Dreaming Of... Australia: Mr Right at the Wrong Time / Imprisoned by a Vow / The Millionaire and the Maid

His warm thumb gently wiped away a dribble of the not-quite-lemony juice that had caught on the corner of her lips. Her pulse picked up in response. Or it could have been the analgesic surging into her system.

Either way, it felt good.

The gentle touch was so caring and sweet, while being businesslike, that it brought tears back to her eyes. When was the last time someone had taken genuine care of her? Had just been there for her when it all went wrong? Her parents believed that prevention was infinitely better than the cure, and Wayne would have just rolled his eyes and scolded her for over-reacting.

As Sam withdrew his ungloved left hand her eyes were tear-free enough to notice that his ring finger was bare and uniformly tanned. Yeah, because that’s always important to know in life or death situations. She shook her head at her own subconscious. Her shoulder bit and she winced visibly.

‘I’m going to have a look at your arm, Aimee. Just keep very still.’

She did—not that she could feel a thing; her arm had been wedged back there for so long it wasn’t even bothering her, although obviously it was really bothering Sam. She heard and felt him changing positions, getting closer to her driver’s door.

‘Do you remember how the accident happened?’ he asked, making conversation while he fiddled around behind her.

She shook her head. ‘I was driving the A10. One minute everything was fine.’ She filled her strained lungs again. ‘The next I was sliding and then …’ She shuddered. ‘I remember the impact.’ Breath. ‘Then I passed out for a bit.’ Breath. ‘Then I woke up here in this tree. Stuck.’

Her strained respiration seemed unnaturally loud in the silence that followed. When he finally did speak he said, ‘Looks like an oil patch on the asphalt. A local passing through slid on it, too, but managed to stop before the edge. He saw your tail-lights down here and called it in.’

Thank goodness he did. I might have been out here for days. Aimee lifted her chin to see better in the mirror what he was doing behind her. ‘Sam, don’t worry about whether it’s going to hurt. Just do whatever you have to do. I’m a rip-the-Bandaid-off kind of girl, despite what I said earlier about pain.’

She felt his pause more than heard it. ‘You can’t feel this?’

The worry in his voice spiked her heart into a rapid flutter. ‘I can’t feel anything.’

When he spoke again, his voice was more carefully moderated. ‘Your arm is wedged back here. I think it’s dislocated. I’ve freed it up a little bit, and I’m going to try to push it forward, but this will go one of two ways. Either you won’t feel a thing even once it’s free—’

Meaning she might have damaged something permanently.

‘—or the sensation is going to come back as soon as it’s free. And if that happens it’s going to hurt like hell.’

She felt a tug, but no pain. It was like having a numb tooth yanked. So far so good. ‘Won’t the ant juice help?’

‘It won’t have taken full effect—’

That was as far as he got. With a nasty crack her arm came free, and he pushed it forward back into the front seat where it belonged. The pain burst like white light behind her eyes, and came from her throat in an agonised retch as full sensation returned—arm burning, shoulder screaming.

His hands were at her hair instantly, stroking it back, soothing. ‘That’s the worst of it, Aimee. It’s all done now,’ he murmured, over and over. ‘All done …’

She rocked where she sat, holding her breath, damming back the tears, sucking the pain in, wanting so badly to be as brave as Sam was in coming down here for her. Then, as the ant juice and her own adrenaline kicked in, the rocking slowed and her body eased back in the seat, not fighting the restraint of the seatbelt as much.

‘Better?’ That voice again, warm and low just behind her. She lifted her eyes to the crooked rearview mirror, reached for it slowly with her good arm, missed and tried again through a slight fogginess. She adjusted it and found his eyes.

‘Thank you,’ she whispered, knowing it would never be enough, but just so grateful that she was no longer alone with her thoughts and fears of death.

He knew what she was saying. ‘You’re welcome. I’m sorry that hurt so much.’

‘Not your fault. And it’s easing off now.’ If easing off could describe the deep, dull, throb coming from her right arm and leg. ‘And it’s made it easier to breathe. Talk.’

Though not perfectly.

‘Don’t get comfortable. We have a long way to go.’

‘Is it time to get out?’ God, she hoped so. Every time the car creaked and settled the breath was sucked out of her lungs.

The compassion turned to caution. ‘Not just yet. We have to wait for it to get a little bit lighter. It’s not safe to try and haul you out in the dark.’

Given how unsafe she felt staying in, that was saying something. Although that wasn’t strictly true; everything had got a whole heap less scary the moment Sam had first called out to her. But every minute she was here he was here, risking his life, too. ‘You should go, then. Come back when it’s morning.’

His eyes narrowed in the mirror. ‘But you’d be alone.’

As uncomfortable as that thought made her, it was a heck of a lot more comfortable than something happening to him because of her. ‘I’ve been alone most of the night. A few more hours won’t kill me.’ Except that it very well might, if things went wrong, her lurching stomach reminded her. But at least it would only be her. ‘I don’t want you to get hurt because of me.’

The crinkles at the corners of his eyes multiplied. ‘I appreciate the thought, but I know what I’m doing.’

‘But the hatch isn’t open.’ So if the car slipped further it wouldn’t just slide away from around him, and the harness she guessed tethered him to something above them. It would take him, too. And who knew how steep this embankment was.

‘We’re secure enough.’

‘Do you do this for a living?’ Suddenly she wanted to know. What kind of person risked his life for total strangers? Plus talking took her mind off … everything else.

‘Amongst other things, yes.’

She tipped her head and spoke more freely than she might have without fifty mils of squished ants zooming through her blood. ‘Are you an adrenaline junkie?’

He laughed and checked her pulse, his fingers warm and sure at the base of her jaw under the foam neck brace. Her heart kicked up its pace.

‘A little fast …’ he murmured to himself, then turned his focus back to her. ‘No, I’m not interested in risk-taking for the sake of it. But to save someone’s life …’

‘I don’t want you risking your life for mine.’

Blue eyes held hers in the mirror. ‘Why not?’

‘Because …’ it wasn’t worth it ‘… this was my mistake. You shouldn’t have to pay for it.’

He looked like he wanted to argue. ‘Well, if I do my job right then neither of us will be paying. Excuse me a sec.’

He reached to his collar and pressed a button she’d only just noticed. He had a speedy conversation with whoever was on the other end of the radio at his hip. It was mostly coded medical talk, but she read his thin lips and his deep frown well enough.

‘Assess this as Code Three. Will offer hourly sit-reps.’ More distant crackles, then his eyes lifted to hers in the mirror and held them as he spoke, a fatal resignation written clearly in them. ‘Negative, Topside. Requiring static again. We’ve just gone Code Two.’

After not much more communication he signed off, and the silence that followed was the longest that had fallen since he’d scrambled into her beleaguered Honda. When he finally did speak, it was hushed.

He cleared his throat. ‘If anyone asks, you passed out just then.’

Her eyebrows shot up. ‘Did you just lie?’

‘Would you feel better if I said I save them up for very important moments?’

I’d feel better if you didn’t do it at all. Her father was a liar, and she didn’t like even the slightest connection between the two men in her mind.