Evan’s gut clenched. He curled his fists. “The media’s still here?”
“Most of ’em. And I’ve gotta warn you, mate, the buzz about you saving Jess and the north-line team is still hot, if you’ll excuse the pun. Harry’s out of hospital and telling anyone who even looks at him he’d be dead if it wasn’t for you. Wouldn’t surprise me if he doesn’t name his next born after you. I’ve seen more than one reporter hanging around the pub waiting for your arrival.”
The knot in Evan’s stomach thickened, making its way up his chest and into his throat like a snake.
An image of Jenna played with his senses. His lips reminded him how soft hers were on his, how receptive. His body recalled how amazing her breasts were crushed to his chest. His dick remembered just how warm the curve of her sex was pressed to it, how perfectly aligned their groins were.
If the media was still here, there was every chance she was as well. With her cameraman, her mic…
Her fingers on his scars…the pity in her eyes…
“Think I’ll take a rain check on the beer, mate.” He turned back to the western sky, refusing to acknowledge the yearning tug on his body to get his arse to the Outback Skies pub ASAP, to see if she was there, waiting for him. To take her in his arms and crush her mouth beneath his.
To pin her to a wall, any wall, the closest wall, and make love to her mouth until she could barely stand, let alone look at him…see him.
“You scared of the limelight, Ev? Or someone in particular? Someone who threw herself in front of a car to get your attention?”
Evan dragged in a breath and shot Ryan a sideways glare. “Not like Charlie to gossip.”
Ryan snorted. “Not Charlie, mate. This reporter, what’s her name, Jenna something, from Channel Eight News? Her cameraman filmed the whole thing. Was showing it to some of his fellow cameramen in the pub last night.”
“Great.”
“Don’t worry. Charlie ended his fun. Confiscated the camera and told the guy he was going to throw him in the lockup for invasion of privacy. If it helps, I haven’t seen either him or your reporter friend in town since this morning. Think they may have headed back to the Big Smoke.”
Evan shuffled his feet, casting the horizon a long look. Gone. She was gone. That was good.
So why the hell are you feeling so empty now, huh? So hollow?
“About that beer?” Ryan said beside him. “My shout. I won’t even expect you to take me home and fuck me silly. Ignoring the whole hero-of-Wallaby-Ridge thing, you’re not really my type. No offense.”
A dry chuckle scratched at the back of Evan’s throat. “None taken.” He gave his friend a small smile. “But I’m going to give it a miss tonight. Tell the guys you can all buy me one later. I’m going to head home, take a shower and then crash. Unless there’s some major emergency, I’m not getting out of bed for the next twenty-four hours.”
Ryan studied him, a contemplative gleam in his eyes. The heli-musterer may have looked like a backcountry cowboy, but Evan knew he had a mind sharper than most of the suits who strutted about in the city.
“Fair enough,” Ryan said with a nod. “But it’s your shout tomorrow night for wimping out tonight. Double round. And none of that piss-water Fosters either. I’m talking Tooehy’s Dry. Or maybe even Crown Lager, got it?”
Evan couldn’t help but laugh. “Deal. Now any chance you can give me a lift home? Given that I can’t see the captain’s Land Cruiser anywhere, I’m assuming she’s reclaimed it.”
“Hell, yeah.” Ryan clapped a strong hand on Evan’s shoulder. “She heard you were trying to run down city reporters and took it back quick smart.”
Evan laughed again, even as the memory of Jenna running in front of the 4WD, and the kiss that followed, tormented him.
The drive to Evan’s house on the outer limits of what constituted Wallaby Ridge town proper was filled with discussion about the fire. Speculation was running rife in the Ridge that a careless tourist illegally camping in the national park had started it. Supposedly, the state’s Fire Commissioner was calling in the big guns, requesting the country’s leading arson investigator, Desmond Russell, to take a look at the scene. Ryan spoke of the media frenzy in town during the night as more than one ground crew firefighter returned, exhausted and drained, for a moments respite from the inferno.
With a sly glance at Evan, he’d pointed out none of them were the Chanel Eight News reporter.
Evan didn’t take the bait, and by the way Ryan’s lips twitched, Evan realized his friends were going to never let him live down his one moment of stupid weakness back on the helipad.
Whether they’d survive the rush of giving him a hard time without him breaking someone’s nose or not was another matter.
Twenty minutes later, with the topic of conversation moving from the fire to the upcoming visit from the Federal Minister for Arts and Culture to open the Ridge’s first indigenous art gallery, Ryan drew to a halt outside Evan’s house.
“Thanks, mate,” Evan threw over his shoulder as he climbed out of Ryan’s pickup. “If you see Jess in the pub, tell her I don’t want to hear from her until the sun’s set at least three times.”
“Shall do,” Ryan replied through the open window after Evan shut the door.
Evan was two steps away from entering the dark front verandah of his home when a shout from Ryan stopped him.
“Oi, Ev?”
Turning, Evan frowned at his friend. “What?”
Ryan fixed him with a steady gaze, the muted glow from his pickup’s dashboard casting his face in a soft green light. “I know you don’t want the fame or attention, but you really did save Jess and her crew’s lives, ya know. Don’t forget that. You may not call yourself a hero, but that’s what you are now to a lot of people.”
A tight band of pressure wrapped Evan’s chest. “I’ll try not to let it go to my head.”
Ryan laughed. “Remember, it’s your shout next time, hero. Crown Lager all round.”
Before Evan could tell his friend to bugger off, Ryan planted his foot on the accelerator and tore away.
Shaking his head, a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, Evan turned back to his house and climbed the dark steps to his front door. He stopped, keys in hand ready to slide into the lock, when the distinct scent of Lou Lou perfume threaded into his breath.
Jenna.
“Hi, Evan,” her voice caressed his ears from the deep shadows to his right.
Throat constricting, gut churning, he slowly pivoted to face her.
She stepped towards him, the darkness of the new-moon night doing nothing to hide from him how stunning she was.
He’d been attracted to her from the very moment he’d met her one hot summer afternoon when he and Tracey had gone to Bondi Beach to swim. Tracey had mentioned a friend from university was meeting them there, but Evan had hardly been paying attention.
He’d been full of himself back then. Six years younger with an ego the size of a teenager and a job sexy enough to feed his ego. Tracey had been the perfect girlfriend, interested in little but fucking him whenever she could and hanging off his arm whenever they were out.
They’d looked good together. His fellow firefighters at the National Aerial Firefighting Centre had hardly been able to conceal their lust for her every time she attended a function with him.
He’d been convinced their happy-ever-after was set in stone—the hotshot aviation firefighter and his soon-to-be-graduated social-media major girlfriend.
So he’d been more than a little shocked by his body’s reaction when the tall, willowy young woman with the curtain of straight ink-black hair and mesmerizing sapphire-blue eyes unfurled herself from a towel on the sand and smiled shyly at him.
He’d spent the rest of the day at the beach doing everything in his power to appear indifferent to every word she said. Fought like hell to deny the effect those words—articulate and intelligent words about global politics, movies, sand, fish and chips, seagulls, anima
l rights and skydiving—had on him.
He’d refused to look at her, no matter how many times Tracey accused him of being rude. If he’d looked at her, there’d have been no way he’d be able to not gorge himself on the sight of her creamy light-brown skin, flat belly, toned limbs and curved hips exposed to his gaze by her black bikini.
By the time he and Tracey had left, Jenna staying behind to chat with the guy she’d met an hour earlier while splashing about in the waves, he’d known he was going to have a hard time not thinking about her.
The next time he’d seen her, she’d been dating the guy from the beach—Richard some thing or other—and he and Tracey had moved in together.
Despite his new living arrangements, he’d never truly been able to erase Jenna McGrath from his mind. And every time they were in the same room together, his gaze would move to where she was often, his ears would listen for her voice…his body would thrum with even the most innocent brush against hers…
To his unspoken but wholly unnerving shame, he’d thought of her more than once when the steel in his cock needed relieving. Jenna, not Tracey.
He never mentioned Jenna’s name unless Tracey was talking about her. He didn’t ask about her once, not even when months went by without Tracey spending any time whatsoever with her.
By the time Tracey had revealed she and Jenna had grown apart, Evan had been convinced he’d gotten over whatever it was he’d felt for his wife’s ex-friend.
The kiss on the helipad less than thirteen hours ago, however, had proved that years-long conviction nothing but a delusion.
As did the hungry want turning the blood in his veins hot now.
He stood motionless as he watched her close the distance between them. Ate her up with his stare.
He’d tell her to go as soon as he found his voice. He would. Tell her there was no story to be found with him. No reason for her to be here. Someone like her had no reason to be with someone like him.
But for now, he needed to look at her. Needed to exist in the same space as her, if for no other reason than to allow himself to be a man—even a broken, scarred man—in the presence of a beautiful, intelligent, sexy woman.
God help him, he was a masochist.
“Jenna.” Her name left him on a croaky breath. “You shouldn’t—”
“My producer wants me to interview you.”
Icy tension licked through him at her rushed declaration.
“A human-interest story,” she went on, the words almost tumbling over each other. She stood as motionless as he did, her stare locked on his eyes. “About the hero of Wallaby Ridge and how he was once a Sydney firefighter who—”
“I don’t do interviews.”
She flinched at his blunt interruption. Caught her bottom lip with her teeth and frowned at him.
With a ragged grunt, he pulled his cap from his head and pointed to the mess of scar tissue running the length of his face. “There’s no story in this either, Jenna. I got them in the accident that killed Franco. The same fire that saw twenty people perish. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, Google it.”
He turned for the front door. Reached for the knob.
“I have,” she said.
Her soft response stilled his movement again. His gut clenched.
“Then you know all there is to know about me. All that’s worth saying has already been said.”
Without looking at her, he tightened his grip on the doorknob and twisted it to the right.
“I disagree. There’s lots more that needs to be said. Like the fact that your efforts during the Mutawintji National Park were beyond Herculean. Like the fact you risked your own life to save the lives of five others. Like the fact you haven’t let what happened to you in the Blue Mountains fire destroy you. You’re an inspiration, Evan.”
Clenching his jaw, Evan pushed his door wide and crossed the threshold. “I’m not who you think I am, Jenna,” he said over his shoulder. “There’s nothing heroic about me.”
“Do you hate yourself that much?”
The question punched into him. His chest tightened.
Turning on his heel, he found her standing in the opening of his door. What little light there was cast her in a faint silhouette that only served to highlight how tall and exquisite her body was. A hot tension flooded his cock. Self-contempt flooded his soul.
“There’s a lot to hate, Jenna,” he said, clenching the edge of the door. “My arrogance, my cockiness, caused Franco to die five years ago in the most horrific way. Burnt to death while pinned to the ground by a crashed helicopter. The helicopter I’d been piloting. I put Franco and me where we shouldn’t have been. My ego killed him. And my inability to forgive myself for that, along with the way I now look, drove my wife to end our marriage.”
He didn’t say Tracey had been sickened by the look and feel of the scars on his body. He understood his ex-wife’s repulsion. He felt the same.
“Evan…” Jenna’s soft whisper danced on the night’s shadows. “Oh God, Evan, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
He returned his cap to his head and let out a ragged sigh. He had to distance himself from her. He had to put a barrier between them. Because the longer she was here, the longer he could see her, the more he remembered how amazing it was to kiss her. And the more he remembered that, the more he realized just how unheroic he was. He’d desired Jenna while he was in a relationship with another woman. Not only had he caused his partner’s death and the end of his marriage, he’d also been unfaithful deep in his soul. What kind of man was he? Truly?
“I don’t deserve your sympathy, Jenna. Nor do I deserve your attention. Now if you’ll excuse me—” He began to swing the door shut.
The sharp slap of her hand against the closing door jarred up through his arm. “Tracey was sexting with my boyfriend when you two were still married.”
Icy shock ribboned through Evan’s self-disgust. He stared at her, his blood roaring in his ears. “What?”
“Tracy and Richard were sexting each other. That’s why I stopped being her friend. I caught them…it was before the Blue Mountains fire. I should have told you but…”
He stared at her. In his chest, his heart pounded like a canon, each beat bashing with punishing force. “They were sending text images to each other? Naked images?”
She dipped her head in a single, shallow nod.
“Did they…?” He stopped. He couldn’t ask the question. It stuck in his throat, a hot, sour lump.
Jenna chewed her lip again. “I don’t know. Richard swears they were just flirting. Harmless, he called it. But it…it destroyed me. Destroyed my trust in him.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t…I don’t know. Tracey told me you guys had a more adult relationship. And you were always so…so relaxed about the fawning and carrying on other guys did over Tracey when we were out. Like you were proud of it.”
Another invisible blow punched into Evan’s gut. A cold band of steel wrapped his chest. A dull roaring filled his head.
He ground his teeth, biting back a muttered curse. Jesus, he’d been such a wanker.
“I’m sorry, Evan.” Jenna reached through the open door and touched his jaw—his right jaw—with gentle fingers. “I should have told you, even if you might have laughed at me. I should have told you. But instead, I took the chicken-shit way out and just ran away.”
He stared at her. Found her gaze in the darkness of his foyer. Saw grief shining in her eyes. Grief and regret and compassion.
And something else.
Something he couldn’t fight.
Not right now.
He would. When no longer reeling from her statement. But not now. Not right at this very second.
For at this very second, he needed the connection she offered. He needed the fantasy of the desire he saw in her gaze.
For this very second. If only this second.
Closing his eyes, he turned his head and pressed his lips to the centre of h
er palm, and in doing so, presented her an uninterrupted view of the left side of his face. Allowed her to see his mangled ear, the lobe fused to the side of his head, the outer shell barely discernable from the knotted flesh on his scalp. The mess of flesh that stretched over his jaw. The white and pink scars—so dense and thick they still seemed new and raw—wrapping the side of his neck.
He stood that way for four pounding beats of his heart—a lifetime. Jenna didn’t move her hand away. Nor did she say a word.
He stood there with his lips pressed to her palm and allowed himself the moment.
Allowed himself that which he’d denied himself for close to five years—another living being’s warmth.
“Evan…” Her soft voice caressed his senses.
Opening his eyes, he pulled away from her hand and turned to her. “Goodnight, Jenna.”
Without a word, she stepped over the threshold. Entered his home.
Cupped his face in both her hands and brushed her lips to his.
4
She couldn’t let him shut her out.
It had nothing to do with the secret desire she’d harboured for him all those years ago. That desire seemed like a shallow high school crush compared to how she felt for him now.
That desire—a superficial attraction to his good looks and swagger—shamed her. Embarrassed her.
That desire didn’t move her to enter his house and kiss him.
The raw ache churning in her very soul, that’s what propelled her.
The unquestionable necessity to show him he wasn’t the failure he believed himself to be.
The undeniable need to heal the wounds in his heart.
She cupped his face in her hands, the skin beneath her left palm healthy and dusted with stubble, the skin beneath her right knotted and containing a world of pain, and let him feel everything she felt for him in the tender touch of her lips to his.
His shaky inhalation, coupled with his light grip of her wrists as he pulled from the kiss, sent a sharp pang of torment through her.
Burn For You: Outback Skies, Book Three Page 4