Of all the women for him to jones over, she had to be the most unsuitable.
He walked back to her car and lifted the hood.
She followed, and even though she kept a good distance between them, he was still damnably aware of her. The way she sucked in the corner of her lower lip as she’d look at him when she thought he was unaware. The way a few strands of hair had worked loose of the knot at the back of her head to cling to the delicate line of her jaw, the paleness of her neck.
He glared at the engine, wanting to ask her about the shelter, knowing she’d have a fit if she knew he’d followed her. As if her car had heard his thoughts, the narrow brace slipped and the hood crashed down on his shoulder.
He swore under his breath while Molly jumped back with a gasp. She hurriedly reached out, her hands knocking into his as they both reached for the brace to lift the hood off him.
He heard the way she sucked in her breath, and wanted to swear at the way she yanked her hand back. He was no prize, he’d be the first to admit it. But he wasn’t used to women being afraid of him. Not unless they were walking on the wrong side of the law.
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah. But hold this,” he muttered, and pushed the flashlight into her hands. “So I can see what I’m doing,” he added pointedly.
She made a soft huff and redirected the beam from his eyes to the engine.
He stared hard, waiting until the spots in front of his eyes disappeared, then began checking hoses and belts. He found the problem quickly enough. “You need a new fan belt. For that matter, you ought to have the whole thing tuned up.”
“Do-re-mi,” she murmured.
He caught himself from smiling as he lowered the hood. “Lock it up. I’ll drive you back to town.”
“You can’t fix it?”
He didn’t know whether to be flattered that she’d thought he might be able to or amused that she seemed peeved that he couldn’t. “Yeah, I could. With the right parts.” He took the flashlight from her and turned it off. “I’m not carrying even the wrong parts.”
“Only flashlights and first-aid kits.”
And evidence-collection kits, he thought. One that contained the print he’d lifted from her drinking glass. There was a part of him that wanted to run that print no matter what so-called agreement he’d struck with the woman.
There was a part of him that wanted to forget he’d ever taken the damned thing in the first place.
“Do you need help with anything?” He glanced at the lumps sitting on the passenger seat.
“No.” Her voice was sharp. Defensive. If he’d been back in L.A., he’d have wondered just what was in that briefcase and enormous purse that would cause a driver to be so antsy with a cop. But he wasn’t in Los Angeles anymore. And thank God for it.
He was standing on the side of a deserted highway in the middle of the night with a woman he wanted but couldn’t trust, even if he could get past her thick defenses.
“Suit yourself.” Leaving her to deal with her car, he went back to his truck and radioed in for a tow. Then he sat there, wrist propped over his steering wheel, as he watched her through the windshield.
The soft-sided briefcase she hefted over one shoulder looked heavy enough to knock her over, and he muttered an oath and shoved open the door and strode over to her.
“Don’t argue. There are some things you’re just going to have to put up with when it comes to me,” he said flatly as he slid the strap from her shoulder and took it. “What’s in here? Bricks?”
She pulled the second bag out of the car and slammed the door shut. “Books. For the reading group, remember? I told you I could manage it.”
The reading group story again. Right. Angel Ramirez hadn’t said squat about a reading group. “So you did. Am I complaining about it?”
“I—” She looked up at him, her expression guarded. “I’m sorry. I thought you were.”
“I wasn’t.” He headed toward his truck. When she stayed right where she was, he looked back at her. Standing beside her twenty-year-old car, clutching her enormous carpetbag of a purse to her with both hands, the faint night breeze barely enough to stir the hem of her floaty pink dress about her shapely knees.
She’d spent her entire Monday evening with a group of women living at a shelter. She still had a small plastic strip on her shin that he figured he recognized.
He let out a long breath. “Come on, Molly,” he said quietly. “Stop expecting the worst. Everything is going to be fine.”
Her fine eyebrows drew together. “With my car, you mean.”
“Yeah. Right.”
She hesitated a moment longer, then walked to his truck. She stowed her purse on the floor by her feet and carefully nudged aside the jacket of his suit as if she might catch something from it.
She didn’t speak until the lights of Rumor were visible through the windshield. “Thank you for stopping.”
“All part of being a public servant.”
She made a noncommittal sound that grated on his nerves. He took the exit down to Main Street. “Your car will be towed sometime tonight.”
“Oh, but—”
“I called it in already.”
Her lips started to tighten up.
“I know you’re perfectly capable of doing it yourself.”
She absorbed that, and slowly lost the tight-lipped expression. “As long as I didn’t spend the night sitting on the side of the highway, trying to decide the best course of action,” she finally admitted. “What were you doing out there, anyway? Surely you weren’t still on duty. Not after having been in Whitehorn all afternoon like you said. You haven’t even changed out of your suit. Your jacket is probably unforgivably wrinkled from lying on the seat in a heap the way it is.”
He was saved from coming up with an answer when he pulled up in front of her house. “Here you go. Will you need a ride to work in the morning? I could send around a car—”
“No!” She hurriedly gathered up her purse. “Of course I don’t need a ride. It’s just a few blocks around the park. A nice walk, in fact. I do wish the heat would let up, though. I keep telling myself that in a month, when the weather has really turned, I’ll be wishing for a little heat.”
She was speaking fast. Too fast. Making him wonder what had set her into this latest panic. He got out to carry in that enormous bag of books of hers. “Sure it’s a nice walk as long as you don’t have to cart this thing back to the library.”
Her expression lightened a little. If he wasn’t mistaken, she almost smiled. Which, of course, there in the middle of the godforsaken ninety-degree night made him determined to see just what that might look like. A real smile on Molly Brewster’s face when she looked at him.
Knowing he was probably one of the last people on earth to be able to succeed at that annoyed him no end.
She was fumbling a little with her keys. “Fortunately, the books are mine,” she assured as she finally pushed open the front door. “They get to stay here. Um, thank you, again, Deputy. For the ride, and all.”
Once again she stood squarely in the doorway. Not budging an inch, telling him absolutely that she was not going to invite him in. Not for coffee. Not for discussion about Harriet. Not for…anything.
“We never did get around to talking much about Harriet.”
“Well, it’s a little late tonight, and you warned me earlier today that you’d be by the library in the morning. Call me selfish, Deputy,