Out of Bounds (2 page)

Yes, I’ve heard the music and seen the girls.
Seen you lately, too—over the fence when I came to visit Gran.

“I didn’t notice you,” she said, hoping to
offend him. He was certainly noticeable, with his height, his
sharply attractive features, and arrogant bearing. Up close, he was
practically edible. She wanted to sniff him and nibble at him, lick
him and see if he tasted as good as he looked. Even though he was a
thieving jerk.

“Australia,” he said, breaking into her
fantasy. “Got seconded to the Sydney office just when things
started to happen at this end. I came home a while before
Christmas, which was helpful.”

She shrugged, still trying to seem
unimpressed. “What do you do?”

“What would you expect? A man acquiring
neglected houses in good locations? I’m an architect, soon to be
property developer. Come and see something.”

And before Jetta could gather her scattered
wits, Mr Porsche—or Anton as she now knew him to be—grabbed her by
the hand and hauled her up.

“Let me go!” she demanded, heart hammering as
her control slipped away.

He simply grinned and towed her down the long
hallway.

“Stop it. I mean it.”

Something in her panicked tone must have
registered because he relaxed his grip and she yanked her hand out
of his. He walked through the open front door and beckoned.

Jetta stood staring at him, feeling a little
better now he’d freed her. He turned and strode along the path.

“Wait!” she protested, torn between panic and
curiosity. “I need to lock up.”

His gorgeous mouth quirked. “Who’d want to
steal what’s in there?”

“There’s
my
stuff,” she said,
exasperated. “I moved back into my old bedroom when Gran went into
care—to sort of guard the place, I suppose.”

“A security guard?” he teased, brows raised
and blue eyes even more vivid now he was out in the hard sunshine.
“You’re a bit young to be here on your own.”

Indignation had her blood boiling all over
again, and it was her turn to huff air down her nose.

“I don’t always look like this,” she
retorted, turning back and grabbing her key-ring from behind the
front door. “I’m plenty old enough to take care of myself.” She
pushed the jingling keys into the pocket of her old shorts. He sent
her such a skeptical look that she added, “Twenty-six—okay?”

He raised a dark eyebrow at that and strode
off. She almost had to run to keep up.

“Stop rushing,” she gasped, but his long legs
just kept up their forward momentum.

He smiled down at her, very pleased about
something. “I got the final consents late yesterday. You’ll be the
first person to see all the plans signed off. Ben and Paul have
already moved out, Mom’s away with her sister, and I’ve been
itching to show someone.”

“Consents for what?”

“Ballentine Park Mews. One for you, one for
me, and six to sell.”

Jetta shook her head. “Six
what
to
sell?”

“Six apartments. Garage and ground floor
study. First floor living. Top floor sleeping.”

He swept her past his gleaming old Porsche
and into the front entrance of number seventeen.

Apartments? Here?

Temporarily distracted, her decorator’s eyes
flicked around. All the interior walls were painted white. The
fitted carpets had been torn up, leaving the timber floors bare. A
couple of spiky Yucca plants stood stiffly in shiny black ceramic
pots. The place had a stark masculine air to it, unexpected in a
1920’s bungalow, but not unattractive. The living area boasted a
huge TV and a tiny expensive stereo.

A charcoal rug with absurd giant-size pile
lay in the centre of the floor. Jetta tripped on the edge of it and
Anton grabbed her arm before she fell. A waft of his lemony cologne
drifted across. Overcome yet again by the hot breathless panic
reaction she knew so well, she squeezed her eyes closed and tried
to shake him off.

It was years since Uncle Graham had crept
into her shadowy bedroom, but sometimes it felt like yesterday. The
terror his stealthy silhouette caused on ‘babysitting’ nights still
visited her at unlikely and unwelcome moments.

Relief washed over her when Anton relaxed his
grip some.

“My room,” he said, angling his determined
chin in the right direction and leading the way.

She hesitated at the doorway and peered
inside. He finally let go of her arm, and the queasiness of being
under his power abated a little. ‘His’ room proved to have the
largest, lowest bed she’d ever seen, an enormous number of glossy
magazines stacked in neat piles, a laptop on a shiny white desk,
and a hulking great drawing board. He motioned her across to
it.

“See,” he said, flipping over a series of
floor plans and illustrations. “Ballentine Park Mews. Bowl the two
old houses, put up a decent sized block of purpose built dwellings,
and make some money.”

“It’s awful!” Jetta exclaimed, inspecting the
long barricade of three storied apartments and picturing them
plunked down in the quiet suburban street. “No lawns, no
trees...?”

“A couple of acres of greenery right across
the road, and private courtyards at the rear,” Anton insisted.
“It’s the way people want to live now—no big gardens to slave over,
easy care exteriors, low maintenance materials. They’ll sell as
fast as I can finish them.”

“No,” she snapped. “I don’t want to live in a
place like that. I want to live in Gran’s house.” She slid a hand
into her pocket and began to jingle the keys with agitation. “I’ve
got it all planned—the bathroom renovation, new curtains, the
polished timber floors... Did you see how nice the wood is under my
old lino?” She glanced down at his floorboards. “Yes, of course you
did—you’ve got the same here. You can’t just rip it up. And I
do
want a garden. I want the garden next door.”

“The flooring won’t be ripped up,” Anton
persisted. “It’ll all be carefully retrieved and recycled. There’s
a lot of money in that timber.”

“Recycled for someone else.”

“But you can’t seriously want to live in that
decrepit dump?” Disbelief danced in his lively blue eyes. “It’s
prehistoric. I can give you a double garage with internal access so
you won’t have to stagger in through the rain on the lookout for
muggers —”

“I don’t have a car.”

“And a purpose built study,” he said,
ignoring her and stabbing a long finger at the plan. “Computer and
A/V wiring all in, and a decent wardrobe in case you’d rather use
this as an extra bedroom with courtyard access. En suite and
laundry right here.” He tapped the plan again.

Jetta sighed. She really loved the older
‘character’ homes with their leadlight windows, fancy timber
moldings, and intricate plaster ceilings. Modern architecture left
her cold.

“Big sunny living area,” he continued
relentlessly. “Floor to ceiling doors to a deck overlooking the
park. Kitchen to die for, and two big attic bedrooms with a luxury
bathroom between. Extra storage in the roof space, too. You could
still give your friends a bedroom each.”

“Awful,” she said. “
So
not my sort of
place.”

“Then sell it. You’ll get a heap more for it
than half of the old dump next door. You could buy what you really
want with the cash I make you. But don’t wreck my plans. I’ve
already invested too much time and money in this.”

“That house is my only security in the
world,” she snapped. “I have to support myself because nobody else
will.”

“Then as I say, accept my offer of an
apartment and sell it. You’ll be better off.”

His eyes had stopped dancing. A steely sheen
now tempered their blueness, and his bottom lip pushing out into a
sulky cushion. She stood almost close enough to lean over and nip
it.

And found she wanted to, quite a lot.

She levered herself abruptly backwards. “I
suppose that’s an option,” she conceded, starting to blush.

What’s the lip thing about? He’s trying to
bulldoze me, and I fancy jumping him? Well, not seriously,
but...

“We should crack open a bottle of Moet to
celebrate meeting, and getting the go-ahead.”

“It’s not even eleven o’clock,” she objected,
glancing at her watch. “And the city planning department might have
given you the go-ahead, but I certainly haven’t—and I won’t
be.”

He ignored the second comment and said,
“Coffee then, and we’ll have the fizz with lunch. Come through when
you’ve finished looking at the plans.”

With that, he removed his warm lemony
presence and left her alone in his bedroom.

God! The day had started badly enough, waking
and remembering Gran had died. Now it felt a hundred times worse.
Skinned hands were the least of it. Punctured plans and shattered
dreams and her stirred up past had taken over.

She shot a blistering glare at the artistic
impression of the finished project, and then couldn’t help riffling
through the rest of the big pages again, imagining the completed
building.

Dammit, I shouldn’t even be interested.

She conceded the land area was ideal—much
wider than it was deep. Anton could certainly squeeze quite a
number of apartments onto it. She bent over, considering colors. If
he surfaced each a slightly different shade from its neighbors it
would break up the frontage and add some individuality. Ivory, soft
clay, oatmeal...maybe the palest watery green and subtle
gold...

“Anton,” she called. “Have you chosen colors
yet?”

“Coconut Milk with accents of Burmese
Bronze,” he yelled, thumping about in the kitchen.

“For the lot?”

“Yup. Why?”

She heard his swift footfall, and he
reappeared. The delicious fragrance of freshly ground coffee beans
followed him into the bedroom.

“Typical of a man,” she sniffed. “One easy
solution. Well, I’m still not the least bit interested in owning
one...but—”

“Hmmmm?” he queried, leaning in far too close
and sending her the same sizzling bone melting grin he’d flashed at
his tall, blonde girlfriend. Jetta was neither tall nor blonde, and
a nasty unexpected jolt of jealousy had raced from her inky hair to
her bright silver toenails as she’d peered through the jasmine at
them.

As close as this it was one hell of a smile,
and although it was difficult staying so near without flinching,
something held her there.

“You need to individualize them a bit,” she
said, tamping down the surge of unsettling attraction. “Make each a
different shade from the one next door. They’re horrible they way
they are. Far too intrusive in the streetscape.”

“Planners didn’t seem worried.”

“They don’t have to live in them. Heaven
knows what the rest of the neighbors will feel. You should use some
visual trickery to break up their size and blocky look. That might
make your damn apartments more bearable. Only slightly though.”

His arm settled against hers on the plans,
warm, muscular and tanned. He didn’t seem to notice, but Jetta
certainly did. She had an overwhelming urge to inch aside, and she
also wanted to press much closer. She concentrated on his arm and
kept her eyes well away from his face.

He wore a chunky brushed-silver watch. There
were scattered dark hairs on the back of his hand, and higher up on
his forearm they were finer and felt soft. Her groin heated and
moistened—attracted, turned on, yearning—but she knew if Anton ran
his fingers over her skin, her brain would stage a closedown and
yet again it would be body nil, brain the winner.

She clenched her hand shut until her nails
dug hard into her palm. Why had that unexpected sexy tingle zinged
through her?

Right
through her.

She moved restlessly and pressed her thighs
together to squash the effect away. Instead, the pulsing
intensified into a delicious insistent beat.

Worse. Much, much worse.

She eased her legs apart again, but it really
didn’t help. She began imagining things that might. Things
involving Anton instead of Uncle Graham.

“I don’t want it to look like Toytown,” he
objected after a few seconds consideration.

She attempted to drag her brain back to the
task at hand, far too unsettled by the kiss of his flesh against
hers, but somehow not willing to move away. “What?”

“The different colors.”

“Oh. Um—I’m not talking red-green-yellow. Use
your common sense. Subtle shades. Soft earthy tones just to make
them seem more like separate properties.”

His eyes locked with hers for a few moments,
bright and blue and searching. “Nice. It’ll cost a bit extra, but
we’ll do it.”

“Just like that?”

“I’m flexible—sometimes.” Again the wicked
grin. “So you’ll sell yours instead of living there, but it’s full
steam ahead now.”

A statement, not a question.

“No!” she exclaimed. “I haven’t agreed to
anything. Nothing at all. I’ll have some coffee with you seeing
you’ve made it now, but then I need to get back to my kitchen.”

“
Our
kitchen. I’ll give you a
hand.”

“
My
kitchen. I don’t want a hand,
thanks. I’m quite happy puddling around on my own.”

He didn’t react to that; simply turned and
waved her out to a long sofa covered in pale grey suede. She
breathed deeply, inhaling the rich coffee aroma, and enjoying the
way the well-worn denim hugged his butt and long thighs as he
returned to the kitchen. Then she heard the clink of china being
set on a hard surface.

“The thing is,” he called through the
doorway, “the demolition crew starts here on Tuesday. So I’ll need
to move in with you on Monday night at the latest.”

“What!” she squealed, jolting upright,
appalled at the thought of being alone and helpless with him. “You
can’t move in with me. You absolutely can’t.”

Anton in pajamas? Does he even wear
pajamas?