Dangerous Kiss (6 page)

Chris scrambled up the embankment. He stopped beside her.

“That’s nasty. God knows what you stepped on out here. What kind of person runs in an alley barefoot?” He peered closer at her face. “Oh, and your eye is starting to puff up. Nice.”

She flipped him the bird. Immature? Yes. Satisfying? Uh-huh.

Hank stepped into the alley and held up a folded piece of paper. “I found this near the railroad tracks.”

They crowded around Hank. He unfolded the grimy square to reveal a younger Kendall Burlington. She smiled shyly up at them. It looked like a copy from an old yearbook photo. Her then dishwater-blonde hair hung in a low ponytail. She wore a strand of white pearls and a black, scoop-necked dress.

“Why would the Voice of Doom kill her? She looks so sweet,” Claire said quietly.

All three men turned to stare at her.

“The Voice of Doom? Who the hell is the Voice of Doom? And what kind of dumb name is that?” Hank asked.

“I had to call him something. Whacked Out Killer Who dumped a Body in my Dumpster seemed a little too long.” Claire twisted a strand of hair around her fingers. She had to tell them about the call and the threats. This would not be fun. Hank would be irate that she had held it back from him. Who knew what Jake would think? She felt like crap already, best to get it over with.

She took a deep breath, then told them about the call and the demand for Kendall’s flash drive and phone.

“I was going to tell you all of this at Harvest, but then my car got blown up.”

“You knew all of this and took off after this guy anyway?” Hank smacked his head with his hand as he hollered. “Do you have some kind of death wish?”

“Hank, stop acting like my older brother for a minute. We have proof this guy is tied to Kendall. Isn’t it worth something?”

“It’s not worth your life.”

The worried look on Hank’s face shut her up. She’d scared him when she’d run after the killer. To be honest, now that the adrenaline had leaked out of her system, her reaction frightened her, too. She hadn’t thought first, she’d let impulse rule her actions. Again.

She wouldn’t actually tell Hank she had acted reckless. No, confession went against the little sister code. Instead, she hobbled over and gave him a hug. He squeezed her back. She was sorry. He understood.

“All right, all right. Enough PDA here.” Hank gave her a quick peck on the forehead and headed toward Harvest.

She shuffled, hopped, shuffled down the alley to keep her weight off her injured foot. It felt like she’d been stung by a bee the size of a mountain lion, but wouldn’t cripple her for life.

Hank, already ahead, didn’t notice her discomfort, but Chris did. He hunkered down. “Piggy back?”

She awkwardly pulled herself up onto Chris’ back. Glancing back at Jake, she saw he hadn’t moved. A look of stark yearning lay bare on his face.

For her? For her crazy but loving family?

He caught her staring and the emotional display disappeared. He ran his fingers through his short black hair and looked into the distance.

A pang of regret squeezed her chest.

Wrong time.

Wrong man.

She needed…well, no one right now. Not after Brett. She’d sworn off men for at least a year. Add to that her three interfering brothers and the last thing she wanted was another man who thought he had to protect her and guide her. For too long she’d let the men in her life do just that.

An hour and two cups of coffee later, the firefighters were gone but the stench of burnt Jeep remained. Its carcass dripped in the afternoon sun, a bizarre centerpiece in Harvest’s parking lot.

Damn, Claire had loved that car. She’d miss the feel of the wind blowing through her hair on the twenty-minute drive home while she blasted the satellite radio.

“Mourning the Jeep?”

Sitting on the employee bench outside the back door, she shaded her eyes with her hand and looked up at her brother. Chris held an industrial-size brown bottle. She squinted at the label. Hydrogen peroxide. He’d wanted to distract her with his question. Really, it was kind of sweet. She would have told him so too, if he hadn’t chosen that moment to yank her foot out and pour the clear liquid over the small gash. It bubbled and hissed like he’d just opened up a shaken Coke bottle. She jerked her foot out of his hand.

“Hurts like crazy, doesn’t it?” Chris twisted the cap back on the bottle. “Mom always said the sizzle means it’s working.”

“Give me the stupid bandage.”

He slapped it into her outstretched palm.

“I’ll be right back.” He paused right outside Harvest’s door and waved the bottle at her. “Unless you want another shot of the good stuff.”

She would have hurled something at him if there had been any ammunition nearby.

Chris had always been a tease, winning the super lottery hadn’t changed him a bit. Except now he had more time to be annoying.

She pushed the sticky ends of the bandage onto her sole. The icy burn from the hydrogen peroxide subsided. Bandages always made injuries feel better. True at age eight and still true at twenty-eight.

“At least let me take you home.” Hank slapped his dark brown sheriff’s hat against his thigh.

Claire slid her sore foot into her shoe, stood up and bounced gently to test her pain threshold. It ached, but nothing she couldn’t handle.

“Hank, I appreciate the offer. I really do.” She smoothed her skirt, hopelessly marred with dirt. “But I drove the farm truck in this morning and if you took me home, I’d be stuck out in the country without transportation. Anyway, the Voice of Doom knows I don’t have the phone or the flash drive.” She didn’t think he’d buy that last bit, but she had to try.

She took in his disapproval, evident by the set of his jaw. He glared at her. The vein at his temple pulsed as he gnawed on an already tortured nail. As the eldest brother, he’d always been her first and most effective protector. No surprise that he’d gone into law enforcement.

“That’s crap and you know it.” He spit part of his nail to the ground.

“Look, I’m only going home for a few hours to shower and let the dog out. I’ll be back before the dinner service. And despite what you think, I’m not completely without defenses. I’ve got dad’s quail-hunting guns at the house. You know damn well that I’m a good shot.”

He regarded her without comment. She gave him her best everything-will-be-okay smile. Hank shook his head and walked away. A few minutes later, he and Chris took off in their cars.

She didn’t know where Jake had gone. She surreptitiously looked for him for half an hour with no luck before she got behind the wheel of the decrepit farm truck to head home.

The truck had a hole in the passenger-side floorboard, dents and rust along both sides and an arthritic manual transmission. Her parents had sold a large part of the family farm to finance their post-retirement dream of cruising around the country in an RV. However, her father refused to part with the heap of a truck. He’d left it parked in Claire’s garage—something she was grateful for this morning when she’d needed to get into town.

But now, she couldn’t wait to get home and shower. She planned to break out the double chocolate fudge ice cream for a quick dinner. Healthy? No, but after the day she’d had, she deserved a little bad-food loving. Claire turned the key in the truck’s ignition.

Nothing. Not a groan of the engine. Not a click of the starter. Nada.

She tried again. Still zilch.

After everything that had happened today, she had to deal with a non-responsive engine, too? The addition was more than she could take. Her temper exploded.

She stomped her feet on the pedals. Yanked on the immobile steering wheel. Cursed and railed against the unfairness of it all. She was in the middle of a diatribe about how the truck would be sorry when it went up for auction at the scrap metal dealer’s when a chuckle interrupted her tirade.

Slowly, already knowing who it was and hating that fact, she turned.

Jake stood outside the truck’s passenger door. His right elbow rested on the open window frame with his chin cradled in his palm as if he were enjoying the show.

“Need a ride?” He winked.

T
he SUV crunched over the gravel drive to Claire’s house and lurched to a stop. She cracked her eyelids, and through the slits she spied the cornfield surrounding her house on three sides. The field blazed golden in the late Sunday afternoon sun, welcoming her home.

Relief wrapped around her like a warm blanket. Not that chills were her problem. No. Being trapped in a car for twenty minutes with Jake had kept her plenty hot and more than a little bothered. She couldn’t wait to get out of his SUV and send him on his way back to town.

When she had climbed into his gas-guzzler, her brilliant plan had been to ignore him on the ride home. Things were crazy enough right now without adding her lustful thoughts about him to the mix. Too bad her scheme hadn’t worked

She’d given him directions to her house, leaned her head against the window of his black SUV and faked sleep to avoid talking. Rude, yes, but her options were limited and jumping his bones wasn’t an one of them. Unfortunately¸ her lack of sight had only enhanced her other senses.

The musky scent of his cologne had teased her as her body vibrated in time with the SUV’s motor. Hyperaware, her muscles had tensed every time he’d moved in his seat.

He had started singing along to an old Smoky Robinson Motown tune. His golden tenor had softened her resolve to ignore him as he had sung, “I don’t want you, but I need you. Don’t wanna kiss you, but I need to.”

She’d squeezed her thighs together to maintain her balance with every twist and turn in the road. The pressure had built in her clit until she’d surrendered to her naughty imaginings. He would sing as he kissed his way down her stomach, a day’s growth of beard tickling her. He’d stop at that spot right below her ribs. Kiss his way across the flat plateau, grasping her hips tight to keep her from wriggling too much. He’d linger near her bellybutton before veering lower and crossing over to her right hip. She’d arch her back, silently beseeching him to move toward her wet pussy. He’d murmur the song’s lyrics as his mouth traveled toward her shaved lips.

Just as her daydream was about to pay off, his SUV had jerked to a halt.

As he cut the motor, she squeezed her thighs together to ease the throbbing pressure. The squirming didn’t help.

“What in the world is that?” His jaw dropped as he stared at her house.

Ignoring the desire pulling her body taut, she glanced out the front windshield. And like that, the invisible weight on her shoulders evaporated.

The dog spotted her and went nuts. He wiggled from the tip of his snout to his tail. He circled. He yipped and whined.

She shrugged and opened the door. “That’s Onion.” She jumped down to the driveway and snuck a sideways glance at Jake. He sat slack-jawed behind the wheel.

Her dog galloped to her side. No one could beat Onion in an ugly dog contest. He looked like a drunken, mad scientist had fashioned him from the leftover parts of several mangy mutts. He had a Bulldog’s short, muscular body, a Chow’s fluffy, curled tail and a few black spots dotted his tan coat. A Labrador’s endearing personality topped off the package. Yep. Onion was an unsightly mess. But she loved him.

She bent and scratched him behind the ears. “What are you doing out here, you silly dog? How’d you sneak out this time?”

Onion looked ugly, but he had a beautiful brain. The dog got into or out of anywhere he wanted. She’d tried to crate him once. He’d escaped before she’d even pulled out of the drive.

“I think he just walked out the front door,” Jake said, slamming his car door shut and walked over to her side.

Claire scrutinized the wraparound porch. Sure enough, the front door hung wide open. She took a step forward, but Jake grabbed her elbow, tugging her to his side.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

She yanked her arm. “Inside my house.”

He jerked her around so she was behind him as he scanned the area. “How’d that work out for you last time you took off without thinking first?”

She wanted to tell him how wrong his words were. But she couldn’t. He was right. A fact that annoyed her to no end.

“He could be in there.” Jake waved toward the house. “He could be armed.”

“I don’t think Onion would be acting all lovey-dovey if that maniac was here. He’s not a doggie model, but he’s smart. He probably scattered as soon as trouble hit and has been waiting for me to get back.”

Jake looked down at Onion, who busily sniffed his boots. He patted the dog’s head. Grudgingly, she chalked up a point in his favor for being nice to Onion.

“OK, but stay with me and don’t do anything stupid.”

The urge to get inside overrode her need to make a snappy comeback. She didn’t like it, but she wasn’t going to argue the point.

She and Jake sidled up the steps to the wide front porch. The door’s stained-glass center oval had been shattered.

“I’m beginning to think I’m cursed,” she said.

Jake clutched her hand in his, sending a jolt of awareness up her arm. “I’m beginning to agree.” Together, they tiptoed around the glass and through the open doorway.