“Sure.”
“Well, then, I guess that’s it.” Jacob slid the cash from the table and wove the folded paper through his fingers, flipping it twice. He didn’t need or want her money, just the woman who’d had the patience to pass time with a mouthy teenager.
Lifting her hand, he pressed the cash into her palm. “Don’t worry about the room. You earned it today. I don’t think the IRS will come after me for one day’s work-for-a-room trade off.”
Her hand felt good in his, small and soft. Her pulse fluttered against him like a bird, her bones easily as fragile. He couldn’t make himself let go.
With a twitch, she tried to pull away, then grew still, too still. Tight lines around her mouth eased. Her brown eyes shifted, melting into a warm shade of chocolate.
She swayed, ever so slightly, toward him.
Still he cradled her hand in his, his forearms so close to her br**sts he could feel the heat of her. He could also smell the lingering scent of hotel cleaning supplies, but it mingled with something essentially Dee. Something unique, intoxicating, more unique than any of those high-priced perfumes he’d seen marketers hocking on television.
Of its own volition, his head dipped. His chin brushed just beside her temple. He filled his lungs and senses with another lingering breath of her hair, of her. Dee. “Just tell me your name. I can help you through whatever’s going on. Running never solved anything.”
Hypocrite. He forced himself not to flinch. He hadn’t been around for his sister.
Dee’s hand fisted in his. Easing back a step, she placed the money on the table by the salt and pepper shakers before turning on her heels.
Regret and frustration jockeyed for dominance in his testosterone-fogged brain. Why was his gut twisting into knots over this woman he’d only just met?
Pausing, she spun back and carefully peeled off three more dollars. She slapped them on the table. “Here. This should be enough to cover my call on your cell phone to the Tacoma Police Department.”
Dee cleared the doorway before he could close his mouth.
The Tacoma PD? Why would someone running from the law call the cops? She wouldn’t.
She also wouldn’t lie about calling the cops to get his sympathy. A fabrication like that could be too easily traced.
Could she have been telling the truth after all?
Damn.
He sprinted after her, right back into the storm.
Chapter 5
“I told William we shouldn’t travel in this storm.” An older woman gripped the tour bus driver’s hand as she disembarked.
Dee held the lodge door open as the driver braced the frail woman with a hand to her back. Idling in the parking lot, the silver bus chugged exhaust into the night. Snowflakes danced in the headlight beams.
After Jacob’s damning disbelief, she’d dashed from his apartment straight into a rolling tide of guests swelling through the door in search of a warm room. She’d absorbed the sight of that tour bus like a piece of salvation rumbling a diesel tune in the parking lot.
Dee tucked her hands in her pockets. She should have held her temper in check. Perhaps she should have concocted a story to tide him over until he’d driven her into Tacoma. But she couldn’t ignore the sense of urgency to discover if she had a child out there who needed her.
Not that she could have convinced him, anyway. He’d looked like a six-foot-four-inch immovable wall, with his jaw set and eyes so cold. He didn’t appear any more approachable now, towering behind the registration desk sorting through the crowd of exhausted travelers. Casting the periodic brooding stare her way. Like now.
Dee studied the bus driver, deciding on the best approach for bumming a ride. The guy was somewhere in his early fifties perhaps, with sandy-gray hair. His patience with the older lady boded well.
Time to start begging. “Do you need some help?”
The driver glanced up. “Oh, hi. Just keep catching the door there, would ya?”
“Sure.” Dee pressed her back against the frosted glass.
The driver’s eyes flickered over Dee with appreciation as he guided the woman inside. “Thanks. Only another thirty-five more people to go.”
Dee gave him the obligatory laugh. He offered a light chuckle in return.