If You Can't Stand the Heat...

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.

‘They let you keep your passport?’

Jack shrugged. ‘They wanted me to leave and not having a passport would have hindered that.’

Ellie shook her head. ‘You have a crazy job.’

He did, and he loved it. Jack shrugged. ‘I operate best in a war zone, under pressure.’ He loved having a rucksack on his back, dodging bullets and bombs to get the stories few other journalists found.

‘Mitchell always said that it’s a powerful experience to be holed up in a hotel in Mogadishu or Sarajevo with no water, electricity or food, playing poker with local contacts to the background music of bombs and automatic gunfire. I never understood that.’

Jack frowned at the note of bitterness in her voice and, quickly realising that there was a subtext beneath her words that he didn’t understand, chose his next words carefully. ‘Most people would consider it their worst nightmare—and to the people living and working in that war zone it is—but it is exciting, and documenting history is important.’

And the possibility of imminent death didn’t frighten him at all. After all, he’d faced death before...

No, what would kill him would be being into a nine-to-five job, living in one city, doing the same thing day in and day out. He’d cheated death and received a second swipe at life...and the promise he’d made so long ago, to live life hard and fast and big, still fuelled him on a daily basis.

Jack felt a hard knot in his throat and tried to swallow it down. He was alive because someone else hadn’t received the same second swipe...

‘We’re here.’

Ellie’s statement interrupted his spiralling thoughts and Jack hid his sigh of relief as she turned up a driveway and approached a wrought-iron gate. Thank God. He wasn’t sure if he could go much further.

Ellie looked at the remote in her hand, took a breath and briefly closed her eyes. He saw the tension in her shoulders and the rigid muscle in her jaw. She wasn’t comfortable... Jack cursed. If he had been operating on more than twelve hours’ sleep in four days he would have picked up that the shyness was actually tension a lot earlier. And it had increased the closer they came to her home.

‘Look, you’re obviously not happy about having me here,’ Jack said, dropping his pack to the ground. ‘Sorry. I didn’t realise. I’ll head back to the bakery—hitch a lift to the airport.’

Ellie jammed her hands into the pockets of her cut-offs. ‘No—really, Jack...I told my father I’d help you.’

‘I don’t need your charity,’ Jack said, pushing the words out between his clenched teeth.

‘It’s not charity.’ Ellie lifted up a hand and rubbed her eyes with her thumb and index finger. ‘It’s just been a long day and I’m tired.’

That wasn’t it. She was strung tighter than a guitar string. His voice softened. ‘Ellie, I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable in your own home. I told Mitch that I was happy to wait at the airport. It’s not a big deal.’

Ellie straightened and looked him in the eye. ‘I’m sorry. I’m the one who is making this difficult. Your arrival just pulled up some old memories. The last time I took in one of my father’s workmates I was chased around my house by a drunken, horny cameraman.’

He sent her his I’m-a-good-guy grin. ‘Typical. Those damn cameramen—you can’t send them anywhere.’

Ellie smiled, as he’d intended her to. He could see some of her tension dissolve at his stab at humour.

‘Sorry, I know I sound ridiculous. And I’m not crazy about talking about my relationship with Mitchell for this book you’re helping him write—’

‘I’m helping him write? Is that what he said?’ Jack shook his head. Mitchell was living in Never-Never Land. It was his book, and he was writing the damn thing. Yes, Mitchell Evans’s and Ken Baines’s names would be on the cover, but there would be no doubt about who was the author. The sizeable advance in his bank account was a freaking big clue.

‘Your father...I like him...but, jeez, he can be a pain in the ass,’ Jack said.

‘So does that mean you don’t want to talk to me about him?’ Ellie asked, sounding hopeful and a great deal less nervous.

Jack half smiled as he shook his head. ‘Sorry...I do need to talk to you about him.’

He raked his hair off his face, thinking about the book. Ken’s fascinating story was all but finished; Mitch’s was progressing. Thank God he’d resisted all the collective pressure to get him to write his. Frankly, it would be like having his chest cracked open without anaesthetic.

He was such a hypocrite. He had no problems digging around other people’s psyches but was more than happy to leave his own alone.

Jack looked at Ellie, saw her still uncertain expression and was reminded that she was wary of having a strange man in her house. He couldn’t blame her.

‘And as for chasing you around your house? Apart from the fact that I am so whipped I couldn’t make a move on a corpse, it really isn’t my style.’

Ellie looked at him for a long moment and then her smile blossomed. It was the nicest punch to the heart he’d ever received.

TWO

Jack looked up a lavender-lined driveway to the house beyond it. It was a modest two-storey with Old World charm, wooden bay windows and a deep veranda, nestled in a wild garden surrounded by a high brick wall. The driveway led up to a two-door garage. He didn’t do charming houses—hell, he didn’t do houses. He had a flat that he barely saw, boxes that were still unpacked, a fridge that was never stocked. In many ways his flat was just another hotel room: as impersonal, as bland. He wasn’t attached to any of his material possessions and he liked it that way.

Attachment was not an emotion he felt he needed to become better acquainted with...either to possessions or partners.

‘Nice place,’ Jack said as he walked up the stairs onto a covered veranda. Ellie took a set of keys from the back pocket of those tight shorts. It was nice—not for him, but nice—a charming house with loads of character.

‘The house was my grandmother’s. I inherited it from her.’

Jack glanced idly over his shoulder and his breath caught in his throat. God, what a view!

‘Oh, that is just amazing,’ he said, curling his fingers around the wooden beam that supported the veranda’s roof. Looking out over the houses below, he could see a sweeping stretch of endless beach that showed the curve of the bay and the sleepy blue and green ocean.

‘Where are we, exactly?’ he asked.

Ellie moved to stand next to him. ‘On the False Bay coast. We’re about twenty minutes from the CBD of Cape Town, to the south. That bay is False Bay and you can see about thirty kilometres of beach from here. Kalk Bay is that way—’ she pointed ‘—and Muizenberg is up the coast.’

‘What are those brightly coloured boxes on the beach?’

‘Changing booths. Aren’t they fun? The beach is hugely popular, and if you look just north of the booths, at the tables and chairs under the black and white striped awning, that’s where we were—at Pari’s.’

‘It’s incredible.’

‘Your room looks out onto the beach and the bathroom has a view of the Muizenberg Mountain behind us. There are some great walks and biking trails in the nature reserve behind us.’

Ellie nudged one of two almost identical blond Labradors aside in an attempt to get close enough to the front door and shove her key in the lock. Pushing open the wooden door with its stained glass window insert, she gestured for Jack to come into the hall as she automatically hung her bag onto a decorative hook.

‘The bedrooms are upstairs. I presume that you’d like a shower? Something to eat? Drink?’

He probably reeked like an abandoned rubbish dump. ‘I’d kill for a shower.’

Jack had an impression of more bright colours and eclectic art as he followed Ellie up the wooden staircase. There was a short passage and then she opened the door to a guest bedroom: white and lavender linen on a double bed, pale walls and a ginger cat curled up on the royal purple throw.

‘Meet Chaos. The en-suite bathroom is through that door.’

Ellie picked up Chaos and cradled the cat like a baby. Jack scratched the cat behind its ears and Chaos blinked sleepily.

Jack thankfully dropped his backpack onto the wooden floor and sat down on the purple throw at the end of the bed while he waited for the dots behind his eyes to recede. Ellie walked to the window, pulled the curtain back and lifted the wooden sash to let some fresh air into the room.

He dimly heard Ellie ask again if he wanted something to drink and struggled to respond normally. He was enormously grateful when she left the room and he could shove his head between his knees and pull himself back from the brink of fainting.

Because obviously he’d prefer not to take the concept of falling at Ellie’s feet too literally.

* * *

Ellie skipped down the stairs, belted into the kitchen and yanked her mobile from her pocket.

Merri answered on the first ring. ‘I know that you’re upset with me about extending my maternity leave...’

‘Shut up! This is more important!’ Ellie hissed, keeping her voice low. ‘Mitchell sent me a man!’

Merri waited a beat before responding. ‘Your father is procuring men for you now? Are you that desperate? Oh, wait...yes, you are!’

‘You are so funny...not.’ Ellie shook her head. ‘No, you twit, I’m acting as a Cape Town B&B for his stray colleagues again, but this time he sent me Jack Chapman!’

‘The hottie war reporter?’ Merri replied, after taking a moment to make the connection. She sounded awed and—gratifyingly—a smidgeon jealous. ‘Well?’

‘Well, what?’

‘What’s he like?’ Merri demanded.

‘He’s reluctantly, cynically charming. Fascinating. And he has the envious ability to put people at ease. No wonder he’s an ace reporter.’ When low-key charm and fascination came wrapped up in such a pretty package it was doubly, mind-alteringly disarming.

‘Well, well, well...’ Merri drawled. ‘It sounds like he has made quite an impression! You sound...breathy.’

Breathy? No, she did not!

But why did she feel excited, shy, nervous and—dammit—scared all at the same time? Oh, she wasn’t scared of him—she knew instinctively, absolutely, that Jack was a gentleman down to his toes—but she was on a scalpel-edge because he was the first man in ages who had her nerve-endings humming and her sexual radar beeping. And if she told Merri that...

‘You’re attracted to him,’ Merri stated.

She hated it when Merri read her mind. ‘I’m not...it’s just a surprise. And even if I was...’

‘You are.’

‘He’s too sexy, too charming, has a crazy job that I loathe, and he’ll be gone in a day or two.’

‘Mmm, but he’s seriously hot. Check him out on the internet.’

‘Is that what you’re doing? Stop it and concentrate!’ She gave Merri—and herself—a mental slap. ‘I have more than enough to deal with without adding the complication of even thinking about attraction and sex and a good-looking face topping a sexy body! Besides, I’m not good at relationships and men.’

‘Because you’re still scared to risk giving your heart away and having to take it back, battered and bruised, when they ride off into the sunset?’

Merri tossed her own words back at her and Ellie grimaced.

‘Exactly! And a pretty face won’t change anything. My father and my ex put me through an emotional grinder and Jack Chapman has the potential to do the same...’

‘Well, that’s jumping the gun, since you’ve just met him, but I’ll bite. Why?’

‘Purely because I’m attracted to him!’ Ellie responded in a heated voice. ‘It’s an unwritten rule of my life that the men I find fascinating have an ability to wreak havoc in my life!’

They dropped in, kicked her heart around, ultimately decided that she wasn’t worth sticking around for and left.

Merri remained silent and after a while Ellie spoke again. ‘You agree with me, don’t you?’

‘No, don’t take my silence for agreement; I’m just in awe of your crazy.’ Merri sighed. ‘So, to sum up your rant: you are such a bum magnet when it comes to men that your rule of thumb is that if you find one attractive then you should run like hell? Avoid at all costs?’

‘You’ve nailed it,’ Ellie said glumly.

‘I want to see how you manage to do this when the man in question has moved his very hot self into your rather small house.’

Ellie disconnected her mobile on Merri’s hooting laughter. Really, with friends like her...

Returning to the spare bedroom with towels for his bathroom and a cold beer in her hands, Ellie heard a low groan and peeked through the crack in the door to look at Jack, still sitting on the edge of the bed, his hands gripping the bottom of his shirt, pale and sweating.

Hurrying into the room, she dumped the towels on the bed, handed him the beer and frowned. ‘Are you all right?’

Jack took a long, long drink from the bottle and rested the cold glass against his cheek. ‘Sure. Why?’

‘I noticed that you winced when you picked up your backpack. You took your time walking up the stairs, and now you’re as white as a sheet and your hands are shaking!’

Jack rubbed the back of his neck. ‘I’m a bit dinged up,’ he eventually admitted.

‘Uh-huh? How dinged up?’

‘Just a bit. I’ll survive.’ Jack put the almost empty beer bottle on the floor and gripped the edge of his shirt again.

Ellie watched him struggle to pull it up and shook her head at his white-rimmed mouth.

‘Can I help?’ she asked eventually.

‘I’ll get there,’ Jack muttered.

He couldn’t, and with a slight shake of her head she stepped closer to the bed, grabbed the edges of his T-shirt and helped him pull it over his head. A beautiful body was there—somewhere underneath the blue-black plate-sized bruises that looked like angry thunderclouds. He had a wicked vertical scar bisecting his chest that suggested a major operation at one time, and Ellie bit her lip when she walked around his knees to look at his back. She couldn’t stifle her horrified gasp. The damage on his back was even worse, and on his tanned skin she could see clear imprints of a heel here and the toe of a boot there.

‘What does the other guy look like?’ she asked, trying to be casual.

‘Guys. Not as bad as me, unfortunately.’ Jack balled his T-shirt in his hand and tossed it towards his rucksack. ‘The Somalians decided to give me something to remember them by.’

Jack sat on the edge of the bed, bent over and, using one hand and taking short breaths, undid the laces of his scuffed trainers. When they were loose enough, he toed them off.

Jack sent her a crooked grin that didn’t fool her for a second. ‘As you can see, all in working order.’

‘Anything broken?’

Jack shook his head. ‘I think they bruised a rib or two. I’ll live. I’ve had worse.’

Ellie shook her head. ‘Worse than this?’

‘A bullet does more damage,’ Jack said, standing up and slowly walking to the en-suite bathroom.

Ellie gasped. ‘You’ve been shot?’

‘Twice. Hurts like a bitch.’

Hearing water running in the basin, Ellie abruptly sat down. She was instantly catapulted back in time to when she’d spent a holiday with Mitchell and his mother—her grandmother Ginger—in London when she was fourteen. He’d run to Bosnia to do a ‘quick report’ and come back in an ambulance plane, shot in the thigh. He’d lost a lot of blood and spent a couple of days in the ICU.