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She got undressed slowly, stood in the dim light of the Shaggin’ Wagon and stared at her wrist once more.
He’d kissed her there. She had no idea what it meant. But when she crawled into bed, she curled her arm up tight into her chest and pressed a kiss on the spot where Oliver’s lips had been.
* * *
Oliver was expectinga frosty reception when he emerged from his tent the next morning.
Felicity was making a coffee on the burner and for the second time in a week, he felt nauseous. Inhaling a deep breath, he muttered something about taking a shower as he strode past.
She said casually, “No worries,” without turning around.
Dawn was streaking the sky with a band of candy floss clouds and the birds were chatting happily before the heat of the day set in and rendered them mute. It was beautiful. But Oliver trudged. Everything in his head was dark. Maxwell came trotting to the fence with an expectant look in his goaty eyes and all Oliver could manage was a mumbled “Morning, Maxwell.”
The goat bounded along the fence next to him as he made his way towards the shower block.
In the mirror his reflection stared back, haggard and hollow-eyed. Even though the glass was losing its patina, he looked like he’d aged ten years overnight.
Dark circles were smudged under his eyes. His beard, longer than usual, because he hadn’t shaved for a few days, lent him a wild, unkempt look. His mouth was a grim hard line bracketed by two deep lines, still visible under the stubble. He rubbed at his cheeks to try and smooth them out. Still there. What if they were permanent? He bared his teeth, half expecting them to be yellowed, but thankfully they still gleamed back at him like a tooth-whitening ad.
The man in the mirror was not one he admired.
ThisOliver, he decided as he pushed back from the sink with the heels of his palms and banged his way through the creaky door of the shower cubicle, was at risk of turning into a brute. Okay, so he’d narrowly averted disaster, but the way he’d spoken to her, what hecouldhave done,wantedto do, didn’t bear thinking about. Oliver winced. What he’d wanted was to selfishly appease his rage and sadness by…Christ,she fucking turned him on like crazy.
There, he’d admitted it.
You only had to scratch the veneer of civilisation and underneath every man there was a neanderthal waiting to drag a woman by her beautiful red locks into his cave to have his carnal way with her.
At the thought, a stirring started up in his cock and he had to jump in the shower and turn on the taps full blast. He let out a gasp as freezing cold water gushed over his head.
After this, he’d go and apologise. Tell her it was an aberration, that he’d had no intention of touching her, kissing her, doing all the things he fantasised about… A sudden image of lying with Felicity naked beside him flashed into his head, and despite the cold water, the stirring down below turned into a hard thick bar, pointing up at him and practically fucking winking!
JESUS CHRIST.
Just then the door of the shower room opened, followed by cheerful tuneless whistling.
One of the grey nomads from last night, probably. Oliver soaped and listened. Mitch, he’d hazard a guess, and yep, when he started bellowing out a Frank Sinatra number, Oliver was sure of it.
And somehow, that helped. Mitch was no neanderthal brute. He was a decent Aussie bloke, probably married to Shelley for forty plus years, and living the dream in his retirement.
He just had to reconnect with that decent part of himself, Oliver decided, and ask Felicity to forgive him for being a complete jerk last night.
When he got back, she was standing watching the sun rise, a mug cupped in her hands. He dumped his clothes—not even folded—into his tent and, hands in his pockets, because they were sweating despite the morning still being cool, he sauntered over.
He felt her body stiffen. Was she afraid of him? The thought that he could have scared her felt like a monkey wrench around his heart.
His scalp tightened. She sipped her coffee.
“Felicity.” He cleared his throat. “About last night. I’m sorry.”
Finally, slowly, “Sorry about which part?”
That flummoxed him. Did he have to pull it apart, analyse it here in front of her? “All of… my, er, behaviour towards you.”
“The snarky words or the attack on my wrist?”
“Jesus Christ. You thought Iattackedyou?”
“Hmmm, there was an element of male aggressor in the mix. A marking your prey kind of thing.”
