Dangerous Tease (The Layton Family 3)

“Happens all the time.” His gaze traveled down her body before snapping back up to her face. “Don't you have a real coat?”

“What do you call this?” She held out her leather-covered arms.

“An invitation for frostbite.”

Fire seared her skin when his hand landed on the small of her back and he nudged her toward his car.

“Come on, let's warm you up in my car before you freeze to death.”

Damn, even his car was tan. This man desperately needed some color in his life. He followed her to the passenger side and opened the door.

“Thanks.”

“Even I have manners occasionally.”

It looked like a shiny, new show model on the inside. No crumpled candy wrappers or junk mail piled on the passenger seat or even a wet patch of melted snow. She slid into the still warm car and practically melted into the leather seat.

Sam circled around back. A blast of cold air shot into the car when he pulled open the driver's door and sat down. After he shut the door, they sat in silence for a few minutes until he turned the key in the ignition and a hard-driving drum solo blared from every speaker. With reflexes faster than a cat sprayed with water, Sam jammed the radio's off button.

Josie couldn't stop laughing. “It's okay, I'm not going to rat you out for actually being human.”

Sam's lips twitched into an almost smile. “No one would believe you anyway.”

“Not even your family?”

He snorted. “Especially not my family. I'm as much a black sheep in the Layton family as my uncle Harlan.”

“What did he do?”

“He stole Rebecca's diary and lost it in a poker game.”

The fact that she ended up with that diary hung unspoken in the air between them.

“And what did you steal to put you in the black sheep category?”

“Nothing. Unlike the rest of my family, I can keep my emotions in check and control my temper. That makes me the blackest of sheep.”

Josie laughed so hard her sides ached. “Are you completely out of your mind? Did you forget you lost it and stormed out into the hallway of that Vegas hotel buck-ass naked to accuse me of sleeping with you to get to Rebecca's Bounty?”

The tips of his ears turned scarlet and his jaw went rigid, but Sam didn't say a word. Instead, he put the car in reverse and backed out of the makeshift parking lot, spitting gravel under his tires.

Deciding silence was the better option, Josie fastened her seat belt and watched the scenery fly by. After half an hour of listening to Sam grind his teeth, she was ready to wrest the wheel from him or bail out so he could drive himself off a cliff. If his plan was to piss her off until she would rather sleep with Snips Esposito than work with Sam to find Rebecca's Bounty, he was well on his way to total success. Meanwhile her attempts to glare a hole in his thick skull failed miserably.

“Enough of the silent treatment. Where in the hell are you taking me?”

The car jerked to a stop in front of a closed metal cattle gate secured with a padlock. “Here. Come on, get out and really see it.”

Wind whipped at Josie's hair, its cold fingers digging underneath her collar despite her coat being zipped up to her neck.

McPherson's Bluff loomed above them looking like a huge, solid, snow-covered brick. It rose nearly a mile from the flat prairie that reached out in every direction from its base. Off to the left, a gnarled path of sunken ravines snaked out toward the horizon. A wide path had been cut down the center of the monument and a modern road weaved its way up the pine-tree-speckled bluff. Josie couldn't help but admire its fierce, solitary and utterly unwelcoming beauty.

“Wow.”

Sam chuckled. “Imagine seeing that from the front seat of a wagon after you've abandoned your old life to create a new one in a place you've never seen and with people you've never met. What kind of person would risk everything to travel through hostile territory for a slim chance at a better life?”

“You sound like you wish you were that kind of person.”

“No.” He slammed the car door shut and stormed over to her, stopping inches from the tips of her black boots. “I'm not that kind of person. I like order and I like certainty. I like standing in the back of the room away from the attention and the talk. I want steak on Friday nights and pancakes every Sunday morning. I like going to my office at the same time every day and having the same roast beef sandwich for lunch Monday through Friday.”