Wild and Willing!

by Lawrence, Kim

  ‘Well, I lent it to Adam. He seemed so interested in your dancing. I thought he might like to see it,’ she rushed on defensively.

  ‘It didn’t occur to you I might not like him to see it?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, no,’ Beth said defiantly. ‘I think he could be very good for you. He’s quite charming.’

  ‘He’d be the first to agree with you,’ Anna called over her shoulder as she jogged to the starting line. She was very proud that it had only taken her two weeks to forget the man completely. He was the past, she thought airily, and a past she had no intention of reliving.

  The serious runners had already begun. Anna was squashed between a spry octogenarian and a middleaged man dressed in a giant nappy and nothing else. The atmosphere of the occasion was enough to lift even the most morose of spirits—not that she needed cheering up.

  ‘First mile’s the worst,’ a large Easter bunny commented as she topped the first incline.

  ‘That’s what you need—limitless optimism,’ Anna laughed breathlessly. ‘Can you breathe in that thing?’ she asked, when half a mile further along the rabbit was still keeping pace with her. She eyed the heavy costume and wondered how the poor idiot in it could see. It must be stifling under all those layers of fur and padding.

  ‘I might need resuscitation,’ the muffled voice observed.

  ‘You could take the head off,’ Anna suggested. A stitch knifed into her side; laughing and running didn’t make for comfort.

  ‘Later.’

  Anna shrugged and offered her collection tin to the spectators lining the route. She accepted the juice offered around the next bend and once more found the rabbit at her elbow.

  ‘Have you done one of these before?’ she yelled. He really did appear to be having trouble.

  ‘No, you?’

  ‘Two other half marathons and one marathon, but I’m not fit enough to do one of those right now.’

  ‘Fit! You mean you train for these things?’

  Anna was beginning to feel concerned about the rabbit. Enthusiasm was all very well, but in this heat, in that outfit, if he wasn’t super-fit he was in real trouble.

  ‘Didn’t you train?’

  ‘Spur-of-the-moment thing.’ He was panting pretty badly.

  ‘You should take some fluids.’

  ‘Can’t drink in this thing.’

  ‘Anna!’ Two nuns with beards ran past and playfully slapped her behind. ‘Great outfit, love!’

  ‘Friends?’ the rabbit enquired.

  ‘Rugby players; one of them comes to me for massage.’

  ‘I might need some of that before this is over.’

  ‘You can always drop out.’

  ‘And lose my sponsorship money? I’m running for the scanner appeal too. Don’t wait for me,’ the muffled voice added heroically as Anna adapted her pace to her lumbering running partner’s. ‘I’ll get there eventually. Remember the tortoise and the hare.’

  ‘I think you’re in the wrong outfit for that analogy.’

  The next several miles passed in relative silence if you didn’t count the gasps and groans coming from the large figure beside Anna. She’d just decided that he couldn’t be that unfit to keep up this pace when the Easter bunny staggered in front of her and fell dramatically at her feet.

  ‘Oh, no!’ she groaned, coming to a halt in front of the prone figure. She dropped to her knees. ‘I’ll get you out of this in a minute. Get the first-aid people,’ she yelled to the small group which had gathered around. ‘I think this thing is stuck,’ she gasped, struggling with the rabbit head. I hope the poor man is breathing in there, she thought, panting.

  The thick fur fabric made it impossible for her to find a pulse. The head shot off suddenly, throwing her back on her heels. ‘Are you al…?’ she began. ‘You rat!’ she spat venomously, much to the amazement of several people who’d stopped to assist. She stiffened with a fierce sense of outrage. Was this some twisted joke?

  ‘Rabbit, Anna, rabbit,’ Adam Deacon corrected her firmly.

  He wasn’t even breathing hard. He actually looked in a much better condition than she did. ‘That was quite an act,’ she yelled wrathfully. ‘It’s some comfort that you look a total fool.’ So much for his much revered dignity.

  ‘I was hoping you’d notice that. Hold on, Anna, wait for me!’ he cried as she sped off.

  She was fit, but he was obviously fitter. No matter how hard she tried to shake him off he stuck firmly to her side.

  ‘That’s right, take some fluids,’ he said approvingly when she raised a beaker to her lips.

  With a squeak of frustration she flung her half-full cup at his head. ‘Can’t you take a hint? I don’t want you.’

  ‘Yes, you do, and I’m not going to go away until you admit it.’

  ‘Are you mad?’ Red-faced, she shot him an incredulous look.

  ‘Just desperate. This was the only way I could be sure of getting you to talk to me. I knew you’d never quit once you’d started.’

  ‘I’m so predictable, am I?’

  What the hell was he doing here? Was this some bizarre joke? He couldn’t mean what his words suggested. Anna couldn’t permit herself the luxury of hope. The memory of the fall from optimism to despair was still painfully fresh in her mind.

  ‘You’ve got something that belongs to me.’ She threw him a hard-eyed scowl. ‘Mum had no right to let you have it; it’s private.’

  I’m over him, I’m coping—that’s hysterically funny! she thought confusedly. Who am I fooling? Anna almost stumbled and Adam’s hand shot out. She ignored it and his injured expression. Now wasn’t the time to start holding hands; just seeing him was a specialised form of torture!

  ‘Beth told you?’

  ‘Jessica told me.’ ‘Jessica!’ That had surprised him; she could tell from his voice.

  ‘Girlish confidences,’ she continued in a soft, taunting voice. ‘You know how it is.’

  ‘I’m happy to say I don’t.’

  ‘I’d be interested to hear what you thought of my performance,’ she gasped as her oxygen-hungry lungs greedily absorbed all she could supply.

  ‘That makes a nice change,’ he growled sarcastically. ‘You’ve assiduously avoided hearing anything I’ve had to say till now. When was the last time you answered a phone? Your poor mother is running out of excuses to cover your reluctance to talk to me.’

  ‘You and my mother have a regular mutual appreciation society.’

  ‘I hadn’t realised just how much you’d lost until I saw that tape,’ he said abruptly. ‘Someone with less guts and determination would have been permanently maimed emotionally. You haven’t wasted your time wailing about the hand fate dealt you, you’ve got on with your life. The fact you can wear that thing—’ he reached out and touched the skirt of her tutu ‘—as a joke impresses me more than I can say. It says it all—you’re quite a woman, Anna.’

  She couldn’t mistake the sincerity in his deep tone, and tears stung her eyelids. ‘Did Mum tell you about today?’

  She couldn’t risk looking at him. She might see what she wanted to in his eyes, not what was really there. One foot in front of the other; that was what she had to concentrate on.

  ‘I’m not going to reveal my sources. I knew you wouldn’t speak to me voluntarily. Surely you didn’t think the moody silence would make me go meekly away?’ He sounded incredulous at the notion.

  He was so unbearably sure of himself, it made her want to scream. But all her breath was needed to keep up the killing pace which was fast reducing her to a wreck. At least the pain was distracting enough to enable her to stay relatively sane in his company.

  ‘Why the pantomime?’ she snapped.

  ‘I thought you’d be glad I’m prepared to make a complete fool of myself for you, not to mention a good cause.’

  ‘All this is meant to impress me! This…this circus?’ she spluttered.

  ‘I’m just entering into the spirit of the thing. Let’s face it, I couldn’t make a
bigger fool of myself than I did that morning. Besides, there’s nowhere for you to hide from me here.’

  She only lost her rhythm for a second. There never had been anywhere for her to hide from him. Despite the confidence and determination in his voice she glimpsed uncertainty etched in the lines of his face.

  ‘You won’t have any arguments on that subject from me. You’re a fool, Adam.’ Adam was apologising—she couldn’t believe it, but if he wanted to say something he would have to spell it out clearly.

  ‘I hate being told what to do, Anna—’

  ‘You don’t say,’ she snorted.

  ‘For God’s sake, woman, let me finish. I really thought I was doing the right thing when I got engaged to Jessica. The fact my entire family made it clear they didn’t agree made me dig my heels in. I didn’t want to admit they were right.

  ‘Even if I hadn’t met you I don’t think I’d have gone through with it,’ he confessed. ‘I felt a complete swine! As far as I was concerned Jessica was the one prepared to make all the sacrifices and I was going to throw it all in her face. It was my fault for rushing into the engagement. After Ben and Tessa’s death I should have taken time out before I made any decisions, but I didn’t. Angus Montford meant a lot to me, and although it might seem bizarre I felt as if it was him I would be betraying.

  ‘For God’s sake, Anna, if you don’t slow up you’ll never reach the finish line.’

  ‘I don’t like being told what to do either.’ The arm that hooked around her waist brought her to an abrupt halt. ‘How dare—?’

  A firm kiss silenced her protest as he lifted her clear off the ground. A ripple of applause broke out as runners ran around the obstacle of a ballerina in football boots being ruthlessly kissed by a six-foot-plus rabbit. An enterprising young local took a snap which would end up on the pages of a national daily and launch him into a new career.

  ‘Adam, people are staring!’ Dazed, she clutched at him as her shaking knees threatened to buckle beneath her.

  ‘Let them,’ he said carelessly.

  ‘I thought you had to be careful of your reputation.’ The possessive gleam in his eyes was making her heart thud.

  ‘I’d have the reputation of being the biggest fool in history if I let you go. I love you, Anna.’

  ‘You loved Jessica,’ she reminded him. His simple statement had made her nearly explode with joy.

  ‘Never,’ he said with a hint of impatience. ‘You knew that, Jessica knew that. I had told her long before we spent the night together that it was over. I had every intention of telling you just that, but your own agenda that night did sort of divert me,’ he reflected.

  She blushed as she recalled how cold—no, hot-bloodedly she’d set out to seduce him. ‘Marrying someone you don’t love is an awful thing to do.’

  ‘I’m a reformed man,’ he announced. The humble statement was spoilt by the dangerous gleam in his eyes. ‘But if it’s any comfort my blue eyes were never the main attraction for Jessica. She played on my gratitude to her stepfather right from the beginning, and I was too blind to see it. She became angry enough to admit she had never really cared for Angus at all. In fact she was furious that he’d left part of his estate to set up a charity devoted to medical research. I am a director of the charity, and it seems early on she had a notion that she might be able to break the trust.

  ‘As for the job she sacrificed, it was never hers to refuse.’ His lips twisted in a cynical grimace. ‘Jessica is incredibly ambitious and seeing the job she’d spent the last two years grafting to get go to someone else must have been agony. For some reason she decided to transfer her energies to getting me. This probably sounds conceited, but it explains why she was so understanding when I told her how I was feeling about you.

  ‘I really expected her to see what had become so glaringly obvious to me—that we were totally unsuited. That was why I tried to throw her together with the children that weekend, but mumps and my mother intervened. At the time it seemed kinder to let her be the one to call things off.’

  ‘They’re green,’ Anna corrected him. ‘Your eyes are green.’ She was still trying to take in these revelations. Jessica’s visit to her had obviously been motivated by pure malice. She couldn’t have Adam and she’d wanted to make sure no one else did either.

  ‘You noticed,’ he said with a pleased grin.

  ‘The way you glare at me, it would have been hard to miss. You said some awful things to me.’

  ‘I did think you’d left my bed to jump into someone else’s. I’m normally the mildest of creatures. Remember this was the same guy you’d had some mawkish adolescent crush on and the same guy whom I’d seen kissing you in the garden. I should have done what my instincts told me to at the time,’ he observed grimly.

  She didn’t enquire what this had been; his clenched fists sort of gave the game away. ‘You didn’t trust me.’

  He ripped off his gloves and took her chin in his hand. ‘That morning after hadn’t gone exactly as I’d planned,’ he explained drily. ‘I was all pumped up to pledge my eternal love—something I’ve had little practice at. I wanted to tell you that it was all off between Jessica and me, and you proceeded to act as if we’d done nothing more intimate than shake hands. “Casual” doesn’t even begin to describe your behaviour. I thought you’d succeeded in exorcising your obsession.’

  ‘It was you who said that,’ she reminded him.

  ‘I was clutching at straws at the time, Anna. I’d never had cause to call my integrity into question before I met you. Learning love is stronger than pride was a hard lesson.’

  ‘What about during our night together?’ she enquired huskily. His voice might have contained a wry note of humour when he’d spoken of love, but there was nothing humorous about the deep sincerity in his eyes. ‘I just about exhausted the dictionary definitions of love that night. You didn’t say a word.’

  ‘People say things they don’t mean in the throes of passion.’

  ‘I don’t.’ Adam caught his breath at the expression in her eyes as she made the admission.

  ‘I couldn’t be sure of that at the time,’ he said, holding her gaze steadily. ‘That’s why I waited. I didn’t want any misunderstandings about what I wanted to say. Unfortunately I couldn’t compete with the cows.’ His smile carried the shadow of recent pain.

  ‘I thought you wanted it casual, Adam. You hadn’t said anything and as far as I was concerned you were marrying Jessica. I had no right to demand anything you weren’t going to give freely. It’s just that loving you felt so right, Adam.’ A husky catch throbbed in her low, passionate voice. ‘I couldn’t let you marry Jessica without trying to show you how much I loved you. I thought I’d made a terrible mistake and you didn’t feel the same way. I didn’t want to be your mistress, Adam.’

  He called her an extremely rude name and his fingers tightened on her upper arms.

  ‘If you really loved me, you wouldn’t be so rude.’

  ‘I don’t expect marriage to you to be a smooth ride.’

  ‘Is that a proposal?’ She tried to look shocked and disapproving, but she could feel an idiotic grin on her face. So much for being mysterious and hard to get!

  ‘I’ve taken advice from my family…’

  ‘Adam, I won’t marry you just because the children like me,’ she said, a cloud passing over her shining joy. Uncertainty made her lips quiver slightly.

  ‘Kate tells me neither she nor Jake are children. My darling Anna, if the children hated you I wouldn’t give a damn. Mind you, it makes life easier that they don’t,’ he felt compelled to admit. ‘You haven’t given me an answer yet. Is it because of the ready-made family?’

  ‘Not at all.’ She nipped that stupid notion in the bud. ‘They’re much easier to get on with than you.’

  ‘Then say it, Anna! Say “I love you, Adam, and I’ll marry you”.’

  ‘This is coercion,’ she told him with mock severity.

  ‘This is two weeks of pure hell talking, An
na,’ he said seriously. ‘I’m not letting you go until I know you’re mine.’

  Anna could have pointed out the impractical nature of this assertion, but she didn’t. ‘I’ve been so miserable,’ she cried, surging forward and flinging her arms enthusiastically about his neck. ‘You’re the only man I’ve ever seduced and the only man I’ve ever loved.’ Her brown eyes glowed as he lifted her up to face level.

  ‘You’re the only woman I’ve ever dressed up as an Easter bunny for,’ he admitted. ‘It’s not the first time I’ve made a fool of myself, though it’s probably the most public. I had made my mind up never to repeat the experience after that awful morning. Only there’s something very infectious about your recklessness. You’ve let me look at the world through your eyes, and you know something? It’s really not such a bad place, so long as you’re in it.’

  ‘Don’t be so nice,’ she gulped urgently. ‘Or I’m going to cry!’ she warned.

  He looked at her wet lashes with tender astonishment. ‘I’ll never understand women.’

  ‘That’s obvious,’ she sniffed, ‘or you wouldn’t have got engaged to Jessica. When she warned me off—’

  ‘You’re never going to let me forget that, are you?’ he interrupted her. An attentive expression abruptly stole over his face. ‘Warned you off?’

  ‘She paid me a little visit, and I’m not telling you what I said because it will only confirm your opinion that I’m a shameless hussy. Besides, you’re big-headed enough without women fighting over you. If I’d been Hope I’d have laid her out cold,’ she told him a tinge wistfully. ‘Her temper bypasses her brain and goes straight to her fists.’

  ‘What sort of family have I got myself mixed up with?’ he said mournfully. His eyes darkened with passion as she laughed up at him. ‘God, but I want to make love to you,’ he said.

  ‘In that case,’ she replied, casting him a sultry smile that sent his pulses racing, ‘it might be a good idea to finish this race.’

  Some time later, holding hands, they stepped over the finish line together.

  ‘Not your best time, Anna,’ a group of fellow fundraisers teased. They eyed Adam with overt curiosity.