LITMIR.BIZ

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he told her, as she murdered him with a scalding look out of hot green eyes. He was out of breath and knew he couldn’t blame it entirely on the last, minor skirmish. That tight little bottom of hers pressing against his crotch had left him uncomfortably aroused.

      And he didn’t want to be.

      Turning from her, he switched on the TV, let the volume boom out. M.J. had already ripped the gag away with her free hand and was hissing like a snake. “You can scream all you want now,” he told her as he took out a small knife and sliced through the phone cord. “The three rooms down from here are vacant, so nobody’s going to hear you.” Then he grinned. “Besides, I put it around at check-in that we’re on our honeymoon, so even if they hear, they’re not going to bother us. Be back in a minute.”

      He went out, shutting the door behind him. M.J. closed her eyes again. Dear God, what was going on with her? For a moment, for just one insane moment, when he pressed her into the mattress with his body, she’d felt weak and hot. With lust.

      It was sick, sick, sick.

      But just for that one insane moment, she’d imagined being stripped and taken, being ravaged, having his mouth on her. His hands on her.

      More, she’d wanted it.

      She shuddered now, praying it was just some sort of weird reaction to shock.

      She wasn’t a woman who shied away from good, healthy, hot sex. But she didn’t give herself to strangers, to men who knocked her down, tied her up and tossed her into bed in some cheap motel.

      And he’d been aroused. She hadn’t been so stupid, or so dazed with shock, that she was unaware of his reaction. Hell, the man had been wrapped around her, hadn’t he? But he’d backed off.

      She struggled to even her breathing. He wasn’t going to rape her. He didn’t want sex. He wanted— God only knew.

      Don’t feel, she ordered herself. Just think. Just clear your mind and think.

      Slowly, she opened her eyes, took a survey of the room.

      It was, in a word, hideous.

      Obviously, some misguided soul had thought that using an eye-searing combo of orange and blue would turn the cheaply furnished, cramped little room into the exotic.

      He couldn’t have been more wrong.

      The drapes were as thin as paper, and looked to be of about the same consistency. But he’d pulled them closed over the narrow front window, so the room was deep in shadow.

      The television blared out a poorly dubbed Hercules movie on its rickety gray pedestal. The single dresser was ringed with interlinking water-marks. There was a metal box beside the bed. For a couple of bucks in quarters, she could treat herself to dancing fingers. Whoopee.

      The yellow glass ashtray on the night table was chipped, and didn’t look heavy enough to make an effective weapon. Even over the din of Hercules, she could hear the roaring sputter of an air-conditioning unit that was doing absolutely nothing to cool the room.

      The print near a narrow door she assumed was to the bathroom was a garish reproduction of a country landscape in autumn, complete with screaming red barn and stupid-faced cows.

      Reaching over, she tested the bedside lamp. It was bright blue glass, with a dingy and yellowing shade, but it had some heft. It might come in handy.

      She heard the rattle of the key and set it down again, stared at the door.

      He came in with a small red-and-white cooler and dropped it on the dresser. Her heart thumped when she saw her purse slung over his shoulder, but he tossed it on the floor by the bed so casually that she relaxed again.

      The diamond was still safe, she thought. And so was the can of Mace, the can opener and the roll of nickels she habitually carried as weapons.

      “Nothing I like better than a really bad movie,” he commented, and paused to watch Hercules battle several fierce-looking warriors sporting pelts and bad teeth. “I always wonder where they come up with the dialogue. You know, was it really that bad when it was scripted in Lithuanian or whatever, or does it just lose it in the translation?”

      With a shrug, he walked over, lifted the top on the cooler and took out two soft drinks.

      “I figure you’re thirsty.” He walked to her, offered a can. “And you’re not the type to cut off your nose.” His assessment was proved correct when she grabbed the can and drank deeply. “This place doesn’t run to room service,” he continued. “But there’s a diner down the road, so we won’t go hungry. You want something now?”

      She eyed him over the top of the can. “No.”

      “Fine.” He sat on the side of the bed, settled himself and smiled at her. “Let’s talk.”

      “Kiss my butt.”

      He blew out a breath. “It’s an attractive offer, sugar, but I’ve been trying not to think along those lines.” He gave her thigh a friendly pat. “Now, the way I see it, we’re both in a jam here, and you’ve got the key. Once you tell me who’s after you and why, I’ll deal with it.”

      The worst of her thirst was abated, so she sipped slowly. Her voice dripped sarcasm. “You’ll deal with it?”

      “Yeah. Consider me your champion-at-arms. Like good old Herc there.” He stabbed a thumb at the set behind him. “You tell me about it, then I’ll go take care of the bad guys. Then I’ll bill you. And if the offer about kissing your butt’s still open, I’ll take you up on that, too.”

      “Let’s see.” She leaned her head back, kept her eyes level on his. “What was it you told your pal Ralph to do? Oh, yeah.” She peeled her lips back in a snarl and repeated it.

      He only shook his head. “Is that any way to talk to the guy who kept you from getting a bullet in the brain?”

      “I kept you from getting a bullet in the brain, pal, though I have serious doubts he’d have been able to hit it, as it’s clearly so small. And you pay me back by manhandling me, tying me up, gagging me, and dumping me in some cheap rent-by-the-hour motel.”

      “I’m assured this is a family establishment,” he said dryly. God, she was a pistol, he thought. Spitting at him despite his advantage, daring him to take her on, though she didn’t have a hope of winning the game. And sexy as bloody hell in tight jeans and a wrinkled shirt.

      “Think about this,” he said. “That brainless giant said something about me taking too long, talking too much, which leads me to believe they were listening from the van. They must have had surveillance equipment, and he got antsy. Otherwise, if you’d gone along with me like a good girl, they’d have pulled us over somewhere along the line and taken you. They didn’t want direct involvement, or witnesses.”

      “You’d be a witness,” she corrected.

      “Nothing to sweat over. I’d have been ticked off about having another bounty hunter snatch my job, but people in my line of work don’t go running to the cops. I’d have lost my fee, considered my day wasted, maybe bitched to Ralph. That’s the way they’d figure it, anyway. And Ralph would have probably passed me some fluff job to keep me happy.”

      His eyes changed, went hard again. Knife-edged gray ice. “Somebody’s got their foot on his throat. I want to know who.”

      “I couldn’t say. I don’t know your friend Ralph—”

      “Former friend.”

      “I don’t know the gorilla who broke my door, and I don’t know you.” She was pleased her voice was calm, without a single hitch or quiver. “Now, if you’ll let me go, I’ll report all this to the police.”

      His lips twitched. “That’s the first time you’ve mentioned the cops, sugar. And you’re bluffing. You don’t want them in on this. That’s another question.”

      He was right about

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