Scarred Survival (Scarred Series Book 5) Read online

  “Nobody who comes here wastes their time, Aaron. Even if what you say is true and you don’t need much help yourself, others will still benefit from your experience. Your time here won’t be wasted especially as it seems that you have nothing else to do except heal that ankle and hand.” She glanced about the opulent room with its sauna at one end and therapy suites just behind. Golden tiles glinted against the walls of summer blue. The place was idyllic.

  She turned back to Aaron who continued staring back up at her with a strange glint in his eye.

  “It’s not such a bad place to be. Rest and enjoy it while you can.” She paused and pulled the towel around her tighter. “Look, finish your swim and then come and help make dinner. Patrick’s heading over from the hotel to show the guys how to make pastry. We’re going to do a steak pie.”

  Aaron suddenly grinned, his bright, open smile wiping all other thoughts from Gemma’s mind.

  “Steak pie! Now you’re talking. I wouldn’t miss that for anything. Give me ten minutes and I’ll join you.” He flipped back around and began gliding through the water at an alarming rate.

  Gemma raised an eyebrow and laughed. Men were the same the world over. Always thinking of their stomachs, though this time she could hardly blame the man. Patrick’s pies were one of the most delicious things she had ever eaten. Mouth watering pastry, light and crumbly with a rich and succulent filling. Her stomach rumbled noisily as she turned and walked back into the changing room.

  She cleaned the waterproof cream layer away from her arm before taking a quick rinse under the shower. She dried carefully before she put her arm back on and dressed. She glanced back into the pool room and then flicked a switch that connected a signal with the reception and Paul’s office. Paul or Amy would be able to see Aaron in the pool. She didn’t feel guilty about doing it. Rules were rules and if he had any sort of difficulty or problem she didn’t want it on her conscience that she hadn’t done the right thing. It wasn’t as if he would know about it anyway.

  She looked up at the clock on the wall and decided she just had time to go and do something with her hair before Patrick arrived to supervise the kitchen chaos that was bound to ensue. Living an Army life didn’t give you much time to learn to cook, and all of their guests were enjoying the challenge. If the kitchen ended up looking more like one of the too familiar bomb sites that all the men had experienced than the clean and ordered cooking station that it should be, it wasn’t so much of a problem. They all helped to clean up the devastation.

  Dragging a comb through her hair, she winced as the knots pulled free. She had kept her style very short while in the services, almost cropped, but in the two years since leaving, her hair had grown an enormous amount. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had it cut at a salon. Split ended curls stuck out everywhere and she groaned as she realized that she had let things go for far too long. She decided to call Ellen and see if any of the salon staff at the hotel could give her a trim later that week.

  She found a clip and pulled her hair into a loose bun, fixed it roughly and was about to leave her room when she spotted a dusty pot of cream on her dressing table. Her sister had given it to her in the weeks before her wedding in an attempt to moisturize Gemma’s skin into some sort of order for the make-up artist to work with. She hadn’t bothered using it since but now she picked up the pot and wiped the dust from the top with her hand. She twisted the lid and gave the cream a suspicious sniff. The scent wasn’t too overpowering. It actually smelled quite nice, sort of like freesias and freshly mown grass. She stuck her finger tip into the pot and dabbed a generous spot on her nose. She spread it about a bit and was surprised by the difference it made to the feel of her skin. She hadn’t realized how dry her cheeks had become since sailing nearly every day.

  A fingertip running over her lips had her sighing in despair. They were dry and cracked too. She groaned as she realized how much she had let herself go. There was a difference between not worrying while in the services where make-up was strictly forbidden and not bothering at all. Her face looked as though she didn’t care at all. Of course she cared. Every woman in the world did, and she cared especially that the fabulously attractive Aaron Thomas had just seen her looking her very worst. She glowered at the person glowering back in the mirror. Her worst? God! She looked like a wreck.

  She quickly scrabbled in the bag on her dresser pulling out several empty contraceptive pill wrappers, wondering why she ever bothered with the things now. In the services they had been useful, controlling her cycle when she was deployed, but since coming out she hadn’t needed them, not even for any random sexual encounter. There hadn’t been any of that sort of thing for more years than she could remember. She dug around and took out three old mascara wands of varying colours. She could have sworn she had bought them before she was injured. She pulled one of the wands from its holder and wrinkled her nose at the sour odour emanating from the tube. She shoved the brush back in its container and threw it into her bin.

  Peering inside at the rest of the mess, she puffed out a breath and gave up the struggle. She tipped out the rest of the bag of miscellaneous make-up onto her dressing table and sifted through the years old junk. Nearly all of it followed the stale mascara into the bin.

  The pale pink lipstick, again bought for her sister’s wedding, had obviously been right in the bottom of the bag. After picking at the bits of fluff and dust that had stuck to the tube, she opened the stick and twisted. She rolled her eyes as she saw the squashed end of colour rise out of its case. It had somehow become twisted around and forced up against its own lid whilst in the bag.

  She pulled a tissue from the box on her bedside table and cleaned the end off a little, squeezing and moulding, trying to reshape it into something that would glide over her lips rather than plaster itself thickly to them. She gave them a tentative swipe of the colour. It was pleasantly transparent giving only a sheen of natural colour and gentle softness to the delicate skin. Pressing her lips together to make sure the colour was evenly spread, she then looked at the effect in the mirror. Smiling at the result for a brief moment, she then frowned as she peered more closely at her reflection. She inspected her eyes and nearly passed out as she noted the state of her eyebrows. She had always thought that they were neater than Joe’s, but on further examination she wasn’t quite so sure. They almost met in the middle and stray hairs were dotted below the main line of her brow almost down to her eyelid. Horrified, she rummaged in the left over mess on the dresser again, knowing that there were tweezers in there somewhere before spending the next few minutes yelping loudly as she plucked at the overgrowth sprouting across her brow.

  After pressing a cold flannel to the tender skin she looked in the mirror once again. Her eyebrows were still not perfect but at least she no longer looked like an extra from the Planet of the Apes film set. She bit her newly tender lips as the ape analogy made her think of her legs. She hadn’t shaved or waxed them in months. She blushed as she wondered what Aaron had thought of her hairy limbs as she had climbed out of the pool, and immediately resolved to ask Ellen about maybe booking her in for not just a hair do, but a whole day’s worth of beauty treatments.

  There was nothing that she could do about her legs that night and she wasn’t that worried about them anyway as she always wore trousers, but she would have to do something before she went anywhere near the swimming pool again. She picked out clean clothes from her wardrobe and put them on before taking a final glance in the mirror. She breathed in deeply. By no means perfect, but she would have to do. In any case her face was already a vast improvement to the one she had shown everyone earlier. She just hoped that she hadn’t done too much and that none of the men would comment on it. Gemma let out a laugh as she tried to convince herself that she wasn’t doing it for anyone’s benefit but her own.

  A few minutes later she walked into the busy kitchen. Patrick Reeves looked up from the big bowl in front of him and gave her a quick smile before he dug his hands back
into the flour and fat, crumbling them together lightly with his fingertips and dropping the mixture again. The men, gathered around the huge kitchen table, looked more like they were squeezing an enemy’s neck as they crushed the ingredients together and flung it back down into their own bowls.

  Patrick exaggerated lifting the flour mixture and handling it gently between his fingers.

  “Gently guys. You’re making short crust pastry not cutting off someone’s airways. Try not to kill it before we cook it. Lift and crumble to make it light. We can pound some dough for bread next week if you like.”

  There was some gentle laughter as they all compared the clods of squashed ingredients in the bottom of their bowls to Patrick’s sloping heap of fine crumbs. He dusted off his hand and measured out cold water in a table spoon before dropping it into his mixture and stirring gently with a knife. He added more gradually until the crumbs just held together.

  Gemma stared at the huge man. It had never made sense to her how he could have been in Special Services. Those men were meant to be cold blooded killers, but Patrick had put that life behind him. Mostly. He’d been known to slip back into action on occasions when his friends needed his help, but his gentle side came out not only when he was with his family and friends, but in his cooking too.

  She looked up again as the kitchen door opened behind her. She took in a shallow breath as Aaron walked in, his damp hair covering his scarred forehead. His eyes glistened brightly and it was obvious that he’d taken a few moments to shave the day’s stubble from his jaw. Gemma kept her hands at her sides as some strange, unbidden emotion rolled in her stomach. She shoved the feeling to the back of her mind and forced her feet to remain still when she really wanted to go to him and run a fingertip along his now smooth jaw.

  Aaron stopped just inside the door as he saw Patrick with the knife in his hand. Patrick glanced up from his work and gave a quick smile but then stopped stirring the mixture.

  For just one moment Gemma didn’t know what was happening. The air felt as though it was sucked from the room as Patrick flicked the knife in his hand and launched himself across the kitchen. The look in Patrick’s eyes was terrifying but she moved without hesitation, forcing herself between the two men who now stood toe to toe just inside the doorway.

  She slammed her flour covered hands into Patrick’s huge chest just as his knife came up to her throat. His eyes flickered downwards to Gemma and he dropped the knife. Several of the men standing round the table jumped as it landed with a clatter, on the tiled floor.

  “Holy shit! Gemma! Dear God, I nearly...” he tailed off as he brought himself back under control.

  Gemma pushed him back a step.

  “What the hell is going on, Patrick? You looked as though you were about to gut one of our guests!” She thumped the big man on the chest sending a cloud of flour from her hand wafting about the room.

  Patrick’s eyes moved to Aaron who stood with his hands on Gemma’s shoulders, his whole body tense and on high alert.

  “Taylor! I thought you were dead!” Patrick suddenly exclaimed loudly. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

  There was total silence in the kitchen for a few seconds. Aaron didn’t take his eyes off Patrick for an instant and it was a few seconds before he spoke.

  “Sorry mate, you’ve got the wrong guy. I’m Aaron Thomas. I arrived here yesterday evening.” His tone was clipped but calm and brooked no argument.

  Patrick stared curiously at the man in front of him for a long moment and gave him a cool look up and down before he bent to pick up the dropped knife and turned to put it in the sink.

  Gemma could see the tension in Patrick’s shoulders. His hands shook slightly as he stood at the sink for a moment, using the time rinsing the knife to calm himself. He dried his hands before he turned back to Gemma and pulled her into his chest. He gave her a squeeze before backing off and looking down at her.

  “Jesus! Gem, I’m so sorry. Did I hurt you?” He ducked slightly to look her in the eyes, his own filled with concern and apology.

  Gemma shook her head and gave a slightly nervous laugh.

  “You’d have a knife sticking out of your butt by now if you had.” She gave him friendly jab on the shoulder with a lump of sticky pastry.

  Aaron let out a low chuckle.

  “Looks like I have my own protection detail!” He stepped out from behind her.

  Patrick’s eyes narrowed as he took a step towards Aaron and suddenly stuck out his hand.

  “I owe you an apology. Obviously a mistake, but I swear you look just like one of my team members, Ryan Taylor. He died years ago during an ambush. Seeing you gave me the fright of my life. I’m Patrick Reeves, with a memory that’s clearly been shot to bits. I obviously lost more than my leg when I was blown up.” He puffed out a huge breath. “If my apology is accepted, come and join us. These guys were just about to kill off their dinner. Let’s see if you have better luck.”

  Aaron gave an easy smile. He took Patrick’s hand and shook it firmly.

  “No harm, no foul. So long as Gemma is okay, there’s no damage been done.” He gave a quiet cough. “You were pretty quick off the mark there.” He glanced about the room and caught the eye of several of the men. “I’m going to have to swear you lot to secrecy about being saved by a short arsed girl with nothing but a lump of pastry in her hands.” There was some nervous laughter from around the table as the men began stirring the now greying, lumpy mess that sat in their bowls again.

  Aaron picked up a bowl and found a place next to Gemma. He pulled a thin rubber glove from his pocket and pulled it over his injured hand before he set to work.

  He glanced at the recipe Patrick had written on a chalk board and leaned across the table. His thigh bumped Gemma’s hip as he reached for the various ingredients.

  Gemma inched away, but his arm brushed hers once or twice as he caught up quickly, crumbling the ingredients together with one hand and rolling his pastry like an expert. Once or twice she glanced up at him and caught him staring back at her. Unable to control her hammering heart, her face heated rapidly, but she refused to think it might be due to a stupid reaction to Aaron Thomas and blamed it on the temperature of the kitchen instead.

  Having recovered his composure completely Patrick carried on with the lesson and brought a cauldron of already cooked steak filling to the table. The men spooned generous portions of meat and gravy into individual serving dishes. They all covered the tops with their pastry, crimped the edges, made little steam holes and brushed egg glaze over the top.

  Patrick washed his hands.

  “Okay, now that needs cooking for about half an hour or until the top is golden and crisp and the meat is good and hot. I like it when the gravy begins to bubble through the steam holes; not only does it look attractive, the bubbling tells you that the filling is boiling and safely heated through. I’ve made a big pie with my pastry for you all to share, compare and revise your technique. I want you all to make another batch of pastry after you have tasted your efforts tonight. We’ll make chicken pie next week only this time I’m going to show you how to make the filling. You can wrap your pastry and freeze it. It keeps very well. Just remember to take it out before next Thursday.”

  There were mutterings of appreciation at the huge pie that rested on the counter. Two portions of pie were always good and it meant that one night they would only have to prepare the vegetables from the garden. The steak pies were put in the oven and Gemma began clearing the table, loading bowls and cutlery into the dishwasher. Aaron handed her his utensils and then moved towards the sink. He washed his undamaged hand carefully before he peeled the glove from the other and dropped it in the bin below the sink. He looked back at Gemma as the other men began leaving the room.

  “Need me to do any veg for today?” He asked suddenly.

  Surprised at his offer, Gemma smiled at him and looked at the potatoes already boiling on the stove. “I think we’re having creamy mashed potatoes and frozen peas wi
th the pie tonight unless you’d prefer something else. Patrick gave us the recipe for the mash a couple of weeks ago. It’s beyond delicious and as we’ve had it almost every night since. All the guys know how to make it.”

  Aaron shrugged.

  “Mash? I think that even I can manage that. It’s just boiled potatoes smashed with a dash of milk, isn’t it?”

  Gemma closed her eyes dreamily and licked her newly moisturized lips.

  “Not the way Patrick makes it. Needs a great dollop of sea salted French butter plus some crushed garlic cloves and plenty of black pepper. Ben had the brilliant idea of adding leeks to it one night and he reckons it will taste even better with cheese grilled on the top. I think that’s he’s going to do that tonight for us.”

  Aaron raised an eyebrow.

  “I guess that does sound pretty delicious. Patrick’s obviously a great cook, but that was hellish scary back there for a moment. I swear I barely saw him move before he was in my face. I wonder why he thought he knew me. I’m flying corps and he was a mess cook. Doesn’t make sense. Those guys have seen thousands of men just like me. I certainly wouldn’t be remarkable.”

  Gemma shook her head and laughed at the thought of no one noticing the handsome man in front of her. Maybe it was a girl thing. She knew that she would certainly have remembered him. It was becoming quite difficult for her to think of anyone else. She took control of her rapidly beating heart.

  “You’d be right if he had been a mess cook, but I know that Patrick hadn’t stepped foot inside a kitchen until he came out here to fend for himself. He was a Special Services Major, a very brave guy. He was awarded the Victoria Cross a few years back. He retired when he lost his leg in an explosion.”