The Complete Red-Hot Collection. Kelly Hunter

tell me, how can I explain?’

      She wrenched free. ‘Under the terms of our contract you don’t have to explain.’

      ‘Dammit, Kate, I’ve had a gutful of the contract. It’s over! Over!’

      ‘It was over on Tuesday, but that wasn’t good enough for you, was it? Because I decided that. I decided it out of love. But you had to control the ending—out of…of…pique! And so here you are, controlling it—like you’ve controlled everything since the moment we met.’

      ‘That’s crap, Kate. I’ve never been in control. Not from the first moment I saw you. I don’t— I don’t want to be in control with you. And that—’ He shoved irritably at his hair. ‘That is not an easy thing for me to admit.’

      ‘Oh, you’ve been in the driver’s seat all the way along. Running rings around me. Flouting the rules. Turning up any time you wanted. All those calculated kisses to get me to shut up when I asked you a personal question—when I told you kissing was dangerous.’

      ‘You never told me that!’

      ‘It was implied! Because it’s obvious! To everyone except you. Kissing—no problem for Scott Knight, because Scott Knight doesn’t care and Scott Knight doesn’t feel.’

      ‘But I did—I mean I do—’

      ‘Shut up, Scott. Just shut up. Because I do feel. And every time you kissed me I felt more—and more and more. Wanted you more and more. But all you wanted was Play Time! So I gave that to you too, because I figured I could sex you into loving me. I would have done anything. Anything! But you wouldn’t even let me protect myself by sticking to a few simple rules.’

      ‘Kate, stop. I—’

      ‘You know what’s the stupidest thing of all? I started to think that maybe you were breaking all those rules because you didn’t want the contract.’

      ‘I didn’t. I wanted—’

      ‘I thought you just wanted to kiss me, see me, be with me—take it however it came. The more you broke the rules, the more I hoped. But you were breaking them because it was a game to you. I was a game.’

      ‘No, that isn’t—’

      ‘And that last night—what you said to me. Tail. A piece of tail. That’s what I was. All I was. All the way along. And you, with more tail than you know what to do with, could have anyone—so why me? Why did you still take and take from me that night? When you knew how…how painful it was for me to love you like I did? You knew I wanted to leave and you wouldn’t let me go.’

      ‘Okay, that’s enough, Kate!’ He grabbed her then, dragged her in. ‘I didn’t let you go because I couldn’t. I can’t, Kate. I can’t.’

      ‘But you will—because tomorrow is the first of March and we are done.’ She jerked out of his arms. ‘Done! Do you get it? A mensa et thoro—legal separation without divorce.’

      ‘Don’t talk Latin to me now.’

      ‘Res judicata—the final adjudication. No further appeals. Goodbye.’

      Scott blanched. His shoulders were tight enough to snap his spine. Head drumming. Heart hammering. Hands clenching and unclenching.

      ‘Except for one thing, Kate,’ he said. ‘You love me.’

      ‘Well, you see, I’m going to let Phillip the barrister help me get over that. Tomorrow—the first of March—when there will be no possible suggestion that I am still under contract to you. Time for a new contract. This time I might even get the friend part of “friends with benefits”. Someone who w-won’t h-hurt me.’

      ‘I won’t hurt you.’

      She turned away, breath hitching. ‘You already have, Scott.’

      ‘Then I’ll make it up to you.’

      ‘You can’t. You wouldn’t know how. Because you’ve never been hurt and you’ve never been in love.’

      ‘I have been hurt. When you left me. When you wouldn’t speak to me. More hurt than I thought was even possible. And you’re hurting me now. And I’m letting you because I deserve it. Hurt me all you want. Any way you want. But just don’t leave me, Kate.’

      He came up behind her.

      ‘Because I am in love. Right now. With you. First love. Last love. All in one. I’m here with my heart bleeding, aching for you, so in love I can’t even find the words to tell you how much.’

      She turned slowly. ‘No…’ she breathed. ‘You don’t love me.’

      ‘Kate, if you think anyone else, in their wildest dreams, could have got me to watch a damned chick flick, let alone re-enact a scene from one… Well, you’re insane—that’s all I’m saying.’

      ‘That was Play Time.’

      He glared at her. Shouted. ‘Newsflash, Kate. I. Hate. Play. Time. Hate it. Got it?’

      ‘Then why—’

      ‘And if you think rolling around in the surf like a lunatic is my idea of a sexual fantasy, you are wide of the mark, my girl. I’ve got sand in every nook and cranny of my body and it’s bloody uncomfortable. A piece of seaweed is sticking somewhere I don’t even want to think about—it may require medical intervention to get it extricated. And it’s driving me nuts. But you know what? I will go back and roll around in that surf until we shrivel into prunes—with salt water pouring out of my ears, and snot streaming out of my nose, and that surfer out there laughing himself into convulsions, if it’s what you want. Hell, I’ll take you to Hawaii and we’ll try it on the original beach!’

      ‘I didn’t ask you to roll in the surf!’ Kate shouted back.

      ‘You didn’t have to ask! I did it because I’m not good with words, so I had to do something. I watched that movie for you. I’m on this beach because I love you. I love you! And, so help me God, if you don’t call that weasel Phillip and tell him to back the hell away and stay the hell away, I am going to kidnap you.’

      ‘Kidnap me?’ she sputtered.

      ‘On the yacht I bought.’

      ‘You bought a yacht?’

      ‘And I bought music—so I can dance with you on it. And I’m going to teach you to sail, and take you to the Whitsundays, and…and… What’s so funny?’

      ‘You,’ Kate said, and laughed so hard she dropped to her knees. ‘The way you said “m-music”. Like it was p-poison.’

      ‘Kate,’ he said dangerously, ‘you do realise how many women would swoon to have me tell them I love them, right? But you’re the only one I’m ever, ever going to say it to.’

      ‘Egomaniac,’ Kate said, and kept laughing.

      ‘It’s not funny.’

      ‘No, it’s not. It’s a serious condition, egomania,’ she said, and laughed again.

      Pause. He was confused. But…hopeful.

      ‘Is laughter…? Is it good under these circumstances?’ he asked tentatively.

      ‘Accedas ad curiam.’

      ‘Yeah, smartarse—going to need a translation,’ he said, but a smile had started to stretch his mouth and he could feel it—feel it!—in his eyes too.

      ‘You may approach the court,’ she said. ‘That’s all I will say for now. And, Scott—just so you know—I have sand in every nook and cranny too.’

      ‘Well,