I’d known he was with you—’
‘I’m sure he’ll not be too far away. How long ago was this?’
‘A good hour ago, I’d say.’
‘Thanks.’ Hunter grabbed her hand and bolted out the door with a renewed sense of urgency. The electric touch of his strong fingers clasping hers sent her pulse racing as they stole back out into the night.
He let go of her long after they had an excuse to be holding hands.
She absent-mindedly rubbed the palm of her hand where his had crossed it, mourning the loss of his touch already.
‘Do you really think we’re going to catch up with him?’ She was a little on edge, spending so much time with Hunter. Every minute together altered her perception of the man she’d loved and hated in equal measure without ever knowing him beyond his public image. It was unsettling to find out he was as normal as anyone else. She’d moved past her crush a long time ago but she was worried it might take her somewhere more dangerous than a shallow physical attraction if she wasn’t careful.
‘Oh, aye.’ His attempt at the local accent couldn’t fail to make her laugh and she was rewarded with a toothy grin.
She’d always thought him attractive—that was a no-brainer. What teenage girl wouldn’t have had her head turned by a handsome sportsman from a distant land? Finding out Hunter hadn’t the hero she’d imagined him to be had been the biggest betrayal of all. Her mistake had been compounded by watching him fall apart before her eyes in those last matches until he’d convinced her there wasn’t actually anything more than good looks and bad attitude there.
His short time back in the country was already beginning to change that opinion when he was doing whatever was asked for him to aid the team. That eye-opener spurred her on over the crest of the hill towards the old brick building with the faded green ‘Kelly’s’ sign.
She was saved from further personal revelations as a rather large, unkempt figure came barrelling out of the pub door to land at their feet on the pavement. It didn’t take a genius to work out what the cheer from inside and the sight of a burly barman dusting off his hands at the door meant.
‘Anderson?’ Hunter hunched down and brushed the dirty, bloody mop of hair out of the face of the unfortunate who’d been swiftly tossed from the premises.
‘That’s me,’ he said with a slur. ‘Gus Anderson. Man of the match. The crowd go wild.’
He was cheering now, swaying from side to side and pumping his fist in the air.
‘Someone’s got a high opinion of himself.’ Charlotte was having second thoughts about helping if he really was this deluded. He’d almost cost them the match, the play-offs and their very jobs tonight.
‘He’s wasted. He doesn’t know what he’s saying.’ Hunter struggled to get him onto his feet and although he didn’t ask her to, Charlotte felt compelled to help.
She ducked under one arm of their patient, bolstering his left side. He weighed a ton, even though she knew Hunter was probably shouldering most of the weight.
‘Er...now what? How are we supposed to fix this?’
‘We can take him back to my place.’ Hunter was already a bit breathless bench-pressing the man mountain so she hoped he lived somewhere close before all three of them ended up in a ditch by the side of the road.
They half dragged, half carried their wayward charge until they came to a cottage down the lane past Kelly’s.
‘This is your house?’ The pretty chocolate-box cottage and garden didn’t seem very him.
‘Here, hold him until I get the door open.’ He deposited most of Anderson’s bulk around her shoulders and stopped her asking any of the questions flooding her head as she fought to stop her body being concertinaed into the ground.
Are you renting? Did you inherit? Does your girlfriend live here with you?
In hindsight she suspected that was the very reason he’d been so ungentlemanly in the first place. Whatever the secret, he wanted to keep it to himself. Thankfully, once he opened the door and found the light switch, he shared the burden with her until they were able to dump Anderson into a nearby chair.
‘We’ll need to get him cleaned and sobered up.’ Gray would be expecting results and now under the glare of the living-room light she could see Anderson was a bit battered and bruised.
‘Let’s see if we can get him up to the bathroom.’ Hunter steered them towards a narrow staircase and they somehow managed to manoeuvre him into the shower cubicle, still fully clothed.
A grinning Hunter switched on the water and closed the bathroom door on Anderson’s shrieks as he underwent some sobering cold-water therapy. He backed out of the room, bumping into Charlotte in the cramped hallway. She stumbled back, tripping over the upturned edge of the faded hallway carpet. There was that helpless moment when she felt herself overbalance and tip over the edge of the staircase. All she could do was brace herself for the hard, painful landing she knew was coming.
Hunter shot out an arm around her waist, catching her before she fell off that top step and pulling her roughly against his chest, knocking the breath out of her.
‘Sorry. I thought we should get out while he’s cooling off. I didn’t mean to nearly break your neck in the process.’
Her adrenaline was pumping as much from the near miss as being pressed against his hard body.
‘You’re forgiven.’ She aimed for a friendly smile to hide the fact he’d unnerved her by being so close but her heart was pounding so hard she could no longer hear anything but the rush of blood in her ears.
For an instant their eyes locked, this intimate moment between the two of them frozen in time. His eyes darkened as they lit on her smiling lips and the conspiratorial joviality seemed to fade. He was watching her with such hunger, such focus there was no denying what it was he wanted, what he wanted to do to her. Just as before, she felt herself submit helplessly to gravity, only this time it was pulling her ever closer to his lips.
‘Hey, you guys are too cruel. What, are you like SAS trainers or something?’ Anderson yanked the door open and exploded the fantasy.
Hunter wrenched away from her so quickly he’d probably left friction burns in the carpet.
Charlotte was more appalled by her own behaviour. They’d almost kissed. Totally inappropriate with a work colleague, especially when there was every chance he was involved with someone else. So they hadn’t actually made lip contact but she was pretty sure the intention had been there on both sides and that was bad news all around. Clearly she hadn’t yet reached her lifetime’s worth of humiliation where this man was concerned.
‘I’ll get some coffee on the go.’ Hunter took the stairs two at a time in his obvious haste to get away.
She waited until she heard him banging about in the kitchen before she dared follow. At least Anderson, who’d ditched his sodden clothes for a bath towel, made for a distraction from the sudden atmosphere in the house.
She reached for her trusty first-aid bag, which she’d been carrying all night, predicting it would end in some sort of medical emergency, and pulled out an alcohol wipe to cleanse the deepest scratch on his face.
‘Ouch!’ He drew in a quick breath as if she’d poured salt into an open wound.
‘Seriously?’ She’d barely touched him and, with the stench of alcohol emanating through his very pores, she’d imagined he was probably numb from the scalp down.
‘It stings, man.’
‘Sorry. I’ll be as gentle as I can.’ Perhaps she’d been a tad more abrasive than she should have when she was angry at herself for the incident at the top of the stairs. She should know better than to let her personal feelings leak into her professional manner. Although Anderson was the reason she’d