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  "Ventilation and light. I've added more than most people. I experimented with mirrors for a while, too, trying to get the most light possible, but I wasn't successful. I reckon a dugout's a dugout for all that."

  "Hardly. This is lovely and unique. You should be proud."

  His grin lit the hallway. "First nice thing you've said to me, Kelsey."

  She realized he was probably right, and, despite herself, she felt ashamed. She wasn't going to let him know it, though. "I guess I'm going to have to be more careful."

  "Or you're going to have to admit you know I didn't push your father down a mine shaft."

  She was silent, but she knew she was only one step away from admitting just that. And out loud, too.

  "This would be your room." He made an abrupt left turn.

  The room was a delight. Round, like a castle turret, with a domed ceiling, the room was different from everything else in the house.

  "I'm afraid I had an attack of whimsy when I designed this," Dillon apologized.

  Kelsey knew it hadn't been an attack of whimsy. Whether he was aware of it or not, the room had been designed for a child, or children. It was large enough for two little people, and with its grass-green carpeting and walls painted the warm yellow of sunshine, it would have been perfect for them. "This was my father's room?" She couldn't imagine a grown man sleeping here.

  "He wasn't here long. He had a place on the other side of town before he came to stay with me."

  Kelsey wondered how it would feel to sleep in a bed Jake Donovan had slept in before her. She smiled a little.

  Dillon saw her defenses weakening. "So, shall we get your things from the motel?"

  Kelsey came back to earth. "Where's your room?"

  "On the other side, down the hall from the kitchen."

  "I'd like to see it."

  That misplaced dimple marred his cheek. "Come on, Kelsey, do you think I intend to sleep in here with you?"

  She shook back her mane of hair. "I have seen only one bedroom."

  "If you're so anxious to see where I sleep," he said with a grin, "follow me."

  Back in the hallway she followed him at a discreet distance. "This is the bathroom," he said, pointing before he turned. "We'll have to share. And this is my room." He stopped in front of a closed door. When he didn't move, Kelsey moved around him to turn the knob herself.

  Dillon's hand clamped down on her wrist. "Don't."

  She was hurt by his curt tone. She answered with sarcasm. "What's wrong? Is this where you store the skeletons of people you push down mine shafts?"

  "This wasn't closed when I left this evening."

  Kelsey frowned. Her wrist was beginning to throb. "You're hurting me."

  With no apology he loosened his grip. "I'm certain I didn't close it."

  "How can you remember something like that?"

  "I had my hands full of books I was taking back into the living room. And I don't close doors, anyway. There's no need, with just me living here."

  "Then who closed it?"

  "An excellent question. Stand back, would you?" Dillon dropped her wrist. When she didn't move, he turned his head to stare at her. "Way back."

  There was no humor in his eyes now. There was deadly intent, and anger. Kelsey was glad she wasn't on the other side of the door. "What are you going to do?" she asked, without moving an inch.

  "I'm going to kick the bloody door open. And you're going to stand back. Understand?"

  She had never seen him this way before. She didn't even give his words a second thought. She moved back. Way back. Dillon nodded. "Thank you." Without another word he gave the door one shark kick, flattening himself against the opposite wall in a single, explosive movement.

  The door hit the wall behind it with a bang, then creaked as it swung back toward the threshold. It stopped short of closing.

  "Well, you showed that door," Kelsey said. "That'll teach it for shutting without your permission."

  "I'll take your sarcasm in small doses and not at all right now, thanks." Dillon nudged the door with his toe until it was open once more. "Stay where you are. I'm going to turn on the light." He reached around the door frame and clicked a switch, leaping back immediately afterward.

  Nothing happened. "Could the bulb be burned out?" Kelsey asked, beginning to feel the first prickles of fear.

  "Quite a coincidence if it were, wouldn't you say?" Dillon peered into the room, but the soft light from the hallway barely penetrated. He joined Kelsey, taking her arm to restrain her from entering the room. "I've got a torch in my workroom. I'll get it. You go back to the living room while I explore."

  "Not on your life."

  "An apt sentiment." His grip tightened, and he steered her toward the workroom. "By any chance were you a cheeky kid? Was your desk in the corner in primary school?"

  She tossed her head. "Just in grades one through three. In fourth grade I got a teacher who asked me to do things instead of telling me."

  "Will you go into the living room and wait, please?"

  "No." Kelsey felt Dillon's fingers tighten in frustration. She felt a surge of sympathy for him. "I'm not trying to be difficult."

  "You're difficult without trying."

  "Dillon, I'm worried, too. I don't want you going in there without backup." When he dropped her arm she leaned against the doorjamb as he went into a well-stocked workroom and pulled a large flashlight off a pegboard hook. "What do you think you're going to find?"

  "I have no way of knowing."

  "Shouldn't you call the police?"

  He laughed humorlessly. "Sergeant Newberry would love that, wouldn't he now?"

  "Then let me help you."

  There was nothing he could do, and he knew it. "Stay in the hall, then."

  Kelsey knew compromise when she heard it. "At first," she agreed.

  "Don't even come with me if you're not willing to do what I tell you to. This is my house," he reminded her as she started to protest.

  She suddenly realized what they were arguing about. She was offering to risk her safety for him, and he was denying her the chance. She frowned. "You keep trying to protect me."

  "Just do as I say."

  She was so busy trying to figure how this side of Dillon fit with Sergeant Newberry's accusations that she forgot to protest. "Fine," she murmured.

  Dillon started back down the hall. At his door he stopped. "I'll let you know if there's any reason to be concerned."

  "This could all be your imagination. Breezes blow doors closed and lights burn out."

  "I changed those bulbs last week. And we're underground. Breezes are one problem we don't have."

  She ignored the last. "Maybe there's a short in the wiring."

  Dillon flicked the flashlight switch and flooded the hallway with more light. "I don't plan to be long."

  Kelsey watched him step over the threshold. She could see nothing except the wavering beam of his light. She stifled the impulse to ask him if he had seen anything yet. She was sure he would tell her. There was a burst of light from the bedroom, and she stepped closer to the doorway.

  "The bulbs in both lamps were loose," Dillon called.

  Kelsey stepped closer until she was on the threshold.

  "Couldn't stay back," he said, peering at her over his shoulder.

  "An insatiable curiosity." Kelsey scanned Dillon's bedroom. It was large and attractive, with walnut furniture, including a huge rolltop desk. The center of the room was taken up by a king-size bed covered with an orange and gold striped comforter. Framed prints of the outback decorated the walls.

  "Nothing looks out of place so far," Dillon observed.

  "Maybe nothing is."

  "I'd be just as glad if it weren't."

  Kelsey watched him examine each piece of furniture. Then he carefully opened the closet door. From the gingerly way he handled everything, she knew he was worried about explosives. When he was satisfied the closet hadn't been tampered with, he knelt beside the bed and peered
beneath it.

  "That about does it, don't you think?" Kelsey asked.

  "There's nothing different that I can see."

  Kelsey wondered if he had staged this entire scene for her. Was she supposed to believe that he had risked his life to be certain the room was safe? Somehow she couldn't believe it, but the possibility still lingered. "Apparently you were imagining things."

  "I don't mind imagining things if just once it keeps me from making a costly mistake." He stood, brushing the knees of his trousers. "But I didn't make a mistake this time. The door wasn't closed when I left."

  "My, my. We hate to admit when we're wrong." Kelsey stood her ground as he approached.

  Dillon put his hands on each side of the door frame, his face inches from hers. "Have you ever wondered, Kelsey Donovan, why you're trying so hard to mistrust me?"

  “Self-preservation.''

  He moved a little closer. "Exactly what part of yourself are you trying to preserve, woman? Haven't you figured out by now that I'm not going to hurt you? I'm on the same side you are."

  "What are you trying to get at?"

  "There's more to your flippant little remarks and your chin two inches in the air than mistrust. You're trying to keep me at arm's length because you feel the attraction between us."

  Her eyes widened, but no other part of her moved. "I'm a very bad person to make a pass at, Dillon."

  "I'll agree, but not for the reason you think. I care this much about your damned black belt." He snapped his finger. "But I am beginning to care about you. And that's the best reason I know not to make a pass at you."

  Confusion seeped through her defenses. "What's that supposed to mean?" Even to her own ears her voice sounded breathy and very feminine.

  "It means that a pass is out of the question." One of Dillon's hands settled in the curls framing her cheek, then threaded through them to rest at the back of her head. "A demonstration of affection is not."

  Kelsey watched his mouth descending. In the brief seconds before his lips touched hers, she told herself that he was kissing her from relief, or from a calculated plan to throw her off guard, or just to get even with her for one too many caustic remarks. The moment his lips touched hers, all those voices were silenced.

  He had been right. Their mutual attraction was undeniable, but if she had known it, she had only known it on some subliminal level. And now, one kiss exposed the attraction and named it something else.

  Desire.

  She tried to pull back, but his hand cupped the back of her head with the comforting touch of a man who knows that eventually he'll get what he wants. He brushed his lips over hers once, again, before he murmured, "Kelsey, why fight everything that happens to you? Just kiss me back. It's so easy."

  Easy for everyone else in the world, perhaps, but giving herself was the most difficult thing Kelsey would ever be asked to do. Even a kiss was giving up too much. "Let go of me," she said, taking a deep breath to draw more air into her lungs.

  His hand fell away, but his lips settled on hers again in a gentle caress. Strangely she could not pull away now that he no longer held her. He was taking nothing, and although she was giving nothing, this in-between, this place where they weren't quite friends, weren't quite lovers, was a place she felt safe to explore.

  Dillon sensed her assent and deepened the kiss a little, stroking his tongue over her bottom lip. She was unbelievably sweet, even though she was denying herself a response. Her eyelids had drifted shut, more like a child who doesn't want to see a hypodermic than a woman who wants to absorb all sensation without the distraction of sight. He stepped closer to her, sheltering her in his arms without actually holding her. With the smallest pressure, she could have broken away.

  Kelsey let the warmth of Dillon's body seep into hers. She hadn't even known she was chilled. She felt his eyelashes brush across her cheek, felt the warm brush of his lips as they trailed slowly to her forehead. Felt a surge of desire force never would have provoked. Her hands hung limply by her sides, but as he moved closer still, she resisted, pressing her palms against his shoulders.

  The resistance was the signal Dillon needed to stop kissing her. He opened his eyes and moved no closer. But his hands settled at her waist. "You've a way of getting to me," he said softly. He inhaled the scent of lavender, and his hands smoothed down to her hips. "Whether I want you to or not."

  "And what about what I want or don't want?"

  "I'm not at all certain you know."

  She stiffened suddenly, so suddenly that his first reaction was to hold her tighter. His eyes searched hers. He could see her pupils dilating in surprise and the beginnings of fear. "What is it?" he demanded.

  "Something just brushed across my ankles," she whispered.

  In the split second before he answered, Dillon called himself every name imaginable. "Stand very still."

  "Very still," she repeated.

  Moving with agonizing slowness Dillon peered over her shoulder. A snake whose orange and brown stripes were the color of his comforter peered back at him from a deadly coil at Kelsey's feet.

  Chapter 8

  THE NEXT FEW seconds would never be clear in Dillon's mind. Perhaps if he had been given time to think, he would have responded differently. As it was, there was no time. His hands slid back to Kelsey's waist, and he lifted her high in the air, turning ninety degrees as he did to thrust her to safety. In the same second that she hit the ground, he lifted one booted foot and smashed it squarely on the snake's head.

  Kelsey's scream unnerved him almost more than the squirming under his boot heel. Both stopped at the same moment.

  Satisfied that the snake would never threaten anyone again, Dillon lifted his foot and moved to Kelsey's side. His arms closed around her as she collapsed, and she hugged him back.

  "It's all right, Kelsey," he repeated over and over, stroking her hair. "The snake is dead."

  She was battling tears and could do nothing more than nod against his chest. "I don't like snakes," she admitted unnecessarily, her voice sounding strangely like her knees felt.

  "A healthy attitude here."

  She almost didn't want to know why. Almost. "Why?"

  "Most of our snakes are poisonous. Not all are deadly, of course...." His voice trailed off as he thought about the one he had just killed.

  Although her arms remained around his waist she lashed out at him,. "How can you live like this, then? Never knowing when a snake is going to find its way in here?"

  She hadn't yet made the connection. Dillon wished she had realized the truth on her own. As he stroked her hair he seriously considered lying, but in the end he opted not to, simply because he knew the truth would occur to her later. "Kelsey, think hard about what's happened in the last few minutes."

  She was still too agitated to think at all. She raised her head and met his eyes. "What do you mean?"

  He knew he was going to have to spell it out. "Someone put the snake in my room. That's why the light was off and the door was closed. I didn't find it because we left the door open and it came out into the hall when we went for the torch. But someone assumed I wouldn't notice the door, and my little welcome home party would greet me unawares."

  She didn't want to believe him. "You're just guessing."

  "This place is as tight as a drum. Even the air vents are covered with wire mesh. Snakes don't find their way inside."

  Add that up with a door that had been closed and light bulbs that had been unscrewed. Kelsey knew he had to be right.

  Or he had to be lying about the whole episode.

  Perhaps the snake was harmless. She ventured a glance at it. It looked like a close relative of a garter snake. She knew garter snakes intimately because she'd had a cousin who had repeatedly teased her with one. Perhaps Dillon had staged this entire little show to convince her that he could be trusted.

  Kelsey's made herself step back. Dillon read the beginnings of distrust in her eyes; he could almost see her thoughts. He could have pointed ou
t that she had insisted on seeing his bedroom and that he had asked her to wait in the living room when he’d first suspected danger. He could even have pointed out that the snake had represented as much danger to him as to her. To his knowledge, snakes couldn't be trained to selectively gnaw on trim little ankles.

  He pointed out nothing. "I'll take you back to the motel," he said coldly.

  "Please."

  He nodded, turning to start down the hallway.

  "Dillon?"

  He stopped but didn't face her.

  "I'd like to take the snake into town for identification."

  Dillon could have identified it for her, but he didn't bother. Kelsey would have to find out for herself. And this time, at least, he was the man who was going to let her.

  "I'll get you a sack. Just remember, dead snakes have been known to kill people who come in contact with their venom. Be careful how you handle it."

  "Then you're saying this snake could kill?"

  "I'm saying that, yes."

  Kelsey followed him, giving the snake the widest berth possible. She didn't know how she was going to stand carrying it, bag or not, but she knew she must.

  "I'd cut off the head for you, but I suspect you'll want to be sure its fangs weren't tampered with." His voice was filled with irony. "Can't have you waking up tomorrow wondering if I'd rendered a deadly snake harmless just to impress you."

  Kelsey was caught in the web of her own suspicions. Either Dillon had just saved her life, or he had perpetrated the worst of hoaxes. She couldn't thank him for one while she half believed the other.

  Dillon turned the corner into the kitchen and came back with a burlap sack. "Yours." He handed it to her. "I'll be waiting in the ute."

  Kelsey took the bag, refusing to let him see how revolted she was at the thought of touching the snake. But she had brought this on herself, and there was nothing to do but go through with it. "Thank you." He was almost through the door of the playroom before her next words stopped him. "I wish things were different." It was the best she could do.

  A shake of his head said he didn't believe her. "I doubt that. This way you've got a built-in reason to stay clear of me. What would you do if that changed?"