time he sounded gruff and he glanced at Reggie, who was talking on his mobile, as if he was uncomfortable engaging in small talk in front of an audience. Ava was so used to Reggie being around, she barely noticed him any more.
‘CT scan is fine,’ she said. ‘Just waiting for a plastic surgeon for the hand.’
He nodded and she waited for him to say something else but he looked as if he was done. Then Reggie finished his call and started talking anyway. ‘I’ve booked you into your usual suite,’ he said. ‘We’ll organise for a suitcase to be brought to you tomorrow.’
Ava watched the angle of Blake’s jaw tighten at the announcement. ‘I thought the point of lying low was to not go to any of her usual places?’ Blake enquired.
The hardness in his tone made Ava shiver. And not in a bad way. Blake Walker was a good looking man. Not in the cut, ripped, metrosexual way she was used to. More in a rugged, capable, tool-belt-wearing kind of way. The fact that Blake Walker either didn’t know it or didn’t care about it only added to his allure.
The fact that Mr-Rugged-And-Capable was looking out for her was utterly seductive.
It had been a long time since someone had made her feel as if she mattered more than her brand. Her mother had cut and run when she’d been seventeen, leaving her to fend for herself in a very adult world, and Ava had never felt so alone or vulnerable.
Sure, she’d coped and it had made her strong and resilient—two things you had to be to survive in her world. But tonight, she didn’t have to be any of those things because Blake was here.
‘They have very strict security,’ Reggie bristled. ‘Ava will be perfectly safe there.’
Blake snorted in obvious disbelief. ‘Have you cancelled her commitments yet?’
Reggie took his glasses off. ‘I’m playing that by ear.’
‘You know, in the army you learn that you don’t secure an object by flaunting it in front of the enemy. I think you need to take the advice of the police and have her lie low.’
‘If Ava put her career on hold for every whack job that ever wrote her a threatening letter she wouldn’t have had much of a career.’
‘Well, this whack job just signed his name in automatic gunfire all along the front of her house. I think her safety has to take precedence over her career for the moment.’
Ava had to agree. Frankly she’d been scared witless tonight. She took Reggie’s advice on everything—he’d been with her a long time—but in this she needed to listen to the guy who had crash tackled her to the ground to keep her safe.
Who believed her safety was a priority.
Reggie hadn’t been there. He couldn’t understand how frightening it had been.
‘I’ve known Ava a long time, Mr Walker,’ Reggie said. ‘A lot longer than you. And she’s stronger than you’ll ever know. She’ll get through this just fine.’
‘He’s right, Reggie,’ she said as the silence grew.
Just because she was strong, it didn’t mean she was going to go down into the basement while she was home alone to investigate the thing that had gone bump in the middle of the night.
Because that was plain stupid.
And she hadn’t had longevity in a career that wasn’t known for it by being stupid. Strength also lay in knowing your limitations and accepting help.
After a solid sleep she might be able to think a little straighter, be a little braver, but tonight she just needed to feel safe.
‘I’m pretty freaked out,’ Ava continued. ‘I think listening to the advice of the police is the best thing. At least for tonight anyway.’
‘So where are you going to go, Ava?’ Reggie demanded. ‘You can’t go back to your home and everyone else you know in London is as famous as you.’
Ava didn’t even have to think to know the answer to that question. She just reacted—as Blake had done earlier tonight. ‘I can go to Blake’s.’
THREE
Blake gaped at Ava as her yellowy-green gaze settled on his face. ‘What? No.’ He would rather amputate his other leg than have Ava Kelly as a house guest.
‘Just for the night,’ she said.
Blake shook his head. ‘No.’ She sounded so reasonable but he had to wonder if the bang to her head had sent her a little crazy.
He was on holiday, for crying out loud.
Reggie—bless him—looked at his client askance. ‘Absolutely not!’ he blustered. ‘You don’t know this man from a bar of soap.’
Blake watched as Ava pursed her perfect lips and shot her agent an impatient look. ‘I have seen this man—’ she pointed at Blake ‘—almost every day for the last three months. That’s the longest relationship I’ve had with any man other than you, Reggie. This man—’ she jabbed a finger in his direction again ‘—pulled me down to the ground and shielded me with his body while some nutcase fired bullets at my house.’
‘And thanks to him you have a cut face, a gash in your hand that requires stitching and an egg on the back of your head the size of a grapefruit.’
Blake bit off the bitter you’re welcome that rose to his lips. He didn’t expect thanks or praise for yanking her to the ground. His military training had taken over and he’d done what had to be done. What anyone with his background would have done. But he didn’t expect to be accused of trying to maim her either.
Ava reached her hand out to Reggie and he took it. ‘I was frightened, Reggie. Petrified. I couldn’t...breathe I was so scared.’ She’d been like that after her mother left—terrified for days. Then she’d hired Reggie. ‘He makes me feel safe. And it’s just for tonight.’
Reggie looked as if he was considering it and Blake began to wonder if he was invisible. ‘Er, excuse me...’ he interrupted. ‘I don’t know if either of you are interested but I said no.’
‘You were the one who said she should lie low,’ Reggie said, looking at him speculatively, clearly coming around to his client’s way of thinking. ‘You said the point was for her not to go to any of her usual places.’
Blake could not believe what he was hearing. They were both looking at him as if it were a done deal. As if his objections didn’t matter in the face of the fabulous Ms Kelly’s needs.
‘I meant wear a wig, don some dark sunnies, throw on some baggy clothes and book herself into some low-rent hotel somewhere under a different name.’
‘Please,’ Ava said, the plea in her gaze finding its way directly to the part of him that was one hundred per cent soldier. ‘I feel safe with you.’
‘She feels safe with you,’ Reggie reiterated, also looking at Blake, his hands in his pockets.
Blake shut his eyes and shook his head. ‘No.’ He opened his eyes again to find them both looking at him as if he’d just refused shelter to a pregnant woman on a donkey. ‘For God’s sake,’ he said. ‘I could live in a dive for all you know.’
Ava shrugged. ‘I don’t care.’
Blake snorted. ‘Right. A world-famous supermodel who insisted on four thousand quid apiece tap fittings is happy to slum it?’
She shrugged again, looking down her nose at him this time, her famed haughtiness returning. ‘I can slum it for a night.’
Blake’s gaze was drawn to her mouth and the way it clearly enunciated each word. Her lips, like the words, were just...perfect. Like two little pillows, soft and pink with a perfectly defined bow shape. But somehow even they managed to look haughty—cool and mysterious. As if they’d never