By Request Collection 1. Jackie Braun

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СКАЧАТЬ can do both. You told me so and it’s good practice. I’ve already organised the painters here for next week and the furniture’s been ordered.’

      For the first time since he’d come back he took a good look at the room, visions of the way it used to look swimming before his eyes. ‘I can’t wait to see this transformed. It always reminds me of …’

      She looked up. ‘What?’ she asked softly.

      ‘Dad used to have his poker nights in here. Four nights a week. I remember the first night I came to live with him. I was fourteen. Mum had gone overseas so I was sent to Dad’s.’ He leaned his head back against the wall, the bad old memories coming thick and fast. ‘Dad had forgotten to pick me up at the bus so I walked. With my luggage.’ He closed his eyes, felt the old tension grab at the base of his skull.

      ‘Go on,’ she urged. Her voice was gentle. Oddly calming, like the trickle of water over a moss-covered rock. So easy to let it flow over him.

      ‘The place was a garbage tip. Beer bottles, pizza boxes, spilled cigarette ash, you name it. I thought after his buddies left he’d clean it up, but no. It was still there a week later.

      ‘The rest of the house was just as bad. In the end I couldn’t stand it so I asked if I could live on the houseboat. He was more than happy with the arrangement. I taught myself to cook. At least I could study in peace …’

      A long silence followed. ‘I never knew my father,’ Lissa said into the hiatus.

      He opened his eyes. ‘What?’

      ‘That man you knew wasn’t my father. My biological father was just passing through town one summer. I must have looked liked him because Dad hated me. I was a reminder of my mother’s infidelity.’

      She smiled suddenly. ‘This sounds like True Confession time.’

      He smiled back, feeling as if a load had been lifted off his shoulders. Feeling something like companionship. He’d never told anyone his troubles. Somehow Lissa had got him to talk. To open up. And it felt good. Freeing. Connected. ‘How about we go eat some pizza? I saw a live band setting up in an outdoor café on the esplanade. Oh, wait up.’ He picked up the boxes, reached over and set them in front of her. ‘This first.’

      Lissa reached for the larger one. ‘What is it?’ When he didn’t answer, she opened the flaps. Her jewellery box sat on the top. ‘Oh …’ Eyes filling, she pulled it out and opened it. It was still damp but she lifted out the bluebird brooch. ‘This was Mum’s. You rescued my things.’ She could barely see him through the tears.

      ‘I had the boat moved yesterday while you were at the shop. I didn’t get everything, most of it was too far gone, but the stuff in the box was salvageable. And what I thought you might like.’

      She ran her hands over a white porcelain bowl with blue dolphins around the edge. It had been a gift from Crystal when she’d moved here. He’d thought enough to sort through her things. ‘Thank you. So much.’

      She opened the other box. It was full of new lingerie. All different colours. Sexy as sin. She sifted through the silky bras and panties, her cheeks blooming with heat. She found two nightgowns. A teal blue and a deep gold.

      ‘I noticed you didn’t buy enough stuff yesterday,’ he said, his voice oddly gruff.

      The heat intensified. ‘How did you know my size?’

      ‘I checked the ones you bought. If you’ll forgive me for looking.’

      ‘Oh, yes … and they’re beautiful.’ She bit her lip. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

      ‘Your smile’s enough.’ He reached out a hand, lifted her chin up. ‘You should smile more often—with those eyes, like you’re doing now.’ For a fleeting moment his gaze turned almost reverent.

      And she felt her heart melt.

      Then he pushed up, as if uncomfortable with the moment. ‘Let’s go eat.’

       CHAPTER NINE

      FOR this evening, at least, it was enough to simply share pizza and enjoy each other’s company while the waves thumped on the beach. To see the ocean change from aqua to indigo to black and to watch Blake finally relax as they listened to the jazz quartet.

      It gave Lissa time to think about what Blake had told her about his father. No wonder he was obsessed with order and tidiness. She resolved to make more of an effort while she was staying in his house.

      When the band packed up, they drove home and went their separate ways to bed. The ever-present hum between them was still there, but also a feeling that barriers had been lowered a little. As if a bridge had been crossed.

      Lissa spent the following day working on the living room and plans for Gilda’s nursery. Blake offered to be at the shop in the morning to receive the office supplies she’d ordered. He refused her suggestion to accompany her shopping in the afternoon and went surfing instead.

      The last item on her list was what to wear to Gilda’s party.

      He should have insisted on going shopping with her, Blake decided that evening as he stood at the bottom of the staircase looking up.

      He resisted the urge to loosen the gold bow tie that threatened to strangle him as he stared at the woman descending the stairs.

      No way he’d have agreed to the skinny tube of shimmering gold lamé and its row upon row of bright coins that jingled and winked in the light as she moved. What there was of it. Her ‘find’ was strapless and covered precious little of those sun-kissed thighs that he’d thought about constantly since that first night on the houseboat.

      His brow wrinkled. Except now she was coming closer he could see that those thighs seemed to be dusted with something like … gold dust. She’d threaded gold ribbons through her hair and piled it on top of her head and he noticed her shoulders gleamed with the same fine gold glitter as her thighs. Strappy gold stilettos completed the look.

      An uncomfortable heat burst into flame below the surface of his skin and spread all over his body like a rash. How was he going to get through the evening without thinking about what other priceless treasures she had hidden beneath that slinky scrap of fabric that looked as if she’d simply wound it around her? He was going to spend the whole night wondering if it came off as easily.

      ‘What do you think?’ she said, reaching the bottom of the stairs.

      ‘It’s … certainly eye-catching.’ Not to mention snagging on a few other sensitive body parts.

      ‘That’s the idea.’ She shimmied like a belly-dancer and the whole thing glittered and jingled. ‘Not bad for a few moments’ work and a couple of quick threads, huh?’

      Quick threads? He swallowed. It was held together with a few threads? ‘You. constructed it yourself?’

      ‘I’m not wasting money when I don’t have to. I found it in an off-cut bin at a belly-dance studio.’ She held up a hand and thin gold bangles danced along her arm. ‘No, don’t ask how it holds together. And no, СКАЧАТЬ