He smiled.
Completely male, completely assured, that look was pure, calculated trouble. “Actually, I’m just killing time and trying to keep you in one place before I go off duty here in about ten minutes.” He tapped his ear and the tiny earpiece he wore. A communications device, she knew. “Besides, Control seems to think you must be guilty of some heinous act or two. I believe I might have even heard a few accusations such as breaking hearts and stealing kisses?”
Gypsy smiled with real amusement, laughter threatening to fill her voice as she stared back at him. “Does that line work for you often?” she laughed. “I would have thought a man of your experience could do much better.”
He chuckled at her response. “Very good, Gypsy, very good. But give me a little credit. You blew my mind on that dance floor. I’m still recovering. Give me a minute and I promise you I will astound you with the many ways I can stake a proprietary claim without ever touching you once.”
Her brow arched. “You would need a mind first.” She wrinkled her nose mockingly. “I think I’ll take my proprietary claim and head home. Now that you’ve found me, maybe you can rest too for a minute.” Setting the remainder of her beer and several bills for payment on the bar, she gave him a little wave. “And I’ll see if I can’t remember to find a bar with a few less complications, not to mention a few less Breeds the next time I go out.”
Proprietary claim?
Gypsy could feel a shudder racing through her at the very thought of Rule claiming her. That was a move her life simply couldn’t accommodate, no matter how tempting it sounded.
She’d already had no less than a dozen calls since returning home that night. The calls had come from friends, family and even acquaintances, informing her that the Breed Commander Rule Breaker was questioning where she’d disappeared to.
As if it were any of their business.
She made a mental note to talk to Cullen and see what he could do to get the Breeds off her ass. After all, she had been doing a job for him while she was gone. She was certain he wouldn’t want the Breeds aware of just what kind of job she was doing for him either.
Not that he’d seemed inclined to want to help her earlier. Once he cooled off, though, he might be in a more helpful frame of mind.
Leaving the loud, smoky confines of the bar for the clear, crisp Arizona night, Gypsy drew in a lungful of clean desert air.
She was growing tired of the bars and the often lecherous, always drunken attention she gained there. More and more often she put off her arrival at the various clubs and bars until late into the night.
Pulling her hair back and retrieving an elastic band from the snug pocket of her leather vest, Gypsy confined her hair to keep it out of her face. With the Jeep’s top down, the long strands could become too tangled to comb before going to bed if she wasn’t careful.
“Hey there, Gypsy Rum.” Mutt, a Coyote Breed rarely known to smile when others were around, strangely enough often smiled at her.
He was cute as shit too.
For a Coyote Breed.
There were few of that species that Gypsy could tolerate being around, but Mutt was one of them. With his shy, hesitant smile so at odds with his kickass confidence and dry wit, he had a way of making her laugh even when she didn’t want to.
He came into her parents’ sweets and gift store often, along with two others, to buy the hard candies her sister, Kandy, made to sell.
He was especially fond of the butterscotch, she remembered, while Loki, one of his partners, enjoyed the cinnamon and Commander Breaker always went for the chocolate and peppermint.