Maid of Dishonor (19 page)

If only they were
normal
people,
Ellie thought. The last colleague of her father's she'd had to stay—again at
Mitchell's request—had got hammered on her wine and tried to paw her before
passing out on her Persian carpet. And every cameraman, producer and
correspondent she'd ever met—including her father—was crazy, weird, strange or
odd. She figured that it was a necessary requirement if you wanted to chase down
and report on human conflicts and disasters.

Mitchell's voice, now that he'd got his own way, sounded jaunty
again. ‘Jack's a good man. He's probably not slept for days, hasn't eaten
properly for more than a week. A bed, a meal, a bath. It's not that much to ask
because you're a good person, my sweet, sweet girl.'

My sweet, sweet girl
? Tuh!

Sweet, sweet sucker, more like.

Ellie sneaked another look at
Mr-Hot-Enough-to-Melt-Heavy-Metal. He did have a body to die for, she
thought.

‘Have you met Jack before?' Mitchell asked.

‘Briefly. At your wedding to Steph.' Wife number three, who'd
stuck around for six months. Ellie had been eighteen, chronically shy, and Jack
had barely noticed her.

‘Oh, yeah—Steph. I liked her...I still don't know why she
left,' Mitchell said, sounding plausibly bemused.

Gee, Dad, here's a clue. Maybe, like me,
she hated the idea of the man she adored being away for five of those six
months, plunging into the situation in Afghanistan and only popping up
occasionally on TV. Hated not knowing whether you were alive or dead. It's
no picnic loving someone who doesn't love you a fraction as much as you love
your job.

She, her mother and Mitchell's two subsequent wives had come
second-best time after time...decade after decade. And she'd repeated the whole
stupid cycle by getting engaged to Darryl.

She'd vowed she'd never fall in love with a journalist and she
hadn't. But life had bust a gut laughing when she'd become engaged to a man
she'd thought was the exact opposite of her father, only to realise that he
spent even less time at home than her father had. That was quite an
accomplishment, since he'd never, as far as she knew, left London itself.

She'd been such a sucker, Ellie thought. Still was...

Maybe one of these days she'd find her spine.

Ellie looked down at her mobile, realised that her father
hadn't said goodbye before disconnecting and shrugged. Situation normal. She
glanced at the monitor again and saw the impatience on Jack's face, caught his
tapping foot. The muscles in his arms bulged as he folded them across his chest.
Although the feed was in black and white she knew that his eyes were
hazel...sometimes brown, sometimes green, gold, always compelling. Right now
they were blazing with a combination of frustration, exhaustion and a very
healthy dose of annoyance.

He was different from the twenty-four-year-old she'd met a
decade ago. Older, harder, a bit damaged. Ellie felt an unfamiliar buzz in her
womb and cocked her head as attraction skittered through her veins and caused
her heartbeat to fuzz...

She tossed her mobile onto her desk and pushed her chair back
as she stood up and blew out a breath.

It didn't matter that he was tall, built and had a sexy face
that could stop traffic, she lectured herself. Crazy came in all packages.

* * *

‘Jack?'

Jack Chapman, standing in the front section of the bakery—aqua
stripes on the walls, black checked floors, white cabinets, a sunshine-yellow
surfboard—whirled around at the low, melodious voice and blinked. Then blinked
again. He knew he was tired, but this was ridiculous...

He'd been expecting the awkward, overweight, shy girl from
Mitch's wedding not this...
babe
! This tropical,
colourful, radiant, riveting, dazzling babe. With a capital B. In bold and
italics.

Waist-length black hair streaked with purple and green stripes,
milk-saturated coffee skin, vivid blue eyes and her father's pugnacious
chin.

And slim, curvy legs that went up to her ears.

‘Hi, I'm Ellie. Mitchell has asked me to put you up for the
night.'

His pulse kicked up as he struggled to find his words. He
eventually managed to spit a couple out. ‘I'm grateful. Thank you.'

Whoa!
Jack dropped his pack to the
floor and resisted the impulse to put his hand on his heart to check if it was
okay. With his history...

You are
not
having a heart attack, you moron! Major overreaction here, dude, cool your
jets!

So she wasn't who he'd been expecting? In his line of work
little was as expected, so why was his heart jumping and his mouth dry?

Jack rocked on his heels, looked around and tried not to act
like a gauche teenager. ‘This is a really nice place. Do you own it?'

Ellie looked around and the corners of her mouth tipped up.
‘Yep. My mum and I are partners.'

‘Ah...' He looked at the empty display fridges. ‘Where's the
food? Shouldn't there be food?'

Her smile was a fist to his sternum.

‘Most of the baked goods are sold out and we put the deli meats
away every night.' She fiddled with the strap of her huge leather tote bag. ‘So,
how was your flight?' she asked politely.

Sitting on the floor of a cargo plane in turbulence, with
bruised ribs and a pounding headache? Just peachy. ‘Fine, thanks.'

The reality was that he was exhausted, achingly stiff and sore,
and his side felt as if he had a red-hot poker lodged inside it. He wanted a
shower and to sleep for a week. His glance slid to a fridge filled with soft
drinks. And he'd kill someone for a Coke.

Ellie caught his look and waved to the fridge. ‘Help
yourself.'

Jack grimaced. ‘I can't pay for it.'

‘Pari's can afford to give you a can on the house,' Ellie said
wryly.

The words were barely out of her mouth and he was opening the
fridge, yanking out a red can and popping the tab. The tart, sugary liquid slid
down his throat and he sighed, knowing the sugar and caffeine would give him
another hour or two of energy. Maybe...

He swore under his breath as once again he realised that he was
stuck halfway across the world. He couldn't even pay for a damn soft drink. He
silently cursed again. He needed to borrow cash and a bed from Ellie until his
replacement bank cards were delivered. He grimaced at the sour taste now in his
mouth. Having to ask for help made him feel...out of control, helpless.
Powerless.

He hated to feel beholden, but he reminded himself it would
only be for a night—two, maximum.

Jack finished his drink and looked around for a bin.

Ellie took the can from him, walked behind the counter and
tossed it away. ‘Help yourself to another, if you like.'

‘I'm okay. Thanks.'

Ellie's eyebrows lifted and their eyes caught and held. Jack
thought that she was an amazing combination of east and west: skin from her
Goan-born grandparents, and blue eyes and that chin from her Irish father. Her
body was all her own and should come with a ‘Danger' warning. Long legs, tiny
waist, incredible breasts...

Because he was very, very good at reading body language, he saw
wariness in her face, a lot of shyness and a hint of resignation. Could he blame
her? He was a stranger, about to move into her house.

‘Funky décor,' he said, trying to put her at ease. Hanging off
the wall next to the front door was a fire-red canoe; its seating area sprouting
gushing bunches of multi-coloured daisy-like flowers. ‘I don't think I've ever
seen surfboards and canoes used to decorate before. Or filled with flowers.'

Ellie laughed. ‘I know; they are completely over the top, but
such fun!'

‘Those daisy things look real,' Jack commented.

‘Gerbera daisies—and I don't think there's a point to flower
arrangements if they aren't real,' Ellie replied.

He'd never thought about flowers that way. Actually, he'd never
thought about flowers at all. ‘What's with the signatures on the canoe?'

Ellie shrugged. ‘I have no idea. I bought it like that.'

Jack shoved his hand into the pocket of his jeans and winced
when the taxi driver leaned on his horn. Dammit, he'd forgotten about
him
. He felt humiliation tighten his throat. Now came
the hard part, he thought, cursing under his breath. A soft drink was one
thing...

‘Look, I'm really sorry, but I've got myself into a bit of a
sticky situation... Is there any chance you could pay the taxi fare for me? I'm
good for it, I promise.'

‘Sure.' Ellie reached into her bag, pulled out her purse and
handed him a couple of bills.

Jack felt the tips of his fingers brush hers and winced at the
familiar flame that licked its way up his arm. His body had decided that it was
seriously attracted to her and there was nothing he could do about it.

Damn
, Jack thought, as he stomped
out through the door to pay his taxi fare. He really didn't feel comfortable
being attracted to a woman he was beholden to, who was his mentor's beloved
daughter and with whom he'd spend only two days before blowing out of her
life.

Just ignore it
, Jack told himself.
You're a grown man, firmly in control of your
libido.

He blew air into his cheeks as he handed the money over to the
taxi driver and rubbed his hand over his face. The door behind him opened and he
turned away from the road to see Ellie lugging his heavy rucksack through the
door. Ignoring his burning side, he broke into a jog, quickly reached her and
took his pack from her. The gangster bastards had taken his iPad, his satellite
and mobile phones, his cash and credit cards, but had left him his dirty,
disgusting clothes.

He would've left them too...

‘Here—let me take that.' Jack took his rucksack from her.

‘I just need to lock up and we can go,' Ellie said, before
disappearing back inside the building.

Jack waited in the late-afternoon sun on the corner, his
rucksack resting against an aqua pot planted with hot-pink flowers. He was
beginning to suspect—from her multi-coloured hair and her bright bakery with its
pink and purple exterior—that Ellie liked colour. Lots of it.

Mitchell had mentioned that Ellie was a baker and he'd expected
her to be frumpy and housewifey, rotund and rosy—not slim, sexy and arty. Even
her jewellery was creative: multi-length strands of beads in different shades of
blue. He could say something about lucky beads to be against that chest, but
decided that even the thought was pathetic...

He heard the door open behind him and she reappeared. She
pulled the wooden and glass door shut, then yanked down the security grate and
bolted and locked it.

Jack looked from the old-style bakery to the wide beach across
the road and felt a smile form. It was nearly half-past six, a warm evening in
summer, and the beach and boardwalk hummed with people.

‘What time does the sun set?' he asked.

‘Late. Eight-thirty-ish,' Ellie answered. She gestured to the
road behind them. ‘I live so close to work that I don't drive...um...my house is
up that hill.'

Jack looked up the steep road to the mountain behind it and
sighed. That was all he needed—a hike up a hill with a heavy pack. What else was
this day going to throw at him?

He sighed again. ‘Lead on.'

Ellie pulled a pair of over-large sunglasses from her bag and
put them on, and they started to walk. They passed an antique store, a bookstore
and an old-fashioned-looking pharmacy—he needed to stock up on some supplies
there, but that would raise some awkward questions. He waited for Ellie to
initiate the conversation. She did, moments later, good manners overcoming her
increasingly obvious shyness.

‘So, what happened to you?'

‘Didn't your father tell you?'

‘Only that you got jumped by a couple of thugs and were kicked
out of Somalia. You need a place to stay because you're broke.'

‘Temporarily broke,' Jack corrected her. Mitchell hadn't given
her the whole story, thankfully. It was simple enough. He'd asked a question
about the hijackings of passing ships which had pushed the warlord's ‘detonate'
button. He'd gone psycho and ordered his henchman to beat the crap out of him.
He'd tried to resist, but six against one...bad odds.

Very
bad odds. Jack shook off a
shudder.

‘So, is there anything else I can do for you apart from giving
you a bed?'

Her question jerked him back to the present and his instinctive
answer was,
A night with you in bed would be
great.

Seriously?
That
was what he was
thinking?

Jack shook his head and ordered himself to get with the
programme. ‘Um...I just need to spend a night, maybe two. Borrow a mobile phone,
a computer to send some e-mails, have an address to have my replacement bank
cards delivered to...' Jack replied.

‘I have a spare mobile, and you can use my old laptop. I'll
write my address down for you. Are you on a deadline?'

‘Not too bad. This is a print story for a political
magazine.'

Ellie lifted her eyebrows. ‘I thought you only did TV
work?'

‘I get the occasional assignment from newspapers and magazines.
I freelance, so I write articles in between reporting for the news channels,'
Jack replied.

Ellie shoved her sunglasses up into her hair and rubbed her
eyes. ‘So how are you going to write these articles? I presume your notes were
taken.'

‘I backed up my notes and documents onto a flash drive just
before the interview. I slipped it into my shoe.' It was one of the many
precautionary measures he took when operating in Third World countries.