LITMIR.BIZ

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      “Shh,” she told him. “Don’t talk. Just think happy thoughts. Happy, healing, healthy thoughts. Big, Jefferson-male-testosterone thoughts.”

      “There’s nothing wrong with my testosterone,” he grumbled, “just the delivery system. Move, okay? You’re treating me like an invalid.”

      “I do think you should see a doctor. I kicked you with all my might. I thought you were some kind of crazed freak when you grabbed me.”

      “You were spying,” he said, “I had a right to throw a little excitement into the mix.”

      “Well, you certainly did that.”

      Archer painfully gained his feet. “You have a very unusual accent that I can’t place. And sometime, when there aren’t birds singing in my head, you’ll have to tell me how you learned to toss a big man like that. But right now, I’m moving toward my warm bed.”

      “I would say I’m sorry, but you really shouldn’t have startled me.”

      “To think I worried about you, too,” Archer said, not about to admit he’d been out looking for her. “Did you want something specific when you were peering in the window, or has maiming me satisfied you temporarily?” He sighed dramatically. “I need a whiskey.”

      “Marvella gave me some of her special concoction,” Clover offered.

      Archer suddenly towered above her. “Marvella!”

      She nodded.

      “Didn’t I tell you not to go over there?”

      Clover bristled right before his eyes, just like Tonk before she threw a low-down, scurvy hoof. “You can’t order me around, Archer Jefferson. I do as I please. I can take care of myself.”

      “So I see,” he said grumpily. “Now, you go over to Marvella’s, get your things and come right over here with me. This side of the street is where girls like you belong.”

      “Girls like me?” She put her hands on her hips. “What kind of girl do you think I am?”

      “Innocent. Travel-weary. Unused to the ways of the world. You came here without a room or any reservations of any kind. Clearly, you didn’t have a plan. That’s how nice girls end up on the wrong side of the street. Listen, I know what I’m talking about. Marvella preys on girls who have no plan.”

      She stared at him. “She said the Jeffersons preyed on girls without plans. In fact, she said you Jeffersons had impregnated one recently.”

      “We impregnated? No, believe me, that’s not exactly what happened.”

      “But it’s close to true?”

      He took a second look at Clover. She sounded so hopeful, as if she wanted to believe he was some kind of big bad wolf. Maybe he was, but not for this girl. She was not the type of girl he’d jump on in the woods as she traveled to grandma’s. He liked his women spicy. If he had a dream woman, she’d be just the opposite of this lady. “You’re very safe with me,” he assured her.

      He thought she looked doubtful, or maybe puzzled, so he realized this point needed to be outlined in teacher-red ink. “Do I look like the kind of man who feasts on innocent girls who can’t see very well?”

      Just then Bandera opened the door, peering out at them. “What’s happening, friends?”

      “Nothing. What are you doing up?”

      “Can’t sleep. Keep waking up, thinking about that lady on the bar stool. Think I’ll go try to round her up.”

      Archer thought Clover gasped, but when he glanced at her, she was looking at her feet. Maybe a bug had crawled across her shoe. He figured her for the kind of girl who spooked easily. “Good luck,” he said to Bandera.

      “Whatever,” Bandera answered. “I’m off.”

      His brother loped away. Archer met Clover’s gaze. “So, do I look like the kind of man who preys on perfectly nice girls with strange accents? I’m trying to help you, traveler.”

      Clover didn’t reply for a moment. Then she sighed. “Hope you feel better soon. I’m going to bed.”

      He watched as she walked away. What had that been about?

      “Hey,” he said, catching up to her in the middle of the street. Turning her to where he could see her in the bright lights from Marvella’s, he said, “Don’t go off mad. You kicked me, remember?”

      “Yes. But harder than I meant to. Clearly I put you out of commission.”

      “Well, for a moment or two, but…” He looked at her, trying to see her eyes behind the thick lenses. “I mean, you didn’t damage me for life.”

      She shook her head. “It’s probably like a party balloon. Once popped, the air is gone.”

      He straightened. “Sister, there is nothing wrong with my party balloon! I am the life of the party when I want to be. That’s when I want to be, and I just don’t want to be. With…you know…you.”

      She looked at him. “Why not?”

      He wasn’t sure he heard her right. “Are you propositioning me?”

      “I might be.” She put her hands on her hips and a mulish expression on her face. “Scared?”

      “Well, I’m not sure.” He rubbed his chin. “It’s just that you don’t strike me as the kind of girl for casual charades.”

      “Well, maybe I am.” She turned toward Marvella’s. “You’re not allowed to come in here unless you’re a client,” she said. “Good night, Archer.”

      There was definitely air in his party balloon, Archer realized. He liked her straightforward approach. “Wait a minute,” he said. “Let’s talk about this some more.”

      “No, thank you,” she said. “I’ve discovered you’re full of nothing but hot air, and I want a man who can have fun and then go home after the party is over.”

      “Isn’t that supposed to be my line? I want a woman who goes home after the party?”

      “If you had known your lines,” Clover said, “you’d be getting a party favor right now. Good night.”

      She closed the door in his face.

      His jaw dropped.

      That crazy girl! She’d kicked him. She’d made his wounded soldier rise to the battlefield with all that talk about sex—sex with her—and then she’d shut the door on him.

      The only door in town he shouldn’t touch.

      “DAMN,” BANDERA SAID a couple seconds later, walking out the door to find his brother still standing there, hands on hips.

      “Damn is right,” Archer agreed. “What did Clover do once she went inside?”

      Bandera laughed. “She went upstairs. You don’t have the hots for her, do you?”

      “No. I just hate to see a nice girl like her staying in a place like this.”

      Bandera shrugged. “She seems pretty confident.”

      “She does not! She needs direction.”

      “Dude, are you ever ignorant.” Bandera stared up at the windows. “Never tell a woman she needs direction. You’ll get a swift kick.”

      “I know.” Archer sighed. “I already did, and strangely, I found it compelling.”

      “I can’t worry about your love life.”

      “It has nothing to do with love. Merely concern for a stranger in town.”

      “That’s what I’m concerned about, too.”

      “Your

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