Country Roads(3)

“Why don’t we go wait in my car, where it’s quiet and air-conditioned?” he said.

She hesitated, fear tightening her spine. He didn’t look like a rapist or a mass murderer, but neither had Ted Bundy. She flicked a glance at his car, discovering a slightly sinister cast in its dark, sleek lines. If she got in, he could lock all the doors and whisk her away to some isolated shack where she’d never be heard from again.

“You go ahead,” she said, keeping her gaze on him as she edged toward the Suburban. “I need to rearrange a few things in my car so they don’t shift when it gets towed.”

She watched his shoulders lift and lower in another sigh before he fished a business card out of his shirt pocket and held it out to her. “Will this convince you it’s safe to sit comfortably in my car?”

It was thick cream vellum with “Paul Taggart, Esquire” printed in block letters in the center. Below it was an address in Sanctuary, West Virginia, as well as phone, fax, and e-mail information. Along the bottom, it read, “Admitted to the bar in: West Virginia, Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Maryland, Georgia.”

It was absurd, but the little piece of paper dispelled most of her nervousness. She slashed the card through the air like a miniature sword. “I guess this could inflict some really lethal paper cuts, if I needed to defend myself.”

“At least you didn’t make a crack about preferring a criminal to a lawyer,” he said, gesturing for her to go ahead of him along the shoulder of the highway.

She felt like a mess next to his clean, pressed tailoring. She plucked at the back of her blouse, trying to peel it away from her skin before he saw how damp it was. She chuckled as she considered she had gone from worrying he was going to assault her to being concerned about what he thought of her appearance.

“Care to share the joke?” His voice came from close behind her and she swore she could feel the stir of his breath on her overheated skin. It was not an unpleasant sensation.

“Just laughing at myself.” She tossed the comment over her shoulder and kept walking.

“I like that in a person.”

They had reached the passenger side of his car, and he stretched his arm around her to open the door. As she slid onto the cool, smooth leather of the seat, she sighed with pleasure. Her trash heap’s air-conditioning had died a hundred miles ago.

“It will get even better when I turn the engine back on.” Startled, she looked up to find him leaning down so his face was nearly level with hers. She had to stop herself from lifting a hand to trace the strong bone structure.

“Watch your elbow,” he said, closing the door as soon as she tucked her arm into her side.

He walked around the car’s long hood, his stride claiming the space around him with the confidence of a man who controls his world. She envied him that. Her world had been taken out of her control since that terrible day she’d fallen off Papi’s horse when she was six. And that was more than twenty years ago.

The driver’s door opened, and he swung himself into the seat with a hand hooked on the roof. Inserting his long legs under the steering wheel, he punched the ignition on, bringing the engine to life with a roar of horsepower.

“Isn’t this car kind of uncomfortable for someone as tall as you?”

“Do you ever wear high heels?”

Baffled, she nodded. “Sometimes.”

“Are they comfortable?”

“Not particularly.”

“So why do you wear them?” he asked.

“Because they look good. Okay, I get your point.” His self-deprecation relaxed her just a bit.

He adjusted something on the climate-control panel and a waft of cool air brushed her face.

“Ah, that feels wonderful.” She twisted the heavy mass of her hair up on top of her head and held it there so the delicious chill could reach her neck.

“So,” he said, as he slewed sideways in the seat to settle his back against the door, his arm draped over the steering wheel. “What brings you to Sanctuary?”



Paul was just making conversation, but her eyes went wide and she hissed in a breath, dropping the bundle of vivid red hair back down over the smooth, exposed skin of her neck and shoulders.

“Er, business,” she said, looking down at her fingers as she locked them together in her lap.

That caught his interest. The truth was he had tried hard to drive right by when he saw her standing beside the road. He was wearing his one and only Armani suit, bought on sale on a trip to Washington, DC, when he had taken the bar exam for Maryland. He had worn it for luck to the meeting at the Laurels, and he really didn’t want to ruin it while changing a tire.