She almost caught his hand back when he drew it away. He was right about the shock. It was years since she had succumbed to fantasy about David McNaughton. She supposed that he was always there, in the background of her mind, but the dreams had stopped forever the day he told her about Sandy.
Childish fantasies.
"Come on, Julie. I want you out of here." He captured her hand, pulled gently, watching her face for any sign of pain. The steering wheel was in his way. He was touching her so carefully. Anyone else might haul her out, but of course David would think of the possibility that shock might mask pain. David always did think first.
"Julie, swing your legs out."
Somehow, her body obeyed.
"Now stand up."
She swallowed, staring at the twist of dark hair that escaped the fabric of his shirt where it was open at his throat. He was so close. What had come over her? David...This was ridiculous! After all these years!
He crouched down in front of her, thigh muscles bulging in his battered old jeans. "Dizzy?" he demanded.
She shook her head.
The lines at the corners of his eyes were deeper than they had been, but his eyes were that deep brown, still framed by heavy dark lashes. Yes, he was older. The cleft in his chin was deeper, sharper, and there were threads of silver among his black curls.
"It's different to have you so silent." He was almost smiling, urging her with his hands. "Come on, stand up. I know you're shaken, but I've got to get you away from this car." He held her as she stood, his arm around her shoulder. "Okay?" he demanded, staring down at her.
"Yes."
"So you can talk."
She closed her eyes, heard the sound of an eagle somewhere. He felt hard and strong beside her, holding her. He swung her into his arms and she felt dizziness as he hurried across the road, carrying her. She had no idea where she thought he would take her, but in the end he deposited her on a big old tree stump at the edge of a clearing. She felt so strange, disoriented. His arms around her, holding her safe. Today's hard, warm David meshed with the memories.
"Stay there!" he ordered.
"Where are you going?"
He ignored her question. Silly to think she could stop him, but if those fumes ignited...Julie shuddered and closed her eyes. She heard him come back a minute later, the gravel crunching under his boots. At any moment this could turn into an unpleasant scene.
"Is your truck damaged very badly?"
When he didn't answer, she opened her eyes. He was staring at her, that old look, somewhere between worry and anger. He was wearing old faded jeans and a sleeveless sweatshirt that left the muscles of his arms hard and prominent. He closed his eyes briefly, said harshly, "I could have killed you, Julie. I damned near did. Bloody luck you don't have two tons of gravel truck and twelve yards of gravel taking you to your grave."
"I always was lucky." She tried to smile but his eyes would not answer.
"Luck? More like stupidity! One day you'll kill yourself with your nonsense!" His legs were slightly astride, his stance big and dangerous. Dark man. Tall. Muscular. Angry. She felt the old, breathless fear of childhood. Running up against David, holding her own, driven somehow to make him angry. His voice, growling, "It's no bloody different than it was when you were a kid! Damn it, Julie! When are you going to grow up? Do you think I'll always be there to bail you out?"
She shivered and hugged herself tightly. "There's never anyone on that lane. I didn't stop to think that—"
"Damn it, Julie Charters! Do you ever think?" He glared at the trees framing the mountains on the mainland. "I was there, wasn't I? Your driving out of that lane without looking—that's about as bright as diving into our bull pen when you were twelve."
"Patrick dared me."
David snorted and Julie couldn't help smiling at the way her own words sounded. Childish, and of course it had been, but she'd always been a sucker for a dare, and David's younger brother had always been a tease.
"And today? Who dared you to back into my damned dump truck?"
She shook her hair back, felt the curls spring free around her shoulders. She'd had two ornate combs holding the curls back, but they were gone now.
"Well?" demanded David.
"Is your truck damaged?" Somehow, he could always do this, turn her to anger and rebelliousness. She got to her feet impatiently, kept moving to cover the sudden unsteadiness. Shock, that's all it was. She certainly wasn't hurt.
"Damaged?" He shrugged. "I haven't tried moving it yet, but the driver's door won't open."
"Sorry," she muttered. Damn the man. He made her feel like an irresponsible teenager again.
"You're sorry?" He hooked his thumbs in his belt. "I need that truck, you know. Some of us have to work for a living."
"I work for a living," she snapped back. "Probably harder than you!"
He laughed, but his eyes were hot and black. "Play-work. I'm sure your divorce settlement covered most of your needs."
"You—"
"Oh, hell, Julie!" He raked one hand through the black curls, dislodging his cap. "I don't know what made me say that. You always—"
"Bring out the worst in you?" She tried to ignore her heart beating with hard, breathless gasps. The sun overhead, beating down summer. David's harsh anger echoing. As if there had been no time between. They'd hardly spoken during the years she was married to Tom. The last time they'd really talked to each other had been shouting and screaming when she was seventeen. And before that, all the way back to her thirteenth birthday.
He made an explosive sound. "I don't usually carry on verbal wars."
"Only with me?"
"You can be so damned exasperating." His lips turned down, but the laughter was lurking in his eyes now.
She said defensively, "My insurance will cover the damage to your truck."
"That's my Julie. Let someone else look after the chaos you've caused."
"That's not fair!" Oh, lord! She grimaced and made her voice quiet, but the anger was still there, boiling up. "I don't run around causing chaos, and I don't leave other people to look after my messes. And what the hell do you think insurance is for, anyway? If you think I won't pay for—Have you any idea how my insurance rates are going to skyrocket after this?"
He growled, "At least you have insurance."
She said rigidly, "It's against the law not to have auto ins—"
"Or you wouldn't? I can believe that." The laughter was all gone. She saw his fingers curl, as if he wanted to shake sense into her.
She muttered, "Will you shut up?"
He shrugged. "Does it occur to you that I need that truck? That I can't afford to have it laid up weeks for repairs."
She snarled, "Some of us have to work for a living?" echoing his earlier words. "You're a great one to talk, David McNaughton. You and your damned relatives own half this island. You—"
"That's a wild exaggeration."
She exploded, landing on her feet on the field grass with a soft thump, pacing away, then back, unsteady in her city shoes. "That's David! Let's be accurate by all means—even in the middle of a raging battle! Gentleman farmer! You'd probably float to your grave in comfort if you never dug another ditch for those cows! You—"
"Julie. Shut up."
She broke off, knowing from the look in his eyes that he would not hesitate to shake sanity into her. She could still hear the echo of her own voice from the trees. Hysterical, raging, screaming at him.
A big bumblebee circled David's head. He ignored it.
"How the hell do you do it, David?" She bit her lip. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I hit your bloody truck, but you've got the greatest talent for rubbing me the wrong way..."
"Yeah. Well..." He ran his hands roughly through his hair. "Forget about the truck. You'll have enough problems over this without my adding to it by putting an insurance claim in on it."
She shook her own hair back, finger-combing it and finding it wildly tangled. "David," she said breathlessly. "I'm not a ki
d. You don't need to protect me. Of course you'll put—"
He shook his head abruptly. "When I saw that car—Have you any idea how small that car of yours looks from the cab of my truck?"
She pushed damp hands down along her skirt. "Look, could you—please stop raking me over the coals."
"Raking you—Don't you ever take anything seriously? You could have been killed."
"All right! I know it!" She could have caused David to die trying to avoid the accident. She knew that, too, but could not say the words with his eyes watching her, criticizing what they saw. Her fingers clenched in on themselves and she managed to calm her voice. "Could you just stop it? I don't need a David lecture. I've had enough of them in my life. So I made a mistake. I can look after it. I'm sorry if your truck's laid up, but I can't do much about that, either. I'll certainly make sure my insurance pays for—I—There's a car coming."
He turned to look over his shoulder. "Police."
"On a sleepy place like Gabriola, with one RCMP cruiser, how on earth—?"
He jerked his head towards his dump truck. "I called them from the truck."
She grimaced. "You've got a phone in your truck? Why did you call? To get me charged with careless driving?"
"Driving without due care and attention?" he said softly. "No, of course not, but it's got to be reported. There's surely more than five hundred dollars damage done to that little bug of yours."
She felt tired suddenly. "And, being David, you go by the rules?"
He said dryly, "It wouldn't hurt you to go by the rules. Like looking before you cross the street. And, anyway, you can't take that car in for repairs on insurance without an accident report."
Predictably, he was right. Being right was one of David's more irritating qualities. She said wearily, "Damn you, why don't you get out of my life. Go home to your wife."
She knew she was being unreasonable, but somehow he did that to her. Whenever she saw criticism in his eyes, heard censure in his voice, something deep inside her snapped.
He said quietly, "Sandy died, Julie. Three years ago."
Chapter Two
Julie's eyes flew to David's. Deep brown. Quiet. David alone? Without Sandy, the woman he had loved so deeply?
"I...David, I'm sorry."
"I know." He touched her shoulder, almost as if he were comforting her. Up on the road, a car door slammed and David said gently, "Sorry about the police, but it's got to be reported."
"I know." Standing in the midst of a green clearing on Gabriola, shouting at David. She sighed. Some things didn't change...except that they had changed. She wanted to touch him, tell him how sorry she was about Sandy. Words weren't enough. She wanted...to know why, what had happened, but arguing with David was one thing...she wouldn't want to say anything to hurt him.
She said only, "How's Stanley?" She remembered David's son as ten years old, shy and skinny, worried that he would be forever small.
"Off at university."
From the road, an official voice called out, "Anybody hurt?"
"No!" David shouted back. "We're fine! Just two of us, over here."
He walked away from her, towards the uniformed man standing on the gravel road. Julie followed more slowly, picking her way over the uneven ground. A dry summer. August now and the grass was starting to brown, the cedar and Douglas fir dark green all around. Every time she looked up, she saw David's back moving away from her. So many years, but she would have recognized him anywhere, any time, just seeing the way he moved, that slow walk that ate up the ground. He never seemed to hurry, but she remembered trying to keep up, running behind, calling out his name. His shoulders, swinging slightly with his movement, broad and steady.
When she got to the road, the officer was muttering, "...sure made a mess of that car, didn't it?"
Even here on Gabriola, an accident meant paperwork. Endless questions later, the officer tore off copies of the accident report and handed one to Julie, then added a green summons form. "You understand that if you wish to plead guilty to this charge, you just have to pay the ticket before the date? The address is there at the bottom."
"Yes. Thanks." She met David's eyes, heard the officer explaining what she should do if she wished to plead not guilty. She wasn't surprised to end up with a traffic ticket for failing to yield the right of way. For once, she agreed with David about her own behavior.
"Want me to call a tow truck for your car?" asked the officer.
Her eyes jerked back to David. He said firmly, "I'll look after that."
"Right." The officer was closing his ticket book, preparing to leave. "What about your truck?"
"It'll run," David assured him. "I can drive it away."
"Okay, then. That's it. Can I give you a ride anywhere, Ms Summerton?"
"I—"
"I'll look after it," said David. "Julie's an old family friend."
The RCMP officer smiled faintly at that. "Okay, then. I'll be off."
Julie watched the patrol car drive away, said dismally, "An old family friend? Just came for a friendly collision, did I?"
David's eyes passed over her as he turned back to the vehicles tangled on the road. She felt what he was seeing, saw herself in his eyes. Her hair tangled in the wind, unruly, a city style gone wild in the country. It had been free and curling around her shoulders, attractive and shining when she started the day. Sandy would have tied her long, blonde hair back to keep it from the wind. Sandy wouldn't have worn a white knit suit either. Wouldn't have driven smack into David's dump truck.
She felt anger stirring, seemed powerless to stop it. There had never been any point to comparing herself to Sandy McNaughton.
Sandy was dead. Remembering that, Julie felt a sick guilt at her own feelings for the other woman. Irrational feelings, because who could find anything to dislike in David's wife?
The silence was full, uncomfortable, as if he could read her thoughts. She said uncomfortably. "I thought you would know him—the policeman. I—Only a couple of RCMP on the island, and you're not on first name terms with this one?" Her words sounded silly, felt trivial.
"This fellow's new."
She laughed, heard the faint note of hysteria and silenced herself abruptly. David was walking around their vehicles, muttering something about their not being locked together.
"Your car's demolished," he said flatly. "You have got collision insurance on it?"
"Yes." Julie hugged herself, staring at the front of her Suzuki Swift. From the front, it looked almost normal. At the back ..."I just bought it. It gets terrific mileage."
It was a wonder she'd escaped alive. And David—she couldn't bear to think about what might have happened to David. She had seen the truck heading towards the ditch. Trying to avoid hitting her car, to save her. He could so easily have hit a tree, crushed himself between the load of gravel and one of those monstrous Douglas firs.
She said unsteadily, "It's the first new car I ever had." It would have been her fault. David...so hard to imagine that anything could penetrate his strength, but she'd almost killed him today. She saw the look in his eyes, heard herself saying, "Please don't tell me that—"
"You don't have right-of-way coming off private property."
She opened her mouth to retaliate, then the anger abruptly drained away. What was she thinking of? Why did she always respond to him with anger? "Don't worry. I'll pay the ticket, of course. You won't land up in court, testifying against me."
"Terrifying thought," he said wryly.
She wondered what he would say in court if she pleaded not guilty. Of course she was guilty, but trust David to go calling the police without even warning her first. Doing the right thing, of course. By the book, according to the Motor Vehicle Act.
He had told the officer that he suspected Julie would have had trouble seeing the truck coming, that Mountainview Lane was curved just slightly, difficult to see from the drive. It wasn't true. It bothered her that he had lied for her, even a small lie.
She bi
t her lower lip. "You said your truck would drive away. What if it won't?"
He pulled open the passenger door. "Then I'll get the tractor up and tow it back to the farm." It was a big step up into the truck. He leapt up easily, the muscles bunching in his thighs through the denim. "Come on, Julie. Let's go."
"I only need a ride to the ferry." She stared up at him, wondering how she would get up there, what to hold onto.
He stared back down at her, his eyes flat and dark. "You need a decent meal and a good sleep before you start running around again."
Running around, as if he'd pulled her out of the bull pen and told her to go home and stay inside for the rest of the day. She muttered, "I can't leave my car here."
"Do you think someone's going to steal it?" The laughter was in his eyes, his lips just slightly turned down at the corners. How often had she looked for laughter in his eyes? Old memories. Why on earth were they surfacing now?
"It's—I can't just leave my car in the middle of the road." Her heart was beating heavier with each stroke. Fear. Excitement. She was not certain which, but knew it was a warning signal. Don't get into that truck with David.
"To quote you: 'There's never anyone on this road.'" He jerked his head impatiently. "Come on." He stretched out a hand and she felt hers folded in it. His was bigger, harder, stronger. He took her weight easily, pulling her up into the cabin of the truck. Afterwards, her hand crawled with tingles, as if he had held too tightly.
For all the truck's battered look, it was clean inside. She pulled the door closed and sat with her hands curled together, jumping when David reached for the shift lever. The dark hairs on the back of his hand brushed against her arm. She stared at his hand, so close to her arm. His skin was dark against her pale whiteness.
The engine growled as he shifted gears.
She stared through the windscreen as he reversed to clear her crumpled little car. "I was going to stay at my place tonight," she said stiffly.
She glanced at him and was hit with an overwhelming impression of hard muscles and a grim mouth that said critically, "You haven't been there in years."
With Strings Attached (Gabriola Island) Page 18