“Are you following me?”

His features froze for about a second before he answered. “Sorry, but I can see where you’d get that impression. Guess we have to chalk this one up to fate.”

There it was again. Fate. And Kel felt it, too.

A small prickle of conscience stabbed her as she arched her eyebrows in feigned disbelief, and a darker slash broached the tanned skin covering his cheekbones. He leaned closer, resting one arm on the back of the seat her day pack still guarded, and swiped his other hand over his chest in a cross. “Honest.”

His voice was low, husky, intimate. She fell into it, into his eyes, her heart skipping at the dark, liquid intensity begging to be believed in their expression.

“I didn’t think men believed in fate.”

His dark eyebrows knitted. “What else could it be?”

Dear Reader,

This is definitely a month to celebrate, because Kathleen Korbel is back! This award-winning, bestselling author continues the saga of the Kendall family with Some Men’s Dreams, a journey of the heart that will have you smiling through tears as you join Gen Kendall in meeting Dr. Jack O’Neill and his very special daughter, Elizabeth. Run—don’t walk—to the store to get your copy of this genuine keeper.

Don’t miss out on the rest of our books this month, either. Kylie Brant continues THE TREMAINE TRADITION with Truth or Lies, a dicey tale of love on both sides of the law. Then pick up RaeAnne Thayne’s Freefall for a haunting, mysterious, page-turner of a romance. Round out the month with new books by favorites Beverly Bird, who’s Risking It All, and Frances Housden, who’ll introduce you to a Heartbreak Hero, and brand-new author Madalyn Reese, who gives you No Place To Hide from her talented debut.

And, as always, come back again next month, when Silhouette Intimate Moments offers you six more of the best and most exciting romances around.

Enjoy!

Leslie J. Wainger

Executive Editor

Heartbreak Hero

FRANCES HOUSDEN

Books by Frances Housden

Silhouette Intimate Moments

The Man for Maggie #1056

Love under Fire #1168

Heartbreak Hero #1241

FRANCES HOUSDEN

has always been a voracious reader, but she never thought of being a writer until a teacher gave her the encouragement she needed to put pen to paper. As a result, Frances was a finalist in the 1998 Clendon Award and won the award in 1999, which led to the sale of her first book for Silhouette, The Man for Maggie.

Frances’s marriage to a navy man took her from her birthplace in Scotland all the way to the ends of the earth in New Zealand. Now that he’s a landlubber, they try to do most of their traveling together. They live on a ten-acre bush block in the heart of Auckland’s Wine District. She has two large sons, two small grandsons and a tiny granddaughter who can twist her around her finger, as well as a wheaten terrier who thinks she’s boss. Thanks to one teacher’s dedication, Frances now gets to write about the kind of heroes a woman would travel to the ends of the earth for. Frances loves to hear from readers. Write to her at P.O. Box 18-240, Glenn Innes, Auckland 1130, New Zealand.

This book is dedicated to the next two generations

of my family. To my son John, his partner, Angela, their

children Tyler and Georgia, and my youngest son, Owen,

and his son Max.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Epilogue

Prologue

I f only he’d gotten here five minutes sooner. If only. The two most damning words in the English language.

Kel Jellic wove his way through a dimly lit maze of tables and upturned chairs. Mood as black as pitch, he cursed the snarled traffic, cursed the snares of hookers and touts whose importuning had delayed his progress down Darlinghurst Road. Cursed the alley littered with 2:00 a.m. drunks and druggies, and reviled the stuttering neon sign that caused his night blindness as he’d negotiated the obstacle course of flesh and bone.

Regret clutched at his gut as he took in the scene.

If only he’d gotten here five minutes sooner, Gordie Tan, G&T to his buddies, might be performing a ribald routine instead of sprawled faceup on the minuscule stage. The blood leaking from a stab wound to his ribs was no stage prop. Kel dipped his fingers in it as he bent over his best friend. Still warm, it ran across the uneven wood flooring to add another stain to the blue velvet curtains at the wings.

Of all the gay night joints in Australia’s Kings Cross, this had to be the sleaziest. The crowd had been spilling into the alley as he arrived. His “Out of my way. Let me through!” hadn’t been enough until he’d put his elbows to use.

He’d squeezed through the crush, ignoring the pathetic squeals and grunts battering his ears. Hell, he might even have passed the jerk who’d knifed Gordie.

And then again, maybe not. This kind of club always had a back exit for those in the know with the need for a quick getaway.

Kneeling on a floor stained with spilled liquor and cigarette burns, Kel balled a handkerchief, pushing it tight against Gordie’s wound. Pain gasped from his buddy’s lips and forced open, opaque dark eyes in a face that used to be inscrutable. “Kel?”

“Yeah, it’s me. Help’s on its way, not to worry, buddy.”

Gordie’s chin lifted a fraction. “Tell you…” It chewed Kel up to see sweat bead his mate’s face, making his painted eyelids and rouged cheeks garish in contrast.

Taking particular care not to add to Gordie’s pain, Kel slipped his other arm under the shoulder away from the injury till he could lift him closer. Close enough for the slick, oily smell of greasepaint to hide the coppery tang of blood. Any casual observer, too drunk to make their escape, might have been fooled into thinking them lovers taking a last fond goodbye.

“What is it? You see who did this?” Kel turned his head to hear him better and felt Gordie’s breath tickle his ear. From this angle he was more than aware of the blood oozing through his handkerchief, then dribbling down the back of his hand. And that the grotesque splash of red matched the lipstick cutting a slash on his buddy’s face. In this place, at this time, it was just one more reason, one more fear, for the crowd to abandon G&T to his fate.

Drag queen extraordinaire, Gordie could have made a good living at it; instead it had served well as his cover in some of the seamier corners of the world.

Kel leaned closer to catch his mate’s rough whisper, “Family member…bugger cut my best frock.”

It took a second to register that Gordie meant Chinese or Eurasian. Kel no longer noticed the difference in their heritages, if he ever had, but he did recognize he was in danger of losing the best partner he’d ever worked with.

Their association went right back to the days after Kel left the SAS. Two raw Global Drug Enforcement recruits with visions of saving the world. Damn! He’d never thought it would come to this. His mind clouded, blurring scenes from the time they’d thought themselves invincible. Had it only been yesterday?

Another lesson learned.

A chair toppled somewhere in the gloomy depths of the club. He jerked his head toward the sound, jarring the cords in his neck. A painful reminder there was no one to watch his back.

Bile burned the back of his throat. Slight, wiry Gordie had a mind like a steel trap with muscles to match, plus a black belt in karate. All of which went to show Kel the assailant must have been damn good to get close enough to stick his friend.

Gordie clutched Kel’s sleeve, the rattle in his throat heightening the urgency as he forced out his information. “Kiss-and-tell, leaving Papeete… Air Tahiti Nui to Auckland…in two days. Name… N. Two Feathers… McKay.” Gordie finished on a weak groan, the weight of his slight frame growing lax in Kel’s arms.

With more haste than expertise, he checked the carotid pulse in Gordie’s throat. He captured a flutter in the artery beneath his sweat-damp fingertips and let a harsh groan of relief echo through the stillness.

Two Feathers…McKay? Beyond his more immediate problems, he pondered whether it was one guy or two. Useless pressing G&T for more information even if his job required a certain degree of callousness. The guy was his best buddy. The wonder was, he’d managed to pass on what he had.

Sirens blared. Their wails of distress prickled the skin at the nape of Kel’s neck. Much as he hated to leave anyone bleeding, the feeling of cutting the cord on friendship made this worse. Like losing an arm. But hanging around, spinning explanations for the cops, could blow their cover big time.

Still reluctant to leave the smaller guy, he pushed the bloody handkerchief into Gordie’s fist and pressed it to the wound. “G&T, can you hear me? I’ve got to go. Help’s arrived, either medics or the cops, but whichever…”

Gordie’s eyes flared for a second as if dark holes burned in his face. With a weak push he sent Kel on his way. “Go, I’ll be all right.” The brave words made Kel’s leave-taking more arduous as conscience warred with duty.

Duty won.

Disappearing behind the shabby velvet curtain, he let his instincts—honed in similar situations—lead him to the rear exit. The information he carried was worth more than one man. “Harrumph,” he snorted in derision at his excuse. It didn’t help.

He wanted to believe he was doing the right thing.

If the powerful drug kiss-and-tell was allowed to hit the streets, the lives of millions would be at stake. It crossed his mind as he slipped out into the darkness that maybe this was too big a job to handle on his own.

The sound of car doors banging echoed around the corner. Kel headed in the opposite direction. Keeping to the shadows, shoulders hunched, he wound his way through the back alleys, trying to appear invisible. A necessary habit for undercover work. And, like the people in the drug world he targeted, he knew to keep his head down in the vicinity of Sydney cops.

Kel never imagined this case would drop in his lap. At the first whispers of the drug, his senses had given a slight prickle, going into overdrive, as innuendo became news of known addicts dropping like flies round pyrethrum plants.

The first postmortems had been done at San Francisco’s exotic diseases center, where the docs feared they had a new plague on their hands. They hadn’t been far off the mark.

The information Gordie’d just given him was every bit as vital as the news that supplies of the deadliest new experience to hit the streets had run out, ringing a knell for its users.

He’d been to San Francisco, seen the pale shades of gray human remains and shuddered at the ghostly color broken by pout-shaped marks, as if shortly before dying someone wearing hooker-red lipstick had kissed them all over. And from that had come the name, kiss-and-tell.

At last, one poor soul, still alive when rushed into the doctors’ care, had wiped all their carefully calculated medical conclusions. But they hadn’t saved the one who’d given them the clue that put them out of their collective misery.

Too bad. If anyone had deserved to live, it was the victim who’d set the clinicians on the right track. But nothing they did prevented every organ in the guy’s body from shutting down. His death was inevitable from the moment his supplier disappeared.

That’s where Kel and Gordie’s team came in. As members of the covert organization, Global Drug Enforcement, they worked undercover to cut off drug supplies at any stage from manufacturer to dealer. From Colombia to the Golden Triangle, or a back room in San Francisco, GDE agents went after the scum of society who traded in weakness and misery.

Another quick glance over his shoulder as he unlocked his car showed nothing had changed. The touts still harassed the passersby and the hookers continued to patrol their patches with their giveaway, one-hip-slung-out walk.

And he’d no way of knowing if Gordie was alive or dead.

Instead of the way-to-go delight he’d felt at him and Gordie being paired up again, now he wished his buddy had stayed in San Francisco to play out his contract at the Glamorous Gals club.

The little guy had been a big hit with the crowds, as well as turning a huge profit in good reliable information.

Kel had worked with the local DEA while they’d tracked the chemist to his laboratory—too late. He’d been long dead when they got there, his place trashed, every particle wiped clean of any evidence linking it to the drug, particularly his notes.

Not one of the team had argued that it hadn’t been a fitting end for the psychotic inventor of the formula. But it was obvious the same thought lurked at the back of their minds. For instance, his exit could have been better planned. Say three months after they’d caught up with him.

Kel put his car in gear and pulled into the stream of traffic, cruising Darlinghurst Road for fresh meat.

He pulled over just through the lights giving way to a fire engine, its siren screeching as it left the dark gray sandstone station on the opposite side of the Cross. He’d have been better pleased to see an ambulance. The noise tugged at his conscience as he sorted through his memory, trying to remember if more than one type of siren had sounded as the cops pulled up in the alley. Damn, he needed Gordie to be saved, by someone. Anyone.

Was there ever a good time to die?

It bugged him that a month down the time chain, even with new information, the researchers were no closer to finding an antidote to the drug. It only took one dose, just one, and users had to keep on buying or be prepared to die. Not only did the drug induce instantaneous addiction, less than five days without supplies and addicts were dead meat.

Kiss-and-tell was a real little money-spinner in the wrong hands, but whose hands? Now the drug, either product or formula, was on the move, and he’d be doing his damnedest to follow its courier from Papeete, across the South Pacific to New Zealand, the only place he could call home.

Chapter 1

K el bit down on the inside of his cheek until he tasted blood. But it didn’t diminish the pain in his gut just thinking of Gordie. His buddy’s life had ended up as a crapshoot. Gordie had played craps with opponents who thought themselves above the law, and when his turn came to roll the dice they’d come up snake eyes.

Goddammit!

His shoulder ached as though his right arm had been brutally wrenched from its socket. He sucked in a long drag of a cigarette in concert with about a dozen others hovering outside the air-conditioned terminal. It burned all the way down.

Hell, he didn’t even smoke. But as part of his cover, it gave him a reason for standing outside Papeete’s Faa’a International Airport building where No Smoking signs threatened at every turn. It was all part of the fresh skin he’d donned, like the white-on-black tropical shirt he’d been buying when the news came through about Gordie dying. Its cotton still retained the creases his fist had scrunched in it while Garnet Chaly’s cool voice had come over his cell phone.

As special agent in charge of Southeast Asian Ops, a huge territory including the South Pacific, he supposed it behooved Chaly to remain calm. The guy hadn’t lost a partner, only an operative.

Kel knew the drill. Agents weren’t allowed the closure of a funeral. They might be spotted among the mourners. No dragging their asses in sorrow; they picked themselves up and got on with the job. Changing his appearance hadn’t changed that, or relieved the guilt-induced nausea roiling under his ribs. Or the knowledge there’d be no time for grief.

Heat struck at him from the concrete pavement. It caught him a glancing blow from a midday sun filling the Tahitian sky with a wide, mean streak of brass, taking its spite out on the palms till their leaves drooped. Not a solitary cloud challenged its dominance, yet inside him the rain came down in sheets.

With one last drag of his smoke, he assumed an outward calm. To maintain the pretence he daren’t blink. Sure his eyes felt raw as a day-old recruit, but it was better than the image inside his lids of Gordie, like a broken china doll someone had tossed aside.

His latest info on the courier put the guy on a ferry from the neighboring island of Moorea, where the mountains rose high and dark and ancient, like castle turrets in a fairy tale. Not one like Rapunzel, but a dark, blood-filled tale to fit his mood.

The connection keeping him out in the heat was an airport bus that, by his watch, should have arrived five minutes ago even on island time. Part of his problem was the lack of a photo to help recognize his target. Though going by the name, and life’s conditioning, he’d concluded Two Feathers to be of Native American extraction. That’s unless the feathers in his name belonged to a wild goose.

Kel lit another cigarette.

“Monsieur.” A stranger’s rough accent infiltrated the roar of a jumbo jet rising through the fine suspension of kerosene vapors hanging in the air, waiting for a breeze to come along.

“Yeah?” Kel grated at a bulky islander whose four spare chins overlapped a red shirt that reminded Kel of an old sofa cover his grandmother once had.

Flashing a grateful grin, the man said, “Whoa man! You speak English. Great. Could I bum a light off of you?”

Kel let his thoughts race through the Filofax in his head, the place he kept everything too important to write down. The accent had none of the French flavors he’d tuned into since his arrival yesterday; instead it reminded him of home.

“No problem, mate.” Kel handed over a matchbook, picked up the night before in a downtown bar where the drums kept time with the dancers’ hips.

The guy sweated noticeably as he tapped his Marlboro on the cigarette packet, then clamped it between his fleshy lips, drawing hard as the match flared. “Thanks, mate, you’ve no idea how I needed that.” He tossed the matchbook over.

Kel caught it and nodded toward the other smokers, saying, “You, me and about ten others. Wouldn’t say no to a cold one to accompany it.”

“A beer wouldn’t touch the sides. This heat bites.”

He looked like a guy who should be used to hotter climates, but appearances could be deceiving. Kel should know.

Slipping the matches into his shirt pocket, he hefted his suit carrier, gave the guy a brief salute and moved over a few feet, following the shade. He traveled light. No waiting for the carousel to disgorge his stuff while Mr. N. Two Feathers McKay, like Elvis, left the building. Having nothing to hide, after a mandatory inspection, both his carrier and laptop would be allowed on board.

Of course, this meant nixing all weapons, other than the skills he’d learned in the SAS and a few dirty moves Gordie had taught him that had helped keep him alive more than once. They were all part of the game. Part of being an agent who might be in Sydney one day and Tahiti the next.

Five days of sun at Club Med had painted Ngaire pale bronze, her skin’s natural inclination. And she’d enjoyed the soft rush of cooling air as the ferry skimmed the waves between islands.

By contrast, the current bus ride sucked. Small, packed tight, with no air-conditioning to speak of, it made her long to be winging her way toward New Zealand in the relative luxury of economy class.

For the first time since she’d left San Francisco, she almost felt homesick for the cool mist that had crowded the Golden Gate Bridge as she flew out of the good old U.S. of A.

Heaven knows, she wasn’t the only one with problems. The legs of the lanky guy behind her stretched into the passage. His bony knees and ankles had invaded her comfort zone, while he had the nerve to grumble in German to his lady companion.

Then, like a snowstorm in hell, all her complaints melted away instantly as she caught sight of the airport, with its regulation stands of palms edging the road, for the second time in a week.

Her skin crawled with anticipation, tightening round her bones until she wanted nothing more than to stand up and stretch it back into shape. In a few hours she’d be landing in New Zealand where her grandmother had been born.

The land her grandfather had called paradise. Though she preferred the words of American author Zane Grey, last, loneliest, loveliest. An evocative description that sang like a siren’s call in her ears. Though she had the blood of four nations rushing through her veins, Ngaire felt ties to none.

Maybe in paradise she would find herself.

The sigh of air brakes announced the arrival of a blue bus carrying a yellow hibiscus logo, pulling up a few yards ahead.

Kel measured its size with his eye and did the numbers, reckoning on a twenty, twenty-two seater. He’d expected to deal with a luxury coach, so this put him ahead of the game.

Maybe his luck had turned.

The bus door swooshed open, folding in two. A pair of shoulders balanced above a belly like Buddha’s took its place as the driver lumbered off in a shirt as loud as his bus. Following him in a jumble of leis and woven palm-leaf hats, a half-dozen colorful Tahitian women alighted, swaying and giggling as the driver unclipped the baggage compartment, calling “Un moment, mademoiselles, s’il vous plaît, un moment” over one shoulder.

Kel took a few swift puffs of his cigarette, letting hot smoke roll over his tongue to release through his nose in short, sharp bursts. Not a sign of anyone resembling the image he’d built of Two Feathers McKay. “Dammit!” He spat the word out under his breath. The curse didn’t relieve his frustration.

Tossing the half-smoked butt into a sand bucket, he moved closer as the passengers dribbled out slowly and began to blend. He counted twelve islanders with a filtering of Europeans, French extraction, going by the casual elegance of their clothes. Behind the anonymity of his dark glasses, he eyed a tall man in a crumpled beige suit, heard a smattering of German as the dude snapped an order, a curse, then a demand at the driver.

One more to cross off his list.

His heart rate picked up. What if McKay had taken a different route? From the smell of things, their info could be a red herring. Wrapping his fist round the strap of his bag, he clamped down on his frustration. He wanted—no, needed—to be the one to find the goons responsible for Gordie’s death.

The last passenger left the bus, tightening the thumbscrews on the fear of failure raging inside him. This was a woman, medium height, with muscles lightly sculpted under glowing skin. She flicked a long black braid behind her shoulder, stepping into the remaining space to complete the crescent of passengers awaiting luggage.

As she dropped her small day pack between her feet, he watched her reach high, stretching with all the athletic grace of a dancer.

Every instinct shouted “Trouble,” with a capital T.

Latent sexual greed slugged him a good one. He wanted some of that, wanted a taste of the peach-fuzz skin making his mouth water. Wanted to feel it slide against his own in the heat of passion, as he sank into her to ease his pain.

He’d heard it could take you this way, but until now he’d never experienced the need to sublimate grief with sex.

To screw your ass off as opposed to crying. Death substituted by procreation. Lust mollified by this cockeyed piece of home-brewed psychology, he swung his eyes round the passengers one more time.

Where’n all hell was McKay?

He began circling the crush, his impatience as obscure as theirs was obvious while the driver dumped piece after piece from the baggage compartment into a heap on the sidewalk. Gucci took its chances with cheap blue-and-pink-striped plastic as the owners pulled their bags from the bottom of the pile.

Lazy movements at the far side of the crowd snagged his glance and zapped him again. Pushing his sunglasses back to improve the view, he gazed at the growing distance between the black crop top and matching hipster pants, separated by lush skin.

Isolated by her unhurried attitude, she reminded him of a cat, easing out its kinks as all hell let loose around it. “Eyes left, Jellic, you’re working.”

As he scolded himself, a piece of crimson, hard-bodied Samsonite, defaced by a Chinese good-luck symbol and propelled by the removal of the one below it, slid from the top of the heap onto his side of the crowd. Kel took off his shades to read the gold words glinting on its side: Blue Grasshopper, Chinatown, San Francisco.

“Now, that’s what I call carrying promotion to the nth degree.” It didn’t prevent the back of his neck pricking as he moved in for a closer inspection. San Francisco?

McKay couldn’t be that dumb, surely, or that cheap. Could he?

The urge to take a gander at the address tag was blocked by a red floral shirt he recognized. The meaty fingers he’d seen lighting a cigarette captured the handle and pulled it away from the rest. He heard the slap of it against the guy’s bare calves as he hopped off the sidewalk toward the back of the bus, swiping the sweat off his brow through his hair as if the exertion was killing him.

“Hey! That’s mine.” The owner was feminine, unmistakably American and anything but happy.

Simultaneously, but not in order of importance, Kel watched Ms. Bronze-skin whip off her sunglasses. Her shocked gaze, bluer than a Tahitian lagoon, followed the red shirt, while her pink sunglasses tumbled from her hand, catching the light.

As their glances clashed, his body tensed, gearing itself to spring after the thief, then he remembered who he was and why he was there. Although he hadn’t moved an inch, Kel felt as if he’d hit a brick wall. A sensation every bit as painful as her swift expression of disappointment, coursed through him.

As the woman hotfooted it round her side of the vehicle, pride overcame caution. Dropping his suit carrier, he chased the good-luck-charm that wasn’t living up to its publicity.

She was fast but in trouble now; the guy outweighed her by more than a hundred pounds. Kel heard her yell as she ran, “Drop the case, you jerk, it’s mine.”

Kel was at least four paces behind them when she confronted the guy, taking up a fighting stance, hands karate style like miniature lethal weapons, as if anything that small could hurt.

He had to do something quick before she copped a lesson no amount of stretching would get rid of.

The thief yelped, dropping the case as though it burned before the woman had to follow through with her threat. Two fast paces later Kel grabbed the red collar and felt it rip in his hand as the chunky guy twisted out of his grasp, leaving his ill-gotten gains behind. Then, before Kel could grasp him again, he shambled off at a fast clip without looking back.

Kel could easily have overtaken him—hell, he ran like a red sofa on speed—but GDE business came first, no matter how beautiful the victim. His first reaction had been correct.

She was trouble.

As the woman straightened, he checked her over with his eyes and tossed what was left of the shirt collar away with a grin. “That’s the problem these days, nothing’s made to last. You all right?”

“I’d have managed.” Her features were tight, the fabulous blue eyes shuttered. The words “Without you” hung in the air like a film title on a theater marquee. He realized she’d seen him hit that wall. How was she to know that just this once he hadn’t let duty win. A first for him. Though, instead of squandering the occasion on her, he wished he’d spent it on Gordie.

“You want to watch it, lady. Acting as if you’re in some kung fu TV show could get you more than you bargained for. Someone might take you up on it, and then where would you be?”

He reached for the case, flicking the name tag over to read. She was too quick for him. No surprise, considering he was working under two handicaps—the lush, arousing scent of her body and the way her breasts fell forward, cupped by the knit of her crop top.

One thing for sure, she wasn’t wearing a bra.

She caught him looking.

Well hell, he was only human.

“Thanks, I’ll remember that,” she replied, voice cool as the drink he’d fancied earlier, especially with the ice in her eyes to chill it.

She curled her fingers round the handle, pulling it closer.

“Let me get that for you.”

“No problem, it has wheels.” She flicked a catch on the curve of the red monstrosity and conjured up a handle. The laptop case still in his hand was written off by a raised brow that made him feel roughly the same size. “Shouldn’t you be saving your own luggage before it disappears?”

He recognized a dismissal when he heard it. His carrier still where he’d abandoned it, he picked it up and realized she must have been watching him, as well. At least he’d been savvy enough not to damage the laptop. Gorgeous she may be, but he’d long ago given up abandoning his gear in a lost cause, or given the IT engineers who’d invented its programs cause for complaint.

That given, why did that look she’d shot him earlier still rankle? For sure, he wouldn’t disappoint her in the sack, but what man wanted to be needed just for the sex?

He joined the tail-end passengers, all too caught up in their own affairs to react to the contretemps. But on his way to the terminal, he noticed her shades in the gutter and picked them up. He wouldn’t mind another close-up of those cool blue eyes.

A vision startled him with its clarity. A hank of black hair twisting round one hand, to pull her closer, the other sliding under her crop top, bringing an end to another ice age.

Hell, a guy could dream, couldn’t he? That and no more.

Time to scrape the bottom of the barrel and see what floated to the surface.

Waiting at the boarding gate, the thought of how close she’d come to losing the package in her care bathed Ngaire in cold sweat. It was worth a fortune. The fear of not living up to the trust placed in her yawned at the back of her mind like a bottomless pit waiting for her to trip. By now it had been checked in and was secreted in the plane’s hold, safe while no one suspected its nature. The attempted theft today had to be a coincidence. She’d told no one but Leena of her plans. And her best friend would never let her down, not even for the million dollars Paul Savage had brandished under Ngaire’s nose. Savage thought her a fool for turning it down. Like a spoiled child he couldn’t imagine not getting his own way, yet Savage was as every bit an outlaw as the ones who once held up coaches saying, “Your money or your life.”

She’d chosen life. The money didn’t come into it.

Taking a long, cooling drink of orange juice, she scanned the passengers for the guy in the black-and-white shirt but couldn’t see him. So, why bother?

“Yeah, yeah,” she chided herself, knowing his features had made her heart jolt at first glance. One of those things you read about but never in a million years expected to happen.

Disillusionment had come hard on the heels of the first thrill spiking low in her belly. He was no different from all the rest.

Sure, she could take care of herself. She was a hapkido master, for heaven’s sake. No fragile rosebud ready for picking.

Then again, she yearned for just one man to treat her like that bud, even after discovering her talent. Was that why she hadn’t set him right when he’d patronized her attempt to regain her luggage? Annoying, yes, but she couldn’t have it both ways.

Even as he’d been telling her off, “You want to watch it, lady,” the timbre of his voice had made her shiver with desire. You mean lust, don’tcha? She’d been careful not to let it show and now she was kicking herself for pouting like a spoiled brat.

For real, the thief hadn’t been quite so certain her stance was all show and no substance. She’d caught a flicker of fear in his eyes as she faced up to him. Her rescuer had been the mugger’s last straw, sending his fat, sturdy legs into a Road-runner windmill.

The guy who’d made her heart leap from her breast would be in no doubt of her abilities by now, if she’d had to carry through and taken the bozo out. Shooting herself in the foot again by losing any chance of seeing a look in his eye that said she was special. Not superwoman special. Just the ordinary, everyday meeting of minds, attraction, desire and falling in love.

Foolish, when she’d never see him again. But for a moment, she’d looked, and wanted something more than the same old, same old. Her relationships all took a predictable cycle.

Me man, you wo…man.

Then bring out the role confusion. Me man, you…?

She was five-four and could down a two-hundred-and-fifty pound man with a flick of her wrist. What did she need a man for?

Ngaire had never yet come out with “Duh? Sex, dummy!” But she’d wanted to.

Surely there was one man in the world she couldn’t intimidate?

What she needed was someone with X-ray vision. Someone who could see through her soft black cotton do bock uniform pants and tunic to the flesh-and-blood woman underneath.

She remembered when their eyes met, how the crush scrambling to find their gear had melted away. For a brief moment there had been only her, only him.

Then she’d caught his fight-or-flight reaction. Ngaire knew the sensation well, adrenaline pumping hard, flowing out to the nerve endings and the body’s response. She never felt so alive as when she was afraid of death. And these days that was every time she let her mind wander.

He’d hesitated, sending her gratification on a steep downward slide weighed by chagrin.

So, she’d been wrong before and she’d be wrong again. No sense in putting herself through the wringer for a guy she’d exchanged less than a dozen words with. She’d never see him again.

“Mind if I sit here?”

Scratch the last statement.

He was here, and he wanted to sit at her table.

His eyes narrowed and the words, dark and dangerous took on new meaning. Ngaire’s heart began practicing rolls and break falls, beating its little self up against the barrier of her sternum. Stay cool. Remember, he hadn’t survived the cut in the macho stakes. She looked around, counted four empty tables. “No worries, help yourself.”

She’d known he was tall, but until he sat opposite she hadn’t had the pleasure of assessing the width of his shoulders. They made his chair look as if it came out of a kindergarten classroom. She could tell that every last bit of him, narrow waist and hips, broad chest, were in perfect proportion. And that was only the bits she could see. Maybe she should stop staring at him as if she’d escaped from someplace surrounded by high walls and barbed wire.

He’d bought a beer. The hands carrying it were large, palms wide, fingers long, blunt-tipped and workmanlike as he set down a dewy bottle already dripping rings onto the table. “Glad to see you’re none the worse for your adventure.”

“It was nothing, thanks to you. And there’s nothing to get over. I’ve had worse experiences.” Memory plucked a knife out of the past and laced it with pain.

Now, what had made her say that? On average, it took longer to refer to the most horrific incident in her life. Right about the time she got over worrying about taking her clothes off and showing her scars.

She shrugged it off with a quick piece of trivia. “Did you know that, worldwide, the odds of getting mugged are 260,463 to one?”

“I guess I do now.”

He grinned at her, making his dark, almost black eyes crinkle at the corners. He was the first honest-to-God guy she’d met with a Kirk Douglas dimple in his chin. Maybe that was why his mouth had a little curl to the lip that reminded her of someone.

Someone else. Hazy, dreamlike, the notion tugged at her mind though she couldn’t put a name to him.

“Of course the odds increase depending on where you live.”

“Bet you never thought you’d become a statistic in a little place like Tahiti.” He lifted the bottle to his mouth and drank.

It was unrealistic to envy an inanimate object. The bottle had no way of knowing how lucky it was. “Guess I’m now a three-time loser.”

His drink halted midway to the table. “I don’t know about the other two, but you didn’t lose this round. Better to say third time’s the charm.”

Charm? Dare she give any credence to that stupid good-luck sign on her case working? She felt like a dweeb carting it around, but it had been a condition of her trip. As if anyone in the South Seas would be interested in the whereabouts of the Blue Grasshopper? So they’d taken a ratty old building and done it up into a variety of bars, restaurants and nightclubs. That was only a smattering of the attractions in Chinatown.

When she didn’t answer, he said, “Jeez, I hope you don’t think I was minimizing your ability to look after yourself.”

His dark eyes glinted above high slashed cheekbones as he pushed a curl of thick dark hair from his forehead. Sheesh, he was disarming. Something about this man called to her, no matter that there wasn’t a hope in hell of this meeting leading to anything more.

“It’s just that I’m not very big, right?” she murmured, her voice as low as she’d learned to set her expectations.

They perked up at his “From where I’m sitting you look just about perfect. A real live doll.”

His top lip lifted in a half smile. The guy was hitting on her, she could tell. Pity the line wasn’t new, but it did make her smile. Men had to have a secret phone number that dished those lines out, so many a dollar.

The trouble with hope, it kept floating to the surface. “I have taken self-defense lessons for women.”

Taken them, taught them, what was the difference?

“What kind? Judo or karate?”

“Neither. Hapkido…” She took a slug of orange juice, anything to stop from talking. If she didn’t fill her mouth, her life story would come spilling out. Keep telling yourself that those muscles are more poster boy than superhero.

“That deserves kudos. Women should know how to defend themselves.” He stretched across to take her hand. “We didn’t exchange names. Mine’s Kel.”

Good grief, she was going to have to touch him. She put down her glass, wiped a palm that had gone sweaty on her pants, until she could no longer leave his hand floating in midair without looking as dweebish as her luggage.

No good pretending her hesitation had anything to do with knowing the average amount of germs on the human hand. It was the thought of ending up as a wet puddle melting all over his shoes.

Too late, she laid her hand in his. Held it a moment too long as the shock sent the blood rushing from her extremities to vital organs like her heart, which was pounding fit to burst. “Ngaire, I’m called Ngaire,” she repeated like an idiot with a few brain cells short of a mind.

“Now, I guess that’s spelled N-y-r-e-e?”

“No, N-g-a-i-r-e.”

“That’s Maori, isn’t it? I thought you were an American.”

He leaned closer, interested, maybe too interested. And, with the response he’d wrung out of her gone-haywire body, dangerous. Before she knew it she’d be spilling her guts about the package she had to deliver. Too dangerous.

She shrugged, dropping her gaze to hide the lie. “I guess my mother read it in a book.” A book with her grandmother’s name in the flyleaf.

She decided to turn the tables, ask questions and let him do the talking while she got ready to leave. “Are you a native of New Zealand?”

“Yes, but it’s been a long time since I was home.” Kel put the bottle back to his lips and took a long swallow.

The movement in his throat, the earthy slide of his Adam’s apple while he downed the rest of his beer in one, hypnotized her. Keep away from there, girl, she scolded herself. This isn’t a pleasure trip you’re on. It’s more important than sex. A life depended on it.

Her own.

Leaving her unfinished juice on the table, she stood. “I need to freshen up. You have a nice visit back home. Bye, now.”

He stood. “Maybe I’ll see you around.”

“I doubt it. We’re just two planes who had a near miss, never to waggle wings again.”

“Take care, now.” He held out his hand. It hurt to ignore it, but the cost of touching him was way too high.

“Don’t worry, I will.” She’d take care not to run into him again before her plane left. Ngaire glanced around, her eyes seeking the nearest rest room and safety. It was one thing to shake a man off physically, emotionally it was a whole other ball game. She didn’t need anyone taking her mind off her goal. That track led to trouble.

Kel’s time was running out. A pleasure though it had been talking to Ngaire as he gave the other passengers the once-over, his target needed identifying before he got onboard that plane. Not that her back view wasn’t as easy on the eye as the front as she strode away with her small navy day pack swaying above her hips.

Ngaire’s unwitting remark about near misses reduced his sex life to a metaphor. Brief encounters were his specialty, a quick fumble beneath the covers, a halfhearted satiating of the soul, then back to work. That’s how he liked it, with nothing to come between him and his career—no wife, no family, not even a relationship. Not anymore.

Yeah, he had no regrets about watching her walk away. Not that she would be alone for long. Something about her set men’s mouths drooling. Even the guy on the phone broke off his conversation, holding the receiver at chest level as he watched her go by.

“Thank you, Ngaire,” Kel muttered as an idea struck him that put a wide cat-that-got-the-pigeon grin on his face. She’d given him the perfect solution simply by walking out on him.

He didn’t feel so bad now about the distraction. One look at her braid swinging behind her chair, like a come-hither signal, and he’d been lost, driven to speak to her.

Having rescued her sunglasses from the gutter seemed the perfect excuse, but the second he got within sniffing distance of her honeyed scent, all had been forgotten.

It was her eyes, he thought, as he opened his cell phone. Those blue irises, with their unusual tinge of green, were out of kilter with her skin and hair coloring. The long lashes framing them made them look as if a coal miner had set them in her face. He knew she was American, she’d told him so, but there was something exotic, different, to the cast of her features, as if they’d been culled from different parts of the world and put together to make her look like a houri, all temptation and forbidden delights.

But enough speculating. She had it right, they’d never meet again. Unless they were on the same flight. Nah, the gods couldn’t be that kind, or that cruel.

Kel punched the Faa’a airport’s number into the high-tech pad of the cell phone and asked for the information desk. Once the clerk came on line he fixed his problem by asking her to page Mr. Two Feathers McKay, traveling on flight ATN 104.

Simple.

The best plans always were. All he had to do now was wait and see which man in the passenger lounge answered the call.

The announcement filled the terminal for the third time, and still no one had moved. The best laid plans, et cetera…

He began sweating on it.

From the corner of his eye he caught sight of Ngaire, pack in hand, her braid like a pendulum counting the seconds as she headed straight for the nearest hospitality phone. In no time at all, Kel heard her incredulous, “Hello. You wanted me?”

Kel hung up.

Yeah, he’d wanted her, but not anymore. Now he knew what the initial N. stood for. Ngaire.

Ngaire Two Feathers McKay.

He’d aced her features: Maori, Native American and Scottish, an eclectic mix and a damn beautiful one. She reminded him of a pup he’d had as a kid. Bitzer, he’d called it. Cute as all hell. But the moment his back was turned, it would creep up and sink its little, sharp teeth into the back of his heel.

So, Ngaire had rung his bell and he hated her for it. Hated being wrong about her. But she was wrong, too.

She would be seeing him again.

Chapter 2

N gaire couldn’t believe she was here in the flesh instead of her imagination. As the plane circled before landing she’d had her nose glued to the window, would have been halfway through the thing if she’d been able to open it.

Paradise, her grandfather had called it as he’d told her stories of his time here as a GI during World War Two. From on high it had all looked so beautiful, the sea blue, the lakes silver, the snow-capped peaks like models from some school project. This was where George Two Feathers had met her grandmother, this land of myth and legend. Like the ones he’d read her from books her grandmother had brought to America. They’d been her fairy tales, and the one that leapt to mind was the Maori god Maui, and fishing up the North Island using a whale’s jawbone as a hook. Ngaire did a mental eye roll as she headed for the escalator down to immigration, grinning wide enough to make her jaw ache.

“Kia ora.”

Ngaire handed her passport to the immigration officer, wishing she could return her greeting without making a mishmash of the language. “Hi.”

Her passport was stamped New Zealand and passed back to her with “Enjoy your stay.”

“Thanks, I will.”

Less than fifteen minutes later Ngaire’s case went through the X-ray machine. She caught the operator’s frown as his chair swiveled away from the monitor, pointing something out to the customs officer towering over the end of the conveyer belt.

“Is there a problem?” Pretending she hadn’t a notion what might have caught his attention, she smiled, blanking out the urge to wipe her palms.

“Did you pack this case yourself?” He looked down his long nose at her, grim as an Easter Island statue.

“Yes, before I left Moorea this morning.” She wasn’t fluffy enough to play it sweet; more brown sugar than candy floss, she stuck to being pleasant, just a woman enjoying a holiday in the South Pacific.

“Open it for me, please?”

It was stupid, but her first reaction was relief that she’d packed all her undies in the pocket. Darn stupid, to worry more about watching his hands slide through her silk thongs than what she knew he would find.

Her glance spun around the Customs hall as fast as her fingertips twirled the numbers of the lock. Pleased to find Kel wasn’t there to witness her humiliation, when she’d done dialing in the codes she turned the clasps toward the customs officer, leaving him to open the case.

As he worked, her mind listed every souvenir she’d bought, dismissing them all as trash alongside what she carried.

There could be only one thing he was after.

As her eyes lifted she caught the inquisitive stare of the elegant French woman she’d been seated beside during the flight and felt herself color. She’d envied the other woman’s cool panache on the plane, knowing she’d never achieve its like in a million years. Such things were bred in the bone, and each of her hodgepodge of ancestors was still fighting for top billing, unable to decide if she was Native American, Maori or Scots.

Her ears picked out the rustle of bubble wrap, drawing her gaze to the officer’s hands. He’d gotten down to the layer where she’d packed her black do bok. She didn’t know why she’d brought it except for the security it represented. Heart jumping to her throat, she watched him untie the black belt with its gold insignia proclaiming her status as a hapkido master.

“Stop!” The command left her lips before she could prevent it, earning her a scowl from the guy with his fingers through the loops of her belt and a muffled curse from the guy on the monitor who’d knocked his papers to the floor.

“If you’re carrying illegal goods into the country, too late. You should have worried about it before you entered New Zealand.”

“It’s not that. I don’t mind you searching. I’d just prefer you did it somewhere private.” Her chest heaved as she took a deep breath and held it, waiting for a reply to her request.

Without answering or permitting a crack to soften his stony features, he signaled another officer, one in a supervisory position stationed close to the exit. A quiet word in the other guy’s ear and her case was refastened. “Follow Team Leader Bennett. He’ll take you to a private room. Do you wish to be accompanied by a female officer?”

Visions of a body search made her feel she’d lost everything from the knees down, but she brazened it out. “That won’t be necessary. I can explain everything.”

He didn’t say he’d heard it all before, but she’d bet anything the T-shirt under his uniform had that written across the chest, probably in capital letters. Without another word she followed the guy carrying her chintzy-looking suitcase out of the Customs hall.

The first time she’d seen it, with its stupid good-luck symbol, she’d known its luck had been meant for someone else. That the owners of the Blue Grasshopper hadn’t meant for her to win their contest for the trip to the South Pacific, or the luggage they’d thrown in with the prize.

Kel had wedged himself in a corner with a good view of the customs area while he spoke on his cell phone. “Where to now?”

The answer made him straighten, banging his elbow against the wall. “The Hilton? Are you sure? She doesn’t look the type.”

It wasn’t that he minded going upmarket, but it didn’t make sense. Most couriers he’d taken out were more concerned with blending into the woodwork. The heat invading his bloodstream confirmed the only place Ngaire would blend was an X-rated movie. His mind distracted by lust, he almost missed the rest of his instructions. “Tell me you’re joking?”

But his contact wasn’t.

They’d booked him on a guided tour of New Zealand. Seven days with his every move up for inspection by a busload of tourists. What was the cartel up to, transporting their courier that way?

There could be only one solution, kiss-and-tell was to be dropped off at some tourist destination. And if he didn’t stick like glue to Ngaire Two Feathers McKay, she’d be making the drop down some dark cave with glowworms as the only witnesses.

His gut tightened. He’d known that woman for trouble the first time he saw her, and he’d been right. How the hell was he to stay up close and personal and still keep his hands off her?

From the moment Team Leader Bennett flung open the door on the wrong side of the glass screens shielding the arrivals area, all Ngaire’s bodily apertures began displaying withdrawal symptoms. Hardly surprising since the first person she saw was a female officer who looked as if she enjoyed her work. One hint of snapping latex and Ngaire would be outta there.

Heck, she could handle all of them, no problem, including the big guy sitting behind the desk. But she had a feeling some countries got a mite upset with visitors who threw their officials against the walls, even walls that were as bare and gray as a prison cell.

“This lady’d prefer her things searched in private,” said Bennett. From his expression as he thumped her case onto the desk, he thought she was acting just too precious for words.

It sat there unopened while the handsome, copper-skinned officer with Manu Pomare on his name tag flipped through her passport. A quick read, since this was her first time out of the States. Hope sparked at the sight of his Maori name; surely he would understand that her reasons for leaving her precious cargo off her declaration form weren’t simply to avoid paying duty.

Finished, Pomare looked up and asked her, “What brings you Down Under, Ms. McKay?”

“I won a quiz show sponsored by a local nightspot. I’m a trivia nut and…” Ngaire could see her excuse didn’t cut any ice with the guy in charge, and her explanation stumbled on her lips. “First prize was a trip to the South Pacific, Australia and Singapore.”

A quick glance showed the prize impressed no one. Pomare flicked a finger and thumb at her suitcase. The sound of his fingernail hitting the lock filled the lumbering silence left by her boast. “And what are you carrying that needs to be hidden from the general public?”

“Open the case and I’ll show you.”

It took only a couple of seconds to remove her black do bok, the bubble wrap with its brown sticky tape would take slightly longer. She loosened one corner and pulled off a strip. Five more to go. Hesitation stilled her hands as her heartbeat gave a hiccup. Had the warm pulsing sensation she’d experienced when wrapping the parcel been more than just her imagination?

And had the startled yelp from the guy in Tahiti as he dropped her case come from pain rather than fear?

“Here,” Pomare said, offering her a letter opener.

“No, thanks. I can’t use anything that might damage it.”

The final layer under the bubble wrap was a white silk scarf more than fifty years old, yet more than two hundred years younger than the treasure hiding in its folds. This very scarf had been wrapped lovingly by her grandmother before she set out on her sea journey to the States. A silken cocoon to protect the only physical piece of her heritage she’d taken with her.

Ngaire pulled the scarf aside, the backs of her shaking knuckles skimming fifteen inches of paddle-shaped jade, careful of its cutting edge. She’d always known her inheritance was special. Magic. She’d been a child when her grandfather had spoken of the way the jade had darkened in the days before and after the deaths of her father and grandmother, and how the mottled spots had turned red as if flushed with blood.

She’d seen the phenomenon herself, seen the changes in the mere before her mother died. But, no warnings for her mother to please be careful had made any difference or stopped a car from ramming into her mother’s in the fog.

Less than four months ago George Two Feathers, master carpenter and carver, had been hard at work building display stands for an exhibition of Pacific Rim artifacts and weapons in the Halberg Museum.

In a casual conversation with one of the curators, George had mentioned the greenstone mere the family owned. The mere’s bloody history and the belief that an ancestral spirit lived inside it had intrigued the curator and her grandfather had been persuaded to loan it as part of the display.

It had been a curiosity when the mere had looked suffused with blood where everyone could see, and it earned a couple of inches in the local newspaper. The day George Two Feathers fell off scaffolding and broke his neck, the mere became front-page news.

That was how the mere came to the notice of Paul Savage.

The museum was high on the philanthropist’s list of charitable donations, topped only by places like the San Francisco opera house and the Savage Art Gallery, which his great-grandfather had endowed in the thirties. He was old money and never let anyone forget it. And the words borderline Mafia were never spoken aloud. At least, not to his face. Which meant her refusal to sell him the mere could make life downright hazardous. And now that she’d had time to think it over, Savage could be connected to the man who’d hijacked her case.

As Ngaire touched the greenstone, she felt it pulse with life. Then again, it might simply be the rush of blood through her veins. She shrugged off the eerie feeling of icy fingers counting the notches in her spine. Soon you’ll think you hear spooky music, she chided herself. It was one thing to believe the greenstone could become darkened with blood, another to imbue it with a heartbeat.

The original leather thong was still looped through the hole carved in the handle. Slipping her hand through the narrow strip, Ngaire lifted the paddle-shaped artifact above the desk from its resting place on the silken shawl and repeated its name. “Te Ruahiki.” She named the warrior chieftain, the Rangatira, whose spirit was said to have entered the mere on his death.

For a deadly weapon, the greenstone mere had a deceptive beauty, its sharp polished edges pale and almost see-through. It was as if all the light in the room had been sucked into the translucent green jade to produce an otherworldly glow. As if it knew that after all its years away from Aotearoa, New Zealand, it had come home.

And the theme tune from Jaws would start playing any second now. Get a grip, girl.

She saw Bennett’s jaw drop as if that would prevent him blinking his surprise. “A greenstone mere.”

“And not any ordinary one,” Manu Pomare said reverently as he got to his feet. “That’s inanga greenstone. Look at the hours of work in it, and the intricate carving on the handle. I’ve never seen another like it.”

As if fascinated, he reached out to touch, his gaze sliding from the mere to Ngaire as she swung it away from his hand.

His voice firmed. “How on earth did this come into your possession? There’s been a ban on exporting Maori artifacts for more than twenty years. The only ones to leave the country have either been stolen or smuggled out.”

“Whoa! Back up there. I’m no thief! No smuggler, either, unless you count bringing Te Ruahiki back home where it belongs. I do have letters of provenance, also one from William Ruawai, the chief of my grandmother’s subtribe.

“She was the last of her family and living in Auckland during the war when she met my grandfather, a GI, and part of the American contingent in New Zealand. After they married, naturally she took Te Ruahiki with her to the States. That would have been 1946, long before the law came into force.”

Bennett and the female officer crowded the desk. Ngaire’s shoulder ached from holding out the mere, but she hoped the sight would do more to further her cause than laying it down. “Can you understand why I wanted to reveal it in private? William warned me that some people will do anything to get their hands on it.”

Paul Savage included. The man had become obsessed with owning the Te Ruahiki. Obsessed, it seemed, with being forewarned of his death. She remembered the gleam in his eyes the last time he’d made her an offer, thinking she’d never refuse such a large sum.

He’d been wrong.

Wrapping the mere inside the silk scarf once again, she eyed the others in the room one by one. “Apart from William Ruawai, there are only four people in New Zealand who know what I’m carrying, and they’re all in this room.”

Thirty minutes had passed since Ngaire had been led away. Thirty minutes of talking and persuading them she wasn’t running a black-market scam, until finally a call to William Ruawai in the South Island had secured the release of herself and the mere.

Thirty minutes, time enough for all the other passengers on her flight to be in Auckland by now. No, she was wrong. One still remained.

A rush of overwhelming tiredness had replaced the excitement she’d felt on her arrival at Auckland. There was much more to the mere’s return to the land of her ancestors than she could have explained and still hoped to be believed.

Maybe one person in that cold gray office would have believed her life depended on the trip she would make to the South Island. Yeah, for all his modern haircut and clothes, Manu Pomare would fit right into a painting of a Maori warrior. All that was missing was the moko, the face tattoo.

He would know about breaking a tapu, and the curse it could bring down on a family. But would he believe that if her quest wasn’t successful then she only had six more weeks to live?

Ngaire didn’t know whether to be pleased or worried as she saw Kel approach. Her first reaction had been a slight lifting of her spirits at the sight of a face she knew, followed by the lead-weighted anxiety of wondering if Paul Savage had sent Kel to follow her. Yet, slow starter or not, he had tackled the thief.

A laugh, half hysterical, half foolish, forced its way through lips dry from talking her way out of a tense situation. It had made her see spooks where there couldn’t possibly be any.

It was hardly logical to blame Kel for her problems, yet she couldn’t rid herself of the feeling that everything in her world had been working perfectly until she’d laid eyes on him.

She turned her face away, pretending she hadn’t noticed him, hadn’t noticed the supple grace of his stride, or that he looked remarkably fit and cheerful for someone who’d sat in the same cramped seats as herself for more than six hours.

Weakening, she let her eyes draw back to him. Darn, he was still coming her way. The air left her lungs in one short, sharp huff. Disapproval, or a way of releasing the tingling feeling inside her? She couldn’t make up her mind.

Kel was an outstandingly attractive guy. Some woman’s dream man. “Handsome is as handsome does.” The thought produced a picture of him hesitating as her case disappeared, rather than his sexy smile. Why couldn’t she shake the feeling he had let her down even before they met?

The glint in his eye told her she would have to be rude to get rid of him. But she couldn’t very well say “Beat it! I need time to get my mind round the assumption that one of my ancestors is alive and well, if only in spirit, and I’m carrying him inside my case.”

The feeling of having a stopwatch running down the seconds of her life wasn’t quite as new. She’d learned to live with it, which might qualify as an oxymoron when what had really happened was that she’d discovered she’d likely die with it.

“So, Ngaire, we meet again,” he said, stopping less than three feet away, not quite invading her space but hovering on the outskirts.

Again, his crooked smile tugged at a memory, a bittersweet one that hinted at the refrain, long ago and far away. She refused to let it affect her. Refused to let hope surface where there was nothing to sustain it, except tiredness and a feeling of being alone and vulnerable. So she answered, “What I’m wondering is, why? I thought you’d have taken off ages ago. Were there no shuttles into the city?”

“It was a question of having to check in with my travel agent. All my arrangements were made in such a rush that I didn’t know which hotel she’d booked. Just one of the drawbacks of acting on the spur of the moment.”

“So you’re all fixed up now?”

“Yeah, but I was hoping to catch you before I took off. What took you so long?”

His teeth cut a white slash in his features. Another time, another place, that smile would have made her toes curl. But too quickly it disappeared as he came out with “They catch you trying to smuggle something into the country?”

Ngaire felt heat flame in her face as her sense of humor took a nosedive. His joke struck closer to the mark than was comfortable. “Just a small problem with my declaration form. I put a cross in the wrong place and the customs guy took some convincing of it. This is my first overseas trip and some of those questions are pretty ambiguous.”

“Your first? I’d never have guessed.” His gaze skimmed her body, breaching the space she’d thought protected her. “You look pretty experienced to me.”

Thanks for the nudge. Kel was so hot a woman was apt to lose her perspective. She shrugged. “A jerk’s a jerk no matter where you find him.”

Let him make what he would of that remark.

Ngaire accompanied the statement with a stare that should have made him back off, but he was obviously too full of his own appeal to take the hint.

“Tell me about it. In my line I must have met them all.”

“And what is your line?” Apart from hitting on strange women in airports. Tiredness, it seemed, had caught up with her again, making her feel disgruntled.

“I’m a sales rep for a software company.”

“Well, nice to meet you, Kel, but I’m not in the market for software.” Or soft looks. Or anything else he was selling, even if his eyes did look like melting chocolate and she was a chocoholic from way back. From this moment on, she was a recovering one.

“No problem. I’m on leave at the moment. Taking a vacation around my old stomping grounds before I head back to Australia. I cover the Pacific Rim and Southeast Asia.”

“Did you know Australia has twenty-five different varieties of fleas? More than any other country in the world.”

“No, I didn’t. It’s not something I’ve personally had to deal with. Now, snakes on the other hand—”

“Don’t get me started on those.” She shivered. “Nasty things, thank heavens there are none in New Zealand.” Only two-legged ones. “Just as well, because the way I feel at the moment, the only thing that could make me run is the sound of a hot shower.”

“How about having dinner with me after your shower?”

Kel must be good at his job. Tenacity was a big requirement for a sales rep. She’d thought she’d made herself pretty plain without being in-your-face rude. “I don’t think so. The only place I’m going after my shower is bed. And no, I don’t want company.”

“Too bad, I know all the best places…for dinner, that is.”

Despite her weakened condition she averted her gaze from Kel’s melting eyes and too sexy mouth and caught sight of a shuttle pulling up outside the terminal. “That’s my ride, I’ve got to run.”

“I’d better give you back your rose-colored glasses, then. You’re starting to sound as if you need them.”

She gasped with delight as he dangled the pink shades in front of her. She’d thought they were gone for good.

Guilt dropped into her conscience, cold and heavy and weighing on her. Her shoulders jinked slightly from side to side, as if that would shift the blame. It didn’t.

“It was kind of you to wait. I’m sorry if I seemed less than sociable, but you know how it is. It’s been a long day. All I want to do is find my hotel.”

“No worries, you didn’t offend me. Which hotel are you in?”

“The Hilton.” Ngaire felt uncomfortable saying the name. Every time she did, it sounded too much like boasting for a girl who lived in the blurred area where Chinatown and North Beach merged. But it was all part of her prize, and she wasn’t one to look a gift horse in the teeth even if they were gold plated.

“The Hilton? Great! That’s where I’m staying.” He looked over his shoulder at the shuttle just starting to fill up outside. “I can ride along with you. It’ll be fun.”

Too frazzled to disagree, Ngaire simply went with the flow as his laptop case changed hands and he took her elbow to accompany her to their transport. Her heartbeat kept time with the wheels of her suitcase as it clicked, clicked, clicked across the tiled floor. Now, what were the odds that they’d both be booked into the Hilton? Neither of them looked to be of the platinum-card variety. But then, looks could be deceiving.

Garnet Chaly eased his slim backside into the chair, a hand on each arm as if it might rock under him. The illusion brought about by the fact that all he could see below him was water. The Waitemata Harbour that the Auckland Hilton perched over.

Running a hand through silver hair just long enough for studied elegance, he leaned back in the chair. Surveying the hotel room, Chaly rubbed his thumb against his fingertips with a shivery whisper of skin against skin that he found soothing. Outside the window, the lowering sun had turned the sea silver, as if the Hilton had ordered it to match its decor of pale gray, blond wood and white. Luxurious, yet minimalist, like a sleek ocean-going yacht. The company was doing Jellic well this time around.

Chaly crossed his ankle over one knee and twitched the cuff of his black pants level with his socks as he heard the click of a keycard sliding through the slot in the door.

As it swung open, Kel filled the gap between the doorjambs, silhouetted against the light from the corridor, but there was no mistaking the high-bridged nose or the cheekbones that made his Dalmatian heritage unmistakable.

Instead of looking into the room, he faced right and gave a wave, not turning until after he heard the sound of a door closing nearby. Shifting sideways, he eased the bag over his shoulder and into the room. He was a big bugger, rough around the edges when he needed to be, but tonight he looked like a beach bum. “Aloha, Kel. Where’s the luau?”

Kel’s suit carrier hit the stand provided. “I know, the shirt needs changing, but I didn’t want the target out of sight for however long it took. One of many drawbacks to working without a partner. Have you fixed me up with a new one?”

Kel threw him a swift, hopeful glance as he placed his laptop bag on the writing desk. Its spindly metal legs barely looked able to support its top, never mind all the gear Chaly knew his agent would be carrying.

“None available. Training new agents takes time, and Gordie Tan was the third casualty in as many months. There’s been a lot of negligence doing the rounds, watch it’s not catching.”

Hands fisted on his hips, Kel prowled toward the window and stared at the water. Without turning he said, “I bet that just cuts you up.”

“All my agents are important. Without them the South Pacific would be the hellhole it became after Cook navigated these waters. Meanwhile we all have to pick up the slack, you included. That said, I’m only a call away if you need me.”

Hiding his face couldn’t disguise the emotion choking Kel. Chaly’s fingertips moved faster against his thumb. Damn Jellic, a perpetual do-gooder. He’d always been a sentimental fool. Hell, the only reason he’d joined GDE was to right all the perceived wrongs his father had done. Chaly knew all about Jellic’s father. A man who’d driven off the top of a cliff rather than face the consequences of being a bent cop caught dealing drugs.

His sister was similarly maimed by their family history. He’d heard that Jo McQuaid Stanhope and her brand-new husband, a millionaire, had started digging around in the past, trying to prove the father innocent. Idealists, they never could be happy with just the money.

With the sea and the islands of the gulf blocking in the rest of the window frame, Kel worried at the stubble on his chin as if considering an apology for his rudeness. Too easy. No way was Chaly going to give him a chance to back down or pull out. Knowing Jellic the way he did, he solved his problem by going for the jugular.

“If you can’t handle the pressure, say so now and I’ll take the job on myself. I hear the target’s built. Maybe I could get myself some of that.”

Chaly’s silky sarcasm relieved the tension. He resisted giving away his thoughts by shaking his head. Hell, he could take on Jellic’s job, no sweat. But Kel could never do his until he learned how to spell dispensable.

“I never said I couldn’t cope, but a bloody bus tour! How crappy is that? Do you know where they take you to on those tours? The Waitomo Caves, for God’s sake! Walks through the rain forest. She could ditch the papers anyplace and we’d never find them. It’s obvious now she’s only carrying the formula, because they checked her out at customs and didn’t find anything.”

The satisfaction of getting his way stuttered to a halt. “You’re sure they didn’t find anything?”

“She’s here, isn’t she? Right next door.” Kel started unzipping the bag holding his laptop. “Ngaire said it was only because she’d marked the wrong square on her declaration form.”

“Ngaire?”

“You didn’t really think I’d been wasting my time?” Quickly opening his laptop case, Kel palmed a small device from one of the pockets, then walked to the dividing door separating his room from the one next door. He opened it quietly, attaching the electronic gadget to the other door, listened for a moment, then tried the handle. “Locked. She’s having a shower. I’ll check out her gear later.”

“Don’t get caught. If she knows we’re on to her we might as well pack up now, as we’ll never know her contact or the drug cartel behind them.” For the first time since Jellic arrived Chaly felt a need to stand, get on the same level.

“You trying to teach me to suck eggs?”

“Sure, and spiders have wings. I’m just reminding you of the importance of this mission. If kiss-and-tell reaches Asia, we’ll never be able to halt its production.”

“How can you be sure this is the only copy of the formula?”

“I’m sure. Dead sure, and that’s all you need to know. Whoever knows the formula can hold the world at ransom. You know how easy it is to slip ecstasy into someone’s drink, do it with kiss-and-tell and they’ll be paying for it the rest of their life. It’s either that or death.”

“Then let me go in there now and search her luggage.”

“Do you really think it’s that easy? No country in the world will prosecute her for carrying a piece of paper with a formula written on it. We have to strike at the optimum moment and take out her contact. I doubt if he’ll be as clean as she appears to be. We need to know who we’re up against. There hasn’t been a whisper of the outfit’s name on the streets, only some scuttlebutt about the drug. And there’s always someone who thinks he can take a rumor and turn it into a profit, so you might not be the only one with an eye to the main chance where Ms. McKay’s concerned. It has to be one of the triads. But which one?

“They’re holding all the cards and keeping them close to their chest.”

“So take it now and let’s be done!” Kel exclaimed.

“No. You’ll have to steal the formula eventually. Whatever happens, the secrets of kiss-and-tell must end up in our hands.”

“That reminds me.” Kel produced a plastic bag from the case on the desk and tossed it in Chaly’s direction. There was a matchbook inside.

“What’s this for?”

“My fingerprints will be on there, and with a bit of luck, the prints of the guy who tried to steal Ngaire’s case outside Faa’a airport. Maybe he was an opportunist, but with the amount of Gucci luggage in the same pile I’d say he’d targeted hers.”

“This is the one time I hoped not to be proved correct quite so easily. At least now we know we’re not the only ones on her trail. Stay close to her. Hell, sleep with her if necessary. I’m sure it wouldn’t take much for a guy like you to pull her. And for God’s sake, take care they don’t take out the courier before we do.”

“The target thinks she can take care of herself—she’s taken self-defense lessons,” Jellic snorted. The first bit of humor Chaly had heard in his voice since he arrived.

“That won’t help against a gun.”

“Speaking of which, did you bring what I need?”

Chaly approached the bedside table and opened the drawer. “See for yourself.”

There, lying beside the Bible, was a Smith & Wesson Chief’s Special Airweight with a two-inch barrel and filed-down trigger to prevent it from catching on his boot, plus a load of ammunition.

Jellic joined him, picking up the ankle holster. “Just the thing for a trek through the rain forest. Are my vouchers for the tour here as well?”

Outside the sun was going down and the room looked as if it was filled with gray water. Chaly switched on the bedside lamp and encouraged it to drain away. “That’s them in the wallet with the New Zealand dollars. Your itinerary’s there, too.”

His stomach pinched as he watched Kel flip through the papers. Time to eat. “Now that you’re armed and dangerous, I’ll take my leave.”

At the door he turned, his fingers on the handle. Jellic was stripping his black floral shirt off. He stood wearing only his crumpled slacks, bathed in the light from the lamp like a modern version of a white knight. Maybe the target would take a shine to him. Chaly believed in using any ammunition he had.

“One more thing, Jellic, try to stay out of trouble.”

“Don’t worry, boss. I already made that decision for myself. And believe me, I’m going to do my damnedest to stay out of her… Slip of the tongue. I meant trouble.”

Chapter 3

N ext morning, Kel took a chance to give his sister Jo a call while he knew Ngaire was in the shower. He didn’t have her home number, but she was sure to be at work by eight. Jo was the baby of the family, the only girl, and probably had had a rougher upbringing than she might have if their mother had lived. He and his brothers had teased the hell out of her. Since Jo was scarcely three inches shorter than him and had been a cop for more years than he could remember, he’d think twice about doing it now.

With Jo’s phone ringing in his ear he kept an eye on the picture on his computer screen. This came courtesy of the fisheye lens he’d slipped through the lock of the connecting door last night. Fiber optics had come a long way. The reception was almost as good as being there. Almost.

So why did it make his skin itch to watch her every move? It had never troubled his conscience when he’d used the setup before. Why did he feel like a voyeur in this instance?

“Detective Jellic.” His sister answered at almost the same moment he saw Ngaire leave the ensuite wearing only a towel.

He had to swallow before he could answer. “Hey, sis, what’s with the name? I heard you’d got married, congratulations.”

“Is that you, Kel? Where are you?”

“Yeah, it’s me, and I’m in Au-ck-land.” The name of his hometown came out mangled as Ngaire dropped her towel. She was tanned all over, and low on her belly a few silvery scars that looked like a botched appendix operation stood out against the bronze skin.

“Yes, I’m married, but I don’t use my name on the job. The powers-that-be have a problem with the wife of one of the Stanhopes using her real name. Too dangerous, they reckon. A temptation to kidnappers. So, when can we meet? I can’t believe you’re home after all these years. Have you spoken with Kurt yet? I’m sure your twin would appreciate a call.”

Ngaire stepped into her black lace thong. Turning her back to the camera, she skimmed a finger between the silky narrow strip and her rounded buttocks, adjusting it to fit.

His mouth went dry as his mind imagined his fingers doing the same. Finally his sister prompted him to answer. “Kel, are you still there?”

“Uh, yeah. Sorry, I got distracted.” More than that, he felt embarrassed, as though standing talking to his sister with a hard-on pressing against his zipper put him beyond the pale.

“No. Kurt and I haven’t been in touch.”

At least not in any way he could explain to Jo. He’d been feeling his twin’s pain for more than a year now and knew that though Kurt’s body had healed from the accident on Mt. Everest where two of his friends lost their lives, his mind was a long way from getting over it.

“I won’t be able to see you this time, I’m on the job.”

“I don’t suppose there’s any point in me asking what job?”

“Right, sis, but don’t worry, I’m not crossing into your territory.” The hardest part of his work was not being able to discuss it with his family. The only one he couldn’t completely hide things from was Kurt. The link between them went both ways, like one of those old phones they’d made as kids with a tin can at each end and a string carrying vibrations.

“I guess I’ll have to take your word for that.”

As he began to answer Jo, Ngaire started dressing and robbed him of speech. He’d been sure Ngaire didn’t wear a bra, and now he knew for certain as she slipped a baby-blue T-shirt over her head. It wasn’t as short as the crop top she’d worn yesterday, but as it barely covered her waist, and she’d still to put her pants on, it did nothing to help his predicament, which was rock-hard.

Seemed his sister had taken his heavy breathing and sighs as something else. “Well, you can’t blame me for being skeptical. I’m a cop, it comes with the job. I wish we could meet, though. I really wanted to speak to you about Dad.”

One leg at a time, Ngaire’s oh-so-tempting skin disappeared from view behind navy capri pants. “Thank God!”

“What?”

He realized Jo had thought his heartfelt exclamation was meant for her and quickly turned it to fit his feelings about his father. “I mean, thank God we can’t meet, because he’s the last person I want to talk to you or anyone else about.”

“The situation isn’t going to go away, Kel. You have to face it some time. I’m sure Kurt would agree.”

“Leave him out of it. Kurt knows my feeling on this better than anyone else.” The screen showed Ngaire gathering up a few things, then she disappeared from view inside the wardrobe. What seemed like an age later, she reappeared holding her small navy day pack and a light nylon yellow raincoat.

“So, have you been in touch with him? Did you know he was living near Queenstown?”

“No, but I knew he was depressed. I thought it was because of his accident. Talk about shades of masochism, what’s he doing surrounding himself with mountains?”

“He’s building a lodge down that way to cater to skiers in the winter and climbers in the summer.”

“Damn, it’s worse than I thought.” He knew instinctively that Kurt had no intention of ever climbing again, so what the hell was his twin up to? The sight of Ngaire opening her bedroom door brought his speculation to a halt. “Gotta go. Talk to you on the way back and we’ll sort out Kurt.”

He slipped one foot, then the other into his boots, pulling them up blind as he checked the clock on the bedside table, then lifted the cell phone that Chaly had left beside the wallet and gun. It only took a second to straighten his khaki pants over his boots and cover the S & W in its holster.

He allowed himself another minute to shut down the computer while he removed the lens from next door, because of an inborn belief that people would as soon take a shortcut as not, housemaids and himself included. That minute and the few others it would take him to search her room should give Ngaire time to descend the five floors to the restaurant for the breakfast included in the tour package.

Kel punched the requisite numbers into his cell phone on the walk to the elevator. He’d found nothing in Ngaire’s luggage but some underwear, and that had made him feel a regular letch as he pawed his way through it with the scent she wore floating up from a pile of silk fancies. The clothes she’d hung up in the wardrobe were easier on his concentration, and though his search was swift, it was thorough and there was no evidence of the formula.

“Heartbreaker,” he said, giving his code name to control. Gordie’s idea, because Kel pulled the girls yet brushed them aside.

Heartbroken would have been more appropriate, but he hadn’t told Gordie that. His buddy had thought it funny, but with him gone the joke had worn thin. There was no room for relationships in his life; his work didn’t lend itself to anything permanent. If he’d discovered anything about love it was that the two Ds, death and divorce, would take care of it for him.

“Anything new?” He listened as the guy on the other end gave him what little information Chaly had already passed on. This assignment had him fumbling around in a fog, half blind. Whoever said “No news is good news” was in a different line of work.

“No, nothing to report at this end. She had room service, no calls in or out and went to bed early.” Almost naked.

“A woman, huh? I’ll add that to what I’ve got here.”

“Right. I’ve just made a fruitless search of her room. Whatever she’s carrying she has it on her. I’ll be out most of the day. No contact unless it’s an emergency. I’ll have company. Heartbreaker signing off until 2200 hours.”

He was the only one waiting, and was amazed when the elevator arrived empty. No distractions. Nothing to stop him questioning the unfamiliar sensation curling in his gut.

Guilt? That would be a new one. It never bothered him spying on the people he investigated. They were the scum of the earth and asked for everything they got.

His father included?

Usually, he avoided going down that road, but Jo had set his memories stirring. One thing for sure, his father’s children hadn’t deserved the fallout from Milo Jellic’s brief flirtation with drug dealing. Sure, in a one-parent unit they’d been halfway dysfunctional before his death, but the final years of childhood, with only Grandma Glamuzina in charge of five teenagers had completed what his mother’s early demise had started. There’d been times when he’d thought suicide—the option his father had taken—put Milo Jellic one up on the rest of the family. They’d had to take all the crap that followed.

Although he hated to admit it, the military had given him some sense of what he’d been missing, and when he met Carly, his ex-wife, he’d been certain he had it all.

So, he couldn’t be right all the time. About two years after his divorce was finalized he’d been offered the chance to join GDE and jumped at it.

Payback time. Payment for the devastation his father had helped wreak on the families of addicts, and more personal, for being robbed of what little childhood he’d enjoyed.

So, why the guilty feelings about watching Ngaire?

Why did the guilt feel stronger when he thought of her going to bed in the white, opaque silk nightdress that hid none of her lush charms, than when she’d been naked? Was it the hot blood pulsing in his groin while doing his job that sent tentacles of shame spreading through his veins?

He shook off the feeling as the silent disappearance of the elevator doors brought the second-floor lobby into view.

The word tentacles was a dead giveaway to the state of his subconscious. Ngaire was making a sucker of him with her exotic looks, white virginal silk sleepwear over a siren’s body sculpted in pale copper with her shoulders cloaked in the shining jet veil of hair she’d left loose. Under his breath, he let out a wry curse at the direction his mind was taking.

As if written in headlines, A Mata Hari for Our Times flashed across his retina in a subconscious warning. One thing for sure, unlike James Bond he had no intention of sleeping with the enemy.

Sleeping with the enemy.

The echo flirted with his memory. Chaly saying, “I hear the target’s built,” then later, “Sleep with her if necessary.”

When had his boss discovered the courier was a woman? And why hadn’t he passed the news on to either him or control earlier? Come to that, what else did he know that he hadn’t passed on? Time had taught him that when the top brass started keeping secrets from you it was essential to watch your back.

His gaze zoomed in on Ngaire’s table, an automatic response from some sort of residual magnetism, useful even if annoying.

“I’d like a table at the rear by the window,” he told the hostess, knowing the restaurant wasn’t busy enough for her to mind him choosing.

Ngaire was supping cereal as he approached her table. He caught her with the spoon to her mouth as he said, “’Morning, Ngaire. I hope you slept well.”

The spoon in her hand waved in response as she desperately chewed what she had in her mouth—muesli, judging from the amount of crunching going on. Her eyes widened, focusing on the chair opposite as she swallowed. He knew it was perverse to take satisfaction from her discomfort, though he had to admit she looked cute, and young.

Too young for the game she was playing.

“’Morning, and yes, I slept fine. Did you want to join me?”

“No, I won’t disturb you.” I’ll leave that until later. “Maybe I’ll see you around.” Count on it.

When he finally caught up with the hostess, she motioned him to a table by the window where the wind spattered the glass with sea and rain. Sitting farther back, he could keep Ngaire in plain view without affording her the same opportunity.

He shrugged off his light rainproof bomber jacket, hanging it over the back of his chair before heading for the breakfast buffet to load up his plate. No problem there, he was a quick eater, a trait that came with being a member of a large family.

Soon they’d have to board the bus for the Gannets and Grapes part of the tour northwest of the city. Their bus would leave at 0900 hours. Ngaire’s small day pack looked as though it was loaded for everything but bear. Being a guy he needed much less—a jacket to keep off the rain, his wallet and a gun to take care of the rest. Maybe even bears. The human kind.

Kel planned to be last onboard. That way he wouldn’t have to endure sitting beside Ngaire with a libido still fragile from watching her this morning. He’d never had any trouble imagining a woman naked, but Ngaire had exceeded anything his mind could conjure up.

Spearing bacon, eggs and mushrooms, he layered them up the tines of his fork and took a bite. If nothing else, he could enjoy the food. Everything was first class on this job.

Including his target.

Ngaire stifled a yawn as she squirmed farther down into the cushioned seat. “The tour is full, but I’ll find someone compatible to sit with you,” the tour guide had said, showing her to a window seat roughly halfway up the aisle. The guide’s accent had been pure Kiwi, though her looks were Oriental, and Ngaire found a sense of fellowship.

Outside in the cafés bordering Prince’s Wharf, where the hotel was built, umbrellas drooped miserably, like sun hats caught in a sudden downpour, and what patrons there were hid inside. This wasn’t exactly the welcome she’d expected from paradise.

Though she’d told Kel she’d slept well, last night her slumber had been filled with visions of Te Ruahiki. Not the war club, but its spirit, the original owner of the mere.

At least she knew she wasn’t going mad. There had been no escaping the reaction of the others at Customs; their eyes had widened, bulged. Even Manu Pomare had looked be-mused.

Once she’d had the temerity to tell her grandfather that no matter how much she’d enjoyed the legends as a child, stories of spirits locked up inside inanimate objects were way off the planet. The scary thing was, even though she’d long since done an about-face, she now believed with every fiber of her being that George Two Feathers had known best. There was indeed a spirit inside the greenstone mere.

With five minutes to go, it looked like she’d have a whole seat to herself. This suited her. She’d soon realized she was the odd man out, since most of her fellow passengers appeared to be Chinese. Considering she’d won the trip from the Blue Grasshopper, she shouldn’t have been surprised.

Although she’d picked up more than a few words of Cantonese, and even fewer of Mandarin, from living around Chinatown, she was anything but fluent, so from her standpoint it looked like this would be a lonely trip.

“You two should get on well together.” The tour guide spoke softly, but there was a big stick behind her words that brooked no argument. “None of the others speak much English,” the guide continued, smiling at Ngaire. Her almost black doe eyes twinkled in the calm masklike perfection of her face, as if she thought she’d done Ngaire a favor by bringing her Kel. She guessed the guy must have international appeal. “I’ll leave you to introduce yourselves.”

Kelvin Johnman. He’d honored her with his full name yesterday as they’d traveled in on the shuttle. Kelvin. She didn’t think it suited him. Nor did she know if she wanted the distraction he represented, even if he did have the smile of a fallen angel. Or that when he pushed his hair back from his eyes, like he was doing now, his palm ruffled his curls, making her wonder how his fingers would feel forking through her hair.

“We meet again.” The shirred band of Kel’s bomber jacket lifted as the last swipe of his hand added a few extra damp spots to its shoulders. Ngaire’s eyes were caught by a glimpse of a slim brown belt that emphasized the narrowness of his waist and hips. Today, instead of the loose floating shirt that had hidden this very masculine trait yesterday, he wore a tan polo shirt tucked into his khakis.

As she lifted her chin, and with it the level of her gaze, she saw his eyebrows quirk as if he expected some comment about seeing him again so soon after making an idiot of herself. She could still feel tenderness in her throat from trying to swallow her muesli without choking.

Kel’s smile cut the thread of her thoughts.

Darn the man. He had the cheek of the devil and he knew it. Plus he fitted every criteria of her wildest fantasies—tall, dark and devastating—making her wonder if Te Ruahiki had conjured him up just for her.

A gurgle of suppressed laughter left her mouth as a gasp. Her far-fetched fantasies had as much chance of coming true as a snowball had of lasting in hell.

Though if that little bundle of ice and slush should take its time melting, maybe that was the best reason in the world to reach out, hang on and let fate take her for a ride.

The code her grandfather had lived by and had drummed into her at the worst moments of her life had been Never Give Up. She’d lost the most important people in her life, including George Two Feathers, whose words had been his legacy. But since her time in the hospital, when she’d won her last battle with life, Ngaire had never backed down from a challenge.

She wasn’t about to change now, while the latest battle still had five weeks, six days until New Year’s Eve. “Are you following me?”

His features froze for about a second before he answered. “Sorry, but I can see where you’d get that impression. Guess we have to chalk this one up to fate.”

There it was again. Fate. And Kel felt it, too.

How long was it since the last time she’d gone into a match blind, with no knowledge of her opponent or his moves? How long since she’d pitted her skills and enjoyed a contest where the balance of throws could go either way?

Too long, according to her best friend Leena Kowolski, who’d urged her to indulge in a holiday fling, who’d been so insistent that Ngaire had had to laugh and say she’d think about it, but only if the guy was the kind dreams were made of. And he was.

A small prickle of conscience stabbed as she arched her eyebrows in feigned disbelief and a darker slash broached the tanned skin covering his cheekbones. He leaned closer, resting one arm on the back of the seat her day pack still guarded, and swiped his other hand over his chest in a cross. “Honest.”

His voice was low, husky, intimate. She fell into it, into his eyes, her heart skipping at the dark, liquid intensity in their expression, begging to be believed.

“Returning your pink shades was deliberate on my part, but that’s all. Unless it was fate that made you drop them. Though if I’d known…”

“I didn’t think men believed in fate.”

His dark eyebrows knitted. “What else could it be?”

What else? Let’s face it, she was a sucker for those eyes. She gave him a melting look, putting her own to good use. Leena said they were her best feature, canceling out the nose she’d inherited from her Modoc ancestors. “I owe you an apology. Blame it on the world today. It’s hard to know who to trust.”

His smile drew her eyes down to the indent in the center of his chin and the square, no-nonsense line of his jaw, tempting her to trace the shape and see if it was as firm as it looked.

“Face it,” he said. “We’ve been thrown together by a common language. The only thing to do is grin and bear it.”

“And since the bus is almost full.” Out of the corner of her eye, Ngaire saw the tour guide wave some tailenders onboard.

It was then she felt the engrossed stares and turned to see two Chinese women in the seats behind them. Her next words froze in her throat as they smiled and nodded. She crossed her fingers mentally that the guide had been correct about Kel and her being the only English speakers. The body language she couldn’t do anything about.

She tried to tip him the wink about their audience with her eyes, but he had his own agenda. “If there’s something about me that rubs you the wrong way, tell me and I’ll do my best to help you get over it. Meanwhile, I’m blocking the aisle and there are people heading this way.”

Grabbing her day pack off the empty seat, she made room for him. He slid his beige jacket from his shoulders swiftly, bundling it to toss into the overhead rack. Actions that were easier than folding his length, all six foot three of it, into an amount of space more suitable for her own five foot four.

It took her a moment to notice the last passengers were familiar. Kel had no such problem. “I suppose you’re going to think they’re following you, as well?”

A smile softened his words, turning it into a joke.

“I’m not really that paranoid,” she protested, though the coincidences seemed to be piling up thick and fast. First Kel, and now here was the German couple who’d sat behind her on the shuttle from the ferry.

As the bus eased its way through the city traffic Ngaire stared out the window. The streets went by in a blur of raindrops. Her mind was elsewhere, negotiating the twists and turns of an awareness she hadn’t expected to find. She’d been looking for something in New Zealand, but it wasn’t an affair.

Her heart had called for something much more familial and an answer to the dread that had haunted her since they’d added her grandmother’s history to her mother’s and come up with an answer that had scared her spitless.

First there were the similarities in the manner of their deaths, both the same age almost to the minute and both killed by a car that had gone out of control. Then there was the fact that both deaths had been foreshadowed by changes in the mere. But were they coincidence or curse?

She couldn’t afford not to believe it was more than coincidence; the risks were too great.

Then she’d come up with a solution to possibly guarantee her a future.

Te Ruahiki was tapu, sacred, and returning the mere to his tribe might break the curse on the females of her line.

With all that was going on in her mind, she still found it impossible to ignore Kel or the source of heat as his thigh brushed her own. In an attempt to escape what she saw as a growing problem of too much too soon, she offered, “I don’t mind taking turns at sitting by the window. I wouldn’t want to take advantage by arriving here first.”

“Later. There’s no rush, or anything I haven’t seen before.”

So, no relief there, for a while. In some other place or time, being pressed against the wall with nowhere to go without crawling all over him might have been fun. But they weren’t alone. They had an audience, and she’d no ambition to become their main source of entertainment.

Better just to suck it up and get on with the tour.

Easier said than done.

Beneath the light fabric of her capri pants, her skin burned with an energy that raced to all the salient points of her body. Kel was all solid muscle, thigh, hip, arm. Large, lean, hard. No use reminding herself she’d handled heavier men with ease.

Beside him she felt puny, susceptible, and all female.

She could have told him her problem didn’t stem from him brushing her the wrong way. From her angle it felt too right.

The rain had lessened but not stopped by the time they reached their destination. It made some matrons twitter like sparrows as their husbands helped them into their rain gear.

Kel stood in the gangway, leaving Ngaire room to maneuver a snarl of sleeves and arms. As she started juggling her day pack and raincoat he stretched out a hand to take the one she wasn’t struggling into. “Let me grab that for you?”

For a heartbeat her eyes flashed a warning with all the force of a push in the chest. Back to square one?

“No need, I’m used to managing,” she answered lightly. Had he imagined the back-off signal? He wondered as she hatched into a canary in her bright coat, instead of another brown sparrow.

He blamed it on Chaly. The man had given him leave to do whatever necessary and unleashed the rampant attraction he’d felt the moment he’d laid eyes on her.

Sleep with her if necessary.

Lies were all part of being undercover. Maybe it was being back home that made him feel Grandma Glamuzina’s finger and thumb twist his ear with every falsehood falling from his lips.

Look what almost an hour of having her scent tease his nose had brought him. With every breath, he’d calculated the risk factors in this operation, not to his health, to his libido.

He was here to watch, not to touch. Yet every time they were thrown together by the movement of the bus driving down Muriwai’s winding lanes, he remembered the lines of separation were only two thin lengths of cotton. Though she’d edged away from the contact, while he’d wrapped a white-knuckled fist around a handle to prevent him chasing her across the blue upholstery, he’d known he was in trouble. Big trouble.

He was the hunter and she was his prey. Now her spoor was firmly fixed in his head along with a picture of her naked. A lethal combination meant to keep him clinging to the edge of his seat for the duration of the trip.

For once, he felt torn between duty and desire.

A park ranger awaited them all outside the bus. Ngaire dawdled at the back. Kel kept close, not wanting to force the situation and mindful of her look. His grandma had had one that could strip paint off walls, and Ngaire’s had run a close second.

Grouped with the other passengers in the car park, he’d no problem seeing over their heads as he listened to the ranger. He and the German guy were the tallest, with a couple of Taiwanese runners-up.

Maori Bay was small compared to the other beaches nearby and sheltered by the arms of land stretching on either side. But in this kind of weather with the wind from the southwest, every now and then a gust whipped the ranger’s voice away. “So easy to get the feeling of being dominated by Muriwai…” he shouted, standing against a backdrop of sand-churning waves as gray as the sky, the black silhouette of a lone surfer balanced on top like a bolt holding the two together.

“Powerful elements…wind and sea formed, dominate…this wildlife park.” Ngaire appeared intent on the ranger’s spiel as she clutched the straps of her day pack, arms crossed. Just then a crack of sunlight broke through the clouds, caught her for a second, disappearing as if her black hair had swallowed it.

“Imagine the lifeblood…earth, lava, spilling here from a massive undersea volcano. Where you…stand was born of fire from that eruption.” Every time the ranger paused, the tour guide filled in with translations, and while the cameras whirred and clicked gannets and terns performed a ballet over rocks of greenish black like a licorice stick newly bitten in two.

“This fire still rages beneath the surface.” A ripple of in-drawn breaths punctuated the translation. Their guide spoke so swiftly, she had to know the spiel by heart.

“Imagine its rhythm beating a pulse…echoing its heartbeat.”

Finished, the ranger turned, leading them up the path to the summit, their heels on the gravel sounding like crunching toffee.

Two paces ahead of him, Ngaire’s dark braid bumped against a bed of yellow, begging to be tugged. He caught up to whisper, “That guy’s a shoo-in for the lead in The Tempest.”

She forgot herself long enough to give him a glimpse of her smile. Gaining her trust was like pushing sludge uphill, one step forward, two steps back. And though he’d gone ahead, he was aware of her every move. As they crested the path, a squeal made him turn. “You okay? What happened, did you turn your ankle?”

For a microsecond she took her eyes off the view beyond the rail. “No.” She gestured with a hand flung out to encompass the horizon. “I saw all of that.”

He guessed it might take your breath away if you’d never seen Muriwai beach before, its black sands fringed with gray-and-white surf, curving for more than sixty kilometers into the distance. Too far to see on a day like today when it resembled a monochrome photograph.

“What makes the sand black?”

“Nothing romantic. Just plain old iron,” he said, but she’d stopped listening and was focusing her camera instead.

To reach the viewing platform they walked across a wooden boardwalk, which wound through a tunnel of pohutukawas. It was one of the only native trees that didn’t mind salty air, but it was too early yet for the red tassled flowers that heralded Christmas. There was still beauty to be found in the twisted shapes from its no-holds-barred tussles with the wind.

All too soon, they stepped out of the green-washed light onto wooden treads that softened their footfalls and led to a cliff top spiked with flax plants.

There had been pohutukawas on the cliff his father had gone over. Drago, his eldest brother, had taken them all to look and say goodbye. That was before all the rumors surfaced. He and Kurt had stood on the edge and watched Jo throw flowers onto the rocks and Franc, younger by about two years, had stood back arms crossed as if to hold himself together. Intuition had told him all their lives had changed irrevocably, but Kurt had only been interested in how easy it would be to climb down to the rough cliff to his father’s wreck.

Kel hung back with his memories, letting the real tourists take in the sight of hundreds of gold-capped gannets on the rocky platform below them, one side of a gap carved by umpteen billion waves and millions of years. The cantilevered deck hung out over the abyss, opposite more birds nested on a hundred-foot pillar of dark weathered rock.

He stood to one side, off the deck, eyeing it warily, remembering a disaster where sightseers had plunged to their deaths off a viewing platform on the South Island.

The ranger was giving them the full ten-cent tour, expounding on the mating habits of the birds. Kel listened with one ear, his mind on Ngaire, drawn again to her unusual beauty, knowing the only mating that interested him was man on woman. Kel on Ngaire. The sooner he forgot Chaly’s suggestion and got back to considering her forbidden fruit, and let go of the image of doing the nasty with her, the better.

The sun broke through, steaming the water off the path. As if he hadn’t gotten hot enough from visions of Ngaire’s slim legs wrapped round his waist. He yanked at the tab to unzip his jacket, then changed his mind. The older ladies had enough to gasp at without him giving them a look at the erection trying to batter its way out of his pants.

He was leaning back, his butt resting on the guardrail, taking charge of his libido, when the ranger pushed through the crush, calling “Follow me, everyone” as he marched past Kel on his way to the next port of call.

Ngaire and a few others who hadn’t been able to get near the front crowded the barrier for a better sight of the nesting birds. Kel stayed where he was, letting the sun beat down through his hair into his skull.

Raincoats were being discarded with waves of right and left arms. Ngaire stepped off the platform, stopping barely a yard away at the side of the track and looking right at him. “That was great. I never thought we’d get so close to the birds. Too bad there weren’t any chicks in the nests.”

“You’d have to come back in December. It’s a lot noisier then, too,” he told her, remembering the first time his father had brought them all up here.

He pushed the thought aside. His father had been in his thoughts too often today. He should never have rung Jo. Yeah, right. Being back in Auckland had made him hungry to hear just one familiar voice. Losing Gordie had made him remember how truly alone he was. For the last few years his buddy had been the only kind of family he’d had to count on.

He watched Ngaire take off the day pack. As the others listened to the ranger, he’d decided she was carrying the formula in the bag, not on her person, a much-needed reminder to be more vigilant in case she passed it on during their visit here, or at the vineyard that was their next stop.

Holding said day pack one-handed, she slid her arm out of the opposite sleeve. In his peripheral vision Kel caught a blur of enthusiastic hand movements from some of the men. Talking about the view, he presumed.

His head swung round as the drink bottle that one man held dropped. It fell past the front corner of the barrier, landing on top of a nesting pair who’d chosen a small ledge near the top, away from the crush of birds.

Quick as a bullet, one bird shot in the air. Squawking its annoyance, it almost took the nose off the owner of the plastic bottle. He reared back, setting a domino effect in motion with Ngaire the last one in the row.

Kel could see what would happen, but his intuition was faster than his feet. Unaware of the wave of bodies heading her way, Ngaire was head down, with one hand on the strap of her day pack as she stuffed a roll of yellow raincoat inside. She took the full brunt of the last guy’s shoulder.

Kel heard her squeal even as he shouted “Look out, Ngaire!” and threw himself at the rail as she did a back flip over the barrier and began to fall.

Chapter 4

S he’d had dreams of falling but had always been able to waken herself before she hit bottom. This time Ngaire’s eyes were wide open as the earth spun away from her in a Catherine wheel of gray, brown and black sparks, as if her past flashed through her mind.

Her training, as much part of her as breathing, was the trigger for tucking her head in as she rolled, the mechanics behind her action bringing her arm down into a break fall. Easier said than done, with the death grip she had on her day pack.

It spun in a wide arc as her arm came round. One strap lassoed a small bush with a hold on the cliff as fragile as her own. Yet, this spindly plant, clawing for existence in an impossible environment, reminded her that even on these wind-gouged cliffs, survival was possible.

She tucked her chin into her neck and spent a giddy moment inspecting a nine-inch rock ledge, too small for birds to nest on, which had saved her. The smell of guano—suddenly a metaphor staining her whole life—was stronger at this height as the wind buffeting the coast carried it from the nesting site.

Her heart pounded in her throat as if lodged there by the fall, only short, fast gasps of breath issued from her lungs, drying every last drop of saliva. The reflex to cry for help stifled by a tongue brittle enough to crack if she dared try.

With her throat like a dust bowl, the urge to cough was fearsome but not as terrifying as the thought of convulsive blasts of carbon dioxide sending her sailing over the edge.

Please God, tell me I didn’t survive being knifed in that mugging years ago, to die here. I need the five weeks and six days I have left. I deserve them.

Who would tell her friends in San Francisco? Who knew who they were? Sea and sky merged on the horizon in a wash of tears.

Never give up, never.

Ears ringing with the words, she fought for control. Numb, her eyes and mind closed to every sensation except those she could feel—her feet on solid ground, the clump of spinifex twisted round her hand—simply placebos to reassure her there was life after a tumble like she’d taken. It took a few seconds to erase the image of dark lava rocks greased with sea spume that for a hundred speeding heartbeats had seemed her final destination.

Beware of waves. Unbidden, the stark warning sign at the top of the path leading to the rocks jumped into her mind, chased by her greatest enemy—fear.

She didn’t want to die. Didn’t want the curse of the tapu to strike her down now she was so close to her goal.

The curse had dealt its first blow to her grandmother exactly a week after her thirtieth birthday, and done the same to her mother. Now no power on earth could convince her this was simple coincidence. Once Ngaire worked it out, she’d realized not only had a skilled surgeon’s scalpel saved her life, but she’d been too young. At fourteen she’d had just over half her life to go. No matter if she survived this fall to live past thirty, the curse had already taken its toll. She would be the last of her line.

Couldn’t the spirit of Te Ruahiki understand she was taking them both home?

With her eyes closed, her other senses returned in small increments. Overhead she heard voices, male voices, Kel’s rattling out commands in pidgin, with a couple of Chinese words thrown in, including utai, which she knew meant belt.

“Stay there, Ngaire.” Kel again. Where on earth did he think she was likely to go, when the only option was down?

Or was it?

What if she could climb back up? Her spine had formed an obsessive attachment to the cliff face, and the thought of tearing them apart unnerved her. Twisting her head round to look might just tip the scales to a point where she lost her balance. But not using her eyes didn’t preclude reaching out with her free hand to explore the cliff face nearest to her. Maybe she could discover if there was any assistance to be found in the rocks and cracks she could reach.

“You okay, Ngaire? Any damage?” Kel’s voice was thinner than normal and sounded a long, long way above her head.

This was not a moment for panic.

She halted her tour of discovery, knuckles hooked round a clump of knife-edged grass that could rip her skin to shreds should it slide through her fingers. At this stage of the game she doubted she’d feel the pain, though she’d no intention of letting go. “Yeah, nothing major. I’ll survive.”

Get me out of here and you’ve got yourself a slave for life.

Her life.

She’d been in some bad situations since the first time she’d been mugged and stabbed, but none she hadn’t believed she could survive. So what if she was scared? That was natural, it didn’t mean she’d give up. She never had before.

Never give up. George Two Feathers had stuck to the motto even when his wife had died, leaving him with a baby girl to bring up. Her own father had died years before her mother was killed in a car crash—she hardly remembered him—and that left her grandfather with a preteen to raise. He said he hadn’t minded, that bringing up her mother had just been practice for when it really counted.

“Ngaire!”

The urgency in Kel’s voice broke her out of a short moon yum meditation as she tried to center the flow of her ki energy, knowing she would need all her skills to get out of this.

Thankfully, her grip hadn’t dislodged the grass. It was one thing to know the plant withstood the howling storms the ranger had told them battered the west coast, but would it, and others like it, take her weight?

“Yeah?” Did her voice sound as weak to Kel’s ears as it did to hers?

“How you doing, doll? Got any room to negotiate an about-face? To pull you up, I’m going to need your assistance, by digging your toes in for starters. Think you can manage?”

He sounded closer now, thank heavens. In that instant she took back every bad thought she’d had about him, including her brief flirtation with the suspicion he might be after Te Ruahiki. “Yes, I can manage.”

She wasn’t certain he could hear her, but within seconds he said, “I’ve made a rope out of belts. Some of the others have gone for help, but how long it will take to get a safety harness and gear here is anyone’s guess.”

Kel’s “If there’s one available” was barely discernible, as if meant for his ears alone. “Hell, I don’t even know if those guys can make themselves understood. They were so worried about giving up their belts, I have this vision of some of them tripping as their pants make a dive for their ankles.”

A gurgle, egged on by a hint of hysteria, erupted deep in her chest until she forced it back down. “Please, Kel, don’t make me laugh. I guess it’s a toss-up which way’s likely to make them lose face. But I’m not worried. I’m sure they’ll deliver.”

A scatter of stones and dust exploded out of the rock above her like residue from a shotgun blast, powdering her head and shoulders, before Kel shouted, “You okay? Did anything hit you?”

A few small huffs solved the problem of the fine debris coating her face. Would that her other dilemma could be fixed so easily. “After what I’ve been through this morning, a little bit of dust doesn’t rate.”

“So, what do you want to do? Wait, or trust me to get you out of there?” He sounded directly overhead now.

How could she let him put his life in danger, then say she didn’t trust him? “I’ll take a chance on you. Just give me a minute to see if I’ve got room to turn around.”

She inched the sole of one Nike, designed for walking, not climbing, to the left. A sigh of relief hissed through her parched lips as she found what she judged to be about a foot more of usable space.

“Don’t take too big a risk, Ngaire. If you can’t turn around, just say so.”

Risks, she’d been taking them from the moment she’d seen the notices for the quiz show in the Blue Grasshopper. Every step she’d taken since then had pushed her from the comfort zone of the do jan where she taught hapkido. Every question she’d answered correctly had brought her closer to New Zealand, to her grandmother’s subtribe. She faced the chance of being rejected by the people she’d learned to love secondhand through the stories she’d read and been told. Faced the risk of being wrong that the curse could be broken. That’s if its source didn’t end up at the bottom of a hundred-foot cliff, and her with it.

Fool that she was, instead of leaving Te Ruahiki in the hotel safe, she’d brought it with her. The mere was hanging to the left of her head inside her backpack, adding its weight to hers on roots clinging desperately to a cleft in the rocks.

Time to act before she lost her ki. Reaching her free hand overhead, her fingers scrabbling like a demented spider across the cliff, she clasped over the ones already clutching the strap. That done, she let her right leg swing free, taking her weight on the toes of her left foot, and rolled as if she was lying on the floor, instead of the side of a rocky plateau. The momentum sent her braid spinning wide to land with a slap between her shoulder blades.

Her warm breath bounced back onto her lips as she leaned against weather-roughened stone, cushioned only by her breasts. A momentary spike of panic aborted a precocious sigh of relief when her right foot pawed air before encountering the shelf. The second her toes hit pay dirt, her breath gusted out as if she’d run a mile in under four.

“Atta-girl! You did it. Now, give yourself a minute to recover, then move on out. Search for a hold, one step, one hand at a time. This rope I’m fastened to isn’t quite long enough for me to reach. You’ll have to climb three feet, four at the most before I can grab you.”

She tried to relax, to ignore the scratches stinging at her waist where her T-shirt didn’t meet her pants. If she’d known rock-climbing was on the agenda she would have worn something more suitable.

Resting her cheek against the cliff, she tried to release her grip on the strap that had become a lifeline. Her fingers were numb with strain. Letting go with her left hand was the hardest task she’d set herself yet. A yip of pain escaped as she flexed her fingers, making the blood flow under her whitened skin.

She looked up as Kel asked, “Do you still think you can make it?” His gaze held hers and for a moment there was only Kel, her and the sky. No windswept headland, no wheeling gannets or diving tern, no fellow passengers on the cliff top, buzzing with alarm. Only the two of them, and the short distance between.

As if hypnotized by the faith in his eyes, she affirmed, “Yeah, I can make it.”

Gradually she climbed toward him, handhold after toehold, to the point where her day pack no longer offered support and the strap slid in a loop down her arm as she sought the next hold.

How could she have known the cliff would crumble beneath her weight, sending her on a downward slide back where she’d come from?

Finally, a small crevice acted like a buffer. She felt brain dead from stress. Not a single squeak burst from her lips. To open them was to give way to the nausea roiling inside her. She simply dug deep into her need for survival and tucked her toes into the space, clasping the strap once again.

Lips pressed flat against her teeth, she sent a quick mental plea to her ancestor. “Here’s how it works, see. You don’t let me down, and I do the same for you. And before you know it, I’ll have you back home.”

“Dammit, Ngaire! Let go of that thing!”

“No way! It’s my safety line. I need it.”

It took her twice as long to regain the lost ground through testing every foothold, every crack in the rock, instead of putting her faith in the cliff to stay in one piece. Seemed that for now, the only thing she could put her trust in was Kel, and maybe a tentative compromise with the supernatural.

As her arm stretched through the strap again to clutch a clump of greenery growing level with the bush, she heard him say, “Forget the bag, we can get it later.”

“No, it’s okay like—” Her words were cut off as the giant, soft-stemmed creeper, like a prehistoric ice plant, turned to liquid chlorophyll at her touch.

Kel spat out a curse so foul it jerked her out of the small pocket of fear the second near-miss dragged her into, a reaction that sparked an urgent attempt to grab something safer.

Three minutes later, her safety lay in Kel’s hand. His crooked smile lit a ray of sunshine inside her that spelled hope. “Okay, I’ll just pull you up a little farther, then you can shift your grip to my wrist.”

The situation was tricky, dangerous, not the occasion for humor, but the irony of the moment wasn’t lost on Ngaire. “Okay, I’ll attempt it, but we’ve got to stop meeting like this. Are you sure you aren’t following me?”

Kel knew it was crazy to feel this way simply because she’d unwittingly put her trust in him. Yet her laughter filled an empty spot centered about two feet higher than the lust contact with Ngaire normally involved.

No matter that Chaly had given him license to do almost anything, he knew such reactions could be hazardous to the health of an agent, made them more likely to catch a bullet than a cold.

Though, he admitted, Chaly’s offhand remark had been made to the cold son of a bitch he knew Kel to be, not to the hormone-driven Neanderthal he became when Ngaire was near.

Sure, her figure was trim, but that didn’t always mean fit. Yet, the way she’d climbed up to him, muscles straining as she hoisted her own weight from one hold to the next, showed her fitness was equal to his own, which if not quite his SAS level, wasn’t far off. He still knew all the moves, plus a few others that could make her head spin if he felt so inclined.

Reliving the moment he’d watched her go over the cliff was almost too painful. He’d never thought she’d survive. His father’s body had been an example of how well humans could fly from a hundred feet up. The thought that if she went into the drink, she’d take the formula with her and solve all his problems hadn’t raised its ugly head.

Yet, now the notion poised at the back of his mind, swaying back and forth like a deadly snake ready to strike.

This northeast side of the cliff was mostly sheltered from the wind, but who knew when a down draft would spew over the top and send them both swinging in its wake?

He shut his dark thoughts away and gave a sharp pull on the rope of buckled belts; the sooner they were out of there the better he’d like it and the safer Ngaire would be from snake bite. “Get ready to pull us up.”

The tour guide was back overhead; he could hear her translating to the men at the top of the cliff. Some of them looked as if one strong gust of wind would blow them over, and when he’d swiped their belts he’d wished for a few men with more girth, and the extra few feet it would have added to his makeshift rope.

Taking his weight, the leather grew taut, stretched, held. He turned back to Ngaire. Although they were what you’d call at arm’s length, this was only the second time they’d touched hands in their brief acquaintance. Only the second time he’d felt the warmth of her skin against his own. It felt too good, too addictive, too dangerous to the code he lived by.

Hell, he’d no desire to play Romeo to her Juliet. She worked for a drug cartel, he for a drug enforcement agency, a case of never the twain will get together under any better circumstances than an arrest. Yet his brain was giving him mixed signals.

Consequently, his body was no better than his mind at eliminating the sexual fantasies she’d aroused the first time he’d seen her lithe figure stretching in Tahiti.

Neither knew how to shed their neediness.

He waved to the tour guide, depending on her to control the men on the other end. “Start winding us up slowly. Get it? Slowly,” he shouted, and heard “Don’t worry” for his reward. He wished he could feel as confident as the rest of his team.

The coincidence of being involved with two people in the drug trade who’d gone over cliffs didn’t escape him. He’d learned his father had been no better than he should, but Ngaire?

Kel’s inner focus fractured, revealing a picture behind the jagged edge of his own needs and wants. Gordie, sprawled on the stage, dying, was enough to stop him picking at the old wound his father had made.

Were the bastards responsible for killing his buddy the ones she worked for? The ones who’d slipped a knife between Gordie’s ribs and let his life force stream out over that grimy stage. If so, why the hell was he trying to save her life?

A useless question—he knew the answer as well as he knew himself, as well as he’d known Gordie. It was the same answer that had made him walk away from his buddy and left him riddled with guilt.

Duty!

Gritting his teeth, he scowled at the top of Ngaire’s head. “Okay. Hang on and move at my pace, step for step. Another two meters and there will be more grass to get a grip on, but you’re gonna have to lose the bag.”

“No, I can’t afford to lose it. If you can’t deal with that, leave me and I’ll wait for the ranger.”

Bang, just like that they were back where they’d started this morning when she’d bristled at him for offering to hold her day pack. The formula had to be inside.

“It’s your choice, lady. Let’s move on out.”

Her lips clamped tight on her reply, as if she was already a hostile witness. He climbed a step at a time, stopping after each to let her close the gap, his mind on other things, like business. He’d wondered where the stuff for the drug cartel was hidden, now he knew for sure. It was inside her freakin’ day pack.

As he looked beyond her, a huge wave broke over the rocks, taking with it the creeper Ngaire had broken off, bright green flotsam against the foam, visible for a second before being towed under. That’s what should happen to her day pack. Save them all a lot of trouble if the sea took the rubbish away.

It hadn’t managed to carry off his father, though, or his car. Problems were all Milo had left his family. Like the porridge Grandma Glamuzina had made the morning they’d gotten the news, it had been cold comfort. His trip with Kurt to see the wreck had made him sick at the amount of damage that imitating an airplane could do to a car.

He faltered on the next step, unable to go higher because she was dragging her anchor in the shape of the damn bag again. It had caught on the last few twigs of the bush.

“Let go!”

Unable to contain itself, the snake in his mind struck.

Let her go.

“Just give me a minute to get it loose.”

“Is it worth risking your life, our lives?”

The snake’s fangs sunk deep into his thoughts and released their venom. Let her go and save a million lives.

“It’s worth it to me. My life might as well be over if I lose what’s in there.”

A feral howl ripped at the wound the snake had inflicted on his mind. “Dammit! You ask too much, lady!”

It would be so easy….

He twisted as if to shake off the demon snake of temptation slithering around his shoulders, whispering in his ears.

Clenching his teeth, he shred his venomous thoughts with a growl. “Shut up!” Murder might be the easy way out for some, but not him. He’d seen too much, done too much to ever kill in cold blood.

“What did you say?”

“Nothing important. I’ll come back down a few steps. That way you can get a hold of the belt tied round my waist, then give the strap a real strong tug. Maybe that will shift it.”

He’d hardly moved when she cried “Oh no!” On her next attempt at shaking it loose, one of the many gannets sweeping through the channel on the updrafts hovered over the bush as if to land.

“Shoo, shoo. Get away!” Her shouts made no difference.

Wings flapping in slow motion, the bird sank lower. Lower. Yellow feathers lit the top of its head like a gleaming halo, but he saw nothing angelic in its intent. They could both die. Both fall in a tangle of wheeling limbs.

“For God’s sake, let go, the bush won’t take its weight. We might all end up on the rocks if you don’t let go.”

Though Ngaire was the one tugging at the bush, the gannet looked straight at him. He shook his head, refusing to give credence to the intelligence he saw in its golden eyes as twigs buckled under the extra pressure. Then the bird flapped its wings, lifting as leaves and branches whipped back, tossing the strap aside. Freeing it, and them.

Neither of them moved for a few seconds. In a daze they watched the gannet return to its nest and awe tinged Ngaire’s voice as it drifted upward. “How weird was that?”

“Too weird to get my head around. Let’s get the hell out of here before it tries a repeat performance.”

The remainder of the climb was anticlimactic. A few more seconds and they covered a distance equal to the one that had stopped his heart more than once while testing his humanity. But they were both still there, still alive. He and Ngaire were both thankful to take a helping hand as they stepped over the rail on legs that shook, from a ranger eager to regain his authority. Much good it did him. All his admonitions were drowned in a sea of applause by the team who’d pulled them to safety.

In a babble of languages louder than a flock of rosellas attacking a berry farm, the passengers bonded from the incident.

Meanwhile the source of all his problems flung her arms around him, her damned day pack landing a good one on his shin, not to mention the pain in his groin created by having her body plastered against his.

Damn his treacherous libido!

She felt too good, fit too well.

“What can I say?” she sighed. “Thank you, thank you, thank you! You saved my life.” Keeping a hold on his waist, she pushed back to looked up at him. The strain of the climb to safety showed on her face as if the pale bronze silk of her skin was lined with white linen.

Time spun out of control as they stared at each other for what seemed like forever, yet the moment the tip of her tongue slid between her lips to moisten them he knew he was about to break all the rules. All his rules.

Her mouth took on the dewy sheen of raspberries in a rainstorm as reason battled with hunger in his mind. One taste. Just one taste. Surely that would be enough to satisfy his appetite?

As he dipped his head toward her, she rose on her toes to meet him, and somewhere in the middle he discovered how wrong he’d been. Far from being satisfied he’d simply whetted the craving.

Thank God there was nothing he could do about it here.

He saw color return to her face as their lips parted. No embarrassment shaded the blue in her eyes, only a wash of emotion he prayed was only gratitude. And that she hadn’t realized how close she’d come to being ravished from a kiss intended to be a simple brush of mouths. And that she didn’t know the danger she represented.

“The Chinese say, saving a life means you now own it, but you’d be short-changed getting mine. Though if I can return the favor in any other way, name it, it’s yours,” she promised, pressing her cheek to his chest.

Hell, she had no idea what she was offering. At that very moment, the only way she could save his life was by spreading her legs to let him in.

The coarseness of his thought didn’t succeed, didn’t turn him off or make the feeling go away. She felt tiny, like a small bird, its body quivering around his. And those huge eyes reminded him of drenched violets. Hell, he was really in trouble when he started getting poetic.

Duty had just taken another blow.

His gut drew in sharply as he felt her nipples pierce the soft cotton that had actually been a decent shirt until their escapade. Of course his shakiness was magnified by the rush of adrenaline in his veins.

So, he was making excuses to himself? Hanging over a hundred-foot cliff will do it every time.

If he didn’t get back on track soon, the rest of the passengers would think they’d crashed a voyeur’s convention. “I won’t keep you to that promise. Heat-of-the-moment stuff.”

Her chin tilted and rested above his sternum. Could she feel the damage it was doing to his heart?

“I do mean it,” she vowed. “Every last word.”

“Okay, if you insist. You can undo some of these buckles and let me return the belts to their owners.”

“No problem, but that isn’t nearly enough for a life.”

Her smile was almost too knowing for his comfort as she moved away, but when he turned, he saw most of their owners had helped themselves. He gave them a wave and a slight bow in reply. “Thanks, guys, you were great.”

The guide translated by his elbow, but from their smiles, he could tell a translation hadn’t been necessary.

Before she’d finished, one guy came up, saying, “I am Jimmy Chen. Please?” Indicating his camera, he took their photo before Kel could protest, or recall he’d been the one to barge into Ngaire, while she, sublimely unaware, simply grimaced. “I looked a mess.”

“Me, too. But never mind, I doubt if it will make the local papers.” Or any newspapers, he hoped. Giving the media a copy of his face wasn’t conducive to remaining anonymous.

When the others had finished patting Ngaire as if to make sure she was still with them, especially the one who’d bowled her over, she began dusting herself off, picking bits of greenery from the front of her T-shirt. He watched, tempted to help clean up the curve of breasts he could still feel imprinted on his chest, driven nearly mad by the urge to kiss the scratches marking the skin above her waist.

The shadow of her navel was just visible above the button fastening. How easy it would be to reach out and flick it open.

As an antidote for lust, he began brushing himself down, but the dirt and squashed plant life decorating his front had taken up permanent residence. The shirt would have to go. He wanted no reminder of what they’d just gone through, no memory of how close his baser instincts had come to ending her life.

Swallowing the gritty lump in his throat, he forced himself to ask, “Are you always this much trouble? First in Tahiti and now in New Zealand. Please tell me this isn’t the story of your life.”

Her answer came flashing back at him. “Believe me, you don’t want to know. As for me being trouble…in paradise?” Her eyes sparkled. “It has a ring to it, though, don’t you think so?”

“Sounds like you’ve read too many tourist guide books with all this paradise nonsense. This is just plain old New Zealand. It doesn’t change much. C’mon, let’s move on out. The others are way ahead. Forget about the mess on our shirts, we can buy new ones at the next souvenir shop they take us to.”

“That sounds like a plan. We could buy a matching pair, like a team. McKay and Johnman.”

He pretended shock. “A matching what? I said you were trouble, not that I was asking for it.”

Grabbing his jacket from the rail where he’d left it, he slung it over his shoulder and curved an arm round hers, supporting her. A few yards down the track he was struck by the thought that his actions were a complete contradiction to his words.

Chapter 5

K el disappeared inside his room before Ngaire managed to unlock her door. The keycard being awkward as usual, it took three or four attempts before deigning to give her the green light.

She wondered why she’d been so hasty when she viewed the mess inside her room, which had been completely ransacked. Acid rose in her throat and stole her breath. Damn you, Savage, why can’t you leave me alone? Cautiously, she checked behind the closet and ensuite doors in case the culprit was still around.

Thank heavens she’d taken the mere with her. The same thought had teased her mind on the trip to the Hilton as well as the tour of the vineyard where they’d lunched.

It was more than residual fuzziness from the wine tasting. No way would she belittle Kel’s efforts, yet she was certain Te Ruahiki’s spirit had been the driving force behind her escape from the bush. As they left Muriwai, she’d remembered the inside of her pack felt hot brief seconds before she fell. Had it been a warning to take care? If it had, the old guy might have let her in on the secret before she started her flying lesson.

It hadn’t stopped her muttering “Show off” as she hugged her pack. But there’d been no warning of this, her trashed room. Thank goodness she was traveling light. Carefully leaving everything untouched, she did a quick scan of the room, but nothing jumped out to say it was missing. Should she report the incident, or simply shrug it off as part of a learning curve to make sure she never let the mere out of her sight?

Kel would know.

She dragged open the adjoining door, slapping the flat of her palm on the one on his side. “Kel, are you there? I need help.”

Within seconds, the door swung back into a room identical to hers but in reverse. Her brain acknowledged the similarity subconsciously. Most of her synapses being too taken up by the vision of Kel, the shirt in his hand no longer hiding the supple strength or width of his shoulders or the hair-rough wedge tapering into a narrow strip at his waistband. She’d realized Kel was buff when she’d thrown her arms round him in an excess of gratitude, but reality exceeded imagination.

Regrettably, no good reason for running her fingers through the fine scroll of dark hair came to mind, and she took a deep calming breath as the muscles in his arms bunched when his grip tightened on his shirt. “What’s wrong?”

Nothing. Absolutely nothing! “Someone’s been in my room.”

“Maid service. They tidied my room, too.” He took a step back, gripping the edge of the door as if to close it and walk away.

“No! My room, someone’s searched my room,” she stuttered, almost brought to her knees by crisp male body hair scraping the top of her arm as he eased past. The feeling intensified as he halted, tossing his balled shirt onto his bed.

His fingers closed around the tops of her arms, tightening briefly as his eyelids creased in a frown. “Show me.”

It took all her willpower to resist, to squelch the urge to lean into him. She closed her eyes and held her breath.

Heaven.

How would he smell after a night of lovemaking? If she succumbed to desire, would the results be something to remember, or to regret, knowing it could never be matched?

“Hell, doll, you’re trembling. Let’s see what’s got you upset.”

The note of genuine concern in his voice brought her down to earth. Not a moment too soon. Saved from the urge to wind herself round him like a lovesick cat. “Take a look-see.”

He stepped over her best nightdress’s abandoned sprawl on the carpet and stopped to survey the silky-gray cover of the bed strewn with no-nonsense daywear. “So, I’m guessing you didn’t leave it this way?”

Her chest swelled with indignation. “Of course I didn’t. I left it tidy.” His eyebrows rose a fraction.

“And I didn’t throw my clothes around as an excuse to get you into my room.”

But she might have, if she’d known it would work. She looked down to hide the truth in her eyes and realized he was barefoot.

She must have interrupted his march to the shower. His feet were long and narrow and he balanced on the balls of them, like a dancer or a fighter. Yes a fighter, like herself. She should have known. It was there in his body language, and read, Walk softly, carrying a big stick. She felt her skin color up.

Heavens, that mind of hers!

“I never suggested you did this to trick me into your room. Believe me, this would be overkill. But at first glance…” He gestured toward her clothes. “My sister used to pile clothes on every flat surface including the floor.”

“Give me a break, I only moved in last night.”

“Have you checked to see what’s missing?”

“Not minutely. I called you almost straight away.”

If anything had been taken, it was small and of no importance. “Looks like everything’s still here.” She shrugged. “I can’t see what the thief hoped to gain. Anything of value, like my passport and travelers checks, I carry with me.”

“Could be a spur of the moment job. The maid may have forgotten to lock up after she did your room.”

“Should I report it to the police or just the hotel?”

“Not if you want to be on that tour bus tomorrow. If you inform the hotel, they’ll report it to the police, then you’ll be holed up answering questions when you could be eating dinner with me. Besides, you said nothing was missing.”

Yet there might have been. Thanks to the attempt to snatch her suitcase in Tahiti, she’d decided to carry the carved chunk of jade in her day pack. The extra weight on her shoulder had been worth it. And might just have saved her life.

If she lost the mere, her hopes of seeing life beyond her thirtieth birthday didn’t stand a chance. Today’s events had confirmed that. All she had to do was reach Christchurch, with both herself and Te Ruahiki in one piece, and the rest of her life would stretch a lot further than the five-plus weeks, which was all she could count on for now.

Chaly said he should have let her die…. The words jibed at Kel’s conscience as she ate dinner.

There had been a light tinge, a very light tinge of humor in the voice over the cell phone when Kel called him, though not enough to disguise his boss’s contempt for the target. Personally, Kel didn’t feel like laughing. The joke was so close to being true it made him cringe inside.

No, because of what he occasionally referred to as Kel’s holier-than-thou attitude, Chaly had said it to annoy. “At least you’ll be able to go to mass with a clear conscience on Sunday.”

Hell, the last time he darkened his church’s door was at his father’s funeral.

Although, the news of someone other than himself breaking and entering Ngaire’s room, had cheered Chaly up mightily. “It goes to confirm Ms. Two Feathers McKay is key to the whole deal. Stick with her day and night.”

The order had immediately reminded him of kissing Ngaire, which led to thoughts of the photograph taken while his head still wasn’t on straight. It bugged him no end. Bugged him enough to consider breaking into Chen’s room to let light into the undeveloped film. Hell, now he was acting phobic about having his image locked inside the camera, as if, as some cultures believed, it had stolen his soul. There were those who thought his soul was long gone. They could be right, which meant all he had left to give was his life.

He looked up from his meal as he felt Ngaire’s gaze stroking him. “I’m glad we decided to eat here,” she told him. “The food’s delicious. This fish is so fresh the chef must have a line off the end of the wharf.”

For all her attempt at normality, she sounded as tightly strung as a bow. He gave her eight out of ten for effort as he looked down at what was left of the rare tenderloin he’d chosen. “My steak’s not too bad, either, but I don’t suspect the chef of hiding a herd of cows somewhere.”

“I don’t see why not.” She gave a small shudder and a thready laugh. “Are you sure that thing’s dead and doesn’t simply have a bad case of sunburn?”

“I’ll let you know if it moos at me.”

It had been easy, almost too easy to persuade Ngaire to join him for dinner. He’d thought she might be too shaky after her brush with death and then discovering her room had been searched. The second time that day had she but known.

That’s why he’d suggested dining onboard. At least, it felt like being on a cruise ship. Watching the view up the harbor from White’s restaurant on the second floor, they could be at sea.

Then again, he could’ve been wrong about Ngaire earlier. Her shakiness might have been relief that she’d had the formula with her. Because, if she was a mule for the cartel he had in mind, they accepted no excuses for failure. To them, Ngaire would be no more than a flicker in the brilliance of their scheme, one they’d snuff out as easily as a candle.

She was staring again. And it wasn’t with a worshipful expression for the man who’d saved her. Quite the opposite, she’d shuttered her thoughts behind her lashes, making them impossible to read. Worse, in its own way, than if she’d treated him to the type of liquid gushing most heroes endured. He almost laughed out loud at the irony. Sure, the heartbreak hero, that was him.

Berating himself for being a bigheaded ass, he realized her focus had shifted and was aimed over his shoulder. Turning, he caught sight of Jimmy Chen being seated a few tables away, and a scowl put paid to his self-deprecating humor.

The way the guy flashed his damn camera around, he swore his scowl would become a permanent fixture. There were only so many ways to sneeze or cough at the precise moment to ruin a picture before people became suspicious.

Catching her glance, he said, “Forget him.”

“You’re right, I should. What sticks in my craw is, he never even apologized. Just kept snapping our photos all day, like we were part of a goddamn freak show.”

“Maybe he did but our guide didn’t translate correctly.”

“No, he never did apologize. I know enough Chinese to be sure of that. I live on the fringes of Chinatown.”

“That explains the suitcase.”

“Obnoxious, isn’t it? Sort of right out in your face. Silly me, I thought that meant no one would take it by mistake, but I was wrong. They tried to steal it.”

“Your vacation has gotten off on the wrong foot, but there’re still a few days left. Let’s turn it around and really have fun. Forget what happened, today’s disaster especially. It’s over and done, with no damage to speak of.”

“Apart from a few bruises, you mean?”

“We can take care of that tomorrow. Rotorua’s our next overnight stop. The hotel’s bound to have hot mineral pools. Good for what ails you, they say. You can soak all your pains away. I’ve a few aches myself that need taking care of,” he added, leaving himself wide open for Ngaire’s comeback. But then, she’d still to experience the sensual qualities of a hot mineral pool.

A wiser man would have thought twice before suggesting the solution. Yeah, man, by tomorrow he could be up to his neck in hot water in more ways than one.

The hell of it was, when he’d suggested dinner, he hadn’t taken into account her wearing paper-thin white pants that whispered of bronze skin underneath. Or that the new jewel-bright turquoise T-shirt she’d bought at the vineyard would do things to her eyes that made him feel as if he’d been sucker-punched.

Something he’d probably learned at his grandmother’s knee was niggling at his conscience, telling him those types of reactions to a woman he might yet need to kill weren’t exactly moral.

So why was he letting his inner voice screw him around? He had only two choices, neither of which came under the heading of ethical. The status quo would just have to stand.

An easy decision, since he knew calling Chaly for a replacement would be the lever his boss needed to ease him out of GDE. A not uncommon occurrence when an agent began nipping at Garnet Chaly’s heels in the seniority stakes. Kel liked—no, needed—his job too much to give Chaly cause. Besides, whom could they send? Chaly himself? He doubted it. Just the thought of his boss taking his place stayed his hand. No matter what Ngaire had done, or was going to do, Kel couldn’t wish him on to her.

If you can’t handle the pressure, say so now and I’ll take the job on myself. I hear the target’s built. Maybe I could get myself some of that. For all Chaly’s expensive clothes and English accent, there was no getting away from the fact that his mind would have a stretch to reach up to the gutter.

Ngaire hadn’t lied to Kel. The food did taste great, and at any other time she wouldn’t have minded the lavish open setting. This evening it felt like eating in a goldfish bowl. For all she knew, the person who’d searched her room could be sitting watching her.

And it unnerved her.

The only person she felt sure of was Kel. So sure that she’d almost blurted out the truth about Te Ruahiki. What a disaster that would have been. He’d not only think she was trouble, he’d be looking at her sideways, wondering where she’d escaped from.

No, much better to keep her beliefs about the supernatural being, presently residing in her day pack, to herself.

Finished eating, she put her fork down and glanced through the window. Wiping her mouth with her napkin, she watched the evening light become the gray-blue of dusk. The lights on the ferry, churning through the waters from the other side of the harbor, were clearly visible. She remembered her grandfather recounting how he’d met her grandmother on a Devonport ferry.

God, she missed him so much it hurt.

She needed him, needed his wisdom and his forgiving kindness.

In a split second her mind was made up.

“Look, sorry to eat and run, but there’s a ferry approaching the wharf and I have to catch it.”

Kel blinked his surprise. “Don’t you want dessert first?”

She almost laughed. She’d seen him eyeing the dessert trolley and gathered keeping fit didn’t preclude having a sweet tooth. He had to have a great metabolism.

“No, I want to catch that ferry. But you have some. They looked yummy. I’ll catch you later.” She pushed her chair away from the table, an action mirrored by Kel. Gathering up her day pack, she slung it over her shoulder, then shaped her lips with a tiny pout. “You don’t mind, do you?”

His face said he minded in spades. The clatter of silverware against his wineglass broke the soft music-filtered ambience.

A short squeeze of her hand on his shoulder was all the apology she’d time for as the ferry began its run toward the clock tower overlooking the wharf. Then she was off.

Luckily her shoes didn’t have heels narrow enough to do body piercing, so she had no problem negotiating the crowds that milled outside the downtown watering holes and restaurants. Aluminum masts thrust yacht rigging higher than the rail along the water’s edge, and beyond the silver-slashed foreground, the ferry unloaded its passengers. Ngaire quickened her pace.

Dodging people traveling in the same direction was difficult, but not impossible, compared to doing a square dance with the squeeze of passengers leaving the ferry. Then the others crossing the street from Downtown as the Walk signal went green swept her round the corner, until she popped out like a cork to check the timetable boarding. No point in taking a ferry going God knows where.

She honestly didn’t see the man coming, but she heard him say “Oooof!” as her day pack caught him between the ribs.

The guy was solid, yet he folded over like a deflating weather balloon. “Jeez! I’m sorry, I didn’t see you.” She bent slightly, shrinking to his level with one eye on the stream of passengers boarding the ferry and the other on the guy she’d winded, trying her best to look sympathetic. “Just take short breaths.”

“Entschuldigen. Can I be of help?” asked a voice from behind her.

She recognized the accent straight away. Herr Schmidt had become quite vocal on the latter part of the tour, probably due to the red wine he’d enjoyed. Now his long, lean figure hovered behind her unintentional victim. “That would be great. I accidentally banged into him, now he can’t straighten up.”

“Maybe he needs an ambulance?”

“God, I hope not. I didn’t hit him that hard.” She crouched lower. It was hard talking to someone who wouldn’t look her in the eye. “How bad is…?”

She was the one gasping now. It might have been the angle, but she’d swear the man she’d hit was also the guy from Tahiti. The one who’d tried to steal her case! And her mind wasn’t letting her imagination get away with saying “All islanders looked alike.”

Ngaire straightened and began edging away, still speaking to Herr Schmidt. “Look, I’m about to miss my ride. Can you see to him for me and I’ll get back to you later?”

“Sure thing. You run fast. Schnell, huh?”

“Danke.” She came up with the only useful word of German she knew and took off like the hounds of hell were after her.

She never even looked back. Ticket in hand, she raced down the gangway. “Devonport, here I come,” she murmured to no one in particular, as if she was about to cross the Pacific from east to west instead of taking a short ride to the North Shore.

Once onboard, she stopped to get her bearings, then spied stairs winding up to the top deck. She’d reached the bend and the upper deck was almost in her sight when fingers circled her ankle, holding her fast.

A ripple of fear iced her spine. Even if she’d been able to move, her balance was all wrong to take out the hand’s owner with a kick as he asked her, “Did you really think you could escape me so easily?”

Chapter 6

I f looks could kill…Kel knew he’d be a dead man.

Though you couldn’t tell from the warm sensations he got from holding her ankle. Reluctantly, he released his grasp on the slim-boned morsel of flesh. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you. You look as though you’d like to kick me. Not that I blame you, but can we leave it until we’re seated? This baby’s leaving port.”

“I thought you were someone else. I mean…” For once Ngaire looked flustered; pink traced the shape of her high cheekbones and her mouth quivered as if it needed kissing. His kiss.

He stepped up, balancing on the narrow end of the tread below hers, and brought their eyes level. “No need for explanations. I was at fault.”

“Actually, I was going to say I thought you were a stranger. I’d no idea you would follow me.”

“You had me worried, doll. You charged off as if the restaurant had caught fire. Then when I got on board, you weren’t here. What happened? Lose your way?”

“There was a bit of a tussle in the crowd when I stopped to look at the board listing the ferry timetable. I banged into someone, a guy, but Herr Schmidt came along and took care of him for me. Thank God.” Her eyelids snapped closed, shutting him out of the blue depths he’d been enjoying close-up, as if there was something in them she didn’t want him to see. The evasion didn’t last long as the ferry rounded the end of the wharf and caught the wake of a vessel heading under Harbour Bridge.

Ngaire fell into his arms. “Oops, guess we ought to go find those seats.”

Her momentum carried him down a step with her hands clutching the front of his shirt and her mouth close enough to kiss. Boy, did he want to kiss her. He heard her breathing quicken and her heart rate increase. Felt its frantic rush dance behind her ribs, where he’d tucked his palm under her breast.

He’d only to move his thumb…

As if she’d read his mind, her eyes darkened, bluer than midnight. That’s when Kel knew he was in deep crap. He needed to get out of it, and quick. He eased her upright, increasing the distance between their mouths, reducing the temptation to sup. Hell, they were blocking the stairs in a public place, and the only thing in his mind would get him arrested if he put his thoughts into actions—the words hot and wet spun through his brain in bold capital letters.

He needed to change the subject.

“Schmidt must have fixed that guy up in no time flat. He came onboard a few seconds after you.”

Her eyelids dipped. Again the evasion. What was she hiding?

“That’s a relief. He couldn’t have been as bad as I thought.” The movement of the ferry jogged her toward him again, but this time she grabbed for the rail instead of his shirt. “We could stand on the stairs until the ferry docks and see nothing, or go up top to get a load of the view. The second gets my vote.”

She swept around to make good her suggestion, her impetus swinging her long black braid out to slap his cheek, as if in chastisement for the lusty thoughts he was about to have as her neat little butt swayed in front of him.

Kel forced himself to think of something else. For starters, he needed to remember exactly why he was following Ngaire. She was the enemy. No matter how delicious this little crumpet appeared, he wouldn’t be feasting on her. No more imagining how her neat, firm breasts would feel in his hands, or wondering if those bronze legs, shimmering under her white pants, were long enough to lock round his waist. No. No. No! He was doing it again, and for his own sanity, he had to stop.

Only two steps behind her when she reached the top, he called out, “Let’s go outside, I could use the fresh air.”

At that time of day, there were few people interested in sitting out on the deck. And in Ngaire’s opinion, finding a seat seemed a waste of time. She headed straight for the rail overlooking the bow.

“If you’re thinking of doing a Titanic stunt, forget it. I’ve had enough of that kind of excitement for one day.”

“Hey, I climbed that cliff, too, remember.”

“Yeah, but you took the quick route down. I was the one at the top with my heart in my mouth.”

“It didn’t show.” As if to confirm her statement, she looked up at him without shifting her position at the rail or moving her folded arms across it. “I take back what I thought of you in Tahiti. You’d be a good guy to have on one’s side in a crisis.”

“So, where did I get promoted from? Bottom of the class?”

Her eyes widened, blue as the night-dark sea, but the stars in them were the reflection of the ferry’s lights. “I think you might have been stood in the corner with your face to the wall.”

“Whoa! You hit low and hard.”

She twisted round, chin tilted in his direction. “Admit it, your first impulse was to let that creep steal my case.”

“What if it was? It took me a moment to get my mind off the sexy woman I’d been watching, but my second impulse has to count for something. I did catch him.”

“Only because he was at least sixty pounds heavier on the hoof. A lighter guy might have gotten away. Or I could have—”

“No, you couldn’t,” he cut in. “Forget about pretending you’re a superhero, at least while I’m around. Considering you attract trouble like a magnet, you ought to be glad we’ll be together the whole trip. One thing for sure, since we left that guy behind in Tahiti, he can’t be the one who trashed your hotel room.”

He caught a quick that’s-all-you-know flash in her eyes before she looked down, pointing at the water below. “See here, where the wave breaks on the bow, the water is phosphorescent. Did you know Benjamin Franklin thought phosphorescence was due to electricity?”

“Frankly, doll, I don’t give a damn,” he paraphrased as his gaze followed her directions. Kel looked but didn’t see, his priorities focused on discovering what she wanted to conceal rather than watching a shimmer as insubstantial as the feelings she aroused in him. Here one moment, gone the next. They had to be. The cost was too high for anything more.

For the space of a heartbeat, Ngaire almost stuttered out the truth when Kel put on his Rhett Butler act with her playing the part of Scarlett. The dimple in his chin had deepened as he told her she ought to be glad of his company, but would Kel willingly continue as her companion for the trip’s duration if he knew the nightmare wasn’t over? For her, anyway.

Not yet.

Her hand curled round the strap of her day pack, and she garnered reassurance from the weight on her shoulder. She decided her safest bet would be to sleep with the mere under her pillow from now on. That way, if anyone wanted to steal it they would have to go through her. Kel didn’t know she would fight to the death in order to retain the prize nestled against the small of her back. Sure, her mettle hadn’t been tested to any great degree since she was fourteen, but now she had the skills to rise above the scenario that had played out when another kid had leapt up from behind a Dumpster in an alley and stabbed her low down in her belly. Robbed of her womanhood for little more than grocery money.

Devonport was one of the places on her wish list to visit. It was the place where her grandmother had lived and worked before moving to the States. And as the lights on shore evolved from specks that flickered in the deepening shadow of the hill into discernible street lamps and uncovered windows, Ngaire’s dream turned into a reality.

Kel pointed out to sea. “Look along the length of my arm. See that dark starless shadow on the horizon?”

When she nodded he went on. “That’s Rangitoto Island. It’s a volcano, a perfect cone that looks the same from every angle.”

“Aha, it must be one of the forty-eight that Auckland’s built on. A bit rash of the city fathers to choose here.”

“Trust you to know how many volcanoes there are. I lived here and never even bothered to find out. Though, it does seem kind of reckless in hindsight. They’d have been more interested in having a harbor each side of the isthmus.”

“Everyone knows hindsight is always twenty-twenty. I think the number of volcanoes was listed in a travel brochure I read before leaving San Francisco.” She looked at him from under her eyelashes, trying not to smile. “You know, the kind of advert that plays on your adventurous spirit. Come to Auckland and be blown away by it.”

“Ah, San Francisco of the Blue Grasshopper fame,” he replied, slipping in a dig of his own. “Now, that’s a brilliant example of planning, the city’s built on a fault line. In all my years in Auckland I never felt the ground shake.”

Maybe she could make it shake for him.

She thanked heaven that the darkness spared her blushes. Where Kel was concerned, her thoughts were becoming increasingly graphic, setting her skin alight every time she was around him. Like now.

“My grandparents met on one of these ferries during World War Two. Grandma was a kitchen hand working in Elizabeth House, where the navy WRNs were billeted, and George, my grandfather, was a GI stationed in Auckland for a while.”

Darn, the hot flashes were going to her head. She hadn’t intended to inform Kel of her Maori ancestry.

“So that’s the reason for your sudden urge to take a ferry ride,” he said on a long huff of breath, as if that explanation made more sense than her running to catch it on an impulse. “I think Elizabeth House is still standing, but they turned it into apartments years ago.”

“Do you think we can go see it?”

“Sure, it’s not that far a walk. We can do it in ten minutes.”

“Good, because that’s what I want to do.”

As they watched the ferry edge closer to the stark modern terminal that she guessed was a far cry from the days of World War Two, he surprised her by asking, “So were you named after your grandmother? And why didn’t you want me to know?”

“My grandmother was half Maori and half Scots.”

“Hell, doll. I’m guessing at least a quarter of New Zealanders have some Maori blood, and are proud of it. It would sure cut down on the number of friends I’d had if I let that bother me. Just wait till we reach Rotorua tomorrow, then you’ll see something.”

“Pops told me the moment his eyes met my grandmother’s, he knew. It was as if they recognized something in each other that wouldn’t exist with anyone else. I guess that was through Pops being half Native American.” She laughed slightly to break the tension she felt inside. When George Two Feathers repeated the story to her as a little girl, she had always felt it was just too heartbreakingly beautiful. “On the other hand, it might have been because they were both half Scots and it was the sound of bagpipes calling.”

Down below, passengers had begun to disembark. As she watched, Ngaire remembered the first moment she saw Kel, that moment when their eyes met and he’d yet to disappoint her. Ancient history now. He’d more than made up for it, so much so she found it hard to believe they’d only met yesterday.

“All ashore who’s going ashore,” she murmured in a singsong voice, pushing away from the rail.

“That would be us. Don’t look so sad, the journey isn’t over yet. We still have the return trip.”

It sounded like a prophecy, as if he’d said, “We still have the rest of our lives.”

If only she could believe it was true.

Although they were two of the last off the ferry, the terminal still hummed with noise, made louder by the modern corrugated-steel construction. People window-shopped or sat outside the cafés located in the terminal, eating or simply drinking coffee. Devonport had certainly grown up since the last time Kel had visited.

Ngaire was drawn to the window of a souvenir shop. He waited five boring minutes. “Hey, you’ll see plenty of those tomorrow.”

“Don’t you think these little cuddly lambs look cute?”

He gave her his best grim look. “Do you really want me to answer that?”

Ngaire’s “What would you do if I said yes” merited an explicit eye roll. It was then that he noticed Schmidt’s tall brown-clad figure two doors down studying furniture in an antique shop. Yeah, as if he believed that one; the guy’s wife wasn’t even with him. “Come on, doll. Let’s move on out.”

“Am I supposed to salute when you say that?”

“What?” He frowned, making a denial harder.

“Move on out. I take it you were in the army or something.”

He began walking and she followed, keeping up with his longer stride as if fixed to him at the elbow. “Or something. The SAS.”

“Whew, becoming a software sales rep must have been a letdown. Not much excitement in comparison.”

He could feel a growl gathering strength at the back of his throat. He wanted off this subject. She was quicker than he’d thought and he’d given himself away. The hell of it was, he felt himself actually starting to like her—not simply want her body—and he couldn’t afford sentiments that might let his guard slip. As it already had done.

“The experience gave me an entry into my job,” he told her, happy not to be lying for once, “at a higher level than I might have expected. Knowing the region was a big plus, you might say.”

They exited through huge glass doors into the car park. “This way, to your right. We have to walk along the beach-front.”

“So you didn’t mind giving it up? All the excitement, I mean.”

She was a persistent little devil, he’d give her that, but he’d thought of a way to make her drop the subject. “Well, I can’t say my life’s been dull, exactly. Only today I rescued a woman off the side of a cliff. Straight up, and hope to die if I tell a lie,” he finished, cursing himself with his own wit.

He glanced over his shoulder as they reached the footpath that separated the lawns from the seawall. Silhouetted against the light from the terminal, Schmidt’s wraithlike shadow stretched out along the path they had taken. His presence didn’t bode well for Ngaire’s little jaunt into her family’s history.

The tide was high, making soft sucking and soughing noises on the other side of the wall, so there was no dodging him that way. What excuse could Schmidt have to take the same direction as they had? It was highly unlikely that his grandmother had once worked at Elizabeth House. That would be carrying coincidence to unprecedented lengths.

For Ngaire’s benefit he kept up a quiet running commentary of what he could remember. “The area we’re moving toward is strictly residential, apart from a café and a few shops where the beach tails off close to North Head, a volcano. One of forty-eight.”

“You can tease, but the day will come when you’ll wish you had my excellent memory.”

“This way.” He veered off the path into the treed area, knowing Ngaire would follow and the soft ground would silence the click of her heels. Opposite, older turn-of-the-twentieth-century villas were being replaced by condos and apartment blocks, old-world charm losing out to a view and a price. And on this side, where they shone through the branches from higher ground, the lights mottled the grass in black-and-gold camouflage stripes.

Earlier, her white pants had teased his libido until he’d wanted to rip them off. He still did. In the dark they glowed like a night-light for a homing pigeon.

“If I remember rightly, we’re almost there.” He skirted a few more trees, keeping to the shadows until Ngaire complained.

“Hold up, buster. My night vision isn’t as good as yours.”

He flung out his arm with a flourish. “Sorry, I’m all out of drum rolls, but this is it. Elizabeth House.” He looked across the top of her head as he spoke. Deep in the heart of the trees a shadow moved, then melted into the night.

So it is old Schmidtty boy. Who would have believed it?

The silence lingered a few moments, stretching out as tight as his nerves. He wanted out of there before Schmidt caught up with them. It was obvious Ngaire didn’t know who her contact would be. Schmidt would probably wait till the last minute to make himself known and leave her with the burden of fending off other interested parties.

“It’s not as I imagined it would be.”

“Disappointed?”

“In a way. I guess Pops added something in the telling.”

“Maybe so. What does it matter? You started dreaming of a fairy-tale palace with Grandma playing the title role of Cinderella and Granddad acting Prince Charming, and instead found a converted castle. All that matters is how your grandfather remembered this. After all, the dream was his.”

The sharp snap of a twig underfoot alerted preternatural instincts honed by years of training. He could sense Ngaire’s unease echo his own without rhyme or reason, as if he’d plucked a guitar string, yet the note it played reverberated through her.

Going back the way they’d come didn’t appear to be an option, but circling the block was as good as stepping out of the end zone with the ball and giving away a free kick to the other side.

A glimmer of silver caught his attention as someone in one of the Elizabeth House apartments turned on an outside light. For a moment they were in danger of becoming floodlit, until he stepped back into the shadows and took her with him.

A silhouette pasted itself against the window, eyes shaded, as it peered into shadows searching for them. “Quick, follow me before someone calls the cops to search for a Peeping Tom.”

They were in luck. The metallic gleam morphed into a bus shelter with a glass advertising screen between them and Schmidt. He pulled Ngaire inside with him, groaning as her day pack banged against the glass. She slipped one strap down her arm and let it hang at her side. He’d tucked them into the darkest corner before she voiced a bewildered protest. “Wha-a-at? Why are we here?”

“Shh…” he said, fitting his hand round her jaw, tilting her face up to him.

As Kel’s hand clamped near her throat, Ngaire’s instinctive reaction was to lash out. She shivered with apprehension. Had she been mistaken about him?

The glass screen felt cool on her back, but not nearly as cold as the determined gleam in his eyes as he looked down at her. Maybe it was as basic as a deprivation of light, opening his pupils wide, that gave him eyes like a creature who hunts by night.

Cold and determined, yes, but she saw none of the malevolence of those who kill for killing’s sake.

Excitement replaced apprehension.

He pressed closer, the weight of him hot where it touched at breast, belly and thigh. Fire or ice? Her body knew its own mind, welcoming the flames. Welcoming the burn. She leaned into him, murmuring “Kel?” and not regretting it for a second.

If the woman would keep talking, what could Kel do to silence her except pull her into his arms and cover her lips with his?

One taste was enough to confirm his mistake.

If her mouth tasted his regret, it didn’t show. It flowered under his as he parted her lips, thinking only to sip. Not a hint of compunction marred his tongue’s foray into the depths of desire as he drank greedily. His head spun, drunk from her essence as she gave and gave with a fervor that surprised him.

Surprise that allowed him to pull back with his mind if not his rampant body. Crushing her against him, he cupped her hips, lifting her level with the powerful ache in his groin. Her legs wrapped round him, fitted as if she’d been made-to-measure, then he tucked her head into the crook of his neck and watched for Schmidt.

Ngaire breathed deeply, held his scent deep inside her and knew she’d been mistaken to think there was anything cold about Kel. The hard length pressed against her center filled her with awe and apprehension. She had no doubts about them coming together, making love, having sex, whatever, her limited experience making her wonder how they would manage.

Brushing her lips across his neck, she tasted the raw spiciness of Kel’s skin and let the soft brush of his stubble tease her lips where his jawbone jutted. There was no doubt in her mind, Kel was all male and then some.

The moments of doubt she’d experienced in Tahiti faded as if they’d never existed. She lifted her mouth closer to his.

“More,” she moaned. Kel obliged.

How could he have known the first time he laid eyes on her that she would be his downfall? The cause and the cure wrapped in one neat parcel that had swept him off his feet, as surely as her little tootsies were almost four feet off the ground and locked round his waist. She was everything he wanted and the last thing he needed. He had to be strong for both of them or end up dying a happy man.

Easier said than accomplished, as she fitted against his hips, filling him with the agony and ecstasy of knowing he hadn’t put a condom in his wallet, hoping to prevent temptation dragging him into the fiery pit. The flames were definitely licking at his heels. Not to mention other parts of his body that hadn’t a hope in hell of being satisfied.

With the part of his mind that stood to one side admonishing him, he noticed a splash of light from a doorway and heard a voice shout, “Who’s out there?”

Ngaire felt him tense as she pulled the shirt from his waistband. Her hands soon rid his skin of its tension, had it melting under her palms as she shaped the taut muscles.

In her business she’d seen and felt loads of male bodies while she taught advanced classes at her do jan. None of them beckoned the way Kel’s did.

For once in her life she knew she was going to take Leena’s advice. How could she pass up the chance of a lifetime, whether there was a future in it or not? She didn’t see many others coming her way.

Her thoughts fragmented and fell away as if they’d never been as Kel cupped her breast and robbed her of breath. His thumb brushed the tip of her nipple and she surged forward, trapping his hand between them even as she tightened her hold around his waist with her knees.

The way things were going, Kel should have known her breast would be the perfect fit for his hand. It was as if the gods were laughing at his arrogant assumption that the perfect woman for him didn’t exist, and had created her just to spite him.

It had seemed natural to claim her breast, to cup it and test its weight, something he seldom thought about when reduced to seeking a woman for relief.

Long before his marriage had ended his wife had removed her services, and even before that, she’d refused to let him touch with his hands. His hands were trained to do violence. They were lethal weapons, and unlike Ngaire, she couldn’t bear them on her skin.

With the still cognizant part of his brain, he heard a man’s voice add its might to the woman’s voice and more lights flicked on in the eyeless windows of Elizabeth House. He knew he and Ngaire couldn’t be seen and he actually felt a moment’s pity for Schmidt as the man on the steps shouted, “Go on, beat it before I call the cops.” After that he was definitely glad it was Schmidt taking the abuse and not him. The last thing he needed from his sister, Jo, was a get-out-of-jail-free card.

Ngaire was deaf to everything but the mutual satisfaction of their gasps and was doing something under his shirt to his back that he never wanted to stop. He strained against her in a rhythmic advance toward satisfaction.

His training had been too long and too profound to miss Schmidt slink past the shelter, looking left and right before crossing the road well away from the people calling the shots at Elizabeth House.

A few minutes later when most of the lights had been extinguished and Schmidt had long since disappeared, he felt Ngaire tense in his arms on a gasp and muffled her moans with his mouth. It took all his control not to come apart in her arms when his whole body burned to join her in the small death pulling her into another world. A place he was forbidden to go.

He kept her pressed tight to him long after her release subsided. Long after he’d swallowed her cries whole, and taken what enjoyment there was to be had from being the catalyst of such intense pleasure deep inside him, locked in the place where his heart used to reside.

Her hair tickled under his chin and her breath condensed in the hollow at the base of his throat. It was enough. It had to be enough. It was all the gratification he would allow himself while still living within his version of right and wrong. The law had nothing to do with it. They played this game under his rules.

His entire body spiked with tension as she sighed his name, “Kel.” She tried it out again. “Ke-e-el. I knew it would be like this with us. All white heat and black magic.”

Yes, he’d known it, too, damn her, he’d known.

Just for once, why the hell couldn’t he have been wrong?

Chapter 7

N gaire didn’t have much experience in dealing with morning-after stuff; tonight it was the few minutes after that were proving difficult. Would it have been so awkward if Kel hadn’t turned into the strong silent type? At least then she could have told him the surprise had been mutual, instead of coloring up each time she remembered spinning off the planet—like right now.

When she shifted the weight in her day pack to her other shoulder, it nestled warmly under her arm, while the sea breeze on her hot face felt cool. Both soothing in their own way. The temperature changes in Te Ruahiki were weird. Even weirder, the thought of the mere knowing what had just gone on.

She colored again. There was more to the greenstone than its bloody history, no matter what Savage gave as his reason for wanting to add it to his private collection. More than likely he had this crazy idea that the changes in the greenstone would warn him of his impending death, in time to prevent it. As the saying went, forewarned was forearmed.

That didn’t make it possible for the mere to sense the way Kel had rocked her socks, in a bus shelter of all places. If she told her friend Leena—the repository for all the important events in her life—she’d never live it down.

The lights of the ferryboat winked as it bobbed slightly in the middle of the harbor, warning her that one of them better say something soon, while they were still alone.

Someone ought to take the initiative, and it was her turn. Deal with it, Ngaire. You’re a big girl now.

“Sorry.” Even to her own ears it sounded weak.

“For what?”

“Losing it back there. I can’t remember the last…” Her voice trailed away. It had never happened that way before, the intensity, the sheer purging of inhibitions, as if she’d just been born. That she’d never lived until he took her in his arms.

If it had, she would have marked it on her calendar as the day she’d been reborn. Jeez, if it affected her that way without full penetration, the future few days suddenly took on super-nova status.

Kel looked down at her, eyebrows drawn straight, eyes and dimpled chin darkened by shadows as they walked under a street lamp. “So you aren’t mad at me because of my caveman tactics?”

So, that’s what was bothering him? Her apprehension faded. “Let’s say I give you an eight for seizing the moment and a three for the accommodation, on a scale where a hotel room scores ten.”

His lopsided grin, which had been missing in action, lit his face the way a comet lights the sky, smoothing out the harsh lines the lamp had drawn in black crayon. “I notice you didn’t rate me on performance.”

The dark cloud hovering since the bus shelter evaporated, as if it had never been. Never weighed on her. A warm rush of feeling swelled as if her heart might burst with pleasure, to hear him tease her like a friend, or lover of longstanding. A voice at the back of her mind, which sounded like Leena’s, whispered, “You are so pathetic, girl, being so pleased by so little.” She ignored it, answering him in the same coin. “Sheesh, if I did, you might stop trying to excel.”

“That counts me out for the rest of the night.” A rejection softened with a lift of a brow, like a wink in reverse. “I’d hate to spoil my record. And you must be beat, doll. You’ve had a helluva day one way and another. And in the caves tomorrow, we’re going to be climbing more stairs than a mutt has fleas.”

On the other side of the harbor, their hotel lights reflected in the water, but she’d turned the lights out in the one they were never destined to share. Swallowing a sigh whole, she urged, “Heck, the ferry is almost in, better make a dash for it.”

They made it to the top deck without a stop halfway. “What do you fancy, doll? Coffee or soda?”

She gave the selection behind the counter a brief glance. “Soda? Make mine lemon.” Unlike their previous crossing, vacant tables were hard to find with the bulk of younger passengers, dressed for a night on the town. From the snatches of conversation she caught, tomorrow Auckland’s city dwellers should waken to find everything painted red.

A small, sharp shaft of envy pierced her. How would it be to dance with Kel? If his long, loose-limbed stride was anything to go by, he could move and shake with the best of them. As always, when his name came to mind, which was often, she had to look at him. Her chin grazed her shoulder as she snuck a peek. Somebody pinch me! Tell me I’m not dreaming.

From behind, his khakis enhanced his firm butt, cupping it. She’d already had the pleasure of curving her hands round that part of his anatomy. Visions of the two of them on a small crowded dance floor turned up her personal thermostat. A twinge of pain was all it took to remind her that the day’s events had put paid to flexing her dancing muscles.

Kel gave his order, more concerned with watching Ngaire than whether or not the server could change the fifty he handed over the counter. The young guy doled two twenties into Kel’s palm, then began scraping through change for the rest.

Impatience crawling up the back of his neck and down his sleeve, set his fingertips drumming on the counter as a massive guy the width of a Humvee jeep blocked his view. With a slickness at odds with his size the guy moved on past, while the woman following slowed. Awareness pushed his something’s-wrong button.

Dressed in red, the blonde wore a minuscule dress that drew the eye to the length of her legs. He couldn’t see past her, but her subtle shoulder movements told him her hands were busy.

Grabbing the sodas, he charged up the aisle.

“Sir, your change!”

“Keep it,” he grunted without a backward glance.

Heat! Pain! Ngaire jumped backward as the jade mere burned through both T-shirt and day pack into her skin.

Crunch! Her heel came down on someone’s foot.

“Ow!” She twirled around, hands reaching to catch a vision of red silk and big gold hair

“Jeez, I’m so-o-o sorry. I didn’t know anyone was behind me. Is it bad? It sounded bad. Do you want to sit down? Let me find you a seat.” Her glance dithered between the blonde’s face and the open-toed sandals with mile-high heels that offered no protection.

“Take it easy, hon, I’m okay. Honest.” A smooth, honey-colored hand, red-tipped, batted at the air between them. “Just gimme a second to catch my breath.”

Her longstanding friendship with Leena Kowolski, “the best damn nail technician in San Francisco,”—Leena’s words, not her own—let her put a price on the nails.

The likeness between her friend and the woman wasn’t confined to a great manicure. Both their hair colorists did a top-notch job. Ngaire experienced a pang of homesickness.

“Ah, good.” Leena’s doppelgänger sighed. “My circulation’s coming back.”

“That’s great news in anyone’s language.”

She caught Kel’s frown as he picked his way toward her, carrying two cans of soda. Suddenly she was reading his mind. Two accidents in one day, and those things travel in threes.

A wealth of weary experience gathered in the creases round the blonde’s baby blues. Leena’s eyes still carried a youthful expectancy that something terrific lay round the next corner, or the next. This woman’s knew it wasn’t true.

“Are you sure I can’t find you somewhere to sit?”

“Sure, I’m positive. But hey, you’re American, huh?”

“Yeah, San Francisco.”

“Get outta here! Me, too. I moved there last year.”

“Small world.”

“You can say that again.”

“You two know each other?” Kel had arrived. “Everything okay?”

“No and no. I stepped back on…” Ngaire hesitated while she waited for the blonde to introduce herself.

“Myrna. But I’m feeling swell now. No need to worry.”

“Can we get you anything?” Kel asked. “Ice?” Uh-oh, he didn’t sound sincere. The aggressive slant to his shoulders wasn’t lessened by his grip on two blatantly pink cans in his fists.

“No, I gotta go, my sweetie is waiting for me. He wants us to watch the city lights from outside on the top deck.” Myrna backed away from him, slipping around Ngaire as she spoke. “You two have a nice evening,” she said, lifting perfectly curved eyebrows.

Turning, Ngaire watched her meet up with a dark gorilla of a guy, all hair and shoulders. Heads together, with Myrna flicking at his dark suit lapel, they spoke for a second before King Kong turned on his heel and thrust his body through the opening with a smoothness that belied his bulk, leaving Myrna to trot after him.

Kel’s mouth flattened, his gaze narrowing as it followed the unusual-looking pair. “Let’s sit down. You can tell me what happened.”

Ngaire sat. “I stepped back without looking and squished her toes with my big feet.” Who would believe the truth?

“Maybe you should check your day pack.”

“My day pack? Why?”

“Make sure she didn’t filch anything.” He clenched his jaw, setting his chin at a stubborn angle that indicated he didn’t expect to hear her say no.

It was just his way of making sure she hadn’t been robbed. She could feel the weight of the only thing she had of value inside, her million-dollar murder weapon, but she checked, anyway, to keep him sweet, flipping open the tabs with the bag on her knee, its contents hidden. “I seem to remember the word paranoid being mentioned when I floated the idea that you might be following me.”

“This isn’t paranoia, it’s caution.” He tipped his head back to drink his soda and watching the way his throat moved made her insides turn somersaults.

Her wallet was tucked next to the scarf she’d wrapped around the mere, and though short, her nails marked the leather. “And what does that make me?”

“For someone purporting to come from San Francisco, I’d say it made you naive.” The Velcro tabs made a small quiet sound as she refastened them. Seemed she couldn’t win with Kel.

Not that she wanted him to see her as aggressive. Hapkido came naturally, like a baby’s first breath. But a succession of distinctly wary male friends had her convinced that some of them would rather have remained in ignorance.

“Is everything there?”

“Yes. I’m not dumb. I cut my eyeteeth a long time ago. Though I admit to being thrown off balance. She’s just like my friend Leena.”

His lips curved at one corner. “And that’s why you squished her toes? Do you always stand on your friend’s feet?”

Whew! She’d rather make him laugh than think her an idiot. She picked up her soda. “I’m actually very kind to my friends.”

He lifted his can toward hers. “Cheers, friend.”

Pink aluminum bumped softly; their glances clashed and burned. His eyes darkened to hot coals that lit flames low down in her belly. Out of an achingly long moment, she re-discovered the blinding sensation of recognition she’d felt when she saw him on the other side of a pile of luggage that wouldn’t stay still. It rocked her soul then, as it did now.

They were passing his door, moving on to hers. The skin on Kel’s nape prickled as if tiny feet walked across it. Make that giant clodhoppers. Someone was in his room. Chaly? He would have called.

Ngaire stopped outside her door. “Early start tomorrow.” He began excusing himself. “We should call it a night.”

“If that’s what you want.” She gave him an opening a blind man could see, but he didn’t dare take it.

Her chin lifted as she stared without blinking. A question written in eyes so blue he had to be mad not to jump in and drown. “I’ll give you a knock at 6:00 a.m. to make sure you’re up.”

A flicker of conscience zapped him like a gnat with fangs. “Come here.” He pulled her close, his big hands spanning her ribs. A wince tightened her expression as the bruises under his palms went into spasm. “You’re pretty sore now, but a soak in a Rotorua hot pool will cure what ails you. We’ll be stopping there tomorrow night.” Finishing what he’d started, he brushed his lips across her forehead, making sure the strain on his face was gone before her eyes fluttered open again.

He took a step back. It didn’t dilute her scent in his head. Part of him wanted to recklessly say, “The hell with it,” and barge through the door with her in his arms to check how easily her cotton sheets caught fire. The sane part wanted to know who was in his room.

“You go on in. I’ll wait till you’ve got the light on and checked the room.”

She slipped the key card into the lock. “You don’t trust anyone, do you?”

“No.” He swore he could hear the question frame in her mind, and cut it off midflight. He was sick of the lies, yet how could he tell her “You top the list of people I don’t trust to tell me the truth.” He settled for “I’m a quick study. That’s one lesson my job’s taught me well.”

The door was ajar, held open by her foot. “I guess that’s where we differ.”

Looking past her into the empty room, he responded with a careless shrug. “That’s okay, you’re young, you still have time. The room looks okay. Now, be a good girl, go check the bathroom as well.”

“I hope never to live long enough for that lesson. Good night!” With that she shut the door in his face. He waited, listening, knowing she would do as he’d asked, knowing whether it suited her or not, she’d taken her first course in Distrust 101.

Kel heard a murmur of voices, not what was being said, though he was sure there was more than one person inside. Either that or the maid had left the TV entertaining an empty room.

With a quick glance left and right, he checked the corridor. It was safe to remove his gun from its holster. Remembering Gordie’s stab wound, he thought wistfully of body armor as the Smith & Wesson Chief’s Special Airweight was tucked in the back of his waistband, hidden by his shirt.

Nothing could be done about the lock clicking as the key card released the catch and a green light dawned above the handle. He eased open the door. The lights were on. A pair of large feet crossed at the ankles on the end of long legs stuck out into the room. A big guy, but then so was he. Though he opened the door wider, the legs didn’t budge, which meant the guy was either at ease with breaking into his room, or already dead, instead of about to be. A growl rumbling at the back of his throat roughened his welcome. “Making yourself at home?”

A woman’s voice slid past the noise of the door shuddering against the wall. “Welcome home, bro. We thought you’d never get here.” His sister, Jo, had made herself comfortable, back propped up by the bed pillows, legs stretched full length across the silver-gray bedcover, shoes and all, and a twist of gold paper lay at her elbow on the nightstand, all she’d left of his pillow mint.

Damn, but it was good to see her. Not that he would give her the information or the satisfaction. The guy with the feet had to be his new brother-in-law. The door closed behind him as he said, “Lucky for me I wasn’t bringing a woman up here. Finding a female already in possession of the bed is inclined to put them off.”

Jo swung her feet onto the thick carpet. “Nice to see you, too, Kel.” With heels on, when she stood, Jo was easily as tall as him. Whatever else the Jellic family had scrimped on, Grandma Glamuzina had made sure they never went short of food.

After they’d hugged as if it had been a million years since they’d last seen each other instead of five, he asked, “Are you ever going to introduce me or are you ashamed of your brother?”

“This is my husband, Rowan.”

She giggled, something he didn’t remember her doing much of when they were kids, though most of his memories of home hit a wall about the time their father committed suicide. Everything that went before then had to have been a lie.

“I still get a glow when I say that word, husband. Our first anniversary isn’t until Christmas Eve.”

Rowan unfolded himself from the chair and made Jo look little. Kel guessed he would have to get used to being topped by at least two inches as he took his new brother-in-law’s outstretched hand. For all his size, there was nothing aggressive about the guy. No trying to get the better of the grip as their fists locked. Rowan McQuaid Stanhope’s smile confirmed he meant it when he said, “Pleased to meet you at last.”

“Likewise. I never thought I would meet a guy who could make Jo blush.” Teasing his sister was something he did automatically.

Rowan turned to his wife and signaled in Kel’s direction with an explicit jerk of his chin. “This one of the ones who put bugs down your back?”

“God! Don’t tell me she still hasn’t forgiven us for that?”

“She hasn’t, but I don’t mind thanking you. It has made for some interesting searches under her shirt if she even suspects there are spiders around.” He winked at his wife, who blushed again and turned on her heel, throwing Rowan a coy look over her shoulder before sitting on the end of the bed.

Kel tried to remember if his brief marriage had ever been that way, or had Carly always been dissatisfied, and counted the touch of his murderous hands on her fragile skin as the last straw. He shrugged away the thoughts. He ought to be pleased for his sister instead of coloring his emotions green with envy. “I don’t suppose there’s much point in asking how you got into my room, sis?”

“I wouldn’t be much of a detective if I couldn’t find out which hotel you were in or your room number. And the lock was a cinch.”

“So what’s the occasion, since your anniversary is almost a month away?” He threw out the question like a masochist, pleased the answer would cause pain. That the day would end as it had started when he’d foolishly called Jo using the hotel phone.

“I want to tell you what we’re doing about Dad.”

“What’s to do about him, he’s dead already. Nothing left but the stuff the worms didn’t want.” His stomach curled at the image and he could see from his sister’s face the throw-away line had had the same effect on her.

Rowan, on the other hand, was wearing a frown that shattered Kel’s first impression that his brother-in-law was just a big likable lug. “We’ve been steadily working through a list of cops he worked with and criminals he sent down. So far we’ve found nothing to confirm Milo Jellic was involved with drugs.”

“Oh, sure, and they’re going to come right out and tell you. It doesn’t work that way.” A pain filled his chest, big enough to come right out and swallow him. He didn’t want this. Didn’t want to know. “Why don’t you just get the hell on out of here and leave me alone?”

Rowan gained another two inches on Kel, and his anger was evident in his voice. “Don’t you dare talk to your sister that way.”

His tone stretched up to meet Jo’s husband’s, no matter that between them the walls in the room began to rock. “I’ll talk to her any way I damn well like. I’ve know her longer than you. When Jo sets her mind on something she’s like a dog with a bone in her teeth and she won’t let go.”

Jo’s hand on Rowan’s sleeve saved him from the punch he deserved. “No,” she said softly, “leave him, Rowan. He’s hurting.”

Even though his head throbbed, he wasn’t ready to give in. “That isn’t pain, it’s indifference.”

“You always loved Dad the most. That’s why you took it so badly.” She was trying to soothe him.

It didn’t work. “Don’t give me any of that psychological claptrap they teach you women at the police academy. I never loved him. You idolized him and that’s why you can’t see the truth that’s staring you in the eye. He was a drug dealer, and I’ve been cleaning up his kind of crap most of my adult life.”

“Shush…”

“Don’t shush me!”

Rowan caught his arm. “No, Jo’s right, someone’s knocking.”

The tapping on the connecting doors grew louder, more impatient, as Ngaire called out, “Kel! You okay in there?”

He walked over to the door but left it closed, glad he hadn’t had time to set his equipment up. “Shoot, yeah, I’m all right. I turned the TV up too loud. Sat on the remote and it went off full blast. Sorry, doll. Don’t worry, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Kel listened to the other door close, then leaned against his own, catching the speculative gleam in his baby sister’s eyes. Like a man of war preparing for boarders he braced himself for the onslaught.

He knew the Jo of old. Knew her face as well as his own. Take away the long dark hair, the full lips, and add a five o’clock shadow and it was his own. The only thing that ran true about Milo Jellic had been his seed. And at this late date Kel knew he couldn’t let the old bastard come between him and the only people he cared for.

Loved.

Who loved him.

“So-o-o, who’s the woman? She your partner?”

He pushed away from the door, away from the chance of being overheard. “Partner in what? Crime? You may have noticed she’s not in my bed.”

He heard Rowan laugh, then try to stifle it with a large fist as he returned to the tub chair. Kel gathered he’d been married to Jo long enough to know what to expect, long enough to know the crisis was over. His earlier analogy might have been on the insensitive side, but once started, Jo never gave up. And she would know a lie if he told one. She hated lies. And his world was based on them. All flimflam and disguises.

When the news had come out about their father, Jo had been the old man’s staunchest ally, and blasted all the stories to hell and gone as untrue.

“Ratchett!” She cursed his answer as he knew she would. “I’m more than fourteen, don’t answer my question with another. Who is she and what are you really doing in Auckland? Don’t think I haven’t seen all the gizmos you’re carrying with you.”

“Huh, I guess I should have known you wouldn’t be able to resist.”

“It didn’t take much figuring out that you’re hiding a gun inside your waistband. Can’t tell you the model, but I know it’s smaller than my Glock. I don’t want to be left cleaning up any of your messes once you’re gone.”

“Nobody likes a smart-ass!” He dropped his voice another notch. “But you got me, I am carrying.”

He pulled the Smith & Wesson out. “I suppose you want to see my ID as well?” he asked, handing it over for Jo’s inspection.

“Don’t be an idiot.” She weighed his piece in her hand, then passed it to Rowan. “What do you think, lover? A bit light for my taste.”

His brother-in-law’s hand nearly swallowed it up. “Kind of sissy, don’t you think, peaches?” Rowan tempered his insult with a wink as he returned the gun.

“I usually wear it at my ankle, but I doubt if they make any your size.”

“So are you going to let us in on why you’re here?”

You couldn’t not trust a guy who could swap insults one moment and freeze your ass off with a hard, cold look the next, especially if he was family. “I’m working undercover. The girl next door’s a drug courier that I’m following.”

“Looks like you are doing more than following from where I sit,” Jo chipped in from her seat on the bed.

“I told you I’m undercover, peaches.”

His use of her pet name made no odds. “Okay, so why don’t you arrest her instead of breaking her heart?” Jo waited and faked him out with a stare. Had she really guessed how things were going with him and Ngaire from a brief conversation?

“I can’t lock her away for carrying a piece of paper. She doesn’t have the actual drug per se, but she’s carrying the formula. You’ve heard of kiss-and-tell? My job is to see which cartel it’s delivered to, take it from there and try to get rid of her contact and it, before he has a chance to pass it on.”

Jo turned to Rowan. A look of complete understanding passed from one to the other as if they’d known each other for aeons and had no need of words as they offered, “What can we do for you?”

“There is something you can do. I don’t think I’m the only one following the formula. Ngaire’s suitcase was almost stolen by a guy in Tahiti, but I fixed that. Also, there’s a German guy who’s been on her tail for as long as I have. Schmidt. He’s in this hotel, as well a woman with him who’s supposed to be his wife. They’re on the same damn tour, so there’s no escaping him. Can you check him out?”

“No problem.”

Standing, Rowan went over to his wife and pulled her up beside him. With his arm around Jo’s shoulders he assured Kel, “Don’t worry, she means it. From your mouth to God’s ear.”

“And with a name like Ngaire the girl must be a New Zealander. Do you want me to see if we have anything on the books?”

“No point, she’s only part Maori, comes from San Francisco.”

“She must have come through Customs though.”

“No problems there, though they did take extra-long processing her.”

“I’ll see what I can do. In return, you can keep in touch more often. You know, we worry about you. Kurt is the only one you’re in contact with, but being a twin his methods aren’t available to the rest of your family.”

He could tell Rowan was making a move to leave and almost wished they’d stay longer. For the first time in years he wished he could give all of it away, all the undercover work and sleazy dives. When was the last time he’d stayed anyplace as classy as the Hilton? Hell, the Y was upmarket compared to his lifestyle. “I promise I’ll keep in touch when I’m able. As for the rest, thanks sis, you’re a lifesaver.”

“No I’m not. In this family that’s Rowan’s title. He saved my life twice, you know.”

The tawny-haired giant just shrugged, a wry twist to his mouth. “I thought we’d agreed to stop keeping count of who saved who?”

Kel grabbed Rowan’s hand and shook it. “Thanks, mate. I owe you. Welcome to the family.”

Chapter 8

A ll Ngaire could think was, thank heavens she didn’t suffer from claustrophobia. The second day of the tour had taken them deep underground. They didn’t even have the comfort of a light on the boat, just a cool blindness that turned her skin goosey from whispers of cold air stirred up by its passage on the water, smooth and gleaming darkly like oil in the bowels of the earth.

It was as if everything around her, the cave, the boat, the other passengers, held their breath, waiting.

She edged closer to Kel on the narrow wooden seat, extra warmth being as good as any incentive to abandon the aloof attitude she’d wrapped around herself. Brought about by her own perversity, her mood carried overtones of cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face.

Had Kel even noticed? She didn’t think so.

If anything, his foul disposition left hers for dead. His mouth had a bitter twist she found hard to ignore, though she’d tried. Was it to do with the woman in his room last night? All her instincts told her she’d heard an angry female.

TV? No way!

Although she hadn’t been able to make out the words, there was too much real passion vibrating through the walls to put down to acting. She’d almost finished her bedtime routine, letting down her hair, removing the mere from her day pack to slip under her pillow, when the harsh sounds began.

The subtle difference in the jade sent small shocks rippling up her arm. Then her hair, as yet to feel the stroke of her brush, lifted in the air crackling with static energy.

Moments such as that reminded her that the mere was an instrument of death as well as a prophet of doom for its owner. An ancient killing machine, not merely the exquisite piece of craftsmanship it appeared at first glance.

She was well aware that those attributes had kindled Paul Savage’s obsession. For a guy supposed to be connected, she’d imagined the constant presence of bodyguards watching his back canceled the need to know the time of his death. Or like her ancestor, Te Ruahiki, did he intend taking his enemies with him to the grave?

Yet who was she to cast aspersions?

Didn’t her nightly routine have its roots in her own fears? To what end? No bloodred flecks had surfaced on the jade before her fall. Yet that knowledge had been forgotten the instant she’d dropped off the edge of the cliff.

As Kel’s body heat seeped through her clothes, she shivered at the contrast between flesh and air.

The hurt as he edged away was every bit as real as if he’d slapped her. And the weight of her pain pushed her neck down into her chest as she turned her shoulder toward him, only to feel his jacket cover her in the warmth he’d radiated.

She felt his breath caress her cheek and the unforgettable taste of him swamped her senses, making her shudder as one kind of tension replaced another.

“I should have warned you to bring a jacket. It has to be twelve degrees cooler on the water than outside.”

The darkness was no hindrance to him finding her hand. His fingers plucked it off her knee and transferred it, palm down, onto his hard thigh. His quad tensed as her fingertips lightly scraped the tightly packed flesh, until the weight of his palm halted her instinctive pursuit. Instead, his fingers wrapped around hers and held on as if he’d never let go.

Dark and moldering, the cave reflected Kel’s mood. Today Gordie would be cremated and his ashes scattered who knows where, as if he had never existed. It wasn’t until Ngaire’s shivers caught his attention that he snapped out of the self-indulgent pall of gloom. He’d been flagellating himself, seeing Gordie’s death as his own failure. And he couldn’t afford another one or Chaly would toss him out of GDE on his ass.

As if Gordie’s funeral wasn’t enough, Jo had set the tone for today by resurrecting old business concerning his father. If he’d needed anything to confirm Ngaire’s place in his life—and he had—that realization hit the nail on the head with a whopping great hammer.

She belonged on the same team as his father.

A chorus of in-drawn breaths alerted him to their arrival in the glowworm cave, the small ripple of surprise enough for a few of the tiny creatures to withdraw their light.

His heart jolted as Ngaire touched his neck, pulling him toward her. No use to say “Get over it!” His body was on a mission of its own and had gone deaf to his protests.

“Holy cannoli! You didn’t tell me what a wonderful experience this would be. It’s like floating in the Milky Way.”

What could he say? Talking turned the stars out, but experiencing the withdrawal of her lips from his jaw, just south of his ear, felt as big a loss.

Hell, he was in a bad way. Up to his neck in hormones, when he needed to concentrate on the whereabouts of her connection to the drug cartel. Some people recited logarithms at times like this, but he turned his thoughts back to Gordie.

If there had been a mirror handy, Ngaire was certain she’d see stars in her eyes. She was sure nothing could cap the experience of being bathed in starlight, but if the rest of her visit to New Zealand was only half as good, she would still agree with George Two Feathers’s definition of paradise.

Her earlier eagerness to reach the boats meant they were first on and last off. Kel’s footsteps rang on the metal stairs just two treads below hers. Reaching the top, she twisted round to catch him eyeing her butt. The knowledge sparked a silent hope that matters were back to progressing nicely in the romance stakes. She’d been worried about going home to report to Leena that she’d blown her only interesting chance for a holiday fling. If Ngaire arrived in San Francisco carrying the same sealed box of condoms her friend had pushed into her hand at the airport, Leena would shake her head in despair.

So far the only thing missing from the box was part of the blue ribbon she’d tied round the package.

“Let’s take one last look in the cathedral chamber before we leave. I want some snapshots that aren’t filled with the rest of the passengers.”

“We’ll miss the bus.”

“Don’t worry, they won’t leave without us, and in the few seconds it will take to click the shutter the others won’t be anywhere near the exit. Come on, you can pose for me.”

“I’ve a better idea.” Kel held out his hand for the camera. “You pose and I’ll snap.”

She was in luck; most of the stragglers from their tour had gone on and the next lot hadn’t reached the cathedral chamber. Awesome hardly described the sight of the earth’s strata, shimmering in blends of light ochre through to deep rusty reds.

She’d been told some places close to the cave wall acted as a whispering gallery, though not when too many bodies dampen the sounds. “Get some shots of the stalactites on the ceiling, then I’ll stand beside the formation they call the pipe organ.”

A few moments later Kel called out from the far side, “Say cheese…cheese…cheese.”

“That was great, do it again.”

He frowned, “Do what?” Again the last word repeated, but Kel couldn’t seem to hear from where he stood.

She flagged the answer away, embarrassed, as she caught a glimpse of movement, a shadow passing behind the stalagmites, close to the door. They were no longer alone.

“What did you do with your camera?” Ready to leave, she flung the question at him as she slid her own back in its case.

Kel slapped his hip pocket, then froze as if someone had stopped the film at one frame for a second then let it roll on. “Oops, I left it at home.”

Her ears pricked. He’d been very cagey with details of home and family, even more so than her. “Where is home?”

“How does that line go? Wherever I hang my hat?”

“You don’t wear a h-hat…” she stuttered as the light disappeared. “My God! I’ve gone blind.”

“Don’t panic, there’s been a power cut. They’re bound to have an emergency backup generator in a place like this. The lights should be on again in a few seconds.”

“I thought it was dark in the glowworm grotto, but this sure beats all.”

“That’s because when we first went in the boat there was some light behind us and our eyes became accustomed before we’d reached the grotto.”

Was her imagination playing tricks? Did Kel sound farther away? She swallowed hard, but the fear stuck in her throat. “I’m too scared to move.”

“Look, I was facing you and away from the exit when the lights went out. If neither of us have moved and you stretch your arm out while I stretch out mine, they should meet.”

“Okay, I’m doing it.” Fingers spread wide, she reached out ready to grab the first solid object. Make that a warm solid object.

But when she found one, she gasped, “Is that you, Kel?” And her heart didn’t stop pounding until he answered.

“Who else would it be? We’re the only ones in the cathedral.”

She wasn’t so sure, but circumspectly, refused to mention it.

Kel reeled her in by the wrist, then steadied her by placing his hands on her shoulders, protecting himself from the need to draw her closer. He hoped someone was working on that generator. “Are your eyes beginning to adjust?”

“No, they are not. This isn’t the best moment to discover I suffer from night blindness.” There was an edge to her voice; he imagined she wore a sulky, little-girl pout.

A brisk command to snap out of it wouldn’t work here. This was a far cry from night maneuvers with the SAS. “Not enough carrots, that’s your problem. A double order for you tonight to make sure this never happens again.”

His fooling earned him a giggle. “That’s better. Now, take a look over to your left. Can you see a slight phosphorescence gleaming on the wall?”

“Like a pale rendition of the glowworm cave, yes, thank heavens I see it. That means I haven’t gone blind.”

A chuckle bubbled up out of nowhere and took him by surprise. He hadn’t thought he could find anything to laugh at today of all days. “Don’t blame the wall, it hasn’t got the same need to attract food the way the worms do.”

“Or a mate, unless that’s the way caves reproduce.”

Trust Ngaire to drag his mind back to sex and the fact that one little pull would send her spinning into his arms. “I suggest we move over next to the wall, then if the worst comes to worst we can follow it round to the cave exit.”

“I won’t mind if the lights come on before we get there, so don’t rush. I noticed a few baby stalagmites that could do a lot of damage if we fell on them.”

Time dragged, when all he could do was lean against a wall and check the luminous numbers on his watch about five times a minute. He could think of more productive ways to use the time.

The more Ngaire fidgeted, shifting from one foot to the other, bringing her closer to his side, the more fruitful his ideas became. He was holding his libido on a tight leash and chances were if she touched him, it might snap.

That had been his less-than-altruistic reason for handing over his jacket for her to wear again.

“Do some of that stretching like you did outside the bus in Tahiti. It will smooth the kinks out and make you feel better.”

“Oh. You remembered.”

“Doll, there’s nothing about you I can forget.” Particularly the notion that in her bag at that very moment was the formula for the nastiest designer drug ever designed.

Just keep reminding yourself of that, Kel boy, and tell your urges to back off.

A rattle that sounded as if someone had rolled small stones underfoot had him pushing upright from the wall. He checked his watch once more. “It’s been more than ten minutes. You stay here and don’t move. I’m going looking for help.”

“Take me with you, please, Kel.”

Her pleading almost got through to him, but he’d learned how to harden his heart against women’s wiles battling with his ex-wife’s demands that he give up the SAS for her.

“You’re better off here where there’s a faint glimmer of light. I don’t want you taking any more chances of getting hurt.” Dim as the light was, her eyes flashed in it. “Hey, doll.” He reached out, took her chin in his hand and rubbed his thumb across the velvety pout of her bottom lip. “I’d never forgive myself if you got hurt.”

“Oh, all right. But if you take too long I’m coming after you.” He bet she would and all.

“I’ll be back before you know it. I’m only going to the cave entrance. From there I’ll be able to see if someone’s searching for us. Maybe they’ll have a flashlight.”

Left alone and blind in the dark, Ngaire felt each minute lasted a lifetime.

Ten lonely lifetimes passed without Kel. As the vague glow of phosphorescence dimmed, Ngaire couldn’t remember ever feeling so isolated. Kel’s company was sorely missed.

A faintly tinny rumble of gravel rolling underfoot sounded again. And again, yet the noise appeared to come from the rock wall behind her. Hadn’t she read somewhere in her research of New Zealand about cave wetas? Critters that grew upward of twelve inches in length? The thought scared her. Now, that was a little piece of trivia she wished she could forget.

Next she thought she heard a whisper, a thread of a voice saying, “Alone…alone…alone,” repeated so softly it might simply have been Kel’s jacket brushing against the rock wall. The only problem with that, she was the one wearing it. She pulled the edges tight, wrapping them around both her and her day pack. She’d worn the pack back to front, so leaning against the wall wouldn’t damage the mere. She got the idea after the carved handle dug into her back. Te Ruahiki felt toasty compared to her, so she snuggled round him to keep warm.

“Ke-e-el,” she whispered as if she’d only to mention his name to spirit him up. It hadn’t worked before and it didn’t work then. Missing him badly, she counted off the seconds inside her head. A thousand more, then she was moving on out.

Light skimmed past the cave entrance, shifting, dancing, taking the fixed silhouettes of stalagmites on an impossible march like clay Chinese soldiers in an emperor’s tomb. Relief shuddered through her like an icy chill rattling her bones.

Kel had come back.

“Over here!” she yelled, but no one answered. Instead the cold maw of darkness, pressing down from the cavern’s vaulted ceiling, swallowed her shout. Yet, she knew in her heart her wait was almost over.

At last, Kel was coming to get her.

Pushing off the wall, she opened her day pack, searching with her fingers, making sure she wasn’t leaving anything behind, relying on her senses since eyesight was redundant in this situation.

“Brilliant!” Her hand closed round her camera. If she set off the flash, Kel would know at once where to find her.

No sooner thought than done, the blue flash lit up her area of the cavern for a microsecond, giving a fleeting image of someone moving. This was great. She didn’t know how long it would take to run the battery flat, but until then…

A beam of light danced across the floor of the cave toward her, skirting the bases of tapering limestone pillars, yet unless her sense of direction had gone awry, it was coming from the back of the cave. “About time, too. Did you get lost?”

No answer.

The small pool of light was almost on her, held by an invisible hand. Her heart wrenched itself free and dropped into her stomach. “Not funny, Kel. Not in the least funny, I know it’s you, answer me, darn it!”

The dazzling beam caught her square in the eyes. Not the answer she’d expected. Ngaire threw up a hand to protect her sight as her night-widened pupils fractured in a million shards of color, blinded by the sudden contrast.

“Gimme the bag.”

Her heart took another plunge. She didn’t recognize the rough voice, and whoever it was, he didn’t sound as if he was joking.

“In your dreams, buster.” She braved it out.

“Paul Savage’s dreams always come true.”

“Not today they don’t.” She slid Kel’s jacket down as she spoke, freeing her arms of its hampering bulk. “Tell Mr. Savage I’m not in the business of making his dreams come true, and get out of here before I have to hurt you.”

His bark of laughter was cut off as she spun Kel’s jacket through the air, smothering the glare of the flashlight. The kick that followed knocked it out of his hand, leaving a pale blur of light shining through the fabric.

Before he had a chance to get his act together, she sprang forward and took his feet out from under him with a side-swiping kick where she judged the level of his knees would be.

He fell heavily. That’s the way to do it!

Satisfied with her first effort she bent to scoop up the jacket and steal his flashlight. But he was quicker than the huge thump he’d landed with suggested.

His thick fingers grabbed her wrist. Just as quickly she twisted, slipping through his grasp. Her fingers locked with his as the momentum of her spin brought her shoulder level with his sternum. As her elbow slammed into his gut with the added weight of his own arm he let out a yowl of pain, and his knees hit the deck.

He wouldn’t be using that arm again in a hurry, but just in case she reversed her spin and added a stunning blow between shoulder and neck.

“You’ll keep.” She laughed, the tension flowing out of her as she repossessed both jacket and light. She then flashed the beam over the bulky body on the floor of the cave but the moment the light hit his face, he covered it with his massive hands. Taking her bearings from the pipe organ, she soon found the way out. But even she wasn’t prepared for the brilliance of normal lighting suddenly flooding the cave, obliterating the darkness as if it had never been.

Never happened.

She ignored the angry grunts behind her, and mainly to avoid awkward questions about where she’d found the flashlight, she tucked it into a crevice, deciding she’d had enough of caves and cliffs to last her a lifetime.

With the jacket looped through the strap of her day pack, she looked down. “A lot of help you were. Thank your lucky stars I know how to look after myself.”

Kel was on the bottom step of the stairs leading back to ground level. One look and somehow he knew she’d been in trouble again. “What happened to you? I thought I told you to wait.”

She hadn’t noticed the rip in the sleeve of her T-shirt until he brought it to her attention. “Ran into something.”

He lifted her arm.

She’d noticed the pain but not the blood. The guy must have been wearing some sort of pendant. “Banged it when I ran into something.”

Kel shook his head. “But you’re all right otherwise?”

“A-okay, boss! I was worried the bus might leave without me.”

“So they miss a few souvenir shops between here and Rotorua, it will be lighter on everyone’s pockets, especially yours.”

“I’m not worried. Just promise me that next time, you won’t leave me behind.”

Hoping she’d rescued his property without doing any damage, she removed his jacket. “Here, Kel, you’d better have this. It served its purpose, thank you.”

With the jacket slung over his shoulder, he rested the palm of his other hand in the small of her back. “No problem, but what makes you think there’s going to be a next time?”

As they climbed, she glanced over her shoulder toward the cave, hoping her assailant was still feeling the effects of her last move and wouldn’t be following them out.

Kel’s eyebrows rose slightly, a hint that he was waiting for a reply. Oh, dear, she thought, keep it simple.

Chapter 9

B eside him Ngaire stirred from sleep, searching for more space in the confines of the narrow bus seat. The imprint of her head on his arm would linger long after she’d straightened. Knowing she trusted him enough to let her guard down as she slept tugged at Kel’s conscience.

Already tired from her escapade in the caves, combined with a ton of walking and souvenir hunting, she’d fallen asleep immediately, still clutching her damn day pack. She never let the thing out of her sight. Hell, she probably even slept with the damn bag.

Looked like he might have to take Chaly’s advice and sleep with her to get a look inside it for the formula.

The nursery rhyme she’d been giggling over as she drifted off rang in his head as if she’d sussed him. Baa, baa, black sheep, have you any wool? He was the black sheep of his family, always had been, and always would be.

Ngaire was the dame, trouble in a way only dames could be. She’d lied about that scrape on her arm, though he didn’t know why. Her scent when he’d reached her in the cave had been of exertion, not fear. As a precursor to death, he knew that sharp, sweet aroma only too well.

But who was the master? The drug cartel or someone else, the boy or boys down the lane? The game he played had become top heavy with players on the other team.

He watched Ngaire’s eyes widen as she came to, blue and innocent as a newborn babe’s. What a doll, to look the way she did yet work for the worst set of characters on God’s earth. He wondered how long she’d been using her looks to fool the police and Customs. She acted as if she’d never been anywhere before, but he was sure her passport told otherwise, unless she had more than one of them.

She stretched again, lifting her arms behind her and emphasizing the thrust of her breasts. He wouldn’t have been human if he hadn’t watched and remembered the weight and shape of them in his hands. She had everything going for her and then some, and it would take living up to his code name, Heartbreaker, to keep him safe.

“Where are we? And what is that smell?” Her face creased as she turned to squint between their seats as if she thought the source of her nose’s discomfort came from the two ladies in the next row who were playing some serious mah-jongg.

Farther back, some of the men played poker. Big money was changing hands, but they weren’t to blame for what ailed her.

“No need to be polite about it, the odor is sulfur, but the name of the place isn’t hell, just Rotorua. We entered town about ten minutes ago, and closer to the center the smell gets worse. But don’t knock it, to the inhabitants it’s pure gold. Twenty-four karat at least.”

She plugged him with a disbelieving look. “And folks live here all the time?”

A glance out the window would have shown her a few locals in a park where plumes of steam rose from miniature cones among flowers and shrubs. But her gaze fixed on his face, waiting for his answer. She’d stared at him the same way at the caves and told him, “Never, ever leave me alone again.”

Even if things had been normal between them, if she wasn’t a drug courier and he didn’t work for GDE, it was a helluva responsibility to land a guy with.

“By this time tomorrow, I promise you won’t notice it.”

“We won’t be here this time tomorrow.”

“Would I lie to you?” Through his teeth a thousand times a day. “Once we get to the West Coast of the South Island, you won’t notice the sulfur.”

“So this is the place where you promised me the hot pools?”

He’d been hoping she wouldn’t remember. Wishing he’d never mentioned hot mineral pools or their healing powers that were Rotorua’s claim to fame. Any sane guy wouldn’t think twice about leaping into one with the half-naked lady of his choice. But how in hell was he to hide the way she turned him on, while wearing next to nothing, and get out of doing anything about it?

It was all very well for Chaly to give him the green light to sleep with her, but he sensed that any mistakes he made now could have repercussions for the rest of his life.

“I hope you brought your bathing suit,” he said through clenched teeth. Now, if only she had something that covered her from top to toe. He didn’t think he could control his libido otherwise. And maybe not even then.

“Bathing suit? I’ve brought a bikini but I thought under the circumstances it might be optional.”

“No way, they have bylaws in Rotorua about being naked in a public place.” Having already seen what she classed as underwear, he’d no great hopes of her bikini being bigger than a New Zealand fifty-cent piece.

Soon as she was safely in her room, he’d be hitting the hotel shop for some board shorts. The bigger, the better.

Ngaire opened the door of her room at the Aroha Springs Hotel to Kel’s knock and did a twirl to show off her outfit. “What do you think?”

“Pretty cool.” He gave her mauve-and-turquoise sarong the once-over with a twist of a smile that was hard to read. “So you’re wearing that in the pool like the Tahitians do instead of a bikini?”

Men! She rolled her eyes. “No, silly, my bikini’s underneath.”

“Are you positive you wouldn’t rather watch the Maori concert party in the hotel lounge instead of soaking in a hot pool?”

She had to admit she’d been torn two ways when she heard about the concert. However, their guide had assured her they would see something similar during the visit to Geyserland the next day. “Dressed like this? I don’t think so.”

“We could change,” he suggested.

A pair of rubber flip-flops protected Kel’s long feet, and on any normal-size guy, the blue board shorts would have hit his knees. But he was tall enough to show a long length of hard tanned muscle. “Forget about it, you’re dressed appropriately for where we’re going. So lead the way.”

“Hey, give me a minute to get something from my room.”

She looked him over. All the essentials appeared to be there, one muscular chest, two lips that knew how to drive her wild, the rest she was certain was just waiting to put in an appearance.

“Okay, I’ll meet you in the lobby. How does a cold bottle of wine and two glasses sound?” she asked.

“Like a great idea.”

Ten minutes later, they followed the sign that read, To the Hot Pools and a red gravel path led them between palms and tree ferns. She might never have left Tahiti. Most of the plantings on either side of them were lit from underneath and the effect hit her romantic button. She tugged at Kel’s open shirt to stop him from striding ahead and grabbed his hand. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

“Humph. If you like that sort of thing.”

“What’s up with you? A few minutes ago you were trying to talk me out of coming here and now you’re racing as if someone might beat us to it. Most people will be at the concert, so let’s just take our time and enjoy the good bit.”

He stopped dead in his tracks, the soles of his flip-flops squeaking as he put on the brakes to look down at her, rubbing his chin as if she worried him. There was a jut to his jaw and a determined glint in his eyes she’d never seen before, but then, she hadn’t known him all that long. The gleam might simply be thrown up by the lighting effect, the same way it threw deep shadows under his brows and emphasized the dimple in his chin.

Kel shrugged, shaking his head as if she was as green as their surroundings. It didn’t erase the edge to his words. “Jeez, doll, if you think this is the good part you’ve never been in a hot pool. Not with a fella, anyway. Mixed bathing is as good as it gets.”

Something pierced the shadows shielding his eye, a heat that had been missing since the night before, as if this morning he’d drawn a curtain over what had happened when she’d shattered in his arms. Had she come on too strong afterward? Taken things for granted? Is that what had been bothering him?

She might have chattered inconsequentially and hung on his arm as they’d walked back to the ferry building, but most of her mind had been elsewhere. A place she’d never visited before, and she didn’t mean New Zealand. A place where Ngaire Two Feathers McKay was so responsive she’d climaxed still wearing all her clothes.

Such a thing had never happened before. It was the dread of discovering last night had been an illusion that slowed her steps, not the scenery.

She laid a palm on his chest, startled to see her hand shake as if she’d never been with a man before.

So much for her plans to clear her head of all distractions. The greenstone mere was locked up in the hotel safe, behind reception and she’d wanted this man from the first moment they’d locked glances.

So what was her problem?

The wineglasses in her left hand clinked as she pressed her palm more firmly against him. To quell the shaking, she concentrated on the little band of greenstone Kel had bought her at a place with an unpronounceable name while souvenir shopping. It fitted perfectly, but not all omens were good, as she knew.

She broke the silence, huffing out a sigh that started at her toes. “Listen, Kel. You don’t know much about me, nor I you. Before we get up to our necks in hot water, you should understand I have no expectations. This is just a holiday out of time, so let’s enjoy it. Afterward, neither of us will owe the other a thing.”

His grin turned wry, the twist to his lips not as cute as she remembered. “Sometimes you crack me up, doll. Should we put that in writing or cross our hearts and hope to die?”

She felt a shadow creep over her soul, spoiling the moment. “That would be asking too much. However, I see steam drifting through the palms, which means there’s a hot pool over there with our name on it.”

“What more can a guy ask for? Lead me to it.’

Kel’s heart was doing handsprings off his sternum by the time the pool came into view. Anticipation. His grandma would have been saying, “Contrary, that’s Kel, always was, always will be.”

Maybe knowing what Ngaire had wrapped up in the delectable package her sarong made had turned the tide on his ideas of right and wrong. Or maybe it was plain old lust.

Sex with the enemy. Men had done it forever by right of conquest. Done it and moved on without a second thought, or a first, for that matter. And when it was all over, it would be too late then to worry about what Ngaire thought of him.

Or, how he thought of himself.

But enough meandering; he had a parcel to unwrap. A parcel to take his time over. At least two hours of it, while—if Chaly was as good as his word—Ngaire’s room would be searched by a professional who wouldn’t leave a calling card. And all because the first or maybe second thing he’d noticed when she’d opened her room door was the missing day pack.

Wraiths of steam drifted between them as he slipped off his shirt, adding a dreamlike dimension to their actions. Her hands went to the knot above her breasts, but he halted her. “No, let me do that.”

If he was going to commit this act, one that went against all he’d thought he stood for, he aimed to do it right.

First he emptied their hands. Ngaire had entered the lobby from the bar carrying a bottle of New Zealand bubbly and the equipment to drink it with. He tossed his shirt onto a locker stacked with towels for guests. It missed. He ignored it and placed the bottle and glasses within easy reach of the pool.

For all his determination to stand outside himself and not bring his prejudices to the party, his hands were rough, hard.

With little finesse, he reached for Ngaire, brushed her hot, satiny shoulders with his palms, but couldn’t move on.

Barefoot, she appeared smaller, doll-like.

A living doll for him to play with, the kind a boy wouldn’t mind tucking into bed with him.

Her chin tilted. A flower head on a slender stem, its face turning to his, eyes huge, an impossible blue, lips full, trembling, making him succumb to tenderness. She was nervous.

It surprised and pleased him.

He wanted to kiss her fears away.

The night was full of surprises.

It took all of his control to back out of a mind-set that had all the signs of a disaster in the making. The knot fastening her sarong dissolved in his hands.

Around them the tree ferns gathered up the breeze, swaying gently in its arms as if not to disturb their dreams of the movie South Pacific. The South Sea island girl and the soldier who was going to let her down, but not yet. Kel held his breath, grinding his back teeth, and steeled himself to let the sarong drop. “It’s going to be hot, doll.”

“I was counting on that,” Ngaire said, pretending an insouciance she didn’t feel. She stopped breathing, waiting for his reaction, quivering under his stare. He was so tall her braid tickled the top of her behind as she lifted her head.

“I was talking about the pool.”

“That, too.” She wanted to touch, did touch, her hands moving of their own free will, circling the dark whorls of hair, measuring the swell of his muscles as they rose on his in-drawn breath.

Teasing a rise out of his flat male nipple with a scrape of her nail, she laughed as it hardened in imitation of her own, without the benefit of his touch, though they craved it.

Oh, yeah! Crave was the word, like women did for chocolate, but this one came from deep down inside and left a space only Kel could fill.

Kel had known her bikini would be of the minuscule variety, yet it still hid too much. With flattened palms he smoothed the straps down her shoulders, sliding the narrow strips of fabric till they caught at her elbows, halting her arousing caresses.

Jaw clenched, his voice ripped the silence apart. “There’s something wrong with this picture.”

Her eyelids lost the torrid sensuality that had weighed them down and snapped open. “What? Don’t tell me. We’re over-dressed?”

“No, that’s not it.” He lifted the weight of her braid and felt its density. The black elastic band shrank into a tight ball as he freed the ends of her hair. “Your hair should be loose to match the setting.”

He cupped the nape of her neck in his big hand, disturbed by the thought of how little effort would be needed to break it. Yet the knowledge crowded his brain that, for all Ngaire was a product of man’s corruption and greed, he could never bring himself to perform the task.

Not now.

With both hands, he tumbled the raw-silk stream of hair into a black waterfall that held moonlight in its depths. So beautiful, it could tempt a man to lose all sense of perspective and drown without a murmur of protest.

Forewarned was forearmed. A bitter surge climbed the back of his throat, forcing his knuckles to clench round fistfuls of dark silk, and loose it almost before her cry broke the stultifying tension between them.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you,” he lied, both to her and himself. He grazed a finger across the dark slash of color tinting her cheekbones and checkmated his lie with the truth. “You’re just too damned beautiful. Thought so the first time I saw you.”

Ngaire dismissed the compliment with a shake of her head. He was aroused, wanting her. She knew better than to believe his flattery, formed by the blood running hot in his veins. “That sounds nice, but I have to warn you I do have a mirror and it doesn’t exaggerate.”

“Exaggeration be damned,” he growled, gathering her up into his arms, into him, closer than paint, hearts hammering at each other with a sudden rush of emotion as he slanted his mouth over hers like a man who had thirsted too long.

Having his compliment thrown back in his face trashed his intentions to keep a part of himself back and just do this thing. Recalling his feelings the first time he’d laid eyes on her stepping off that bus into the torpid Tahitian heat, he crushed her in his arms and poured a jumble of emotions from his mouth to hers. Mixed emotions. Wanting her, knowing it was wrong. Grief for Gordie. The whole damn mess his life and the world was in. Knowing one man was never going to fix enough to make a blind bit of difference.

Ngaire took it all and gave back more. Her tongue warred with his, twisted and dived and circled. Her breasts pressed into his chest, hard nipples leaving their mark. Her hands fisted in his hair as if it were a lifeline. Like the makeshift rope that had taken them both to safety. His head spun with every moan she let loose, his arms tightening with every whimper, demanding surrender.

Never in her life had Ngaire wanted a man so much that crawling inside his skin with him didn’t seem too far out there.

Fear had to be one of the world’s best aphrodisiacs, fear that if she didn’t take a chance now she’d never know…

Never know what? A family? Facts set in concrete.

Kel’s finger slipped under the elastic strip attached to the front triangle of her bikini thong. Gently, teasingly, he ran it back and forth, skimming the valley of her behind, his touch releasing a moan for him to swallow.

Never know love? The hearts-and-flowers thing after only three days was huge to ask of any man. And, as she felt Kel’s finger ease between her legs from behind, searching out her heat, she tensed, held her breath, held on to him.

His taste was on her lips, her mouth. It fanned her face as he lifted his head. “Easy, doll. Easy. You’re so soft and wet this is going to be like stealing candy from a baby. Just let me in.”

She widened her stance as his finger probed, gently, slowly. He watched her face, his eyes holding hers as surely as his arm clamped her against his arousal, and all the while his entry into her body deepened.

Never know hope? But she did…always had, she realized. Yet from the moment Kel had pulled her into that bus shelter and kissed her, hope had increased a thousandfold, from a tiny light shining at the back of the darkness cluttering her mind into a radiant beacon calling her on. Telling her that she could have a life. Short? Long? It didn’t matter as long as it was full.

A whimper escaped her lips, full of need and want as his hardness flexed against a tender bruise near her navel, a reminder of two narrow escapes, today’s and yesterday’s.

Was that what showed in her eyes? Her needs. Her wants. Was that what he looked for in them while her lids ached but refused to close? In that moment, as her insides fluttered and tightened on the intrusion, setting up torrid waves of sensation, she knew that never again would she categorize Kel as any man.

His face dissolved in front of her eyes as they blurred and went blind, all-feeling, all-knowing, centered on one thing, her climax. And along with the throes of blind ecstasy came the sensation of falling with Kel off the end of the world into liquid flames.

Kel stepped off the edge of the pool, taking Ngaire with him, the aftershocks of her response to him still squeezing his fingers. As the hot water reached his waist, it struck him that throwing petrol on to a fire wasn’t going to quench it.

As he set her free, her sleek hair fanned across the water in a dark veil, the kind he had to keep over the truth. Back in control of himself he shrugged off the urge to drop a kiss over each eyelid to still her confusion.

“We’re in the pool.”

“Yeah, things were happening so fast I thought we needed to cool off.”

“In hot water?”

“Believe me, doll, there’s hot, and then there’s hot.”

Her small “Oh” said it all, but didn’t stop there. “Don’t even think there was anything normal about my reaction. This has never happened to me before…well it has, but only with you.”

“All the more reason to slow down and make it last. We have all evening. Why don’t you float on over to the side. There’s a seat about two feet below the rim. I’ll open the wine and pour us each a glass before it grows as hot as everything else around this place.”

He lunged over to the edge, kicking his legs, and heard Ngaire giggle behind his back. “What? Did I say something funny?”

“No, you’re still wearing your flip-flops.”

He threw a grin in her direction, anything to take the heat out of the impossible situation his libido had gotten him into. “Protection.”

The instant he spoke it, he remembered. Protection, he didn’t have any on him. He’d intended to use that as an excuse to avoid having sex with Ngaire. Now he had more than an hour and a half to fill and no condoms. Slowly, very slowly, he filled their wineglasses, preventing the bubbles from fizzing over the top and gaining time to plan his way out of this one.

A situation of his own damn making.

Handing Ngaire one of the glasses he carried, Kel smiled, his lip quirking to the left of his mouth, signaling an amusing thought. “I don’t know why mermaids were always portrayed as blond when this—” he ran his fingers through the long strands of dark hair floating on the surface, swathed in steam and shimmering like a mirage “—is so much more satisfying.”

“I hate to prick the bubble of your imagination, but I should mention I’d never win medals as a swimmer.”

He watched her take a sip of wine and wrinkle her nose as if it had fizzed up the back of her throat. She licked the pale gold liquid off her lips, giving him a glimpse of her small pink tongue, a muscle she’d used on him with devastating effect and made him wonder… Ah well, maybe not.

“Mmm, this is good. The bartender didn’t put me wrong.”

“Did you expect him to?” Kel asked.

“In some parts of the world I believe he might have palmed off someone more used to soda, or the occasional shot, with something he’d had a hard time selling.”

He latched onto “some parts,” thinking he had caught her out at last. “I thought you said you hadn’t traveled much.”

“So sue me, I meant my hometown, San Francisco. Though I do read and watch TV shows.”

He laughed through his mouthful of wine and almost gargled as he asked, “Soaps? Books? All fiction?”

“No, I won’t let you get away with that one. If someone’s thought it, then someone’s done it.”

“Ouch! You know how to bite, doll.”

She laughed and snapped her strong white teeth at him. He wanted to say “Show me later.” But that would take him straight back to the place he’d been in before he stepped into the pool with her locked in his arms.

Before and after, up to his neck in hot water.

Instead he asked her, “Do you have family in San Francisco?” The longer he kept her talking, the less time he’d have to put his hormones and his conscience on the line.

A frown saddened her expression and dulled her eyes. “No. No family, but I do have a friend, Leena Kowolski, who’s like a sister to me.”

Kel took a mental note of the name, meaning to check it out.

“We met at a self-defense class.”

“Don’t tell me there’s two of you roaming the streets of San Francisco with a superhero complex? I’m sure all the bad guys are shaking in their shoes.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. We couldn’t be more different. Leena’s more likely to slay them with her mouth than her hands. She’s sharp as a razor and quick on the comeback. Nothing like me.”

To which Kel raised his brows and said, “I’d say you could hold your own in a spitting contest.”

“I wish. Leena’s bright and savvy, knows the latest trend before it’s happened.”

Thinking of kiss-and-tell, Kel knew he was definitely going to check this woman out.

“She wears shoes you need a ladder to climb into and she’s as fair as I’m dark, but you’ll see for yourself when you meet her.”

He almost spilled his wine as he sat up. “Meet her? Is she in New Zealand as well?”

Ngaire’s eyes widened, dark and hopeful, as if she expected him to reject her suggestion. “No-o-o, she’s not here, but you did say you covered the Pacific Rim. That includes San Francisco. I thought if you looked me up, I could introduce you.”

Hell, his sex drive had awakened like a sleeping giant, and look what it had gotten him into, gotten them both into. He had a feeling that one day soon, when Ngaire looked at him, the hope would have disappeared. Hate would have taken its place.

When that introduction came about, it might be because he was locking them both up.

“Actually you’re right. I was in San Francisco a few weeks ago and I’m sure to be back soon. Give me your number and address and I’ll look you up.”

“I’ll write them down for you tomorrow,” she said. It couldn’t have been simpler. So why did he feel like such a heel?

Chapter 10

F unny how she’d let a brief resurgence of hope blindside her into taking things for granted. But, wishful thinking or not, she would give Kel her address and number before the trip was over.

Who knew, with Te Ruahiki on her side, wanting her to return home, maybe she would see her thirty-first birthday and more.

Having fended off Paul Savage’s henchman once, she felt confident she could do it again. The knowledge she had only five weeks, five days till New Year’s Eve, exactly one week after her birthday, she flicked aside. Now wasn’t the time for feeling blue.

So she sipped her wine and talked to Kel of little things, like the places she’d be stupid to miss visiting during her trip, places he would show her. And as the wine went down and her mind floated on the surface of dreams, she let her feet bob to the top of the pool, occasionally bouncing off him as gradually she let herself drift closer and closer.

Tilting her head back against the rim, she gazed up through the palm fronds at the star-filled sky. It was truly dark now and the moon had risen. “See that moon? It looks like a half scoop of vanilla ice cream.”

Kel edged closer, letting his eyes follow her line of sight. His arm rubbed against hers, making the water slide and slap between the two. “Mmm,” he agreed. “From this angle it does. As an analogy, it has more going for it than the green cheese one.”

She broke into a throaty chuckle, her fingers dancing down his arm, taking the game to another level. “Luckily it’s cold in space, so it won’t melt.”

Slipping one arm under her, Kel turned, pulling her closer, aware that it wouldn’t take much effort for her to melt in his arms. He reached for her glass. It was empty. Any inhibitions desire hadn’t managed to conquer, the wine had. “Let me put this up on the side before it ends up on the bottom in pieces.”

He’d rid himself of his own a while ago, so his head was clear…clearer than hers, but the two-hours’ grace Chaly had demanded still had a way to go.

When he was this close to her, not even the light tang of sulfur could diminish her exclusive perfume or its effect on him. It took just one trace to turn him hard and needy again. He’d never been less than half hard from the moment he’d poured their drinks. Hell, he was in that state of arousal most of the time she was within arm’s reach. Sometimes, not even as close, he mused, remembering the view via his computer.

From Ngaire’s angle, Kel’s body loomed as he stretched higher to return her glass to the pool’s rim. A hard, unruly erection brushing his board shorts rubbed against her thigh. Her womb clenched as she gauged his size. Though her hand itched to reach out, she didn’t scratch it. Mellow as the wine made her feel, it hadn’t removed all constraints.

Instead, she began touching his chest with soft hands. Stripped of almost all his clothes, he had the most beautiful body. One he let her hands explore as he sank into the water.

Her buoyancy allowed her partial equality in the stature stakes. Without rush, she reached out and shaped his muscles, traced his tight abs, and measured the width of his pecs with her palms, aware he watched, looked down out of eyes black as the night sky. But unlike the moon, they didn’t look as if they could melt.

“You’re very well built. Do you work out much?”

On a swift breath forced out by the trail of her fingers, low down, through the hair near his navel, Kel said, “A bit. When I have the time.”

Her hand stopped teasing, slid back to his shoulders, and just when he thought he could breathe again, she kicked her feet, surging out of the water to lay a kiss in the hollow of his neck.

“Hey, turnabout is fair play. You have a pretty spectacular body yourself, and it’s time I saw more of it.”

Releasing the catch of her bikini top, with a dexterity Ngaire was sure men learned in the cradle, he said, “That’s better.”

Heat that had nothing to do with hot mineral springs played across her cheekbones. No longer covered, her breasts flaunted themselves, their tight, furled peaks cresting the water to reveal the state of her arousal.

Kel examined them with interest, first testing their weight in his hands, then rubbing the tips with a drugging enchantment that made her eyes close. “One taste, just one taste,” he murmured, but by her count it was more like ten.

Drunk on her, Kel lifted his head before he did or said something that might rebound on him later. Turning his attention to her hair, he combed it with his fingers, breaking up the cascade until a million strands of sparkling jet draped her from shoulder to waist. A half smile cracked his mouth, more would have given him away. “I wondered how this would look.”

And now he knew.

He’d also wondered how it would look covering them both, but now her hair was wet it was never going to happen. Not now, not ever, he promised himself. Tonight was one out of a lifetime, in the call of duty.

He couldn’t let it happen again and be sure he’d survive.

Even now as his hands dove into the water, splashing them both, he wasn’t certain if kissing her again would leave scars. He locked his fingers round smooth satin shoulders, closing his mouth over hers for a taste of the pleasure he’d tried to forget, wanted to put away since stepping into the pool.

All the while he’d sat beside Ngaire, pretending to be the kind of guy she thought he was, the memory bugged him like a gnat that wouldn’t go away, no matter how many times he swatted it.

His male scent filled Ngaire’s head with visions of sun on his skin, distilling musk and paradise into the one note no chemist could match. Two days and already she was addicted to the thrust of his tongue, filling her mouth in a byplay of what they both wanted, needed. He lifted and she climbed, scraping her aching nipples against his hard chest, the pain of it screaming in her womb. Mouth to mouth, belly to belly, heart to heart, legs and arms tangled in knots of desire.

Heaven lay in the touch of his hands, hell in him removing them. As it had happened before, one second she was caught in a maelstrom, the next she was falling through space into a sun swallowing them whole. And when their lips had torn apart, the shock had deprived her of comprehension. Like, where was she? Up to her neck in hot water. Who was missing? Kel.

Taking the hot water literally made no difference, she’d still be up to her neck. Still wondering if she could turn the weeks she had left into a lifetime. And do it in five days.

Her grip tightened as Kel went to pull her arms from his neck. Released, he ducked lower to look into her face. “Hey, don’t look so worried. I’ve got you.” He held her wrists as her fingers curled like flowers missing sunlight. “Relax, doll, that’s it.”

Her muscles went lax as he took her hands and stepped back until her head floated, wreathed in steam. “No, keep your legs round my waist.”

If he was going to do this, he needed distance. Kissing her had gotten way too personal. He could pleasure her, rock her with orgasms she wouldn’t forget; the trick was to take as little, or as much as he was able from the experience and remain sane.

Her hair fanned out, a dark sea anemone backlit by the pool lights. “Good. Lie back and let yourself float like a mermaid.”

Her arms drifted away from her sides, hand making small circles that kept her afloat. “Not ‘The Little Mermaid.’ That story didn’t end up so well.”

“Anything you say, doll-face.”

She scrunched up her nose at his second effort.

“What, you don’t fancy being my china doll from Chinatown?”

“China dolls break too easily.”

And just as easily, she thrust him into the truth that lay outside that moment. That Ngaire, like Gordie, would be broken at the end. And this small interlude, cut out of his real world, could help bring about that end.

He dragged his mind out of the mire of dark thoughts. “There’s a local legend of a maiden who swam to an island on the lake where her lover was confined. She’d go secretly, in the dead of night, as he was the enemy and their love was forbidden. Her statue sits looking over the lake.

“With the pool light under you, turning your skin bronze and your hair floating in the water, you could be her. Hinemoa, her name was.”

He drew his hands up and down Ngaire’s legs from hip to knee. They were as smooth and strong as the metal molding the statue. She stared at him for long moments without speaking, then asked, “This legend, did it have a happy ending?”

“Do you think they’d have built a statue if it had?”

“I guess not.”

“Well, you’re right.” He looped his thumbs through the narrow strip circling her waist and began to slide it down. “The good news is, she was buck naked when she went swimming, so these have to come off.” A task he accomplished in less than two seconds.

She kicked out of his hold, diving to catch her bikini thong before it reached the bottom of the pool, and came up with her hands hooked over his waistband. “And the bad news is, if I’ve got to be naked, so have you.”

He clasped his hands over hers, stopping their downward pull. “Wrong. The bad news is that my only protection is the flip-flops beside the pool. But I can pleasure you in other ways.”

Shocked for a moment, she thought she hadn’t heard correctly. The wry grimace on his face said it all. “But you went back to your room.”

“I must have lost it on the way here.” He shrugged it off. “It’s not the end of the world.”

“I’ve never had unprotected sex before.”

His hands clasped her shoulders as if he’d push her away. “And I’m not asking you to have it now.”

Trust her to put it the wrong way. “No, what I meant was that I’ve never had unprotected sex with anyone, I’m safe, healthy. How about you?”

“No, me, neither.” Not even his wife. She’d said it was his job to take care of it, then hadn’t trusted him. He’d found out later she’d been on the pill. That had set the final seal on their relationship. What with no touching and no chance of kids… “Are you on the pill?”

“No, but I’m safe that way, too. Trust me, I wouldn’t lie about such a serious subject.”

Kel let himself brood for about as long as it took her to curl her small hand round him.

He froze, unable to move, unable to draw back.

Her hand moved, slid upward and drew the thumb over the blunt tip of his erection. His knees almost buckled, it felt so good. It took all his control to take hold of her wrist, to pull her hand away, halting the sensation.

Too bad it didn’t blank out his mind, as well.

“I can tell you want to.”

“Well, hell. I’m not dead. Even then I’d have to be in the ground a long time not to respond to your persuasion. But if we’re going to do this, I’m in charge. In control. Understand?”

No kid of his was going to experience the shame and chagrin he’d inherited on the death of a man he could hardly bear to call father, Milo Jellic. No way, not in this lifetime.

His grip tightened on her wrist. She refused to wince. “I understand. You’re a control freak, it happens.”

He looked big, bad and dangerous to know, and she only wanted him more. She understood his reservations; she’d known girls whose pregnancy had sealed their relationship with marriage, and she could inform Kel it didn’t apply in her case.

It was hard to tell a man you wanted more than breath that you were less of a woman than he thought.

“I’m not laughing, doll. I want you, but know this. I’m not the kind of guy to leave his spawn littering the world, and if you’ve lied, I’ll find out.”

“I’m not lying.”

“Great, I can’t wait any longer to be inside you.” He kicked off his shorts. They landed atop the lamp built into the center of the pool and blotted out the light. In the dark blue gloom he lifted her high and carried her to the side. “Plunk yourself there, doll, and hang on. I’d hate you to drown.”

“If I do, it better have been worth my while.”

“You can rate me later. Soon, you’ll be too busy to think.”

Not a smile crossed his expression, not even a smirk. They’d gone from playful to deadly serious in no time flat. She tried to think of something to say, some statistic or trivia about how many people drowned making love in a pool, but nothing came to mind. Hiding her nervousness that way was a no-go area.

So, why was she so edgy?

Was it the thought of opening herself to the experience of a naked man inside her? Or having sex with someone she knew so little about? And what had he meant when he said, “If you’ve lied I’ll find out?”

The answers were still playing hide-and-seek in her mind when Kel lifted her hands over her head to the terra-cotta-tiled coping. “Hang on there.”

“But I won’t be able to touch you.”

“I don’t want you touching me. This isn’t about me. It’s about you, doll. Your needs. I don’t want distractions.”

She shivered, nerves taut. A wisecrack, that will be a first, jumped into her mind. His index finger traced her from navel to thigh, seeking her heat. Semidarkness did nothing to avert a rush of vulnerability. Hiding behind closed eyes, she fell into sensation and the power of his touch.

“Open your eyes.”

“Wha-a-at?”

“Open your eyes. How can I see if I’m pleasing you if they’re closed? We’re in this together. Except I’m the more active partner.”

She stared at him, having difficulty associating what was going on under the surface with the feeling of him opening her wide. Her hips bucked, a climax threatening as the tip of his thumb brushed in a lazy circle. Her eyelids fluttered as she gave into ecstasy.

“Uh-uh. Remember what I said, eyes open. Look at me.”

“It’s too dark to see. You must have eyes like a cat’s.”

Good night vision was a plus in his line of work, something he’d always been grateful for. The night-vision goggles he’d worn in the SAS were useless for working undercover.

“Don’t worry, I’ll fix it.” He kicked back with one foot and pushed his shorts away from the light. He could see her clearly now, spread like a virgin sacrifice for some deity’s pleasure, except she was no virgin and he definitely wasn’t a deity. He was just a guy doing his duty and trying not to enjoy it too much.

“Is that better?”

She could see him clearly, too clearly, standing in the V her legs made, arm muscles flexing to the rhythm she felt inside. Etched in light, male flesh she’d only known by touch till now, rose through the water. Her insides contracted as she realized she hadn’t been wrong. He was big all over.

“Define better.”

“First there’s this.” His thumb drew a ring round her.

“Next, that.” He pushed and the undulating water rocked her on an erotic tide, caressing her breasts. Wide-eyed and wondering what came next, she followed instructions and watched.

“Lastly, there’s this…”

He thrust inside her. A swift movement, blurring her mind as she marveled that he fit. Then everything but the feel of him gliding back and forth inside her was forgotten as he rocked every particle of her being, her soul.

“Better, definitely better,” she moaned as his strokes robbed her of speech, of thought, until one word filled her mind, and her shout as she reached the peak. “Kel!”

Pulling her hips firmly against his, Kel held on tight as she pulsed around him. The result was indescribable, pushing his body to the point where it wanted to let go.

Whoa, you don’t want to go there, remember?

He bit down on the inside of his cheek.

His wife had never come like this for him, not once. And every other woman he’d had sounded like fakes compared to Ngaire. The ebb and flow of stormy emotions in her sea-blue eyes showed hers was real. It was as if they’d been made for this.

Only not in this lifetime.

As the aftershocks lessened he began moving again, his control on as short a leash as his first rhythmic thrusts. Slowly, gradually, he built up to long caressing strokes from thigh to womb. Then her ankles locked in the small of his back, disrupting his momentum, changing the angle of his thrust, throwing him forward. The soft fullness of her lips taunted inside his head with a promise he didn’t dare take up. Kiss me.

Determined not to be beaten, he gripped her knees, pulling them wide, closing the gap hip to hip, yet in the game of mind control increasing the distance from dangerous to manageable.

Staring at Kel, Ngaire watched grim concentration shape his features. His jaw tightened where his smile usually tilted. Sweat beaded his face as the water slopped round them in heated waves of sensuality. It grieved her to find no joy in his expression, none of the elation he brought to her.

Though her shoulders ached and she struggled to hold her head above water, her discomfort faded as she began another climb, Kel driving all the way until nothing existed. Pain, heat and water were forgotten as she fell over the edge and let go.

Just as Kel reached the point where holding back started to look like a masochist’s version of paradise, Ngaire disappeared underwater in a cloud of hair swirling around her head like black seaweed. Releasing her legs, he grabbed her shoulders.

The pain of separation felt like having his heart ripped out as he pulled her up into his arms, coughing and spluttering. He patted her back, and soon she began breathing normally.

“Hey, doll, I didn’t mean what I said about drowning. You gotta learn to take a joke.”

She looked at him, eyelashes beaded with pearls of water, as if plucked from her lagoon-blue eyes. “That’s a lot of saving in only three days.”

He pulled her into his arms, pressing her face against his shoulder to hide his tortured expression. “This is getting to be a habit. A bad one. We ought to make a pact to break it as soon as possible.”

No way would he tell Chaly of Ngaire’s third close escape. It didn’t take much effort to imagine his growled response. “You should have let her drown.”

He’d done what he’d set out to do, distract her. Murder, assassination, call it what you will, wasn’t included—never would be, not after tonight. He’d kept her busy for two full hours while her room was searched and made certain while he did it that no drug runner would mother a kid of his.

Instead, she was warm and wet in his arms and he’d an ache in his groin that would never be eased, not by Ngaire.

Chapter 11

H ell had nothing on this place. How people lived constantly with the smell of sulfur in their noses was beyond Ngaire, yet the small village of Whakarewarewa abutted the tourist park of the same name filled with boiling mud pools and spouting geysers.

The tour had started off with a Maori welcome and concert party, much like the one she had shunned last night.

There was no comparison.

What idiot would willingly swap an evening of passion with the best lover on earth—by her limited experience—for this morning’s Maori haka? And though the opening words of the challenge—death, death, life, life—gave her pause for thought, the rhythmic stomping of feet and studied arm movements had soon distracted them. Kel’s take on it hadn’t been forthcoming. He’d been quiet, remote with an edge, like a spring wound too tight, threatening to snap at the slightest touch.

From the moment she’d joined him on the bus, after sleeping so well she’d missed breakfast, she’d known to be wary. All she’d done was lay a hand on his arm and he’d tensed, glowering from under his dark brows, saying, “What?”

Some men just weren’t morning people. And if the chance of her getting pregnant after last night’s lovemaking still bugged him, she for one wasn’t going to take a shot at explaining. Not before he was on his third cup of coffee.

In fact, she empathized with his condition. She’d been just as edgy when Pops died, and Paul Savage wouldn’t take no for an answer. She shuddered to remember the lessons her students received on not letting their feelings temper their skills. Or the way her do jan had rung with her satisfied cries as they hit the floor during a demonstration. That had been a black time, when she’d almost hit bottom.

One she refused to repeat.

With an uncommunicative Kel by her side as the little electric train taking them round headed for their last stop, the giant geyser, Pohutu, there was little to do but think of what she’d learned that morning. She mulled over the Maori guide’s words after they’d visited the wood-carvers. “You may have noticed the blond carver and thought he wasn’t Maori, but even a teaspoonful of our blood in his veins is enough to be regarded as such.”

Right there and then, she’d restructured all her negative feelings of not belonging and had wanted to shout “That’s me!”

And an empathetic pulse from Te Ruahiki had seemed to agree.

As the train drew up beside a rocky area stained in sulfurous yellow, where a couple of geysers spouted a meager three feet, she forgot her intentions to let Kel come around in his own good time. “Sheesh, I thought it would be bigger than this. I mean, they named it Pohutu and everything.”

Kel shook his head, but his lips twitched. “There’s not enough hot water in all of Rotorua to keep it constantly running. My guess is you won’t have long to wait, though. They usually time these conducted tours to the minute.”

Armed with her camera and intent on being first in the race to the fence overlooking the rocky basin, she slipped off the train the moment it stopped.

Kel followed hard on her heels as he’d done at each stop, this time minus the black cloud. A sign that whatever had disturbed him was beginning to mend.

Cameras clicked in a cicada-like chorus, hers one of them as the guy driving the train pointed out the famous geyser.

Pohutu looked as if its night had been as bad as Kel’s, but when she turned around to tell him so, he’d gone. For a moment it was as if someone had stolen her shadow, a sensation forgotten as she discovered the metal fencing sloping up the bank overlooking the basin. No one else had thought to park themselves there for what should be a sensational shot, but she needed to arrive before the geyser decided to blow. So, without Kel to nag her about the dangers, she climbed higher.

Confident Ngaire was going nowhere until she’d taken the photos she was after, Kel strolled over to wait by the train. All night he’d been cursing his response to making love—no, having sex—with Ngaire, and his restless sleep had left him bone weary.

He had put his values on the line, and still Chaly had come up empty-handed. Since there was no formula in her day pack, he should have looked elsewhere. It had to be in her room; he knew for a fact she hadn’t hidden it on her person.

Hell, he’d even considered checking for microchips under her skin, but he’d pretty much covered most of that already and found nothing.

Resting one boot on the train’s footplate, he caught a glimpse of Myrna, from the ferry. No doubt in his mind, it was her. How many other blondes would take a chance on their big hair collapsing in the damp microclimate of Geyserland, wearing mile-high shoes and a miniskirt? Only someone desperate to get their hands on a piece of paper worth a billion dollars.

But, could he take his eyes off Ngaire long enough to tackle the blonde? He scanned the crowd for the source of constant ache in his groin, worse now than before he’d known how it felt to balance on the edge of pleasure and be dragged back just in time. Mark him up as a masochist, he wanted to do it again.

He couldn’t see Ngaire for Schmidt’s tall, wiry frame, but he doubted the guy would try anything in that crush of snap-happy passengers. Anyhow, he’d already marked the guy down as an opportunist who’d heard the whispers about kiss-and-tell on the streets and decided to crash the party.

By the time he turned back, Myrna had disappeared, although she wasn’t going anyplace fast in those heels. So he set off at a brisk pace, catching a glimpse for an instant before losing her again. There was comfort in feeling the Smith & Wesson strapped to his ankle as he moved. One more turn in the track and he’d go back down. The whole setup seemed too pat. Hell, if he’d kept his mind on the job instead of his damn libido he’d never have let himself be lured away from the action.

Dirt-bound boulders protruded from the path, forcing Ngaire to watch her step. Not enough to want to turn back, but just enough that she was thankful she’d worn jeans impervious to mud should she land on her butt. She soon found a vantage point above the basin and congratulated herself on her fore-thought as the spout rose and fell, gathering force. Sort of like the ups and downs her affair with Kel was taking. Should she be more careful there, not to follow him blindly down a path that seemed as littered with rocks as the one she’d just climbed? Leena had always been a fountain of knowledge when it came to men, but then she’d never met Kel, or anyone like him.

Would her friend have encouraged her to have a last-ditch fling and arm her with condoms, knowing someone like Kel would swing into her orbit? Uh-uh. This was no ordinary fling.

She rolled her shoulders. As if she wasn’t hot enough from her exertions, sweat began pooling at the small of her back next to Te Ruahiki. “You’re surely not frightened of a little steam?” she teased, having long since given up thinking of the mere as an inanimate object.

The ground beneath her rumbled as if she were in the path of a locomotive. Clicking shots all the way, she followed the rush of water into the air as the geyser at last lived up to its publicity.

When the lens clouded over, she shrugged off her day pack, intent on grabbing a tissue to fix the problem, then realized the problem was hers, as well. She couldn’t see a foot in front of her face.

She laughed out loud, delighted by her sudden walk among the clouds. Laughter that faded as she remembered where she was and took a step, then another away from the fence and the drop beyond it. Kel was right not to trust her to avoid trouble. It had followed her ever since she picked up the case with its worthless good-luck charm from the Blue Grasshopper. Maybe she should ask for a refund.

Rocks rolled underfoot. Some other idiot had gotten lost in the steam bath. “Take care,” she warned when a hail of stone chips dashed against her shoes. “There’s a steep drop nearby.” Hands reached out of the blanketing mist as she swung round and her day pack clunked against someone. “Kel, is that you?” She didn’t much care for the quaver in her voice or the silence that followed. “This isn’t funny.”

“It isn’t meant to be. Gimme the bag, lady, and stop wasting time.” The accent was American, but the message was just as threatening.

She brought back her elbow, the strongest bone in the body, and hammered something built like a tank. Strike the fat guy from Tahiti off her list. Spinning on the ball of one foot, she reached for the huge mitt grasping her shoulder and received a push for her trouble and came to a halt against the fence. Too bad the hulk wasn’t as well informed. He lunged, pushing her back against the wires with the sound of water reminding her how close she was to taking her second leap over a cliff.

Her jeans ripped on twisted wire as she led with a shoulder to his gut, pushing off and up like a sprinter at the gun. She swung her pack, hoping to catch him in the kidneys, the vulnerable area meres were designed to take advantage of. Judging by the sound of his moan, she succeeded. She ducked out of range and ran down the boulder-pitted path as if it were as smooth as a stadium track.

Savage’s man should be thanking his lucky stars that Te Ruahiki’s lethal edge was still under wraps.

She ran into another body as the mist faded. Herr Schmidt, again, with Kel at the foot of the path in the lanky guy’s wake.

“Hah, Fräulein McKay, sehr gut. I saw you take the photographs. Our train is ready to leave.”

Kel caught up with them. “Ngaire, are you all right?”

“Yeah, I’m fine now. I couldn’t see for the steam.” Schmidt seemed an okay guy, though a strong wind might blow him away.

Kel, on the other hand, made her feel safe.

For the rest of the trip she would stick to him as if they were Siamese twins. Once she got Te Ruahiki back home, the heat would be off, literally. And next time he started warming her back she wouldn’t shrug the sensation off because she was too busy.

Kel nodded his thanks to Schmidt. Whatever Ngaire had been up to this time, the tall guy hadn’t been part of it. “Don’t miss your ride because of us. Ngaire and I can walk back while the others check out the shop. She doesn’t need any more souvenirs.”

“Who says?”

Schmidt laughed, nodding. “I haf seen her shopping. I’ll hold the bus if you are late.”

“Since when did you get so bossy?”

He breathed out through his nose, taking his time, choosing his words. “Since you started thinking you’re a superhero, and boldly going where no woman has gone before.”

“I believe that was Star Trek, completely different. The other is fantasy.” She slid her arms through the straps of her day pack and stared, as if daring him to disagree. Her hair fell loose around her shoulders where it wasn’t caught under the straps.

“And Star Trek isn’t?”

“Not in the same way. Those superheroes couldn’t possibly happen, but I know we’ll go to the stars one day.”

“Well, I know your hair is coming loose—” he dropped his gaze to her legs “—and you’ve ripped your jeans.”

“It’s the fashion.”

“Well it wasn’t in fashion this morning, so how did it happen?”

When all she did was shrug, he hunkered down and took a look for himself. “Damn, don’t tell me a gashed calf is the latest on the catwalks. You’re bleeding, doll.”

Standing, annoyed with himself as much as her, he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket. “This is clean. Pull up the leg of your jeans and let me wrap the wound before we add infection to your list of misadventures.”

The sight of blood had made his stomach turn. Not that he was afraid of blood, he’d seen enough in his time, but it hadn’t been Ngaire’s. His reaction made him doubt his own feelings and his ability to do the job that earned him a living.

“It’s not that bad. I hardly felt it.” She turned in the direction she’d come when she’d almost mowed Schmidt down. The water vapor had thinned since the geyser had shrunk to a garden-size fountain. Looking up at him she pulled at his hand. “Let’s do it later, when we reach the bus.”

Damn, he was a sucker for those eyes and that face with its stubborn little chin and a nose that didn’t fit, yet made everything else perfect.

He slung his arm around her shoulder, crowding them both into a space meant for one. A silky strand of hair tickled his wrist and he wound it round his finger, like Ngaire had done to him.

“How did you do it?” Her head shifted and grazed the underside of his chin. He read her action and said, “The leg?”

“I walked into a fence.”

“Walked into it backward?”

She reached up and curled a beseeching finger around his. “You see too much. I was blinded by the steam. Something scared me and I stepped back into the fence.”

They’d reached the road. The train had long gone, but other visitors clustered around the view of subdued geysers. He didn’t give a damn who saw them, he turned Ngaire into his arms and, when she looked up, framed her face between his big hands.

He rested his forehead against hers. “Don’t ever feel you can’t admit you were afraid, not to me. You don’t have to be brave all the time. If anything ever frightens you, anything at all, come to me. I’ll be there for you, day or night.”

And with his mouth being so close to hers what else could he do but kiss her? Again and again.

She tasted like sin and looked like an angel, the kind he’d like to find on his Christmas tree. Slowly, he ran his tongue round her lips before taking a bite at her full bottom lip. The promise was still there as his tongue dove inside her mouth and played with hers. The promise he’d looked for in his wife and never found, had given up on, he’d now discovered in the last place he’d wanted to look.

Reluctance shaped his hands as he released her. “We’d better go. Schmidt won’t be able to hold the bus forever.”

They trudged up the road through the trees, the direction Myrna had taken, as though they didn’t want to arrive. Didn’t want to be surrounded by curious faces that would nod their understanding, or knowing hands that would say what their owners couldn’t voice in English.

Her eyelids flickered as she sent him a quick questioning glimpse of her eyes. “If what you said back there was about last night, about being afraid to tell you if I got pregnant, I didn’t lie to you. It won’t happen.”

That’s when he realized she didn’t know that he hadn’t spilled his seed inside her, hadn’t come near to making a child with her even if she had lied.

“I didn’t mean that, I meant anything. You don’t have to hold back with me. If you need me, I’ll help.”

As he reached the corner he took a last look at the steamy basin and wondered if it was anything like hell. He heard Ngaire begin, “There’s…”

But the rest was lost as he saw a mountain of a man watching from above the now-languid geyser. He should have known Myrna wouldn’t be alone. He’d caught Ngaire out in a lie, and at that moment he couldn’t stand to hear any more of them. “Let’s move on out. We can’t keep them waiting forever.”

Chapter 12

T he next leg of the tour, the flight from Rotorua to Nelson in the northwest corner of the South Island, was delayed for two hours. Both Kel and Ngaire had been assigned seats beside strangers, and he’d been glad of it. Glad to have the pressure taken off if only for an hour. It didn’t stop his gut from churning at having caught her out in another lie, or the gnawing pain of wanting a woman who was no better than she should be.

Thank God, his glimpse of the huge American had interrupted the flow of her worthless confession; he’d had enough of being taken as a fool for one day. The moment he saw the blonde from San Francisco he should have looked for her boyfriend. Judging from Ngaire’s condition the meeting hadn’t been any too friendly. The need to smash his fist in the other guy’s face had competed with knowing she’d brought it on herself by the company she kept. It tore him up inside.

It had put an end to him thinking of tempting her to tell him about the formula. Of wanting to help her sever her ties to the drug cartel and clean up her act.

Help yourself, more like, Jellic.

How hard was it to admit he wanted her to fess up and leave the way clear for him to bed her without staining his conscience?

Damn hard.

Hard to confess he’d wanted to put himself first and duty second for once in his life. That he’d almost abandoned his scruples the way his father had, and all for a woman.

Was that what had led to Milo Jellic’s downfall? A woman? If so he could almost pity him. But it was only speculation and not worth worrying about, or caring why. Better to set his mind to the question of how many more people were after the formula.

He’d counted five, so far, including the Maori he’d met up with in Tahiti. He’d known the guy was a New Zealander since the previous evening. Chaly had produced the information after revealing the search had got them nowhere.

“Son of a bitch!” he’d cursed. After all he’d put himself through he’d felt entitled to swear. Neither side of the mission could be counted as a gain, as he knew to his cost.

At least keeping the matchbook from Tahiti had paid off. He’d discovered the fingerprints on the matchbook belonged to Ray Hohepa, a nickel-and-dime bad guy with family ties in California that smelled of the mob.

Then there was Schmidt and his mismatched wife. They had been on Ngaire’s trail longer than he had. So far, there’d been no news from Jo or Rowan on the German pair.

Lastly, the American whose face he wanted to smash, and Myrna, his blond sidekick, who might or might not be Leena. She fit the description like a glove. In his mind’s eye, he turned over a scenario where the blonde was being forced to cooperate, and dismissed it out of hand. He was making excuses as if she actually was a friend of Ngaire’s. A blind man could see no coercion was involved. Myrna wasn’t simply a traveling companion, they were sleeping together. The signs of intimacy between them that night on the ferry had been unmistakable.

Which, like all other roads he’d taken recently, led him straight back to Ngaire and how it had felt to be inside her. Better for his peace of mind to close his eyes, go to sleep and catch up on the zzzs he had missed last night.

Keeping tabs on six people at once was too much even for him. He was only one man, and the sooner Chaly got his act together and found him some real help, the happier he’d feel.

He shut his eyes, wondering why Jimmy Chen had been bent over as if tying his shoelace outside Ngaire’s room that morning, when he’d been wearing loafers?

As he drifted off to sleep, Kel changed the total to seven.

A Farewell from Nelson sign raced toward them as the town thinned to a stray house or two set among rolling green pasture, dotted with shade trees. Ngaire nudged Kel with her elbow, jabbing a comment at him, “The sign should have read, Don’t Let the Door Hit Your Heels on the Way Out.”

They’d been allotted the same seats as on the last bus, but little had changed besides the scenery disappearing past the window. “This must be the quickest tour of any town we’ve visited so far. Not even a stop to shop.”

“Don’t let the withdrawal symptoms get you down. There will be heaps of other tourist traps. All of them just waiting to lighten your pocketbook. Be happy. If not for the delay, you might be a lot poorer now.”

The bus swayed as it took a tight corner, throwing her against Kel, tempting her to cling and break through the negative energy he radiated.

“Looks like the driver is desperate to make up some time.”

“Don’t worry, we’re safe. There’s no graveyard listed on the itinerary,” she murmured, astounding herself. More than half a day had passed without her doing a running total of how much time she had left until her D day.

Squaring her shoulders, she put her weight on one foot and shoved upright. The movement tightened the handkerchief Kel had tied around her calf. Darn, it must have stuck to the wound.

A trip to the onboard facilities to soak it off seemed like an idea, but the moment the thought was born, Kel shifted his long legs, twisting in his seat to punch his headrest to fit better.

Just as well. A walk to the back of the bus meant passing Jimmy Chen and being subjected to another query on the state of her health. The man was obviously worried she might sue, and although she didn’t hold him to blame for her trip over the cliff, the sly undertone to his ever-present obsequiousness made her skin crawl.

Finished with his fight with the adjustable headrest, Kel turned his attention to her. “Who have you bought all those souvenirs for? I hope they appreciate the trouble you’ve gone to.”

“There’s the people I work with, and Leena, of course.” He’d asked her about Leena before, digging into her past as they drank too much coffee, and eventually when they had to force down an airport lunch while waiting for their plane to arrive.

“Yeah, you couldn’t forget her. Where is it you work? It can’t be with Leena, you don’t look like a beauty salon product.”

His tone was dry and she wasn’t sure if she was meant to take his remark as a compliment or not. She could never tell exactly what Kel was thinking. His dark eyes were full of shadows that he hid behind. Even when making love to her he hadn’t opened up completely. Just once she’d like to see him lose control.

A shiver zapped up her spine and she couldn’t blame it on Te Ruahiki; he rested in the pack between her toes. No, it was the thought that wishing for Kel to lose his composure might be compared with begging to reap a tornado. And like Dorothy, she might not like what she found in Oz.

No, a controlled Kel was best.

“Having trouble remembering? You do work, don’t you?”

“I do, in a small gym. Nothing as glamorous as Leena, just lots of sweat. I was trying to decide if I should be insulted by your beauty salon tag line.”

Kel fitted his head into the corner of the headrest and curved his shoulder away from her so that she barely heard him murmur, “It wasn’t an insult.”

Satisfied, Ngaire smiled at her reflection in the window.

The next overnight stop was in a hotel consisting of a cluster of two-story log cabins edging a rock-strewn beach. They crouched under the cliffs below the main highway at Punakaiki, as if sheltering from the gales that swept in from the Tasman Sea.

Kel only had time to throw his bag on to his bed and sluice his face before Ngaire was knocking on his door. Although their rooms were adjoining as usual, they had no connecting door, which ruled out spying on her.

He was almost pleased. The exercise had taken on voyeuristic connotations, and he didn’t need a fiber-optic lens to remember what she looked like naked. Her image burned in his brain, keeping him horny as a bull in spring. But the memory also dragged up regrets for the method he’d used to keep her occupied. He’d lain in bed going over his role in the deception, seeing Ngaire’s blue eyes cloud over as he’d brought her to completion and wishing the hell he’d grabbed himself some of the same.

Damn, he’d been a teenager the last time he’d had to look after himself, and if the act brought him a short span of relief, it had brought him no satisfaction.

As soon as he opened the door he realized Ngaire had been running on gas. She’d taken the time to change out of her ripped jeans into the thin white pants she’d worn in Auckland. The ones that allowed her skin to shine through. Her hair hung long and straight down her back, skimming her waist, and it took all his control not to grab two fistfuls and drag her mouth to his. He’d had more dangerous assignments, but none that had left their mark on him like this one would.

Jaw clamped tight on his inclinations, he asked, “You hungry?”

“Ravenous. But I’ve had my fill of communal living for today. I fancy walking up the highway to that small shopping strip. What do you say? I’m sure I saw a restaurant among the souvenir shops as we drove past.”

“Sounds good to me. I could do with the exercise. It will be light for a while yet, sunset’s much later in the South Island. So if you want to walk off dinner afterward, we can take in the tourist attraction.”

“I thought you’d never ask.” She hugged her day pack, her eyes gleaming, and he knew exactly what she had in mind, so he said, “Now, let’s get this straight, I’m talking about the Pancake Rocks, the blowhole, tourist-brochure stuff.”

“Yeah, that, too,” she giggled, and pulled on his hand. “C’mon, let’s move on out.”

He wanted to laugh with her, but the effort would have killed him. As it was he felt drained. There was so much more to Ngaire, a vitality, a radiance he’d never found in any other woman. Even now she lit up the wood-lined corridors with her presence.

He wanted her. Oh, man, did he want her.

But she had spoiled everything by mixing herself up with drug runners.

He bought a bottle of red wine to go with the steak they’d chosen and drank more than his share. But not enough to enhance his disposition. Ngaire wished she knew what was going on behind the thick black line his eyebrows formed as the gap between them narrowed, shading his thoughts.

She wanted to see his smile again, the one that had teased at her memory the day she met him, and now couldn’t possibly belong to anyone else. Still she persisted, flirting, laughing, happy to catch a brief, if sardonic lift of those dark brows, instead of watching him eat with a hunger more mechanical than enjoyable.

He finished before her and threw back the last of the wine in his glass. Her silverware made a sharp, off-key sound as she laid it down. He eyed the remains of her food. “Is that all you’re going to eat?”

“I lost my appetite about halfway through the steak. The salad was good, though.” She’d pushed it around until the pile looked small enough for the waitress not to ask if there was something wrong with her meal. “I’m ready to go now.”

“Good, I’ll go settle up. Wait for me by the door and we’ll cross the highway together.”

Anger, kindled by being practically ignored while they ate, flared. “I’m not a kid. I can cross the road on my own.”

His gaze burned where it touched, at lips, breasts and belly. It made her mouth quiver, her breasts swell, rubbing her nipples against her T-shirt like a come-hither sign, and turned up the heat at the junction of her thighs, leaving her fully aware he didn’t see her as a child.

“You see any speed-limit signs on the way into Punakaiki? This is just a bump in the road. A truck comes round that corner, it’s not going to stop till it hits the other end of the strip. I’d rather escort you across the highway than clean up the mess.”

“Crudely put, but succinct. I’ll wait outside.”

“You do that.”

By the time they’d crossed the highway, he’d come to the conclusion that Ngaire had earned the right to bitch at him. He’d bombed out at entertaining dinner conversation, leaving all the work to her. Hell, he’d known from the moment they were shown to a table that this day wouldn’t be remembered for his sparkling conversation. Talk about acting like a kid. He’d felt sorry for himself, and there hadn’t been enough wine to drown the blues. Blues and red wine, someone had probably written a song about them.

If he was ever going to get back on side with Ngaire he’d better stop dragging his ass and work at lifting his mood.

“Take a look at the sign. You won’t see many places that don’t charge for a view like this. And from the height of the sun we timed it just right.”

It made him feel like a cur to see her smile. He’d done nothing to deserve it. Not one damn thing. Even now, he couldn’t help notice how her breasts swayed against the front of her T-shirt as she moved closer to read the sign, or the way her neat little butt reminded him of how it felt against his palms as he brought her up against him. He was hard again, getting close to breaking point.

He could read the signs as easily as the one in front of her.

The walk through the bush to the boardwalk was gloomy in comparison to the glimpses of flame-red sky flickering beyond the trees between them and the Pancake Rocks.

Seemed as though the worst moments of his life happened on cliff tops, but tonight Milo Jellic was far from his thoughts. In his mind’s eye, it was Ngaire he saw sail over the rail at Muriwai. It slowed his steps as his gut twisted in a replay of his reaction, when he’d believed she wouldn’t survive the fall.

Back in the present, a very much alive Ngaire flashed him a grin. Would she always be as willing to forgive him, when he knew it was unlikely he’d forgive himself once this was over?

“C’mon.” Her hand signaled her eagerness. “Let’s see if the tide is high enough to see the blowhole in action.”

“There’s only one way to find out.” He caught up and reached for her hand, as if he kept her beside him she’d be safe. Fingers locked with hers, he led them into a tunnel formed by branches.

She’d never understand Kel, not in a million years. One moment so moody, the next caring, protective, even. It was a new sensation, but wouldn’t last if he knew her better. Maybe it was as well their association was on a deadline.

Deadline! A misused concept but appropriate in her case. If, God forbid, her shot at breaking the tapu turned out to be a nonevent, she’d have a margin of five weeks, three days and twelve hours to remember this. She wanted them to be happy memories.

Slowly, she let her gaze travel from their linked hands to his face. So big, so strong, a man to rely on in times of trouble.

He caught her eyes on him and smiled. “What?”

She shook her head and looked away. How could she tell him history had repeated itself? Tell him of that magic rush of recognition the moment she first saw him. Broad as his shoulders were, she couldn’t lay the responsibility for her life on them. Oh, she’d been tempted this morning after she’d been attacked in the mist, but it wouldn’t be fair. She needed to take charge of her own happiness. Besides, the recognition might not have been mutual, the way it had been for her grandparents.

Kel gained her attention by brushing the backs of her fingers against his thigh. With the other hand he gestured toward the earth and sky. “Now, this is what I call something for nothing.”

The sunset was as good as any she’d seen at the end of a movie. Holding hands, they walked into it together.

“I had thought it would be bigger.” In all the photos Kel had seen of the Pancake Rocks they’d appeared as giant monolithic stacks ready for a pour of syrup, or melt of butter. Kids’ stuff.

Reality was pretty good, though. This evening’s sunset silhouetted some ridged towers black, painting others a bloodred that seeped into the waves of surf threatening to smash the rocks to pieces, and never quite succeeding.

A feeling he knew well. For the first time since joining GDE, he saw it as a thankless job with more lows than highs. If kiss-and-tell’s formula got through, he and others like him would be no more use than those waves, pounding on the drug cartel but barely putting a dent in their thick hides.

Ngaire tilted her head to look straight into his eyes, a habit she had that made it seem she’d nothing to conceal. “Bigger isn’t always better.”

The wind spun her hair into a dark clinging web. She brushed it back, not quick enough to stop him winding it round his hand. Heat spiked. It owed nothing to the sunset. Narrowing his gaze didn’t diminish her appeal. Nor did the sudden feeling of inevitability as he made up his mind. A decision made in hell. What the hey? Between father and wife, he was an honorary member of the deceivers club.

He would take Chaly’s advice and sleep with the enemy, stay with her twenty-four/seven until he found where she’d hidden the formula.

Getting into the role, he kidded, “Are you casting aspersions on my equipment?”

“Who, me?” Her gaze dropped from his eyes to his size twelves, resting a fraction too long below his belt, sending a rush of blood to his groin. Her shoulders shook as she laughed.

So he said, “You had your fill, doll?”

“Hmm, from what little I remember it’s all in proportion.”

“You trying to tell me I didn’t make a big impression?”

“It’s kind of hazy, between the steam and the wine, though I do recall you being very masterful.”

Her eyes softened as he raised her palm to his lips for a kiss. They widened in surprise as his next move placed it over his zip. “Damned by faint praise, or what, doll?”

Then he covered her mouth, slanting across her parted lips to gain deeper possession. Her impudent tongue challenged his to a duel he wanted to win. Supporting her hips, he pulled her against him, trapping her fingers, only to feel them slide between his thighs, cupping him. Hunger drove him to groan out a challenge. “I want a chance to remedy your first impression.”

“Done. Your room or mine?”

“Yours,” he said, turning as he heard a titter and saw a family almost level. Still holding her close, he slid Ngaire down as the father growled at the teenage girls to “Hush up.”

Kel watched the mother’s eyes fill with memories; the father just stared. Ngaire sighed and said, “Guess we remind her of a romantic movie, with the sun, wind and rocks.”

“Yeah, and he wants some of what I’m having.” If only they knew they’d happened upon a spy thriller, not a romance.

They tumbled, breathless, into Ngaire’s room with the last flames of sunset still licking the windowpane. She’d made them run all the way, made a childish game of it, laughing for him to hurry while they could still see where they were going down the country highway. Her cheerful nonsense tested his resolve to just do the damn thing and think of duty and country, to remember it wasn’t a game. He needed to stop grappling for the answer to Ngaire. To wonder why someone like her worked for the most vicious, greedy souls on God’s earth.

“I need to go next door and get some condoms.” And do something about removing the gun and holster inside his boot.

“No worries, I have a whole box.” She dropped her very ordinary day pack on the bed. He found himself staring. How could Chaly have failed to find the formula?

Ngaire dashed across the room to the luggage stand. The red monstrosity was starting to look the worse for wear with all the handling. She came back with a prettily wrapped package, shredded remnants of blue ribbon hanging from it. “Planning a party?”

“Leena gave it to me at the airport.”

“And it’s still unopened.”

A frown marred her expression. “Of course it’s unopened, I’m not promiscuous, no matter how this looks. Leena just hoped I’d have a good time, but keep safe. I never met anyone I wanted…”

She left the rest unsaid. The load on his shoulders just got heavier. He didn’t need to know the powerful fascination he felt was reciprocated. Didn’t want to know that in another time, under different circumstances, they might even have loved. Didn’t want to know what real love might have been like.

“Well, doll, don’t stand there wasting time. Open the box.”

She threw it to him. “You open it. I want to brush and floss.”

Suddenly the urgency faded. It became academic; they were going to get into bed together and have sex. It suited him just fine, gave his mind time to take a step back from the proceedings and view it from a distance.

He ripped the paper from the box, walking away from Ngaire’s day pack. It lay on the red silky bedspread, taunting him to take a look inside.

She’d given him breathing space, time to get his act together. And that’s what she would get, an act, with only his body engaged and his heart and mind somewhere else.

Quickly, before she returned, he put the open box on the nightstand and heeled off his boots. His Smith & Wesson went in one and the holster in the other, before he stripped off his socks and pushed them on top. He’d slipped them under the bed, stripped off his shirt and was unsnapping the waist of his khakis when the ensuite door reopened.

Damned if she wasn’t wearing the white Chinese silk nightdress that he’d stripped from her body night after night in his dreams. Minuscule white panties broke up the expanse of pale bronze, shimmering through sheer translucent folds. Her breasts swayed against it as she crossed the room. It smacked too much of brides and happily ever after for comfort. Yet as his body grew harder, his mind urged it on. So much for being academic.

The long silky hair he’d imagined caressing his skin flowed through his waiting hands like water as she fitted between the spread of his knees. “Cat got your tongue?” she taunted, well aware of his reaction as the strain on his zipper increased.

She’d been unsure as she left the room with the mood they’d brought back from the park lying in tatters on the floor. Now Kel stared as if seeing her for the first time, his jaw square and eyes serious. “You’re beautiful, and you know it. Do you really need to hear it from me?”

“It couldn’t hurt.”

He leaned forward, grazing his teeth along the taut skin covering her collarbone. His breath dampened the edge of silk lace above her breast. She almost swooned like a silent film starlet when he sucked a beaded nipple into his mouth, silk and all, teasing it with both tongue and teeth.

Kel lifted his mouth, staring at how the damp nightdress clung to her breast. The wet fabric uncovered a nipple several shades darker than her skin. Tonight, there was no steam, no electronic distance to spoil the view, only a layer of silk he wanted gone.

“You’re the most beautiful woman I know. And if you don’t get out of that scrap of material ASAP, I’m gonna have to rip it off and bare your skin. That what you wanted to hear?”

His question came out like whiskey flowing over gravel, and made her shiver inside. “Something along those lines.”

She navigated her nightdress up to her shoulders as Kel released her hair. Free of his hands, it flowed down her back, brushing the top of her hips, softer treatment than she expected to get from him after last night in the pool. Wasn’t that just what she wanted? A man she couldn’t intimidate?

Turning her back, she said, “Hold up my hair till I slip out of this. It’s too good to let you rip, as exciting as that sounds.”

Standing, he held her hair until she said, “Let go now.”

“Not yet, I’m not done looking.” A quick sleight of hand separated nightdress and hair. He studied her back as though mesmerized. He’d had a yen for her breasts since catching a glimpse at Papeete. But her back? How to describe it? Held straight, it was a masterpiece of line and fluidity, from her shoulders to the roundness of her sweet little derriere separated by a thin strip that disappeared between her buttocks. She was curved, not soft, a lightly muscled, well-taken-care-of look.

Thoughtfully, gently, he ran a fingertip down her spine, watching the play of her muscles as it passed. He gathered her up against him and turned to face their reflections in glass, mirroring a wine-dark sea and sky, his larger, paler reflection framing hers. Something shifted painfully in his chest.

“I take it all this perfection is due to working at a gym?”

Ngaire licked her lips, her body quivering with tension. “What perfection?” she asked, needing to hear him say the words.

Her hair swept down between them as he demonstrated, cupping both breasts. “These, they fit perfectly in my hands.”

She shivered, breasts mourning the loss of his hands as they slid lower, caressing her ribs, molding her waist and hips. His thumbs hooked through the narrow elastic holding her panties, loosening them till they pooled at her feet. She stepped out of them.

Her breath hitched as his fingers forked through the hair at the junction of her thighs with an impatience that made her tingle all over. Dipping lower, he tested her readiness.

Air left her mouth in a fevered moan.

One night and already she was addicted to him, to his touch.

A touch that immediately drew a response, jolting through the tiny nerve endings connected to the nipple he slowly rolled between finger and thumb. She’d thought he couldn’t be gentle, thought he only wanted to dominate, and he did, but with the lightest of caresses. She groaned her pleasure as her insides quickened, and closed her eyes at the wonder of every sensation he created with his skillful hands.

“Don’t close your eyes, look at your reflection.”

Wild-eyed with shock, she stared at the sensual image portrayed in the glass. His lighter gold skin outlined pale bronze as he played her body like a finely tuned instrument. The melody raced faster and faster, until her nerves coalesced in a top note so pure, she almost screamed. She fell back, her body lax, satiated and unnerved, against his chest.

Not giving her time to recover, Kel lifted her in his arms and laid her on the bed. Eyes still blurred from an overdose of sensation, she blinked up at him. “I could be wrong, but only one of us is naked and that doesn’t make sense.”

He laughed, a dry, ironic sound he had no control over, and removed his khakis and shorts in one swift movement, betraying his eagerness. It might not be moral, it certainly wasn’t ethical, but he was out of control where Ngaire was concerned.

He wanted her, couldn’t wait to slide inside her body.

She reached for him and he dodged her hand. “No, you don’t. When I climax, I’m going to be so far inside you that if we die tonight, they won’t be able to tell where you start and I end.”

He sat on the edge of the bed and prepared himself, surprised to see his hands shaking. He felt her hand on his back, hot, firm, impatient as she told him, “I might have known the romantic stuff wouldn’t last long.”

He leapt on to the bed, straddling her with his thighs. She looked small and vulnerable, but he couldn’t let it get to him. “What would you rather have? Me, or the romantic phrases?”

She rolled up off the pillow to meet his mouth, locking her hands round his neck, and said against his lips, “You, only you,” until her words were lost in the kiss.

Chapter 13

“A re we here at last?” The bus climbed the hill to a hotel overlooking Lake Wakatipu, and Ngaire for one couldn’t await to arrive. Queenstown lay at the end of a long day, where she’d lost count of souvenir shops, glaciers and waterfalls, after a long night of interrupted sleep. The man was insatiable.

The town might be the adventure capital of New Zealand, but she couldn’t think of anything she wanted more than dinner, a hot shower and sleep, except maybe Kel.

Definitely Kel. She’d turned to him in the night just as eager to make love as he was. A brush of his hand on her skin was enough to set her pulse racing, and tired as she was, the heat of desire still burned.

With rooms assigned to both McKay and Johnman, they crossed to the hotel rooms overlooking the lake with Kel toting the luggage instead of waiting for a porter. She’d been on the point of suggesting getting just one room when he’d said, “Might as well get both rooms since they’re paid for. I wouldn’t like to confuse the staff by upsetting their arrangements.”

The scratch on the back of her calf felt hot against the inside of her mended jeans. She couldn’t wait to get out of them. And into something lighter, like her skin.

Kel must have noticed her hesitation as they reached her door and he put down her case. “Just chuck your gear inside and check out the facilities. Five minutes and we’re out of here before the restaurant gets too crowded.”

“I’m not that hungry,” she said, realizing that suddenly the shower was more inviting.

Then he said, “You have to eat, they’re going to keep us busy all day tomorrow. Only three more of them and the tour’s over.”

She was another day closer to her birthday, and maybe her demise. Blinking, she realized despair had come out of tiredness. As if sensitive to her thoughts, she felt a comforting pulse from the mere inside her day pack.

Kel, too, seemed to have picked up the vibes, though his courtesy made her feel more pampered than comforted. “You do look sort of shattered. What say we compromise and get room service?”

“I’d say that sounds like a plan. Five minutes to dump your stuff and get back here.”

“I thought I’d shower first. You can order if you like. I’m not choosey.” Pushing away from her door he slung his suit carrier over his shoulder, straightening his large body. After last night she knew it as well as her own. That was all it took to make her body hum in anticipation. “We could shower together.”

A slow smile lifted one side of his mouth, a reminder of the day they met. It seemed like she’d known him a lifetime, they’d pushed so much into the last few days.

What if he knew what she was up against? Would he help her? Or would knowing turn him away, thinking she was crazy? Being with Kel had driven the problem of Paul Savage from her mind, and after a whole day without sighting any of Savage’s henchmen she’d actually started to relax and enjoy the trip for what it was, a holiday out of time, like none she’d experienced before.

Kel tilted her chin with a finger, kissing her nose before her mouth could meet his. “You got a deal, doll. See you in five.”

With his toilet kit and shaving gear in hand, Kel waited for Ngaire to open the door. When she did, her hair was already loose. Pity, he’d been thinking of how he’d undo it, taking his time, enjoying the feel as it sprang free of the braid she tortured it into each morning. The rest of her was drowned in a white toweling bathrobe big enough for two. “You got enough towels or should I go back and retrieve mine?”

“Better than that, I’ve got two of these,” she said, tugging at the rolled collar. “It’s quite cozy.”

“Are you feeling cold? The air-conditioning is probably set too low. I’ll fix it.” He marched in and found the control unit. “Looks okay to me. There may be something wrong with the gauge. I’ll set it higher.” He turned the dial, then gave it a light thump.

“I thought you were supposed to be an electronics whiz? Is that really how you fix stuff?”

He looked at her blankly as her brows rose in dark question marks. Then he remembered his cover. “Huh? I sell software. I’d never make an engineer.”

“That explains it. You’ll find the robe in the closet. I’ll go turn on the shower.”

He tucked his boots under the far side of the bed, then stripped down to his shorts, forgoing the robe as the temperature struck him as just fine. He’d locked the Smith & Wesson in the wardrobe safe, though he’d slipped a small but deadly knife into a special pocket in the lining of one boot. He might be going to get naked, but he was unwilling to depend on his hands and feet alone.

He checked out the box sitting in full view on her nightstand. Only four left; he’d save them for bed. He knew how to bring her to a screaming climax without needing a condom. Uninterested in the bathrobe, he nevertheless perused the closet and safe on his way to the shower. Locked. She was about as trusting as him.

The shower lived inside a clear glass cave. Closing the bathroom door, he saw Ngaire’s reflection in the mirror as she reached for the shampoo.

“Hang on, I’ll do that for you.”

“You want to wash my hair?”

“Hell, yeah! Call me kinky, but I’ve developed an obsession with your hair. Don’t ever cut it.” He stepped into the glass cave with her, glad it had started to cloud over and their images were blurred. He might be feeling slightly kinky, but it was Ngaire he wanted to watch, not himself.

She handed him the shampoo bottle, then helped herself to a bar of soap. “We’ll make it a fair shake, I’ll wash you.”

He tipped shampoo over her head as her hands started work on his chest in slow, lazy circles. Lather dripped in large globs of white suds as she tilted her head to the side and gave his hands access to the nape of her neck. Kel took advantage to give her a massage, working his fingertips from the back of her neck to the top of her crown. The thrill of hearing her moan tightened his skin as she breathed across his chest. Soon he’d have her in bed, reduce her to putty, and her breathless whimpers would be from pushing deep inside her, nothing so mundane as a massage.

He was engrossed in rinsing her hair, and her touch caused a jolt through his loins. He went from hard to hard as hell before he could draw breath. The temptation was there to let her carry on and find his satisfaction, but he refused to give in. “Uh-uh. This is about you, not me. I can wait.”

Her soapy hands glided along his length, then a caress of her thumb shaped the tip, making his stomach muscles spasm. He clenched his fingers around the showerhead for support. She caught his gaze, took in his taut expression with a look as mysterious as time and deep enough to drown him in blue.

“You could have fooled me.”

“I’m an old-fashioned guy, I believe in ladies first. Are you gonna make me break my rules?” He’d broken enough already just giving into the lust he felt whenever she was near, which was all the time. Yet he managed a smile as he said, “Now, are you letting go, or do I have to hurt you?”

A mischievous smirk hovered round her lips. Her hand slipped lower, cupping him. “I could bring you to your knees, no sweat.”

It took all his control to drawl a retort, when he’d rather she just kept on with what she was doing to him. “Doll, do your worst. I was heading in that direction, anyway.”

She laughed and released him. “Okay, you win.”

Because she was such a good sport, he started with a light kiss but couldn’t resist whispering, “I always do,” which made her chuckle and taunt him with a mock threat.

“One day soon I’m going to make you eat those words.”

But he’d already gone to his knees, shaping her with his palms from hip to knee. Her skin felt like hot, wet satin as he stroked the back of her thighs, but when he reached her calves the wince she made was unmistakable. “What’s up?”

She shook her head in denial that anything was wrong, but when his palms took a return journey, he heard her breath catch as he swept over the wound she’d gotten at the geyser park. “Turn around. I want to take a look at your leg.”

Although the wound had closed up, it felt hot and puffy under his fingertips. “Looks like you have an infection. No wonder you’re feeling chilled, you probably have a temperature. Lucky for you, I have something that will do the trick among my gear.”

Her face went pale under her tan. “Do you think it’s blood poisoning? I’ve had it before, when I was a kid.”

“I won’t lie to you, it could turn to that if we don’t do something about it, but I’d say we’ve caught it in time.” He flipped off the shower and lifted her outside to drip on the mat. Her toweling robe hung on the back of the door. He unhooked it and bundled her inside, rubbing to dry her off, then grabbed a towel to wrap around his waist.

It only seemed right while she was sick to conceal that running his hands over her, even through thick toweling, was still a turn-on. “Don’t look so tragic, doll, we’ll soon have you right. I’ll give you a rain check. Just keep my place until next time.”

She let out a gasp level with his ear so he couldn’t miss it, and he knew he’d done the trick when she hit him with “Don’t hold your breath, babe. I might have other fish to fry.”

“Low blow. I’ll remind you you said that.” And as he tied the belt in a knot at her waist, he patted her butt. “Later, doll.”

A quick sortie inside his toilet bag revealed a tube of ointment and a bottle of pills he hadn’t had to use in a while. Holding them in one hand, he closed the lid on the commode and sat her down on top. Kneeling in front to lift her ankle, he smeared the opaque gel over the heat building in the wound. “This antibiotic ointment should take the heat out of it, and these pills ought to bring your temperature down quickly.”

“What kind of pills? I don’t believe in taking drugs.”

He struggled to keep a look of disbelief from his eyes. What a turnup for the books, a courier who jibed at swallowing a legal drug. It snapped him back to the business of reality and twisted through his words. “Everybody takes something, some more than others. This time you don’t have a choice if you want to be rid of the infection. What do you take if you never use drugs?”

“I didn’t say I never took them…ooow!” She yelped as his hand tightened on her tender skin.

“Sorry, but that’s why you need to take these.” Fist clenched on the faucet, he filled a glass with water, then slid two dark red capsules from the bottle into his palm. He handed them to her and waited to see her swallow. “What do you take when you get sick?”

“I go to a Chinese herbalist I know. Herbs work just as well as drugs. I had enough of those when I was in the hospital as a kid. I swore off drugs and needles from then on.”

“Is that where your scars come from?” She nodded, and he went on, “Sorry to make you break a vow, but don’t knock it. There are only a few vacation days to go and a lot of souvenir shops to cover. You won’t be able to get round if this starts to spread. Believe me, it’s for your own good.” He watched her grimace. “At least the medicine wasn’t too hard to take.”

He’d a feeling his words might come back to haunt him. Only three days and four nights to go, and before they were over, he could be handing her medicine she found harder to swallow.

“C’mon, you can have dinner in bed, then we can snuggle up and play spoons all night. D’you know how to play spoons?”

“No, but I’m a quick study, you’ll only have to show me once.”

He hardened his heart against the picture she made, small and vulnerable and wrapped in a white robe that would better fit his bulk, knowing before this was over he would teach her a lesson she would never forget or forgive.

Ngaire felt better next morning, and despite the early start, well rested after spending the night spooning with Kel. She laughed inwardly as the old-fashioned word sprang to mind, but it had contrasted directly with the previous night they spent together.

She nudged Kel as the bus swung round a corner and the bridge on the old Queenstown road came into view. “Are you ready for this?”

“More to the point, are you?”

“I’m feeling a—what was it that woman at the vineyard said I’d soon be feeling after I fell over the cliff?—a box of birds.” She’d laughed when she’d first heard the Kiwi saying, but it perfectly described how she felt inside, chirpy and ready to surprise someone. Kel, probably.

He leaned across her, the better to see the small jumping-off spot fastened to the side of the iron bridge. “Not delirious, are you? You seem far too pleased with yourself for a woman who had a fever last night. Sure you’ve never done a bungee jump before?”

“Never, but I’d like to try everything at least once before I die.” Somehow, today she could say that without a chill of dread running through her veins.

“I’m beginning to realize you’re a danger junky. Falling off that cliff has simply whetted your appetite for more. Just be thankful the tour company won’t take its buses on the road to Skipper’s Canyon. The drop from there is even longer than this.”

Being on one of the first buses on the scene, they didn’t have long to queue for their turn. Most of the other passengers had opted for a passive take on the proceedings and wended their way down to the viewing platform set halfway above the river. Below it a small yellow boat scooped up the passengers dangling from the bottom of the bungee cord.

After she realized the actual depth of the canyon, she hadn’t felt quite so flippant. Her see Naples and die happy attitude began to take a bit of a nosedive. She was glad they visited the shop first to buy tickets. In there, she discovered a large plastic tub of bungee-cord cutoffs that satisfied her anxiety over how safe jumping off a bridge could actually be. The dozens of elastic strands were meant to hold up more than panties.

Yet her stomach did somersaults the closer it came to her turn. The excited squeals of the jumpers at the front of the line, echoing from below, weren’t much help, either.

She hung on to Kel’s arm, practically bouncing with nervous anticipation, and wrapped her other arm around her waist to hold herself down. Te Ruahiki was tucked against her chest, fastened inside the day pack that she’d worn back to front with a sweater buttoned over the top for good measure. Sure, she’d considered leaving the mere behind in the safe, but it had taken on the role of a good-luck charm, a more successful talisman than the one on her suitcase. All the way down the West Coast she had known they were in greenstone country; she’d even thought of buying a miniature mere to wear as a pendant, but Kel had whisked her away before she could reach for her pocketbook.

She sensed Te Ruahiki was as anxious to get home as she was to deliver him to Akaroa, the area her grandmother’s kin claimed as theirs. Every passing day brought them closer to her goal and a new lease on her life.

Now that she was next in line, her arm was still hooked on to Kel’s. The man who would throw her out into space, or what felt like space, looked at them both and asked, “You two flying solo or tandem?”

She turned to Kel. Their eyes met and they answered together. “Tandem.”

Kel turned his khakis inside his boots before navy toweling was rolled round them to take the pressure off the bindings that would fasten around his ankles. One set for him, one set for her on the end of a single bungee cord.

If only she’d thought to wear her jeans—she wouldn’t be imagining her skinny ankles slipping right through the cord. It was too late to back out now.

“Ready?” asked the guy who’d leg-shackled them together. She shuffled into Kel’s arms, let him wrap them tightly around her. As if he’d never let go. Then the guy gave them the okay.

“On the count of three. One, two…three,” he called, pushing them off just as Kel kissed her and her world turned upside down.

He kept kissing her as they bounced up and down, his hard, solid length pressing into her belly with Te Ruahiki vibrating warmly around chest level. She wondered if he’d say anything once the boat crew released their ankles and they were rowed safely to shore. But Kel just grinned. “That was the most incredible sensation, let’s do it again.”

“Sure thing! But this time I’ll keep my eyes open.”

Before they stepped off the boat, Kel knew he’d fallen in more ways than one. Flying through the air clinging to Ngaire was like nothing he’d ever experienced before. The chilly air above the water had shimmered and rippled over and around them, yet he’d felt warm through to his bones.

There had to be something he could do to extricate her from the cartel’s hold. No way could he let her go down with the rest of them. Chaly was another he’d have to approach warily on her behalf.

Tonight he would make love to her so well, she wouldn’t be able to hold anything back. Soon he hoped to be partway to helping both her and himself at the same time.

When they were next in line again, he waved to their less adventurous traveling companions on the platform. Ngaire made a performance of it, swinging her hands over her head as if they were champions. “Look at Jimmy Chen,” he said as she calmed down.

“Yeah, I noticed he didn’t wave back.”

“Bet he’s thinking we’re mad doing this voluntarily after all the fuss at Muriwai.”

This time as he put his arms round her he felt the shimmering sensation straight away. He went to ask her if she’d noticed, when a tall man, shoulders as wide as a barn door, caught his attention. The bastard stood on the horizon next to the tour bus, but before Kel had time to do more than glance at him, Ngaire stretched up to kiss him and there was nothing between them and the ground but air.

And though he looked for the mountain-size man after they climbed back to the top, he couldn’t see him.

Somehow the gloss had rubbed off their last jump.

Chapter 14

T he Remarkables certainly lived up to their name. The mountain range crowded the shores of Lake Wakatipu like parents guarding an only child. It was almost midsummer, yet enough snow crowned the peaks to chill the evening wind. It fingered Ngaire’s hair with a careless indulgence that made Kel envious. Long wisps floated loose at her nape and ears, softening the adventure junky he’d discovered, returning her to the woman he was coming to know.

Hell, he couldn’t avoid getting close to the woman who’d fought off a fever in his arms. Unlike his ex-wife, Ngaire responded to him sexually, not feeling revulsion at his touch.

She was a special woman whose life had been derailed, and he intended getting her back on track whether she liked it or not.

Surely she couldn’t be in too deep. After searching his brain for answers, coming up blank nine out of ten, the only logical answer was that the cartel was blackmailing her. And he aimed to fix the situation.

They were maybe a mile and a half from the hotel, strolling along the grass edging the lakeshore—a mown strip, broken by the occasional slender tree, chosen to enhance but not block the view that drew the tourists. They’d eaten a late dinner in Queenstown, and were ready to keep it slow and easy after a day of nothing but buzz and energy. Electrifying.

Twilight had turned the mountains dark purple and capped them with lilac snow, while coloring the lake a milky blue only seen early or late when the sun was either a promise or a memory. That was as poetic as he got. Too much high life was turning him soft.

“You sure you don’t mind the walk, doll? It’s still a good way to the hotel. I could flag down a cab.”

She skipped ahead of him as if to belie she was tired. “No way. I need to walk off that meal. Draft Guinness and lamb stew at an Irish pub in the southern heartland of New Zealand. Something strike you as odd about that statement?”

“Not when half the signs in town are in German or Japanese. That I do find odd, but the Irish have been here forever.” He touched her shoulder, the one unfettered by a strap. “Hang on.”

“Something wrong?”

“How’s your shoulder holding up? Does it feel bruised?” He pushed the collar of her sweater and strap of her tank top aside to run a finger down her shoulder blade. “Is it tender?”

“Not any more than it should be after thumping into the guardrail of the jet boat. The life jacket saved me.” She spun away from him, her day pack slipping down her arm, following the movement of her body. His hand landed on her breast. They both stilled, feeling its warmth escape into his palm.

Their eyes clashed. Desire flared and with it the need to rush back to the hotel. He squeezed gently, prolonging the transfer of heat, and continued the conversation as if sex didn’t hold them in thrall. “What do you expect when you stand waving your arms overhead when the jet boat doubles back on itself in a spin?”

His thumb flickered over the hard bead his hand had aroused. She didn’t miss a beat as she leaned closer, but her heart rate stepped up and gave her away. “It was exciting, wasn’t it? I thought we might lose our heads when he took the boat right under that overhang where the river had cut away the side of the bank.”

“I thought we already had, you know, lost our heads.”

She shook, shoving against his palm as it encased the whole of her breast. “Is this the point where you reflect on the dangers of getting tied up with an accident-prone woman?”

“Uh-uh. It’s the moment I admit I knew you were trouble the second I laid eyes on you.” He felt her sigh brush his lips, inviting him to taste.

“That long, huh?”

“A lifetime…”

In the glimmering twilight tears glistened in her eyes and moved him to confess, “I’ve been chasing trouble ever since.”

He didn’t care that they might not be alone; the occasional passing car on the other side of the trees, faded to a faint hum compared to the tumult of beating hearts. “Ngaire.” He whispered her name on a breath she took as her own. “Ngaire.” He wrote the passion in it upon her lips as she opened up to his possession. They were deaf to the slamming of car doors at the road’s edge. Didn’t hear pounding feet flatten the grass while they shared air, in a prelude to love, until he raised his head and they were almost on them.

Three men. Black balaclava-covered faces announcing their intent. Dark stares threatened through the slits in their masks, from eyes as oriental as those of his Chinese tour companions. He pushed Ngaire behind him before the three could touch base. So, he had a height advantage? They were three to one. Odds he’d never minded before Ngaire. It went to prove the old adage, never get emotionally involved with the subject.

Too late for recriminations as he parried kicks.

Too late to reach for a gun that would give away his calling. They circled. He feinted a pass. “Keep behind me, doll. These guys mean business.”

Damn, she’d ignored the warning again. But she’d been hot all over and too deep in thrall, Kel’s thrall, to notice the heat radiating from her pack until the threat was real and on top of them. “I’ll watch your back.”

She heard rather than saw the blow he blocked, bone on bone. His voice was rough with misgiving, the words thrown over his shoulder, “I’d like it fine if you just kept safe.”

“Too bad…this guy has other ideas.” Her breath hissed as two hands reached for her. She brought up her arms and broke the hold without leaving a space where they could jump at Kel from behind. She improvised, stepping on her opponent’s toes, then kicking his other knee from under him. He went down but not for long. He bounced back, wary now, as his dark bloodshot eyes cursed her without words. The eeriest part of all was no one spoke a word.

Everything after that merged into a whirl. She was on automatic pilot, yet the only thing flying were hands and feet, if she discounted the occasional curses from Kel’s mouth.

Kel had to be winning. Why else was she facing two goons instead of one while they sacrificed the other to him?

Hmm, two hands to four, she’d faced worse odds. Dropping her pack might have shortened them, but all her instincts said she might as well hand the mere over without a fight.

Temper bit hard as she struck another defensive blow. Damn Savage! This was all his doing. She slapped the face of an anonymous ski mask and fought with refreshed energy, taking all her anger out on them since she couldn’t reach Paul Savage.

The last person to rob her had taken more than her money; he’d stolen any children she might have raised. A hot spike of rage shot through her. She was sick of Savage’s goons sniffing at her heels like jackals. Scavengers, snapping at the bones of the only thing left—her life. She’d be darned if she’d give him the satisfaction. And knowing no red splotches had put in an appearance on the mere—the signal of approaching death—strengthened her arm.

Either way, she was counting on Te Ruahiki. The least he could do after all she’d been through was give her these last five weeks. As though her thoughts had lit a bomb under it, the strap of her pack slid down her arm and the greenstone blade took on a life of its own.

Blunted by canvas and silk, it still packed a wallop.

Encouraged, she stopped being frightened to put the mere to the use it had been designed for. It added an extra eighteen inches to her reach, an advantage she maximized, holding one assailant back while dealing with the other. It didn’t stop her sigh of relief when Kel’s opponent hit the dirt and he joined her, fighting shoulder to shoulder.

He made some moves she wanted him to teach her. Hell, he’d been doing that from the first time they made love. Her mouth curved in satisfaction as she tried an unconventional move of her own and heard a bone break, a move the guy dropping back would remember as long as it took his arm to heal.

The fight ended as quickly as it started, with a shout from the roadway. Taking a moment to glance over her shoulder she saw that the cavalry had arrived, and turned back to see the two left standing run off hauling the third.

Schmidt, excitement mangling a mix of English and German, said, “Mein Gott! What happened? Anyone verletzen…uh, injured?”

Still breathing hard, she looked at Kel. Everything changed once her troubles swooped down to hurt him as well. He gave Schmidt the thumbs-up and said, “I’m okay.”

Thanking God for Te Ruahiki, she flung herself at Kel.

His arms opened and gathered her in. “Looks like our tag team came off best. Make that one for the good guys.”

“Sehr gut. Frau Schmidt is by the taxi. Please to share it to the hotel.”

Kel took one of his arms from her, holding it out to shake the German’s hand. “That sounds like a plan. You’re on, Schmidt.”

Following his lead, she loosened her hold on his waist, instantly missing the warm imprint of his body. “Guess I’m with you there. Walking along the lake edge just lost some of its glamour. Besides, I think we already worked that meal off.”

“And then some.” Kel reached across, tweaking her bicep, a promise warming his eyes, then laid an impulsive kiss on her cheek. “Later, doll. Let’s move on out.”

Touching her cheek, she let Schmidt shepherd them to the taxi, holding on to the promise of his lips till they were in her room.

Kel felt he could ride the elevator for hours, as long as Ngaire was in his arms. The soft sound of the doors opening interrupted a kiss that was becoming more heated by the second. Reluctant to part even for that long, they were bumped by the automated doors as they squeezed past, damn near falling into the corridor.

On a mutual high, Ngaire giggled. “Race you to the room,” she challenged, taking off down the long, glossy green space filled with pastel watercolors of mountains, lakes and trees above a quiet pool of carpet that soaked up noise as if they were in a funeral parlor. Except nobody ever ran or laughed out loud in those places, full of the joy of just being alive the way Ngaire was now.

She was fast, but he was faster, and they reached the door together, panting more from lust and desire than the race. In a combined effort, she zapped the lock with her key card and he pushed it open. It clicked behind him, a sleek, expensive feel at odds with the emotions bubbling inside him. “You were fantastic. I loved it. Where did you learn to fight that way?”

He pushed her sweater and pack to the floor in one continuous movement. “I told you, self-defense classes.”

His boots hit the floor, one thunk following another, marking their progress toward the bed. “Come off it, I know marshal arts training when I see it.”

Her hands pulled at his shirt, popping the buttons. “You win. The gym where I work is mine. I’m a hapkido master. It’s my vocation and I teach it to others.” Generously, she handed him a compliment. “You’re not so bad yourself, big guy.”

He didn’t feel diminished by her condescension as he whipped his hands under her top and found her breasts. It made him hot to see her eyes glaze over as his thumbs circled and made him smile at her next breathless question. “Where did you learn?”

“Army…SAS.” His brain suddenly made the connection that he still had a gun strapped to his ankle. Part of his mind worked on how to deal with it as they circled across the room, gazing into each other’s eyes. He knew what he saw in Ngaire’s tonight to be the truth and nothing but the truth. She wanted him almost as much as he wanted her, with a passion that might never be slaked.

He shucked off his shirt while Ngaire rid herself of her tank top and he was grateful that she didn’t wear a bra. “Get my buckle,” he said, stepping closer, reaching for her.

“Guess what happened to the last guy who tried that tonight?”

“What?” He’d almost reached his goal when she took his feet out from under him and they tumbled on to the bed with her on top. Her breasts pressed into his chest, soft and hard at the same time. He groaned his appreciation. “No problem. I was heading this direction, anyway. Except, I wanted to be on top.”

He rolled, taking her with him, and heard her breath escape in a rush, loving the feel of her against him as she drew in another. He bent to taste the sweet curve of her neck.

“Kel, you need to resist this tendency you have to control everything around you.”

He rose over her, “Who me?” She had sized him up.

“Is there anyone else in this room?”

“No, only me, the control freak.” He rolled to one side, propping himself on an elbow so he could watch her. “You need an answer to why I treated you like I did in the pool that night.”

She touched his face. “Honey, it’s not necessary.”

“Yes, it is. I was a bastard, I admit it. Damn, that’s the first time I’ve acknowledged it. You know I was in the SAS, but I didn’t tell you I had a wife in those days.” With a shrug, he released Carly’s hold over him. “It didn’t last, me being away a lot. Every time I got home, the tension got worse. Hell, she took more headaches to bed than they made aspirin. Finally, she said she couldn’t bear my hands on her. That my touch made her skin crawl because of the violent use I put them to.” He pushed up farther on the mattress to watch her eyes. “Dammit! I was a soldier, trained to defend her, but she wanted none of that. She didn’t want kids with someone like me, either. That hurt most of all.”

Tears welled in her eyes as she sat up beside him. “Hey, doll. I didn’t tell you this to make you cry, just to make you understand what was driving me. To understand it myself.”

“I’m not just crying for you. I’m crying for the babies she didn’t want.” She grasped both hands, kissing their palms, then flattened them against her body to rub over her skin.

“What are you doing, doll?”

“Making you all better.”

Her simple statement of belief twisted his gut in knots. He almost cried out with the pain. The pain of knowing he truly was a bastard and he still hadn’t been completely truthful to either her or himself. That’s what happened when the truth was too frightening to face.

For long moments Ngaire thought she had drowned the momentum with her tears. Tears for them both. She’d never understand women who took for granted the one thing she’d never have. Children. No one to name Sarah for her mother, or Daniel, after her father.

It sure was a wacky world they lived in. Full of contradictions and people who didn’t know when they were well off. A thought disappeared as Kel’s big hands took over. And if his touch was rougher, more urgent than the ones she’d instigated, she didn’t care. He made her feel alive and that was worth more than any gentlemanly caress.

Gentle and manly sure didn’t combine overmuch with the speed her pants and good lace thongs were ripped from her body. Or his curses when they caught on her Nikes. She’d had enough of men too timid to touch, for fear of an elbow in the gut or foot in the groin.

Kel came over her, simultaneously reaching for the box on the nightstand and parting her legs to kneel between them, pulling his khakis low enough to give him access. “I’m past dealing with niceties. If you don’t want this, say it now.”

“And here I was, wondering what was taking you so long.”

He answered with a snarl, yet his hand shook as he prepared himself. She wanted to shout there was no need. No worries. But that meant peeling another layer off her soul, and she wasn’t quite ready. She’d see what the evening brought.

His arms tensed as he came down to his elbows. Fascinated by the whorls of hair on his chest, she twined it through her fingers.

He turned aside a smile for a grimace. “No more teasing, doll, just tell me you’re as hot for me as I am for you.”

She was still saying “Hotter,” as he thrust into her. A swift action her hips arched to meet. Their joining so powerful it almost blew her mind. Long gliding strokes took her, then let her go, rocking her close to the head of the bed with each thrust. She glanced down as he entered one more time, his slim, muscled hips pounding fiercely. The sight set her alight as she shaped her body to fit his the way a bow curves to take an arrow.

Almost too late, she had met her match. A warrior for a princess with her full quota of fighting blood from nations as diverse as the countries that looped the globe from end to end.

And just when her heart thought it could take no more, locking her legs round his waist to hold him tight, she and her champion fell into a world that knew no barriers, had no demarcation lines. A world that knew only love.

Ten minutes later, Kel’s body was still draped over hers, unmoving. His weight pushing her into the mattress. Struggling out of a dream conjured by her desire, she felt sure he’d fallen asleep.

Then his hand reached for her breast and squeezed.

She licked at the lobe of his ear. “Still alive, then?”

“Fighting, fit and ready to tackle another round.”

“I hate men who boast.”

“Just let me get rid of my pants and I’ll show you.” He rolled off her to sit at the side of the bed. She heard fabric scrape down hair-roughened skin and wasn’t prepared for his question. “One thing bothers me, what’ve you ever done to the Chinese?”

Confused, she raised her head off the pillow and said, “Sorry, back up. You just lost me.”

He slid closer to her, already hard and pressing against her hip, one long leg sliding between hers. “I’m back, and I was talking about the Chinese who attacked us. Someone’s upset them and I don’t think it was me.”

Her head reeled back into the soft quilted foam. She’d never heard rumors that Savage had connections in Chinatown. The Mafia, yes, she knew that had to be right from what she’d seen of his goons. She’d presumed leaving San Francisco without his knowledge would be easy. Wrong! But if he’d had Chinese connections all along, where did that leave her? Set up, with egg roll on her face?

“Let’s not ruin the evening by puzzling over it, we can talk tomorrow.” With that, Kel’s hand smoothed the knots at the back of her neck, dismantling the twists in her braid as swiftly as he’d unraveled her composure. She’d begun wondering if tomorrow was the day she’d have to confess all when he asked, “Did I tell you about this fantasy I’ve had since we met?”

She frowned, curious. “Not that I remember.”

He rolled, taking her on another whirling ride, then announced, “The good news is, this time you get to be on top.”

Pale, watery sunlight glanced off the lake onto the ceiling, unhindered by the drapes they’d forgotten to draw the night before. Ngaire awakened slowly, blinking, aware, in the moments before her eyes focused on Kel’s hand on her breast.

It felt so good, she soaked it up before turning in search of the rest of him. He lay flat on his stomach, solving the problem of too much sunlight, too early in the day, by shoving his head under the pillow.

Squinting through half-closed eyes, she searched for the clock on the nightstand. Kel’s hand trailed over her ribs as she rolled. It fell onto the sheet with a soft bump. Seemed it was going to take more than that to wake him up.

The once prettily wrapped box blocked her view. She knocked it aside. It tumbled to the floor, empty. A random flash of memory spiked a thrill low down in her belly and almost managed to make her smile until she saw the time, 5:30 a.m. As she stretched, the notion of waking Kel and making them both happy leapt to mind. And just as quickly jumped out, with a nudge from the empty box on the floor.

He was almost paranoid about using condoms; not even a rush of passion could block the need to protect her. She felt guilty. It would have been easier on them both to have told him the truth.

Slipping from between the sheets, she stood, curling her toes into the soft carpet, surveying a disaster scene of impatient desire.

Looked good to her, though closing the drapes on the mess couldn’t hurt. So, should she shut her eyes and head for the ensuite, or close the drapes first and let Kel sleep?

Or should she do all of that, plus hop a cab down to the twenty-four-hour mom-and-pop store they’d passed last night and renew their supplies?

Half an hour and a cab ride later, she was feeling pretty smart finding the right aisle without having to ask. She picked up one box and eyed a second, then shook her head. Bad enough having to pass one over the counter to the old guy yawning behind it. Besides, they only had two more nights.

The heel of her Nikes squeaked on the checkerboard floor as she turned and went back. Two days be damned, she was going to make the most of them.

Head held high, she passed the boxes to the cashier, adding a package of doughnuts from a stand near the counter. Let him make what he liked of that. He never even blinked, just rang them up.

She laid the notes on the counter beside her purchases and averted her eyes, looking through the window while he bagged them and made change.

A vehicle drew up to the curb behind her cab, a Range Rover. Her mouth dropped as Kel got out. He was halfway through the glass door before she thought to alter her expression. A pity there was nothing she could do about the flash of embarrassment as she clutched at the grocery bag.

The plastic rustled in her hand as she said, “I thought you’d still be asleep….”

He looked at her with the frown she’d come to know well. It crossed his face every time she did something mad. Like rushing out of the hotel at 6:00 a.m. to buy condoms. She shrugged, not wanting to go into detail. “We’d run out and as I was awake I thought…”

The explanation faltered as she stared past him. “Where on earth did you get the wheels, Kel?”

He rewarded her with a brief grin, a lopsided curve of his lips that deepened the dimple on his chin. She’d been right to make the cab trip; the way he smiled always got to her.

Suddenly her memory flashed back more than a year as she noticed he had on the same kind of anorak he’d worn when she’d seen him on TV. It was just before he set off on his last Everest expedition. The one that had taken the lives of two of his companions and almost cost him his own.

It hurt to think the photographic memory she’d been so proud of had let her down the one time it would have done her the most good. “You’re Kurt Jellic.”

A frown deepened the creases that had yet to form on Kel’s face. “Guilty as charged. You must know my brother well to catch on so fast.”

“You could say that.” And then again you might not. She compressed her lips on a howl as he held out his hand.

It would have been rude not to take it. His hand had the calluses of a man who lived his life in the open, a man who drove steel spikes into rock and ice and knew what it was like to hang on the end of a rope and wait for death.

The way she did.

“I’m Kel’s twin. Is he nearby?”

“No. I’m afraid he’s at the hotel, and sorry, I must go…cab waiting, but I’ll tell him I met you.”

“Yes, do that. And you can tell him I approve.”

Ngaire all but ran back to the cab, but she wouldn’t let herself cry. She just sat behind the driver with a hole in her heart you could drive a fist through and a lump in her throat that used to be the part that kept it beating.

He was Kel Jellic, not Kelvin Johnman as he’d introduced himself that first night on the way to their Australian hotel.

He’d lied to her. Used her.

It hurt now to realize she’d been correct when she’d asked Kel if he was following her. She could only have one thing he wanted.

Te Ruahiki.

She only hoped the mere was still in her day pack on the floor. She’d just stuffed some money into her jacket and dashed from the room, so pleased with herself and her brilliant idea.

An idea that could have cost her life.

Chapter 15

C areful not to disturb Kel, Ngaire slipped back into the dim mugginess of a room that smelled of him, herself, and the gyrations that had gone on during the long night hours.

The reminder hit a body blow to her fragile ego.

Get over it! It was just sex.

Great sex!

She’d watched the sun rise on a new day during the short ride back to the hotel. But how many were left to her if Kel had his way?

The bastard!

Pushing the door shut, she waited for the slam to excise her anger. The slightly louder swoosh as it settled its width into the frame didn’t cut it, did nothing to ease the temper rippling under her skin the way the first flickers of distant lightning intimate a thunderstorm.

It hurt to think she had fallen for one of Savage’s lackeys. Had opened herself up to him in all the ways that counted—heart, body and soul. Kel had certainly fooled her.

She threw the bag with its doughnuts and condoms on top of the pile of souvenirs she’d bought the day before. Nervous energy quickened her pace as she strode to the desk where carelessly, trustingly, she’d left Te Ruahiki for him to find.

Her angst flew out on the sigh she’d held tight, as her day pack’s weight told her he hadn’t gotten hold of the mere. Yet.

Clothes hangers scraped along the rod as she peeled the few tops and slacks she’d hung up. Was it only yesterday? She had to get out of there fast, away from Kel, as soon as she could pack.

Nightstand next, she opened the drawer in case she’d dumped change or keys inside, the way she did at home. The Gideon’s Bible caught her eye. She stared at it considering its weight, then down at Kel’s head on the pillow, sizing them both up.

Don’t!

His tousled hair stood up like a kid’s, and his body was sprawled, relaxed, taking most of the bed. At the other end, his feet hung over the bed like a teenager’s during a growth spurt. But there was nothing childlike in the way he’d deceived her.

Hurt her.

He must have known who she was all along.

The bastard! She’d never thought the name Kelvin Johnman suited him, and now she knew why.

For an undercover thief, he could do with a few lessons in technique. Look at the way he’d muffed the job in Tahiti. But maybe not. Maybe he’d set that up as a way to gain her trust. And nearly blown it. But…

God, it was confusing! Who was it who’d jumped them last night?

Tahiti she could understand, but surely the attempts to steal Te Ruahiki in the cave and at Rotorua were over the top when Kel Jellic was traveling with her. Damn, had Savage advertised a reward for the mere on the World Wide Web? She shoved the drawer closed. It glided shut on smooth runners. The sound of the Bible thumping against the inside was slightly more satisfying than the result with their room door.

“Hey,” Kel rolled, taking the twisted sheet with him. It did nothing to hide the width of his shoulders, or the hair-roughened chest that tapered down to his waist. She watched the rolled edge of percale cotton sheeting keep time with his breathing. White cotton caressed his early-morning erection the way her hands had done last night. What had she been thinking?

“What you doing up already?”

The sultry heat in his dark eyes pinned her gaze, an acknowledgement of memories equally as explicit as her own.

The bastard!

He leaned up on his elbow and reached out, fingers seductive, beckoning. “Come back to bed, doll. I’m hungry for something more exciting than breakfast.”

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

She bit back her anger, swallowed it in one piece. Lambasting Kel with the words he deserved would give her new-found knowledge away. Best keep her secret until she’d formed a plan. Until she knew how to handle him in ways that weren’t associated with bed. “No time to fool around. We have to be downstairs in an hour.”

“I can do fast. I do my best work under pressure.”

“I’ve seen your best and you are too controlled to do fast. Now, get up. I’ve had my shower so the bathroom is all yours.” His scattered clothes bore witness to the urgency that had driven them, socks and shoes near the door, shirt in the middle of the carpet and, lastly, khakis in a pile by the bed. She kicked them and walked away as they hit the nightstand with a thud that made her wonder what he carried in his wallet. “You need to pick up. This room is a mess and most of it’s yours. I’m going to pack.”

“Boy, did you get out on the wrong side of the bed.”

Not only the wrong side, the wrong bed.

She pretended to ignore him, her attention once more on the pile of shopping yet to be packed. Dragging the bags off the top of her case, she noticed the good-luck sign looking frayed around the edges, and took it as an omen.

She was feeling slightly frayed as well, but if she put her mind to the problem, she might find a solution before they reached Christchurch and he expected to climb into her bed again.

Hearing his khakis thump against the nightstand gave Kel a moment’s panic in which he spent cursing his stupidity. Thankfully his luck held and Ngaire didn’t pay attention to the bump of his Smith & Wesson as it hit the nightstand wrapped in khaki.

He rolled out of bed, giving himself a lecture on the idiocy of allowing his libido to lead him by the nose, among other body parts. He blamed too much sex too many times on the trot. Great sex.

Being inside Ngaire was becoming addictive. And made him no wiser than the addicts he wanted to save from the kind of creeps behind kiss-and-tell.

Not once in this lifetime had a woman responded to him the way Ngaire did. Her pleasure became his, heightening his senses to the extreme. The control she mentioned so easily balanced unsteadily on the edge of a precipice of mutual gratification.

Damn, he needed to get his mind on something else or his arousal would never let up. Slipping into his shorts gave him a measure of protection against her knowing gaze as he picked up after himself. Since she wouldn’t remedy his problem he’d have to depend on a cold shower to do the trick.

Last night, before they’d left the hotel in search of dinner, he’d hung some clean clothes in the closet alongside hers. Quick as he could, he collected them and left her to her packing.

She was finished when he came out of the ensuite, head bent as she chased something in the bottom of a plastic bag. He looked pointedly at his watch. “I told you we had plenty of time.”

“Good, that means we can have breakfast. I’m starving. I need food and coffee, and more coffee. Lots of hot black coffee.”

“That sounds like a hangover remedy to me.”

“It’s a remedy of sorts…but not a solution,” she answered cryptically.

When he returned, lugging his suit carrier and laptop, a snack appeared to have superceded breakfast. Red case sitting by her feet, she tucked into a doughnut. The half-eaten remains filled one hand and she clasped a package with at least two missing in the other. “Jelly doughnuts, my favorite. Where’d you get those?”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out. And I’m not sharing,” she informed him. “You’ll have to find your own.”

“I didn’t ask you to share.”

“No, but I saw you looking.” He’d never seen her so hyper before. Her snippy expression would give a terrier scared of losing a bone a run for its money. If it hadn’t looked cowardly, he might have dodged backward a step or two until she finished eating. Instead he asked, “What happened to you? Someone sneak in overnight and give you an attitude transplant?”

She blasted him with a look that said You should know. And made him relieved that her explanation was so simple.

“Energy. I’ve been deprived of doughnuts for almost two weeks and I just now realized how much I missed them.” She wiped the powdered sugar off her lips with a tissue.

He wanted to say that licking was his job, but didn’t fancy his chances with the mood she was in this morning. His ex-wife’s excuse for highs and lows had always been PMS, but then she’d never equaled Ngaire’s sunny personality, not even before they were married. In retrospect he couldn’t remember why he’d wanted to marry her in the first place.

Liar! The word screamed inside his head, making him acknowledge the truth. You were looking for a family with a regular mom, dad and 2.4 kids to replace the one you never really had.

Never would have now.

Why?

Because as much as he hated to admit it, even to himself, he’d never find another woman like Ngaire. But she was all wrong for him for all the right reasons. “Better check the room before you leave, doll. We won’t be back this way again.”

“You check, I want to wash my hands.”

He found the empty box under the sheets on the floor. As he shook the box Leena had given her, it was difficult to hide his smile as he remembered the fun he’d had emptying it. “You can toss that away.”

He waited for a comment about replacing it, but none was forthcoming. All he got was “Do you think the shop in the foyer will be open? I need some chocolate.”

That was the last piece of information she volunteered until they reached Mount Cook and stopped at the Hermitage Hotel for the morning tea promised on the schedule, as well as a chance to see New Zealand’s highest mountain.

From the amount of Hershey’s Kisses Ngaire’d popped on the way there, he doubted she’d want anything more to eat. Of course, he’d been known to be wrong.

The view from the restaurant was as good as any in the world. But she wanted to see it from outside. He followed her and her camera to photograph the mountains. He was relieved when her enthusiasm got the better of her mood, or all the chocolate she’d eaten sweetened it enough to remember he was there. “Sheesh, the air’s chilly at this level. Though as long as there’s still snow on the mountains I don’t mind much. I was afraid it would have melted farther north.”

“They’re pretty much snowcapped all year round.” He moved closer but kept her in front, feeling an urge to guard her back.

Unlike him, she appeared to have pushed last night’s bad guys out of her mind. He couldn’t, not with everything that had happened imprinted on his synapses as clear as if they were playing on a big screen. No, he wasn’t likely to forget a thing from the moment they were accosted, until she fell asleep exhausted in his arms.

Crescents of long dark lashes had fluttered above her cheek as she slept. He’d watched, the puzzle that was Ngaire spinning in ever-widening circles in his mind, a still unsolved mystery when he gave up, pulled the pillow over his head and ordered his brain to shut up and sleep. It had either been sleep or take her again and again.

“This is where Sir Edmund Hillary trained for his ascent of Everest, though Mount Cook can’t be nearly as high.”

He’d become so attuned to her in the last few days, and the tension in her body sang to him, the way her unspoken question leapt out of the statement to prickle the hairs on his neck.

“Where did you hear that?” he asked tersely, senses alert to the nuances of body language. He ignored the need to look in her eyes, shoving hands fisted like mallets down deep in his pockets to stop from turning her round. Was his imagination running on more fumes than fuel?

Hell, was it knowing they were in the area his brother Kurt had chosen to build his lodge that made him see problems where none existed? This was the place Kurt had chosen to hide from the media and everyone else, Kel included.

The tension he’d sensed in his brother had eased lately, as if he was coming to terms with the accident, and the investigation that followed. The open-ended result had been worse than if, as leader of the expedition, they’d found him guilty of negligence.

Instead, his friends’ deaths hung around his twin’s neck like a rotting albatross he was unable to shake loose. Thank God Kurt seemed to be putting the whole inflammatory business behind him.

Kel’s mind leapt back to the present when Ngaire waved a colored leaflet under his nose. “It says so in this brochure I got inside the hotel. Though, I actually knew all that when I arrived in New Zealand. Because of my connection, I made a point of learning all I could about the country, long before I got the chance to win my trip. For instance, did you know the mountain was named Aoraki, Maori for the ‘cloud piercer,’ eons before Captain Cook landed on these shores?”

He wanted to remind her he’d been born in New Zealand, and unlike her he wasn’t just an accidental tourist. Damn, she’d got him acting as if he believed her story, instead of it being a convenient front for the dangerous game they were playing. He wanted to growl that he didn’t give a damn for trivial pursuits, but settled for “Seems all that trivia you squirrel away has paid off.”

“Well hey, you were paying attention.” She snapped her fingers under his nose. “Easy, isn’t it?”

She angled her head to look in his eyes, her lashes dark moths fluttering against her cheek. His body tightened. Those eyes of hers were so blue, so innocent, so dangerous. Damn, he’d a feeling he was about to be taken for a ride. Time to jump before she bucked him off and trampled all over him.

“Since you’re so smart, how ’bout putting your mind to the Chinese puzzle we were sent last night.”

“Sorry. That one I don’t have an answer for, Mr. Johnman.” Her eyes never blinked. “But, would you say this is the same place Kurt Jellic trained for his Everest expedition? You’ve heard of him, haven’t you? His name’s spelled J-e-l-l-i-c. There was a whole lot of footage about him on TV when the tragedy was in the news. Hardly surprising when he’d lost one of the richest men in the U.S.A., not to mention his beautiful wife, over a ravine.”

She’d won that round, tossed him onto his ass, and the fall was every bit as hard as he’d imagined, for he couldn’t deny it. He hadn’t needed a big-screen TV to live through it vicariously; his brother’s problems had followed him day and night.

Kurt’s pain was his pain and vice versa.

“So, where did you meet my brother?”

Ngaire hadn’t expected it to be this easy, and it brushed at the rough edges of her chagrin. “So, you admit your name is Kelvin Jellic?”

His jaw squared. Damn! He wasn’t happy about being caught, but it looked like he intended toughing it out. “No, actually it’s Kelman Jellic.”

“Kelman. It suits you. So tell me, Kelman Jellic, what exactly do you want from me?” For the whole of their journey to the Hermitage, she’d meditated in an attempt to find her ki, to feel centered again, focused.

For once it hadn’t worked.

Inside, contained anger threatened to break out from behind the placid mask she’d assumed. Instead, she circled with Kel, two opponents parrying on a mat made of words with hidden nuances.

The next point was Kel’s. “What do I want?” A flame, cold as ice, lit his eyes. She felt it in the slow burn of his perusal touching her body. Felt it deep inside, in the places he’d taken as his own. “Seems to me, I’ve had it all, but you know what I’m like, doll, always greedy for seconds.”

With one look, he’d added a sexual slant to her question, and it was humiliating how easily it had been achieved. She shifted her stance, gave herself a little space, ultra aware of the softly clinging cotton knit against her breasts. And the way her pants brushed against her skin from hip to thigh. It felt like his palms had, sweeping over and over, driving her mad with wanting.

“Low blow, Kel. You know darn well I’m talking about you pretending to be someone you’re not. Still pretending even after…even after all of that other stuff—”

“The word is sex, doll. But I’ll tell you why. I didn’t think it mattered.” His chest rose, nostrils flaring on a deep breath. “What has it been? A little more than a week? Hardly long enough to delve into personal histories. I saw you and wanted you, nothing more, nothing less.”

He stared past her at the mountains, eyes half shut, crinkling at the corners as if he’d already said a mouthful. The shutters were up and he had no intention of letting her inside his head.

And when he finally looked at her again, all his eyes held were the twin reflections of cold snowcapped peaks.

They said attack was the best form of defense. But Kel knew he’d come across as a sullen bastard. Self-preservation could take some of the blame. He had feelings for Ngaire. Feelings he should have stifled the moment they surfaced. Instead he’d allowed them to grow. And to get them back on the same footing as last night, he was going to have to lie like he’d never lied before, lies on top of more lies. They weighed on him. He didn’t like it one iota. “It’s pretty hard on the ego having a famous brother. Especially one who’s an identical twin. This trip was booked under another name because I’m sick of people’s reaction. They read K. Jellic and immediately assume I’m Kurt.”

He shoved his fists deeper in his pockets and told the truth, nothing like it for adding a pinch of authenticity to the lie. “Everyone wants to know what it was like hanging off the end of a rope for hours on end, not knowing if you’re going to live or die. Once the media gets in your face they’re harder to shake than flies in the outback. What they really want to know, but won’t come right out and ask, is did he kill them?”

The moment she laid her hand on his arm, he knew he’d won, but as victories went, this last one was cheap, more likely to give him ulcers than bring him out in a rash of high-fives.

Her expression softened, eyes, blue as a Tahitian lagoon, stared into his, washing over him in a wave of empathy that played hell on his conscience as she confided, “I’ve had my own fifteen minutes of fame. All I got from it was the need to be on my guard.”

“I suppose your quiz show win made you a celebrity in Chinatown. Did everyone keep touching you for luck the way the other passengers did after you made it back on that cliff?”

“Do you think that’s what they were doing? It hadn’t occurred to me.” Her eyelids fluttered for a moment, and when she opened them again her eyes were clear and uncalculating. “Guess I owe you an apology for going for the throat.”

He shrugged, still acting, blunting the cutting edge of the words he’d used to hurt her, when given half the chance he’d rather kiss her better. “I took the bigger bite. Put it down to the human condition, none of us likes to be caught out.”

He tasted bile in the back of his throat as she said, “No, I’m sorry—” conceding blame, then “—I should have come right out and said I’d met your brother. Instead I let my hurts stew. I thought we’d become close and gave too much weight to a holiday affair.”

“Don’t. It’s my fault. I meant what I said before. One look at you and I wondered how it would feel to be inside you. Now I know, and it’s better than anything I could have imagined. But our relationship has nowhere to go. You know it. I know it. We’ve both kept secrets from the other….”

She shook her head.

Pulling his hands from his pockets, he gripped Ngaire loosely above the elbow and tried to ignore the softness of her skin and the memory of touching every satin inch. Would he ever get over wanting her? Never. He pushed aside the thought of needing a lifetime to erase her from his mind, to tell her, “You’re still denying it, but I know those guys who tried to beat us to a pulp weren’t after me. You’re the one they’re interested in.”

A sigh rippled through her. He felt its passing in the outside curve of her breasts, the undulating shivers caressing the sides of his hands. “You’re right. I know who sent them. There’s this guy back in San Francisco, Paul Savage. Rich dude, well connected, borderline Mafia. I have something he wants me to sell and since I refuse he’s decided to steal it instead.”

Savage? Mafia? Why hadn’t Chaly warned him of the new player in the game? He gritted his teeth to ask, “What have you got that he wants?” His question came out sounding the worse for wear and slightly anxious round the edges, so he looked down at her breasts, rubbing his thumbs against them, and added, “Apart from the obvious.”

She gave a self-deprecating snort, like ones he remembered her making while she slept. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you, and the less you know the better. I’m sorry for getting you into this. Maybe it would be safer for you not to have anything more to do with me. Last night wasn’t the first attempt, that’s why I was surprised you thought the guys wearing the ski masks were Chinese.”

Damn. It seemed Ngaire thought the Mafia were involved. He’d have to make time to call Chaly, if his cell phone would work surrounded by all these mountains. “So, they’ve gone after you before. When and where?”

“You know about the one in Tahiti, well I saw him again in Auckland. I banged into him as I was running for the ferry and winded him, but Schmidt took care of it for me.”

“Schmidt?”

“Yeah, he was right behind me. The other attempts happened in the caves at Waitomo and that time I got lost in the mist at Rotorua.”

“God, doll, you’re not safe to be let out on your own.” He cupped her face in his hands, knowing it was the lover speaking, not the undercover agent. “You know I can handle myself. From now on I won’t let you out of my sight. Day or night.”

He kissed her then. Right out in the sight of God and everyone around them. Not caring a damn who saw, he deepened the kiss and held her close as she answered him with an equally impassioned response. After one last, slow brush of his mouth over her lips, he let her go and felt her sigh stretch between them.

“It’s too much to ask of you, Kel. I should have realized the danger and not let myself become involved. But stop worrying about me. It will all be over soon.”

“When?” All his senses snapped to attention as Ngaire ran her hand up and down the strap of her day pack. He knew he’d been correct. The formula was definitely hidden inside. The pack was looking worn around the edges, probably the weight of the million or so lives it held inside its scuffed navy canvas. The problem was figuring out where she’d stashed it that Chaly hadn’t already searched.

“Tomorrow…” She hesitated.

Every particle of concentration focused on Ngaire, as if to extract the information through sheer strength of mind, as she finished, “Somewhere near Christchurch. That’s when I hand it into someone else’s care.”

“Don’t be sighing your relief too quickly, and don’t even think of relaxing your guard, tomorrow’s not here yet. And you can be sure I’m going to be closer than your shadow.”

Ngaire looked over her shoulder. He followed her gaze. A few passengers had begun filing into the tour bus. “Somehow I think you’ll have second thoughts about following me into the rest room. That’s my next port of call.”

“No problem, I can wait outside.”

Together, they walked back into the Hermitage, their paths on an angle that crossed Jimmy Chen’s and a few of his cronies.

Chen barred their way. “Bus leaving now. You come quickly.”

Ngaire answered for them both. “We’ll be there in a couple of minutes.” After they cleared the doors, she grabbed Kel’s arm, looking back at the men they’d just passed. “You don’t think…”

“Let’s not discount anyone.”

“But they’ve been so nice.”

“Could be it’s the smirk on the face of the tiger, best not to trust anyone.” She smiled, when realistically his warning included himself. As soon as she’d gone inside, he’d call Chaly with the news of the handover. Knowing his boss, he’d want to be in at the kill. A cold lump of lead settled in the pit of his stomach as he wondered what tomorrow might bring, for him, for Ngaire. From whichever angle he looked, none of them had a hope in hell of coming up smelling of roses.

Outside the rest rooms, keeping up the pretence, he said, “Look, we have two nights before we fly out of Christchurch in different directions, let’s make the best of them.” She nodded, and now that was settled he asked, “My brother say anything?”

“Only to tell you he approved.” Then she disappeared into the rest room.

He should never have asked. That was the trouble with being Kurt’s twin. The knowing went both ways.

His thoughts were still with Kurt as he hung up on Chaly and Schmidt arrived. Hardly a surprise. The man always seemed to be there, like last night. There was more to that than met the eye. His answer wasn’t long coming. Schmidt strode straight up to him. “We need to talk.” The German nodded to the other door. “In there.”

Wondering what had happened to the guy’s heavy accent, Kel told him, “No thanks, I’ve been.”

Schmidt reached inside his jacket, saying, “Maybe this will change your mind.”

Kel locked his fingers around Schmidt’s wrist. “No you don’t.” He quickly patted down the guy’s perennially brown jacket.

“I’m not armed. Take a look for yourself, inside pocket.”

He flicked back the brown lining. “You take it out, Schmidt, if that’s your real name. Be quick about it. I’m expecting company.”

Seemed his name really was Schmidt, at least according to the Interpol ID in his pocket. Kel handed it back. “You don’t half pick your moments. We can’t talk now. She’ll be here any second.”

“At the next stop, then.”

“That’s Lake Tekapo. She’ll want to go into the Church of the Good Shepherd overlooking the lake. It’s small, so it’ll be pretty crowded. I’ll wait outside. We can talk then.”

On the walk back to the bus, Kel wondered who in the hell next was gonna join their game of follow the leader?

Did Ngaire have any idea of the high stakes most of the players hoped to win?

Chapter 16

T he Christchurch hotel room was standard city fare, the bed a little harder than Kel would have chosen, which was no reason for feeling he’d spent the night on a knife’s edge, holding Ngaire close, so neither of them fell off.

Kel always said he could sleep anywhere, knowing the slightest sound out of sync with his surroundings would have him instantly awake, and though it was almost light when Ngaire began to rouse in his arms, he’d hardly closed his eyes. All night long, his mind had calculated the odds against untangling her from the crisscross of intrigue centered around her.

He knew the way things worked. Once her usefulness was over, the drug cartel would have no compunction about taking her out as casually as they would squash a mosquito that irritated them.

He and Schmidt were on the same side, but then Schmidt’s only interest was in nixing the formula for kiss-and-tell, and Ngaire was simply a byproduct of the deal, only important because of what she carried, while she carried it. Once that was gone all bets were off, and she’d be fair game for anyone carrying a grievance over missing out on the profits from the new drug.

Profits that would never eventuate if he had his way.

He wished he could be like Schmidt, but he had feelings for Ngaire, feelings that had snuck up and planted themselves under his skin without his knowing. It was all right pretending he’d only been following orders, doing his duty.

His heart knew otherwise.

Inside his head he’d done an equation with her on one side and all the people who would suffer if kiss-and-tell got onto the streets. Ngaire lost out big time. But when he did the same experiment with his heart, she was the clear winner.

“What time is it?” Her voice vibrated across the skin of his shoulder where her head had lodged as she slept.

He rolled with her in his arms, covering her with his oh-so-eager body, and felt the jolt that shot through her as he fit his hardening flesh to the apex of her thighs, taking most of his weight on one elbow. “Too early to do anything except make love.”

She didn’t say “again,” though she could have; he’d lost count of the times he’d taken her in the night. But morning would be on them with a rush, and after that nothing would ever be the same.

“Good thing I went out and bought those condoms.” Her voice was husky, breathless, sending spikes of desire shooting through him. He ducked his head to capture her lips and her essence. He wanted to breathe it down inside him and hold it there forever.

A latent hunger prowled the back of his mind. He cupped her breasts and lavished her nipples with kisses. “Man, you taste good, I’ll never get enough of you to satisfy me. I need to taste you all over.”

Ngaire laughed. It was the truly sexual sound of a woman who knows what is going to happen next. “Be my guest. Don’t let anything stand in your way.”

“I don’t intend to.”

He dipped lower, his tongue circling her navel. Ngaire’s heart pounded. What a way to waken up. Her hips squirmed under his weight, anticipating what was to come. Kel was such a wonderful lover, the thought of losing him was almost too much to bear. It was as if they truly had thrown their hearts ahead of them when they’d jumped off that bridge, and each gotten theirs back, implanted with a piece of the other’s.

Mesmerized by the rhythmic feel of his palms flowing from her hip to her knee, from somewhere outside herself she felt him part her legs. Felt his mouth, his hot, wet mouth, kiss the ache his touch had wrought in her womb. Felt his tongue tighten the knot on the sensation of pleasure and pain he’d tied her up in, until she splintered into a thousand tiny pieces.

Ngaire’s moans were a clarion call to his hunger, and before the aftermath of her climax subsided Kel thrust inside her and let her heat ripple over him. Her pretty little rounded buttocks filled his hand as he held her still, unmoving, breasts crushed to his chest and hair spilling over her pillow. He twisted a hank of black silk round his fist and pulled her face closer.

Slowly they tormented each other’s lips, nipping and licking and let the conflagration build in strength where they joined. She wriggled her hips under him; he refused to move until finally the desperation, the striving to get back where he’d taken her before, drove her to beg him. “Now, Kel. Now.”

“I’m not wearing anything.” It felt so good being inside her, flesh to flesh with nothing to dull the sensation. He was drowning in it, frightened to move in case he climaxed too soon and lost this feeling of being one with her.

“Neither am I.”

He felt her tighten around him, a sensation tempting him to let go, lose control. “I mean you’re not protected.”

“I always feel protected when I’m with you.” She grabbed his face between her hands and began covering it with kisses, whispering between each brush of her lips. “It doesn’t matter. Don’t worry about it, I’m safe…” She rocked her hips against him. “This is how it was the first time, only better.”

Ngaire handed over her heart in her kiss, pouring all her feeling for him from her mouth to his, loving him. Small ripples of fire caressed her insides as he returned it. His hips flexed as he stroked her, slowly, slowly setting her aflame. “Yeah, this is much better. Last time you kept your distance and it hurt. Do you know how painful it was not being able to touch you like this?”

Her hands danced across his back in swift, teasing nips, taking her pleasure from the jolt of his heart against his sternum as she stung little love nips across his tight butt.

It wasn’t enough. She wanted more. She wanted it all, to be dominated by the power of his thrusts, not to be treated like the fragile doll he’d nicknamed her. “What would make it better still,” she said, wrapping her legs round his waist, pulling him closer, “would be for you to lose some of that control.”

He did a long, slow glide out and in, gritting his teeth all the way, a demonstration of what control meant. “Be careful what you ask for, doll. You might just get it.”

“And I might just like it.” Ngaire’s nails traced the nodules on his spine, touched the nerve guaranteed to make his body thrust involuntarily.

It felt fantastic. He bit back a groan and through gritted teeth, he shredded a challenge. “So it’s war, is it?”

“You betcha!” Her teeth fastened on the cord of his neck and nipped, short and sharp, with no allowances for kissing it better. “Let the good times roll.”

It occurred to Kel that he’d never known what good times were before Ngaire. She was saint and sinner all wrapped in one, a temptress, a teaser, and since Gordie was gone, the person he’d most prefer to have by his side in a fight.

Talk about teasing and tempting, she squeezed her internal muscles in a way designed to make him yell “Uncle!” Well, he would see who yelled surrender first.

From the moment the decision was made, he felt a weight lift from his shoulders, and for the only time since he’d first bedded a woman, Kel Jellic lost hold of his famous control and took Ngaire with him to a place above and beyond the call of duty.

From the safe haven of Kel’s arms Ngaire said, “I need to get up.” His arms tightened round her, but the thrill that shot through her had more to do with fear than sex. What happened today would shape her future. Life or death—which would it be?

Anxiety left her mouth in a long drawn-out sigh, knowing she had Kel only for today and tomorrow, especially tonight. If only all her problems could be solved so easily.

“I have to move, they’re delivering a rental car for me at eight. Don’t want to be late today of all days.”

She felt Kel tense. “When did you arrange for a car?”

“It was arranged for me. All I have to do is drive the route marked on the map and get rid of my passenger.” Oh, ho, was Te Ruahiki listening? She wouldn’t like him to take offence at this late stage of her trip.

Kel sat up in bed, taking her with him. “Passenger?” He twisted her on his lap till she faced him, straddling his knees, but unlike last time his male strength didn’t rise to greet her.

“What passenger?” His grip tightened as the glint in his eyes morphed from heated to ferocious. “Who are you taking with you?”

She shivered in his arms. She’d never seen Kel look so angry, not even yesterday when he’d been defensive over being caught out in a lie. “It’s no one. I told you. I have to make a delivery. It’s no big deal.”

“No big deal. Huh! I suppose that’s why all and sundry have been chasing after it.” His hands plunged into her hair, spilling it over her shoulders like a black shroud, holding her face between his palms with none of the tenderness he’d brought her in the night as the weight of each fingertip clamped to her scalp.

She could easily have broken his hold, knew she could remove his hands by simply saying “Kel, you’re hurting me.”

The emotions warring in his eyes kept her quiet.

He loosened his grip and pulled her close, resting his forehead against hers. She felt his ragged breath on her face, her lips, listened to him urge her to, “Give it up, doll. Give it to me and I’ll fix it, I’ll make it right for you.”

“If only it were that easy, I would do what you want in a flash.” She rolled her forehead from side to side, failing to stifle the moan building inside her that shaded her words in funereal drab. “I should have known you were too good to be true. You want the same thing as everyone else, you just took a different approach to get it.”

She grabbed his neck and punished his lips with a hard, vicious kiss full of pain, disappointment and determination, then pushed him away. “No, damn you, you can’t have it! It’s my life at stake here and I’ll fight you with every fiber of my being before I let you toss it away as if it has no meaning.”

Face sober, he took the punch she landed as she leapt up off him and out of bed. “You’re right, doll. It’s too much to ask. I won’t fight to change your mind. It might not seem that way at this moment, but believe me, your life means as much to me as it does to you.”

Relief washed over her, for all her challenge she hadn’t wanted to fight such an uneven battle, she against Kel and her heart. It was hard to keep her voice upbeat as she issued a last challenge. “Then prove it. Come with me when I hand it over.”

“That’s already a given. But get this straight, I’m driving.”

“I thought you’d never ask. They say there are some crazy roads where we’re going, and besides that, you guys drive on the wrong side of the road.”

“Better take a jacket,” Ngaire had said, yet rain had been the last thing on the weather forecaster’s mind. She’d tidied herself as well, navy linen brushed the backs of her knees, and the top that matched the skirt, though short-sleeved, was a lot more formal than anything she usually wore. He had visions of visiting some drug lord’s fancy compound.

It couldn’t hurt. The more he got on those guys, the better. He just hoped his cover held.

While Ngaire got ready, he’d tried to call Chaly and give him an update on the situation, but just this once the boss’s cell phone had been off, so he’d made do with leaving a cryptic message.

Once they set off, Kel could see why she’d been dubious about the roads, though typical of New Zealand. Their route wound over the hills separating Christchurch from Akaroa Harbour. She’d shown him the isolated little township on the map, and he depended on her to navigate the few miles on from there, while he kept them on roads with a hundred-foot drop on their side and no safety barrier.

The car that had been waiting for them outside the hotel wasn’t a clunker, but it sure wasn’t top of the line when it came to horses under the hood, and a black car, twice the size of theirs, was snarling behind them, waiting for a chance to overtake. But, since he couldn’t see what was coming, he’d have to wait until they picked up speed on the downward side of the hill.

At last they were over the top, and although he couldn’t see it through the trees he knew Akaroa lay ahead of them.

Concentrating on keeping the offside wheels on the road as they negotiated a bend he could swear was damn near a 360-degree loop, his grip almost let loose of the wheel as Ngaire squealed, “My God, he’s going to overtake!”

He let his eyes wander for a brief second to see the other car edging alongside theirs on the tight side of the loop. Throttling down with the stick shift, he rammed the gears into second to slow them down, knowing braking too hard could send them into a spin and over the edge into the tall pine trees with their tops barely cresting the edge of the road. “Keep an eye on him. Tell me if he gets too close while I try to slow this baby down enough to let him pass.”

“Okay, I’m watching. Oooh,” she gasped. “He’s getting closer. His car’s too long to fit round the tight curve. Try to stop…”

The horrified tone of her next gasps made the hairs on his neck crinkle. “Sheesh, it’s him! The guy who stole my case in Tahiti. Go, go, go! Go faster. Don’t let him pass.”

Kel saw the nose of the other car creep level with the driver’s-side mirror, brakes squealing as they reached the halfway point of the bend. This is what he’d feared, a last-dash attempt to steal the formula before she handed it over. Well, the bad guys weren’t going to get the chance to pick over the wreckage of their little car, especially with that dolt Ray Hohepa behind the wheel.

Not if he could damn well help it.

The next bend was coming up fast and on Hohepa’s side a rock wall loomed hard and jagged, a place where nothing grew but moss and metal slithers from cars it had eaten whole.

Staying in second gear, Kel started winding the engine up, easing ahead. The swipe the other car laid on the rear driver’s-side wasn’t powerful enough to spin them off the road, but all he had to rely on was the agility of the smaller car to take the bends faster than the bigger one could rear-end them.

The humidity inside the little box on wheels they were trapped in increased tenfold, mostly him sweating, as he took the next curve on two wheels that were screeching their little hearts out, the way he wanted to. Except, his fear was locked deep, where it wouldn’t show, as he prayed for the strength to keep Ngaire safe and beat the lunatic on their heels at his own game.

“I can see a small patch of straight road coming up. If he gets in front of us there it’s curtains, so put the pedal to the metal, sweetheart, or we’ve had it for sure. We’ll either go over the edge or I’ll die of fright.”

Though he couldn’t see her, Kel heard a smile in her voice. “Glad I could keep you amused, doll. Just one thing, does this baby come with air bags on both sides?”

The little car rocked round the corner and on to the straight, all fifty yards of it. He glanced in the mirror, saw the other car fishtail, and barely missed the rock face. The engine protested as Kel slammed into third and floored the accelerator. Twenty yards and counting. He gripped the wheel with one hand and dropped a gear with the other as the corner charged closer. It was a tight little curve with a twist in its tail that dove back on itself in an S. He spun the wheel to the left and the car slid sideways, wheels gripping at the last moment as he suddenly flung them in the opposite direction, panicking a little as he saw the road straightening out in front of them in a racetrack where the only winner was high-powered speed.

His eyes flicked to the mirror as Ngaire gripped his arm, jumping in her seat, and cried, “Oh, wow! We’ve won. A wheel just rolled across the road and over the edge.”

The sky above them was as blue as a Dutchman’s coat, and the sea in the bay even brighter. Their goal was in sight. It didn’t stop his gaze flicking to the mirrors every few seconds to be certain they’d seen the last of the black car. “Here’s hoping the road has been cleared by the time we want to go home. I checked the map. There’s only one road in and one road out of this burg.”

“You’ve brought us to a Marae….”

His surprise was as puzzling to Ngaire as the incredulous note of his gasp. Where else had he thought she’d take the mere. Sheesh, Kel was a New Zealander, she’d thought he’d know all about the culture. “This is the spot where I’ve to hand it over. Pull up close to those four people. I expect one of them is my contact.”

“What’s the story, is this a gang headquarters?”

“Get real, Kel. Are you a kidder or what?” She pushed open her door, smiling as a silver-haired man closed the distance to the car. This must be William Ruawai. “No time to explain. You’ll just have to take it as it comes, same as me. I’m the new guy on the block with all this stuff. Come and meet William, my contact.”

She picked her pack up off the floor. Te Ruahiki was resting on the nest of white silk instead of wrapped in her grandmother’s scarf. Unfamiliar with traditions, she wanted easy access to the mere. How would it look to stand there unwinding layers of silk in a rush? She’d feel like a lunatic, and look like one, too.

Feeling nervous now that the time had arrived, she waited as Kel locked the car, taking his time to pocket the keys. She wished he’d hurry. He made it just as William reached her. The elder’s skin was much darker than her own, but his features were as familiar as the photographs Pops had kept of her grandmother.

“Haere mai. Haere mai. Haere mai. Thrice welcome, daughter of the Ngati Kahu.” Placing his hands on her shoulders, William bent his head toward hers. She knew what was coming, the hongi. Her grandfather had once described the action of touching foreheads and noses as the equivalent of a kiss on the cheek.

“Thank you, William, and thanks again for your assistance with the Customs agent.” She glanced at Kel. He was frowning, but didn’t shy from the hongi as she introduced him.

The formality was repeated as they met an older couple, George and Hine. “Cousins of your grandmother,” William explained. “They’re visitors, too, so I’ve asked them to guide you through the powhiri. Marae protocol can be confusing to the uninitiated.”

Suddenly, the undertaking took the form of a huge responsibility. What if she wasn’t up to it, did something wrong and insulted the people gathered for the ceremony? Keeping her eyes down, she edged closer to Kel, stopping when their arms brushed. Knowing he was there gave her a shot of confidence.

William was saying, “Hine will answer the calls from the other women, so don’t worry. As the Rangatira, chief of this hapu, it’s my duty to greet you inside the Marae.”

There didn’t seem to be a trace of Maori in the last man, Robert McIntyre, but she’d been fooled at Rotorua. Fair-haired, Robert had a ruddy complexion, and with the leather-patched elbows of his sport coat he reminded her of a school-teacher. When introduced, he shook her hand, starting to say, “You’ll never know how much this means to us,” but was interrupted by William’s “We must get on.”

When she finally glanced Kel’s way, his eyes were intent, his expression cold. But before she could ask him what was up, William began speaking formally once more.

“This is the Marae, our turangawaewae. It is not just a place for people to meet. It is the spiritual home of the generations who are no longer with us.”

The words rolled off William’s tongue as if they’d been sung instead of spoken. Her skin tingled with a sensation at one with the air around them, which seemed to sparkle with nervous energy. His words made her think of Te Ruahiki, lost to his people for so many years. And of her family—mother, grandfather, and the grandmother she’d never known but who had lived in this place. All of them lost to her now. Instinctively, she reached for Kel’s hand, as if he was her anchor in the present. The moment their hands touched, Te Ruahiki made his approval known to her.

“It is a spiritual home for the present generation.” William’s open-handed gesture toward her seemed to say “You.”

“And will be the spiritual home of generations yet to come.” His hand movements encompassed both Kel and her, as William smiled, saying, “That will be your children.”

Her heart squeezed inside her chest as if the tribal elder had reached out and gripped it in his large rawboned hand. If only… The words seemed to hang in the air for all to see. As deep inside that same heart, the hurtful knowledge that there could never be any children—not even if her love for Kel was reciprocated—made the wound bleed freely.

The next few hours merged in a blur of speeches and action songs punctuated by a rhythmic wave of hand and foot movements. The plaintive calls that Hine replied to in her stead seemed to take them back to another place, another time.

Once the tapu had been lifted from the visitors, it was introductions and hongis all round. She hadn’t realized what a big deal the return of Te Ruahiki would mean to her grandmother’s people. Thank heavens for her little support troupe. Without them she didn’t think she would have made it through the day. Particularly, as after a huge meal, the ceremonies began again.

Afterward, George took her aside to explain how to proceed from then on. At last she would play her final part in the return of the greenstone mere.

Wanting to keep Kel up with the action, she tried to convey George’s instructions. “This next part is where I hand over Te Ruahiki. Wish me luck.”

“Te Rua who?”

“Te Ruahiki. That’s the name of the greenstone mere that Paul Savage sent you to procure. Didn’t he tell you anything?”

“Sent me after? What the hell are you talking about? I’ve never met the man. Never heard of him until you mentioned him.”

She didn’t know whether or not to believe her ears. She’d heard of the Mafia taking out contracts, but subcontracting? “What was that about this morning, when you said you could fix things for me? I thought you meant you’d make sure I’d get the money.”

“Money? You said that your life was at stake.”

“Oh, this is too weird. We can’t talk now. I’ll tell you on the way back to the hotel.” Then, as they went to take their places, her breath jolted from her lungs. Hoping she wouldn’t have to point, she whispered to Kel, “There’s the guy who tried to run us off the road. He’s in the crowd at the far side of the meeting house.”

Kel nodded, the light in his eyes uncivilized. “I’ll take care of him later, don’t worry. You have loads of support now.”

But she wondered if Paul Savage would ever let her win. If he managed to get his hands on Te Ruahiki, would the curse still hold?

Her hands shook. For the first time since she’d passed through Customs, the jade mere would be visible to people other than herself. It seemed to shimmer in her hands, pristine as the day it had been carved hundreds of years before, a symbol of mana to its owner. Thankfully, no prediction of death flecked its color. Nudging Kel’s elbow, she whispered, “Meet Te Ruahiki.”

As if drawn, Kel stroked his fingertips across its pale green surface. She knew he felt the warmth that the jade accepted from its owner. Her warmth. In the back of her mind, she realized that in all her journey, even when they’d traveled through the wild western region where it was unearthed, she’d never bought herself any greenstone. All she had was the small greenstone band that Kel had given her.

With him on one side and George on the other, they faced the meeting house with traditional red coloring, carved lintels and beams. At last the speaker finished and George indicated this was her moment. The mere had been part of her life for as long as she could remember. Soon it, too, would be gone, like all the other important pieces of her past.

“This is it, old guy,” she murmured, stepping forward. “I’ve kept my promise. I’ve brought you home. Here’s hoping you’ll be content now and remove the curse.”

Gingerly, she laid the mere on the ground with its handle toward William and its fighting edge pointing at her support group. “So long, my friend, I really hope you’ll be happy.”

Back in place, she watched William approach Te Ruahiki. As he bent to pick it up, the strangest thing happened. The air around him appeared to shift and change shape, moving with William, but not part of him.

Once more she reached for Kel’s hand, met his without taking her stunned eyes from the Maori warrior rising before them.

Black hair was drawn up in a topknot at the crown held by two white-tipped charcoal feathers in the form of a V. Swirling tattoos caged his proud face from forehead to chin. There was no doubting she beheld a leader, a battle-hardened chief. One hand gripped the greenstone mere—his spiritual home since he’d died in battle—his arm bent across a kiwi-feather cloak that moved with the breeze. A touch that added reality to the illusion.

Was that a glimmer of a smile on Te Ruahiki’s face?

Did he want her to know the curse had been dispelled?

Who could tell?

Who could she ask that would believe what she’d seen?

As the apparition disappeared, Kel gave her fingers a squeeze. Only time held the answer.

No one acted as if anything out of the ordinary had taken place. The ceremony carried on, leaving her to wonder if her imagination was playing tricks.

Her gaze turned to the tall man at her side. Rock solid, immovable, Kel still held her hand. Was it fair to pin her hopes on him, to expect him to share the burden of her wait? Their eyes met as he plucked a narrow brown feather off her sleeve and slipped it into his pocket. His head lowered, came closer as he whispered for her ears alone, “How weird was that?”

Maybe she would tell him about the curse, after all.

Chapter 17

S he was laughing as they set off again. “Did you see the look on that guy’s face when they sent those two Maori wardens after him? Sheesh, they were big. Back home, they’d be playing linebacker.”

Kel’s dry-as-a-bone laughter came somewhere between a laugh and a cough, knowing his own problem had still to be solved. “That’s one guy who won’t be dogging our trail for a while.”

For the first time since he met her, there was a glimmer of light beckoning in the distance even though their day had finished up as weird as all get out.

“And by tomorrow, Te Ruahiki will be safely locked up in the Canterbury Museum, on loan from my grandmother’s subtribe.”

“Somehow, I think your name will be featured prominently once Robert McIntyre sets up the display.” A deep sigh from Ngaire punctuated his comment, but they were back on the road across the hills so all he could afford was a swift glance.

“I wish I could see it someday. Although, displaying it in a museum started some of my problems.” In contrast to her earlier upbeat mood she sounded soulful.

“Is now a good time to explain? I’d like to know what led you to bring the mere back.”

Her seat squeaked as she shifted position. Another sidelong glance showed her sitting against the door, a measured look in her eyes as if his reaction mattered. “I’ll talk, you keep your eyes on the road,” she said, fidgeting some more in her seat.

Shadows from the past filled the car as she began speaking. “My grandmother took Te Ruahiki to the States back in 1946. The last of her family, she was a direct descendant of Te Ruahiki.”

“The Maori warrior we saw?” He kept his eyes on the road, jaw clenched, on the chance he was making an ass of himself.

“Hmm, I wondered which of us would break first. Congratulations, it takes guts to admit to a spooky visitation.”

A wry snort exploded from his lips. “It certainly wasn’t one of your honest-to-God, everyday experiences. It really threw me when no one else seemed to notice. I’ve heard tales, no, legends of spirits becoming one with their greenstone meres, especially where warriors died in battle, but I never heard of one actually turning up in person.”

“What if Te Ruahiki had a reason for showing himself? What if he wants you to believe my family’s story?”

Kel didn’t think believing her story would be too big a leap of faith since he’d already believed she was a drug courier on less evidence. Gordie had sure got that wrong. Or maybe they’d meant to send him on a wild-goose chase. No matter what, he was going to have to explain his part of the story sometime soon.

“And your point is?”

“Well, exactly a week after she turned thirty, my grandmother was hit by a runaway truck and killed. Lucky for me, she managed to push Mom’s stroller out of the way, so she was safe, but it left Pops, my grandfather, to bring her up on his own. My mom was pretty young when she married. My dad was a musician and he OD’d on heroin when I was still a baby so I never really got to know him. Nothing really unusual in that, it was a sign of the times, San Francisco, musicians, drugs, but it served as a warning for me to have nothing to do with anything that could take over my life so completely.”

As they crested the hill, he stole another glance. The car faced west into a red lowering sun, and the elongated shadows of the trees played in moving pictures across her features, emphasizing that she felt her father’s loss deeper than her flip words conveyed. He knew personally the effects a father’s death could have on a kid’s soul. It could shape their lives in impossible ways that were hard to undo.

“It wasn’t always easy for Pops, he’d had two of us to bring up on a carpenter’s wage. Not that we lived in Chinatown because of the lack of money. Pops always said that as family we didn’t look as out of place there as we would in the suburbs.” She paused, but it didn’t seem to be for effect, just that it was hard to go on. “My mom died in a horrific motorway pile-up. She was just one of many caught out by thick fog, but it happened exactly one week after she turned thirty.”

“Hell, I’m starting to see a pattern here.” His mind raced ahead, chased by fear, wondering exactly how old Ngaire was.

“So did we. It struck us even harder to realize we’d had a warning, but without my grandmother to explain it all, we’d been too ignorant of the myths surrounding the greenstone mere to realize that more than a change in the weather had turned the dark green splotches on the jade to a rusty-red.”

“You mean bloodred? That’s bizarre.” Her story was getting wilder by the minute, like something they told in a New Age shop. But he wouldn’t have believed the tale before today’s spooky happenings. And he still mightn’t tomorrow.

“After that, Pops spent some time researching the subject. It took a while, but we came to the conclusion there was a tapu, a curse, on Te Ruahiki. Guess the old guy was pretty unhappy about being taken so far from home.” Her attempt at humor didn’t fool him for a second.

“I can’t say I was really a true believer until I reached New Zealand and started to feel the jade resonate. Sheesh, talk about uncanny. Then there was the gannet incident. Well, you were there. Did you know the mere was inside my day pack when it caught on that shrub? If that bird hadn’t tried to land…”

The road in front disappeared as he re-created the scene in his mind’s eye. Gannets couldn’t land on trees. Water, yes, but not trees. And with the memory came piercing clarity. “So when you said your life might as well be over if you lost the pack, you were talking of the mere.”

“What’s not to understand? I told you as much this morning.”

The switchback road was behind them and the road ahead a straight line into the distance, with hills rising on Ngaire’s side and a burgundy-dark sea on his. Daylight was fading fast. Too fast. He wanted to see her face while he straightened out the delusion he’d been working under. Pulling to the side of the road, he clicked the lights on full. They’d had enough close escapes for one day to take a chance on the car being visible to other drivers. “Tell me, when is your thirtieth birthday?”

“Four weeks from today. Christmas Eve.”

He didn’t need to ask, yet couldn’t hold back the question, any more than he could the cold, sick feeling invading the pit of his stomach. “So that’s just over five weeks…?”

“Until I know if I’ve broken the curse.”

He couldn’t take his eyes from her face. His beautiful doll had eyes he wanted to drown in and a mix of features that shouldn’t fit, yet made her absolutely perfect for him.

Five weeks, it wasn’t much to build his hope on. Hope that was little more than a bud, and could yet be dead before it had a chance to flower. He took a deep breath and sucked up emotion he hadn’t felt since his father died. He’d loved his father. That’s why his betrayal had hurt so much. And he loved Ngaire. It was more than simple grief playing havoc with the human instinct for survival. He’d fallen for her at first glance.

What she’d said about her grandparents, how they’d recognized each other. Well, one look and he’d known Ngaire for his soul mate, or whatever name they were giving it these days.

But she still hadn’t explained everything. “Okay, tell me where this Savage guy comes into the picture. Did he sponsor the trip you won?”

When she touched his face, he knew he hadn’t fooled her for a second. She’d seen his heart laid bare. “The trip came later.” Quietly, she continued, yet her voice filled every part of him with a longing to take her in his arms. To take her right there and then, in that tiny car, on a road from Nowhere, New Zealand.

“Pops had a contract to build display stands at a museum where Paul Savage is patron. A showing of Pacific Rim artifacts. One day Pops mentioned the mere we had at home to the curator. It intrigued him, so he asked if the museum could borrow it as part of the display. After some research, the curator realized what a find the mere was, also how valuable. He offered to buy it for the museum, but Pops was adamant, they could only borrow it. I went to see it and there he was, Te Ruahiki, displayed in a custom-built glass case, taking pride of place.”

“Had your grandfather told the curator of the curse?”

“No, but he had told him about the color changes in the jade. Trouble was, when it actually happened in the museum, right there for everyone to see, the curator didn’t think to inform Pops. Instead, he called in the media. I mean…who could resist that kind of publicity?” She shrugged, as if the movement would shake off the sequence of emotions crossing her face.

“The publicity was even bigger when a few days later, Pops fell from scaffolding and broke his neck.” Her face began to crumple before he could pull her close. The pain of the shift stick stabbing into his gut meant nothing compared to holding her in his arms. Right where she belonged.

Ngaire sobbed heartbrokenly against his neck until he was as damp from tears as her. “I can’t stop thinking if only he’d called us instead, maybe we could have kept Pops safe.”

She sniffed, hands pushing away, but he refused to release her. Grabbing his handkerchief, he mopped her tears. “I may be coming from left field here, but is the warning of impending death Savage’s reason for wanting the mere?”

“He didn’t say so, but there was an avaricious gleam in his eye when he looked at Te Ruahiki that had nothing to do with it being a collector’s piece. I checked him out after he asked to meet me at the museum. They say for all his money and old family name, he’s no better than he should be. He’s been linked to the Mafia. And after what I’ve gone through this week, it had to be true. Look at that jerk who tried running us off the road.”

“Yeah, our man Hohepa at the Marae has mob connections through family in the States.” For a few seconds he thought he might have given himself away and braced for the inevitable question. It came, but diluted by half sobs and the remnants of tears.

“Oh, I didn’t know, did William tell you about him?”

“Something like that. But I’m more interested in Savage.”

“He offered me a million dollars for Te Ruahiki. I thought I was so clever winning the trivia quiz, but now I’m not so sure. What if Te Ruahiki fixed it like he did with the gannet, to make sure he got home?”

“I know he’s good, but don’t put yourself down. You’re definitely clever enough to win without his assistance.”

Her breath seeped through his shirt as she murmured without looking up, “After today I wouldn’t put anything beyond the bounds of probability.”

Laughing, he kissed her brow, being the safest target, and said, “After more compliments, hmm? C’mon, fasten your seat belt, we have to get back to Christchurch. It’s getting late.”

“All right, but on the way there you can tell me what it was that you actually wanted me to give up this morning.”

Ngaire took it on the chin, priding herself on not losing it, there was always later. Hurtling along a dark highway at a hundred kilometers an hour, locked beside Kel in a little tin box, didn’t leave her many other options. And after all she’d gone through to ensure she had a life to look forward to, she wasn’t about to open the door and leap into the nearest ditch.

She would save her screams for the privacy of her shower. No way would Kel be sharing it with her. It didn’t sit well, knowing that he’d simply been using her, while she’d been falling in love. How could he? How could he have thought she would do something so horrendous as courier drugs? Didn’t he know by now she wasn’t that sort of person?

They dropped off the rental car and walked half the length of the block between there and the hotel, before her ire forced her to ask, “So, Kel, all that stuff about you wanting to be inside me, from the first moment you saw me in Tahiti, was a con.”

He thrust his hands deep in his pockets. From the look of the glower blackening his already dark features, it was probably to stop himself throttling her. “Damn. I should have known you would take it personally. I never lied to you…about that.”

“You just didn’t tell me the truth,” she prodded.

“What did you want me to do? This is my job for crissakes! This isn’t about me, or you, it’s about a million people who could die if kiss-and-tell gets onto the streets. I have to put my job first. Making love with you comes under the heading of forbidden pleasure, not work.”

She pushed through the front entrance of the hotel ahead of him. “Well, after that mouthful I should count myself lucky you said it so politely. Making love and not just screwing.”

She turned to catch the full emphasis of his reaction. He spoke quietly from a mouth that didn’t look soft enough for some of the uses he’d put it to last night. “Quit while you’re ahead, doll. I refuse to have a shouting match in the hotel lobby.”

“Good, we’ll take it upstairs to my room.”

He followed her into the elevator, a twitch of one black eyebrow the only indication that he’d heard.

How dare he be so calm when she was fighting mad. “And don’t think we’re going to end up in my bed,” she growled as she exited the elevator, disappointed that it sounded more spitting kitten than full-throated tigerish roar. The simplest things seemed to conspire against releasing the anger bubbling inside her. First her skirt restricted her stride to a girlish length, then the thick, luxurious carpet nullified the annoyed click of her heels.

“Wait.” Kel’s voice didn’t rise above the norm, but there was no disguising the urgency in the word.

Her temper took a back seat as she followed his lead and whispered, “What’s wrong this time?”

“Did you put that Do Not Disturb sign on the door when we left this morning?”

She glanced down at the black print below the handle and thought back. “No. I left it on the other side out to make sure the maid changed the sheets.” Her cheeks flushed, remembering the reason. She’d imagined her and Kel sliding into fresh, clean linen instead of the ones they’d managed to tangle in knots the night before. Some hope. “Maybe the maid changed it over.”

“I doubt it. She’d be trained to return it to the inside of the door. You keep watch, I’m going to organize backup, just in case.”

He used his cell phone and her eyebrows rose as she heard him call Schmidt by name. “He’ll be up in a few minutes.”

Taking the key card from her fingers, he warned, “Stay behind me.” At least he wasn’t banning her from the fray by telling her to be a good little girl. Seemed the day’s excitement still had a way to go.

Kel hoped there was someone in the room. He had a full head of anger and frustration steaming around his brain, from knowing Ngaire hadn’t taken his explanations lightly, and he fancied taking them out on someone who deserved a pounding.

Trouble was, he’d gotten out of the habit of placating women, if he’d ever known how.

Her eyes widened as he removed the Smith & Wesson from his boot and tucked it inside the waistband of his khaki pants. “In case of emergency,” he silently mouthed. A quick slide of the key card and he pushed down on the handle, letting it ease back real slow. No sense in giving more warning than necessary. Ngaire’s story had split conjecture wide open. Were they after the formula or the mere?

Was she a red herring or an unsuspecting courier?

Chances were that GDE wasn’t the only one following the wrong lead. With a finger to his lips, he hushed her, then pushed the door open, signaling Ngaire to stay behind him.

Well, he’d be damned. Jimmy Chen. Large as life and twice as ugly, caught red-handed as the door swung inward.

Too intent with Ngaire’s red case, Chen didn’t notice their presence at first. Concentrated stealth took Kel within a few yards before Chen looked up. “Find what you were looking for, Jimmy, or can I give you a hand with that case?”

The knife remained invisible until Chen twisted, shouting what Kel took to be a curse as he waved the lethal-looking blade in their direction. The spew of Chinese could have been turning the air blue for all Kel knew, until Ngaire translated, “Jimmy says he wants us to move over by the bed, out of his way.”

“What he wants and what he’s gonna get are two different things. You happen to understand the word no, Jimmy?”

Excitement rippling up her spine, Ngaire slipped from behind Kel. “We could take him. You go in from one side, I’ll take the other. The odds are with us.”

“Chancy. If he’s one of the gang we met in Queenstown, he already knows what you can do. Try to follow my lead and don’t give him an opening.” Ngaire blinked at that. Did he think she couldn’t take orders?

He took one step, two steps, with her a bare microsecond behind, as if they were Siamese twins. But the distance between them and Jimmy remained the same, as he backed himself into the wall. Rat that he was, she should have seen at least a flicker of apprehension in his eyes at being cornered.

The reason for his confidence became eminently clear when Kel—her man—dropped like a stone at her feet. Cold fury iced her veins as she reacted, skirt forgotten. She turned, spinning on the ball of her foot, lashing out with a kick that jarred to a stop below the guy’s knee. The small black rubber club he’d used on Kel gave her a painful clip on the shoulder, but not as painful as her knee connecting with his groin. Her gratification was short-lived, as she watched him roll on the floor. Without Kel to watch her back, Jimmy crooked his arm around her neck from behind and squeezed tight.

Cold steel pricked the side of her throat. She’d trained for years to tackle just such a threat. It hadn’t erased her memories of a knife sliding up under her skin, the pain of it twisting.

You’re bigger than this. Go for it, girl.

She took a short, sharp breath, was halfway through the planned move with her elbow poised, when she caught Kel’s look of horror.

“Don’t!” He attempted to rise, reaching his knees as Jimmy landed a kick round about level with Kel’s kidneys. Pain etched the results on his face, but he refused to go down.

Jimmy shuffled backward around his disabled partner, his labored breath ringing a ragged knell in her ears. She’d let the guy she loved down. Damn Jimmy! He wasn’t much taller than her, she could have taken him. Now she was off balance, and though she’d heard her skirt rip, it still hampered her movements.

“You’ll never get away with this, Chen,” Kel shouted after them as he leant against the doorjamb, shaking his head as if to clear his vision. Then she saw him reach for the gun at his waist. She swallowed hard. Now she knew what it meant to be caught between a rock and a hard place. She loved Kel, trusted him, but had the blow to his head impaired his sight? If her room had been farther from the elevator they’d have had more time. But no matter what, she’d take a chance to give Kel a clear shot before Chen dragged her into it.

Once inside, with the doors shut, Jimmy could slice her throat and escape down to the basement before Schmidt arrived.

Kel stopped advancing as Chen reached the elevator door. Feet spread, he took aim, steadying the small gun with both hands. There was more riding on this than a drug bust. If he missed Chen, the woman Kel loved could die, but at least he no longer saw more than one of each of them.

The threat was almost as important as taking the shot. If Chen got flustered by it, Ngaire might be able to disarm him, but at the moment her chances looked slim to none.

Ngaire felt Jimmy hesitate, then the knife left her throat as he struggled with the down button. The warning ping ringing almost immediately seemed to startle him, and as the blade returned the amount of time left to her ran out.

There was little humor in Chen’s yelp as her funny bone jabbed his gut. There was pain as she ducked into the knife edge, and a shot missed her by inches as Kel took the opportunity she’d made for him. Then the doors swung open and the last thing she remembered was Kel shouting, “Get him, Schmidt!”

Kel adjusted the ice pack on the back of his neck for the tenth time as Ngaire said, “Thank God it’s all over.”

“Not quite. Schmidt’s gone with the police to lock up Chen and his buddies, and I was lucky they didn’t lock me up with them, but we still don’t know what he wanted from your case.” As a lucky charm, the symbol was like a liar never letting the truth stand in the way of a good story. And now its luck was well and truly up. He bent to his boot and removed his knife. “Let’s see if this will do the trick.”

One thing about Ngaire, she could always make him laugh. She eyed the blade, then his boots. “What else do you keep in there?”

“Only my feet, doll. Only my feet.”

Unable to control a shudder, she took the knife from him as he went to put down the ice pack. “Here, I’ll do it.”

He touched the dressing at her throat. “It’s a wonder you can bear to handle it after what happened.”

“It’s not much more than a scratch, I’ve had worse. Why do you think I took up hapkido in the first place?” She held the blade flat, slipping it under the slit Chen had made.

“Well you sure fooled me when you fell.” God, his stomach had turned over when he saw the blood and thought he’d lost her. Yet here they were, more than just going through the motions. She was every bit as determined to spike the drug cartel’s plans.

She eased the blade right round the edges of the laminate but found nothing. “Oooh, this is so frustrating. Time to get to the heart of the matter.” One second later, she’d slit the laminate, top to bottom, side to side.

“Hey, watch, if it’s inside you might damage it.”

She lifted one eyebrow and stared. “And that would matter?”

“It could be the only copy…but I guess you’re right.” Nursing his ice pack, he watched her take a few more swipes.

“Well what have we here?” Slipping a narrow strip of paper from under the laminate, Ngaire followed it with two others. Spreading them out on the case, she began to fiddle with them. “Does it matter which order?”

“I wouldn’t have a clue. Chemistry was never my long suit. I know as much as I need to do the job. But the word is, it’s the only copy. Why else would Chen go to so much trouble? And now we’ve found it, my boss will expect me to pass it over to him.”

Holding the strips between finger and thumb, Ngaire pouted, head on a tilt as she considered them. “So, how’s his chemistry.”

“He came to the job from the army, same as me. He was officer material, though, so I don’t suppose it’s any great shakes.” His facetious statement earned a brief laugh from Ngaire, yet he could see her mind hadn’t stopped working when her hands did, as she nodded toward the laptop on the desk.

“Can you get the Internet on that thing?”

“You betcha. What are you looking for?”

“I know this site where we can get the formula for Viagra. Do you think your boss would recognize the difference?”

“He’d never admit to it. Chaly likes to give the impression that he’s extremely virile. Can you remember the Web address?”

“With my memory, definitely.” She gave him the thumbs-up and somehow everything fell into place. “So what do we do with the evidence? Should I eat it or what?”

Kel had an idea his life was never gonna be dull again.

He had expected Chaly to waken him in the middle of the night, eager for the results, but his boss’s patience surpassed belief. Not that Kel had slept in his own room, but Chaly had the kind of supercilious belief in his own importance that wouldn’t be put out of shape by rousing him from Ngaire’s bed no matter what the hour.

The call on his cell phone came at 7:00 a.m. “I’ll share breakfast with you. Meet me in the lobby in half an hour.”

That was it, no please, no thank you. Exactly like the man he knew never to turn his back on. Chaly wasn’t going to be pleased to see Ngaire by his side, but he could lump it. Damned if he was going to let her out of his sight until he had to. They’d had a bittersweet night, two wounded heroes, him with a headache and her with her throat swathed in dressings. It had either been suffer or let the painkillers put him to sleep—and he hadn’t slept. But he’d missed supping on her throat’s tangy flavors so reminiscent of her personality. To him Ngaire would always be a margarita—don’t hold the salt—and he loved it.

“Which one is Chaly?” she asked as they stepped into a lobby filled with their traveling companions, minus Chen and company.

Chaly was at the far side with his back to them, looking out the window. God knows what had happened to him last night, but this morning his impatience was hanging by a thread. His boss’s nervous habit of flicking his thumb across the tips of his long fingers was the first thing Kel noticed. You’d think they were an hour late instead of a mere twenty-five minutes into their allotted thirty. “See that tall, edgy-looking suit, the one with silver hair standing by the window? That’s GDE’s SAC.”

“That man?”

Her step faltered as if she might hang back. He squinted down his nose at her, as it hurt like hell to bend his head. “What’s wrong? Do you know him?”

“For a moment, I thought I did, but I guess it’s just a trick of the light. The guy I’m thinking of was younger.”

“Here he comes. Brace yourself for action. He’s not the kindest man in the world, and he won’t give a damn that we’re walking wounded.” He laughed, trying to make a joke out of something that was only too true. Ngaire edged closer.

Funny how Chaly always managed to look down his nose even when he wasn’t as tall as Kel. “Well, now…” His boss’s gaze scanned his watch, then took in Ngaire’s attributes from top to toe, without stopping to blink. Kel’s hand fisted in his pocket. His SAC didn’t actually lick his lips, but Kel saw the wolf in his eyes begin to prowl. “Seems the heartbreak hero takes the lady, again. Too bad we have to part you lovers so soon.”

“You said meet for breakfast. We’re here, and I’m not going anywhere until I’ve seen Ngaire on to her plane.”

The wolf in Chaly’s eyes leapt for Kel’s throat. “Yeah, and spiders have wings. You’ll leave when I say you will, Jellic.”

He felt Ngaire tense, but he supposed when you weren’t used to Chaly it could take you that way. “Not this time. I’m not ready. I’m booked on the afternoon connection for Singapore. We can either do our debriefing when I get there, or you could change your mind and take the flight I’m on.”

Kel pulled the narrow strip of paper from his pocket. Folded in four, he held it in his open palm, wondering if the lie in it would burn his skin. “I presume this is what you were wondering about? Better take it with you.”

A moment’s greed flickered in Chaly’s eyes. Kel’s lips twisted as he guessed his boss had already spent the money his promotion would bring. One moment the paper was there, the next hidden in the depths of Chaly’s inside pocket as he patted the gray suiting that matched his hair. “At least you did one thing right. I suppose you deserve a few extra hours for a job well done.”

The cold sensation Ngaire had experienced stayed with her even after Kel’s boss had gone. It was as if the ice chips in Chaly’s eyes and voice slithered down her spine. “I don’t like him.”

Kel’s laugh was wry. “I’d say that puts your vote with the majority. He’s good at his job, though.”

She didn’t know if Kel would want to hear this, but she had to tell him. “Maybe too good. I was right, I have seen him before.”

“Where?”

“In the Blue Grasshopper. Although his hair was dark then, I know it was the same man. It happened when I went up to the manager’s office to collect my prize. The door was partly open when I got up there, and I could see two men. They were arguing, so I waited outside, but that habit Chaly has, of constantly flicking his fingers, was exactly the same. He was doing it as he waited by the window this morning. It was the first thing I noticed. Then, later he said, ‘And spiders have wings.’ The inflection in his voice was the same as he used arguing with the manager at the Blue Grasshopper. I’d never heard the expression before, I think that’s why it stuck in my mind, but its all too big a coincidence. I guess he must have worn a wig that day.”

“Damn! How dumb am I? That’s what Gordie meant by a family member. One of ours. An agent!”

The weather had turned up the heat to bake down on the long, low-lying roof of Christchurch Airport, as if to tighten the screws on Kel’s sore head. Wasn’t it enough that Chaly’s perfidy made him feel his head was sealed inside an iron mask, with his warring emotions battling to escape?

The supposition that one of GDE’s agents murdered Gordie had reopened the wound on his grief, the loss of his good right arm.

And now he was about to lose Ngaire….

It was harder to give credence to the curse, coincidence being an easier out. Yet, on this trip he’d seen and learned things that grabbed at his fractious synapses screaming, “Believe!”

As he waited with Ngaire near the gate, he felt as if time had folded back to the first day they met, with him guarding his laptop and Ngaire protecting the day pack that contained Te Ruahiki.

Driven by lack of time, at last he blurted out, “I can’t let you go through the wait alone. I’ll join you in San Francisco and keep you safe. Not even an earthquake can separate us.”

Ngaire knew there was a steel strength in Kel that refused to be beaten. It shone through everything he did, like rescuing damsels in distress, but he’d never battled against a curse before. And no matter that his need to protect her radiated like a tangible aura, they faced a preternatural force.

“The fatalist in me says it’s out of our hands now. I’ve done all I can, the rest is up to Te Ruahiki.”

Ridding himself of his laptop, Kel pulled her into the heart-stopping shelter of his arms. “Hell, how can you think that? I can’t.”

Beneath her ear she heard his heartbeat hiccup twice, deep in his chest, as if stumbling over a rock-strewn surface. Like the weeks ahead. “We’ll do it the only way I know how, one day at a time.”

She thrust the platitude at him, thinking women had done this through all time, put on a brave face to make things easier for their man as he readied himself for battle. It seemed like a lifetime since she’d wondered if this moment would arrive wrapped in regrets. But she’d never regret a moment of knowing Kel.

Loving Kel.

“You have to go. Chaly must be stopped, but you’ll never take him down overnight. Just promise me you’ll take care. There’s always the chance that he’ll discover the trick with the formula. Please, please watch your back, since I can’t do it for you.”

“Damn, I’m going to miss you. You know I love you, don’t you?” Kel watched a brief spark light her eyes, then cloud over as she lifted her fingers to his lips, pretending she didn’t want to hear more. He kissed their tips and pulled it away. “You can’t fool me, doll. I know you love me, too. We have something in common with your grandparents. That moment of instant recognition. It was like that with us. Go on, admit it,” he said.

“Am I so easy to read?” she asked.

“Only a fool wouldn’t know the other half of himself when he saw it.” He gathered her close. Her pulse raced under his fingertips. Raced faster when he pressed his mouth to the pulse point on her wrist and her breath parted her lips in a sigh.

“Of course I love you. How could I not?”

Her answer turned the screw a notch tighter on his reluctance to let her go. All that was in him, all that he was, clawed to hold on to her, to never let her go, duty be damned.

But he wouldn’t be who he’d become—what his father’s betrayal had made him—if he let Chaly get away with murder.

“The hell with it! When this is over I’m resigning from GDE. It’ll just be you and me, doll, taking the road to hearth, home and family. How many kids do you want? I always fancied four myself.”

If he’d struck her, the pain couldn’t have hurt more. She blamed herself. Why hadn’t she told him the truth when she’d had the chance, and saved herself the heartache and chagrin.

She had been too blind to see it coming.

His dear face blurred as tears blinded her. She heard her name called as if from far, far away. “Will passenger McKay please board Flight NZ 202 at gate eight. Your flight is about to depart.”

She wanted to kiss him goodbye, but to do that meant never letting go. Instead she put the facts baldly. “That first time I got mugged, the guy who stabbed me took more than my money, he also stole any children I might have had. I’m sorry, I can’t give you a family. So sorry… Goodbye, Kel…”

With one glimpse at the undisguised horror on his face, she thrust her boarding pass at the hostess, escaping like Alice, down a tunnel leading to the last place she wanted to go.

Away from Kel.

As she dived on board and hurried up the aisle to her seat, behind her she heard the steward’s angry shout. “Sorry, sir, I can’t let you enter the plane without a boarding pass.”

Epilogue

I f only… Once more it had come down to those damning words, a reminder of how he’d gotten there too late to help Gordie, balked by the lowlifes inhabiting the dark. No use blaming others for the delay this time, at six o’clock of an evening, Chinatown’s honest citizens were simply going about their lawful business.

He’d blown it pure and simple by thinking he could rely on the date line to get him out of a fix. But too many people had wanted to experience New Year’s twice. To paraphrase, airline seats were scarcer than wings on spiders.

He checked the number—this was where she worked. He barreled through the door, saw her name on the wall under the legend First Light Do Jan, the only address she’d allowed him. The arrow pointed upstairs, the direction a little too close to heaven for comfort. Ngaire just had to be alive.

Hell, he’d even informed Jo he was getting married and given his blessing to the search that might clear their father’s name. So his loving Ngaire had already achieved one miracle. Without hesitation his boot hit the first step. The saying, a day late and a dollar short, clipped him a fast one round the heart. Eight days since Ngaire turned thirty and today would soon be over. Pray God, he wasn’t too late.

He’d left GDE’s Singapore headquarters in turmoil, with all of their agents but one fighting to recover from the shock of their late SAC’s betrayal and murder. And that was the agent he’d discovered had stabbed Gordie.

Hell, he hadn’t known whether to be mad or glad that his flushing away the tiny pieces of torn-up formula had gotten Chaly killed by his co-conspirators, instead of him facing a jury of his peers the way Gordie’s murderer would. Damn and blast! It had all taken too long. Far too long.

He’d been hamstrung, tied up in the investigation and forced to renege on his promise to be there for Ngaire.

Had she even remembered he’d made it?

Or had she given up on him, long ago, deciding his word was as insubstantial as the case he’d had against her? Melting away like flames for water. Or had their five weeks apart been a lifetime, the way it had for him? He’d wanted to call her, but hadn’t. If she was going to tell him to piss off, he had no chance of changing her mind unless they were face-to-face. He’d made a crass blunder, though the signals that she couldn’t have children had been there. He’d chosen to read them the wrong way.

The door at the top was well oiled, pushing open without a murmur. A clean sweep of planked wooden floor stretched ahead of him, a smooth oiled surface that bare feet would appreciate. Under the windows, folded stacks of blue mats courted dust mites dancing in a stray strand of late winter sunlight that dodged the gap in the buildings across the street. The uneasy silence mocked him like the smile on Te Ruahiki’s face, a lifetime ago.

“Too late,” it said.

Too late for Ngaire and the life he’d planned for them.

But the well of hope inside him hadn’t completely dried up. It surged as the sunlight picked out a doorway he hadn’t noticed.

Striding toward it, his heart racing his feet to the door, he grabbed the handle and flung it open wide.

Ngaire reached into the semidark pocket of space, expanding it by half again with the simple flick of a switch. She heard soft footfalls in the do jan as she plugged in her hairdryer. Leena was early for once, and surprise, surprise, she’d removed her shoes, so the click of heels that usually announced her arrival was missing. “You’re early,” she called without bothering to look as the door opened in a rush. Leena was always in a hurry. “I’m not quite ready. Take a seat while I finish drying my hair.”

“Only if I can play with it after you’re done, doll.”

The hairdryer did a bungee jump from her hand. Only the shortness of the cord stopped it smashing to pieces on the floor.

“Kel,” she whispered in a voice so needy, it confirmed everything she’d refused to own up to in the long, long weeks since she’d left New Zealand. How much she’d missed, wanted, loved the man she’d run away from like a whipped puppy.

Keep it light, don’t spoil it now, don’t jump the gun or take things for granted, just because he’s traveled thousands of miles to see you. Turning slowly, she wondered what he wanted with a woman who couldn’t give him the four children he had in mind. “What, no long-haired women to fuel your fantasy in Singapore?”

One glimpse of his face, his dear face, and his eyes, weary yet burning with a fire she couldn’t ignore, and she held out her arms. He stepped into them, pulled her in tight till she couldn’t tell whose heart pounded fastest against her breast-bone. If she hadn’t been anchored in his arms, she’d be floating ten inches above the floor, just because Kel was there.

“Aah, Ngaire.” His sigh grazed her cheek and was music to her ears, it said so much. “I’m home, doll… How I’ve missed this, missed you…. Never run away from me again.”

She leaned against the taut muscled arms holding her, to run fingers that trembled over the wide slash of cheekbones and dimpled chin, just to make sure he was real and she hadn’t conjured him up out of needing, wanting this man. Kel. Her touch earned her the smile that she’d fallen in love with in Tahiti. My heart. My home. My family. “No more than I’ve missed you, Kel. But you sound breathless, what’s up now?”

“I ran all the way, I was so damned frightened I’d be too late, and when I opened the door and met nothing but silence… I love you, doll, let’s not put ourselves through this again.” His kiss confirmed every heartfelt word. She never wanted it to end.

Her head spun when he released her lips. He wanted her so bad, she felt it in his taste, in the hard flesh that burned where he’d clamped her against him. Oh, yes, he wanted her as much as she wanted him. “Mmm, don’t stop. I love you, too.”

He grinned. “I know, it shows. Boy, have I missed this. Just holding you, making love to you.” He glanced over his shoulder. “I thought the do jan would be busy around six.”

She laughed, able to do it without effort now he was here. Holding her. “It’s New Year’s Day. I was having a holiday to celebrate breaking the curse. I only came in to work out a bit and wait for Leena to show up. We’d planned on dinner.”

“Don’t remind me. I wanted to see the New Year in with you. To be here for you. But you beat the curse without me, thank God!”

“That’s not true. You were with me every mile of Te Ruahiki’s journey home. You saved my life.”

The sound of heels clicking on the stairs ripped any form of finesse from his delivery as he gazed into the lagoon-blue depths of her eyes. “Will you marry me, doll…Ngaire? Be my partner in all the ways that count—love, life, career.”

Her head jerked back. “Career? Did I hear correctly?”

“Doll, we were made to be partners, what with your hapkido skills and memory for things other people would never notice. A little bit of training is all it’ll take to get you into the GDE team. And with Chaly dead and another one locked up, we need all the good people we can find, and you’re good people.”

“Chaly’s dead? Did you…know?” She couldn’t ask him straight out if he’d killed Chaly, knowing Kel wouldn’t have taken any pleasure in it.

So she was relieved when he said, “Indirectly.”

The patter of footsteps got closer. “What about children?”

“As long as I have you, I’ll have everything I ever wanted.” He placed his forehead to hers, and as their noses lined up he pressed down in a hongi. “What about it, doll, will you?”

“I accept,” she whispered against his lips.

He pulled a small box from his pocket and said, “I have something for you.”

It wasn’t a ring box. Curious, she opened the lid. The heart-shaped gold-and-greenstone locket shimmered against white satin. Kel removed it from its setting to hold it flat in the center of his palm. “Go on, open it.”

Inside, a soft brown kiwi feather curled. “It was in my pocket. I thought you’d appreciate a little part of the magic.”

The moment his lips kissed hers, Ngaire knew the magic had been in them, Kel and her, all along.

She drew back as his hand slipped down the front of her panties and his foot kicked the door shut and pressed her against it. “Kel, we can’t,” she gasped.

He ignored the noise of Leena’s heels as his fingers found her. “Didn’t I tell you I do my best work under pressure?”

ISBN: 978-1-4268-8088-9

HEARTBREAK HERO

Copyright © 2003 by Frances Housden

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the editorial office, Silhouette Books, 233 Broadway, New York, NY 10279 U.S.A.

All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

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Table of Contents

Prologue

Epilogue