Page 24 of Indie

Water hammered the tiles in the bathroom, echoing loudly around the sparsely furnished upstairs rooms. I paced the floor, a new flood of anxiety coming over me, a conflict of emotions and a heavy dread. And I couldn’t pick either out from the other. Instead, I peeled back the curtains, making a tiny gap, my eyes scouring the street below. The same cars parked on the roadside, battered and well used, apart from the four-wheel drive with the tinted windows. It was too new for this street, for the people who lived hand to mouth, just like me.

I swallowed, forcing back the thick feeling of nausea grabbing at my throat. It was difficult to see from this angle, through the tiny space I’d made in the curtains, peering at the car, trying to see through the tinted glass at the occupants inside.

“Emmie?” His voice grumbled from behind me unexpectedly, and I jolted, nearly tearing down the curtain in shock. “I’m so sorry, Emmie,” he said, more softly this time. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

Indie stood in my bedroom, clutching a pink unicorn towel around his waist, his body half covered in colourful tattoos, winding down his arms and across the hardened pecks of his chest. They stopped just in line with the end of his sternum, leaving his stomach bare, the ripples of a six-pack untouched by the ink. The sudden intrusion of his nakedness had stolen any words, or any sounds I could make, my eyes darting over his body, unable to stay in one place long enough to process any of what I was seeing. Muscle, skin and tattoos. That was what I was seeing.

My cheeks grew warm, an irritating heat to my skin. I didn’t know what to say as I stood there staring at a half-naked man wrapped in a unicorn towel.

“I just need another towel. This one’s a bit small,” he said, the hint of a grin on his face.

I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t look anywhere but at him. At the mass of muscle in front of me. At the reds, and the blues, and the green snaking up his arms, covering, or rather complementing, the muscle of his biceps. Oh God. I’d never expected that was underneath the black T-shirt and the blue jeans I was used to seeing him in. Or the black leather bike jacket. I’d never even caught a hint that all those muscles would be hiding under his clothes. Now I didn’t know where to look. Well, not quite true. I knew exactly where to look; and I stopped looking there. And thank God the unicorn towel of Lily’s was enough to cover up most of his bottom half, because my eyes wandered everywhere.

“Emmie? Do you have a bigger towel?”

Indie’s voice broke my thoughts, making me flinch, the heat of embarrassment licking at the base of my neck.

“I… err… yeah. I’ll find you one, just a minute.”

But now the only way to get that towel was to squeeze past him in the doorway. The doorway he seemed to fill with his almost naked presence. And as I slid past him, holding my breath, he seemed even wider. His damp skin brushed my hand, the fresh soap smell radiating off his warm body. I held tighter to my breath, in case he could hear my rapid breathing as I passed, or the flutter of my heart.

I moved to the top of the stairs, to the airing cupboard where I kept the towels, pulling off a big white fluffy one fromthe top of the pile. When I turned around, he was behind me again, all muscles and tattoos, and a white fluffy towel I pushed against his chest.Indie retreated to the bathroom, clutching the pink unicorn towel around his waist and the white towel against his torso. I watched him go, the unicorn horn on the back of the pink towel waggling at me as he walked away.

The next time I saw him he was fully clothed, the jeans back on from the night before, and the black long-sleeved top covering up the tattoos I hadn’t known he’d had. The towels in his hands were bundled up, clutched under his arm as he walked towards where I stood in my bedroom, peering out through the crack in the curtains.

“Do you have a washing basket?” He asked, signalling to the towels in his hands.

“Here, I’ll take them.”

I held my hands out, waiting for them to be put into my arms. Instead, he dropped them on the bed behind me, stepping closer. He reached up, his arm moving too quickly, and I started, squeezing my eyes shut. But the arm that reached out didn’t cause pain, but sat gently around my shoulders, nudging me towards him. My breath stopped in my throat, my body tensing, and I wasn’t sure whether it was from the shock of him touching me, or the electrified pressure now building in the pit of my stomach.

“Thank you, Spuggy,” his voice was low, inviting.

I glanced up at him, at the rich brown eyes staring down upon me, grasping for reasons he would thank me. And then he ducked his head, placing a gentle kiss on the top of mine. I closed my eyes, savouring that moment, feeling his lips lingering against my hair. A million electrified tingles cascading from theroot to the tip, reminding me of everything I really wanted and everything I didn’t have. Pulling away, I let my gaze fall back to the window, moving the curtains again and glancing back down into the street, back to the car. The car that had been parked in my street since the altercation Indie’d had with Gaz in the garage. And now a new sensation filled my stomach. Fear.

“Emmie, what’s wrong?” Indie asked, right behind me.

I could have lied to him right then, made something up, but what I knew of him was that he could see more of me than I realised.

“That car out there in the street. With the tinted windows.”

“Uh, huh?”

“It’s been there two days now. Since you had that run in with Gaz. They’re watching me. I know it.”

And now that I acknowledged that fear, panic welled in my stomach, slithering up my throat, wrapping its fingers round my neck.

“It’s ok, Emmie. That’s just one of my guys.”

“One of your guys?” The words threatened to choke me, panic squeezing ever tighter.

What the hell did he mean, one of his guys?

“Who are you?” I whispered.

Chapter Twelve

Those beautiful blue-green eyes widened, panic contorting her pretty face, her mouth dropping open in a silent ‘o’.