Dark Country Read Online Free PDF Page B

make sure
     that anyone else who wants to punch you doesn’t get the chance tonight. Since there aren’t any other options, that means that
     you’re sleeping in my guest room, and I’m checking on you every hour for the next eight hours.’
    ‘That’s not necessary.’
    ‘In my judgement, it is. Humour me, Gillespie. Otherwise I’ll spend the whole night imagining you dead or brain-damaged, or
     standing guard over the Barretts, to make sure they don’t go after you again.’
    He made neither comment nor move, and his guarded expression gave no indication of his thoughts. But at least he hadn’t walked
     out.
    She snapped the catches on the first-aid kit and rose, picking it up with one hand, tossing him the ice-pack with the other.
     He caught it deftly.
    ‘Look, I’m not going to jump your bones, if that’s what you’re worried about. Even if I was interested, I’ve been working
     double shifts for two weeks and I’m too frigging tired to remember how. So you’re quite safe here.’
    She caught a flicker of something – amusement, maybe – on his face. Yep, underneath the layers of granite, there definitely
     lurked a human being. A physically attractive one. Possibly even a decent one. Not that a guy like him was likely to admit
     it.
    And yes, if she had any libido left he’d quite probably tickle it, but she
was
too tired to even follow that train ofthought, and he’d be gone in the morning. A quiet night with no more worrying was all she wanted, and Gillespie had given
     no sign he’d even think of trying anything. And if he did, well, he’d find out quickly enough that years of policing in the
     rugged, masculine environment of the bush had given her a whole lot of skills that made the police self-defence training redundant.
    As she headed towards the office, she tossed over her shoulder, ‘Did I mention that the guest bed is extra long, and the mattress
     is at least a decade newer than the ones at the hotel?’
    Two seconds passed before his laconic drawl floated down the passageway after her. ‘Well, you sure know how to tempt a man,
     Blue.’

    Gil jammed the ice-pack against his aching face and mentally kicked himself. Hard.
    No
. That’s what he should have said.
No thanks, I can sleep in the car out in the scrub
.
    Instead he’d not only called her by the traditional bush nickname for anyone with red hair, he’d made a damn stupid comment
     that could well add bruised balls to the rest of his injuries.
    There had to be a law against flirting with cops. And if it wasn’t in the statute books, it definitely was inscribed in his
     personal rule book, up there on page one, right next to ‘Thou shalt not let the Sydney mafia rule your business’.
    He heard a door close, then the firm tread of her boots back along the wooden floor.
    But when she appeared in the doorway, she didn’t look pissed off, just bone-weary. Like a woman who’d been working too many
     hours, and caring too much, for way longer than just a couple of weeks.
    Guilt twisted in his gut. If it weren’t for him, her day would have ended at least an hour ago.
    ‘So, this is where you tell me that the guest room is the one with the bars on the windows and the steel door, right?’
    She leaned against the door frame, arms folded, her strained smile hardly touching her eyes. ‘It’s only used for storing old
     files these days. Just don’t make me cram you into a filing cabinet, okay, Gillespie?’
    ‘I won’t cause you any trouble, Sergeant.’
    ‘You already did,’ she said simply, without any rancour, but the truth of it still made him feel like a bastard. ‘Adam’s walking
     the Barretts up from the pub now, so I’d better go and deal with them.’
    ‘What will happen to them?’
    ‘Since you won’t pursue charges, they’ll get the thermonuclear death-glare. They’ll be reduced to piles of radioactive dust
     on the floor within minutes.’
    She didn’t smile, and he almost felt some sympathy for the