But…but if she knew it was just a fling, a teeny tiny little detour, something to take the edge off—after all, it had been two months, for God’s sake, and a vibrator could only do so much; she had needs, dammit—wouldn’t that be okay? Sort of a little reward for being so good for so long?
That rationale took on more and more logic the longer she stood there looking up at the sheriff’s gorgeous chiseled face. Even his scowl turned her on. She had no idea why he was so irritated with her; she was only trying to help. Well, okay, maybe she wasn’t helping, exactly. But she certainly wasn’t keeping him from doing his job. And usually men were more than happy to let her help them. She’d built an entire career on that specific ability. Her clientele had been largely of the male persuasion simply because she understood their needs, their sense of pride and that little boy insecurity they never seemed to outgrow.
That was the part she missed most. Being needed, being the one they called to make it all better. She knew it was more of that faux intimacy thing, but without that, the gaping void in her life loomed even larger. Actually, it had sort of come as a surprise to her that she didn’t miss much of anything else. Not the parties, the tours, the openings, the award ceremonies, the press conferences. The wild, uncontrolled sex with the Hollywood hottie of her choice. Okay, so maybe she missed that last part just a little bit. But she didn’t miss the empty feeling that came afterward. The little pangs of neediness that postcoital snuggling no longer fulfilled.
Only, she wasn’t quite sure how to transcend the arm-candy-at-the-latest-premiere followed by the fun-in-the-sack part. Probably she had to be friends with a guy first, find a man who satisfied her on levels other than sexual, a guy whose sole credentials weren’t that he owned his own tux and looked damn fine in it. Then the rest would probably just happen. Wouldn’t it? She thought of Natalie and had to grin. Her best friend had found her man in exactly the opposite way. An exclusive, purely sexual relationship that had led to real love.
So why couldn’t it work that way for her?
Because it never has before, Liza, that’s why. Nat had just gotten lucky.
Well, she’d like to get lucky, too, Liza thought with a wistful sigh as she watched Sheriff Sexy Ass lever that impressive torso of his up a bit higher, trying to reach his quarry. A quarry with an awfully big beak.
“Does he bite?” she asked.
Mango strutted some more and let out another one of his ozone-disintegrating screeches.
“Never mind,” she called up. “Who needs the beak when you can defeat your predators by deafening them first?”
She thought she heard Sheriff Sexy Ass snort under his breath, but when he looked down at her again, his face was an impersonal mask. “Really, we’ll be fine up here, ma’am. Thank you for stopping,” he repeated. “Please be careful when you pull back into traffic.”
Brown. She was pretty sure his eyes were brown.
“Do you always come to the rescue of your feathered citizens?”
“Do you always refuse to take a hint?”
She merely grinned.
He sighed. “I do when it’s this one.”
“She belongs to you, then?”
“God, no,” he said, his tone one of horror. Mango strutted closer and he turned his attentions back to the bird. A minute or two passed, but he didn’t look her way again.
She was being dismissed. Had been being dismissed for the past several minutes. Problem was, she wasn’t ready to leave yet. An occasional drawback of hers, true, but more often a hallmark of her success. She never left something alone until she was done with it, no matter if it was done with her.
Staring at the flex of muscle in the good sheriff’s thighs as he pushed himself up even higher, she freely admitted she wasn’t done with him yet. In fact, right at that moment there was nowhere else she’d rather be than standing on a street corner in downtown Canyon Springs.
Suddenly Mango lunged, and Liza squealed and pointed. “Look out!”
He might not have flinched at Mango’s scream, but he did at hers. Mango made a beak-dive for the nice, shiny star on his pocket just as he lost his balance.
Liza gasped. He slid from his branch and fell, butt first, into the V of branch and trunk just below. Mango flapped his wings and raced up and down the branch overhead, screeching the entire time as the sheriff cut loose with his own vocal tirade.
“I’m pretty sure they didn’t teach you that in the academy.”
“Nope, those I learned courtesy of Vegas street scum,” he grumbled, trying to unwedge himself.
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.”