Man About the House

by Alison Kelly

  ‘What’s the difference?’

  ‘Each way,’ he said, with forced patience, ‘means you’ll collect money even if the horse finishes second or third. If you just back it for a win and it only gets a place you get nothing.’

  ‘Oh, each way, then!’ she said. ‘Definitely each way. There might be a faster horse in the race.’

  A dry laugh broke from him and he pointed to one of the small TV sets suspended above the bar. ‘Since your choice is showing at thirty-three to one, I’d say there’s a good chance of that. I’m not much of a gambler, but even I know that in a seven-horse field odds like that aren’t a good sign. Sure you don’t want to pick something else?’

  Emphatically shaking her head, she wriggled around until she could prise some change from her pocket, then shoved a two-dollar coin at him. The idea of watching her repeat the seductive squirming which producing the small coin had required tempted Brett to urge her to increase the minuscule wager, but, not confident his blood pressure would take it, he simply palmed the money and headed to the section of the bar where the tote computer was installed.

  ‘Oh, thank heavens!’ she exclaimed, when he made his way back to the table. ‘I was wondering where you’d got to. The race is about to start.’

  ‘Sorry. I got a beer then decided I better check the other bars in case my cousin was waiting in one of them. It’s not like him to be late for—’

  ‘Hey! This ticket is for four dollars, not two.’

  ‘Half of it’s mine.’ He shrugged. ‘I figured if you’ve got a hot tip, I don’t want to miss out on it.’

  Genuine concern clouded her face. ‘But, Brett, what if it loses? I don’t want to be responsible for you losing your money.’

  ‘Jo...it’s two dollars; trust me, I can spare it.’

  ‘Still, I—’

  ‘And they’ve jumped in...’

  Whatever protest she’d been going to make was forgotten as her eyes flew to the big screen. The race was a distance of fifteen hundred metres, but Brett didn’t see the field of horses cover even one of those; he was too transfixed by the rapt pleasure and anticipation in Jo’s face and her ability to surrender herself completely to her emotions.

  She started out perched on the edge of her stool, whispering, ‘Go, Lust ‘n’ Laughter.’ Then progressed to standing, clench-fisted, with her even white teeth nibbling on her bottom lip. Watching her interest develop from mere excitement to a point where she was jumping up and down cheering the horse’s name was both a revealing and disturbing experience for Brett. It made him wonder how hard she’d had to work to subdue her instinctive enthusiasm for the little things in life in order to survive her family’s rigid view of it. It also had him speculating on just how unfettered and passionate a lover she’d be.

  By the time the horses hit the home straight, Jo’s was making a late run from the tail of the field down the outside, and she was pumping her arms and chanting, ‘C’mon! C‘mon! Go, Lusty, go!’ When it managed to stagger over the line to grab third place, she cheered as if she was the owner of a horse that had just won the Melbourne Cup.

  ‘We won! We won!’ she screamed. Laughing with undiluted joy, she threw her arms around Brett and kissed his cheek. The action so stunned him that she’d danced out of his reach before he could do anything more than freeze in shock. Although how that was possible when his body felt as if it had been hit with a zillion volts of electricity was beyond him.

  ‘Oh, Brett, we won!’ she continued to enthuse, unconcerned by the amused looks she was drawing as she danced around the table waving the ticket. ‘We won!’

  ‘Er...actually, Jo,’ he said, through a chuckle, ‘we only got third.’

  She waved a dismissing hand. ‘Same thing! Oh, wait till I go tell Steve! He told me I was throwing my money away!’

  The words iced Brett’s veins. ‘Steve’s here?’

  ‘Mmm. He’s in the other bar playing in a pool competition. Too boring for me. I—’

  ‘Brett! Mate, I’m so sorry I’m late. I—’

  ‘On the contrary, Glen,’ he muttered. ‘Your timing is perfect. Spot-on, in fact. Here, let me introduce you to my punting partner.’

  He waited until Jo and Glen had finished uttering polite greetings to each other, then said, ‘Well, I’ll leave you to collect the winnings, Jo. And if you want to make any more bets you’re going to have to get your date to do it. Glen and I have to be going.’

  ‘Already?’ Glen protested. ‘I haven’t even had a beer yet.’

  ‘Yeah, well, we’ll buy a slab in the bottle shop on the way to your place. See ya, Jo.’

  ‘Er...okay. Um, bye. And, er...thanks. I’ll see you at home, then. Nice meeting you, Glen.’ She gave a limp-fingered wave, wearing the expression of someone who’d walked into a movie late, couldn’t make head or tail of what was happening but wasn’t going to admit it. Glen wasn’t that reticent.

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ he demanded, following Brett’s rapid exit to the car park. ‘I thought the plan was we were going to have a few light beers before we went to my place.’

  ‘We would’ve, if you hadn’t chosen today out of an entire lifetime to be late. The way I’m feeling right now, if we stick around here any longer I’m likely to make an idiot of myself by breaking a pool cue over someone’s head.’

  Glen laughed. ‘Yeah, right! You’d be the last person in the world to get into a pub brawl.’

  ‘I used to think you’d be the last person in the world not to be somewhere on time too, but it happened,’ Brett muttered.

  ‘Fair go, mate, I never expected to have a flat on the car...’

  CHAPTER TEN

  IT WAS two weeks before Brett learned who and what Steve Cooper was, and then only by chance, since he’d vowed not to ask Joanna even if it choked him. In fact, after the weekend of the fund-raiser and the encounter at the pub, he’d done a good job of if not putting her out of his mind, then at least keeping out of her way. Not that it was all that hard when she was out practically every night of the week and had anything up to six things going on over the weekend. Still, the up-side of all the Joanna-free time was that his business and professional future was moving ahead at full speed.

  After discussion with five television networks he’d narrowed the choice of which one to link with down to two. He was now in the comfortable position of merely fielding the bids and counter-bids as they fought each other with offers of impressive salary packages to secure his services. He’d also commenced negotiations with the owners of three mid-market home furnishing stores with the possibility of him buying into the business and expanding it on a national scale. So far the financially secure but commercially shortsighted threesome were still too bemused to really talk turkey. However, Brett was prepared to give them a few months to come to terms with his ideas before giving them a further nudge. One of them had already shown definite signs of interest...

  As for his personal life...well, if there was one thing cohabiting with Jo had shown him it was that he had to get out fast! Even limited contact with her was putting him under more mental and hormonal stress than even a saint could handle! If she didn’t stop breezing into the living room clad only in a slinky robe to sprawl out on the sofa either to paint her nails or flick through magazines while he was trying to watch the late news or sports... Well, he was going to have to kill one of them. If he spent any more time hiding out at Jason’s place, his friend was going to start demanding rent!

  So, his first inclination when he heard her come in the front door late on a Thursday night was to bid her a brief hello and adjourn to his bedroom, before she had a chance to start telling him about her day. Before her husky voice and delighted smile made him wish he’d been there to witness first-hand the pleasure she got from everyday things most people took for granted.

  Last night she’d come in bubbling over the fact Steve had taken her to a small travelling fairground. She’d laughingly admitted that she’d been so terrified for the first fiftee
n seconds on the ferris wheel that she’d thought she was going to be sick, but then she’d opened her eyes and ‘...I was so close to the stars I felt I could just reach out and pluck one from the sky.’

  None of the women Brett knew would have admitted to such feelings even if they’d had them, but Jo shared her joy as if she couldn’t imagine others hadn’t felt the same way. Although Brett had discovered this charming quality had a vicious edge. Her description of her first taste of candy floss had been so damned sensual he’d been almost suicidal at not being the one responsible for introducing her to it.

  ‘Hi,’ she said, pausing at the entrance of the living room and holding carry-bags bearing the names of various shoe and clothing stores.

  ‘Been late-night shopping, I see,’ he said, trying to keep his gaze casual even as the sight of her kicked his pulse up several gears.

  ‘Reluctantly,’ she moaned. She moved wearily to dump the bags on the nearby sofa and perch on the arm. ‘Meaghan wouldn’t take no for an answer. She’s so excited about going to London and checking out the agency there I think she’s running on jet fuel and assumes everyone else is too.

  ‘If we didn’t go to every designer boutique in the city,’ she went on, her eyes bright with good humour, ‘it was only because they were closed. I’m convinced she’s the marathon champion of shopping. I ache from head to foot.’

  ‘Nah, that’s just a light sprint session for Meaghan,’ Brett teased. ‘When she’s in marathon-mode she hits the suburban stores as well. You must be out of condition.’

  ‘Don’t you start.’ She scowled. ‘I’ve been told that enough by Steve. Believe me, his idea of keeping things light differs from mine.’

  ‘Keeping what light?’ Brett demanded, jealousy spurring him to his feet.

  Her expression suggested the answer should be obvious. ‘My workouts, of course.’

  ‘Your workouts?’

  She nodded. ‘He’s a personal fitness trainer. He’s been helping me to get into shape and tone up.’

  Brett made a long, slow visual appraisal of the woman separated from him by a coffee table and two metres of floor space. Loose tresses of jet hair tumbled onto her shoulders from a fashionably untidy topknot. A boat-necked black angora dress displayed a long neck and just a hint of clavicle, then stretched down to embrace the ideally rounded curves of her breast and hips before revealing twelve inches of black nylon-clad legs.

  Tonight there were no long boots shielding them, and Brett felt his body tighten in appreciation of her chunky shoes. Yeah, right, he’d always had a fetish for uglylooking shoes!

  Finally, in an act of sympathy for his hormones, he forced his eyes back up to hers.

  ‘Jo, if you think there’s the slightest thing wrong with your tone or shape,’ he said gruffly, ‘you’re as crazy as Cooper. You need a personal fitness trainer like the Sahara needs more sand.’

  She blushed and offered a self-conscious thank you. Then said, ‘I think Steve just offered to let me use his gym because he felt sorry for me at school.’

  If Jo believed that she was even more naive than he’d originally feared, or she’d never seen a mirror. But his curiosity was snagged by the school concept, because he’d estimated Cooper as being in his late twenties—at least five years older than Jo.

  ‘You went through school with this guy?’

  She shook her head. ‘He was one of the sport masters the year I was at boarding school,’ she clarified. ‘Sport was compulsory for live-in students, but because my parents had never allowed me to take part in it at my other school I was pretty hopeless. Actually, I didn’t even know how to swim,’ she admitted, her head dipping sheepishly for a moment.

  ‘Anyway,’ she continued, ‘when Steve found out he volunteered to give me private coaching and arranged with the principal for me to have access to one lane of the school pool twice a day when the swim squad were training. Then, when I could swim four hundred metres without stopping, he took me to the beach so I could learn to handle rougher conditions.’ Her face broke into a radiant smile. ‘I’d never seen a beach before then.’

  ‘Nice guy,’ Brett muttered, hating him for it.

  ‘Very,’ she agreed, bending to regather up her shopping bags. ‘And I’m glad he’s found another career; all us girls in the dorm always thought he was too nice to be a teacher!’

  And too damn good-looking! Brett added silently, wondering what idiot had employed him to work in a private girls’ school.

  ‘If you haven’t eaten, there’s some left-over stir-fry in the refrigerator,’ he said as she started from the room.

  She paused and looked over her shoulder, wincing slightly as she did so. ‘Thanks, but much as I love all the exotic meals you cook, I think I need a long hot soak in a bath first.’

  For the next forty minutes Brett sat in front of the TV telling himself he needed to keep abreast of the latest scientific breakthroughs in the treatment of ticks in cattle—it was easier than admitting he was waiting for her to come in search of food just so he could catch one last glimpse of her before he went to bed. Oh, God! he thought, flinging his head back against the couch and contemplating the ceiling. Had he ever been this emotionally wired in his entire life before?

  ‘Oh, good, you’re still up...’

  His heart leapt out of his chest at the sound of her voice. It was soft, light and sensual. He swallowed. So was the peach-coloured negligée she wore. It was also frilly and painfully short.

  ‘So you do own something that isn’t black.’ The comment probably struck her as inane, but it gave him a good excuse for the way his eyes refused to budge from her. He searched and found another one to do the same.

  ‘You know, Jo, with your eyes you’d look dynamite in turquoise. Black is such a cliché.’

  ‘Maybe to you,’ she said. ‘But for me it’s liberating. I was always forbidden to wear black. Besides, I’ve read several articles that have said black goes anywhere.’

  ‘Although presumably not to bed.’

  Her shrug not only sent ripples of awareness through his belly, but lifted the swell of her creamy breast above the scooped neckline of frills. He fought down a groan of frustration, unsure if his mind was playing tricks on his tortured body or if he could see the dark peaks of her breasts beneath the two layers of gossamer fabric.

  ‘Actually,’ she said, gliding over to perch on the arm of his chair, ‘I bought this in a moment of weakness when I was on my way to deposit my wages in the bank. I really didn’t need it, and it was criminally expensive,’ she confessed. ‘But it was too pretty to resist.’ She sighed heavily. ‘I think I need to stop deliberately blocking out my father’s lectures on the evils of giving in to temptation, or I might find myself in trouble if my credit card application is approved.’

  Brett figured that he and temptation were already shaking hands! If he didn’t get out of here fast, he was going to forget that she was a young, naive girl who’d already been taken advantage of by one guy and, as Meaghan had pointed out, was still vulnerable.

  Ultimately, though, it was the memory of Jo’s own admission that she trusted him which propelled him to his feet. ‘Right. Well, I’m off to bed—’

  ‘No, wait. Here.’ She snagged his hand and pressed a metal bottle into it.

  Presumably she’d been holding it when she entered the room, but since her bands hadn’t been the focal point of his interest he hadn’t noted it. He did now. ‘Goanna Oil?’

  ‘Steve swears it’s the best thing for sore muscles. The school swim team used it all the time.’

  ‘Yes? So? Why does he think I need it?’

  She laughed. ‘It’s not for you, you goose! It’s for me. I want you to rub it on my back. I—’

  The metal clanged hard against his mother’s imported Italian tiles.

  Bounced once. Twice. Then eventually rolled under the coffee table.

  ‘Oops! Sorry. I thought you had hold of it,’ Jo apologised, scampering to retrieve it.

  Brett r
emained catatonic.

  ‘Oh, thank heaven it didn’t spill!’ she said, presenting her beautifully rounded butt to him as she knelt to reach the bottle. ‘We’d have had oil all over the place!’

  ‘You want me to massage your back?’

  She sighed. ‘Desperately. I started doing some weight work the day before yesterday; now I’m really starting to get achy and stiff. You know what it’s like...’

  Oh, yeah, he knew!

  The day after you don’t really notice it, but the second day...’ Groaning, she sat back on her haunches and began to flex her shoulder. ‘Boy, that’s when it starts to kill!’

  ‘Er, don’t you think you’d be better off having a hot shower or—?’

  ‘Tried that. It hasn’t helped.’ Her expression became beseeching. ‘Please, Brett? I phoned Steve and he said a rub down with this would help.’

  I just bet he did!

  ‘Please,’ she cajoled. ‘It’s only got to be a quick one.’

  Her choice of words didn’t help the situation one iota! Temptation squeezed Brett like a vice. What the devil had he done in his past life to deserve such torture in this one?

  ‘I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t in agony.’

  ‘Yeah, okay! Okay! I’ll do it.’ God help me! ‘Lie down.’ Her face flooded with pleasure. ‘Oh, thank you! So where do you want to do it? On my bed—?’

  ‘No!’

  Her astounded reaction to his snarled response didn’t do anything to improve his mood. Good! Maybe if he could stay furious, he just might get through the next few minutes without embarrassing either her or himself.

  ‘Er...well then, where do you want me to lie?’

  Under me! His mind screamed.

  ‘The floor!’ his mouth snapped. ‘On that rug over there! Hurry up and get comfortable. I’ll be back in a minute.’

  Storming into the adjoining room, he made a beeline to the bar, uncapped the first bottle his hand fell on and took three long gulps. Lowering it from his mouth, he blinked his watering eyes and studied the label. Russian vodka. Hell, if that couldn’t get him through this ordeal nothing could!