Holding Out for a Hero (13 page)

Ella pushed her hair behind her ear. “I thought I’d left all that behind me in Huntley. Why is it following me? First Cam and then you and now Roger bloody Hillman. I left there nearly two decades ago and still it keeps sucking me back.”

She was looking at him like it was his fault. She wanted someone to blame and he was it. He let her go, she was upset and growing up in and around pubs Jake had learnt early that sometimes you just had to let someone run out of steam.

“I vowed when I left there I’d never look back. And here I am a thousand miles away but everywhere I look lately there are reminders of Huntley.”

“Hey.” Jake gave her a wounded look. “It wasn’t all bad, was it?”

Ella felt a rush of emotion. After he’d left—the one person who, without knowing her much at all, had known her pain better than anyone—it had been unbearable.

“Yes, it was.”

“Ella, I copped a fair bit of crap but even I had some good times.”

Ella snorted. “Well, goody for you. I guess being the son of the town drunk gave you a little bit more latitude to let your hair down. But the town tramp?” Her voice wavered. It hurt even now to think of Rachel in that way. Even though she knew it to be true. “I never had that kind of freedom.”

“Ella.” Jake took a step toward her.

“Jake, Roger Hillman and his cronies, they used to … offer me money, ask me my … price.” Ella’s voice cracked and she stopped. She couldn’t go on. All the old feelings of revulsion and fear swamped her. The gossips of Huntley had called her haughty but it’d all been an act to disguise her anxiety. She’d never been sure when one of the boys would try something on with her. They may not yet have been men but they’d been expert at playing grown-up games. Some days she’d felt so dirty, she’d stand under their rickety old shower for hours.

“Ella,” Jake whispered as her first tears fell and he pulled her into his arms, holding her against his chest as a strangled sob tore from her chest. He held her firmly, anchoring himself, knowing that if he didn’t hold on tight he’d walk straight out of his office, hunt Roger Hillman down and beat the crap out of him.

He ushered her to the lounge, pulling her into his lap, cradling her close as she sobbed great heaving sobs, loud and wet and snotty, right onto his shirt. And he didn’t care. Until this moment he hadn’t been aware of quite how bad things must have been for her. His jaw clenched thinking about what she had endured.

He may have been the son of the town drunk but his aunt would have boxed his ears if he’d disrespected a woman like that. In fact, Thelma had raised him with a healthy respect for the opposite sex.

Ella buried her face in his shirt and cried like she hadn’t cried in a long time. She’d cried in his arms two years ago, the day after she’d buried her mother, as the orgasm he’d given her released unexpected emotions, but even then she’d refused to give into soul-deep grief. Now she was crying for Australia; for Rachel and Cam and her lost childhood and even Hanniford High.

His chest was warm and he smelled of soap and deodorant, not expensive cologne as she might have expected. And there were other aromas. Beer and coconut rum and bar nuts. She felt warm and safe and even though he was the last person she should be baring her soul to, she did it anyway. He rocked her and held her and she couldn’t remember a time when she’d felt so right. Befriending Rosie and coming to live with Daisy and Iris had been godsends but she felt inexplicably at home within the circle of his arms. Two kindred spirits united in a shared memory.

So it wasn’t such a stretch that she should fall asleep. She’d had insomnia for a week worrying about their first game—worrying about Cam doing well and Jake winning and how much Hanniford’s future depended on the success of this venture. Frankly she was  exhausted. And after crying a decades’ worth of tears while Jake held her tight against his big, warm, delicious body, it was so easy to sigh, shut her eyes, push her nose into his neck and drift off.

So easy.

Jake drew the cue back and jabbed the white ball into the cluster of colored balls, picturing Roger Hillman’s face on the front of it. The satisfying smack was like music to his ears and his gaze tracked the blur of color as balls flew around the table. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been playing for but it was his third game and he wasn’t done with torturing snooker balls just yet.

Pete had stayed to help him clean up after closing and had hovered like a mother hen, challenging him to a game or two. But Jake had ordered him home and he’d gone, reluctantly. Pete was a good kid and while his self-appointed role as Jake’s guardian was amusing and Jake indulged him, tonight he wasn’t in the mood for Pete’s wisecracking.

Jake inspected the table now the balls had settled into place and chose the longest shot, sending the white ball flying across the felt, smashing the yellow into the distant pocket. The clink of balls as he set about annihilating the table was also a good distraction from the echo of Ella’s tears that needled at his subconscious. It was the second time she’d cried in his arms but it was different this time. Two years ago she hadn’t allowed herself to wallow. She’d bitten down hard on her grief and channeled it into their sex, screwing like it’d been her last day on earth.

This time she hadn’t held back any of it and he hadn’t had to dig too deep to feel the echos of his own lost childhood. Her grief had been gut wrenching, hard to witness and frankly, he’d been relieved when the sobbing had settled and she’d grown heavy against him as she’d slipped into slumber. He’d never been good with weeping women but her sorrow had been particularly poignant and had reached deep inside him and squeezed great big handfuls of his gut. He smacked the black ball and it thunked heavily into the pocket. He wondered if Roger Hillman’s face connecting with his fist would make the same sound.

Jake reached under the table and pulled the lever that released the balls and they thundered into the return slot. He set up another game. He had no idea how long Ella would sleep but he had no intention of waking her up. He drew back his stick and sent the white flying into the colors again and watched the chaotic scramble until all the balls were still.

“Is this a private game or can anyone play?”

Jake looked up from the table and squinted into the gloom. He’d turned all the lights in the bar out except for the one directly above the pool table. “You’re up.”

Ella moved carefully toward the light. “What’s the time?” she asked, squinting as she stepped into the pool of light spilling over the table.

Jake checked his watch, ignoring the appeal of her messy hair and the just-rolled-out-of-bed rumpledness of her clothes. “Three-thirty.”

They looked at each other for a moment. Ella pushed a stray lock of hair behind her ear. The silence stretched between them and it seemed out of place in a bar where only an hour and a half earlier music had throbbed into every corner.

“Have you—” Ella stopped and cleared her throat. “Have you got any change for the jukebox?”

Jake laid his stick against the wooden surround of the table and fished into the change pocket at the front of his jeans. He pulled out some coins and deposited them into her outstretched palm.

She smiled at him then walked away. He picked up his stick and returned his attention to the table. Even so, out of the corner of his eye he could see her hunched over the jukebox, the jersey she wore slipping off her shoulder, leaving it bare except for a purple bra strap. He forced himself to focus on lining up a shot, jabbing the white toward the target. It missed, for the first time tonight. He shook his head. Harry Ryan, his first coach as a rookie, had always said that women ruin men’s focus.

Harry had been one wise old bastard.

Ella waited for the opening beats of “Breakfast at Sweethearts” to filter out before returning to Jake. He was bent over the table, his powerful legs spaced evenly apart, his knees bent. She could see the thick slab of his thigh muscle bunch beneath the denim as he rocked forward a little on his front foot and remembered how strong they’d felt against the backs of her thighs as he’d held her in his lap.

She drew close to the table and leaned her hip against the wood grain as she watched Jake shoot. His arms were strong as they braced for the shot. The snug sleeve of his black T-shirt barely contained his bicep as it tensed in preparation. Jimmy’s rough baritone sang about hot coffee and brown toast and Jake slammed his cue into the white ball.

And missed. He cursed under his breath.

“Bummer,” she said.

Jake took a moment to pull in a steadying breath then straightened up. There was a hum between them tonight, a connection evident even before the Roger Hillman incident and it scared the hell out of him. “Your turn.” He reached to the nearby cue rack and pulled one down, passing it to her.

“Oh. No.” Ella shook her head. “I’m hopeless at pool.”

“We’re not playing for sheep stations.” Damned if he was going to play while she stood and watched, half falling out of his football jersey.

Ella resisted. “Rosie’s the one that you need. Rosie can beat a bar room full of bikers.”

Jake made a mental note to never challenge Ella’s friend to a game. He lifted the stick and pushed the rounded end gently into her chest. “I don’t want to play with Rosie.”

Ella looked at him with big eyes. He was watching her all dark and brooding, his green eyes blazing. She took the cue, suddenly desperate for something to do with her hands other than putting them all over Jake.

“Which ones am I supposed to hit?”

He dragged his gaze away from her naked shoulder. If he kept looking at her like that there would be no question that she would end up on the table. “Don’t worry about that. Just go for the easiest.”

Ella had no doubt that if he kept looking at her like that she’d be the easiest thing at this table. She focused on the felt, her mathematician’s mind admiring the patterns on a subliminal level while the chant of
shit, shit, shit
reverberated through her more conscious levels.

She drew the cue back to hit the nearest ball, missing by a mile.

Jake blinked. “Wow. You really are hopeless.”

Her stance was awful, her cue positioning terrible and her aim shocking. His grip tightened around his own cue. Ordinarily he’d give someone this bad some pointers, especially if they were an attractive woman. He’d be up there behind her, draping himself along the length of her back, invading her space under the pretense of showing her how to hold the cue. But he didn’t think he should lay himself bare to that kind of temptation tonight. Once again he found himself in a position where he wanted Ella but her emotional fragility put her off limits.

Ella glared at him. “You want me to point out the mathematical patterns on this table or work out the probabilities of each shot, I’m your girl. You want me to sink the ball? Not so much.”

Jake chuckled. “Okay. So I’ll play really badly and let you win.”

She shook her head. “I know this may be a revelation to a jock like you, but I actually don’t care about winning.”

That’s what she thought. “Yes, you do,” he said, leaning over the table, setting up a shot for her that even Cerberus could make. “You just need the right incentive.”

Ella’s gaze flicked to his and she didn’t have to ask to know what he was talking about. Hanniford High. She’d fight to the death for her school, her kids.

“Red into the center pocket,” he said.

Ella dragged her gaze from his and looked at the indicated shot. She leaned over and hit the white with her cue. The red bounced off the edge and ricocheted to the far side of the table.

Jake winced. “Too hard.” He concentrated on lining up another ball and dropped his voice an octave or two. “Sometimes you have to go softly,” he said, demonstrating as he gently nudged the white to cozy up to a yellow that was sitting square with the pocket. He looked at her. “Sometimes you need a slow hand. A gentle kiss.”

Ella felt hot suddenly. Very hot. James Reyne cautioning not to be too reckless floated towards them from the jukebox.

Good thinking, James.

Except the heat intensified As she leaned across the table and the too-big jersey slipped from her shoulder, she could feel his eyes on her, on the exposed skin, and glanced up to see his gaze drifting lower to where the V-neck fell forward, revealing her cleavage, her bra.

Her insides felt as if someone had jabbed them with an electronic cattle prod and she didn’t even look at the table as she made the shot, pushing the cue toward the white ball, missing it completely. Not even James Reyne’s melodic mournful warning could break through the sudden electric charge and it was on the tip of Ella’s tongue to suggest strip pool. But she’d been the sexual aggressor with him once, she didn’t have the nerve to do it again.

And,
she reminded herself,
Jake was backwards
.

Jake drew in a shaky breath. His palms itched remembering how good the creamy rise of her cleavage had felt in his hands; soft and full. His mouth watered at the memory of how it had tasted, sweet like she’d been brushed with honey dust. His dick, predictable as ever, joined in the walk down memory lane and he knew there was no way it was going away while Ella’s bra kept playing peek-a-boo.

She straightened and he breathed again, counting to three before he spoke. “You should keep your eye on the ball when you’re shooting.” He forced himself to peruse the table. “Here, try this one.” He maneuvered the white into another good position.

They played on, the longest game of Jake’s life. Between her hopeless aim and her damn cleavage, he was fighting a losing battle with his temper and his libido. He talked her through the moves, giving her pointers as they went, demonstrating with his own stance, his own cue, but Ella was stubbornly uncoordinated.

That should have made a difference to his dick, but it didn’t. He really preferred sporty women, ones who enjoyed this type of recreation and could hold their own. He especially loved the ones who could whip his ass. But his erection didn’t seem to care how bad she was as long as she kept bending over, her bra on display, her ass in the air, snuggled nicely into his tatty old sweats.

The game finally came to an end when he potted the black with a resounding thud. It was four am. He was tired. And horny. He needed to get the hell away from her. Maybe he could dig out his little black book and ring one of a dozen women who would welcome a booty call even at this hour.

“Another?”

Jake opened his mouth to say no. No way. No how. No siree. There was Alicia and Candice and Jennifer—three willing women he could name off the top of his head.

“A proper one this time. I think I’m getting the hang of this.”

His jersey slipped off her shoulder again and his “Honey, you have so not gotten this” was snatched away as the brain in his pants took over. “Sure.” He cursed himself as he retrieved the balls and racked them up in the triangle.

Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

“Can I shoot first?” Ella asked.

“Sure,” he said again, stepping back a pace as she stood at the head of the table with him.

Ella bent over, balancing the tip of her cue between her second and third knuckles as Jake had taught her, acutely aware of his muscled presence a mere arms length away. She stopped and straightened, turning to look at him.

“Thank you,” she said. “For before. For rescuing me from Roger. And being so … nice, in your office. I seem to make a habit of saving my meltdowns for you.”

Jake knew all he had to do was take one step and he’d be pressed against all her soft feminine curves. He knew instinctively she’d have a different kind of meltdown if he dared to kiss her. There’d been a simmering passion raging between them since she’d first leaned over the pool table. But it had been an emotional evening, for both of them. Best to heed the wise words of James Reyne and Australian Crawl.

Don’t be so reckless.

“I’m sorry you had to be exposed to his crap. I should have kicked his sorry ass out the second I saw him.”

Ella smiled. “On what grounds?”

“Being a class-A dickhead.”

She laughed. “Jake, you’d have to kick out half your clientele.”

He shook his head. “That’s the beauty in being the owner. I get to say who the dickheads are.”

The silence stretched between them again and Ella found her gaze drawn to the strong line of his jaw and the incredible sensual curve of his mouth. “Well, thanks anyway. Much appreciated,” she murmured.

She bent over the table, lining up her shot to hit the center of the pyramid while trying not to think about where that mouth had traveled. And how long it had been since a mouth had created anywhere near the havoc that Jake’s had.

Naturally she ruined the break. The wonderful spider-webbing of balls she’d expected fizzled as the cue hit the white off-center and it barely made the colors move.

Jake hauled his gaze away from her ass, so beautifully rounded and so very, very near. “Why don’t we try that again?”

He used the triangle to muster the couple of balls that had managed to escape during the most pathetic break he’d ever witnessed. And then, because a part of him couldn’t bear to watch her cock it up again, but mostly because he was weak, he did lean over her as she bent again to take the shot.

“Here, let me show you.” he said, fitting his body snuggly against hers, his stomach and chest pressed along the length of her back, his crotch fitting around her ass like it was made especially for him.

Ella forgot to breathe. His lips were at her temple, his breath warm against the sensitive skin. He fitted around her perfectly. Like a glove. Like a coat.

Like a lover.

“Like this,” Jake said, determined to stay business-like even though the silky caress of her hair and its fruity aroma were digging seductive fingernails into his resistance.

Ella was aware of him like never before. His left hand curled around hers, steadying it as it balanced the cue. His right hand gripped the stick just above hers, pulling it in close to both their bodies. She could feel his lungs expanding, his pulse thumping against her back, the hard ridge beneath his zipper, brushing occasionally against her rear.