Baby Dreams
Raye Morgan
CELEBRATION 1000 A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE BABY SHOWER… One minute, Cami Bishop was driving to a baby shower. The next, she'd been thrown in the slammer, courtesy of the county sheriff! How could she convince rugged Rafe Lonewolf she was innocent - when her thoughts about him were anything but? Thanks to a raging blizzard, Rafe was stranded at the jailhouse with his pretty prisoner.Thing was, Cami didn't act like a notorious outlaw. But she had come armed with a carload of baby loot and a hankering for happily-ever-after. For this confirmed bachelor, that was dangerous enough!THE BABY SHOWER: We're excited 'cause you're invited to celebrate the arrival of one bouncing baby - and three brand-new brides!CELEBRATION 1000: Come celebrate the publication of the 1000th Silhouette Desire, with scintillating love stories by some of your favorite writers!
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#ub082de83-ebbe-5ad1-bc8d-fd34d03088f2)
Excerpt (#u3f8434fc-3c58-5645-a73a-32e3d8957560)
Dear Reader (#ubb9e3c60-d164-5d72-b7c6-534dc3b82efd)
Title Page (#u0e619047-be94-5b41-a7cf-8a0e79ee215f)
About the Author (#uca326e57-251a-5e6b-b68f-334386ef28ed)
Dear Reader (#ud2929187-4e38-594c-861d-5e6f20d48b38)
Prologue (#u68579490-fb22-5f4b-8c5b-2c8196a507b4)
One (#u5d71ca2d-4824-59f5-9c30-f96bca951035)
Two (#u80f19b43-5999-590e-a02a-1388c7d40414)
Three (#u8a6547f9-f5be-5cd3-ad93-0aec8cb787d4)
Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“You’re Touching Me,” Cami Said.
“That’s not allowed, is it?”
Rafe’s fingers tightened. Anger was smoldering in his dark eyes.
“It all depends on whose rules we’re following.” He reached out and took up the handcuffs, then turned to her with a glint in his eyes. “I’m gonna have to put the cuffs back on you.”
She shrank back. “No!”
“You tried to make a break for it, lady. You’re not cooperating like a suspected criminal should.”
“I’m sorry I did that,” she said, backing away.
“I won’t do it again. Honest.”
Rafe hesitated. She was saying the right words, but the look in her eyes told him she was feeling anything but meek. Still, what was he going to do, tie her up?
At the thought of that, a part of him cringed. She was so pretty, so…
No. What was the matter with him? He was a cop. He’d locked up prettier women than this. And he was going to do the same here.
But not yet…
Dear Reader,
It’s the CELEBRATION 1000 moment you’ve all been waiting for, the publication of Silhouette Desire #1000! As promised, it’s a very special MAN OF THE MONTH by Diana Palmer called Man of Ice. Diana was one of the very first Silhouette Desire writers, and her many wonderful contributions to the line have made her one of our most beloved authors. This story is sure to make its way to your shelf of “keepers.”
But that’s not all! Don’t miss Baby Dreams, the first book in a wonderful new series, THE BABY SHOWER, by Raye Morgan. Award-winning author Jennifer Greene also starts a new miniseries, THE STANFORD SISTERS, with the delightful The Unwilling Bride. For something a little different, take a peek at Joan Elliott Pickart’s Apache Dream Bride. And the fun keeps on coming with Judith McWilliams’s Instant Husband, the latest in THE WEDDING NIGHT series. Our Debut Author promotion introduces you to Amanda Kramer, author of the charmingly sexy Baby Bonus.
And you’ll be excited to know that there’s more CELEBRATION 1000 next month, as the party continues with six more scintillating love stories, including The Accidental Bodyguard, a MAN OF THE MONTH from Ann Major.
Silhouette Desire—the passion continues! Enjoy!
Senior Editor
Please address questions and book requests to: Silhouette Reader Service
U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269
Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3
Baby Dreams
Raye Morgan
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
RAYE MORGAN
favors settings in the West, which is where she has spent most of her life. She admits to a penchant for Western heroes, believing that whether he’s a rugged outdoorsman or a smooth city sophisticate, he tends to have a streak of wildness that the romantic heroine can’t resist taming. She’s been married to one of those Western men for twenty years and is busy raising four more in her Southern California home.
Dear Reader,
What an anniversary! One thousand Silhouette Desire novels. One thousand red books, packed full of love, laughter and touching moments. Do you have them all? I have a friend who does—all those red books in a row on a special set of shelves her husband built for her in her bedroom closet. Any time she wants, she can pick one out and recall the surprises, the sudden laughs out loud, the tears, the sighs.
That’s what romance is all about—emotions. Who doesn’t like to think about what it feels like to fall in love—to see that special guy for the first time…the thrill the first time he touches you…the first time he kisses you…In real life you usually only get to fall in love once. Between the covers of those red books, you could have done it one thousand times! And I get to go even further—I get to write them (well, not all thousand).
Thank you for reading them. Thank you for loving them. This anniversary is for all of us to celebrate. Happy birthday, Silhouette Desire!
Love to you all,
Prologue (#ulink_355ccb49-a1d2-578b-9633-4ec9630774a2)
The Invitation
“Reginald, my darling, don’t you understand? I’m about to have…I mean, I’m…oh dear, it’s just that…don’t you see? Can’t you tell?”
“Margaret, my precious one, you’re not…I say, you can’t mean…that is, you’re not saying that you…”
“Yes! Oh, my love, it’s true! We’ll need a new wing on the old mansion.”
“Oh, my dearest. You’ve made me the happiest man in the world. At last, our love will be complete.”
“Yes, Reginald. At last. At long, long, last.”
The music in the soundtrack swelled with triumph and joy as “The End” swept across the screen, and Cami Bishop reached for another handkerchief at the same time she switched off the TV with the remote. She sniffed as she dabbed at her eyes. Looking around the nest she’d made for herself while watching the old movie, she noticed there were far too many used tissues littering the couch. Even for a rainy Saturday, this was a bit too much.
Listening to the early spring rain on the roof while sitting around in her pajamas and sobbing over happy endings was a guilty pleasure she only indulged in on days like this. There was just something about people falling in love and having babies that sent her into orbit.
“Maybe,” she noted dryly to herself, “that’s because it seems more and more like fantasy, something that could never happen to me.”
Once, it had seemed a sure thing. She’d wasted years on a relationship that had evaporated when she’d finally tried to pin it down. Now she felt like someone running for a bus that was picking up speed and pulling away.
But self-pity wasn’t her style, and she brushed away maudlin thoughts, pulling back her thick, curling blond hair and shoving a band around it, keeping it out of her eyes while she steeled herself to fight off the wave of weariness that seemed to be tugging at her senses.
The sound of her mail delivery hitting the floor of her entryway brought a quick surge of relief. At last, something to think about besides the babies that she would probably never have.
Jumping up, she padded to the door in her panda bear slippers and bent to retrieve the stack of magazines and envelopes.
“A bill from the phone company, a bill from the department store, a magazine on organic gardening, a flyer from my dentist…”
And then, a pink envelope with no return address, but heavily scented with a familiar smell. What was that? Baby powder? She held the envelope for a moment, feeling the texture of the linen paper in her hand. Then, holding it up to her hall light to see the shape of the card inside, she reveled in anticipation.
What could it be? An announcement of some sort? An invitation?
Her heart was beating just a little faster than it had a moment before. This was going to be something good. She could feel it. This was going to change her life.
“Yes!” she said under her breath. “Whatever it is, yes!”
Quickly she grabbed her letter opener and made a slit along the top of the envelope. The card that fell out was shaped like a cunning duck, wearing a tiny pink satin bow at his throat and holding a frilly umbrella. “A Baby Shower” the caption read. “We’re excited, ‘cuz you’re definitely invited!”
Cami’s heart fell, along with her shoulders. “No,” she groaned, closing her eyes for a moment. “Not another baby shower.”
Was everyone in the country having babies except for her?
Flipping open the card, she braced herself. “Come help welcome a new little person,” the card read. Her gaze slipped down to the handwritten note at the bottom of the page. “You’ll notice there’s no phone number for an RSVP. That’s because you will be here. Excuses are not an option. Cami, I’m dying to see you. Eight years is too long.”
Sara Parker. Her college roommate. Despite everything, a smile curled Cami’s wide, generous mouth. Turning to her desk, she rummaged in a drawer and pulled out a framed picture of four young women smiling at the camera, their faces full of hope.
Sara and Hailey and J.J…and Cami herself. So young. The Fab Four, they’d called themselves. It seemed like yesterday, and yet…so much had happened since then. That youthful optimism was hard to muster up lately.
And now Sara was going to be the first of their group to have a baby. Cami couldn’t help but feel a twinge at that news. Back in the old days, Cami had been the one who had been full of dreams of romance and making a family. The others had laughed at her. They’d all had other goals—careers, travel, adventure. Hailey was going to study art in Paris. J.J. planned a career in journalism. Sara was going to take over her father’s business—and then she was going to marry someone with the potential for real glory—maybe even the future president—they’d all said so. Smart and elegant, she’d make the perfect First Lady. And now, here she was having a baby shower.
Cami looked down at her wrinkled pajamas and her panda bear slippers and sighed. It wasn’t that she was a failure. After all, she was busy publishing and editing a successful specialty magazine, and doing a darn good job of it, if she did say so herself. Still, there was no longer a man in her life—hadn’t been for ages.
“Maybe there never will be,” she whispered, looking about at her lonely home. No husband. No babies. She was thirty. Was this it? Had she missed her chance? Would there never be a Reginald in her life?
“Oh, grow up!” she told herself disgustedly. “There is no Reginald, you dreamer. Face reality. Life and romance just don’t mix, not in the real world.”
There. That settled it. She needed one of these little pep talks every now and then. But at the same time, she was happy for her friend—her best friend. And full of resolve.
Yes, she would go to the baby shower. She was only human, and it wouldn’t be easy, seeing Sara’s happiness when she felt so left out. But she would do it. She had to.
The address on the card told her Sara was still living in Denver. She would drive there, she decided quickly. And suddenly she was filled with excitement. To see Sara again, and to maybe even see her new baby—that was going to be special. She could hardly wait.
Now what was she going to wear? Panda slippers were out. If she was going to portray an image of success and competence, she would need a new wardrobe. Gee, what a shame!
One (#ulink_3458ccae-cce1-5b0a-a465-2b57a6d6785d)
The snow was going to get bad. There was no way around it. It was fixing to storm. By midnight, the roads would be impassable. If he wanted to take one last run up the mountain, he’d best get to it.
Rafe Lonewolf strapped on his holster and put his service revolver in place, then shrugged into his heavy down jacket, pushed his hat onto his head and stepped out into the icy wind, heading for his blue-and-white unit.
A silver sedan was passing. It slowed to a stop and the window rolled down.
“Hey, good-lookin’,” called out the pretty young woman in the driver’s seat. A ruff of fur framed her face, just showing a hint of the long, black braid that was coiled at the crown of her head. Slanted dark eyes gave her an exotic look. “Want to come over for some hot coffee before you go?”
“No thanks, Sally,” he called, pausing and rocking back on his heels to nod to her. “I’m just going to make a run up to the ridge to make sure the Santos place is locked up for the night. I’ve only got one more hour on duty. Then I’m going to turn in.”
“Okay,” she said, smiling at him playfully. “Then come on over after you get back. It’s going to be a cold night. You’re going to need something to warm you up.” Her mischievous eyes sparkled, telling him she had more than coffee in mind.
He paused, kicking the heel of his cowboy boot against the curb, then sauntered to the car and looked down at her. “Sally, honey,” he said ruefully, giving her a slow, wry grin. “Give it up. What do you want with an old man like me, anyway?”
“You’re not an old man,” she said, looking slightly horrified.
His mouth twisted. “I’m charging hard toward forty, and you know it. You can’t be more than nineteen. You’ve got every young buck in the county crazy about you. Choose one of them.”
She pouted prettily. “Sometimes a girl hankers for a man with experience,” she told him, her gaze still flirtatious. “Sometimes those guys just seem so young.”
He laughed. “Pick a young one, Sally. He’s liable to be more trainable. This old experienced male is a little too fargone for you.”
She shrugged, still hopeful, and bit her lip teasingly. “Maybe you just need something special to recharge your batteries.”
He laughed again, drawing back. “No, I’d have to have a complete overhaul to deal with a bright young thing like you. Face it, Sally. I’m just an old bachelor, too set in my ways to change.”
Sally sighed and shook her head, still smiling. “I’m just talking about one evening, Sheriff. I’m not asking you to marry me.”
Not yet, anyway. But he only thought that, didn’t say it aloud. It was his experience that women always came around to the marriage thing, no matter how much they protested along the way—almost as though it were something implanted in their blood, something they couldn’t help—any more than he could help his aversion to it.
“Sam says you’ve got a tragic love affair in your past,” she said, not ready to give up at all. “Is he right?”
He wasn’t prepared for that, and whenever anyone blindsided him with the subject, it always took a second or two to steady himself. For a fraction of time, a picture of Janie flashed into his mind. It was more than a picture, really. There was the scent of gunpowder, the sting as one of the bullets crashed deep into the muscle of his thigh, the sound of Janie’s soft cry, the red haze of blood that spattered as she fell. And then he closed it off again. He always did. He never thought about Janie in front of people. He saved that for when he was alone.
“Sorry,” he said, shaking his head. “Nothing that romantic.” Grinning, he gave her car a slap. “Get on home. A storm’s coming up.”
She gave him one last smile, full of regret, and took off toward her house. Rafe chuckled as he walked on over and got into his car. There was no way he would ever touch that girl, but he had to admit, her little crush on him was good for the old ego.
The tires crunched on the new-fallen snow, and he knew when he got up a little higher, the precipitation was really going to get thick. Good thing he still had on his snow tires. This late in the season, he hadn’t expected another storm before the full spring thaw. But even snow tires were not going to take him all the way to the Santos place if he didn’t hurry.
Turning up toward the mountain, he traveled quickly on a road that hadn’t seen many cars that day. Three years in this area and he still wasn’t used to it—the peace—the wonderful peace. It was the ultimate contrast to the rest of his life. Down in Los Angeles, he’d been a cop in a department under siege—the gang fights, the drive-by shootings, the hatred, the resentments.
There was no hatred up here in Clear Creek. Not that things were perfect. But here, people dealt with each other one-on-one, with some understanding, some willingness to compromise. No one was staking out territory. It was a brand-new world for him, a world he had grown to love. Sure, compared to L.A., it was boring. And that was the way he liked it.
His car climbed high on the winding mountain road and he checked out the Santos place, securing locks on the gates, then started back down, anticipating his bed. Just as he came to the crossroads, something caught his eye—a light, high up on the old forest road.
“Damn,” he breathed, watching it as it moved. Someone was up there, and that road was closed. It looked as if he weren’t going to make it home as quickly as he’d thought. In fact, he might just be looking at a very long night.
Turning his car back up, he headed toward the gatecrasher, and his mood was less than cheery.
She was lost. It had to be near midnight and the snow was getting worse. And she was lost.
This was crazy. She was crazy. Who expected snow this close to spring? But why had she taken that shortcut, anyway? Here she was in the mountains of New Mexico, looking for angles, just like always.
And getting in trouble because of it. That was just like always, too.
What on earth was she doing out here in the wilderness, anyway? She was a city girl, born and bred. She knew all there was to know about navigating the freeways and alleyways of Southern California. She knew very little about icy mountain roads.
She hadn’t seen another car for an hour. For all she knew, she’d driven right out of civilization and into the twilight zone. She let out a small shriek as the car skidded and came to rest turned broadside. Her pulse was beating like a drum as she straightened out her car. Was she going to have to pull over and wait for morning?
Her heart lurched as lights appeared in her rearview mirror. Another human being! Hallelujah.
But then a red light began to flash behind her. The cops. She groaned, half laughing. Every bit of good news had bad news tacked onto it tonight. If he was going to give her a ticket out here in the middle of nowhere…
She pulled over and turned off her engine, sighing, then watched in her mirror as he slowly got out of the police car behind her, holding on to his hat as a vicious gust of wind tried to take it. He looked big and grouchy. Just her luck.
“Hello, Officer,” she said brightly, rolling down her window as he approached the driver’s side of the car. She winced as snowflakes hit her nose with a sting. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to see a friendly face. Where am I, anyway?”
Ignoring the question, his dark eyes made a quick inventory of the interior of her car. “Where do you think you’re going?” he asked, all business.
She hesitated. On this road? Absolutely nowhere. “To a baby shower in Denver,” she said aloud. “Am I going the wrong way?”
Something about the set of his chin told her she wasn’t going to get an answer to that question.
“May I see your license, please?” he intoned evenly.
She swallowed. Not a ticket, on top of everything else. “What was I doing?” she asked, putting off the inevitable.
His dark face didn’t respond in kind to her friendly smile, but he did tell her what he thought. “Driving like an idiot,” he noted calmly.
Her smile became a little more strained. “Have they got a special number in the vehicle code for that now?”
His bland look darkened into a frown. Obviously he wasn’t in the mood for light repartee. “Let me see your license, please,” he repeated, his voice just a shade more steely.
“Okay.” She sighed, resigned. “My license.” She reached onto the floor beside her seat where she always kept her purse. Her hand didn’t contact anything familiar. “Just a second.” She reached under the seat, then looked behind it. A tiny flare of panic began to lick at her throat. Where the heck was her purse?
“Wait a minute. I can’t find my purse,” she said.
“Interesting,” he murmured dryly.
She glanced at him, caught by something in his tone. “No, really, I have it. It’s here somewhere.”
But she still couldn’t find it. Oh, brother. Now what? She thought back quickly. She’d made a stop about three miles ago when the snow had begun to blind her. She’d taken out her map to see if she was on the right road, then had gone back to the trunk to see if there were any chains hiding there. At one point, she’d thought she sensed something falling out into the swirling snow, but when she’d looked she hadn’t seen it again. Now she knew—it must have been her purse falling out of the car.
She gasped. “Oh, my God. I must have knocked it out along the road back about three miles,” she told him. Twisting, she looked at the darkened road and had a quick flashback to a child’s fairy tale, complete with witches and goblins hiding in the shapes of trees. “I…I’ll have to run back and take a look.”
His face didn’t change. “No,” he said firmly.
She blinked at his impassive look. She wasn’t used to this kind of unsympathetic opposition. It did tend to put her back up.
“What do you mean, no? My purse is back there. Someone might pick it up. All my money and my credit cards are in there.”
The cynical glint in his dark eyes deepened. “Listen, lady,” he said evenly. “Don’t bother to try a con on me. I’ve heard them all.”
A con? She almost smiled. She was the last person to try to con anyone. Most of her friends thought she was much too open and forthright as it was. But she kind of liked being thought of as a latent con artist. Still, this was the police. She probably ought to take him seriously.
“Well, I can’t prove who I am,” she told him brightly, pushing back her thick, curly hair with a casual motion that came to her naturally…and often. “But I can tell you, and you’re just going to have to take my word for it. Cami Bishop, from Marina Del Rey, California.”
His mouth twisted. He’d obviously noted her pushing back her hair and thought it an affectation that might even border on flirting. The set of his mouth told her he didn’t succumb to flirting. “A swinging California single, no doubt,” he said, almost sneering.
She squinted, trying to see him better. In the dark, with his hat pulled down low, all she could really make out was a hard mouth cut like a slash in granite and a pair of dark eyes that were colder than the icy wind that was making periodic raids on their position. She hesitated. Something about this man could give a girl chills.
“That’s a bit of an exaggeration,” she said, then tried one last grin. “But basically, yes.” And even at that, she couldn’t get a smile out of him. Oh well. “Anyway, I’m on my way to this baby shower…”
“Hold it.” Cocking his hat back, he stared at her for a long moment, then drew away from her window abruptly, as though he’d just thought of something, something that startled him.
“What?” She blinked at him, surprised.
“Just hold on.” he told her sternly, “I’ll get back to you.”
Rolling up her window to keep the snow out, she lifted her gaze to the rearview mirror to watch him walk to his patrol car, stamping his boots to clear a path. Why did these guys always seem to swagger? She supposed it was meant to make peons like her stay in line. Too bad. Lines and boundaries had never been her forte.
In a moment, he was back, and she only rolled down the window a crack this time. After all, there was a limit to the amount of snow she was going to let the wind whip in around her. It was freezing and she had no heavy coat.
Why she’d left Santa Fe in only this medium-weight linen suit was a question she would be asking herself later on, along with many others—such as, what sort of an idiot had she been to brave the mountains on a night like this? But that was all waiting for the moment when this trip was over and she would have the luxury of second thoughts and incredulous comments. For now, basic survival seemed more important.
“Get out of the car,” he said, his voice hard and authoritative.
“What?” She squinted, trying to see him better. He sounded meaner than before. And here she’d been hoping for a thaw in their relationship. “It’s snowing!”
“Get out of the car,” he ordered grimly, “face it, and spread your arms out.”
And that was when she noticed he had his gun drawn.
Her heart leapt into her throat. Suddenly things seemed very serious indeed. “What are you doing?” she gasped, staring down the black muzzle of the weapon.
“Get out of the car, face it, and spread your arms out.”
She swallowed hard. He had a bad habit of repeating himself, but she wasn’t about to call him on it now. For one split second, she considered starting up her engine and driving off as though all this had never happened. But that gun was just too ominous. And the snow was just too heavy. And most of all, his face was just too hard and cold.
“Okay,” she said hoarsely. “Just a minute. I’m getting out.”
She put her hands up so he could see she had nothing in them. Wasn’t that what they always did on TV? Then she stepped out, her soft leather shoes sliding a bit on the sleetcovered blacktop. She looked at him questioningly, shivering with the cold, and he gestured for her to turn.
“Spread your arms,” he said softly, but his softer tone seemed even more chilling and she complied quickly, gasping again as he stepped up close behind her and reached out to pat down her sides.
“This is insane,” she said sharply, pulling away from his touch.
“Hold still,” he ordered, taking control of her by the back of the neck the way a cat might a kitten. “And listen carefully to your rights. You have the right to remain silent…”
She shook her head slowly as he went down the list he was obliged to give her. He was arresting her. This was surreal. It couldn’t be happening. She’d just been driving along, on her way to Denver to see old friends and have a jolly time celebrating her college roommate’s new baby. That all seemed innocent enough, didn’t it? Just exactly when had she stepped out of the real world and into this wonderland where everything was upside-down?
It was all so strange. There was a break in the wind, and snow was falling in tiny, glittering flakes, falling silently all around, hitting her face with small, frosty impacts and melting there. It had been years since she’d even seen snow, not since her college days in Northern California, when they’d all packed up the car and headed for the mountains to try out the ski lifts. It always made her marvel how the snow could change the landscape in such a short time and never make a sound. It was like magic—as though some wizard had waved a wand and transformed everything when no one was looking. An enchanted episode.
And so was this whole situation. Was this really happening? Was she in the middle of some off-the-wall nightmare?
“If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you.”
She sighed and began to shiver uncontrollably. No, she wasn’t dreaming. It was all crazy, but very real.
“This is a joke, right? You’re just trying to scare me.” She half turned so that she could see his face again, look into his eyes, search for a spark of humor. “Hey, I promise. No more speeding, honest. I’ll be a good girl from now on. In fact, I’ll stay away from driving altogether and get myself a chauffeur. How about that?”
He didn’t seem to hear her, his eyes as opaque as ever. “Do you have any questions? Have you understood these rights I’ve just read you?”
She shook her head, feeling silly, and gripped her arms tightly around herself. “I don’t understand anything at all.”
His mouth twisted and he gestured toward her. “Hold your hands out behind your back.”
“What?”
The handcuffs were on before she knew what was happening, and she was so shocked she couldn’t utter a word.
“Let’s go.”
She turned to look at him, aghast. “But why?” she asked weakly, too stunned to fight for the moment. “What have I done?”
“Armed robbery, for starters.” He pointed her toward his car, and she went along in a fog of disbelief, his hand guiding her. “That was in Utah. Arizona said something about kidnapping. Colorado mentioned bunco. And then there was the little matter of a shooting in Laughlin, Nevada. Remember that one?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head, dazed. “No!” she repeated more loudly. She stopped, eyes blazing as her spirit revived. She was no criminal. There was a mistake being made. He had to listen to reason. It was silly, really, in a perverted sort of way. Surely he would see the joke if she just explained. “No, this is crazy,” she told him, shaking her head. “I’ve never done any of those things. I’ve never even been to Laughlin.”
“Get in the car.” He held open a door to the back seat.
She stared in at the interior of the car. It looked grotesquely lonely. He couldn’t do this. Could he? She started shaking her head again, backing away. “No, I…”
Reaching out, he gave her an encouraging push that brooked no argument or hesitation. She got in awkwardly, her hands stretched out behind her.
“Okay, wise guy,” she muttered, anger beginning to rise in her. “Okay,” she said more forcefully, turning to look at him, her cheeks bright with the humiliation. “If you think you know so much about me, tell me this. Who do you think I am?”
He flipped up a clipboard from the front seat and scanned it. “Billie Joe Calloway of Fort Worth, Texas,” he read off what he had clipped there. “Twenty-eight years old and good-looking. Five foot six with nice curves. Golden blond hair. Blue eyes. Driving a green Ford Mustang with California plates.” He dropped the clipboard and looked at her. “Now, doesn’t that sound familiar?” he asked her softly, his eyes as cold as an Arctic winter.
If it wasn’t so scary, the situation might have been funny. But right now it would be pretty hard to work up a real, honest laugh out of it.
“I’m thirty,” she said quickly. “And I’m not from Texas. Do you hear even one tiny hint of a Texas twang in. this voice?” But when you came right down to it, the rest fit her to a tee. “I’m not this Billie Joe person,” she said more strongly, glaring at him for emphasis. “You’ve got the wrong woman this time.”
She thought quickly. There had to be some way to prove it. Of all the times to lose her purse. “Oh, my car registration!”
He shrugged. “So you stole a car.”
“Oh, I see. No matter what I come up with, you’ll have a reason why it doesn’t apply.” She stared at him in exasperation. “You’re going to feel like such an idiot when you find out the truth.”
He shrugged again, seeming totally disinterested. “We’ll see,” he said as he swung into the driver’s seat.
“My car,” she protested, suddenly realizing they were going to drive off and leave it. “It’s just sitting there. Someone will take it.”
He turned and looked at her through the opening in the glass partition between the seats. “Don’t you get it?” he said, his voice soft but tough. “There is no one around, Miss Calloway. You took the wrong road, all right. You must have gone past three separate barriers to get this far. You were on a street to nowhere when I picked out your headlights and came on out here to see what was going on.” He started up his engine. “If you’d gone a mile farther, you’d have probably driven right off a cliff,” he added, sounding almost cheerful for once, “since you seem to have an opposite reaction to warning signs, or any other sort of rules or regulations.”
Cami turned slowly and looked back, squinting into the blurry white wilderness, dumbfounded. Was he right? She didn’t remember any barriers. So now she was supposed to consider him her savior instead of her enemy? It didn’t make any sense, but it served to keep her quiet as they rode down the mountain and turned onto a highway. She was thinking things over—and getting more and more puzzled all the time.
“My purse,” she murmured hopelessly at one point.
“The snow’s getting too deep to find it now,” he told her. “I’ll send someone out in the morning to look for it.”
She lapsed into silence again, overwhelmed by it all. She’d been in scrapes before. In fact, she’d been known by her friends as someone who seemed to attract trouble. She liked to think of it as trouble attracting her. And she usually had no problem in dealing with such things. But nothing in her background and experience had prepared her for this, and it was going to take some time to pull herself together and figure how to get out of this one.
“This is utterly outrageous,” she said, staring at his rock-hard profile. “You can’t just go around arresting people like this.”
“Sure I can,” he responded, glancing back at her. “It’s my job.”
Two (#ulink_d3ef0c44-7f0a-54ed-ab60-3a9877e7b76c)
Okay, so this was going to be a little more complicated than he’d thought. Rafe eased the car around the corner, wheels spinning in the snow, and avoided looking in the rearview mirror. With the storm coming in, he was probably going to be stuck with her for the night. Oh, well. It came with the job. And it had been so long since he’d arrested anyone, he’d almost forgotten how to do it.
“Here we are,” he said as the car slid to a stop beside the old adobe building. “Hold on a minute. I’ll get your door.”
He wasn’t being gallant, merely careful. With the rap sheet this lady carried in her background, he wasn’t going to take any chances. She was tougher than she looked—had to be, with the things she’d done lately. He held the door and watched her emerge awkwardly from the car, and then wished he hadn’t.
She had the longest damn legs he’d seen in some time. And what was she doing wearing a skirt up here in the mountains, anyway? Nobody wore skirts around here. And if she had to wear a skirt, why couldn’t she control it better? She didn’t have to let it hike halfway up like that.
He knew that was hardly fair. After all, she was still in handcuffs. Still, it made him feel better to complain, even silently. The way she moved did allow him to get a good look at some of the most beautiful legs he’d ever gawked at, but that wasn’t what he wanted to do—not at her. She was a suspect, for Pete’s sake. He wasn’t supposed to notice her legs, or anything else about her. It wasn’t professional. He swore at himself and looked away. No, this definitely was no cinch.
“We’ll go on in,” he told her, turning her and pointing her in the right direction. “We’ll get the proper forms filled out, and then we’ll call Santa Fe.” There was still a chance they would come on out and pick her up right away. It all depended on how badly they wanted her.
“Okay,” she said absently, gazing about herself.
A city girl all the way, Cami had been expecting a nice brick building swarming with experience-toughened cops who would be crusty but ready to hear the truth if it were presented correctly. One call to some sort of centralized information bank, one check of the picture with the arrest warrant for Billie Joe, one look at Cami herself in the light, and this whole fabrication of her supposed criminal career would crumble into the dust. Apologies all around. Someone would drive her back to her car and send her on her way. And it would be all over.
No such luck.
“This is it?” she asked in wonder as he led her through the thickening snowbanks into the small adobe building set right against the street. She looked to the right and to the left and saw no more than three or four small buildings set back along the side of the road, one of which had a sign that read Country Store and had a bus stop designation hanging out front. The place was barely a crossroads, much less a town.
“This is your police station?” Standing in the middle of the floor, she looked from side to side at the desk, the table and two chairs, the television set, the small, old-fashioned cell in the corner of the room. “Where’s the rest of it?”
The only sign that he’d heard her was a slight twitch at the corner of his mouth as he came in behind her, shrugging out of his jacket. With one quick, deft movement, he unlocked the handcuffs and removed them, setting them down on the desk beside the hat he had just removed, as well, then pulled up a chair. “Sit down and we’ll get the paperwork started,” he suggested.
“This looks like something right out of an old Western movie,” she said, still looking around nervously and rubbing her wrists. “A relic.”
“It is,” he told her calmly, dropping into the desk chair and pulling a typewriter into position. “It’s been here since 1889.”
“That’s over a hundred years.” She tucked her arms in close and shivered, as though the ghosts of all that history were treading on her space.
“You got it.”
Looking down, she eyed the ancient machine he was adjusting. “Is that why you still use a typewriter? Just to keep in line with the historical accuracy of the place?” She pointed to the television in the corner of the room. “In which case, that’s certainly an anachronism you ought to get rid of.”
He gestured toward the chair once more and said with cool formality, “I still use a typewriter because the good people of this little town can’t afford to buy me a computer.”
She sat down with a thump and glared at him, annoyed that he was ordering her around, even if silently, and even more annoyed with herself for letting him get away with it. “I guess that means they probably got you dirt cheap, too, doesn’t it?”
He looked her full in the face and his voice hardened. “It does. But no matter what I get paid, I’m still the sheriff. That means I’m the law here, lady.” It was something he was going to have to remember around this woman. “I think it’s time you stopped and thought that over.”
She did, but only for a moment. She resented his tone, and she told him so.
He gave her a long-suffering look. “Okay, if you want to argue about every detail of this arrest, we can do that. But that will only delay filling out the forms I need before I call Santa Fe and get to the bottom of this.”
She knew he was right, but she could hardly help complaining. After all, this was a case of mistaken identity. How dare he keep her here this way? “Meanwhile I get to cool my heels here in a jail cell?” she said, looking over her shoulder at the bars and shuddering lightly.
His gaze darkened as he looked at her. Her hair was floating around her face in a cloud of silver and gold that set off the crystal blue of her eyes. He’d noticed the shudder and he assumed it was part of her act. He had to admit, she was damn good. “Look at it this way—it’ll keep you out of trouble for an hour or so.”
Her chin rose and she glared at him. “I don’t need to be kept out of trouble.”
He shrugged, turning away. “It’s pretty obvious you need a keeper of some kind,” he muttered.
“Hey, I don’t like the sound of that.” He didn’t seem to care, so she got tougher. “What are you, some kind of sexist pig?” she said pointedly.
That got his attention. He turned back and stared at her, his eyes hard as tinted glass. “Excuse me?” he said icily.
She turned down the corners of her mouth and lifted her chin. “That was a purely sexist comment.”
He considered her words for a moment, tilting his head to the side, before shaking it slowly. “No, I don’t think so,” he drawled at last. “I would have said the same to any criminal, male or female.”
She flushed, but luckily he’d already turned away again, so he didn’t see it.
“You’re the one who’s going to look ridiculous when it all comes out and you see that I was absolutely right,” she told him quickly. “I am Cami Bishop. I’ve never even heard of this Billie Joe person.” He didn’t respond, and she tried again. “Who am I going to have to see to get compensated for this outrage? I’m going to sue the pants off you and your town.”
“You can certainly try,” he said casually, taking papers and pens out of his drawer and setting up for the paperwork. “It’s within your rights.” Looking up, he met her gaze. “But that would mean you’d have to come back and hang around here for weeks, maybe months.”
She made a face. “You’re right. It wouldn’t be worth it.”
For the first time, she really took a look at the man who was causing her so much trouble. His dark hair was thick and worn a little too long in back and lightly touched with silver at the temples, as though a few snowflakes still clung to him from the storm outside. There was a primitive strength to him. His face was handsome in a hard, emotionless way, dark, all granite planes and angles, with deep grooves that almost made him look bitter. Something about him fit the place, though. He might have been here in 1889, back in cowboy-and-Indian days. And she wouldn’t know which category to place him in. With his dark skin and wind-weathered look, he could have fit in either one.
Sheriff Rafe Lonewolf was what the sign on his desk called him. She could see traces of Native American ancestry in his face, but other things were mixed in with it. He looked tough, as though he were used to using his fists as well as his brain to get himself out of trouble. She searched his expression, but there was no humor, no empathy. Was this just the mask he put on to do his job, she wondered? Or was this the real thing?
“If I do decide to file, I guess you’re the one I’ll have to name in my unlawful arrest lawsuit, huh?” she said brightly, wondering if she could get a rise out of him and not stopping to realize that might not be such a good idea. “I hope your little town can afford that judgment.”
She watched him for a moment, but there was no response, no change in his expression. So what now? Should she say something more impertinent, try to get his goat? Probably not. But how was she going to get out of this? A gust of wind rattled the windows and she pulled her chair up a little closer, glad that at least she was out of the storm.
But that wasn’t going to be enough to satisfy her for long. “When do I get my phone call?” she asked, looking around the room restlessly.
He glanced at her, then looked away. “As soon as we get this paperwork out of the way.”
“I think I’ll use my call to order a pizza,” she quipped, leaning back as though she were sure of herself. “By the time we get the paperwork done, you’ll realize you made a big mistake and I’ll be ready to get on my way. A nice hot pizza would hit the spot about then.” She smiled. So there, her expression said, even if her mouth didn’t actually form the words.
He looked at her balefully as he rolled a form into the typewriter. How had he gotten so lucky, anyway? It had been a nice quiet night. In fact, it had been a nice, quiet life since he’d taken this job out here in the sticks. He liked it that way. He’d had enough of the rough stuff down in the city to last him a lifetime. Peace and quiet were slowly healing a lot of wounds he’d collected down there.
But something told him it couldn’t last. Not now that Billie Joe Calloway had hit town and entered his jurisdiction.
He had no doubt that he had the right person in custody. After all, how many beautiful blondes in green Mustangs would be cruising through Clear Creek during any given space of time? Not many. This area was so out-of-the-way, they didn’t even have a real gas station—just the pump at Gray Eagle’s farm. Not too many tourists cruised through here. That was why he’d barely paid any attention to the bulletin that Billie Joe might be in the area when it had first come in that morning.
No, the idea that two blondes in identical cars might drive through stretched credulity a bit past the breaking point. And the prospect of having two of them in one weekend would be more than he could handle, he thought with a surge of humor he was careful not to show to her.
He glanced at her, letting himself look her over for a moment. He had to admit she didn’t look much like the usual criminals he’d dealt with in the past. There was a softness to her they usually didn’t show. Her expensive clothes and jewelry didn’t impress him. He’d arrested women before who’d looked like they belonged in Beverly Hills. But there was something about those blue eyes. They flashed with annoyance, but not with craft. And the rest of her—he only allowed himself one quick, cursory look and his immediate response served to warn him not to do that again. Her body was as pretty as her face, curves that nicely strained the fabric of her clothes and sent a rush up his thermometer. That wasn’t supposed to happen. He couldn’t let her get to him. He looked away, hardening his face even more, determined not to let her know she was in any way attractive in the cold eyes of the law.
He typed in a few spaces, then sighed softly and sat back. “Name?” he asked, though he knew it was probably going to lead to another argument. The night stretched out long and unpleasant before him.
“Cami Bishop,” she said smartly. “Cambria Shasta Bishop, if you want to get formal about it.” She added her date and place of birth. “Unmarried.”
He nodded, typing in the information she was giving, though he knew he was going to have to fill out another form with what he assumed was the more accurate version. The warrant said, though she was currently unmarried, she’d been married three times. He glanced at her from under lowered brows, wondering about such a young woman with three marriages behind her, but he couldn’t see any evidence of her past on her face. In fact, she looked far too open and trusting to be the sort of man-eating babe the warrant portrayed. But looks were deceiving. He’d learned that lesson before.
“Occupation?”
She hesitated. For some reason, it was always hard to explain that one to people. “I publish a fern journal,” she said at last.
His mouth twisted with obvious annoyance. “You mean a foreign journal?” he asked, looking at her.
She shook her head and held back a sudden urge to giggle. “No. I told you I wasn’t from Texas, didn’t I? The word is fern. You know, those green plants that grow in shady forests.”
“Oh. Botany.” He glanced at her linen suit and soft leather shoes and frowned skeptically. “You don’t look much like a nature freak,” he noted coolly.
“Oh, I’m not,” she assured him quickly, amused by the thought herself. “I don’t actually go out and tromp in the woods or anything like that.”
He looked slightly pained. “Of course not.”
She heard the sarcasm but chose to ignore it. “No, I edit research articles scientists submit.”
She was something all right. She said these things with a cool patina of honesty that could almost fool you. He had to hold back the grin that wanted to steal into his expression. “I see. You don’t get your hands dirty.”
She smiled as though she could sense his amusement. “Only with printer’s ink.”
He abandoned the typewriter and faced her, his natural skepticism plain to see. This was just too much. “Who the hell reads something like that?” If she could answer that one, he’d have to hand it to her. She could manufacture the whoppers.
She gazed back in wide-eyed innocence, her answer ready. “Other scientists. Hobbyists. People who like ferns.”
Throwing his head back, he groaned, “Right.”
For the first time, she thought she detected the barest glint of amusement in his eyes, but this time it didn’t make her smile. “You think I’m making this all up, don’t you?” she cried with sudden insight.
He stared into her eyes for a moment, then nodded and shrugged. “Of course you are.”
She shook her head in wonder. It was finally sinking in. He really thought she was the outlaw. This wasn’t just some strange coincidence. She was being booked. She might go to jail. Impossible as that was to believe, it seemed to be coming true. A small flare of panic lit in her breast. She had to do something.
“Where’s the warrant?” she asked, leaning forward and pressing her lips together with new determination.
“The warrant?” His dark gaze was veiled.
“For this Billie Joe Calloway’s arrest.” She put out her hand authoritatively. “Let me see it. I want to see the picture.”
He hesitated, gazing at her speculatively. “There is no picture.”
“What?”
“I don’t have a fax. We’re out in the country here, in case you hadn’t noticed. I have to wait for mail. I just got the information on you today, mixed in with a long list of fugitives from the law.” He glanced at a stack of papers on his desk. “I will tell you this. You’re listed as one of the three most dangerous.”
She groaned and looked at him beseechingly. “But it’s not me! Don’t you get it? I’m innocent.”
He turned away. There was no point in getting into a hassle over this. “Hey, tell it to the judge,” he murmured, rolling the paper into a new position in his typewriter.
“I’d love to,” she snapped, tossing her thick blond hair. “Where is he? When do I get to see him?”
He squinted at the window, plastered white with winddriven snow. “I don’t know. With this storm, it may be a while. Considering the judge is in Santa Fe.”
“Santa Fe?” She’d been there only that afternoon. It seemed like days ago. Another lifetime. “That’s almost three hours away.”
“You got that right.” He nodded, eyeing her. “Three hours on a sunny day.”
She stared at him in horror. It had all seemed so simple at first. Now she was beginning to get the picture, and the scene before her was abhorrent.
“So, even though I’m innocent, I have to sit around here for hours and hours, waiting to prove it?”
He didn’t look up. There seemed to be an awful lot of words and numbers he had to fill into slots on the form. “Looks like,” he murmured, his voice barely audible, as though she hardly counted any longer.
He was a very annoying man and she was beginning to get really angry. This was all his fault. Anyone with any sense would have realized long ago that she wasn’t a criminal. She glared at him furiously, but he didn’t look up, so the effect was lost.
“Well, there has to be somewhere we can call, something we can do.” Cami wasn’t used to being told there was nothing she could do. She was used to action, to coming across a problem and dealing with it right then and there. She moved restlessly in her chair, anxious to get on it. “I suppose a lawyer would be hours away in Santa Fe, as well?”
He nodded. “I’m not asking you to make a statement until we get hold of one.”
“How very thoughtful of you,” she noted dryly. But hardly helpful. There had to be another way to attack this thing. “Where did you get the listing from, anyway? Maybe we could call them. Or we could call the different police who claim Billie Joe did these things. Just ask them a few questions and I’m sure you’ll start to see she’s not me. Or I’m not her. Or whatever.”
He nodded again. He was planning to do those very things, but not until he had the paperwork done. Forms were the worst part of the job, but they had to be filled out. “We’ll make some calls. All in good time.”
He went back to his work and she swung her feet, impatient and frustrated. Her mind went back over the past few weeks—how she’d received the invitation from her best friend from college, Sara Parker, to come to her baby shower in Denver—how she’d planned her trip with stops along the way to visit with some of her regular contributors to the journal—how they’d wined and dined her in Santa Fe and sent her on her way much later than she’d planned—and how the storm had caught up with her. And now she was here, sitting in this ancient building with this disturbing man, accused of being Billie Joe Calloway. It was all so ridiculous.
She glanced at the sheriff. He was going to feel awfully foolish when the truth came out. Right now, that was her only solace. She could tell he was a proud man, used to being right. It wasn’t going to be easy for him to face this mistake.
Good. Served him right.
“Do you have any tea?” she asked, looking around. “A nice cup of tea would taste so good right now.”
He shook his head, not looking up. “There’s a coffeepot by the TV,” he said. “Go ahead and pour yourself a cup.”
“Coffee?” She shuddered. “No thanks, that would just make me shaky. I only drink coffee for breakfast. You’re sure you don’t have a little tea bag hiding around here somewhere?”
“No.” He glanced at her coolly, his gaze just skimming her, not lingering too long in any one place. “No tea. Just coffee. Take it or leave it.”
She stared at him, affronted by his attitude, but at the same time, she knew she was being ridiculous. He wasn’t her host, after all. He’d arrested her. He couldn’t be expected to provide hospitality, now could he? Still, she couldn’t help but resent it.
“No tea,” she muttered. “No fax machine. How do you get fingerprints and stuff like that? Do you have to wait for the mail for that, too?” She paled, suddenly realizing just exactly what that meant, and when she spoke again, her voice was pitched higher. “Am I going to have to wait for the mail in order to get out of here?”
He glanced at her, then back down at his paper. “Don’t worry,” he told her smoothly. “Either Santa Fe will send someone for you, or I’ll take you down in the morning.”
No. Something had to give before that. Morning seemed very far away right now. Rising, she paced restlessly through the room. She had to get out of here. There was just no way she was staying. Somehow, something had to be done. But what? The storm was slashing snow against the windows and whistling through the tiles on the roof. It was dangerous out there. She whirled, feeling frustrated.
“Previous arrest record?” he asked, and she spun, dropping back down to sit in the chair.
“None,” she said crisply. “Unless you count the time old Mr. Campbell caught me stealing gum out of the broken gum machine at his store when I was ten years old.”
He looked up at her. He couldn’t help it. He looked up at her and he noted her eyes, the pale blue of icy Arctic caverns, and her pretty mouth—it looked soft and smooth and very warm. Fire and ice—an intriguing combination, a pairing that stirred him in ways he didn’t want to admit.
And then he looked away and uttered a few obscenities silently and to himself. He had to keep from doing things like that. If he didn’t watch out, he would let her see the way she was affecting him, and if that happened, he would have a hard time maintaining his authority over her. He knew very well what could happen, the games men and women played with one another. And he wasn’t going to let himself get pulled into them.
“What did he do to you?” he asked gruffly, forcing his mind back to the childhood story she was telling.
She thought back, her eyes suddenly dreamy. “He gave me a lecture and made me sweep the floor.” An irrepressible smile curled her lips at the memories. “And then he gave me a whole bag of gum balls to take home. I was the most popular kid on the street that night.”
“Ah.” He nodded wisely, a sardonic look in his eyes. “So that’s what started you on your road to crime. You found you could gain popularity from handing out things that didn’t belong to you to your friends.”
Her jaw dropped and she sputtered incoherently. Grinning, he pulled out the paper and turned it to fill in the back, feeling very pleased with himself for having annoyed her. “Education?” he asked.
“Hidden Valley College in Marin County.” She looked at him defiantly. “I graduated, too.”
“Congratulations.” He typed in the words. “Well-educated criminals are the best kind.”
“Oh!” Exasperated, she rose again, throwing a quick glare his way, and went back to pacing the room. “If you weren’t a cop…”
She left the threat up in the air, but it hit home. He was a cop and he’d better not forget it. Looking at her, he wished he could take her back up on the ridge route and start this all over again. Somehow they had gotten off on the wrong foot. He wasn’t acting like himself at all. He was usually cool and detached, a complete professional. Where had he lost that reserve? To make up for it, he was going to have to be tougher than usual. Mean. Could he be mean to her?
She turned her head and her golden curls danced in the harsh light and something curled inside him like a coiled spring. He groaned silently. No, he couldn’t be mean to her. And if he didn’t watch out, the cop in him would disappear, and the man was going to take over. No matter what, he couldn’t let that happen. Hardening his mouth, he tried to harden his heart at the same time, and years of practice made it that much easier to do.
“Let’s just get this done, Miss Calloway,” he said firmly.
She glanced at him and frowned, wanting to shake him, wanting to shake up everything and get to the truth. The truth should be plain for him to see, if he would only look at her without all his preconceived ideas.
“This is crazy,” she muttered, still pacing. Suddenly she found herself nearing the corner of the room she’d been avoiding, where the bars were, and her steps slowed. Reaching out, she tentatively touched the lock on the little cell. The door swung away from her and she stared into a space hardly big enough to keep a cat in. There was a simple cot and a chair, and that was it. Was she going to end up spending the night in that place? No way!
She turned back to look at the sheriff, scared but unwilling to let him see it. “You call this a jail?” she said scornfully.
He barely looked up, still involved in paperwork. “It’s got bars, doesn’t it?”
She made a face at him, secure in the knowledge that he couldn’t see it. “So does the Las Vegas strip.”
He nodded, then looked up and actually cracked what might be considered a smile. “Yeah, but I don’t have the key to that,” he said.
Their gazes met, the lights flickered as a gust of wind hit the building, and something else happened.
She wasn’t sure what it was, but it hit her hard. Time seemed to stand still. His dark eyes turned smoky with a mystery she suddenly felt an aching need to unravel. All in a moment, she was intimately aware of his wide, sensuous mouth, his rock-hard shoulders, his long, lean, muscular hands. At the same time, she was alive to an acceptance within herself of an emotional embrace. This was not at all like her, and scared her to death. She’d never felt anything like this.
“No,” she whispered, still staring into his eyes. “No.” And then, finally, she tore her gaze away from his. “No, I’m out of here,” she muttered, rejecting it all as she whirled and began a headlong flight for the door.
He swore softly as he sprang up to catch her. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he demanded, grabbing her by the arm and jerking her around to face him.
She stared up at him as though she were afraid of what she might see, and shook her head. If he hadn’t sensed what she’d sensed, so much the better. But it didn’t really help her. “I can’t stay here with you,” she said hoarsely.
His head went back and his eyes took on a distant look. “Why not?”
But she couldn’t put it into words. Putting it into words would mean acknowledging it, and that would only make things worse.
It seemed he hadn’t felt the stinging connection she thought she’d experienced. That was a relief, she supposed. Maybe. Or maybe he was just pretending not to notice. Or maybe he made these sensual links with women all the time.
Well, she didn’t. And she wasn’t about to go where such things inevitably led. What she really had to do was get out of here.
“I…I just can’t, that’s all. Let me go. Come on.” She looked up at him beseechingly. “You know, deep down, that I’m not a criminal. Just let me go and I won’t tell anyone you ever saw me. Nobody will know and…”
“Stop it,” he demanded, frowning at her as his fingers tightened on her arm. “Don’t get all worked up. There’s no point to it.” He jerked his head toward the outside world. “You hear that wind? You can’t go out in this storm, no matter how innocent you are. You’re stuck here. You might as well relax.”
Relax? Relax? When every nerve ending was quivering inside her? She took a long, deep breath and closed her eyes.
He was right. She couldn’t go anywhere until morning. At least she wasn’t huddled in her car on the side of the road, wondering if she was going to freeze to death.
She opened her eyes again and managed a bleak smile. “Okay,” she said softly, pulling away from his touch and turning back into the room. “I guess I’m more tired than I realized.”
But her gaze flickered from one corner of the room to another, looking for a possible escape route, something he noted with a cynical gleam in his eyes. He took hold of her again, by the shoulders this time, just to drive the point home. “Don’t get any more ideas, lady,” he said firmly. “You’re not leaving here until I let you go.”
She stood stock-still, her gaze icy. It was obvious to her that she was going to have to defend herself against him—or at least, against letting him beguile her in any way. “You’re touching me,” she said. “That’s not allowed, is it?”
His fingers tightened, and so did his mouth. She was getting to him at last. Anger was smoldering in his dark eyes.
“Isn’t it?” he said softly. “It all depends on whose rules we’re following.” But he released her, standing back as she flexed her shoulders and glared at him.
“You’d better just hope I don’t get any bruises,” she said smartly. “I’ll charge you with police brutality.”
His head went back. “You know all the buzzwords, don’t you?” Real anger shot through him like a hot gulp of whiskey.
Those were city words, words he hadn’t heard for a long time, words he had come here to forget. Around here, he was a part of the community. Everybody knew him. Everybody turned to him with their problems, with their worries, anytime they needed help—not every time they needed a scapegoat. No one here would ever think to charge him with brutality. It made him angry to have her bring city words and city concepts here. He reached out and took up the handcuffs, then turned toward her with a glint in his eyes.
“Tell you what,” he said, eyes narrowing. “I’m going to have to put the cuffs back on you.”
She shrank back. “No!”
He moved toward her, holding the cuffs up where she could see them. “You tried to make a break for it, lady. You’re not cooperating like you should. There’s no reason not to suspect you might do it again. You don’t have a leg to stand on.”
She glared at him, but when she spoke, she worked hard to keep her voice low and polite. “I’m sorry I did that,” she said, backing away as she spoke. “I won’t do it again. Honest.”
He watched her for a moment, dangling the cuffs before her. “It’s your choice,” he told her at last. “As long as I can trust you…”
“Oh, you can trust me,” she assured him hurriedly. “Believe me, you can trust me.”
He hesitated. She was saying the right words, but the look in her eyes told him she was feeling anything but meek. Still, what was he going to do, tie her up?
No, he reminded himself. He was going to put her in a cell.
And even at that, a part of him cringed. She was so pretty, so…
No. He turned and dropped the handcuffs on the desk. What was the matter with him? He’d locked up prettier women than this, back in Los Angeles. There was that time he’d been in on that raid of the porno movie set in Burbank. And the time he and his partner had broken a ring of young women who pretended to sell cosmetics door-to-door but were really casing the houses for visits later on in the night. And Doris, the sticky-fingered contortionist. Gorgeous women, every one. He’d locked them up without a qualm. And he was going to do the same here.
But not yet. They still had paperwork to finish. It could wait.
Three (#ulink_521cae6a-8a20-5cc9-8c1a-b0a505fde4d6)
Rafe Lonewolf, sheriff, and Billie Joe Calloway, con artist extraordinaire. This was going to be some night. He looked at her narrowly, and she looked right back. It was evident that whatever had spooked her a few minutes earlier was under control now. She had her confidence back, and her spirit.
She plunked herself in the chair and he sat back down in front of the typewriter, and she watched for a moment as he filled in spaces on the form.
He was just a man. And as the song went, she’d known a lot of men before. Now that her pulse had calmed and her nerves had steadied, she couldn’t imagine what had upset her so much a few minutes earlier. She couldn’t let this situation, this man, this night, get to her. She was woman, she was strong, and all that. And he was just a man.
And she was no victim. She could hold her own, and she could act like an equal. She could, in fact, go on the offense. That was often the best defensive strategy anyway. Put him off his guard. Keep him guessing. She wet her lips and launched her game plan.
“That’s quite a little Hitler complex you’ve got there,” she said, speaking softly, as though she were musing about an interesting detail rather than accusing him of being a world-class despot.
He glanced up, determined not to take her too seriously. “No. I’ve got a cop complex. That’s all.”
“Hmm,” she reflected, studying her fingernails. “Suspicious, cynical, mean. It can’t be much fun going through life like that.”
He leaned back in his chair and looked at her as though she’d brought up speaking ancient Greek as a recreational activity. “Fun isn’t what life is all about,” he reminded her.
She nodded. “You’re right. But it sure does help you get over the rough spots.” She glanced around the room. “What do you do around here for fun? Or is arresting innocent people the way you get your kicks?”
“No. I work. I sleep. I read.”
She stared at him. Suddenly she was really concerned. “That’s it?” she said incredulously. So that was the answer, that was what made him so mean. He was a grouch because he was badly socialized. Hope surged again. Cami was a can-do woman, and she liked nothing better than finding potential solutions to problems. She’d been struggling with this problem, this man, for about an hour now. And finally she saw light at the end of the tunnel.
Nothing could be simpler. All she had to do was make friends with him, like you would a snarling dog, bit by bit, offering a snack, extending a hand…
“Listen, you need to break out of your routine,” she told him kindly. “You need something new in your life.”
“Thanks, but no thanks.”
He didn’t look grateful for her sensitive suggestions. Still, these things took time.
He typed another line in the form and she frowned, trying to think of something to offer him. “You know, I’m probably a faster typist than you are,” she said. “Would you like me to fill it out?”
She could have sworn he was rolling his eyes, but he didn’t turn back to face her, so she couldn’t tell for sure.
“No,” he said simply.
“Could I get you a fresh cup of coffee?”
“No, thanks.”
Her mouth tightened. If he wasn’t going to cooperate, this experiment in the building of an understanding between them was going to be harder than she’d thought at first. A tiny doubt tugged at her. What if he were incapable of unbending? What if he were just born mean, and that was that? But she couldn’t accept anything so hopeless. She was made of sterner stuff. She pressed on, thinking hard.
Suddenly she sat up straighter, struck with an idea. “How about this? How long has it been since you’ve had your fortune read?”
That got to him. He turned and stared at her. “My what?”
She stuck out her slim fingers. “Give me your hand,” she ordered.
“What?”
“Your hand,” she said impatiently. “Let me see it.”
He shook his head. No way. Was she crazy? The prisoner did not act like this. Prisoners were scared and hesitant, or they were brash and unruly, in which case they had to be cuffed. One or the other. Prisoners did not offer to make you cups of coffee. Prisoners did not ask to see your hand.
So why was it that he was extending that very same hand, palm up, and letting her hold it? He didn’t know. Forces beyond his understanding seemed to be at work here. They weren’t following the rules. Things were very close to spinning out of control.
Her touch was cool and smooth and light. He felt a strange buzzing in his ears as she held his hand, like the fleeting high from a quick drink taken on an empty stomach. He was crazy to let this go on. But it sure did feel nice.
His hand was in hers and she was studying it closely, noting its clean, hard lines, its strength. He had nice hands with straight nails and hard yet uncallused palms. She liked them. But she wasn’t going to let things go in that direction again, so she sealed off that side of her emotions and got on with it.
“You’ve got a long life line,” she told him, gazing down thoughtfully. “Look.” She traced it with her finger. “Look how far it goes. I’ve never seen one this long before.”
“And you probably never will again,” he noted dryly. “That’s an old scar from breaking up a bar fight.” His mouth quirked at the corners. “I didn’t know at the time it would add years to my life, or I would have done it more often.”
“Oh.” Her gaze met his and they almost laughed together.
Almost, but not quite. They caught themselves in time. Rafe pulled back his hand.
“Some fortune-teller. You’d better keep your day job,” he advised her.
“Wait,” she protested quickly. “I haven’t got to the part about the tall, dark stranger in your future yet.”
His mouth twisted in a way that might have been a smile, but she wasn’t really sure. “I think a short, ditzy blonde in my present is more like it,” he said gruffly, turning back to the desk. “We’ve got to finish this paperwork if you ever want to get to the call to Santa Fe.”
She made a face at him, knowing he wouldn’t see it. “I’m not short,” she said softly, but he ignored it.
She sighed. So it did no good to get friendly with him. Back to square one, and the original plan. When in doubt, tough it out. That was what her father always used to tell her. Funny but she’d never realized his words to live by would come in handy someday. She had to curb her natural inclination to be reasonable and give everyone the benefit of the doubt. She knew what her rights were. Maybe it was about time to see that they were upheld by this country sheriff.
“When do I get to make my phone call?” she demanded, prepared to fight about it.
“When I’m good and ready to let you make it.”
“I have rights,” she reminded him, raising one eyebrow. “Does it usually take this long? Or am I just special?”
He met her gaze and held it, as though evaluating his options. Finally he picked up the phone and plunked it down in front of her. “Go ahead. Just keep it short.” But as she picked up the receiver and began to dial, he reached out to stop her, adding, “Who are you calling?”
She held the receiver away from him and frowned at him furiously, sure he was still trying to thwart her. “Do I have to tell you? Is that in the rules?”
He looked pained. “I’m not trying to figure out your strategy. I just wanted to advise you to be careful who you call and how you do it. By law, you get one call. Once it’s gone, it’s gone.”
She frowned suspiciously, not ready to accept that at face value. “But if the first phone call doesn’t work out, surely there’s another one allowed.”
Squaring his shoulders, he couldn’t keep the gleam of satisfaction out of his voice. “Nope.”
Her eyes sparked. “The deck is really stacked in your favor, isn’t it?”
“Of course,” he said simply. Then he almost grinned. “I’m the good guy.”
“In your dreams.” She shook her head, exasperated. He was enjoying this a little too much. Sadistic beast. She turned away so that her back was to him and began to dial again. But something wasn’t right. Holding the receiver to her ear, she frowned. “There’s no dial tone,” she said, turning back to him. “Listen.” She held it out to him.
He listened, then tapped down the buttons a few times and gave up. “It’s dead,” he said shortly.
She stared at him, hoping he didn’t mean what he obviously did mean. This telephone was her only hope, her only lifeline to the outside world that would surely prove, quickly enough once contacted, that she wasn’t any more Billie Joe Calloway than she was Billy the Kid. “Dead? What do you mean, it’s dead?”
He glanced at her, his eyes as dark as coal. He knew what she was thinking, and he knew more than that. This meant the die was cast. The two of them were going to spend the night together in this room. There was no longer any way out. “It’s dead. The storm’s probably knocked out the lines.”
The look of horror on her face mirrored her distress. She was feeling more and more isolated here, more and more helpless. Was there no escape from this situation? “But… what about my phone call?”
He raised that dark eyebrow again, and the look on his face was a cynical one. “Got a cellular phone?”
Her eyes lit up. “Back in my car.”
He gestured toward the snowstorm raging outside the window. “Then I guess you’re out of luck.”
“But that’s not fair!”
He wasn’t sure why, but he was feeling rather smug at the moment. “No. Neither are lotteries or beauty pageants, but we have them anyway.”
She shook her head. “There’s got to be something.” A note of desperation was edging her tone.
He turned from her and gestured toward a dark, old-fashioned-looking machine sitting against the back of the desk. “There’s the old shortwave,” he told her reluctantly. “It’s ancient and it doesn’t work very well. But at least I might be able to get through to the district office in Santa Fe.”
“Okay.” She spread her arms out. “Let’s do it.”
She sat down and watched as he fooled with the controls for what seemed like hours, and finally there was a crackling sound of someone on the line.
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