Caught by Surprise (2 page)

He had the rugged, weathered appearance of a man who spent time outdoors doing something a lot more physical than making music. Under the hat she noted a blunt, handsome nose and a droll smile that radiated trouble.

McKay shut the car door with a jaunty slap of one hand, looked up, and stared straight into her eyes. The self-amused smile faded away, and his gaze roamed over her like a heat-seeking missile in search of a target. Millie realized suddenly that her mouth was open in amazement.

Brig thought he’d stopped breathing. After a moment, he covered his heart with one hand and nodded to her solemnly. He felt a thrill of challenge as she stiffened at his melodramatics and her chin went up proudly. Face like an angel, body like a blessing, eyes like a wary tiger, he thought. The combination appealed to him immensely.

“G’day, gorgeous,” he called in a deep voice. He swept his hat off, revealing a short-cropped head of wavy, golden brown hair, and bowed low to her. The gesture was both flattering and absurdly teasing. Every woman in the jail thought it was meant for her alone.

Millie staggered as the crowd of female fans shoved past her. She caught the door with one hand and frowned, annoyed that Brig McKay had disrupted her concentration on duty. But she’d never even seen a
picture of the man before—how could she have been prepared for a bolt of Australian lightning?

Brig watched as a small child hugged the uniformed woman’s legs. The woman reached down and stroked her hair in a soothing, gentle way. That maternal action made a homey and stirring sight to his bachelor’s heart. As the colorful crowd of enticing women streamed out of the jail and surrounded him, he put on his most flirtatious smile, but his eyes stayed riveted to the adorable blond deputy. Even if she had been dressed like the others, she would have snared his attention.

A woman stopped beside her at the top of the steps and reached for the little girl. Brig watched as the child blew the deputy a kiss, then turned toward the other woman and said “Hello, Mommy!” So blondie wasn’t the mother. Maybe blondie wasn’t even married. He realized that he’d been holding his breath.

“I may have copped it sweet here,” Brig murmured aloud.

“Oooh, he’s talking Australian!” someone yelled.

He dragged his attention away from the deputy as a woman threw her arms around his neck and hugged him. “Easy, doll, I’m breakable,” he managed to say, just before she squealed in delight.

Millie grimaced as pandemonium erupted around Brig McKay. Every woman in the crowd seemed determined to touch him, and he seemed determined to let himself be touched.

She was studying him intently when he suddenly looked at her again. It startled her since he was in the process of brushing a platonic kiss on the cheek of a tiny, elderly woman wearing a purple tennis suit. The senior citizen had a wrestling grip on his neck. Brig McKay gave Millie a devilish wink, and it said unmistakably that he had a different kind of kiss in mind for her.

Brig saw her gasp, then frown, then turn to the side and look at the sky and shake her head in disbelief. She had full breasts under the crisp white shirt with emblems and badges of authority on it. Creased, camel-colored
slacks neatly encased an athletically-rounded rump and slender legs. Her hair was short, honey-blond, and curly. She looked back at him, one blond eyebrow arched, one hand on her hip, her attitude disgusted.

“Work your way through to his right side!” Raybo called. “I’ll get beside him on the left!”

Millie nodded, then angled her way down the steps, prying women aside and feeling short because she
was
short, just an inch over five feet. She ducked her head and peered between bodies as she made her way. Her brother Jeopard had once called her a small blond bulldozer. She’d nearly broken his thumb in retaliation, but he was right.

Mature, sophisticated women were leaping up and down like extras in a bad teenage beach movie. Brig stood languidly in the middle of the action, being pawed by adoring female hands, grinning, signing autographs, and still enjoying himself immensely.

“Deputy sheriff. Let me through,” Millie ordered in her gruffest voice. No one listened. Raybo was drowning in a sea of crazed women on the other side of Brig, so it was up to her alone to represent authority and save their prisoner from excessive hero worship. Millie put her head down and aimed for an opening between a pink shorts set and a yellow sundress.

She shoved through, caught her foot on someone’s ankle, and gained unexpected momentum in a forward lunge. Her head connected with the center of a hard, flat, nonfemale stomach. The crowd gasped in unison.

“Strewth!” Brig exclaimed in an outrush of air just before he dropped his hat and she slammed him against the side of the Cadillac.

Oh, no, Millie thought desperately. She’d gored the only famous prisoner they’d ever had.

Two strong hands latched into her tossled hair. She was off balance, so she sprawled against his incredibly muscular body, which smelled of denim, leather, and good cologne. Her face was mashed so tightly against
his chest that she could feel the mat of curly hair under his shirt.

“Strewth!” he said again. “For such a little Sheila, you scored a wallop!”

His accent was straight from a Paul Hogan commercial for Australia, and combined with his deep voice it was the sexiest sound she’d ever heard. She pushed herself away from his voice and his body, then swallowed hard to regain her dignity in the face of humiliation.

“Sorry, McKay,” she said in a raspy voice. “If I hurt you, you can file a complaint.”

His hands were still immersed in her hair. She’d knocked the breath out of him, but he wasn’t so far gone that he didn’t notice that her hair looked like sunshine between his fingers and her eyes were the deep green of new leaves in the spring. He gazed down at her with amused respect at the stern, take-charge tone. “No worries, love. I like this kind of pain.”

Love
. The nonchalant endearment annoyed her because it was obviously what he called every woman. He let his hands trail slowly through her hair as she stepped back. Lord, the man had eyes bluer than the sky after a rain. His face was expressive and full of good humor, but those eyes held the kind of quiet maturity that comes from years of hard living. She was breathing just as heavily as he was.

“Brig boy, you okay? Y’all ladies get back and give him some breathin’ room!” Millie glanced blankly toward the sound of the rolling drawl which sounded as though it were built of grits and molasses. A big redheaded man in a three-piece suit had just gotten out of the Cadillac’s passenger side, and now he was trying to make his way through the crowd on this side of the car.

Brig McKay nodded, kept looking down at her, and waved the redhead’s concern away with a distracted gesture. “No sweat, pal,” he murmured. “I like bein’ attacked by little bitty gorgeous women. She couldn’t hurt a flea.”

Millie smiled grimly and her embarrassment faded.
He was as misinformed about her as most men, and she’d have to set him straight. It was nice to have a package that men admired, but the contents didn’t fit their expectations. He stuck out one brawny hand for an introduction.

“Brig McKay, darlin’. Here to sit in your slammer for a couple of months.”

She took another step back, pulled a pair of handcuffs from a loop on her belt, and deftly snapped one cuff around his outstretched wrist. For a split second she noticed that it was a terrific wrist, strong-looking and covered in dark brown hair.

“Call me Deputy Surprise,” she informed him coolly.

There were shocked mutters in the crowd, but Millie ignored them. Brig McKay might think he was something special, but he was going to be treated just like any other convicted offender as far as she was concerned. His eyes widened with disbelief and he stared down at his shackled hand. Then, to her amazement, he began to chuckle.

At that moment Raybo arrived beside them, and she looked up to find him staring at her bug-eyed. The sheriff was two degrees shy of exploding, she figured.

“There’s no need for handcuffs, Deputy Surprise,” he said in a low, strained voice. “Unlock that damned thing immediately.” He turned toward Brig and introduced himself.

Brig used his free hand to shake hands with the sheriff. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Deputy Surprise—lord, that name suited her to a tee—straighten with rigid pride. She was trying to look ten feet tall, and his respect for her tripled. He hadn’t meant to get her into trouble, and he felt bad about it. She faced the sheriff with her head high.

“I overreacted,” she said formally, her bearing almost military. “I was wrong.” She snapped the cuff off his hand and secured the pair back on her belt without looking, her fingers moving with expert skill. She was a warrior going down with her ship in great honor, and Brig didn’t want her to drown on his account.

“I don’t expect special treatment,” he interjected tactfully. “She was just doin’ her job. Guess I oughta get going with this jail term.” Groans from the crowd indicated that there were a lot more autographs to be signed. She glanced at him and he read the gratitude in her eyes. Brig knew he’d scored a few points for being a good sport.

“Officially, we don’t have to take you into custody until you step inside the jail lobby,” Raybo told him. “Stay outside and finish your business, Mr. McKay. No hurry.” He glared at Millie. “Deputy, stay here with Mr. McKay. Well discuss this incident later.”

“Yes, sir.”

For a second Brig had the feeling that she might salute. He, accustomed to soft and fluffy women, was fascinated by this petite soldier. And charmed. And in big trouble.

She turned toward him stiffly. If her eyes were the color of spring leaves, then a winter storm had just coated the leaves with ice. Her lightly tanned skin was the kind that showed red when she was upset. Man, was she upset right now. “Continue your business, Mr. McKay,” she said crisply, as someone thrust a copy of his latest album cover into his hands.

While he signed autographs, Brig squinted one eye at her in a thoughtful way. “You work at the jail full-time, Deputy?”

“Yes.”

“Will my life be in your hands?”

“You might say that.”

“Is my goose cooked?”

Millie gave him a fiendish little smile. “To a crisp.”

He had a cell with a small private bathroom, a window, a plain pine dresser, and brown indoor-outdoor carpeting. He could look out and see the rolling Florida landscape, which included an orange grove and numerous oak trees draped with Spanish moss. Not a bad view, Brig decided, but sure as hell a boring one if he
had nothing else to look at for the next two months. He had his guitar and some notepads, so he guessed he’d write about a thousand songs.

Subdued and more depressed than he wanted to admit, he sat on his bunk and peered down at his clothes. A friendly-faced deputy named Suds LaFont had taken his regular clothes and given him standard prisoner duds—a white T-shirt, a white short-sleeved shirt that he wore unbuttoned, and baggy white trousers with a blue stripe on the outside seam of both legs—but allowed him to keep his western boots and bush hat. Brig took one more look at his new clothes.

“I feel like an ice cream delivery man gone bad,” he muttered. He lay down on the bunk, pulled his hat over his face, and concentrated on recalling every detail about Deputy Surprise. He fell asleep wondering how the memory of being tackled and handcuffed could be so pleasant.

Millie had new resolve as she walked down the hallway between Paradise Springs’ four jail cells. She’d be firm but polite with Brig McKay. This Aussie import wouldn’t wreck her dignity again. She stopped in the hallway outside his cell and stared at his lazy, enticing form on the bunk.

The man was a marvel. He gave new meaning to the term
laid-back
.

“Wake up, McKay,” she ordered briskly. She put a magnetized card in the cell’s electronically controlled lock. The door clicked and slid open.

“Hmmm?”

“Wake up.” She walked into the cell, crossed her arms over her chest, and waited patiently. “It’s recreation time.”

He tilted his head back and looked at her from under the brim of his hat, his eyes sleepy and teasing. “What game do you want to play, love?”

She shook her head in mild disgust and motioned toward the cell door. “We’ve got a lounge with a TV and a pool table. There’s also a fenced-in yard with weight equipment. You can amuse yourself until dinner.”

He sat up, swung his long legs off the side of the bunk, and tossed his hat across the room. It landed precisely on the dresser. “Can I stay put? I’ve got some thinkin’ to do.”

Millie gave him a puzzled look. “You don’t want to sit in this cell all the time, do you? It’ll be a long two months.”

“Gonna be a long two months no matter how I cut it.” He looked toward the window, his jaw set tightly. “I grew up in the outback. During the five years I’ve lived in the States, I’ve spent most of my time on the road playin’ gigs. I guess I’m used to being about as free as a man can get.”

Millie studied the unhappiness in his face, and a traitorous feeling of sympathy lightened her stern attitude. “We’ll keep you busy,” she told him. “You’ll get put on work details, just like any other prisoner.”

“I’m the only one in the pokey. Why don’t you go arrest somebody to keep me company?”

“Oh, we’ll find some other n’er-do-wells to share the jail with you, don’t worry.”

He turned to look at her, cocked his head to one side, and said in mild accusation, “So, my fine Sheila, you’ve got no heart for me and think I’m a bad guy.”

His Australian accent had a way of turning the end of sentences up, as if he considered everything a question. He talked out of the side of his mouth in a way that she found mesmerizing. For a second she didn’t answer, but simply stood there and looked at him. A woman could lose herself in the sturdy contours of that well-lived-in face. Get a grip on yourself, she ordered silently, and took a deep breath.

“Lots of people think you’re a bad guy,” she informed him. “You attacked a man for no good reason.”

“Oh, I had a good reason.”

“Hmmm. I’m not going to play judge, McKay. Let’s not discuss it any—”