Chapter 20
Niall
Niall lay in his tent and imagined Carli in hers.
They’d had a perfect day together and things had mended a little.
There had even been some flirting by the edge of the loch when he’d shown her the tattoo.
He was glad he’d come here to keep her safe.
Having her camping in the pitch dark on her own was not something he would have been at all comfortable with.
But even though Carli was in the next tent, she was too far away.
Too far away to protect her if someone did turn up and sneak into her tent, the chances of that happening, thankfully, being slim.
And too far away. Too far away from him.
Niall shuffled onto his side in his sleeping bag. Fortunately, the exhaustion from jet lag meant he would easily be out for the count. He closed his eyes.
The next thing he was aware of was the sound of rain on the tent. It wouldn’t normally have been enough to wake him, but the lack of fly sheet meant that not only could he hear the rain, he felt it too.
Fucking Scottish weather. You try to assume the best and it slaps you in the face to remind you who’s in charge.
No baby raindrops either. Big heavy belters like steel pebbles were seeping through the tent and onto his sleeping bag.
Bloody Sean and his chaos. Niall sat up, shuffled out of his sleeping bag and reached in his jeans for the car keys.
He unzipped the tent, pulled on his jeans, t-shirt and boots, scooped up as much stuff as he could whilst guiding his way to the car using his phone’s torch.
He then returned to get everything else before it was ruined by the rain.
‘Niall?’ Carli’s voice came from inside her tent. Shit, she might think there was an intruder in the campsite.
‘Aye, it’s me. Don’t worry. Go back to sleep.’
‘What’re you doing?’
‘Och, nothing. There’s a wee bit of rain.’
Niall heard the zip on Carli’s tent and then her voice. ‘It’s bucketing down. What are you doing?’
‘I’m away to sleep in the car ’cause my tent doesn’t have a fly sheet. Go back to sleep.’
‘You are not sleeping in the car. Come on.’ Carli moved closer to the edge of the tent door, and he could see her motioning for him to come to her.
‘It’s fine. I’ve slept in worse places.’
‘Why are you being a martyr again?’
‘A martyr? How am I a martyr? Again?’
‘You gave up on our whole relationship because you were punishing yourself for your misgivings. Don’t punish yourself tonight, too, by sleeping in the car.’
‘Well, where else do you suggest I sleep?’
Carli moved out of the tent and walked towards him. She was in those sausage dog pyjamas again, which Niall could see by the light of his torch were getting immediately saturated by the unremitting rain.
‘Where I suggest you sleep is in my tent with me,’ she said, right up close to him now, rain soaking her dark hair and making it stick to her face. And, damn, that rain was heavy because the other thing he could see were her nipples poking through the now translucent fabric of her pyjama top.’
‘Fuck!’ he muttered, unable to help himself.
Carli smiled like a temptress. She knew. She fucking knew. Of course she did. She could probably see the semi in his jeans.
‘Cass.’
‘Come on, Niall.’
Lust blazed through him, the rain doing absolutely nothing to dampen it.
‘But… we’re friends.’ His protestations sounded pathetic, like a five-year-old boy whose buddy had stolen his toys.
‘Are we? Do friends walk out of the loch in their underwear and unabashedly flirt with each other?’
Niall dragged his fist through his wet hair. ‘No, they don’t. Trust me, I want you. I just thought it might be too soon after…you know…’
‘So, you get to stick your body, your barely disguised dick, practically in my face and then take away my decision about whether or not it’s too soon?
You got to decide our fate last time, Niall.
Now I get to choose. I’ll decide if I get to invite my camping bodyguard, whose tent has no protection from the rain and who is willing to sleep in the car, into my tent.
Oh, and those tattoos. Niall, goddammit. ’
The tattoos. Her name on his hip. There had been women who’d asked who Cass was and most of the time he’d said it was his childhood dog because how could he talk about the truth? And the lines of poetry he’d got done after she’d gone. Those were harder to explain as being about a dog.
‘You were meant to get one too,’ he reminded her, rain streaming down his face, soaking his clothes through. ‘When I got Cass done.’
‘I got one up here.’ She tapped at her temple. ‘“Butler” inked on my brain forever.’
‘Nice. Not quite the same as having it on your skin. But not your fault you’re a feartie.’
‘I was sixteen. You’re thirty-three and I could say the same thing about you?’
‘How am I a feartie?’
‘Because you’re scared of kissing me again.’
Niall cocked an eyebrow. Well, here he was backed into a corner.
Rain lashing down both their faces, this feisty woman who drove him wild, persuasive chocolate eyes tempting him, the attraction potent like someone had plugged an electrical device in the rain-soaked space between them.
She was right. He was scared of kissing her, but only because he was terrified of hurting her again, of putting her through more than she needed to go through on this trip that was for healing, not hurting.
She shifted a little closer. Pushed her chest to his so those puckered nipples were touching him through his own sodden t-shirt.
Niall stepped back. ‘Cass. I... Maybe I’m not a good idea.’
She blinked up at him, her eyes questioning, the hurt and rejection clear to see, even to him. He could change all that. Instead he found himself saying, ‘Yeah, you know it. I’ll see you in the morning…’
He turned towards the car, knowing he wouldn’t to get one wink of sleep because he’d be tormented by thoughts of her standing here in those translucent pyjamas, asking him to spend the night.
But when Niall reached the car and turned back to check that Carli was inside her tent, what he saw threw him completely. She was still standing in the same patch of now soggy grass, watching him walk away from her. His heart backflipped, somersaulted and cartwheeled all at once.
You threw this away once. Don’t make the same mistake again.
And in three paces he was back with her, muttering two words which meant there would be no more restraint.
‘Fuck it!’