By Request Collection 1. Jackie Braun

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      ‘Yet I have a key.’

      Before she could analyse that dryly delivered fact or think of a response, he released her, stepped sideways and flipped on the light switch. Then he raised both hands to show her he meant no harm.

      She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the sudden glare. As she noticed the red mark where the shell had grazed a bronzed neck. As her brain caught up with the fact that yes, absolutely, he had a key and he’d reached for the light switch with such easy familiarity …

       Blake Everett.

      She sagged against the table but her partial relief was quickly chased away by a different kind of tension. He wore faded black jeans and a black sweater washed almost transparent with age. The shrunken sleeves ended halfway down thick sinewy forearms sprinkled with dark masculine hair.

      Jared’s mate. Her first innocent crush when she’d been nine years of age and he’d been eighteen and joined the navy. Then when he’d come home on leave after his mother’s death. oh, my. She’d been thirteen to his twenty-two but she’d looked at him as a woman would, dreamed of him as only a woman would and she’d kept the guilty pleasure a secret.

      She doubted he’d ever looked at her other than the time she’d fallen off her skateboard trying to impress him and bloodied her nose, his whiter-than-white T-shirt and, most of all, her young pride.

      Gossip had circulated. Bad boy. Black sheep. It hadn’t changed the way she thought of him until eventually she heard the rumours that he’d got Janine Baker pregnant then skipped town to join the navy. In an odd way, she’d felt betrayed.

      He had eyes that could turn from tropical-island blue to glacial in an instant and an intense brooding aloofness that had called to her feminine nurturing side even way back then. She’d spent a lot of time imagining what it would be like to be the focus of all that intensity.

      And now. maybe now he was looking at her the way she’d always wanted him to … with a definite glint of heat in those summertime eyes. But where men were concerned, she wasn’t as naive now. And she wasn’t looking back—not that way. Absolutely not. She wasn’t thirteen any more and there was a major problem here.

      ‘My name’s Blake Everett,’ he said into the silence broken only by an intermittent plop of water leaking from the roof into a plastic container on the floor. He remained where he was, hip propped easily against her counter top, his gaze skimming her too-slinky too-skimpy dressing gown and making her tingle from head to foot before meeting her eyes once more. ‘I—’

      ‘I know who you are.’ Posture stiff, she resisted the urge to hug her arms across her braless breasts to hide her suddenly erect traitorous nipples. She concentrated on relaxing tense muscles. Shoulders, neck, hands. Breathe.

      His gaze turned assessing, then stern, drawing her attention to the pallor beneath the tanned complexion, the heavy lines of fatigue around his eyes and mouth. But his lips. They were still the most sensual lips she’d ever laid eyes on—full, firm, luscious—

      ‘You’re one up on me, then.’

      At his clipped reply, she dragged her wayward eyes up to his. He didn’t recognise her. Good. ‘So now we’re even.’

      He frowned. ‘How do you figure that?’

      She knew him? Ignoring the cramped muscles from the rain-lashed drive up from Surfers and the headache battering away inside his skull, Blake searched his memory while he studied her. No hardship there.

      He hadn’t been this close to a woman in a while, let alone one as attractive as this little redhead. After the navy’s testosterone-fuelled environment, she smelled like paradise. In the yellow light her hair shone brighter than a distress flare and her eyes were the clear translucent green of a tropical lagoon, but, just as the pristine-looking beaches he routinely assessed hid potential and possibly lethal dangers, there was a storm brewing behind that gaze.

      And no wonder—the old man had obviously neglected to inform her that it wasn’t his boat to rent out. Ten years ago when his mother had died, Blake had bought it from him to help get his father out of debt and to secure himself a quiet and solitary place to stay when he was on leave in Australia. He’d not been back since.

      ‘I understand if you’re renting. I’ve been overseas and my father—’

      ‘I’m not renting. My brother bought this boat from your dad three years ago. It belongs to our family now. This is my home so. so you’ll need to find somewhere else.’

      ‘Your brother bought the boat …’ He remembered the less-than-considered transaction and an ominous foreboding tracked up his spine. He should’ve known better than to trust a gambling addict—

      ‘Jared Sanderson.’

      Jared? The familiar name spoken in that stiletto-sharp voice sliced through his thoughts and he looked her over more thoroughly. The tousled bedroom hair, those aquamarine eyes and luxurious lips pulled down at the corners as she stared back at him. He’d lost contact with his long-time surfing buddy but he remembered the little sister …

      ‘You’re Melissa.’ Still tiny in stature but all grown up and curvaceous and looking. different from the kid he remembered. Disturbingly so. Blood pumped a tad faster through his veins. Don’t go there.

      He flicked his eyes back to hers, catching a glimpse of generous breasts and smooth ivory décolletage on the way, before she jammed her arms in front of her. He didn’t miss the remnant shadows in her gaze. ‘I apologise for scaring you, Melissa. I should’ve knocked.’

      ‘It’s Lissa now. And yes, you should have.’

      Her mouth pouted in that sulky way he remembered but tonight, rather than amused, he found himself oddly captivated. ‘Lissa.’

      She seemed to shake off the sulk. ‘Okay, you just stripped five years off my life but apology accepted. And I didn’t ring the police.’ She lifted one delicate shoulder and gave a wry grimace. ‘Phone’s dead.’ She blinked up at him, still wary. ‘So what are you doing here?’

      ‘A man can’t come home after fourteen years?’ He didn’t elaborate. Now was not the time to ponder the demons that had sent him home to re-evaluate the universe and his place and purpose in it.

      She shook her head. ‘I mean what are you doing here, on the houseboat?’

      ‘I thought I owned the houseboat.’ Conned by his own father. He clenched his jaw. He should have made the effort to see his old man earlier today before driving up here but he hadn’t needed the inevitable angst it would’ve entailed.

      ‘No. You can’t …’ She frowned, confusion adding to the clouds in her eyes. ‘I don’t understand.’

      ‘It’s a long complicated story.’ He rubbed absently at the tiny scratch beneath his chin.

      ‘I’m sorry … about that.’ She glanced at his throat and a pretty pink colour swam into her cheeks. ‘I’ll just get some—’

      ‘Don’t bother. I’m fine.’

      But he didn’t push the point as he watched her move to a cupboard and reach up … СКАЧАТЬ