Marie Donovan - The Bad Boy's Redemption - Too Much of a Good Thing? / Her Last Line of Defence / Her Hard to Resist Husband

‘But...’

‘Nothing happened, Lu.’

Will hooked her chin and made her look into his calm face. She could see hot rage bubbling in his eyes...for her? She grabbed his wrist and held onto to him, needing his steadiness, needing the contact, needing to lean, just for a minute, on his strength.

She sucked in more air. ‘OK, nothing happened. You’re sure?’

‘Very sure. A thousand percent sure. You were in my sight the entire time, apart from the fifteen minutes just after your drink was spiked. You’ve only been alone with me the entire time. Believe me?’

She did.

‘Your mobile is dead, so I couldn’t contact anyone, but I took you to the closest hospital, they pumped your stomach and you stayed there the night.’

‘What? I stayed the night in hospital?’

Will nodded, his face grim.

‘So today isn’t today, it’s tomorrow?’ Lu cried. ‘I lost an entire day?’

Will grimaced. ‘Yeah. You came round for a while this afternoon and the doctors thought that you were well enough to be discharged, provided someone kept an eye on you.’

‘I don’t remember anything!’

‘Apparently that’s normal.’

‘That’s your opinion. Nothing is vaguely normal about this. So you brought me back here?’ Lu looked around. ‘Where is here?’

‘The Bay—penthouse suite. My temporary quarters until I find a flat to rent. Well, I didn’t know who to contact, and I couldn’t leave you alone, so I changed you into one of my T-shirts and let you sleep it off.’

Lu looked at the bed they’d shared. ‘You slept with me?’

‘Just to keep an eye on you,’ Will reassured her. ‘You were having some nasty dreams. Judging by your quick downhill slide, the hospital doctors think it was GHB, which is very easy to overdose on. You were very lucky. Because you weigh next to nothing, the doctors were worried. An overdose can lead to a coma or death. ‘

‘I never leave my drink unattended,’ Lu protested.

‘You did. You put it on the bar when your friend came back from the dance floor. You checked the time...’ Will cursed.

Lu raised her eyebrows. He’d been watching her? How? From where? And yet she still didn’t feel creeped out. Just protected...and safe. As if she had a burly guardian angel looking after her.

Will closed his eyes for a millisecond. ‘You were directly below me. I was watching the action from the VIP area above.

‘Now I sound like a stalker.’ He raked his hand through his short hair and grimaced. ‘I’m not, I promise. I saw you. You looked sober. The next time I saw you, you looked high, with someone I hadn’t seen you even speak to. Something just didn’t seem right.’

Lu believed him. Maybe she was being naïve or dumb, but she knew, to the bottom of her toes, that Will had saved her. Besides, seriously, why would anyone who looked like him need a date-rape drug to get a girl into bed? He was probably beating them off with clubs as it was.

She wasn’t a celeb-watcher but his profile was high enough that it was hard not to read about him. He was the ex-bad-boy of international rugby who dated supermodels and superstars. His ex-wife was the Golden Princess of women’s professional tennis, with a face and body that could launch intergalactic starships. And he was an international rugby god—one of New Zealand’s national treasures, Lu thought as she remembered the twins’ many conversations about him. He was a multi-capped player and had been instrumental in leading his team to victory in the last World Cup. He’d just retired from international rugby and was in Durban for a few months.

Lu was snapped back to the present by a sharp rap on the suite door. Will smiled and her stomach rolled. Hoo-boy! Mega-attractive man.

‘Coffee. It’s about time.’ Will moved to the door and looked at her over his shoulder. ‘My mobile is next to the bed, or use the hotel phone to contact anyone you need to.’

‘Thank you. I will...after I use the bathroom. And Will?’

Lu swallowed and lifted her hands when he turned and looked at her.

‘Thank you. It sounds inadequate, but I am so, so grateful. For everything. I am forever in your debt.’

* * *

Lu washed up and held each side of the free-standing basin, staring down into the expanse of white porcelain. Why did she feel nineteen again? Defenceless, vulnerable, scared... It had to be because, like before, she’d been dumped into this horrible situation without any warning, any time to prepare.

It was a situation she couldn’t control and she was propelled back to that black time when she’d felt sick with grief, crippled by the responsibility of her new role as guardian to her brothers, feeling so helpless.

Every insecurity she’d ever had came rushing back—every sadness, every fear. Oh, she knew intellectually that this wasn’t her fault, but knowing was different from feeling, and being at the mercy of whoever it was who’d spiked her drink scared her down to her toes. Added to that was the realisation that she’d been in Will’s hands, his care...under his power.

She wanted to curl up in a corner and suck her thumb. GHB? Spiked drinks? A high-profile celebrity rescuing her from what might have been a very nasty situation? Incidents like this didn’t happen to ordinary girls like her. If she thought about what could have happened...

Lu bumped her hand against her forehead in an effort to clear the cobwebs and realised that her stomach was rebelling again.

Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it...

Will’s face popped into her head and she focused on that as a distraction. He was so much better-looking in real life than in the newspapers and on TV. They didn’t capture the intelligence in those topaz-coloured eyes, the flicker of movement in that mobile mouth, the very, very small dimple-type dent that appeared in his cheek when he smiled.

And she wasn’t even going to think about his body...fit, hard, utterly—shockingly!—masculine. Lu rubbed her thighs together. Strangely, she suddenly felt a pounding pulse in a place where she’d never pulsed before.

Lu raised her head to look at herself in the mirror above the sink and yelped at her reflection. Her brand-new, streaky gold hair that had looked so fabulously chic last night now stood up in tufts on the right side of her head and lay dead flat on the other side. She was sheet-white, her freckles the only bit of colour in her face, and someone had painted the bags under her eyes a bright purple.

No wonder Will Scott had belted out of bed as if the hounds of hell were snapping at his heels. Admittedly her eyes were an unusual colour—sometimes green, sometimes blue—but the spray of freckles across her nose and cheeks were the bane of her life. She was more ‘girl next door’ than ‘I am woman, hear me roar’.

This morning she barely reached ‘I am human, hear me whimper’.

So any ideas that he’d been looking at her legs or mouth or any quick flashes of interest she’d thought she’d caught in his eyes was just a very optimistic dose of wishful thinking. Stupid girl. Lu pulled a tongue at her reflection, opened the tap and splashed warm water on her face. Stealing a bit of Will’s toothpaste, she brushed her teeth with her finger and helped herself to a healthy swig of his mouthwash.

She wet her hands and ran them through her hair in an attempt to look less like a neurotic bantam chicken. She wished she could pull on her clothes, but when she reached for the packet containing them one whiff of the contents had her changing her mind. Will’s T-shirt, which barely hit her knees would have to do for now.

Right—she felt marginally human and slightly better able to deal with Will, his smack-you-in-the-face sex appeal and this very weird situation. Lu straightened her spine and opened the bathroom door just as Will walked across from the closet, now dressed in hip hugging faded Levi’s, a fire-engine-red T-shirt clutched loosely in his hand.