Wicked Appetite (Lizzy and Diesel 1)

“I’m asking you to stop,” he said. “If you don’t listen to me, I’ll make you stop.”

My eyes were narrowed, fixed on the peanut butter stuck to the end of my finger. I wanted the peanut butter bad. “Let go,” I said to Diesel.

Diesel put his mouth to my finger and sucked the peanut butter off.

“Hey, Mister Jerk,” I said, “that was my peanut butter.”

And then it hit me. Heat. And a rush so strong it almost knocked me to my knees. His mouth had been warm and wet, and there was some tongue involved.

“Jeez,” I said on a whisper.

He was inches from me, our bodies barely touching. His eyes were dark and serious, and his hand was still wrapped around my wrist. For a long moment, I was sure he was going to kiss me, but the emotion changed in his eyes, and he pulled back.

“We need to talk to Mark,” he said.

“Un-hunh.”

The corners of his mouth tipped into a small smile. “Are you hungry?”

I nodded.

“For chocolate?”

I gave him my squinty-eyed eat-dirt-and-die look. He knew perfectly well what I wanted. “I’m hungry for everything,” I said.

Diesel grinned wide. “I like the sound of that.”

“Can you read my mind now?”

“Honey, it doesn’t take magic to read your mind on this one.” He gave me a kiss on the forehead and released me. “Let’s roll. Wulf is out there on the hunt. I can feel his energy polluting my air space.”

The Spook Patrol jumped to attention when we exited the house. One of the guys shoved his gizmo at Diesel, and Diesel snatched it from him and threw it across the street.

“This is getting old,” Diesel said. “I’m about done with the Spook Patrol.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The More Is Better front office was manned by a tastefully dressed older woman. She was at her desk, hard at work painting her nails dark blue, when we walked in.

“We’re looking for Mark,” Diesel said.

“In the back,” she told him, smiling, waving us through without so much as an eyebrow raise that one of us was a monkey. I guess nothing surprises you when you work for a man who owns forty ferrets.

Mark was in the warehouse rearranging his locks, returning them to the original pile. So far as I could see, no one else was in the building. The mint business didn’t seem to be booming.

“How’s it going?” Diesel said as an opener.

“Someone broke in last night and moved my locks.”

Chump change, I thought. Wait until you see your apartment.

Mark shut the backhoe down and glared at Diesel. “I don’t suppose you know anything about this.”

“Has it happened before?”

“Never,” Mark said.

“It looks like Wulf’s work,” Diesel told him.