In Too Deep (21 page)

Bree, the third member of Piper’s
schoolgirl cronies, continued to apply another coat of mascara, her
parted, gloss-slicked lips reflected in the mirror. Only Queen Bee
would think to touch up her make-up before getting down and dirty
on a rugby field.

Un-freaking-believable.

Bree’s mascara wand made a sharp
click as she jabbed it back into the tube. Smoothing non-existent
wrinkles in her pink tee shirt, she turned and leaned against the
sink.

“
So kind of you to take time out
of your busy schedule to help our little team.”

Honestly. There were half a dozen
snarky remarks she could choose from to remind Bree she was just
the biggest fish in a teeny-tiny pond, but the déjà vu of high
school struck her right on the funny bone.

“
Happy to help—so long as you’re
not planning to reenact the shower scene from
Carrie
where
you start hurling sanitary products at me.”

Mouths dropped, and a couple women
made choked snorting noises. Bree uttered a sharp bark of laughter
before moving to the center bench and snatching up a pink shirt.
“I’m glad to see you haven’t lost your good taste in humor.” She
tossed the shirt over Lani’s and Kezia’s heads.

Piper snagged the shirt with one
hand. “And I’m glad to see you still insist on picking a color that
appeals to the six-year-old princess trapped inside
you.”

Bree raised an immaculately shaped
brow. “Since my business is sponsoring the women’s team uniform, I
got to choose the color.”

“
Such a sophisticated
choice.”

That almost forced a genuine smile
out of her. “Are you still fast on your feet, Piper? Or has your
bum gotten fat after years of coffee and donut
stakeouts?”

“
Think you’ve been watching too
many cop shows.” Erin rose on tiptoes to angle a better view out
the window. “Now, take our local lawman, Noah, out there—nothing
wrong with his bum
at all
, not from where I
stand.”

Holly raced to the window and
elbowed Erin over. “Praise Jesus—he’s doing lunges now!”

“
I bags full body tackling him,”
Tarryn said.

“
Nobody tackles anybody,” Bree
said. “That’s why it’s called ‘touch’ rugby.”

The other three women who weren’t
ogling ignored Bree and made a beeline for the window. Piper
stripped off her tee shirt and slid her arms into the sleeves of
the pink monstrosity.

“
Oooh… are there any bits we
can’t
touch?” Kezia said, turning back to give Piper a quick
wink. “And can someone explain why we have to wear bike shorts,
while the guys wear ordinary rugby shorts?”

“
Men don’t look good in Lycra hot
pants, Kez.” Shaye had given up on the cluster of women by the
window and climbed onto the bench for a better view.

“
West does,” Piper
said.

Ohhhh…crap. A total
brain-edit-fail moment.

Piper stretched the tee shirt over
her head. Maybe no one heard amongst all the lusting noises. Pink
knit fabric, probably close to the shade of her burning face, slid
past her nose as she looked up to seven pairs of unblinking
eyes.

“
Really?” Holly said, with an
utterly evil grin. “
How good?
”

Piper’s disgustingly accurate
memory did a u-turn back to West rising out of the pool in those
snug training shorts. Or West wearing nothing but his yoga
pants.

Her face flamed hotter as she
hauled the tee shirt down over her sports bra. “Aren’t we meant to
be out on the field by now? They’re all waiting for us.”

“
Piper and West sittin’ in a tree,
k-i-s-s-i-n—” Piper shoved Shaye off the bench.

Various other lewd comments were
directed Piper’s way before Bree silenced them with three sharp
claps and an imperious voice. “Ladies? We have a game to win—out,
out, out!” She hustled the others from the changing rooms with a
pointed look back at Piper, leaving her alone with
Shaye.

Piper clapped her hands over her
face and sat down on the bench.

“
Bet you wish they had thrown
tampons,” Shaye said.

“
God, yeah.”

“
Your face is
very
red.”

“
Thank you for that insightful
observation, dear sister. Now leave me to my humiliation.” Piper
unzipped her kitbag and dragged out the spare pair of rugby boots
Shaye loaned her.

Shaye sat down next to her and
laid a cool palm on her leg as Piper slid her foot into the cleated
boot and started lacing. “You like West, huh? Like him
a
lot
.”

“
You’ve come to that conclusion on
the basis that I said he looked good in Lycra?” Did her tone sound
incredulous? Probably not enough to fool Shaye.

“
I came to that conclusion because
you sometimes use snooty words when you’re covering something up.
And because I’ve seen the way you look at him when you think no
one’s watching.”

“
Shaye—”

“
Have you slept with him
yet?”

Piper gawped.

“
That’s a no then. Well, have you
kissed him?”

“
What makes you think I kissed
him
? Maybe he kissed me!” Then her brain caught up and she
stopped in the middle of lacing her boot. “Oh, for Pete’s
sake.”

Shaye giggled. “For a hardened
police officer, you’re surprisingly easy to
interrogate.”

“
I’m not hardened.” Hardened on
the outside, maybe. If only she could harden herself on the inside,
where it mattered.

“
Most of the girls think you
are.”

“
I bet most of the girls think a
lot of things about me right now.” Piper dropped her elbows to her
knees and rested her forehead in her cupped palms.

“
Yep, and they’ll expect to hear
all the deets at the beach bonfire tonight.”

“
I’m not going.”

“
Course you are.”

“
No.” Piper lifted her head. “I’m
not. A group of women who’d gain orgasmic pleasure witnessing my
ongoing humiliation at the Westlakes’ annual bonfire after this
morning’s slip of the tongue, are not people I’d voluntarily hang
out with.”

“
You’ve got some weird ideas about
your friends, sis.”

“
They’re not my
friends.”

“
Yeah, they are. And the ones you
don’t know could be, if you’d let them.”

“
Puh-lease, Pollyanna.”

Shaye shrugged and squeezed
Piper’s knee. “You’re coming tonight, Pipe, or I’ll tell everyone
you’re crushing on West and want to have his babies.”

Piper hoped the glare she turned
on her sister disguised the lurching thump of her heart. “You’re
such a brat.”

“
Agreed. Now let’s go chase some
good-looking men around a muddy field.”

***

Muddy hair, muddy face, and mud
plastering his shorts and top to his skin. Twenty minutes into the
game and all was good with the world.

West swiped a hand across his
forehead as a light rain began to fall. A bloom of multi-colored
umbrellas sprouted up at the sidelines. He glanced to the other end
of the field where the women’s team clustered in a circle, his gaze
automatically honing in on Piper’s rangy, thoroughly mud-covered
form. The guys’ team was at a serious disadvantage with six hot
females in tight, wet clothing running around. Or maybe he was the
only one distracted by a certain hot female.

He dragged his gaze away from the
curve of Piper’s ass as she bent down to re-lace her boot, and
glared at the huddle of men around him.

“
Right. Kip and Joe, you’re on the
bench until the last ten minutes, then we’ll sub you in to win this
thing.”

Opposite him, Gav Reynolds spat on
the trampled grass. “Women are kicking our sorry asses out
there.”

“
Would help if you’d stop getting
so many penalties,” Ford said.

Gav swore, his Due South team
shirt straining over his puffed-out chest.

Ford’s dad, Rob, grunted and shook
his head. “Chill, Gav.”

Ben, complete with his plastic bag
covered cast and crutches, elbowed further into the group from
where he’d watched the game on the sidelines. “The ref’s already
threatened to send you off for misconduct, Gav, so stop acting like
such a douche and leave Kezia and Piper alone.”

Gav swung toward Ben. “What
business is it of yours?”

“
It’s my sister and her friend
you’re gunning for.” Ben refused to budge.

So even Ben noticed Gav’s amped-up
aggression toward the two women—accidently shoving Piper out of the
way, taking the term “touch” to mean grabbing Kezia’s ass. And it
hadn’t escaped his attention that Piper kept heckling Gav, putting
herself between him and Kezia. Like a rodeo clown distracting a
pissed off bull.

The ref’s whistle blew a long
continuous blast. End of half-time break.

“
Watch your step, Reynolds,” was
all West said as they jogged onto the field—when what really burned
on his tongue was, “Touch Piper again and you’ll be pissing blood
for a week.”

“
Bunch of pussy-whipped little
girls.” Gav moved to his position as left wing on the
sideline.

West walked onto the field,
spectators clapping and bellowing advice. Blocking out the rush of
super-heated testosterone that made him want to punch something
until his knuckles were bloody, West looked down the opposite end
of the field where Piper jogged in place, calling out last minute
instructions to her teammates.

A short whistle blast pierced the
air and they were off.

The women flew across the grass
toward them, determination to make it to the men’s try line etched
in the stubborn set of their jaws. Gav homed in on Kezia, who had
the ball, his teeth bared. Pumping his arms faster, West charged
after him, until he was close enough to spot Piper coming up on
Kezia’s left side, her gaze also rooted to Gav’s murderous
expression.

“
To your left, Kez,” Piper shouted
and to Kezia’s credit she didn’t hesitate, tossing the ball left in
a textbook on-the-fly pass. Piper caught the ball and put on a
burst of speed— straight toward Gav.

It happened so fast, so smoothly,
that if he hadn’t watched with such vested interest in the
son-of-a-bitch now targeting
his woman
, he would’ve missed
it. Piper feinted left and immediately changed direction and ducked
right, intending to dodge past Gav. Gav, having wised up to her
modus operandi, didn’t fall for it and slammed his body right, his
elbow connecting with Piper’s stomach and knocking her clear off
her feet.

The ref’s whistle shrieked, the
crowd roared, and voices shouted all around him.

A red haze blurred his vision as
he covered the last few feet to where Gav smirked down at Piper,
who curled on her side in the mud. West dived, hammering Gav in a
full body tackle.

Kill him. He’d bloody kill
him.

Chapter 11

Rough arms
pulled him up, and blood, bitter and warm, flooded his mouth.
Voices hollered his name—Ford, Joe, and Noah—and someone pinned his
arms so he couldn’t swing at Gav again.

Noah’s deep growl finally
penetrated beyond the rasp of his labored breathing. “Don’t turn
this from fisticuffs into an assault, West. I don’t want to arrest
you.”

He glared at Gav, hauled to his
feet by Rob, Kip, and even West’s skinny dish-hand, Fraser, who
looked a little grossed out at the blood pouring from Gav’s
flattened nose. His gaze flew to where he’d last seen Piper, curled
in the mud. She sat a short distance away with her head drooping
between her bent knees, arms wrapped around her stomach. Kezia and
Shaye crouched at her side, the other four women in a unified
circle behind them, shooting venomous glances at Gav.

West rolled his shoulders to
loosen his wire-taut muscles and met Noah’s gaze. “I’m
done.”

Joe released West’s right arm and
slapped him on the back. “Jaysus, that’s a killer right hook you’ve
got there. Knuckles okay?”

“
I’ll live, Doc.” West flexed his
hands but didn’t bother looking at them. “Have you checked out
Piper?”

“
The prick hit her like a Mac
truck,” Ford said from West’s other side, he too letting go of his
arm and thumping West’s back. “He was due a good hiding
anyway.”

“
Now you’ve got yourself under
control, I’ll check the state of her, but it seems your lady’s just
winded.” Joe walked over to the cluster of women.

If his jaw, knuckles, and
stomach—where Gav got in a couple of lucky punches—hadn’t throbbed
like a mother, West might’ve had the energy to correct the
doctor.

Piper was not his
lady
. Or
his girl, his woman, or his frickin’ girlfriend.

He didn’t know what she was. But
seeing Reynold’s plow into Piper smashed open a floodgate of
protectiveness and, okay, he confessed, a gut-clawing
possessiveness.