “Wait here, I’ll get the photos and we’ll discuss them over breakfast. It will add to the fiction that you’re working with me.”
Having something to focus on besides how much he wanted her in his arms was a good idea, he decided. He slid the photographs into a folder and jammed it into his day pack. Shara already had her satchel slung over one shoulder.
“Cut that out,” he grouched.
“Cut what out?”
“You’re standing like a model. Scuff your feet. Slouch a bit. Trail your bag as if it’s too heavy to carry.”
“Is this better?”
She did as he instructed but still looked like a beautiful sheep in wolf’s clothing. He dragged in air. If he was to be any use to her, he needed to start thinking with his head instead of his hormones. She was Nudge, the work-experience kid. He didn’t really think she had learned anything useful from the materials on his desk, but discussing them would help keep his mind where it belonged.
On his job instead of on her.
He jerked his head toward the front door. “Let’s go, kid.”
Chapter 9
Kid? Learning to answer to her name instead of a ti
tle was challenging enough, but kid? In Q’aresh, she could have had Tom arrested for taking such a liberty. Of course, in Q’aresh she would never have dressed like this.
Seeing her wearing men’s clothing would have scandalized her father. His response to her wearing Judy’s figure-hugging jeans didn’t bear thinking about. And the red dust coating her top-of-the-range sports shoes would have cost some poor palace servant her job. But since the king wasn’t going to see her, she didn’t have to take his feelings into account. Why couldn’t she dismiss Tom’s opinion so readily?
He’d become important to her, she realized with a jolt. Despite her vow not to let him get to her, somehow he had, and it had to stop.
The thought depressed her so much, it was easy to slouch and scuff her shoes in the dust like a teenager. She was aware of Tom watching her, with mild amusement, as if he hadn’t believed she could carry off the act.
The café he took her to was little more than a room at the front of an old weatherboard cottage. The front was sheltered by an iron-roofed veranda and inside were a few tables and chairs upholstered in plastic. Shelves of secondhand books lined one wall, and a table of hand-knitted items for sale was displayed in a corner.
“It’s dreadfully hot in here,” she said, wishing she could remove the hat as sweat trickled down her cheek.
“There aren’t many people around this early. We can sit out on the veranda,” he said.
Outside wasn’t much cooler but at least more air was circulating. She waited for Tom to pull a chair out for her, then remembered she was supposed to be a teenage boy. Annoyed with herself for forgetting, she dragged a chair out and sat down opposite him. He was already looking at a menu, so she retrieved one from another table and began to study it, keeping her head down.
From beneath the hat brim she saw a motherly-looking gray-haired woman in her fifties approach the table. “My usual bacon and eggs, thanks, Betty,” Tom said.
The woman smiled. “And two slices of thick toast with extra butter.”
“You know me too well. My young friend here will have the same.”
“He looks like he needs feeding up. You going to be a ranger too, son?”
Shara nodded without looking up. Answering would be too much of a giveaway.
Betty didn’t seem fazed by the lack of response. “His first day out with you, Tom?”
He nodded. “I’ve promised not to feed him to the crocodiles. His name’s…Nudge.”
The woman took no notice of Tom’s hesitation, and patted Shara on the back. “You’re in good hands, son. Tom’s shown lots of kids the ropes, and they all survive the experience.” Barely pausing for breath, she went on, “I heard that Alan Beckett, the last youngster who worked with you, ran away to Derby.”
“Not on my account, I hope.”
Tom’s irony was lost on the woman. “Hardly. His mother says he has a sweetheart on the coast. The family used to live in Derby, you know, until the father inherited his parents’ place in Halls Creek.”
“Breakfast?” Tom suggested gently.
The woman seemed unperturbed. “I’m getting carried away as usual. I’ll get your food.”
Hearing the screen door slam, Shara looked at Tom over the menu. “I gather you make a habit of taking young people out with you on your rounds.”
He shrugged. “It’s called work experience. Gives them a chance to find out what a job’s really like. Soon knocks any illusions out of them.”
“Or shows them if they’ve made the right career choice.”
“Whatever.”
“Do you get paid for the extra work?” she asked.
He shook his head. “Part of my job.”
Somehow she doubted it. “Your foster father must be pleased that you’re following his example.”
“I could do unpaid work for the rest of my life, and never be the man he is,” Tom denied.
He was already as good a man as his foster father, she thought, but could see that Tom didn’t know it. Why not? What was in his past to make him so self-doubting? And why on earth did she care?
The silence lengthened, although Tom didn’t seem to mind. He was probably used to being alone with his thoughts. Accustomed to having people chattering at her all the time, Shara knew silence would take some getting used to. She refused to allow that some of her uneasiness stemmed from wanting more attention from Tom.
When it arrived, the breakfast was enormous. “Enjoy,” Betty said as she set the plates down. Tom overpaid her, overriding the waitress’s objections. She seemed inclined to say more, but a phone rang in the café, and she went inside to answer it.
Shara let out the breath she’d been holding. She felt horribly conspicuous. The café owner seemed pleasant enough but was just as obviously the town gossip. Wasn’t Tom worried that she’d stumble on Shara’s real identity?
“You’re thinking too much,” he said, watching her. “We’ll work this out, trust me.”
Oddly enough she did. She picked up a fork and prodded the heap of bacon, eggs, mushrooms and tomatoes on her plate. “I can’t possibly eat all this.”
Tom was already eating with gusto. “Nudge wouldn’t think twice.”
She sighed. “You’re right.”
“Have you any idea what it does to a man when you do that?” he asked, and forked most of the remaining bacon from her plate onto his.
“Do what?”
“Make that little sighing sound, as if life is too much for you.”
“I don’t do any such thing.”
“You do, and it tears me up inside.”
So she was having an effect on him after all, even looking like this. Her spirits rose unaccountably and she began to eat. The food tasted delicious. Between bites, Tom explained that most of it was locally grown or produced.
“All the same, the serving is far too generous,” she insisted.
Her fork clattered against the plate and she looked down, astonished. A few bits of bacon, a mushroom and traces of the egg were all that remained.
Tom grinned. “The outback air gives everyone an appetite.”
He made no comment when she helped herself to a slab of his toast and spread it with creamed honey. The heat was building up and the honey was almost liquid. She bit into the toast, leaving teeth marks in the butter. The taste was heavenly.
“The honey comes from Betty’s own bees,” Tom said, seeing her blissful expression. “She’ll be glad you appreciate her food.”
Anxiety gripped her. “And everyone for miles will know you have a new protégé called Nudge.”
The idea didn’t seem to bother him as much as Shara thought it should. “Betty would give you her last dollar if you needed it, but she’s an incorrigible gossip. What she knows, the whole town soon knows.”
“What happens if word gets back to Jamal?”
“So what? He won’t care that a scruffy teenager is hanging around learning my job. You’d be more at risk without a cover story. Halls Creek is a small place and strangers tend to attract attention.”
His behavior started to make sense. “You brought me here to provide this cover story.”
He leaned closer. “What we haven’t told her, Betty will make up. By day’s end, your entire life story, or her version of it, will be common knowledge.”
Shara’s spirits rose, although she told herself he was only being practical. He would have done as much for anyone who needed his help. “Perhaps your friend should be a writer.”
“I told her the same thing. She said she’s thinking of writing a gossipy saga set in the Kimberley.”
The last of the toast and honey disappeared and Shara reached for a glass of orange juice to wash it down. “You really care about these people, don’t you? And don’t tell me it’s your job. Your job doesn’t include encouraging a middle-aged woman to start a new career.” Or going out on a limb to protect a runaway princess, she thought. Instead of putting himself at risk, he could have handed her over to the local police for protection
.
“When my mother was—died, Betty took me in and I got to know her better. After her husband left her for a younger woman, Betty bought this place with her divorce settlement. She taught me that you can either lie down and let life beat you, or you can take the lemons you’re given and make lemonade.”
Shara had the feeling he’d made a lot of lemonade in his life. Could she do the same? “Why didn’t you stay with her?” she asked.
“She was too softhearted, and I was too young and stupid to know when I was well off. I made too much trouble and was hauled off to an institution. It took Des Logan’s no-non-sense foster parenting to set me straight.”
Hard to imagine Tom as a troublemaker. There was so much she didn’t know about him, and wanted to. His shuttered expression told her she wasn’t going to learn any more now. If ever. She pushed her plate away. “I haven’t eaten this much at one time in years.”
“Time you started. As Betty said, you need feeding up.”
“You think I look scrawny?” She’d known this outfit was a problem.
He eased his chair back from the table. “You have a figure like a fashion model.” Spoiling the compliment, he added, “Most of them look undernourished to me.”
Ridiculous to feel slighted. She didn’t need his approval. She looked at the empty plate in front of her. “I won’t be if you keep feeding me like this.”
His eyes narrowed. “You won’t be in the Kimberley long enough for it to be a problem.”
Butterflies jumped in her stomach. “Because?”
“As soon as this situation is sorted out, you’ll go home to Q’aresh.”
“Returning home isn’t an option until I can prove Jamal’s treachery to my father.” Bitterness rang in her tone.
“By now your father might have missed you enough to see things your way.”
A snowstorm in the Kimberley was more likely, she thought, feeling her heart grow heavy. “You obviously don’t know my father. He’s as stubborn and single-minded as…” About to say “as you are,” she trailed off, not wanting to evidence too personal an interest in Tom. “…as your greedy neighbor,” she substituted.