“Thanks. Now watch this. I promise you I wouldn’t do this with a venomous spider. But huntsmen are really common, and I did this a tonne in the house I grew up in.”
Marcus advanced towards the spider with the container in one hand and hovered it a foot above the counter. Then he brought it down fast, trapping the spider beneath it. It started and its legs made a scraping, crunching sound against the plastic. Behind him Heather gave a small, disgusted whimper. Holding the container down firmly, Marcus dragged it towards the edge of the counter where he held the cardboard in his other hand. In one quick motion,he pulled the container off the counter and covered the bottom with the junk mail.
“Can you open the front door, please?” he asked, and Heather scurried out of the room as he flipped the container over. He followed her to the front, where she waited with the door thrown open. Once out onto her little verandah, Marcus crouched down next to the bushes and set the container down, taking the cardboard with him as he stood again.
“That’s it?” Heather called.
“That’s it.” He shrugged, facing her. She’d closed the door almost completely and peered out through a narrow crack. “He’ll see himself out.”
“What if it comes back?”
“Then you know how to escort him out.”
Heather scoffed again. “Or I can just move to a new house.”
“Or you can call me again.” He smiled. Heather paused, and he realised what he’d said. An uncomfortable silence stretched between them. He was about to assure her he hadn’t meant it like that when she spoke.
“Um, thank you. For saving me.”
“Yeah, no worries. Any time.” Another silence. “Did you eat dinner? You missed some pretty good lamb.”
She sighed from behind the door. “I ordered some takeout, but now I think I’ve lost my appetite forever.” She opened the door a little wider. “Do you...would you...could you stay? Just for a bit? In case it comes back? Or has friends?”
Marcus paused, staring at the cardboard in his hand to buy time. He should just go home. He’d done what she’d needed him to do. She was never in any real danger, and she definitely wasn’t in harm’s way now. Staying here would only make it harder to pretend he didn’t want her.
“Spiders don’t have friends,” he said softly, throwing her a rueful smile.
She paused, then opened the door wider still, her shoulders hunched and tense. “Please, Marcus?”
The sound of his name in her mouth decided it. The Heather Hays—gorgeous, talented, funny, loud, disobedient Heather Hays—was asking him to come inside and keep her company on a dark, windy, spider-infested night. He was kidding himself if he thought he had the strength to say no.
“Okay, Heather. Just for a bit. In case it comes back.”
A relieved smile broke over her face, and her shoulders dropped as she pulled the door open to let him inside.
“Do you want a drink? I want a drink, or five.”
“Sure, but I can’t get too drunk. What if I have to save you from another poisonous monster?”
“You said it wasn’t dangerous!” she exclaimed as he sidled past her. “I don’t know how people live like this.” She shook her head and disappeared into the kitchen, returning a moment later with two bottles of light beer and a bottle opener. Marcus was still standing in the entryway with his hands in his pockets. She handed him one and switched on the living room lights.
“You can sit if you want,” she said, gesturing towards the plump, pale-yellow couch, but Marcus was too nervous to sit, so he wandered into the living room, feeling stilted and ungainly. He forced himself to stand still and at least try to look relaxed. This was just a beer. Just a beer with a colleague. A colleague he’d kissed once and desperately wanted to kiss again. Hard and deep, for as long as she’d let him.
Heather fumbled with the bottle opener, and her fingers slipped on the condensation. “Sorry, I’m still a bit shaky.”
“Here, let me,” he said, putting his hands out, and she brushed her hair out of her face before offering him both the bottle and opener. For a second, he didn’t move away, and they stayed like that, their hands loosely joined around the items. He looked down into her breathtaking face and told himself to pull away.Now.
There’s a policy against this, and it exists for a reason.
He would pull his hands away, he told himself. Right after he ran the pad of his thumb lightly over the heel of her hand. Just once. Just to know what it felt like. He held her gaze, watching her watch him, and stroked the soft, smooth skin of her palm. A tiny movement, and the sound she made in response, the quiet intake of breath, was just as small. But it nearly undid him. He watched her as she bit her lip, watched the plump pink skin dimple and flush dark under the pressure of her teeth. He watched her as a small frown creased her forehead, and as she gave a tiny, decisive nod. Then her fingers tightened and he watched, perplexed, as she tossed both bottle and opener onto the couch.
“Cartwheels,” she whispered, and then she kissed him.
He stepped towards her so fast he knocked over his own bottle. It clattered onto the glass coffee table, but he barely heard it. Heather Hays was kissing him again, and nothing else in the world mattered. He grabbed her hip in one hand and her face in the other, pulling her into him, kissing her back, hard. She gasped in surprise against his mouth, but a second later she looped her arms over his shoulders and pressed herself against him.
The kiss felt like oxygen, like he would be lightheaded if his mouth ever left hers. He explored her lips with his, first one, then the other, then his tongue slid between them. Her mouth was hot and hungry, her lips achingly soft and full but determined to match his urgency.
There was no trace of the slow caution he’d felt in her kiss in the changing room. This time, she was fierce and focused, as if she’d been craving him for days, just like he’d craved her. The thought shot through him, hot and triumphant, as her body pressed and arched against him, fluid and strong and so much better than his brain had allowed him to remember.
