Princes of the Outback Bundle Read Online Free Page B

the bluff to the waterhole.”
    Nic shrugged. “They’re just stories.”
    “Just stories or a symptom?”
    “Of…?”
    “In all the years we were together, we never talked much, did we?”
    All Nic heard was her use of the past tense— were together—and denial kicked in.
    “We talked more than enough. When I got back you always asked about where I’d been, my last job.”
    Her face was in shadow. He couldn’t see her expression, but he heard her soft expulsion of breath. “Oh, we’d start out in the right direction. But then somewhere around the second sentence…”
    The soft heat in her eyes would fry the words on his tongue and the only thing he’d think of to say would be, “Ah, Liv, I’ve missed you like crazy,” as he’d reach for her. And as quick as he could utter “unzip me” they’d be naked and halfway to paradise.
    Nic frowned and shoved those images aside. Remembering the softness of her hands on his skin and her husky hurry-up murmurings and her sexy cat’s smile when she had him right where she wanted him—hell, none of that was doing him any favors right now.
    “So, talk to me, Liv,” he said, more harshly than he’d intended. Because he was about half-a-memory away from turning and saying, Ah, Liv, I’ve missed you like crazy . And, unzip me .
    “About?”
    He heard the caution in her voice and knew what she was thinking. But he didn’t want to go there. Didn’t want to break the tentative strands of connection he’d allowed to slowly build through this long day. “Today. After the accident. You went very quiet.”
    For a long, tense minute he thought she was going to clam up. He shifted closer, moving so he could see her face in the flickering light.
    And the sadness on her face, in her eyes, punched him in the heart.
    “It was that little girl, Hollie. I was holding her and she put her arms around my neck. And it was just like when I used to hold…when Brooke was little…she used to—”
    Her voice, already low and husky, caught on her sister’s name, and although she drew a shaky breath and tried to continue, she couldn’t. Because, ah hell, she was crying. Those silent, heartbroken tears that always did him in.
    Nic didn’t think. He just reached for her.

Chapter Eleven
    Olivia let him comfort her. At first it was an awkward hug, with him sitting and her lying down, but then he stretched out beside her and pulled her close.
    How could she object? She’d always loved the solid strength of his chest and the way their bodies matched up. She loved how his hands stroked her back and tucked her hair back from her face.
    She even loved the slight tension she felt in his big body. He was a man, after all, and inherently averse to tears.
    Yet he held her, the same as he’d done at Brooke’s funeral and for so many days and nights afterward. And when the initial flood of tears eased, he tucked her even closer, and pressed a tender kiss to the top of her head.
    She knew if she stayed right where she was long enough—maybe another minute or two—he’d make some crack to ease the what-next awkwardness. He’d managed to make her laugh in days when she thought she’d never laugh again.
    “It’s a gift,” he’d told her more than once, and thinking about that now—thinking about her decision to walk away from a man with such a gift—jabbed sharply in her heart.
    Suddenly, she couldn’t wait for him to make funny. She didn’t want to be reminded of how things used to be between them. How, after the wisecrack, he’d dry her tears and then he’d kiss her, and within the space of a long stroke of his magic hands the kiss would turn from tender comfort to warm arousal to consuming flames.
    As always when he held her, she’d managed to get her hands on his chest. Beneath them she felt the solid thud of his heartbeat. And the heat of his body. As always, her body hummed in response, even as she used those hands to lever some space between them.
    “I’m sorry. I keep