She's No Angel

Guilty conscience. That was the only reason he was reaching into the dangerous confines of her luggage, pushing aside all sorts of silky, sexy things that made a sweat break out on his brow. Did the woman not own anything but underwear? How many frigging bra and panty sets did one female require? Blue ones, pink ones…He was losing his mind here. And had she never heard of sneakers?

Finally, feeling the rubbery sole of a flip-flop, he tugged it out, then felt around for the other one. It wasn’t there. “I guess your aunts weren’t really worried about doing a good packing job,” he said as he tossed her the shoe.

“Try that one,” she said, pointing toward a smaller case.

He did as she suggested, unzipping the smaller case. She was right, the other shoe was inside. Thank God.

Tossing it over, he rose and stepped to the Jeep in time to watch her slip the flip-flop on her bare foot. “You’re not taking that with you,” he said, nodding toward the tire iron.

Tilting her head to one side, she stared up at him for a moment, then sighed. “You’re right. I probably shouldn’t.”

“You still feeling violent?”

She stared hard at the screw-me sandals. “Do you know what I paid for those shoes?”

Whatever it was, it couldn’t have been enough to cause the instantaneous reaction in him. “Give me the tire iron.”

“What if I get a flat tire?”

“Call AAA. You’ll have a car with you this time.”

She handed the iron bar over grudgingly, then stepped out of the car, hissing as her weight shifted onto her feet.

“You all right?”

“I’ll be fine.” She was entirely focused on her belongings and her scratched car, staring at them, then at the two old houses. And suddenly her anger appeared to fade again. He could have sworn he saw a tiny, reluctant smile playing around on those full lips of hers. “They are tough old birds, aren’t they?”

“Just don’t wring their necks and stuff them.”

She laughed, as though he’d been teasing her. He supposed he had been…. Where did that come from?

Jen bent over and began picking up her things, shoving them into her bags. Without asking if she wanted him to, Mike began to help her. He avoided anything silky, sticking only to toiletries. Even that was a little dangerous considering he wanted to lift a bottle of creamy lotion to his nose and smell it, to try to figure out whether it had provided the incredible scent wafting from Jennifer’s soft skin.

“Do you want me to come in with you?” he asked, having no idea where the impulse had come from. He could honestly say it wasn’t out of fear that she was going to do anyone harm—despite her anger, he knew she wasn’t going to hurt her elderly relatives. No, he had made the offer because of that hint of vulnerability he’d seen earlier during their drive. And the touch of humor he was seeing now.

He liked this woman. He sensed he could like her a lot. Considering he already wanted her more than he’d wanted anyone in ages, it was probably a pretty dangerous combination. One that should have sent him running, considering his track record with relationships. As in: two typical losses at the end of long, drawn-out, nine-inning matches. And one total strikeout, complete with a hospital stay for a bullet wound.

“That’s nice of you, but no thanks.”

He still didn’t go. Even with Mutt whining from the back seat, wanting either to get moving or get out, he just stood there, waiting to see if she needed him.

Women often needed him. His brothers thought he liked that. Hell, maybe they were right. Maybe he did have some basic urge to take care of people who couldn’t take care of themselves, quite often attractive women. He had the feeling anybody who wanted to be a cop had the basic urge to protect. And, in his line of work—particularly when working vice—he met a lot of women who’d been abused or taken advantage of. By pimps, dealers, hustlers. There was always somebody in need.

Maybe this woman wasn’t like any he’d met on the streets of New York. She was, however, still in need, whether she knew it or not. Even if all she needed was for someone to make sure she had a pair of shoes on her feet.

He wasn’t abandoning her. Not yet.

“I’m going to be fine,” she said with a resolute nod. “Obviously I have a lot to say to my aunts….”

“Are you sure you can say it without a weapon in hand?”

“My tongue has been registered as a lethal weapon in a couple of states.”

There was a suitable comeback to that, he was quite sure. And it would have rolled out of his brother Max’s mouth immediately. But Mike wasn’t wired that way, to grab any opening a woman provided and charm his way through it. No. Instead, he kept his reactions deep inside, schooled in giving no one an advantage by revealing his thoughts. Especially like the ones flooding his mind right now…the heated images of what her tongue was capable of doing. Wicked things. Amazing things.

She glanced at the house. “I feel like I’m heading into the lion’s den.” Her face was a little pink. Probably from her stroll in the sunshine—not a subtle admission that she knew what had been going through his mind. And certainly not that her thoughts had echoed his.

“Have any idea what you’re going to say?”

“Not exactly. They don’t understand,” she said, not looking very sure who she was trying to convince more, herself or him. “I need to make them see that I’m talking about The Love Boat on land for seniors. Not the nasty, run-down home for the indigent that they’re picturing.”

“Sounds reasonable.” And it did. To him. A twenty-seven-year-old single male living in a small house in Queens. If he were the one being asked to leave his home and move into a sterile “retirement community”? Well…he wasn’t so sure.

“Thank you, Mr. Taylor. I really do appreciate you stopping, but I can handle this on my own now.”

He stared into her face, noting the blueness of her eyes, a contrast to the stormy gray they were when she was angry. She looked calm…resolute. Able to take on any challenge. He suspected her relatives would have more trouble on their hands with a determined Jennifer Feeney than with an enraged one. Because something told him this woman didn’t give up when there was something she wanted. Ever.

Oh. Right. She’d told him exactly that, hadn’t she?

“Goodbye,” she said, putting out her hand to shake his. She didn’t suggest they see one another again, didn’t offer her phone number or ask for his. And since he already knew she didn’t give up on anything she wanted, there was only one conclusion he could reach: she didn’t want him. The attraction was purely one-sided.

That, it seemed, was the end of that. The interesting interlude was over and he’d never see Jennifer Feeney again. By her choice. He wondered why the thought bothered him so much, considering he’d known her all of an hour.

Left with no other option, he put out his hand. Ignoring the cool softness of her skin against his, he said, “Good luck. Don’t kill anyone.”

Without another word, he got in his Jeep, and drove away.

RIGHT AFTER SHE’D BEEN DROPPED off in the driveway by Mr. Hunky-but-aloof, Jen calmly finished picking up all her things. Well, pretty calmly, considering how painful it was to see the mangled shoes and broken luggage. If her parents had been around to hear the words coming out of her mouth, they would have regretted wasting their money on her parochial-school education.

Somehow, she put aside her anger and managed to repack. Though she suspected Ida Mae and Ivy were watching from their windows, no matter how many times she looked toward them, she never caught as much as a twitch of a curtain.

That didn’t mean anything. The old structures were so dark inside—as forbidding and unwelcoming as a pair of caves—either of the aunts could have been standing behind an uncurtained window, studying her every move. Her gaze would never have been able to penetrate the murky recesses of the houses to see them. But she could see them in her mind. Arming themselves in case she came in. Or praying to the gods of mean old ladies for her to get in her car and drive away, never to bother them again.

Fat chance. Not giving up, not giving up, not giving up.

When, she wondered, had it become a crime to offer to pay a fortune to put up your relatives in a pricey, lovely retirement village where they could be waited on, kept fed and entertained, with lots of elderly single men to keep them occupied?

She simply had to explain—had to make them see.

Once she’d picked up all her things, she carried them to Ida Mae’s porch and reached for the doorknob. It was, for the first time she could ever recall, locked.

Pounding on the door, she cupped her hands around her eyes and tried to peer through the dirty inset glass. About all she could make out were the tiny dead bugs stuck between the window and the door frame. “Aunt Ida Mae? Come on, open up, we need to talk about this,” she yelled before pounding again.

A full minute went past. No Ida Mae. No Ivy. But from somewhere above, she heard the squeak of a window. Quickly backing off the porch, down the front steps, she looked up just in time to see a toothbrush come sailing through the air.

It was hers. And it landed in the dirt.

Jen gritted her teeth as the window slammed shut. “I’m not leaving,” she shouted, glaring at the second story of the house.

The window slowly groaned open again.

“Aunt Ida Mae?”

This time, her hairbrush was sent flying. It landed in a patch of mud a few feet away from the toothbrush.

“This is war,” she muttered, marching back up to the porch and trying the windows to the parlor. Though they didn’t budge, she wasn’t about to give up, and made her way around the entire perimeter of the house. Knowing the old woman wasn’t too concerned about security in this small, quiet town, she tried every single window, certain Ida Mae wouldn’t have locked them all since she’d ditched Jen in the middle of nowhere.

“Damn,” she muttered, trying the last one, to no avail.

Still not giving up, she went next door to Ivy’s monstrosity, only to discover the same thing. “They’re pretty serious,” she whispered, still not sure whether to scream and pound on the door or laugh at how darned determined they were.

The warped back porches of both houses nearly touched each other, and the two sisters went back and forth constantly, never trying to keep each other out. If Ida Mae had locked her door against Ivy, her sister would likely have taken offense and burned her house down.

Some would speculate that it wasn’t the first time.

Despite being a Feeney, Jen was not an arsonist. “But I am capable of a little breaking and entering,” she murmured. Especially because she paid the bills on these two houses.

Eyeing a small window into Ida Mae’s laundry room, she gave it some serious thought. It was already dingy and cracked, and would be just big enough for her to squeeze through.

Well, maybe. Given her recent love affair with two guys named Ben and Jerry, who’d substituted for any real man in Jen’s life, she had some serious hip action going on and she suspected some in the hood would say she had back. But she still suspected she could push herself through and pop out the other side like a cork emerging from a bottle.

Only to land on her head on the washing machine and bleed to death because, given her mood, Aunt Ida Mae wouldn’t lift a hand to call 9-1-1, if they even had such a thing in this town.

Okay. No breaking and entering.

She couldn’t force her way in, and she knew the best thing to do when dealing with the Feeney sisters was to outwit them. Or outwait them. So, deciding to make them think they’d succeeded, and, hopefully, let down their guard, she went around front, got her stuff and threw it into the trunk of her car.

“Put away your weapons, start celebrating,” she whispered as she started the car. “Just unlock a door.”

As she drove off, watching the houses in her rearview mirror, she waited for one of the women to come out on her porch and do an end-zone happy dance. Jen couldn’t watch for long, however, because she hadn’t gone a single mile when the car’s engine started to sputter. Quickly glancing at the gas gauge and seeing it firmly below the E, she groaned. “Oh, no, you did not!”

But they had. The two maniacal old women had gone on a joy ride and emptied her tank. And for the second time that day, Jen found herself stranded, thanks to the wicked Feeney sisters.

CHAPTER FOUR

When Napoleon dumped Josephine, don’t you think she was dying to run around saying, “That thing about a man’s height and his length…it’s true, it’s true!”

—I Want You, I Love You, Get Out by Jennifer Feeney

AFTER MIKE HAD DROPPED JEN OFF at her aunts’ houses, he’d made the short drive to his grandfather’s place. With every second, he’d tried to force all thoughts of the strange interlude he’d just shared with her out of his head. In the future, he’d probably look back and grin, thinking about the sexy, crazy woman with the tire iron. But for now, he was still too focused on the sexy part of the equation. Which wasn’t good. He didn’t need to be thinking that way about anyone right now, especially not a woman who had a violent streak. A woman he’d never see again.

He got as far as his grandfather’s driveway before he remembered the one thing he had neglected to pack. The dog snuffling against the back of his neck reminded him of the dog food still sitting on his kitchen counter at home. He had nothing for Mutt.

“Sorry, boy,” he said as he drove up toward the house.

He knew better than to just get out and leave a trip to the store until later. Mortimer would insist on giving Mutt an entire grilled sirloin, which would make Roderick sniff and mumble stuff about cooking for dogs. They’d snipe at each other like an old married couple—Roderick would get his feelings hurt, Mortimer would be completely oblivious and Mike would sit in silence all evening.

Uh-uh. No thanks.

The crotchety and affectionate, love-hate relationship between the two men might make people who didn’t know them wonder how close they were. Looking at them under today’s standards, their relationship might be questionable. But Mike knew better. In their day, Mortimer and Roderick had forged a completely unbreakable brotherhood, fired in battle, cemented during years of adventure and treasure-hunting. They’d been the modern-day equivalent of pirates, with women on every continent. Even stuffy Roderick had, per Mortimer, “cut a dashing figure” in his day.

Which made it strange that they were both now alone, and had been for many years. He didn’t doubt his grandfather would have liked to fall in love one more time, and he suspected Roderick would have, as well. They’d spent so long raising Mike and his brothers, though, they seemed to have let those dreams slip away. Now that the two old bachelors had taken up residence in Trouble, Pennsylvania, the odds of them meeting the kind of women they’d met in the capitals of Europe were slim to none. So they were apparently stuck with each other for life.

“I know Grandpa would welcome you right up at the table, pal, but old Roddy’s pretty particular.” Reaching over his shoulder, he scratched the animal’s scruffy head. “He won’t like cooking for a dog, not even one as superior as you.”

Besides, even if he did, Mutt didn’t handle table food well and Mike would spend the night cleaning up after a sick pet.

That cinched it.

So, doing a quick turnaround, he headed back to Trouble, hoping the small grocery store carried the right brand. For a mutt, Mutt was pretty finicky.

For some reason, his foot lifted off the gas pedal and he slowed down when he passed the old house where he’d dropped Jennifer off a few minutes before. He’d seen no sign of her.

That was good. Great. Perfect. So why, he wondered, had he been holding his breath, half hoping to see her yelling curses up at the window? Alone. Stranded.

In need of rescue again?

The idea was stupid and he kicked himself over it as he ran his errand. Why one hour in the company of a woman would have him wishing he’d have to come to her aid again, he honestly didn’t know. Talk about selfish.

Hell, maybe his brothers were right and he did have some kind of protector fixation. One more reason to stay away from women right now. All women. Especially the brunette who’d been filling his head since the moment he’d laid eyes on her.

Arriving at the store, he parked out front, then tied Mutt up to a pole by the door. Fortunately, the store was tiny and he could see him from inside. Even more fortunately, they carried the right brand, if not the same flavor of food.

He was heading back to Mortimer’s Folly, as his brother Morgan liked to call the ugly old white elephant their grandfather lived in, when he saw something that made him wonder if he was some kind of jinx. Or just the luckiest son of a bitch on the planet. Because ahead of him, parked on the opposite shoulder of the two-lane road, was a car. And standing beside it was a very frustrated-looking woman.

It was all he could do not to let Jennifer see his amusement when he did a quick U-turn and pulled in behind her. Getting out, he called, “Problem?”

She glared at him through her bangs, which had fallen into her eyes. “I ran out of gas.”

“Good. I was afraid the old ladies had ditched you again.”

Shifting her gaze away as he reached her side, she admitted, “They used up all my gas and I didn’t even notice it.”

“You know, I have to admit, someday I’d like to see those two aunts of yours for myself.”

“You can come to their funerals. They’ll be next week. Ivy would definitely want an open casket.”

“Still feeling murderous?”

“You have no idea.”

Oh, he felt pretty sure he had some. Dangerous or not, the woman was cute as hell when she was mad. “I think you need to be a little more on guard with those two.”

That full, sexy mouth of hers pulled tight. “No kidding.” She gazed longingly at his Jeep. “I don’t suppose you have a spare gallon or two?”

“No,” he admitted, “but there’s a gas station a quarter mile away. Let’s go.”

She hesitated for a moment, staring at him with those big, incredible eyes. She looked tired and annoyed still, but also wore that hint of vulnerability he’d seen before. She’d obviously had a very long day and looked about at the end of her rope.

Mike reached out and took her arm, giving her some physical support. And maybe some of the emotional kind, too. Not even realizing he owned such a gentle tone, he murmured, “On second thought, you’ve been through enough today. Why don’t you wait in your car, I’ll be back in five minutes.”

She nodded slowly, not pulling away. A tremulous smile curved her mouth up. Not her usual smile of snarkiness or mischief, but one of relief, of gratitude. “You know, it’s not going to do my reputation any good if people find out a nice, considerate guy came to my rescue not once but twice today.”

Ha. As if anyone would recognize him as a nice, considerate guy. Seemed they were both suddenly acting out of character. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”

Opening her car door, she got in. “Fair enough. Thank you.”

She didn’t say anything else as he walked away, nor much when he came back ten minutes later with a small gas can. Though he offered to follow her to the station after he’d put some gas in the tank, she insisted she’d be fine.

He didn’t press it. Whatever moment of weakness she’d allowed him to see earlier, it was under control now. She was staunch and resolute, appreciative, but also once again very self-confident. So accepting her final thank you and knowing there was nothing more for him to do, Mike got in his Jeep and drove away from her for the second time that day.

JENNIFER DIDN’T LIKE THE END of anything. Whether it was one of her books that she was having a great time writing or a visit from her parents or simply the joy of the holiday season, she hated reaching The End.

She especially hated watching people leave. Particularly people she’d just met—sexy people—who she’d like to get to know better. Like him.

But it obviously wasn’t to be. Like before, he’d played the hero and ridden away on his Jeep Wrangler steed. Big, strong, silent. As she watched Mike Taylor’s taillights disappear into her history again, she felt like a saloon girl watching the handsome lawman ride away in some cheesy western.

Pathetic. She was thinking like one of the women who wrote to her talking about how wonderful her own handsome hero had been before he’d turned into a cheating toad.

This latest incident was simply the crap-flavored icing on her mud pie of a day. One for the to-forget books.

After filling up her tank at Trouble’s one and only gas station—paying prices that would make an oil baron blush—she headed downtown. Her mood had slipped from mostly gray and cloudy to nearly black and stormy. A big part of her wanted to just keep driving, straight back to New York. She had a book to finish—her third—with a hefty check waiting at the end of it.

But she had a feeling that if she left, she would never be able to make herself return to Trouble and see her aunts again.

While that appealed to her on one level, on another, she knew that, as twisted as they were, she’d miss them. Miss their stubbornness and their independence, their caustic natures and the aura of mystery that had always surrounded them.

No. She wasn’t going anywhere. Not until they’d hashed things out, face-to-face.

But first things first. She steered the car toward the local store. Once inside, Jen ignored the shelves full of expired canned goods for a nickel to scout the first-aid area for bandages and antiseptic to clean her blisters. She managed to find a tube of stuff that didn’t look as if it had been produced during the Carter administration. Adding a toothbrush to her cart, she paid for her things just as the store closed at six.

Six o’clock on a Friday night and the town was closing up shop. Rolling up its sidewalks. The one stoplight in the main square had already stopped changing from red to green and turned into a flat, blinking yellow beacon that screamed, “You’re in the middle of nowhere! Get out while you still can!”

“Unbelievable,” she muttered, glancing across the street at the one business that still appeared to be open. But it took a few minutes for her to muster the courage to actually go over and enter Tootie’s Tavern. Because if the Travel Channel ever stopped doing shows on the ten scariest places in the world, and started naming the ten scariest places to eat, this would probably make the cut. She’d bet it was on an FDA watch list somewhere.

Finally, though, she forced herself inside. Knowing Aunt Ida Mae and Aunt Ivy were very untrusting, she suspected they hadn’t even crawled out of their hiding places yet, much less unlocked any doors.

“Hey there, missy, thought you was gonna spend your whole week here without comin’ in to see me!”

This comment came from the owner, Tootie herself, who was shaped like a box—as wide as she was tall—with hair the color of congealing sausage gravy. But she had always been nice to Jen as a kid. Even if Jen’s mother had always made her throw away any cookie or treat Tootie had slipped to her during a family visit.

“Hi,” she said. “I, uh, need to use the ladies’ room.”

Jen immediately wished she hadn’t put it like that. She knew she’d been overheard when a meaty guy at a nearby table, wearing a Bud T-shirt and a backward baseball cap, snickered like a third grader who’d spotted a little girl’s underwear.

That, of course, instantly made her think about the conversation she and Mike had had earlier…and his wickedly erotic comment about the soft fabric between a woman’s soft thighs. The soft fabric between her soft thighs had gotten a mite damp after the remark, that was for sure. And just thinking about Mike now could probably make it more so.