Page 8

E ight o’clock. The woman slept like the dead.

Not that she was. Jesse knew because he’d checked earlier, prowling over to listen to her breathing, steady and regular.

He sipped his coffee as he leaned against the doorframe separating their two rooms, studying the unmoving figure huddled in the bed.

Destiny lay curled around a pillow, her arms clutching the bag of feathers like a drowning woman hanging on to the boat’s last life preserver. Her covers had been flung to one side as if she’d fought a mighty battle, kicking them away into a heap.

And those curvy bared legs? They were the kind that had obviously inspired man to invent high heels and miniskirts.

Another sip of coffee, the dark liquid flowing down his throat, bringing a flush of heat to his skin. It was the coffee making him so warm, wasn’t it?

Just his damned luck the first time he went off the grid to help someone behind the company’s back, she’d turned out to be a sexy-as-hell Faerie descendant being chased by a mutant Nuadian. Then again, maybe it was more than luck. Dallyn had counseled the Guardians more than once about the rise of Faerie magic in the Mortal World. He’d also spoken about the numbers of Faerie descendants.

There lay his proof, curled up on the bed in front of him. All five feet, four glorious inches of her.

He’d heard her last night. At first he’d thought it might be the wind as it picked up, the leading edge of the hurricane Peter had warned him was headed their way.

But he’d been wrong. It had been Destiny, moaning in her sleep, the sounds followed a short while later by bare feet padding around the room and the click of her bathroom door. After the nightmares she’d apparently had, it wasn’t any wonder she still slept.

No! No more Mr. Nice Guy.

The gloves were off today. He would not be sucked into feeling sorry for her again. He was getting his answers, and damn soon, too. They didn’t have time to hang out here while she wasted the day sleeping. If she didn’t wake soon, he’d be dragging her ass out of that bed and she’d be talking in short order.

He emptied the last gulp of coffee from his cup, but made no effort to move from his spot by the door.

Yep. That’s exactly what he’d do. Any minute now.

Instead of crossing to the bed, he eased his phone from his pocket, flipping it open with one hand, punching the necessary buttons to once again pull up the information Peter had sent him last night.

In addition to the missing sixteen-year-old sister, Destiny had a younger brother, born in between the two girls.

Chase Noble. Whereabouts unknown.

Jesse might be tempted to think that running away was a family trait if not for the encounter with that Nuadian Fae bent on nabbing Destiny last night. There was much more here than initially met the eye. First and foremost, the question was why the Fae would want Leah Noble. Or Destiny, for that matter.

He turned back to the scrolling information on the small screen in his hand.

Mother, deceased. Father, deserted family sixteen years ago, whereabouts unknown .

If the younger sister had been abducted, it sure couldn’t have been for money. It appeared these people had lived hand to mouth for years, on whatever income Destiny could bring in.

“What do you think you’re doing in my room?”

Jesse glanced up, snapping the phone shut and shoving it into his pocket.

“Technically I’m not in your room.” He grinned as she grabbed at her covers, pulling them practically up to her chin. Too late, babe. Assets already ogled. “Why don’t you climb out of there and we’ll have ourselves that little talk you mentioned last night.”

She shook her head and silky black curls curved onto her rosy cheeks. “Coffee, first.”

He turned into his room and poured another cup from the small pot. By the time he walked back through the door, Destiny was nowhere to be seen, the sound of running water coming from behind the closed bathroom door his only clue to her location.

Setting both cups on the small nightstand, he sat down on her bed and propped his legs out in front of him to wait.

When she came back into the room, she was once again dressed in those black tights and the blouse that masqueraded as a clingy little dress, carrying the T-shirt she’d slept in—his T-shirt—neatly folded. She accepted the cup of coffee from him but ignored his invitation to have a seat next to him, instead primly arranging herself in one of the hard chairs across the room from him.

“Where’s your sister?”

“Arizona,” she responded, averting her eyes as she lifted her cup for a quick drink.

That was almost too easy. He’d expected more of last night’s evasion.

“Arizona, huh? It’s a big state, you know.” He watched her closely, noting her hands begin to shake at his comment. “So how about you be a touch more precise, babe. Where exactly are we heading?”

Her lips tightened into a stubborn line and she set down her cup before lifting her chin to meet his gaze.

Uh-oh. Here it comes.

“Right now, the exact spot we’re heading is back to the fairgrounds to pick up my purse and my laptop like I asked for last night. And then we’re going to my motel to get all my things. I’ve thought it over and here’s what I’ve decided— I’m the client. You work for me. We’ll do what I say from this point on. And don’t call me ‘babe.’ “

If she was going for tough and in charge, that shaky exhale at the end of her speech pretty much ruined the whole effect.

“No point in our doing that.” He took another drink, watching her over the rim of his cup. She wasn’t going to like hearing the news he’d gotten this morning. “Nothing there to go back for. It’s all gone.”

“Gone?” Her facade crumbled. “Gone as in ‘those people you sent already have it’?”

“Sorry, babe. Gone as in ‘not there when my people arrived.’ “

She stood and started to pace back and forth in front of the bed. “I don’t understand. What could have happened to my things?”

“My guess is that once our friend from the parking lot picked himself up, he went looking for clues as to where he could find you.”

Destiny stopped, crossing her arms in front of her. “You mean Psycho Blondie stole my stuff?”

Jesse shrugged his response. In spite of the ridiculous name she pinned on the mysterious Fae, that certainly seemed the most logical answer to him.

Her cheeks went a blotchy red and she turned her back to him. He’d seen that performance from enough women, including most recently his ex-girlfriend, Lara. He knew what to expect and readied himself for the coming waterworks. Damn but he hated it when women cried.

Destiny, however, surprised him. When she turned around, it wasn’t tears in her eyes. It was fury.

“Dammit. Dammit all to hell!” Her pacing started again, rapid and agitated. “If I ever get my hands on that jerk, I swear I’ll make him think what you did to him in that parking lot was playtime. I need that laptop to find my sister.”

“I thought you said your sister was in Arizona. Why do you need the laptop?”

“Like you said before, Arizona’s a big place. And I won’t know where in that big place Leah is until I read the email telling me.”

She was making absolutely no sense.

“Wait a minute. You mean to tell me you can’t remember what you read in an email about your missing sister’s location?”

Hands on her hips, she leaned toward him, eyes flashing. “I haven’t read it yet. It wasn’t there the last time I had my laptop.”

“Then what makes you think it’s there now?”

“Because I dreamed it, okay?” she yelled at him before throwing her hands in the air and turning to fall into her chair. “I dreamed it. Just like I dreamed Coryell Enterprises, and you, and the Arizona road sign. I have visions. Weird, freaky-assed, totally accurate visions, okay? There’s going to be a message sitting in my email that will tell me exactly where to find Leah.”

There. She’d told him. Not at all in the way she would have preferred. A temper fit probably wasn’t the best means to convince somebody you weren’t a total looney tune, but at least it was out in the open now and she’d deal with whatever came next.

Jesse sat quietly for a long moment, simply staring at her, his expression completely unreadable.

“Interesting,” he said at last. Swinging his long legs off the bed to stand, he dragged his cell phone from his pocket and held it up to his face. “Smile pretty for me, babe.”

“What do you think you’re doing?” Destiny was beginning to suspect she might not be the only looney tune in the room.

“Taking your picture, of course. We need to get you some new ID, if we’re going to be flying out to Arizona to find your sister. Airport security is a little testy about things like that.”

Destiny was struck mute at his words. No questions. No doubt. He’d simply accepted what she’d told him without blinking an eye. Unbelievable.

A small flash and he was once again looking at the phone, pushing buttons.

He’d already taken the photo?

“Oh!” Her hand flew to her messy hair. “You could have given me some warning. It would have been nice to have had some makeup. Or at least a comb.” Wonderful. She was going to be stuck with identification that made her look like she’d just crawled out of bed. Which she had.

He grinned, his face taking on a whole new level of attractiveness. “Makeup? You kidding? You don’t need that stuff. You look great just like you are. Peter?” This last was directed into the phone he held. “Damn voice mail,” he muttered.

A warm feeling curled through her stomach. He thought she looked great just as she was.

“It’s Jess. I’ve just sent over a photo. Call me ASAP when you get this.” He snapped the phone shut and slid it back into his pocket as he strode through the doorway into his room. “You want any more coffee before I dump it?”

“No. I’m fine.” Amazingly she really did feel closer to fine than she had for over a month. She got up and walked to the doorway separating their rooms. Stepping across the threshold into his room felt too odd, too personal, so she waited at the opening, her hands fidgeting together behind her back. “What do we do now?”

He leaned out of his bathroom, drying his hands on a towel. “Well, one thing’s for sure, we can’t hang out here waiting to be found by Psycho Blondie.” Another killer grin as he parroted her earlier words. “We’ll stop somewhere and grab some things for you… a toothbrush, some jeans, whatever you—”

The tinny notes of “Play that Funky Music” blasted from his pocket and he hurriedly grabbed the phone, flipping it open in the process.

“Yeah?”

He caught her eye and winked as he turned his back. She couldn’t seem to tear her gaze from him as that strange feeling of delight filled her again. She shouldn’t be staring at that made-for-T-shirts chiseled body. Or the perfect jeans-filling butt.

Well, maybe just for a minute wouldn’t hurt anything.

But it didn’t take that long for her internal critic to kick into overdrive, setting all her emotional alarms to blaring.

Destiny turned and headed back into her room, forcing herself to ignore Jesse and his telephone conversation. One foot after the other, she made her way over to the big picture window facing the parking lot. Opening the drapes, she closed her eyes and hoped for the warmth of the morning sun to soak into her body, willing it to fill the empty spot inside.

But the day was cloudy and gray, much like the message her common sense was bombarding her with even now.

It was ridiculous to let herself get all gooey-feeling over this guy. He was with her because his company had sent him here and for no other reason. For all his winks and grins, she was just another job to him, and unless she planned to end up like her mother, she’d do well to remember that. From watching what had happened to Rainbow, Destiny knew that the only thing worse than a handsome man was a rich handsome man.

She could resist handsome… and she knew better than to trust any of them. Men were all alike. Even this one.

“That’s bullshit, Peter. I don’t care if it is Saturday. You know we sure as hell can’t stay here.”

Jesse’s raised voice broke into her thoughts, pulling her attention away from her spot at the window, back toward his room. Through the opening, she saw him jam his cell phone back in his pocket and look in her direction, the scowl on his face quickly erased as if he didn’t want her to know he was upset.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing I can’t handle, babe. Now get away from that window and close the curtains. Damn.” He was into her room and pulling on the cords, sliding the drapes together, before she could move.

“I like it open.”

The man was awfully bossy for someone who was supposed to be working for her. And he still insisted on calling her that irritating pet name, in spite of her having told him not to. He made her think of those annoying Highlanders in the romances she loved to read.

The ones who turned out to be heroes in the end.

But, she reminded herself, those were just books. This was real life, and she’d long ago made up her mind that the bossy, take-charge man she might find attractive in a paperback novel held no interest for her at all in real life.

“I don’t care if you like it. The guy who’s looking for you would like it if you made it easy for him to find you, too. Easy like you standing on display in that open window.”

Oh. That made sense. She hadn’t even considered something like that. A shudder of fear rattled through her body as she stared at the now closed draperies.

Okay. He’d been right and she’d been wrong. This one time. She could admit that much. Flustered, she followed him back to his room, trying once more to probe him for information.

“Problem on the phone? You sounded angry.”

He shrugged, continuing to pick up his things and stuff them into the black bag she recognized from the back of his motorcycle. “Let’s just say bureaucratic delays aren’t one of my favorite things in life. Come on.”

He walked over and opened the door, holding it ajar for her after scanning the parking lot.

“Where are we going?”

He fastened the leather bag onto his bike before taking the helmet off the back bar and turning to answer. “Norfolk International Airport.”

The airport?

“I thought you said we couldn’t fly out until I have photo ID.”

“That’s right. We can’t fly yet. Won’t have your fancy new government-issued identification until Monday morning.”

“Then why are we going all the way to the airport in Norfolk?”

The grin was back, and this close, she could see that it crinkled the corners of his eyes.

“We’re going to park my bike and nab us a car, babe. And then we’re going on a shopping spree and heading out of town on a road trip.”

Any further questions she might have—and there were plenty—were put on hold as he once again shoved the big black helmet on her head and lifted her into the air and down onto the seat of his motorcycle.

He climbed on in front of her, and when she heard the muffled “Hold on!” she fastened her arms tightly around his chest and tried not to stress over what was to come.

What kind of crazy man had come to save her? It wasn’t bad enough her sister was missing and she had some insane kidnapper on her trail. Now it appeared she was about to become a car thief!