Can't Say No (9 page)

To her utter fury, Audrey felt tears brimming in her eyes. She didn't want to play this game with him anymore. She'd opened up to Blake, shared all of her worst traits with him. If he refused to see the truth then that was his problem. It certainly wasn't his place to try to convince her that she was someone she wasn't. If she'd wanted a therapist, she would have hired one. She sure as hell didn't want one who came with strings attached and who ought to be flying this damn balloon instead of kneeling down beside her, while she moped like some ninny.

“Just go and concentrate on winning the race,” she said. “Leave me alone.”

He didn't budge. “I will not leave you alone. This is important. If we don't get past this image hang-up of yours, we don't stand a chance.”

“If this balloon crashes, we don't stand a chance either,” she pointed out. “You can do more about keeping us aloft than you can about my problems.”

“We won't know that until you tell me exactly what those problems are.”

“Dammit, I don't want to talk about it.” She spit out each word emphatically. “Am I making myself clear?”

“Very,” he said slowly, standing up. “Maybe I was wrong. Maybe you are a wimp after all.”

The words fell on her with the sharpness of a well-aimed dagger. Like something that happened when you least expected it, the unfairness of Blake's comment incensed her. Instinctively, she reached out, grabbed a handful of denim and yanked him back down. She caught him off balance and he landed beside her in an awkward heap, his legs sprawled across hers in intimate abandon. She was so furious, she hardly noticed.

“I am not!” she shouted directly into his ear. With any luck it would make him go deaf. He deserved it after a crack like that. “How dare you say that? You don't even know me.”

To her astonishment, instead of cowering beneath her fury the way he was supposed to, the irritating man was chuckling, his face split with a wide grin. He definitely looked like an Irish rogue on a winning streak.

“Apparently I know you better than you know yourself,” he said with annoying smugness.

“Are you trying to make a point?” she growled at him suspiciously.

“I just did.”

“Exactly what do you think you've proved?”

“You are a very unlikely wimp, Audrey Nelson. With that sharp tongue of yours you could strike terror into entire armies. Now, that's the last I want to hear about it.” His implacable expression indicated he wouldn't tolerate any argument on the subject. Audrey glowered back at him, until at last he grinned at her.

“Armies, huh?” she said.

“At the very least. Now stand up here with me,” he urged, getting to his feet with a quick, lithe movement. “Take a look around. Let's stop all the heavy philosophical stuff and just concentrate on enjoying the day. When was the last time you simply relaxed and enjoyed yourself? Harvey probably hasn't given you a vacation in years.”

“He gave me one,” she muttered dryly. “I'm supposed to be on it now.”

“What happened?”

She shook her head. “It doesn't matter. I'm going to take a few days here, after the race.”

“Let's start that vacation now.” He held out his hand. After an instant's hesitation, she put her hand in his and allowed herself to be drawn up. They stood in silence. Toe to toe. Hand in hand. The air grew thick with a sweet, unbearable tension. With his free hand, Blake reached out a tentative finger to brush a stray lock of dark hair out of her eyes. That finger was warm and trembling as it skimmed her cheek.

“I know I promised it was going to be your choice, but I'm not sure I can keep from kissing you,” he said with such gentleness and longing that Audrey's heart stilled.

Despite fear, despite anger, despite everything, she wanted that kiss as much as he did. More, perhaps, because it had been so long since she'd felt this yearning, this dull, sweetly tormenting ache deep inside. Eyes locked with his, she lifted his hand to her lips and brushed a kiss across his knuckles. The gesture, meant as an answer, set off a trembling in him and a harsh moan rumbled deep in his throat.

“You're sure I'm not pressuring you?”

Audrey gave him a shaky grin. “Hey, don't let that stop you now.”

“I will stop, if it's what you want.”

“No, please. It's okay. I don't understand it and I'm not sure I like it, but I know exactly what I want. I want you to kiss me.” She hesitated. “Very much.”

With a deep sigh of satisfaction, Blake closed his eyes and drew her close. The urgency abated. He wanted to savor every moment she was in his arms, even if she was filled with uncertainty. He wanted to delight in her fresh, clean scent that hinted of spring flowers, in the clarity of those vivid violet eyes, the feel of her warm, gently curved body pressed against the throbbing, demanding heat of his own flesh.

Lord, she felt so good held close like this, it was as though she belonged. The rightness astounded him, sent his senses reeling. He'd felt these same sharp stirrings of excitement before, but never the tenderness, the protectiveness that had almost immediately surfaced with Audrey. He knew the protectiveness was something he would have to deal with later, that Audrey was a woman who wouldn't welcome him in the role of guardian. She had things to prove to herself and he had no right to stand in her way. It was the only way she would rid herself of those foolish insecurities.

For now, though, he found the combination of feelings swirling through him irresistible. This second, more volatile kiss was inevitable.

He searched her face for any sign of lingering hesitation or regret and, finding none, he breathed a soft sigh of relief. Able to wait no longer for the taste of her, he pressed his lips to her forehead, to the tiny furrows in her brow that came, he suspected, from fretting far too much about inconsequential things. With the touch of his lips, he hoped to ease the worrying. The silkiness of her skin lured him on, next to her cheeks, then to the tip of her nose and, when her eyelids had fluttered closed, to each of those in turn.

By the time he reached the generous curve of her mouth, her own lips had parted for him and what began in gentleness escalated quickly into fire and hunger. Mere acceptance of his touch became ardent demand. Her teeth were sharp and teasing against his invading tongue and he felt her body tremble from head to toe. His flesh burned with the heat of her touch and his muscles tightened in anticipation of all that was to come. With that potent kiss, they shared breath and need and life.

“Blake! Dammit, Blake, what the devil are you up to now?”

John's irritated, anxious words on the radio slashed across the moment's tenderness, cooled passion more effectively than an icy shower.

“Damn!” Blake muttered, as he grabbed the radio. He kept one arm firmly around Audrey's waist, his hand splayed on the curve of her hip. To his relief, she didn't draw away immediately. In fact, her gaze traveled over his face at leisure, her eyes wide, as though she'd been as startled as he was by the intensity of the kiss.

“Blake!”

“John, you've got a lousy sense of timing.”

“If my timing were any worse, you'd be getting your feet wet in another few minutes.”

His eyes still locked with Audrey's, Blake inquired distractedly and without much interest, “What are you talking about?”

“You're losing altitude. I thought at first you were heading down to a better current, but you've been dropping for too long now. I don't like the looks of it. Is there some sort of problem?”

That brought him out of his trance. Blake glanced out and saw that they were, indeed, lower than any of the other balloons in the vicinity. He couldn't even spot the blue and gold of Larry Hammond's entry.

“Where's Hammond?”

“Forget Hammond for the moment, unless you want to take a dunking in the creek.”

That woke Audrey up. The dazed expression in her eyes faded. “What creek?” she said, suddenly trying to free herself to get a look. Blake knew she wasn't going to like what she saw one bit. He wasn't exactly thrilled about it himself. He tried to nestle her head in the curve of his shoulder, but she was having none of it.

“I want to see!” She peered past him and her body sagged in his arms, as she murmured, “Oh, dear heaven, we're going down in a river. We are going to drown.” She glared at him and repeatedly punched a finger square in the middle of his chest. “And if we do, Blake Marshall, I'm going to give you a very nasty time of it.”

He tried not to chuckle at the threat, because she was obviously so serious about it. “It's a piddly little creek,” he observed pointedly. “Even if we were to go down in it—which we're not going to—there's no way you're going to drown.”

Black brows arched in feminine skepticism. “You don't mind if I ask John about that, do you?”

“Don't you trust me?”

“Your track record for the day isn't exactly top of the line.”

“When have I lied to you?”

“Let me count the times,” she muttered darkly. “Would you just stop bickering with me and get this thing headed in the right direction.”

“It wasn't so long ago that you thought down was the right direction.”

“That was before we had a raging river underneath us.”

“It is not...”

The radio crackled. “Blake, have you found the problem yet?”

Blake knew perfectly well what the problem was. It didn't take a genius to figure it out. He'd been so infatuated with Audrey, so lost in the sensuality of that kiss that he'd let the air—in the balloon, anyway—cool too long. All he needed to do was send another long burst of hot air into the envelope and they'd be flying high again. He might have been foolish, but they were certainly in no real danger, despite Audrey's conviction that they were about to be well past their earlobes in swirling, violent white-water rapids.

“No problem,” he told John, casting a significant glance at Audrey as he spoke. He urged her toward the side, then went to turn on the propane tank.

That was when he noticed the problem. “Oh, hell,” he muttered before he could catch himself.

Audrey was leaning over his shoulder before he could take his next breath. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“‘Oh, hell'
is not nothing. It is most definitely something. I want to know what.”

This was no time to start getting distracted, but he tried to give her hand a reassuring squeeze. She shook it off. “Blake! You can't placate me like some child. If we're going down, I deserve to know the truth. I might have plans to make or something.”

He just barely managed to restrain a chuckle. His lips twitched, though, and she caught it. She frowned.

“Sorry,” he said. “I'm not trying to placate you. I swear this is nothing serious. The pilot light went out. That's all. It happens all the time.”

He didn't look her in the eye when he said it.

“W
hat do you mean the pilot light went out?” Audrey asked. She was particularly proud that no note of hysteria had crept into her voice. She was saving it for later—when they crashed in the river.

After all, Blake had looked perfectly calm when he made the announcement. Then again, it was obvious he was in a big hurry to get the thing lit and it wasn't because he had a turkey ready for the oven. This pilot light of his apparently did something important. On second thought, perhaps she ought to be screaming her head off.

“Blake, you're not answering me again. Explain about this pilot light.”

“I mean the damn thing went out,” he muttered, fiddling intently with something she couldn't quite see and wasn't sure she wanted to.

“Let me try that question another way: does it matter?”

He glanced up at her. “You're not going to like the answer to that.”

“Oh, dear heaven,” she murmured.

“Don't go getting crazy on me. I haven't had one of these crash on me yet.”

Suddenly Audrey noticed that puffy white clouds, which had been drifting pleasantly overhead, seemed to be receding at a rather alarming rate. “Then why are we falling?” she managed in a choked whisper, trying to decide if it was auspicious that her entire life was not flashing before her eyes yet.

“Because the air is cooling off.”

The significance of that did not slip past her. Hot air rises, cool air...dear God! “I don't suppose you'd like to borrow some matches?”

Blake shot her a quick, encouraging grin. “Hang on to that sense of humor, sweetheart.”

“Is there anything else I should hang on to?”

“You could try me,” he suggested hopefully. The look he cast in her direction was so steamy it could have heated an entire room. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to help the air in the balloon, though it certainly warmed her from her head to her toes. She could feel her cheeks flush. She ran the tip of her tongue over dry lips.