Nicola Marsh - Interview with the Daredevil

‘Wind, snow, water, mountains, you name it, we do it.’

‘So you’re basically an adrenalin junkie?’

She made it sound as though he killed cockroaches for a living but he didn’t mind, the crinkles at the corners of his eyes deepening; by the creases her rescuer spent a lot of time laughing.

‘You bet. Nothing like a shot of endorphins to get the blood pumping.’

He crooked a finger and she leaned closer. ‘Throw in a kick of dopamine and serotonin and you’re on a high almost as good as …’

His pupils widened as he trailed off, giving her fair indication what he’d been about to say.

The safe thing to do would be to change the subject. But she’d done safe her entire life and hadn’t it only been a day ago when she’d arrived in Melbourne that she’d vowed to loosen up? To start living a little?

Yeah, she’d had a gutful of safe.

‘As good as?’

She held her breath as a flicker of lust lit a spark to his eyes, a flash of caramel in all that gorgeous brown.

‘Sex.’

He didn’t blink, didn’t look away and she could’ve sworn the invisible thread binding them tugged.

The flirt’s response would be ‘that good, huh?’ but she’d used up her limited chutzpah supply in the last few seconds.

Besides, the thought of sex being anything other than routine and lacklustre was as foreign to her as this guy and his extreme sports.

‘What else do you do besides skydive and snowboard and cliff diving?’

He chuckled at her sidestep. ‘You really want to hear about nine air sports, eighteen land sports and fifteen water sports?’

‘Maybe not.’ Impressed by his mile-wide daredevil streak, she shook her head. ‘You seriously do all that stuff?’

‘Yeah, all that and more.’

He paused, his gaze momentarily flicking to her lips. ‘Much more.’

And just like that the thread binding them tugged harder, like an intangible, irresistible force dragging her towards him.

‘Are you impressed?’

‘I think you’re crazy,’ she blurted, wondering if she could’ve picked anyone more different to while away a few minutes.

‘So I’ve been told,’ he said, not in the least offended by her outburst. ‘What do you do for kicks?’

In that moment the drudgery of her life flashed before her eyes: being the daughter of the prime minister, the private school, the chauffeurs, the bodyguards, the etiquette and deportment lessons, the expected marriage, being a politician’s wife, the civilised divorce no matter what lies the press printed.

All of it, every constrained, uptight second of it rose up to suffocate her, as it had her entire life.

But she wouldn’t put up with it. Not any more. She needed to wipe those memories, needed to start creating new ones.

Starting now.

‘What do I do for kicks?’

Buoyed by his talk of adrenalin and a soul-deep craving to let loose, she lay her hands on his shoulders and tugged him towards her, murmuring, ‘This,’ a second before her lips touched his.

THE moment Ava’s lips touched the sexy stranger’s she deliberately blotted out every sane reason why she shouldn’t be doing this and simply allowed herself to feel .

His warmth was the first thing she noticed, the heat from his lips moulding hers, melting, mesmerising, as she moved her mouth experimentally against his.

In response his hand slid into her hair, cradling the back of her head but this time there was nothing remotely gentle or therapeutic in his touch.

Uh-uh, this time his fingers splayed and pulled her towards him while his skilled mouth coaxed hers into opening.

As his tongue touched hers starbursts exploded in her head as she belatedly wondered if she had sustained a concussion.

Surely that could be the only explanation for this dazed, stunned confusion clouding her usually immaculate rationale and making her want to kiss a guy she barely knew for ever.

Yeah, he was that good and when the pressure of his lips eased she wanted to scream ‘no-o-o!’

For this was when her reliable logic would kick in, the logic that had helped her breeze through tense seating arrangements at foreign embassies, the logic that had prompted her to give up her writing dream and undertake a sensible economics degree, the logic that had insisted marrying a family friend would be a solid basis for a sound marriage.

Screw logic.

‘Can I blame that on concussion?’

The lips she’d just ravaged kicked up at the corners. ‘That depends.’

‘On?’

‘How bad it is.’

With a fake wince, she pointed to her head and pretended to swoon. ‘It’s beyond bad.’

‘In that case, I insist I walk you to your room.’

His gaze dropped to her mouth for a moment. ‘Just in case you impulsively kiss every stranger you come into contact with.’

Just like that, her bubble of illusion popped. For that was what she’d done. Kissed a stranger, some random guy, she’d met in a hotel.

Sheesh. What had she been thinking? It was one thing to abandon boring logic, another to lose sight of the facts completely.

‘Hey, I was kidding.’

He touched her arm and a spark of something zapped her, reminding her of the reason she’d ignored logic in the first place.

‘Though introducing ourselves should take care of the stranger problem?’

He smiled and her chest constricted. Smooth, sweet-talking charmers shouldn’t have a lethal smile too.

‘Roman. Extreme sports fanatic.’

He held out his hand. ‘And part-time poolside paramedic.’

She laughed, the carefree cadence foreign to her ears. When was the last time she’d laughed, really laughed, just for the heck of it?

Not while living in Canberra under Daddy’s watchful eye while he’d stood at Australia’s helm, not during her sedate two-year marriage and certainly not during her divorce last month, a divorce that had been publicly scrutinised while her name had been dragged through the mud for no other reason than she was Ava Beckett, reported society royalty, who’d supposedly got what was coming to her.

It felt good, great in fact, and by those attractive crinkles at the corners of his eyes Roman had spent a hell of a lot more time than she had laughing.

She placed her hand in his. ‘Ava. Recent quitter of boring financier job. Clumsy oaf and danger to others poolside.’

His fingers closed over hers, his grip firm and solid, and another little shiver of awareness slithered through her.

‘Well, then, with your clumsiness and my paramedic skills, we’re a match made in heaven.’

He squeezed her hand and released it when she grimaced.

‘Tell me those lines don’t usually work for you.’

He leaned closer and she bit her lip at the sudden onslaught of masculinity temptingly within reach. ‘You tell me?’

Sotto voce, combined with a wink, had her laughing again.

‘So when you’re not rescuing clumsy damsels in distress and jumping off bridges with an elastic rope tied to your ankles, where do you live?’

For the first time since she’d met him a shadow shifted in the rich depths of his eyes before he blinked and the resident twinkle was back.

‘I’m based in London at the moment.’

She caught a hint of hesitancy, a slight stiffening in his shoulders before his smile caught her off guard again, dazzling in its sexiness.

‘Boring financier job, huh? Lucky you quit.’

‘Yeah, real lucky.’

She wanted to act blasé, as if she could walk out on a solid job and live a carefree life traipsing around the planet. Instead, she did what had been ingrained from a young age: told the truth.

‘Actually, I have no idea what I’m going to do next.’