His chest rose with each steady breath. “You know, Dee Smith, there’s one thing that absolutely pushes my buttons, and that’s someone who lies to me.”
“But I’m not—”
“Amnesia?” He nudged the form back to her. “If you want to keep your job, you’ll have to come up with a better story than that.”
“You don’t believe me.”
Jacob snorted. He’d meant what he said about hating liars. His father had backed out on promises, concocted grandiose schemes, flat out fabricated too many times. A need for truth, people he could trust, had driven Jacob to join the military.
After thirteen years in the Air Force traveling the world, he’d seen it all. But in all that time he hadn’t come across a Dee Smith yet. “Do you really think I intend to pass out a pay slip without running a background check or filing paperwork?”
Apparently she did. There went the possibility of hiring her on as help with Emily.
Dee’s head fell to rest on her folded hands. “Perfect end to a perfectly wretched day.”
Jacob refused to let the dejected slump of her shoulders sway him. “You can always tell me the truth.”
“Yeah, right.” She sat up again in the dinette chair.
“If you’re in some kind of trouble with the law—”
She tipped her face toward him, her defeated expression replaced by tight-lipped frustration. Or could it be anger?
“Hmm. Am I in trouble with the cops? How would I know? Aliens erased my memory in their sensory deprivation chamber. My whole history is stored on their spaceship with Elvis flying it through the galaxy at light speed.”
“Now that’s more like it.”
Spunky as well as prideful. If only the evening had led to dinner instead of this. She’d had a bad day? In the past six weeks he’d been shot and lost his father.
“Never mind.” Dee snatched her coat from the back of her chair and charged toward the door, arms pumping.
“Running away again? I’m getting mighty damned tired of chasing you out into the snow.”
“Who asked you to?”
She had a point. She also had a great set of h*ps twitching beneath that bulky sweater and his body had picked one hell of an inconvenient time to react. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“To my room.” She spun to face him, her hair swinging a satiny blanket around her face. “It is still my room if I pay for it, isn’t it? Even if I don’t work here anymore.”
“How do you plan to finance that one?”
“Elvis floated me a loan before he left.” Dee stuffed her arms into her coat and marched through the archway.
Yeah, right, she’d gone to get money. She would probably hole up for the night until she could cut out or concoct a better story.
Jacob glanced at the empty chair across the room, a seat with a missing spoke on the back. He’d been thirteen, tipped the chair and fell over. His mother had been alive in those days and had given him an icepack for his sore head.
No amnesia there. In fact, too many memories floated around this place.
Jacob pulled a spoon from the drawer with half the anticipation he’d felt when starting the meal. He turned to start eating straight from the pot—and stopped.
Dee stood framed in the archway, her fists clutched by her side, her cheeks flushed from the elements.
Passing time with her wouldn’t be a hardship. Except she didn’t look all that happy with him. Her eyes glinted with icicles that rivaled the spikes frozen from his eaves.
Dee glided across the room like a debutante and placed folded bills on the table. “There’s enough to cover tonight. No need to drive me into town tomorrow. I’ll hitch a ride on the tour bus.”
“So you have somewhere to go after all.” He tossed his spoon on the counter. Just as he’d predicted, she would slip from his life as quickly as she stumbled into it.