Kurzbeschreibung
The injured U.S. Marshal needed a ride from Kansas to his home in Texas. Haley had a car. She figured she owed him a favor. And he knew a lot more about being bad than she did. A few days, just the two of them, in her tiny convertible and intimate hotel rooms…It would be fun, it would be passionate, it would be an experience.
At least, that was her plan. He just didn't know it yet.
Leseprobe. Abdruck erfolgt mit freundlicher Genehmigung der Rechteinhaber. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.
He'd been around long enough to know that when a pretty, wide-eyed blonde walked into a seedy roadside bar, somewhere, somehow, there was going to be hell to pay. Kevin was determined to stay out of the way. No matter what.
He turned his attention from the petite blonde back to the bartender. "Burger," he said, pushing the plastic menu back at the man. "Extra fries."
The bartender nodded and wrote something on a pad of paper, then set a frosty mug down on a once-white coaster advertising the local grange.
Kevin took a long drink. He'd just spent the better part of the day transporting a convicted felon across state lines. The process had not gone smoothly, which explained the bite on his arm. The skin hadn't been broken, but he really hated when there was trouble on the road. If he hadn't drawn the short straw, he would be down in Florida, helping with a drug raid. But no, he was stuck in Kansas where the air was so thick you could practically stand a spoon up in midair. The pressure was rising—or maybe falling—he could never remember which one caused storms to spin out of control and become tornados.
He'd grown up with twisters, back when he'd lived in Texas, and he'd never liked them. They always seemed to show up right when he was supposed to be whipping the crosstown rival at a baseball game.
Kevin thought about tornados and Texas. He even tried to remember if he needed to buy milk when he flew home the next day. Anything to keep from turning to watch the progress of the blonde. It wasn't that she was so attractive that he couldn't resist her. Far from it. Sure, she was pretty enough, but pretty was a dime a dozen.
Instead, what made him determined to stay out of it was the nervousness he'd seen lurking in her eyes, and the hesitation in her step. She belonged in this bar as much as a dog with mange belonged in church.
The bartender flipped on a small television. Instantly the sound of a ball game blasted into the half-full room. Kevin continued to drink his beer, while he stared determinedly at the screen. He ignored everything else, even the half sly, half defiant male laughter behind him.
Bullies moving in for the kill.
He swore under his breath as he set his mug on the bar and pulled off his cap. The one with U.S. Marshals embroidered on the front. He was hot, he was tired, he was hungry. The last thing he wanted tonight was a fight.
Since when did fate pay any attention to what he wanted?
He turned on the bar stool and surveyed the situation. The blonde stood between two big guys with more tattoos than sense. A third, smaller man, had his hand on her arm.
She was of medium height, maybe five-four or five-five, with short hair and big eyes, more blue than hazel. There wasn't a speck of makeup on her face, but she was still attractive, with full lips and a stubborn-looking chin.
Her clothing choices made him wince. The shapeless short-sleeved dress she wore fell nearly to her ankles. It looked ugly enough to be embarrassed to be a dust cloth— with a white lace collar and some god-awful flower print. What was it about women and clothes with plants on them?
Kevin approached the quartet. The blonde struggled to break free of the little guy's hold. When she looked up and saw him, relief filled her eyes.
"You with them?" he asked, getting more tired by the second.
She shook her head.
Kevin turned his full attention on the man holding her arm. "Then, son, you'd best let the lady go."
One of the big guys took a step toward him. Kevin flexed his hands.
"I've had a bad day, gentlemen. I'm hungry, tired, and not in the mood. So you can walk away right now, or we can move it outside. I feel obliged to warn you that if we take this to the next level, the only one walking away will be me."
Haley couldn't believe it. She felt as if she was in one of those Clint Eastwood Dirty Harry movies her dad liked so much. She half expected to see the dark-haired man pull out a .357 Magnum and ask someone to make his day.
Instead, the skinny man with rabbit teeth who'd been holding her arm let go. He took a step back, holding up his hands and trying to smile.
"We didn't mean nothin'. Just thought the lady would like some company."
His two friends nodded. They were big. Bigger than her rescuer. A couple of their tattoos had interesting swearwords woven into the designs. She'd been trying to read them when Mr. Rabbit Teeth had grabbed her.
The three of them threw some bills on their table and left. Haley breathed a sigh of relief.
"That was something," she said earnestly. "I didn't know what to do. I mean, when he wouldn't let go. I thought about screaming, but it's kind of embarrassing to have to do that. I didn't want to make a fuss."
The man who had come to her assistance didn't say anything. Instead, he headed back toward the bar and slid onto his stool. She followed.
"Thank you for rescuing me," she said.
"Make a fuss," he said, reaching for his beer.
She sat next to him. "What?"
He took a long swallow, then stared at her over the mug. "Next time you get in trouble, make a fuss. Better yet, next time stay out of bars."
Haley reached out to tug on a strand of her hair, only to remember too late that she'd cut it all off the previous afternoon. Instead of a long braid nearly to her waist, she had short bits of fluff flying around her head.
She smoothed what was left of her bangs, then nodded. Stay out of bars. It was probably good advice. "I just can't," she said with a sigh. "Not yet."
The man stared at her. "You have a death wish?"
She laughed. "I'm not going to get killed. I just need to handle things better." She scooted a little closer and lowered her voice. "Can you believe that until two days ago I'd never been in a bar before?"
Her rescuer stared at her in shock.
"I know," she said. "I've led a very sheltered life. It's pathetic. I mean, I'm twenty-five years old and I've been living like a nun." She shrugged. "Not that I'm Catholic. We're Baptists. My dad's a minister at our church."
The man didn't say anything. He turned his attention to the baseball game on the television. Haley studied his strong profile. He was handsome, in a rugged, cigarette-advertisement sort of way. There was an air of strength about him. He looked people in the eye when he spoke and she liked that. He wore his dark hair short.
She reached over and picked up his U.S. Marshals cap, then ran her fingers along the stitching. "So you're like a cop?"
"Sort of."
"I'll bet you're a good one."
He turned his attention back to her. She noticed he had brown eyes the color of chocolate, and while he'd yet to smile at her, she liked the shape of his mouth.
"How the hell would you know that?" he asked, sounding gruff and annoyed.
His tone made her spine stiffen just a little, while the swearword startled her. He'd said the H-word. Just like that. She would bet that he hadn't even planned it. The word had just come out.
One day she was going to swear, too. She would casually drop the H-word or the D-word into conversation. But that was all. Swearing was one thing, but really bad words were just ugly.
He waved a hand in front of her face. "Are you still in there?"
"Oh. Sorry. What was the question?"
"Never mind."
She put his hat back on the bar....
