Blue Jeans and a Badge

“Nothing's further from my mind.” His gaze slid down her body and his amusement faded, replaced by something edgier. Something hungry, circling around her like that hawk he'd been watching.

Luce felt the impact of his perusal from her head to her toes. “Good. Because I'm not interested.”

She slid him a look to check his reaction. And Philip shot back a smile. A knowing smile that called her a liar louder than if he'd yelled the word at her.

“So tell me about the bounty hunting,” he said.

She waited for the telltale heat in her face to diminish. Then, because it was either that or do something really crazy like ask him to kiss her, she told him.

Anything to avoid talking about the loaded shotgun that was hovering there, big as life, between them.

A shotgun called desire.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Epilogue

April
Piñon Lake, New Mexico

T
his was almost too easy.

Peering through the chilly April New Mexico darkness, Luce Montgomery watched with satisfaction as the silhouette of a man emerged from the Tafota Salvage and Engine Repair Shop office in Piñon Lake, and glanced around before closing the door quietly behind him.

“Gotcha,” she whispered, flipped her ponytail behind her shoulder and fingered the Walther holstered at her hip. Why did they always go home? “Clyde, my man, you're toast.”

It was all good. She pushed off the carcass of the burned-out '79 Chevy she'd been leaning against and prepared to confront her quarry. Their stupidity made her job easier.

Clyde Tafota had been a very bad boy. He'd jumped bail. Though no one could figure out exactly why. He'd been in
volved in a cousin's drug buy while on a visit to St. Louis during which two dealers were killed, but SLPD forensics had recently nailed down who did it—and it wasn't Clyde. He was sure to be exonerated for the murders. So why had he run?

Luce didn't care. Her job was to bring him back to St. Louis, period, for which she would be paid a nice chunk of change. Twenty percent of thirty-five grand, to be exact.

Illuminated by the bare bulb burning over the silent repair shop door, the man turned and quickly walked toward the yard where a black Jeep was parked in the driveway. She could see there was something in his hand, but it looked like paper, not a weapon.

Luce stepped out from the shadows, drawing her semi-automatic. “Stop right there, Clyde. You're—”

Tafota looked up in surprise, and the paper flew out of his hand, skittering away on a breeze.

“Damn it!” he exclaimed, and took off after it, completely ignoring her.

With a single, succinct curse, she holstered the Walther and started to sprint, launching herself at him in a running dive just as he caught the paper.

They hit the dirt in a tangle of limbs, him with a loud “oof” and she with an expert roll so she landed sitting on his back, her gun once more out and pointed at his neck.

“I wouldn't recommend trying that again, sport,” she drawled.

She really hated it when they ran.

“What the hell—” Clyde sounded mad.

Tough. “Like I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted—” She moved her knee off a sharp rock and shifted back a few inches so she ended up straddling his butt…and was momentarily distracted by how nice he felt under her. His backside was firm, his thighs hard and muscular. She frowned. Tafota's file had said he was an older guy, sixtyish, and in his mug shot he appeared downright skinny.

Her musings were interrupted when Clyde tried to turn over.

“Don't move. You're under arrest.”

“Really,” he said as she grabbed his arms and twisted them up behind his neck.

“Yeah, really. And I'll take that.” She plucked the paper he was holding and stuck it in her windbreaker pocket, then snapped her handcuffs onto his wrists below his jeans jacket sleeves.

“Don't lose that,” he admonished, but didn't resist being restrained. They usually didn't. Fleeing justice was an act of desperation an offender rarely thought would actually keep him out of jail. As a rule they came pretty quietly in the end.

“I won't, Mr. Tafota. Now, if you'll just—”

A low, rumbling chuckle interrupted her. “Tafota? I'm not Clyde. I'm—”

“Sure you're not,” she went along good-humoredly. “That's why you were sneaking out of Clyde's office in the middle of the night. Because you're not Clyde.”

“Check my ID,” he calmly suggested.

“I intend to.” That was always one of her first moves after cuffing a suspect. Wouldn't do to get the wrong guy. But so far she'd never been wrong; she did her homework.

She pulled Clyde's arrest sheet and a flashlight from her windbreaker and illuminated his mug shot. He looked just like she remembered. Unfortunately, this guy's face was still in the dirt, impossible to see in the dark.

“It's in my pocket.”

“What is?” She shone the flashlight at the side of his face that showed. Shortish black hair and a well-shaped ear. Inconclusive.

“My ID. It's in my pocket.”

That might be easier than having him turn over. “All right. Hold still.”

She scooted back a smidgen and ran a hand over his jeans pockets, feeling for his wallet. But the only thing she felt was his tight male derriere. She felt again for good measure—for the wallet—trying not to enjoy it.

After a moment he cleared his throat. “Um, my
front
pocket.”

She lifted her hand and squeezed her eyes shut for a second. “Very funny, Clyde. I'm going to lift up and I want you to turn over. Slowly. Remember I have a gun.”

“So do I,” he said, and she swore she saw a flash of white teeth as he followed her instructions.

She almost groaned out loud. Hell.
What was she thinking?
Not searching first thing for weapons was a real rookie mistake. And she'd been in the bounty-hunting business for eight years, more than long enough to know better. This guy's butt must really have scrambled her brains.

She shook her head to clear it and ordered herself to focus. She found his weapon tucked in a shoulder holster under his jacket. A Beretta .38. Which struck her as vaguely odd, since that was the kind of gun cops carried, not druggies or engine-repair-shop owners. She relieved him of it.

“Do I get a receipt for that?”

“A real comedian,” she muttered, and reached for his front pants pocket. “I'm getting your ID.”

That pocket was empty, so she switched hands and stuck her fingers into the other one.

He squirmed. And her fingers brushed against something that was definitely not a wallet.

Her mouth dropped open. “Are you
enjoying
yourself, sport?” she asked dryly.

She felt him shrug. “It's not every day a man gets to lie on his back with a beautiful woman sitting on his lap.” His voice was strong and smooth, like a shot of good bourbon.

An involuntary shiver sifted through her body at the sound of it. She scowled. Attraction to a voice? That had never happened before. Especially with a skip.

“I am not beautiful,” she snapped. “And if this turns you on, you are one sick puppy.”

“Hey, I'm the one in handcuffs here, and
you're
the one with your hand in my pocket,” the soft, gravelly voice pointed out.

She snatched her hand back and counted to ten. This recovery was not going at all as she'd planned.

“ID's in my shirt pocket, by the way.”

She should know by now that when things seemed too easy, it was usually because fate was about to kick you in the—

No. She was not thinking about that particular bit of anatomy.

“Get it for me,” she ground out. “Now.”

“Yes, ma'am.” He lifted his head and brought his cuffed hands around to his front pocket, pulled out a thin wallet and handed it to her. “I just gotta warn you…”

“Yeah?” she asked, flipping it open.

“I'm, uh—”

“A
cop?
” she blurted out, staring incredulously at the badge and credentials revealed in the beam of her flashlight. “You're a damn
cop?
”

“Philip O'Donnaugh, Piñon Lake Chief of Police, at your service.” He waited with a patient expression as she shone the flashlight in his face and compared it with the photo on his ID. Piñon Lake was the one-horse town she found herself in at the moment. Which meant this guy had jurisdiction here.

Oops.

“Satisfied?”

She nodded, so shocked by her monumental mistake that she was unprepared when he bent his knees up, tipping her flat onto his chest.

“Good,” he said as the flashlight went flying and she grabbed his shoulders to brace herself. “Because, sweetheart, you—” everything went topsy-turvy and suddenly she was on the bottom and he was sitting on
her
“—are busted.”

It took her a second to figure out what had just happened, and another to decide pulling her gun would probably be a bad idea. Under the circumstances. Even if she could get to it. Which she couldn't. Because his tight butt was sitting right on her—

“Busted for what?” she croaked out. To distract herself from noticing anything else. Like how good he smelled—all woodsy and sagey like New Mexico.

She swallowed and tried not to breathe.

“We could start with assaulting an officer of the law,” he said conversationally as he pried her fingers from his shoulders and gathered both her wrists into one hand. It was a big hand. And strong. She thought about resisting but decided that wouldn't be a good idea, either.

“You got a carry permit for that Walther?” he asked.

She found her voice. “In my car.”

“Okay, how 'bout false imprisonment?” He jangled the handcuffs still locked on his own wrists. “Key?”

“Windbreaker pocket.
I'll
get it.”

After a moment's hesitation he let one of her wrists go. “Be good,” he admonished as he lifted slightly.

“I'm always good,” she assured him, fetched the key and unlocked the cuffs, depositing them both back in her windbreaker pocket.

The ground was cold beneath her back, but his breath on her cheek felt warm. The moon must have risen, because she could just make out his features in the dim light. His dark eyes watched her with an inscrutable expression. His black hair was short, but not short enough to prevent a lock from falling over his forehead as he loomed over her, making him look broody and sexy instead of scary.

Her heart pounded inexplicably when he captured her wrist again and held it with the other above her head.

“Now what?” she asked. The position they were in reminded her a bit too much of other things. Inappropriate things.

He gave her a slow smile. “Now it's my turn. To see some ID.”

Her lips parted as she realized she might not be the only one with a vivid imagination. “Don't. Even. Think about it,” she said, alarmed. Not that she figured the Piñon Lake chief of police would try anything.

Or maybe she did, and what really alarmed her was the tingle of excitement purling through her veins.

“Think about what?”

“Anything.” She took a deep breath to steady her nerves. “I'll show you my ID. Just let me go,” she said in her firmest no-nonsense tone.

After a short hesitation, he dropped her wrists. A second later he rolled off her and leaped to his feet, leaving her suddenly freezing and not a little shaken.

“Take my hand,” he said, offering to help her up. Standing way up there, he looked like a dark, menacing two-legged skyscraper towering above her.

“I'm fine.”

She rose on her own, dusted herself off and fished her credentials from her back pocket with shaky fingers, along with her copy of the bond order.

In the meantime he'd located her flashlight on the ground and switched it on when she passed him her info. He scrutinized it thoroughly. “Bail enforcement officer?”

“That's right.”

“Why didn't you check in with my office?”

“My boss notified the county sheriff,” she said, grateful to be back to business.

“This is
my
jurisdiction.”

“Sorry. I'll keep that in mind.” Who knew Podunk Lake had a police department?

“What are you doing in Piñon Lake?”

“Looking for Clyde Tafota,” she said, not letting the interrogation bother her. Professional questions she could handle. It was all that…other stuff she didn't want to deal with. “I've been hired to return him to St. Louis for trial.”

O'Donnaugh glanced up in surprise. “Clyde was arrested?”

She nodded. “And skipped bail. We told the sheriff. You didn't know?”

He peered at her in the growing moonlight. “No, I didn't. I'm looking for him myself.”

It was her turn to be surprised. She'd assumed Clyde had bolted for home, but if he was wanted by the law here, too, that could change everything. “For what?”

O'Donnaugh regarded her for a brief moment. “Not to arrest him. He's a potential witness to a robbery in Piñon Lake village. What did he do in St. Louis?”

“Probably nothing,” she admitted, and explained about the drug dealers being murdered and the forensics that had subsequently cleared him. “But he still needs to come back for trial even if the murder charge will be dismissed.”

O'Donnaugh nodded consideringly. “Yeah. This complicates things.”

“For both of us,” she muttered. “I was hoping this job would be a slam-dunk.”

“Anxious to be out of here so soon?” he asked. His tone was casual, but in it she thought she detected the barest edge of suggestion.

Best nip that one in the bud. The man might have a sexy-as-hell voice and a backside to match, but she wasn't interested. She was here on a job and not looking for company.

“Out-of-Here is my middle name, Chief O'Donnaugh,” she stated.

“Call me Philip.”

“Speaking of which…” She handed him his Beretta. “It's been fun, but I've got work to do. See ya 'round, Chief.”

With that she gave him a wave and walked off to her car, not waiting for a response. Better that way. Who knew what might happen if he actually made her an indecent proposal. The way her hormones were misbehaving, she might be tempted to take him up on it.

Which would be stupid. And unprofessional. Not to mention totally out of character.

Luce Montgomery wasn't into casual sex. Nor was she looking for a man.

And, sexy or no, this man was no exception.

 

Handcuffs and sweaty sex.

It should have been great. But every time they got to the good part, Clyde Tafota would walk by and they'd have to jump up and chase after him. So instead of waking up with a big, satisfied grin, Philip awoke at 5:00 a.m. the next morning scowling, frustrated and grumpy as a spring bear.