Some Girls Do (Outback Heat Book 1) (12 page)

Going to bed had seemed like a good idea. Pregnant women were tired, weren’t they?

But here she was, still awake, trying to ignore the sinful little whisper in her head.

Get into bed with him.

But that’s what a screw-up would do. It was impulsive and not well thought out. And egocentric. And Coop had made his feelings on them becoming
involved
very clear, even as late as yesterday morning when he’d pulled her hand out of his pants.

So she wouldn’t do that. No matter how much the whisper yammered at the back of her brain.

But maybe she could take a different approach. What would a
grown-up
do? They’d be honest about it. Talk about it openly. Logically and methodically lay their cards on the table. They’d discuss the pros and cons. They’d make a reasoned argument.

Right
. For deciding on whether to start a family or buy a house, sure. Probably not for fucking each other’s brains out while they were pretending to live together.

But Lacey was desperate enough to try. Who knew? Maybe he’d respect her for a mature approach. Maybe she could sway him with reasoned arguments.

Lacey rolled on her side to face him. She watched him for long moments. The muscles in his forearms seemed to tense, the warm, yellow light from the lamp accentuating their form, bathing them in splendour, the blond hairs almost golden.

Did he know she was awake?

“Coop?”

“Mmm.”

He didn’t start, he didn’t look at her, he didn’t shift his attention from the book. It was slightly dismaying and a lesser woman would have been discouraged, but not Lacey. Her pulse kicked up a notch or two as she prepared to make her argument.

“I’d like to talk to you.”

“Mmm.”

Lacey ploughed on. “Do you think you could put that book down for a moment?”

He waited a beat or two before looking at her. “Can’t this wait ’til morning?”

“No.”

He sighed, but placed the open book face down on his lap. “What?”

Lacey bent her arm and propped her head up on her palm. “I’ve been thinking about our … situation.”

“Oh?”

It came out sounding nonchalant enough but the lamp picked up the clench of Coop’s jaw and Lacey was enormously encouraged. “It seems kinda silly to me that we’re in separate beds when we’ve already slept together once before and both had a good time.”

His jaw clenched again. “You do, huh?”

She nodded. “It seems dumb not to at least … enjoy ourselves while we’re stuck here with each other.”

“Lacey …” He shifted a little so he was facing her. “I should never have slept with you all those years ago. I’m
thirteen
years older than you
and
your brother’s best friend. He asked me to look out for you. Just because I don’t have a sister it doesn’t mean that I don’t get that guys have a very strict code where their sisters are concerned. I
broke the code
, Lacey and I am not going to compound that by repeating what happened just because of our
situation
.”

Lacey nodded. This was good. They were having a
discussion
. And she understood that he felt guilty over what had happened that night they’d first met. But it didn’t seem logical that this kind of bro code stood up in their situation. She was supposed to be pregnant with his child for crying out loud.

“Okay. I understand where you’re coming from. All I’m saying is that we’re in this room together for the next two weeks and I’m pretty sure everyone who knows about this,
including
Ethan by the way, thinks we’re having sex. So … why not …? You have to know I’m attracted to you and, correct me if I’m wrong but I think you’re still attracted to me.”

“Just because attraction exists it doesn’t have to be acted upon, Lacey.”

She was encouraged by Coop not denying the attraction. Confirming it in fact. “Sure. But if it’s not hurting anyone and it’s a mutual thing then does it really matter?”

He shook his head. “It matters to me. It’s a little thing called personal integrity, okay?” He said it in such a way that left Lacey in no doubt he didn’t consider it to be a topic within her realm of understanding. “I’d like to be able to look your brother in the eye and know I didn’t take advantage of this situation.”

Lacey had to admire Coop’s resolve. Ethan could truly not have picked a better guy to look out for her. “Okay, fine,” she sighed, backing off, her personal integrity calling upon her to leave his intact. “Just so you know though, I don’t mind you taking advantage of the situation.”

“Duly noted,” he said then shifted back into his prior position, picked up his book and started reading again.

Lacey collapsed back on her pillow. It was going to be a
long
two weeks.

‡

L
acey was pleased
the next morning when Coop was the same Coop he’d always been, as if her proposition last night hadn’t even happened. She supposed he was used to that. It was almost like his default position with her. And it was probably for the best anyway. He clearly didn’t want to rehash it and the fact that he wasn’t in a bad mood over it was probably a sign that she shouldn’t rehash it either.

He ran her home after breakfast. Ordinarily she would have walked. The Weston family home was about a ten-minute stroll from the pub—nowhere was very far from anywhere in Jumbuck Springs. But there was going to be quite a bit of stuff to bring back, so a car was handy.

“Thanks for doing this,” she said as they pulled up outside her house.

“No worries.”

“You think we could take a trip to Brisbane on the weekend and I can drive my car back?”

“Sure. But I think Mum and Dad are coming up on Thursday. Dad wouldn’t mind driving it here. He can get the spare key from my apartment.”

Lacey had scoffed when Coop had gotten a spare key made after the first time he’d come out to her when she’d locked the keys in her car. But given that she’d done it two more times, and lost her key at a party on another occasion, it had turned out to be quite fortuitous.

“That’d be great,” she said. Lacey wasn’t keen on leaving town so soon, even if it was only for half a day. As far as she was concerned
residency
was nine-tenths of the law. “They won’t mind?”

Coop shook his head. “Nah. They’d be happy to.”

“They’re good people, your parents,” she said, undoing her seatbelt.

“Yeah,” he grinned. “I think I’ll keep them.”

Lacey exited the car and Coop followed. “Morning, Mrs Durrum,” she called and waved to their eighty-year-old neighbour who was at the front gate checking her letterbox.

The Durrums had lived next door for fifty years. Edna had been a widow for the last thirty. Selena, Mrs Durrum’s granddaughter, who she’d raised singlehandedly until Selena had left Jumbuck Springs for the big smoke to study journalism, had been Jarrod’s girlfriend all through high school.

“Morning, Lacey dear, so nice to see you back. You here to stay?”

“Yes,” Lacey smiled. “I am.” It still felt surreal to say it. Lacey figured the more people who knew the better.

Mrs Durrum bestowed a satisfied smile her way. “That’s good news.”

“Yes, it is,” Lacey agreed. “How’s Selena?”

“She’s fine, lovey. Busy, busy, of course but she writes every week without fail.”

Lacey kept the smile firmly in place. Selena hadn’t been back to town since she’d left and although Mrs Durrum never said it, Lacey knew her heart ached.

“That’s nice,” Lacey murmured.

The old lady didn’t linger over the subject. “Drop in and see me sometime.”

“I will Mrs Durrum, thank you.”

The old lady gave a little wave as Coop pushed the gate open for Lacey. “I’ve been thinking about your car,” he said.

“Oh yes?”

“It’s an unreliable, forty-year-old, broken down money pit—”

“Hey,” Lacey protested as her foot landed on the path.

“But I could turn it into a classic beauty that purrs like a kitten.” Lacey concentrated really hard on not thinking about how much she wished he would make
her
purr like a kitten. “And will start first time every time.”

Lacey was a huge admirer of Coop’s car restoration business and how he’d gone on to build a new life in a completely different direction after his devastating injuries, but there was no way she could afford the kind of prices he charged. Even at mates rates it just wasn’t in her budget. She opened her mouth to politely decline, but he jumped in ahead of her.

“Just think about it,” he said. “You don’t really need a car to get around Jumbuck Springs so it won’t matter if it’s off the road for a few weeks and it’ll give me a project to work on while I’m here. Campbell’s isn’t exactly busy. I can work on it in-between times and the weekends. I might not be able to get it done before I leave but I could finish it off back home.”

“Coop … Thank you, really, but I can’t afford you.”

“It’s on the house.”

Lacey shook her head vehemently. “No.” That was a step too far. She’d spent the last few years taking advantage of him and she totally would have last night if he’d been up for it. But this? His work? His livelihood?

“You forget.” She stopped on the bottom step. “I know what you charge.”

“Honestly, you’d be doing me a favour,” he said.

“Oh really?” Lacey raised an eyebrow. “How’d you figure that?”

“I’m trying to get over the perception that the business, that car restoration, is just a bloke thing. We do a lot of stuff for guys and that’s great but in doing so we ignore another potential market. Gav and I have been talking about attracting a female clientele for a while now. We just need the right job. I think the Mini would be perfect. I’d do it up then use it in all our advertising to show that we do more than muscle cars.”

He looked sincere enough, but Lacey wasn’t sure it wasn’t some elaborate story. “You’re serious? You’re not just making it up on the spot because you’re sick of being my personal roadside assistance?”

That had happened a bit too often. She’d probably interrupted his workday about a dozen times in all. Him coming to her rescue all sweaty and greasy straight from an engine.

Do not think about Coop all greasy and sweaty
.

“I’m serious. I honestly don’t know why I didn’t think of your pile of junk before. I can turn her into one sweet ride. She’ll look gorgeous. She’s exactly what we need.”

“Okay,” she shrugged. She didn’t care about gorgeous so much, but having a more reliable car would definitely be a bonus. And being able to pay Coop back for all his help with her car was a bonus. “Knock yourself out.”

“You won’t regret it,” he assured.

Lacey nodded. “I don’t doubt it.”

No-one was home when they entered the house and they were in and out quickly. When they got back to The Stockman, Coop helped Lacey upstairs with all the stuff, then went off to see Alec Campbell. After he left, Lacey looked around at the garbage bags full of fabric and her two large, plastic tackle boxes that she’d used for all kinds of sewing bits and bobs.

She opened the lid of the first one and pulled out the top drawer; an array of buttons stared back at her from the different compartments. Collecting buttons had been a hobby since she’d first started making her own clothes from the age of twelve. Not that she’d made anything for herself since moving to Brisbane. Clothes were plentiful and cheap in the big city compared to a small country town, and convenience had won out.

She opened the next drawer, which boasted reels of cotton, and the next stuffed full of different types of ribbon. She fingered the nearest one—a plush crimson velvet she’d used on a dress she’d made to go to a cousin’s wedding. A sense of home rose like a tide inside her and she sank to the bed as it overwhelmed her. Even with
home
a ten-minute walk away, Lacey knew this was where she belonged.

Amongst her stuff and her family and her town.

Her tribe.

Jumbuck Springs was where she belonged.

She spent the next hour going through all the bags of fabric, finding some scraps and some really funky buttons that would be perfect for the bodice of Connie’s costume, but not finding exactly what she wanted for the mermaid tail. There were a couple of fabrics that were satisfactory, but Lacey Weston didn’t do satisfactory. Not without hunting down every avenue first anyway.

She decided to pop into the haberdashery and see if Mrs Hoff had exactly what she was looking for. But first she drew up a paper pattern to Connie’s measurements. She used the dining table as her work surface, drawing and cutting the pattern with the ease and efficiency of someone used to tackling much more complex projects. Once she was done with that she set up her sewing machine and took a moment to admire her ordered, tidy workspace. In a couple of hours it would look entirely different.

Satisfied with her progress, Lacey headed out. It was another beautiful winter’s day. The sky was an endless blue, unmarred by clouds, and it had already warmed up after the chilly night.

Hoff’s was on the other side of the main street and hadn’t changed in all the years Lacey had known it. It was dark and cosy, crammed with fabric rolls and smelling of mothballs and old lace. It was surprising to see it had survived, given the decline in home sewing and the advent of online shopping.