“Maybe. If we assume this woman isn’t his mistress, it begs the question, why is she there and why would she lie?”
“Yeah, and if she doesn’t need pain to get off, why couldn’t she come last night?”
“Who the hell knows?” He sighed. “It’s not relevant, anyway. We need to find out what her connection to Lawton is.”
“Yeah, just not as much fun.” Thorn winked. “Does she know where he is?”
Hesitating, Cam appeared to ponder the question, weigh things in his mind. “That one…maybe. She said no, but that was also when the ice princess act started. I think we go with the assumption that she’s got some clue.”
“Sounds reasonable.” Thorn nodded. “And if she does, she’ll tell him we’re sniffing around.”
“Lawton should know we’re after him, anyway.”
“True. Well, give her a few hours, go back there, and try her again. Maybe she’ll cough up the truth.”
“I can’t.”
“You have to.”
“It won’t work. She’s hi
ding something, I’m sure of it. But she also knows I’m on to her. I had to do something…questionable to get the little bit of information she gave me. To get more, I’d probably have to do something that could get me arrested.”
“Nah, man. You couldn’t just question her? She could fuck up when you do, Cam. You can wear her down. I’ve seen you do it with suspects. Just use all that cool patience.”
“Around her, I don’t have any.” With a sigh, Cam rose, paced. “She’s too…soft and curved. Hell, she fit right against me. That sweet Texas accent of hers went straight to my cock.”
Thorn laughed. “Now you know how the rest of us guys live. Welcome to reality.”
“This is serious!” Cam snarled. “If I’d spent another ten minutes alone with her, I would have found some way to get her clothes off, get her on her back, and fuck her senseless.”
Grinning, Thorn decided then that’s exactly what should happen…as long as he had a ringside seat. “Do you think she knows you’re watching her every move?”
“Damn it, stop smiling. This is not good! Of course she knows I’m watching. She’s not stupid.”
Of course she wasn’t. Even better. She’d give ol’ Cam the runaround, make him hard and crazy. Make him see how every other red-blooded man lived his life. Maybe then, Cam would shut up about how much Thorn lived his life through his dick.
“And if you try to visit so you can question her again,” Thorn said, “Even if you could keep your dick to yourself, she’s simply not going to answer, right?”
“That pretty much sums it up. I need another beer. Then I need to get my head together and figure out what the hell to do.”
Thorn couldn’t miss the fact that, when Cam stood again and yanked the fridge door open, his erection stood as tall and thick as it had the minute he entered the trailer door.
“Well, if you tried your way of questioning her and didn’t get all the information…” Thorn retrieved his Glock, his sunglasses, and the keys to his Harley from the rickety kitchen table. Then he flashed Cam a dangerous smile. “Maybe it’s time for me to question her. My way.”
Chapter Three
Brenna woke suddenly, to the feel of something around her ankle. Her cat? Winky rarely left her hiding places long enough to fraternize with the enemy. Was she cold?
Fighting sleep, Brenna managed to crack open her eyes. With a frown, she glanced around the dark, shadowed room. Where was she? Certainly not in her own bedroom.
Then it clicked—Arizona. The bedroom in Curtis’ bungalow.
Which meant that Winky was back in Muenster, Texas with her aunt, not prowling around her ankles.
So what had she felt?
Opening her eyes completely, she gave the room a thorough scan. Black corners and unlit nooks surrounded her, but that didn’t freak her out.
What did was the feeling that she wasn’t alone.
The air seethed with a vibe she didn’t understand—and couldn’t ignore. Dark, intense, sexual. How weird… Had she been having a dream she couldn’t shake? Maybe, but she didn’t remember it.
Her palms began to sweat. Adrenaline eked into her system. She gave the room a harder stare—and still couldn’t see a damn thing.
“Curtis?” she called hopefully.
“Guess again.”
The unfamiliar male voice from across the room sent ice dashing into her veins. His tone wasn’t much warmer either. Fear rooted her in place.
“Oh my God.”
“I don’t think He’s going to help you tonight. Right now, it’s just you and me.”
“Who are you?” She heard her voice tremble.
He laughed in answer.
Brenna tried to get up, dart out of the bed. No go. Her ankles had been spread and secured to the bedposts. Something jerked at her wrists and rattled near her ears.
The intruder had tied her ankles down, secured her wrists with handcuffs. Oh, shit. Was she going to wind up on the five o’clock news in a segment about a horrific murder, featuring some recent picture of her and a body bag?
She struggled again, frantically tugging at one wrist then the other. But the bite and metallic jangle let her know she wasn’t moving.
“Those are standard-issue police cuffs,” said the stranger as he stepped from the shadows, into the pool of moonlight under the skylight. “You’re not going anywhere until I release you.”
She could see enough about the intruder to get a general impression. He was a dream and a nightmare at once. Black leather pants, a matching vest…and nothing underneath but smooth bronze skin and rippling muscles. Oh, and the tattoos. They covered his left arm and shoulder in some intricate black flame pattern that wrapped around his enormous biceps multiple times, almost to the elbow. Blond hair hung straight to his shoulders. A silver medallion dangled from his neck and glinted in the moonlight between solid pecs and brushed the top of taut abs.
In another setting, this very bad boy would have made her incredibly wet.
Uninvited in her bedroom with her all tied up?
She screamed.
Calmly, he crossed the room, then covered her mouth with his hand. “You know no one can hear you since your nearest neighbor is half a mile away. If it makes you feel better, I’m not here to hurt or kill you. I’m a…friend of Curtis’.”
Yeah, wild hunch here, but friends of friends didn’t tie one another up.
Brenna closed her mouth against the unfamiliar salty tang of his skin and jerked her head away, but her mind raced. Hearing that he knew Curtis didn’t fill her with a warm fuzzy.
“As you can see, he’s not here.”
“I need your help finding him.”
“I-I don’t know where he is.”
“Now, see, that’s where I think you’re lying to me.”
She looked back at him, her eyes pleading in the dark. “No, I swear. A detective came by today. I told him I didn’t know too. And I don’t. I arrived here Saturday morning and he left fifteen minutes later. I don’t know where he went. Honest.”
There was a long pause. The stranger didn’t step back or take his hand away. After she’d turned her head, his palm had settled on her neck, long fingers wrapping easily around it. God, that made her nervous. He could cut off her windpipe with a good squeeze.
“Know when he’ll be back?”
“No. How do you know him? What kind of trouble is he in?”
He glided his palm over her shoulder, his thumb brushing under her tank top, perilously close to her breast, before running a light finger slowly down her arm, leaving a trail of unwanted tingles behind. He reached the handcuff around her wrist, binding her to the bed, and gave a playful tug. “I don’t think you’re in any position to be asking the questions. Let’s try again. How do you know Curtis?”
“I-I…” She didn’t dare float the mistress story again. If the detective had seen through her quickly, despite the dark, she couldn’t possibly hope to hide anything from this predator.
“You…what?”
She stubbornly refused to answer. What could she say when she knew the lie was ineffective and the truth, at least according to