The Big Heat

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Between him, Linc and Martin, there were always a couple of extra jackets in the closet. Mostly because they just wound up leaving them at work, but sometimes they came in handy as a disguise.

“Fine, I’ll grab her a jacket. Go ahead and call a cab and have it waiting around the back. That’ll at least avoid most of the melee out front.”

A fine frown settled between Marlene’s arched brows. “A cab? But—” she glanced at the pink copy of duplicate paperwork on her desk “—I think this address is only a block or two out of your way. Weren’t you heading home? Seems like it shouldn’t be a big deal to just drop her off on your way.”

“Will you be happy then? Will I have thoroughly atoned for my sin? Will you finally concede Sunny Templeton’s not my problem?” And would he finally feel as if he could walk away with a clear conscience? That he’d done his best by her?

“Yes. Mostly. Maybe.”

He sighed and crossed the room to the back closet. He dug out a well-worn orange and white University of Tennessee jacket from Linc’s college days. He also snagged a ball cap off the top shelf.

“Feel free to nominate me for sainthood when I’m through.”

Marlene smiled sweetly and passed him the paperwork. Martin snorted from his office. Cade paused in the doorway on his way out. “Enjoy the sushi dinner,” he said, closing the door on Marlene’s laugh and Martin’s grumbling.

The wind held a sharp edge and carried the smell of old grease and hickory smoke from the barbecue shack on the corner. Cade avoided a wadded fast-food bag blowing down the sidewalk and rounded the corner of the building to the small, potholed parking lot beside AA Atco.

He just wanted to get this over with. Done.

He unlocked his car and tossed the jacket and cap onto the passenger seat. Marlene was right, he could take fifteen minutes out of his day to do the woman a good turn. He cranked his car and pulled past the media to an unlit corner of the parking lot close to the back entrance.

He was about to encounter Sunny Templeton in the flesh. No flyer. No newspaper article. No Internet blog. His heart pounded the way it hadn’t since he’d apprehended his first skip sixteen years ago.

He had to get a grip. He brought in hardened criminals, for chrissakes. Just how much trouble could it be to bail Sunny Templeton out and drop her off at home?

4

“SHE’S ALL YOURS,” officer Jack Winslett, per his name badge, said, speaking over Sunny’s shoulder.

Time to face Nadine. It wouldn’t be pleasant but it couldn’t be any worse than what she’d been through so far. She turned, expecting her sister. Instead she came face-to-face, well to be technically accurate, face-to-wall-of-hard-muscular-chest with the big, badass bounty hunter himself who’d been starring front and center in her secret fantasies. Cade Stone.

She must truly be off the deep end because she locked gazes with his piercing tawny eyes and something primitive, something hot and wild and deliciously disturbing shook her to her core, despite having just been bailed out of jail. More than likely, she was just flat-out disturbed. This hadn’t exactly been her finest day. She was tired. Hungry. Grubby. Still damp from her soaking. And to top it off, she’d been hit on by a big woman named Spanky with a skull tattoo on her forearm. And much as he might show up in her fantasies, she didn’t want to deal with him in real life. Especially not when she looked like she’d just crawled through hell and back. Feeling flushed and breathless and slightly weak-kneed was downright inconvenient right now.

“What are you doing here?” she said, also reminding herself he was the enemy. He’d campaigned for Cecil, against her. He had a lot of nerve showing up here.

A flicker of…remorse, amusement…something flickered in his eyes and then was gone. “I’m passing along your get-out-of-jail card.”

His voice was deep, sexy with an underlying hint of gravel. Oh. Sweet. Mother. She reached behind her and grabbed the edge of the desk. A part of her would’ve been relieved if he’d sounded like Tweety Bird. She was pretty sure she wouldn’t be feeling this incredible surge of sexual energy if the guy sounded like he’d just sucked on a helium balloon. That would’ve killed the fantasy. But no, Cade Stone had to sound as good as he looked.

“You want to take this somewhere else, folks?” Officer Winslett scowled at them. “You’re blocking my desk and I’ve got other people to process.”

Cade grasped her by her elbow, his touch sending another heat wave through her, and led her out into the corridor.

Once outside the release room, she dug in her heels and shook his hand off of her arm. She wanted some answers and his touch was…well, it made coherent thoughts other than “I’d like to see you naked” difficult.

She tilted her head back to look at him. Way back. He had to be nearly a foot taller than her. Fine lines radiated from the corners of eyes that were a golden brown with flecks of black. No-nonsense lines bracketed his mouth. A dark stubble shadowed his jaw. His dark hair was close-cropped. Faint lines etched his forehead. His nose, Romanesque, skewed slightly to one side, as if it’d been broken once or twice and never quite made it back to the center. He was beautiful in a rugged, untamed kind of way.

His size alone would have made him intimidating, but a body-hugging black T-shirt tucked into black jeans, black leather jacket and black military-style boots only furthered the intimidation factor. No one would mistake him for a gentle giant. He seemed hard through and through, but she didn’t sense any cruelty, just determination and focus.

She stared him in the eyes, not wanting him to think he intimidated her.

“I don’t understand why you’re here. I called my sister.”

Nadine had been the lesser of two evils. Calling Sheila hadn’t been a remote possibility. She wasn’t screwing up the woman’s vacation. As for calling her other friends, it didn’t seem right to drag them into the financial matter of bailing her out. Nadine had plenty to say about Sunny landing herself in jail. Eventually, however, after she’d had her say, she’d agreed to bail her out. So where the heck was she?

Overhead, a fluorescent bulb that needed replacing flickered. She looked away from Cade to an officer escorting a disheveled middle-aged man in handcuffs down the hall.

“Your sister posted your bond but she couldn’t make it over here to finish up.” Was that a hint of disapproval behind that implacable stare? He’d campaigned for Cecil Meeks. He didn’t have room to disapprove of anyone. Then it suddenly occurred to her…color her slow what with being arrested and booked.

“Nadine came to you to bail me out?” She could handle her sister’s tirades, her disapproval. She could handle Nadine not bothering to show up and give her a ride home. But to have gone to this man’s company, the very people who’d been on that billboard with Meeks to post her bond, that stung like an open-handed slap to the face.

“Our office is right across the street.”

She lifted her chin and started down the hall. “Thanks,” she said, more of a dismissal than an actual appreciation. She walked toward the exit arrow at the end of the hall.

He caught up with her easily. “Look, put on this jacket and cap. We’ll duck out the back door and I’ll give you a lift home.”

She hadn’t even noticed the items he held in one hand. “No, thank you.”

“There are camera crews and news vans outside that are going to crawl all over you when you walk out of here.”

Sunny stopped. Cade stopped, too. What did it take to get rid of this man? “Look. I know my sister stuck you with coming over here and bailing me out. I’m bailed. You’re done. Go home. Shoo.”

Okay, so maybe the accompanying shooing motion was a bit much. Cade Stone didn’t look like a man who got shooed very often…uh, probably never. And from the way he narrowed his eyes and thinned his lips, he wasn’t happy with it happening now.

“There’s nothing I’d like to do more. I’m trying to go home. I just need to take you home on my way.”

“That’s not happening. How do I know you’re not a pervert who just wants to get me in his car?”

After a stunned moment he laughed. If he was a pervert, he was a most amused one. “Sorry to disappoint you, honey, but you’re not my type.” He rubbed his hand over his head. “Look. I’m just trying to help you out, here.”

“The same way you helped me out by campaigning with Cecil? No thanks.” She crossed her arms over her chest. Nice to know she wasn’t his type. He might have some bone-melting physical effect on her but he wasn’t her type, either. Case in point, she’d told him to go away and he was still here. She wasn’t feeling particularly tactful. “I don’t need your help, so quit bugging me.”

“I’m bugging you—” uh-huh, he didn’t like that word any better than he liked shoo “—because our secretary has taken you up as the cause of the day. Marlene damn near considers you Joan of Arc. Your sister showing up today and then leaving you high and dry was just icing on the cake. Marlene has taken it into her head that I need to give you a ride home to atone for our sin of being part of Meeks’s campaign. If I let you walk out of that door and allow the media to swamp you, if I don’t deliver you safely to your door, my life isn’t going to be worth living.”

She’d lived on her own for the past twelve years. Aside from having been taken into custody today and subsequently released, she was the only one that made the decision on whether she walked out of a door or not. “If you let me walk out the door…? You’re seriously confused on several issues.”