Too Close for Comfort. Heidi Rice
of juice dribbling down her chin. She swiped the back of her hand across her mouth, wiping off the trickle, but the tug of arousal made it impossible to drag his gaze away.
I must seriously need to get laid.
Had it been six months since he’d had that weekend fling in Sonora with Elena, the public defender? Six months wasn’t that unusual for him—he’d always been choosy about his sexual partners—but this time the abstinence had to be messing with his radar.
The girl was cute, no question. The slanting chocolate eyes, thick red-gold curls, her wide kissable mouth and pale freckled skin made a unique package—but cute was hardly his type. And then there was the biggest turn-off of all. He was involved with her in a professional capacity. She was definitely a witness, possibly even a perp. And he never crossed that line. Ever.
The heat subsided as he watched her gulp down the last of the burger as if her life depended on it. Exactly how old was she? With that petal-soft skin it was hard to tell, but she could be a teenager.
He forced his gaze from her lips as he lifted the bag of fries off the dash, and passed them to her. ‘How long’s it been since you had a decent meal?’
She stiffened. ‘Not long,’ she said grudgingly but took the bag.
Yeah, right.
She popped the fries into her mouth, but continued to watch him, as if she expected him to snatch them back at any moment.
He suppressed the dart of compassion.
Grab a dose of reality, Montoya.
She’s no damsel in distress—she’s a resourceful little operator with her own agenda. Getting a job at Demarest’s motel had been a neat trick. And how the hell had she tracked the guy from Scotland, when they’d had trouble tracking him across California? Until he had the full story of how she fitted into the picture with Demarest, he didn’t plan to trust her an inch.
But that didn’t solve his immediate problem. What to do with her tonight? He hadn’t planned much past getting her away from Demarest’s motel.
He couldn’t take her back to Morro, and booking her into another motel wasn’t an option either, because she’d skip.
Of course he could dump her on the cops. But while handing her over would ‘contain’ the problem, he couldn’t quite bring himself to do it.
‘So how did you find out Demarest had a room at the Morro, Iona?’ he asked, deciding it was about time he started interrogating her properly—and stopped fixating on those damn lips.
She stopped shovelling fries into her mouth. ‘How do you know my name?’ she said in that lilting Celtic brogue.
‘The motel clerk was real talkative when I told him about your crime spree with his key.’
Her rich chocolate eyes went squinty with temper. ‘You told him? How could you? I’ll lose my job.’
‘You’re not going back there anyway,’ he said, dismissing the prickle of guilt. He wasn’t the one who’d decided to indulge in some after hours B and E. ‘I don’t want you alerting Demarest to our presence.’
‘I’m not going to alert him. Why would I?’ She sounded aggrieved. ‘How am I going to pay my bill now? They probably won’t even give me the wages they owe me.’
‘I settled your bill.’ He’d also paid the clerk to keep her valuables in the motel safe. If Demarest showed up tonight, he might not need the bargaining chip Iona’s ID documents represented, but he had a feeling it wasn’t gonna be that simple. Because nothing about this damn case had been simple so far.
And the biggest complication of all was sitting right in front of him.
A complication made a whole lot worse by his perverse reaction to her.
He’d never before got a kick out of manhandling a woman—even on the force he’d earned the nickname Lancelot, because of his preference for using persuasion and persistence when interrogating female suspects, instead of threats and intimidation.
But there was no getting away from the fact that when he’d caught her in Demarest’s room tonight—he’d noticed the generous breasts propped on his forearm and the fresh, subtle fragrance of her hair. And while he might have been able to ignore that momentary loss of control—because it had been six months since he’d had a woman, any woman in his arms—that excuse was nowhere near good enough to explain why he’d come close to getting a hard-on just watching her eat.
‘But you can kiss your paycheck goodbye,’ he said, making sure the chill stayed in his voice.
Her big brown eyes widened, making him feel as if he’d just kicked Bambi.
‘Now stop arguing with me or I’ll kick you out of the car and leave you in the middle of nowhere.’
It was an empty threat, he wouldn’t do that to any woman, especially not one who had no money, no ID, who’d just devoured a burger as if she hadn’t eaten in days and who had eyes like Bambi.
But instead of being cowed, she stuck her chin out. ‘Fine, dump me here if you want. I’ve no got a problem with that.’
Damn, she was actually serious.
What kind of guys had she been dealing with? Then he thought of the seedy motel, and her connection to Demarest and had a pretty good idea.
‘Yeah, well, unfortunately I do.’
‘Then take me back to the motel. I’ll get my stuff and stay somewhere else. I won’t interfere with your case, I swear. I want Brad caught as much as you do.’
Maybe it was the flinty determination in her voice or the way her gaze never wavered. But he wanted to believe her.
Which only made him sure he shouldn’t. Ten years on the force had taught him that trust was a dangerous thing—and following your gut instead of having proof could get you killed.
He slid the car into reverse. ‘Forget it. You’re staying where I can keep an eye on you.’
‘Why?’ she said, the hitch in her voice telegraphing her shock. ‘This is ridiculous. You dislike me as much as I dislike you.’
Unfortunately he didn’t dislike her nearly as much as he should, but he let the observation pass.
Her brow creased. ‘All you have to do is trust me a little bit and we never have to lay eyes on each other again.’
‘Trust you?’ He sent her a long look. ‘You think?’
‘Oh, for Pete’s sake,’ she hissed. ‘I already told you Brad stole money from my father.’
So it was Brad now.
‘I was trying to get it back,’ she finished, crossing her arms, and making her breasts plump up under the scoop neck of the tank.
‘Yeah, but I don’t have a heck of a lot of proof.’ He dragged his eyes away from her cleavage. Annoyed with himself. And her. Was she doing that on purpose? ‘And until I do, we’re stuck with each other.’
He reversed out of the lot, deciding the argument was over.
‘Now hang on,’ she piped up. ‘If you don’t trust me, why the heck should I trust you? You say you’re a private investigator, but for all I know you could be an axe-murderer.’
‘I showed you my licence,’ he said, humouring her.
‘Which you could have had forged for you by axe-murderers.com.’
His lips quirked at her tenacity, but he bit back the chuckle. The accusation wasn’t funny, it was insulting.
He braked and pulled out his smartphone, then keyed in the number for the LAPD. He passed the phone to her as it started ringing. ‘Ask for Detective Stone, or Detective Ramirez in Vice, whichever one is on shift.