.

      Las Vegas? Street scum? Hmm, Liza thought. She didn’t think he was talking about Las Vegas, New Mexico. Which meant her sheriff had once run a much bigger town. A town filled with vice and sin. Fully intrigued now, she folded her arms and leaned against her car as she watched him try to extricate himself. He certainly appeared to have the upper body strength for it. A nice, thickly muscled chest, and incredible arms… Did they have a gym in Canyon Springs? she wondered. Somehow she didn’t think her sheriff had paid a membership fee for those biceps.

      “Are you sure you don’t want me to run over to the fire department and get them to bring a ladder or something?”

      “I’m sure,” he growled, not bothering to look at her. His gaze was focused on Mango, who sat, quietly now, preening his magnificent tail feathers and looking as innocent as a little canary. “Escape artist,” he muttered.

      “So, he makes a habit of this, huh? Whose is he?”

      “My mother’s.”

      “Aww, that’s so sweet of you, rescuing your mom’s bird.”

      “There is nothing remotely sweet about this bird. Or my mother, most days, for that matter.”

      Liza thought of her own parents and nodded in understanding. She hadn’t heard from her father since marriage number five, which, as several years had passed since then, was likely several “I do’s” ago. Her mother only remembered to check in when she wanted something. Which was mercifully infrequent. “So, what kind of bird is Mango?” she asked. “I’ve never seen a white parrot before.”

      He gave her a long look, then sighed. “He’s a cockatoo. Moluccan.”

      “He’s really gorgeous.”

      “Yeah. Right. A real prince. Listen, maybe you can do me a favor.”

      Liza grinned. She knew she’d get to him eventually. “Sure.”

      “How good are you at climbing trees?”

      Her grin disappeared. “You’re not asking me to climb that tree.”

      He twisted a bit and looked down at her. He could smile, as it turned out, only there was nothing friendly about it. This was more like a take-no-prisoners kind of smile. Still, it managed to send those shivers through her again, anyway. She might like being taken prisoner by him for an afternoon…or three. But she drew the line at physical exertion of any other kind. That’s what personal trainers were for—to sweat with her clients while she got her nails done and took another business lunch.

      “I’m not what you’d call a climber,” she said. “Social, maybe,” she appended with a saucy grin. “Why don’t you let me get you a nice strong fireman with a ladder?”

      “Because Tucker Greywolf would love nothing more than to come pull me out of this tree.”

      “Ah.” The pride thing. This she understood. “What exactly is it you think I can do for you if I were to climb this tree?” Not that she was going to, but she was nothing if not good at solving crisis situations. It was simply a matter of finding out who to call to fix it.

      “My belt is stuck under a knob on this branch. I can’t reach around for it without letting go. If you could climb up just a few feet and pop it off, I could maneuver myself out of here.”

      He was only about twelve to fifteen feet up. A person—meaning someone other than her—would only have to climb about three or four feet, reach the rest of the way, and presto. Shouldn’t be too hard to wrangle someone walking down the street to do that. Only when she turned and looked around the corner, there seemed to be a sudden dearth of pedestrians. A few children down the block on their bikes and two elderly women crossing at the far corner—that was it. She sighed and looked up again.

      He was staring down at her, waiting.

      She glanced down at her perfectly gorgeous Jimmy Choo slings. They gave a two-inch advantage to her skimpy five-foot-four frame, but that wasn’t going to be enough.

      “I can’t climb in heels,” she said.

      “Then kick them off.”

      “I really don’t climb trees. I’m a city girl. L.A. by way of New York.”

      “This is a city.”

      She planted her hands on her hips. “A city with a perfectly good fire department two blocks down.”

      “Forget it.” The sheriff redoubled his efforts, making the branch Mango was perched on sway wildly. The bird merely continued to preen, as if it were the wind blowing and not its rescuer flailing about. Then the sound of ripping fabric rent the air. “Well, shit.”

      “Shit! Shit!” Mango did a little hop from claw to claw, quite happy with his new vocabulary word. “Well, shit!”

      Sheriff Sexy Exposed Ass let his chin drop. “Wonderful. This is all I need.”

      Liza was wide-eyed, staring both at the bird…and the patch of bright yellow smiley faces peeking out from those brown trousers. She focused on the former, though it cost her. “I didn’t know Mango talked. What else does he say?”

      “Only the things you never want him to. Listen, could we cut the chatter—” he glared at Mango “—from both parties, and get my belt unstuck, please?”

      Liza shifted her attention from the prancing cockatoo to the smiley faces. After all, she had tried to focus on the bird first, hadn’t she? “A briefs man, huh?”

      “Wha—? Oh, that. Present from a friend. A joke, really. It’s early when I get up and they were just what came out of the drawer next. Why am I explaining this to you?”

      She shrugged. “That’s what you get for dressing in the dark. Me, I prefer doing it with the lights on.”

      For a split second his gaze sharpened to such a fine point she thought she felt it pierce her. Right where she wanted to be pierced, too. Then he sighed and let his head drop back, and it was like the moment never happened. Only it had. She knew it, and her libido definitely knew it. And wanted to be pierced again. And again. Down, girl.

      “Please, I’m at your mercy here,” he said. “Name your price.”

      Boy, talk about a test. The things she could come up with right now. But she met the challenge and said, “Do they serve lunch somewhere nearby?”

      “Fine, lunch, great. Now could we— Oh, shit.”

      “Shit!” Mango mimicked happily. “Shit, oh, shit!”

      Liza ignored the bird and turned in the direction the sheriff was looking. From his vantage point he could see past the corner. She took a step or two and craned her neck so she could see as well. A small, somewhat interesting contingent was heading their way. A strapping man in a form-fitting blue uniform, framed by two identical middle-aged women in identical business attire, fronted by a tall, rawboned woman wearing plaid Bermuda shorts, a pale green, long-sleeve pullover and a floppy straw hat. A long braid of shocking red hair lay over her shoulder. Her cane clacked against the cement sidewalk.

      “Please God, just kill me now,” she heard the sheriff say over her head.

      “Greywolf and company, I take it?”

      “I will pay any price if you could get me out of this tree before they get here.”

      Liza looked at the closing contingent, still a good block and a half away, then back up to the beseeching eyes of her sheriff. Definitely brown, she thought. And she was a sucker for brown eyes. Okay, so she was a sucker for green eyes. But that was only because she’d never seen eyes like his before.

      “This is going to cost you big, you know,” she said, still weighing her options. “Very, very big.”

      Then he grinned. A real grin. The Cheshire cat had nothing on this grin. “Oh, I’m sure it already has.”

      Liza