Heartbreak Hero

by Frances Housden

  “Gimme the bag.”

  Her heart took another plunge. She didn’t recognize the rough voice, and whoever it was, he didn’t sound as if he was joking.

  “In your dreams, buster.” She braved it out.

  “Paul Savage’s dreams always come true.”

  “Not today they don’t.” She slid Kel’s jacket down as she spoke, freeing her arms of its hampering bulk. “Tell Mr. Savage I’m not in the business of making his dreams come true, and get out of here before I have to hurt you.”

  His bark of laughter was cut off as she spun Kel’s jacket through the air, smothering the glare of the flashlight. The kick that followed knocked it out of his hand, leaving a pale blur of light shining through the fabric.

  Before he had a chance to get his act together, she sprang forward and took his feet out from under him with a side-swiping kick where she judged the level of his knees would be.

  He fell heavily. That’s the way to do it!

  Satisfied with her first effort she bent to scoop up the jacket and steal his flashlight. But he was quicker than the huge thump he’d landed with suggested.

  His thick fingers grabbed her wrist. Just as quickly she twisted, slipping through his grasp. Her fingers locked with his as the momentum of her spin brought her shoulder level with his sternum. As her elbow slammed into his gut with the added weight of his own arm he let out a yowl of pain, and his knees hit the deck.

  He wouldn’t be using that arm again in a hurry, but just in case she reversed her spin and added a stunning blow between shoulder and neck.

  “You’ll keep.” She laughed, the tension flowing out of her as she repossessed both jacket and light. She then flashed the beam over the bulky body on the floor of the cave but the moment the light hit his face, he covered it with his massive hands. Taking her bearings from the pipe organ, she soon found the way out. But even she wasn’t prepared for the brilliance of normal lighting suddenly flooding the cave, obliterating the darkness as if it had never been.

  Never happened.

  She ignored the angry grunts behind her, and mainly to avoid awkward questions about where she’d found the flashlight, she tucked it into a crevice, deciding she’d had enough of caves and cliffs to last her a lifetime.

  With the jacket looped through the strap of her day pack, she looked down. “A lot of help you were. Thank your lucky stars I know how to look after myself.”

  Kel was on the bottom step of the stairs leading back to ground level. One look and somehow he knew she’d been in trouble again. “What happened to you? I thought I told you to wait.”

  She hadn’t noticed the rip in the sleeve of her T-shirt until he brought it to her attention. “Ran into something.”

  He lifted her arm.

  She’d noticed the pain but not the blood. The guy must have been wearing some sort of pendant. “Banged it when I ran into something.”

  Kel shook his head. “But you’re all right otherwise?”

  “A-okay, boss! I was worried the bus might leave without me.”

  “So they miss a few souvenir shops between here and Rotorua, it will be lighter on everyone’s pockets, especially yours.”

  “I’m not worried. Just promise me that next time, you won’t leave me behind.”

  Hoping she’d rescued his property without doing any damage, she removed his jacket. “Here, Kel, you’d better have this. It served its purpose, thank you.”

  With the jacket slung over his shoulder, he rested the palm of his other hand in the small of her back. “No problem, but what makes you think there’s going to be a next time?”

  As they climbed, she glanced over her shoulder toward the cave, hoping her assailant was still feeling the effects of her last move and wouldn’t be following them out.

  Kel’s eyebrows rose slightly, a hint that he was waiting for a reply. Oh, dear, she thought, keep it simple.

  Chapter 9

  B eside him Ngaire stirred from sleep, searching for more space in the confines of the narrow bus seat. The imprint of her head on his arm would linger long after she’d straightened. Knowing she trusted him enough to let her guard down as she slept tugged at Kel’s conscience.

  Already tired from her escapade in the caves, combined with a ton of walking and souvenir hunting, she’d fallen asleep immediately, still clutching her damn day pack. She never let the thing out of her sight. Hell, she probably even slept with the damn bag.

  Looked like he might have to take Chaly’s advice and sleep with her to get a look inside it for the formula.

  The nursery rhyme she’d been giggling over as she drifted off rang in his head as if she’d sussed him. Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool? He was the black sheep of his family, always had been, and always would be.

  Ngaire was the dame, trouble in a way only dames could be. She’d lied about that scrape on her arm, though he didn’t know why. Her scent when he’d reached her in the cave had been of exertion, not fear. As a precursor to death, he knew that sharp, sweet aroma only too well.

  But who was the master? The drug cartel or someone else, the boy or boys down the lane? The game he played had become top heavy with players on the other team.

  He watched Ngaire’s eyes widen as she came to, blue and innocent as a newborn babe’s. What a doll, to look the way she did yet work for the worst set of characters on God’s earth. He wondered how long she’d been using her looks to fool the police and Customs. She acted as if she’d never been anywhere before, but he was sure her passport told otherwise, unless she had more than one of them.

  She stretched again, lifting her arms behind her and emphasizing the thrust of her breasts. He wouldn’t have been human if he hadn’t watched and remembered the weight and shape of them in his hands. She had everything going for her and then some, and it would take living up to his code name, Heartbreaker, to keep him safe.

  “Where are we? And what is that smell?” Her face creased as she turned to squint between their seats as if she thought the source of her nose’s discomfort came from the two ladies in the next row who were playing some serious mah-jongg.

  Farther back, some of the men played poker. Big money was changing hands, but they weren’t to blame for what ailed her.

  “No need to be polite about it, the odor is sulfur, but the name of the place isn’t hell, just Rotorua. We entered town about ten minutes ago, and closer to the center the smell gets worse. But don’t knock it, to the inhabitants it’s pure gold. Twenty-four karat at least.”

  She plugged him with a disbelieving look. “And folks live here all the time?”

  A glance out the window would have shown her a few locals in a park where plumes of steam rose from miniature cones among flowers and shrubs. But her gaze fixed on his face, waiting for his answer. She’d stared at him the same way at the caves and told him, “Never, ever leave me alone again.”

  Even if things had been normal between them, if she wasn’t a drug courier and he didn’t work for GDE, it was a helluva responsibility to land a guy with.

  “By this time tomorrow, I promise you won’t notice it.”

  “We won’t be here this time tomorrow.”

  “Would I lie to you?” Through his teeth a thousand times a day. “Once we get to the West Coast of the South Island, you won’t notice the sulfur.”

  “So this is the place where you promised me the hot pools?”

  He’d been hoping she wouldn’t remember. Wishing he’d never mentioned hot mineral pools or their healing powers that were Rotorua’s claim to fame. Any sane guy wouldn’t think twice about leaping into one with the half-naked lady of his choice. But how in hell was he to hide the way she turned him on, while wearing next to nothing, and get out of doing anything about it?

  It was all very well for Chaly to give him the green light to sleep with her, but he sensed that any mistakes he made now could have repercussions for the rest of his life.

  “I hope you brought your bathing suit,” he said through clenched tee
th. Now, if only she had something that covered her from top to toe. He didn’t think he could control his libido otherwise. And maybe not even then.

  “Bathing suit? I’ve brought a bikini but I thought under the circumstances it might be optional.”

  “No way, they have bylaws in Rotorua about being naked in a public place.” Having already seen what she classed as underwear, he’d no great hopes of her bikini being bigger than a New Zealand fifty-cent piece.

  Soon as she was safely in her room, he’d be hitting the hotel shop for some board shorts. The bigger, the better.

  Ngaire opened the door of her room at the Aroha Springs Hotel to Kel’s knock and did a twirl to show off her outfit. “What do you think?”

  “Pretty cool.” He gave her mauve-and-turquoise sarong the once-over with a twist of a smile that was hard to read. “So you’re wearing that in the pool like the Tahitians do instead of a bikini?”

  Men! She rolled her eyes. “No, silly, my bikini’s underneath.”

  “Are you positive you wouldn’t rather watch the Maori concert party in the hotel lounge instead of soaking in a hot pool?”

  She had to admit she’d been torn two ways when she heard about the concert. However, their guide had assured her they would see something similar during the visit to Geyserland the next day. “Dressed like this? I don’t think so.”

  “We could change,” he suggested.

  A pair of rubber flip-flops protected Kel’s long feet, and on any normal-size guy, the blue board shorts would have hit his knees. But he was tall enough to show a long length of hard tanned muscle. “Forget about it, you’re dressed appropriately for where we’re going. So lead the way.”

  “Hey, give me a minute to get something from my room.”

  She looked him over. All the essentials appeared to be there, one muscular chest, two lips that knew how to drive her wild, the rest she was certain was just waiting to put in an appearance.

  “Okay, I’ll meet you in the lobby. How does a cold bottle of wine and two glasses sound?” she asked.

  “Like a great idea.”

  Ten minutes later, they followed the sign that read, To the Hot Pools and a red gravel path led them between palms and tree ferns. She might never have left Tahiti. Most of the plantings on either side of them were lit from underneath and the effect hit her romantic button. She tugged at Kel’s open shirt to stop him from striding ahead and grabbed his hand. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

  “Humph. If you like that sort of thing.”

  “What’s up with you? A few minutes ago you were trying to talk me out of coming here and now you’re racing as if someone might beat us to it. Most people will be at the concert, so let’s just take our time and enjoy the good bit.”

  He stopped dead in his tracks, the soles of his flip-flops squeaking as he put on the brakes to look down at her, rubbing his chin as if she worried him. There was a jut to his jaw and a determined glint in his eyes she’d never seen before, but then, she hadn’t known him all that long. The gleam might simply be thrown up by the lighting effect, the same way it threw deep shadows under his brows and emphasized the dimple in his chin.

  Kel shrugged, shaking his head as if she was as green as their surroundings. It didn’t erase the edge to his words. “Jeez, doll, if you think this is the good part you’ve never been in a hot pool. Not with a fella, anyway. Mixed bathing is as good as it gets.”

  Something pierced the shadows shielding his eye, a heat that had been missing since the night before, as if this morning he’d drawn a curtain over what had happened when she’d shattered in his arms. Had she come on too strong afterward? Taken things for granted? Is that what had been bothering him?

  She might have chattered inconsequentially and hung on his arm as they’d walked back to the ferry building, but most of her mind had been elsewhere. A place she’d never visited before, and she didn’t mean New Zealand. A place where Ngaire Two Feathers McKay was so responsive she’d climaxed still wearing all her clothes.

  Such a thing had never happened before. It was the dread of discovering last night had been an illusion that slowed her steps, not the scenery.

  She laid a palm on his chest, startled to see her hand shake as if she’d never been with a man before.

  So much for her plans to clear her head of all distractions. The greenstone mere was locked up in the hotel safe, behind reception and she’d wanted this man from the first moment they’d locked glances.

  So what was her problem?

  The wineglasses in her left hand clinked as she pressed her palm more firmly against him. To quell the shaking, she concentrated on the little band of greenstone Kel had bought her at a place with an unpronounceable name while souvenir shopping. It fitted perfectly, but not all omens were good, as she knew.

  She broke the silence, huffing out a sigh that started at her toes. “Listen, Kel. You don’t know much about me, nor I you. Before we get up to our necks in hot water, you should understand I have no expectations. This is just a holiday out of time, so let’s enjoy it. Afterward, neither of us will owe the other a thing.”

  His grin turned wry, the twist to his lips not as cute as she remembered. “Sometimes you crack me up, doll. Should we put that in writing or cross our hearts and hope to die?”

  She felt a shadow creep over her soul, spoiling the moment. “That would be asking too much. However, I see steam drifting through the palms, which means there’s a hot pool over there with our name on it.”

  “What more can a guy ask for? Lead me to it.’

  Kel’s heart was doing handsprings off his sternum by the time the pool came into view. Anticipation. His grandma would have been saying, “Contrary, that’s Kel, always was, always will be.”

  Maybe knowing what Ngaire had wrapped up in the delectable package her sarong made had turned the tide on his ideas of right and wrong. Or maybe it was plain old lust.

  Sex with the enemy. Men had done it forever by right of conquest. Done it and moved on without a second thought, or a first, for that matter. And when it was all over, it would be too late then to worry about what Ngaire thought of him.

  Or, how he thought of himself.

  But enough meandering; he had a parcel to unwrap. A parcel to take his time over. At least two hours of it, while—if Chaly was as good as his word—Ngaire’s room would be searched by a professional who wouldn’t leave a calling card. And all because the first or maybe second thing he’d noticed when she’d opened her room door was the missing day pack.

  Wraiths of steam drifted between them as he slipped off his shirt, adding a dreamlike dimension to their actions. Her hands went to the knot above her breasts, but he halted her. “No, let me do that.”

  If he was going to commit this act, one that went against all he’d thought he stood for, he aimed to do it right.

  First he emptied their hands. Ngaire had entered the lobby from the bar carrying a bottle of New Zealand bubbly and the equipment to drink it with. He tossed his shirt onto a locker stacked with towels for guests. It missed. He ignored it and placed the bottle and glasses within easy reach of the pool.

  For all his determination to stand outside himself and not bring his prejudices to the party, his hands were rough, hard.

  With little finesse, he reached for Ngaire, brushed her hot, satiny shoulders with his palms, but couldn’t move on.

  Barefoot, she appeared smaller, doll-like.

  A living doll for him to play with, the kind a boy wouldn’t mind tucking into bed with him.

  Her chin tilted. A flower head on a slender stem, its face turning to his, eyes huge, an impossible blue, lips full, trembling, making him succumb to tenderness. She was nervous.

  It surprised and pleased him.

  He wanted to kiss her fears away.

  The night was full of surprises.

  It took all of his control to back out of a mind-set that had all the signs of a disaster in the making. The knot fastening her sarong dissolved in his hands.
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br />   Around them the tree ferns gathered up the breeze, swaying gently in its arms as if not to disturb their dreams of the movie South Pacific. The South Sea island girl and the soldier who was going to let her down, but not yet. Kel held his breath, grinding his back teeth, and steeled himself to let the sarong drop. “It’s going to be hot, doll.”

  “I was counting on that,” Ngaire said, pretending an insouciance she didn’t feel. She stopped breathing, waiting for his reaction, quivering under his stare. He was so tall her braid tickled the top of her behind as she lifted her head.

  “I was talking about the pool.”

  “That, too.” She wanted to touch, did touch, her hands moving of their own free will, circling the dark whorls of hair, measuring the swell of his muscles as they rose on his in-drawn breath.

  Teasing a rise out of his flat male nipple with a scrape of her nail, she laughed as it hardened in imitation of her own, without the benefit of his touch, though they craved it.

  Oh, yeah! Crave was the word, like women did for chocolate, but this one came from deep down inside and left a space only Kel could fill.

  Kel had known her bikini would be of the minuscule variety, yet it still hid too much. With flattened palms he smoothed the straps down her shoulders, sliding the narrow strips of fabric till they caught at her elbows, halting her arousing caresses.

  Jaw clenched, his voice ripped the silence apart. “There’s something wrong with this picture.”

  Her eyelids lost the torrid sensuality that had weighed them down and snapped open. “What? Don’t tell me. We’re over-dressed?”

  “No, that’s not it.” He lifted the weight of her braid and felt its density. The black elastic band shrank into a tight ball as he freed the ends of her hair. “Your hair should be loose to match the setting.”

  He cupped the nape of her neck in his big hand, disturbed by the thought of how little effort would be needed to break it. Yet the knowledge crowded his brain that, for all Ngaire was a product of man’s corruption and greed, he could never bring himself to perform the task.

  Not now.

  With both hands, he tumbled the raw-silk stream of hair into a black waterfall that held moonlight in its depths. So beautiful, it could tempt a man to lose all sense of perspective and drown without a murmur of protest.