‘Out?’
‘Yes, out. ItisSaturday night, and I’m not a total sad case, you know,’ she retorted, her face flushing red and her fingers crossing behind her back. He didn’t have to know who it was she was going out with, or where they were going. He scowled at her, tape measure forgotten.
‘You’re going out on a date?’ he asked. Katie found the disbelief written across his face pretty insulting, and stupidly she rose to the bait.
‘Yes, a date. Just because some men think I’m “vertically challenged, mouthy and annoying ” doesn’t mean that the whole male population of Wales is of the same opinion.’ Her chin went up and she tried to stretch a couple of extra inches on her heel, but only succeeded in stumbling to the side. Before she could fall, a strong hand shot out to take her elbow and steady her. When she looked up he was standing inches away staring down at her.
‘I’m sorry, Katie,’ he said softly. Katie felt her breath catch in her throat, and then stopped breathing altogether when his eyes started searching her face. It was the first time she had ever heard him use her name, and at the sound of it in his low, rough voice she felt her stomach hollow out and a warm feeling spread through her chest. This close up, he looked almost too beautiful to be real. He leaned in further, and just before she thought he was about to kiss her, he closed his eyes again, clenched his jaw and stepped back so suddenly that she was left tottering without the support of his hand. He took a deep breath and his hands bunched into fists at his sides again before he opened his eyes, his expression reset to the standard blank mask she was used to.
‘Right, well,’ Katie said, feeling out of her depth and flustered, ‘I’m already late and Bryn doesn’t like to be kept waiting, so …’
‘He’s not picking you up?’ Sam asked, his eyebrows drawing together in disapproval.
‘Um … well …’ Katie twisted her hands together, racking her brain; lying was not one of her strong points. ‘He doesn’t live far. I’m just going to pop round and pick him up, then …’
‘You’re walking?’ He was really frowning now. She shrugged.
‘What’s wrong with me walking?’
Sam took a deep breath and rubbed the side of his face in what looked like a gesture of frustration. ‘You’ve got to be kidding me?’
‘What?’
‘It’s dark. The road is covered in ice. You’re alone. We’re totally isolated. There are no streetlights. Any of this seem like a problem to you?’
Katie rolled her eyes. ‘We’re not exactly in the backstreets of a war-torn, drug-infested ghetto, Sam. I think the worst crime Aberllwellyn has seen recently was when Mrs Gwilliam tapped into the Jones’s electricity supply to power her Christmas lights. Not exactly teeming with rapists and murderers.’
Sam totally ignored her rant and focused on what to him was probably more relevant. ‘Tell me you’ve decided on the snow boots.’
‘They’re not snow boots, they’re UGGs,’ Katie said snottily. ‘And it’s none of your beeswax what I wear anyway.’
‘Beeswax?’ he asked, his angry expression clearing again for a second to make way for another lip-twitch. Katie decided that she had had enough of his confusing body language and facial expressions to last her a lifetime. Glancing at her watch, she realized she was running late and that Bryn would have started to get worried by now. He was a stickler for punctuality.
‘I don’t have time for this,’ she said, turning away from Sam and limping off in the direction of her bedroom in as dignified a manner as possible. She turned back just as she was about to disappear to find her boot. Sam’s huge frame was still dwarfing her tiny living room, and when she looked up at his face she realized that her walk across the living room might not have succeeded in the dignity stakes: his lips were still twitching, and he looked like he was holding in more laughter.
‘You can see yourself out,’ she told him, and slammed the door behind her.
Chapter 6
He’s not right
‘Ugh,’ Katie groaned when she turned to see Sam following her on silent feet. For such a large man, he certainly had the whole stealth thing down. ‘Honestly you don’t have to follow me. He only lives next door, for goodness … Whoa!’ After picking her way carefully down her drive and feeling quite proud of herself, as soon as her boot made contact with the slick pavement it shot out from under her. Before she could hit the ground she was hauled up by her coat at the scruff of her neck and suspended in mid air, before being placed carefully back on her feet. She heard a cough behind her, which sounded suspiciously like a suppressed laugh, and she turned to scowl at him.
‘Get off me,’ she said, giving the hand that gripped her coat a pointed look.
He shrugged. ‘No problem.’
Katie realized her mistake when, on being released, both her feet shot in opposite directions and she felt her body careering towards the snowy bank. Yet again she was yanked back up by the scruff of her neck and placed in an upright position. But this time the hand at the back of her coat did not let go – which, she conceded, was probably the most sensible option. She may as well have been wearing ice skates, the amount of grip her boots were giving her on the icy pavement.
‘It would seem that I may have made an error of judgment footwear-wise,’ Katie informed him, trying to maintain a lofty tone despite her ridiculous predicament. Again she heard the suppressed laughter behind her and, having not heard even a hint of amusement from Sam in the last six years, she was annoyed that when his austere veneer finally cracked itwouldhave to be down to hilarity at her expense. She moved forward cautiously again, and was still slipping all over the place, the only thing keeping her upright being the hand on the back of her coat. After a few yards of very slow and unsteady progress, she was spun around to face him and, to her shock, unceremoniously hauled up over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes.
‘What are youdoing?’ she screeched, once she got her breath back.
‘This is quicker,’ Sam told her, his voice still laced with amusement and his long strides eating up the distance between her house and Bryn’s. Before she knew it, she had been deposited back on her feet on Bryn’s doorstep, her face flushed bright red and her hair having worked its way free under her hat to spill down her shoulders in complete disarray.
‘I … well … I … you …’
‘Jesus, woman, this has to be the first time I’ve ever seen you lost for words,’ Sam said, his eyes dancing. ‘How about: “Thank you Sam for not letting me fall on my backside repeatedly on the way over here.”’ Katie scrunched her nose, torn between telling him to bugger off and knowing that he probably had saved her from a very bruised arse. Sam’s eyes dropped to her scrunched-up nose and the amusement was wiped from his expression.
