Ultimate Heroes Collection

by Various Authors

  It? What it?

  ‘Fine,’ she said, letting go and sliding past him, through the kitchen and outside to the grassy area at the side of the cottage. ‘Slimer! Here!’

  Slimer came bounding outside, as usual too thick to realise what the hose in her hand meant until she had him chained to the clothesline.

  Damien followed in his wake, dark and broad and beautiful in his designer threads with muddy dog prints on his chest, dead leaves attached to the bottoms of his shoes, and a crazed old bucket in his hand. He still looked out of place, but beautifully so.

  She turned on the hose and he kept on coming. Let him get his perfect clothes all wet and muddy. Then he’d really see how literally messy her life was.

  ‘Come here, boy,’ she called out. Slimer came to her, she held out the hose and at the last second he darted away. She instinctively tipped the hose in the opposite direction to herd him back where she wanted him.

  The shout that came from Damien’s direction swung her gaze his way to find him standing with his feet shoulder-width apart, his face dripping with water, a neat spray covering his shirt and the bottom of his trousers soaked. He looked so shocked, she had to bite her lips to stop from laughing.

  He looked up at her, his eyes blazing. ‘You did that on purpose.’

  ‘Did not.’

  He took a gigantic step towards her and she squealed. She held the hose in front of herself as a shield.

  He shook the droplets from his hair which left it spiky and left him looking like something out of a magazine photo spread. With his dark eyes, stormy expression and clothes clinging wetly to him he was unbelievably hot.

  ‘Don’t you dare tell me you’re turned on right now,’ he demanded, and her eyes shot from the fabric stretching across his thighs to his face and her cheeks turned a degree warmer.

  But his eyes were now dancing. Bright and beautiful and laughing.

  She cocked her hip and let the water tilt away from him. ‘And what if I am? Watcha gonna do about it?’

  He took another step her way and she baulked. The hint of a smile quickly turned into a devilish grin. Then he moved with such speed she brought the hose between them only to have his hand clasp down on hers. The water shot skyward, showering them both in a thick spray of water.

  Slimer barked and frolicked and generally loved the fact that anyone else was getting wet bar him.

  Chelsea screamed, and tried to kick Damien in the shin but he was too quick. He turned the hose on her full blast, her hair flew back from her face and her white long-sleeved T-shirt soon became sodden.

  When the water spray disappeared, she spat out a clump of hair and opened her eyes to find Damien standing before her staring hard at her breasts. She looked down to find her T-shirt and beige bra had become completely see-through. Her cold nipples stood out hard and dark through the thin fabric.

  He dragged his gaze to her face, and her breath caught in her lungs at the level of desire surging behind his eyes.

  Love me, she thought with such desperation he must have heard. Instead she said, ‘Don’t even think about it. There are kids just inside the house.’

  ‘I know,’ he said, his voice a deep growl. ‘But if there weren’t, I want you to know that your dry-cleaner would be trying to get grass stains from your clothes come Monday.’

  ‘I don’t have a dry-cleaner. Like most regular people I wash my own clothes.’

  His mouth tilted into a smile. ‘You’re frozen solid, drenched to the bone, without a weapon, and breathing so hard you look like you are about to pass out from it, yet you still manage to dredge up a way to keep me from getting too big for my boots. I love you.’

  His words hung on the air like snowflakes. Delicate, ethereal and in danger of melting away lest she pay close attention. Chelsea licked her suddenly dry lips. ‘Did you just say—’

  ‘I did,’ Damien said, his own breaths suddenly coming harder. He reached over and turned off the hose at the tap and the world turned silent. Even Slimer chose that moment to have a little lie-down.

  Damien let the hose slump at his feet and walked over to where Chelsea stood shivering, much less from the cold than from the events consuming her.

  He reached out and ran his hands up and down her arms, warming her, inside and out. And then he closed the gap completely and drew her to him and kissed her. Softly, fully, deeply and full of the feelings he had just admitted.

  When he pulled away and looked down into her eyes Chelsea wasn’t shaking any more. She wasn’t scared, she wasn’t unsure, she wasn’t even the least bit overwhelmed. She loved him and he … he was real, after all.

  ‘Since I drove away from you last night,’ he said, his voice low and intimate and true, ‘I have been miserable. Wretched even. But hitting that low was what I needed to realise that you are my high. I drove here planning on whisking you away somewhere beautiful, and most of all somewhere private in order to convince you of what I feel for you.’

  ‘Here’s fine,’ she said, her voice breathless.

  He smiled, crinkles fanning out from the edges of his stunning eyes. ‘So it is. Now for this moment to at least end the way I planned for it to end I need you to look me in the eye and know, to the bottom of your heart, that I have gone right ahead and fallen madly in love with you.’

  Chelsea did as she was told. She looked into his Pacific-blue eyes, and saw the truth. The whole truth. That was the difference she saw in him. He not only loved her, but he was ready to love her and to keep on loving her.

  ‘I’m in love with you too,’ she blurted, the words spilling from her like a rainbow splashed across a rain-cleansed sky. ‘From the moment I met you you made me feel like for the first time in my life I could dream as big as I wished. You may own a suit or two, and you may be a touch arrogant, but that’s only scratching the surface. You’re good and kind and generous and fun and playful and you’re hot. Have I even told you how beautiful I think you are? And tall. I lo-o-ove that you’re really tall. And when you kiss me …’

  Her next words were lost within the warmth of his lips. Thank God, she thought, because once she’d opened the flood gates she felt as if she could go on and on for ever telling him how alive he made her feel.

  He slid the wet cotton of her T-shirt upwards until his warm hand made direct contact with her waist and before she knew it his thumbs were running along the undersides of her breasts.

  ‘Hey, guys, is Slimer done?’ Kensey came round the side of the house and Chelsea hid behind Damien and tugged her shirt back into place.

  Kensey placed a hand on her hip and glared at them, though Chelsea caught the delighted twinkle in her eye. ‘My dog is now covered in cake mix and is muddy and wet. And you lot look just as bad. Can I not leave any of you alone for just one second?’

  ‘We’ll wash him now,’ Damien said. ‘I promise.’

  ‘Mmm. You’d better. Though if you turn out to be a bad influence on my little sister, Damien Halliburton, I may just kiss you myself.’ Kensey winked, turned tail and left.

  ‘She means it,’ Chelsea warned.

  ‘I don’t doubt it.’

  Damien grabbed the hose, Chelsea the brush and they had Slimer clean in five minutes flat. She rubbed him down with a towel and sent him running in the direction of the house.

  ‘I’m getting the feeling,’ he said, wiping his hands down the only dry patches of his trousers, ‘the events of this past week, the loss of my phone, the stalker claims, the animal-print-underwear fiasco, the food poisoning, aren’t actually anything unusual for those in the London family. This is what life with you is really going to be like from now on, isn’t it?’

  When she looked back over her shoulder and realised just how wet Damien was, wet and still beautiful, while she must have looked like a drowned rat, Chelsea burst into laughter.

  She padded up to him and threw herself into his arms, snuggling up to him, sliding her cold hands beneath his clothes and up his warm back. ‘If I admit it is are you going to lea
ve and never come back?’

  He nibbled at the soft skin below her ear. ‘No. I’m thinking I could get very used to your life. So much so, in fact, it would mean less nights on Caleb’s couch and more at your apartment, I’m afraid.’

  She shrugged, her breasts rubbing deliciously against his front. ‘We’ve proven my bed’s big enough for the two of us. And I loved how you looked in my kitchen. And my shower. And on my couch. I could get very used to that too. Move in with me.’

  He looked down into her eyes, searching, hoping, dreaming as big as she’d ever seen any man dream as the idea of moving in with her obviously sat well on his shoulders.

  A light sprinkle of autumn rain fluttered against her eyelids. She blinked them away and held her man tighter still. Her man. The man of her dreams. Whatever she’d done to deserve this, to deserve him, she was planning on doing it a whole lot more.

  ‘It would be my pleasure,’ he said. ‘Though I do have some things in storage I’d like to bring over to make me feel more at home. A couch and some bookshelves and a desk and some appliances I’ll need if we are going to eat anything more nutritious than leftovers.’

  ‘I like leftovers,’ she said as she nipped at his neck.

  ‘I hate chintz,’ he warned as he angled his chin to give her better access.

  ‘I hate dark leather and stainless steel.’

  ‘Of course you do. But I washed a dog today.’

  ‘You did.’

  ‘So next week you come to a bar with me.’

  It wasn’t a question. Chelsea sank further against him. ‘I’ll come. I’ll even play tennis with your parents. But I won’t drink Martinis. I prefer Harvey Wallbangers with my sporting endeavours.’

  ‘You can play tennis?’

  ‘Surprised?’

  Damien grinned down at her as he slid his right thigh gently between hers. ‘Infinitely.’

  Chelsea’s phone buzzed in her back pocket.

  ‘Leave it,’ he said.

  ‘Can’t. Might be important. Life-changing even.’

  She flipped open to find a message from Kensey:

  CHELSEA! DAMIEN! DINNER!

  ‘We have to go in now or we’ll be in big trouble,’ she said, sliding her phone back away.

  Damien growled as he disentangled himself from her. ‘Will I never get past second base with you again?’

  ‘Tonight,’ she promised.

  ‘So I’m staying after dinner now, am I?’

  ‘If you don’t mind sharing a room with me, which is on a different floor from the bathroom, has creaky floorboards and a lumpy double bed.’

  ‘Well.’

  ‘What if I guarantee you a home run? Or two if you’re very nice to me.’

  ‘That’s the best you can offer?’

  ‘Fine,’ she said on a sigh. ‘I can guarantee the same the next day and the next. If that’s what it will take to get you inside now before Kensey blows her lid.’

  ‘Minx,’ he said, rubbing her nose with his.

  ‘Hunka Hunka,’ she said, kissing him hard, and long, and slow before ducking under his arm and running towards the house.

  He caught her in about three steps, grabbed her around the waist and threw her over his shoulder. She kicked but soon dissolved into raucous laughter. ‘So this is what life with a Halliburton is going to be like,’ she managed to say between giggles.

  ‘Sweetheart, you have no idea what you’re in for.’

  And while a week ago the thought of having no idea what the days ahead might bring would have frightened her silly, she let herself droop until she could slide her hands into the back pockets of his jeans and she hung on tight. And grinned. From ear to ear. Because she knew the most important thing—he’d be there with her.

  Damien slapped her on the butt, shifted her into a more comfy position on his broad shoulder and carried her into the great big beautiful future.

  HOT NIGHTS WITH A PLAYBOY

  Nicola Marsh

  About the Author

  NICOLA MARSH has always had a passion for writing and reading. As a youngster, she devoured books when she should have been sleeping, and later kept a diary whose content could be an epic in itself! These days, when she’s not enjoying life with her husband and son in her home city of Melbourne, she’s at her computer, creating the romances she loves, in her dream job. Visit Nicola’s website at www.nicolamarsh.com for the latest news of her books.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Style guru Abby Weiss wows the fashion world with her incredible work for Australia’s leading chic magazine, Finesse. The Whitsunday islands proved a spectacular backdrop to showcase Weiss’s talents, who, thanks to her stellar work on this shoot, secured the number one stylist job at Finesse. Look out for more from this brilliant up-and-comer in the industry.

  ABBY could see the headlines.

  She’d visualised nothing else since she’d received the phone call from Mark Pyman, CEO of Finesse, saying she’d scored the lucrative gig for the magazine’s summer spread, boarded a plane for Sapphire Island and checked into this exclusive resort.

  What she’d seen of the place so far had fired her imagination and she knew with a little creativity and a lot of hard work this would be her best shot at the top job ever. Mark had hinted at it and the powerbroker of Australia’s fashion magazine industry didn’t hint at anything lightly.

  Oh, yeah, thanks to a little healthy visualisation, she could see those headlines: in huge Arial font, bold, cut out from Finesse’s summer issue and taking pride of place over her desk back home in Sydney.

  This was it. Her chance at the big time.

  Wandering into the hotel’s poolside bar with an extra spring in her step, she marvelled at the staggering array of tropical plants and exotic orchids, her excitement growing as she scoped out yet another great site for a shoot.

  Sapphire Island had proven to be a gold mine, providing the perfect backdrop for displaying the fashions of Australia’s leading designers. True to form, Mark had organised several top models, which made her job a heck of a lot easier.

  Dealing with professionals and seeing the results always made her proud of working in the cutthroat industry of fashion. Though she hadn’t sighted the photographer yet, she knew Mark only used the best.

  As the topic of photographers drifted through her mind, she wondered which part of the world Judd was currently hiding in. They hadn’t spoken for three months, an anomaly in their close relationship. Well, as close as they could get over the phone and Internet.

  She hadn’t even received one of his infamous one-line postcards and she smiled, wondering what he’d say if he knew she’d kept every single one and made a collage out of them that adorned her study wall. Probably something witty designed to cut her down to size, in typical Judd Calloway fashion.

  Some things never change.

  And she wouldn’t have it any other way.

  Luckily they’d got past the little mistake on graduation night and had managed to sustain a strong friendship.

  Nothing like denial to get through the last eight years as his best buddy and confidante.

  ‘Well, well. Amazing what the ocean can wash up these days.’

  Abby jumped and whirled around, seeing but not quite believing what she’d initially thought her imagination had conjured up.

  ‘No way!’

  She reached out and poked Judd in the chest: yep, he was real. Very real, if the rock-hard wall her finger had barely made a dent in was any indication. ‘What are you doing here?’

  He smiled at her, the same lazy grin that lit up the gold flecks in his hazel eyes and had her instinctively grinning right back at him, despite the fact she hadn’t seen him since that fateful night of the grad dance.

  ‘Now, is that any way to greet your new star photographer?’

  ‘You’re doing this shoot? But we’re shooting fashion, not wildlife.’

  He slid onto one of the barstools and patted the seat next to him.

  ‘I’m not too sure a
bout that. I’ve seen the way some of your crowd party and it ain’t pretty.’

  ‘They’re not my crowd. I just work with them.’

  ‘And you date them,’ he teased, reaching for a stray curl and tucking it behind her ear. ‘No accounting for taste, is there?’

  Abby fought a losing battle with a blush as the heat surged up her neck and settled somewhere in the vicinity where he’d touched her.

  He hadn’t touched her in a long, long time: those hot dreams on sultry Sydney nights of him touching her as she wanted him to definitely didn’t count.

  ‘No, there isn’t, seeing as I keep in contact with you. ‘

  Judd chuckled, the familiar sound warming her like the hot chocolate sundaes with extra fudge they’d shared as kids.

  ‘So, tell me the whole story. Your last postcard said you were in the wilds of South Africa shooting zebras, and now you’re here. What on earth would tempt the world’s best wildlife photographer to do a fashion shoot of birds of the non-feathered variety?’

  He’d scoffed at what he termed ‘the shallow world of fashion’ ever since she’d started working in the industry, so she knew something, or someone, important had to be behind this.

  ‘All will be revealed in time.’ Judd beckoned the waiter. ‘Drink?’ ‘The usual, please.’

  He grinned, his eyes crinkling in the corners just as they used to. ‘Is this some kind of test?’ ‘You bet.’

  Shaking his head, he chuckled. ‘You’re still drinking the same poison you used to in high school? How sad is that?’

  ‘Like you’d remember anyway,’ she scoffed. She was more than a little impressed when he nodded at the waiter and said, ‘Soda and lime for the lady and a beer for me, thanks, mate.

  ‘So, did I pass?’

  ‘You always did have a good memory,’ she muttered, seriously thrilled he’d remembered something as innocuous as her favourite drink. ‘Now, tell me why you’re really here.’

  ‘A friend set this up. She begged me to do it as a favour for a guy she gets a heap of assignments from, some big shot called Mark Pyman, so here I am.’