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“Sure you don’t want coffee?” Jackson called to her from the doorway. “Hell, you deserve a beer. Apartment hunting is thirsty work.”
She turned to him, considering the possibility of at least taking some coffee. Then she saw his face, soft with sympathy. He felt sorry for her. She seemed pitiful. That would never do. She was on her own, for better or worse, for richer, poorer and, it seemed, homelessness. She’d made it this far. She was not about to fold at the first crisis.
“Thanks anyway.” She forced a smile she didn’t feel, shifted the tree to her hip and turned on her earth-shoe heel, desperate to get inside her new car where she could panic for a few moments before she figured out what to do.
Except…where was her car? The street was bare of her shiny new Outback. In fact, the block that had been busy with ballplayers was now as eerily quiet as Home Depot on Super Bowl Sunday.
Heidi’s stomach dropped like the first plunge on a roller coaster and her heart flew into her throat. She spun to check both directions. No glory of chrome and steel anywhere. It was gone. Into thin air.
“Oh, my God!”
“What’s wrong?” Jackson took the stairs to the sidewalk, headed her way.
“My car’s gone.” Could it have possibly rolled downhill as she’d feared? She set down the heavy plant, dropped the candy sack and ran a few yards down the sidewalk, peering as hard as she could toward the far intersection, desperate for a glimpse of her vehicle.
Then she remembered something awful. She’d left the keys in the ignition. A common habit in tiny Copper Corners, where people often left even their houses unlocked. She’d planned to zip into the garage as soon as Deirdre let her in to unload.
If only Heidi could take back those two short minutes. Get a do-over. Grab her keys like the sensible person she was.
“What kind of car?” Jackson asked, dragging her back to the terrible present.
“Subaru Outback. Silver. New. With the keys inside,” she added wretchedly. “How could a car get stolen in broad daylight in two minutes?”
“No place in the city is safe enough to dangle your keys in people’s faces.”
“I was going to pull right into the garage.” With a jolt, she realized what else she’d left in the car. Her purse. Not only did the thieves have her new car and everything she owned, they also had her driver’s license, her only credit card and, worst of all, the cashier’s check for every cent she owned. Yeah, it was a big check, but she was careful. Cashier’s checks were stolen everyday. The clerk had warned her….
Fresh icebergs broke off into her bloodstream.
She struggled against the numbing chill. She had to figure this out and fix it. Fast. “There were guys here…playing basketball.” Her gaze shot to the hoop a half block down. “They must have seen what happened.” She started across the street.
“Hang on.” Jackson caught her arm. “I don’t know those guys, but they have a lot of late-night visitors—in and out and I don’t think they’re selling baseball cards. We’ll call the police.”
“But I’m sure they saw. They watched me arrive. I waved at them even.”
“They were probably casing your car. Come on. We’ll call the police.” He reminded her of her brothers, jumping in to take care of things for her.
She had to act for herself, so she took her phone from her pocket and pressed 9-1-1—her first-ever emergency call and due to her own stupidity.
Standing on the sidewalk in the pounding sun, under Jackson McCall’s watchful eye, Heidi explained to the dispatcher what had happened, fighting the wobble in her voice. When she revealed that the car held her purse and her money, Jackson grimaced. He thought she was an idiot.
She was an idiot.
The dispatcher told her to wait where she was for the detectives to arrive. She clicked off the phone and slid it in her pocket, her chest tight and her brain racing. “I’m used to a small town,” she explained to mitigate Jackson’s impression of her. “I expected Deirdre to let me into the garage. It would have worked fine, except that Deirdre wasn’t…and you were…and I was—never mind. I’m an idiot.”
“Forget it. Come inside. You have calls to make.”
She did. She had to cancel her credit card and find out if she could void that cashier’s check. There was no point calling about car insurance. She’d bought only the required liability policy, fibbing to her brothers that she’d paid for comprehensive because she didn’t want them paying her way. She planned to increase her policy when she could afford it.
That had been shortsighted, she saw now. But maybe she’d get back the car. Maybe it was all a misunderstanding.
She felt numb, stripped of everything, even her purpose in being here. She forced herself to move, but stumbled on her first step.
Jackson caught her, supporting her with a hand against her back. His fingers pressed into the bare skin exposed by Celia’s top. She should stand on her own two feet, she knew, but she was freaked and her legs weren’t working so well, so she let Jackson guide her with his big hand.
He picked up the sweets sack and extended it.
“For you,” she said, trying to smile. “My thank-you gift. Prickly pear candy—my town’s famous for it.”
“Prickly pear and beer. Sounds like lunch. Come on and I’ll serve it up.” He seemed to be trying to cheer her.
She wanted to respond, but reentering the boob-adorned hovel that was supposed to have been her glorious new home made her heart sink like a stone into the neighbor’s grass-flecked kiddie pool.
Jackson hefted her plant effortlessly and guided her inside, pulling out a kitchen chair for her. He stuck the tree in a corner and tossed the candy on the table.
Heidi sat, noticing the clock on the wall was part of a bar ad for a German beer. “If you’ve got the time,” was written beneath a barmaid with, of course, huge boobs. Heidi had the time, all right. It was only eleven and she’d lost everything.
She noticed a lump under her butt and extracted a pair of plaid boxer briefs.
Jackson nonchalantly tossed them into the hall. Toward the hamper? She could only hope. The man must have stripped in the kitchen. Did he cook in the buff? Obviously he didn’t clean—dressed or naked. The sink and counters were heaped with dirty dishes. Empty cans of ravioli and Hungry-Man soup, lids bent jauntily, kept company with empty TV dinner containers on every surface. If this was his diet, she hoped Jackson took a daily vitamin.
“Beer, soda or coffee?” He opened the fridge door. The pleasant smell of ripe fruit—peaches?—was quickly swamped by rotting greens. “Whew. Something died in here.” He squatted, then lifted out a plastic sack of mossy lettuce. “Looks like a Chia Pet.” He carried it by finger and thumb to the overflowing under-sink trash. Beer cans and paper plates slid to the floor. He swore and shoved the cupboard door shut on the mess.
“I’ve disrupted your morning,” she said. “Please do what you’d normally do. I’ll make the calls and wait.”
“Normally, I’d be sleeping, but I’m up now. I’ll make us both coffee. Just make yourself at home—” He stopped abruptly, realizing what he’d said.
She’d lost her home, too, along with her car, her clothes, her computer, hundreds of dollars in beauty supplies and equipment, and all her savings.
She swallowed hard and blinked back tears, tilting her head so they’d drain inward, but it was no use. They spilled over her lids. She swiped them off her cheeks and sucked in a breath that turned into a choked noise way too close to a sob. She jumped out of her chair, thinking to head to the living room to keep Jackson from seeing her dissolve completely.
But he caught her upper arms. “You get to cry, Heidi. You got the rug yanked out from under you. It’s okay.” He pulled her into his arms for a hug—the kind given to a sorrowing friend.
For just a heartbeat, she let herself enjoy the sensation of his broad chest under her cheek, his bay rum and warm man smell, his fingers splayed across her shoulder blades.
But that only delayed the inevitable. She backed away fast. “It is a shock, that’s for sure. But I’ll figure out what to do and where to go…and everything.” Her voice faded as the enormity of her problem sank in.
“You can stay here,” he said with a shrug. “Until you figure it out.”
She froze. Stay here? Her first reaction was relief. That had been the plan, right? This was supposed to be her place. But she couldn’t impose on Jackson, no matter how sincere his offer. “Thanks, but I’ll get a hotel or something.”
“With what?” He looked at her doubtfully.
Good point. She had no money and no credit cards.
“Do you know anyone in Phoenix?”
“My new boss. I’m working at a hair salon. Just part-time, since I’m a student really. Going to ASU…” With no tuition money. And she didn’t exactly want her first words to Blythe to be, “Can I sleep in one of your salon chairs?”
She could call her brothers. On her first day? Three hours after her escape? She didn’t even have bus fare to get home, if she were willing to give up. Which she was not. She swallowed across a dry throat.
If she stayed with Jackson, did that make her weak or merely practical? She needed to know before she said yes.
The doorbell rang. “That’s the police,” she said, delaying her decision. “Maybe they found my car.” She didn’t need the doubt in Jackson’s dark eyes to tell her she was dreaming. She needed something to cling to. Her new life had just taken off down the road without her.
2
JACKSON WATCHED HEIDI race toward the entry hall, around the corner from the living room, the tight bounce of her backside distracting him a bit. He heard the door open and her say, “Did you find my car?” with too much hope in her voice.
He didn’t catch the mumbled response, but her “oh” was so dejected he felt it in his bones. Hell, the car was chopped or halfway to Mexico by now.
She could stay with him for a few days easy. Probably she had family who would come fetch her, poor thing. Though she’d jutted that pixie chin and blinked back tears so fiercely, he figured she’d take some convincing to call them.
She led the cops to the living room where he stood and she cleared the couch for them as though she already lived here. “Were you making coffee, Jackson?” she said. She had a husky voice like that woman on Cheers. Kirstie Alley, wasn’t that her name? It sort of locked into him like invisible hooks on a cholla cactus spine.
“Right. Sure.” He’d have to talk her into staying—for her own good. He sometimes let the girls from Moons live with him when they had troubles with boyfriends or landlords. You always have to be the hero. That’s what his ex, Kelli, said about him. Everybody’s big brother, nobody’s one and only.
What was the point in fighting his nature? If someone needed help, he helped. Period.
These days, maybe, he was the last person who should offer though. His radio station—his dream—had gone belly-up after six months, taking everything he had, everything his parents had given him. He’d thrown it out as stupidly as Heidi leaving the keys in her car. Only he’d written Take Me in shoe polish on the windshield.
To cut his losses and keep expenses down, he’d sold his house in Scottsdale and moved into his rental town house—supposedly investment income. Yeah, right.
But he wouldn’t think about that now. Now he’d brew some java for the sprite in the living room who was about to hear the cops weren’t likely to recover a hubcap.
Leaning over the coffeemaker, he got a blast of scent from his shirt, where Heidi had pressed her face. Flowers and something tropical and it made him go soft inside. She’d sort of folded into him, then stiff-armed herself away—not offended by the hug. More as if she didn’t dare let herself feel better.
He pinched up some fabric and took a big sniff. Mmm. Made him think of down pillows and that lip gloss girls wore in middle school, when the first wave of testosterone had knocked him to the sand. Those middle-school girls. Batting their lashes, pursing their lips, jiggling those curves—not fully aware of their power over him and the other hapless boys under their spell.
Heidi was hot that way. With big eyes that shimmered blue—like the metallic paint on the Corvette he’d rebuilt. She had some stare on her—innocent and all-knowing both.
At least Kelli wasn’t around to give him grief about taking in another stray. She’d cut out right after the station folded and her departure hadn’t hurt as much as it should have. He’d been kind of distant. Still was, he guessed. Gigi had stayed here for ten days and he’d turned her down flat. That wasn’t like him.
But his neutrality would make Heidi feel safe, he hoped.
How could he get her to stick around? She’d hitchhike or sleep in the bus station before she’d take charity or money, he’d bet.
Listening to the coffee hiss into the pot, he watched a fly take a lazy header into a blob of ketchup on the counter. The place was a sty lately, true. Comfortable, but messy. The kind of messy women loved to straighten out….
So she could be, like, a housekeeper. He’d trade cleaning for rent. She’d go for that, he’d bet. She seemed to have a lot of energy. And a cute little jiggle. Mmm. He felt a strange zing. As if something in him was waking up.
She’s your guest, man. Or soon would be. Shut it down.
When the coffee was ready, he loaded the pot and some mugs onto a pizza box and carried it all out to Heidi and the cops.
Heidi stood to help, but when she caught sight of the mugs, she sucked in a breath, then swooped them up, hiding them against her chest.
“What the…?” he said.
Keeping her back to the cops, she raised one mug—a gimmee from the opening of the Toy Box sex boutique, it showed a topless girl—and frowned before she bustled off.
Like the cops would care.
He made small talk with them while she rattled around in the kitchen, finally returning with two white mugs from Moons. If the cops recognized the bar name they’d think worse thoughts than over a couple of naked chests, but the slivered moon design looked innocent enough.
They all sat and drank, while the cops took down Heidi’s statement, and Jackson wondered what kind of a roommate Heidi would be. If tits on cups freaked her out, she’d hate his decor. What if she was a neat freak? Was he ready to never find his stuff where he had put it? Prepared to have the newspaper tossed out before he read it? And no hot water whatsoever? What was it with women and baths, anyway?
At least Gigi had been a slob like him.
Maybe he could get one of the girls at Moons to let Heidi stay with her. Not the best influence, though, the girls. And Heidi struck him as a babe in the woods.
The detectives finished the interview and Jackson walked them to the door. He returned to find Heidi slumped on the couch, elbows on her knees, chin in her palms, looking as though she’d just been turned down by the last foster family in town.
“Maybe you’ll get some stuff back,” he said to cheer her.
“Maybe.” She lifted the pizza box with the coffee crap and climbed to her feet, moving as if the weight of the world rested on her shoulders. “I’ll clean this up, make a few calls and get going.”
“Hold on a sec,” he said to stop her. “Now that you mention cleaning…I was thinking maybe you’d help me out.”
“Excuse me?”
“You can see I need a housekeeper.”
She looked around the room and gave a droll smile. “You think?”
“So, how about I trade you a room for cleaning? Save me calling a service.”
She seemed to doubt his intentions. “Thanks, anyway, Jackson. I’ll ask my boss about…options.” She snatched her lip between her teeth, looked toward the sofa.
He noticed a basket of nachos on the arm. They looked pretty gross—the cheese shriveled and an unnatural orange. “If you weren’t here, I might actually eat those,” he said.
She turned shocked eyes on him. “You wouldn’t!”
“Take the job. Save a life.”
She smiled, then studied him, scrunching up her short nose and the freckles like sprinkled cinnamon that decorated it. “What were you planning to pay?”
Hell, what was the going rate? “Twenty bucks an hour?” he threw out. “Thirty?”
She frowned, ferreting out ulterior motives. “Not more than twenty. Let’s see…I was going to pay Tina three-fifty a month for the room. It would take maybe six hours to clean up the first time, three after that. At twenty an hour, that’s…sheesh…not even close to rent.” She looked suddenly ill.
“Don’t sweat the money now. Get back on your feet and we’ll work it out.”
She sank back to the sofa in despair, jarring the nacho basket, which landed on her lap upside down.
“Damn!” She swept the chips back into the container, leaving a grease spot and a smear of hot sauce on her tan shorts, nicely tight across her thighs. She must work out.
She scrubbed at the spots. “These are the only clothes I own.” Her husky voice cracked and wobbled with the motion and she was chewing her lip raw again.
