One Reckless Night

Zanna stiffened. ‘I hope you’re not implying...’

‘I’m stating a fact.’ His arm was like a band of steel round her waist as he guided her back into the hall. ‘From now on it’s orange juice for you, Susie, if you want to be fit to drive in the morning.’

She hung back, glaring at him. ‘Maybe I should just go back to the Black Bull and sleep it off.’

He snorted impatiently. ‘You’re really keen to be on your own again, aren’t you?’

No, she thought. Suddenly I’m not any more. and it scares me. I want to feel safe again—self-sufficient and sate—like I did yesterday, and all the days before that.

Aloud, she said stiltedly, ‘Look, I’m sure you had plans for tonight-people you wanted to meet here.’ She could see the redheaded girl watching them avidly from the other side of the room. ‘I must be spoiling things for you. If you’ll just introduce me to this caretaker friend of yours, I can leave you. to enjoy your evening.’

He looked at her for a moment, his brows drawn together in a frown, then he sighed abruptly. ‘Don’t run out on me, Susie. At least, not yet.’

The music had started again, another slow, beguiling waltz, and before she could think of a viable excuse Jake had swung her effortlessly into his arms and back onto the floor.

‘Relax.’ he said laconically into her ear as she stiffened. ‘Stop fighting me—and the world.’

His arms tightened, drawing her close against him. She felt the warmth of him penetrating through the layers of clothing to her own skin and beyond. Felt the frozen, frightened core hidden deep within her begin, unbelievably, to dissolve away, leaving something unknown, new and vulnerable in its place.

She knew that she should not—could not allow this to happen. That suddenly the danger she’d sensed was all around her, pressing on her, and that she had no one but herself to blame.

She knew also, and more disturbingly, that she wanted to press closer still. To bury her flushed face in the curve of his shoulder and breathe the unique male scent of him. To feel the harsh pressure of his lean, muscular body against her breasts, her belly, her thighs. To spread her hands against the powerful breadth of his back and reach up to touch the thick silky hair curling gently at the nape of his neck. To feel his mouth touching hers.

The need was bone-deep and desperate, but she knew she had to fight it if she was going to walk away from him tomorrow unscathed. As she had to do, she reminded herself.

She said, with a little nervous laugh, ‘Actually, you could be right about the alcohol. I—I didn’t realise. Maybe I should go back and sleep it off. As I have to drive tomorrow.’

There was a silence, then he said levelly, ‘Fine. I’ll get your jacket.’

Having him walk her back across the moonlit green wasn’t part of the plan at all.

She hung back. ‘I hardly need an escort. There can’t be many hidden perils in this village.’

‘Who can tell?’ His tone was brusque. ‘Anyway, I’m not prepared to take the risk.’

But the risk was all hers, Zanna thought numbly as he helped her on with her jacket. And the only real danger was right here beside her. Because no amount of punch, however lethal, could account for the way her blood seemed to sing in her veins, for the throbbing awareness of every sense, every nerve-ending in her body, as they started out through the scented darkness together.

She stumbled on a tussock of grass and instantly his arm went round her. ‘Careful.’

‘Oh, hell, my shoe’s come off.’ She scrambled frantically round with a stockinged foot.

‘And it’s not even midnight yet.’ There was amusement in his voice. ‘Keep still, Cinderella, and I’ll see if I can find it.’

‘We need a torch.’ Standing on one leg made Zanna feel undignified as well as giddy.

‘Something Prince Charming lacked too.’ Jake came back to her side. ‘I’ll continue the search later, when I have one, Susie. But in the meantime...’

Before she could utter a word of protest, he swung her up into his arms as easily as if she were a featherweight and carried her across the grass.

When she could speak, she said icily, ‘Put me down, please.’

He lowered her to the ground with almost insulting promptness. ‘Are you planning to hop the rest of the way?’

‘Of course not,’ she snapped, angrily aware of her racing pulses.

‘Then stop turning a problem into a crisis.’ He picked her up again, without ceremony, and set off.

‘You think you have an answer for everything,’ she said bitterly.

‘I often wish I had.’ She felt him lean forward to release the catch on a gate and looked round in swift alarm.

‘But this isn’t the Black Bull.’

‘Full marks for observation, Susie.’ He carried her up the path, then deposited her gently on the mat while he reached into his pocket for some keys. ‘You did say you wanted to look round Church House? Well, now’s your chance.’

‘But what right have you...?’ Her voice trailed away into stunned silence. Then, ‘My God,’ she said slowly. ‘It’s been you all the time, hasn’t it? You’re the caretaker. You’ve just been stringing me along all evening.’ She shook her head. ‘Oh, I don’t believe it.’

‘I hope,’ he said, gravely, ‘that you’re not going to reproach me, my dear Miss Smith, for not being entirely honest with you?’

His words seemed to hang in the air like a warning as he pushed open the front door, and turned to her. ‘Would you like me to lift you over the threshold?’

‘No, I wouldn’t,’ Zanna said stormily. ‘I’d like to go back to the inn.’

‘And so you shall.’ His voice was almost soothing as he urged her into the hallway. ‘Just as soon as we’ve had some coffee.’

‘I don’t want any bloody coffee.’

‘Well, I do, so tough.’ He opened a door, switched on lights, and Zanna found the house taking shape, coming to life before her just as she’d always imagined. In spite of herself she felt interest, excitement building inside her.

‘And I’d take off that other shoe,’ Jake added over his shoulder, walking into the kitchen. ‘You don’t want a sprained ankle to add to your other woes.’

‘At least you admit they exist.’

‘I imagine I’m responsible for most of them—in your eyes anyway.’ He filled a kettle and set it on the Aga to boil. ‘And while we’re on the subject I may as well confess that I finished your car this afternoon. It’s working perfectly again and I parked it at the Bull before I met you for dinner.’

Zanna stared at him, shoe in hand, momentarily mute with outrage. But only momentarily. ‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me this earlier?’

‘Because I had this perverse compulsion to dance with you, Susie. To see you smile. To discover if there was a softer layer under all that autocracy and aggression.’

‘Don’t think I’m flattered by your interest,’ she almost spat back at him. ‘I presume, now that you’re curiosity’s been satisfied, I’m free to get out of this dump?’

‘Not immediately.’ He collected pottery mugs from the dresser and spooned coffee into them. ‘Unless, of course, you actually want to lose your licence?’

The fact that his comment was quite justified did not improve Zanna’s temper.