8
Tuesday morning, Kaci careened into her office thirty minutes early. In her Jeep, thank you very much.
She hadn’t been entirely convinced Lance’s squadron would bring it back, and she’d been on the verge of reminding him she knew the number to the police station when they’d shown up. She’d watched from the window while they pulled it off a flatbed trailer and delivered it safely into her normal parking spot, and now she was done with Lance forever.
To compensate for the weird feelings in her heart and belly, she’d had two brownies from Jimmy Beans for breakfast with hercoffee, and she was bound and determined to do some research on overcoming phobias before she was due for any meetings or lectures.
Her phone was blinking, so while she waited for her computer to boot up, she checked the voicemail.
And all the fizzing in her veins from the caffeine and brownies instantly turned to flat-out jitters.
Except the jitters were eighty percent hormonal and twenty percent scaredy-cat.
“Hey there, Dr. Kaci,” Lance’s voice drawled in that subtle twang of his. “Just wanted to thank you for making sure Gertrude was safely guarded until we could get there to pick her up yesterday. If she had to be kidnapped, we’re all relieved she was with someone who had her best interests at heart. Hope you found your Jeep without any trouble this morning. But there’s stillthat matter of Pony’s keg to settle. Appreciate if you’ll give me a call.”
That arrogant, muscle-headed son of a cow’s uncle. She didn’t want to call him. She didn’t want to hear his voice. He was nothing more than a?—
“And in case you’re wondering,” his message continued, “Ididfeel something when I kissed you. Both times.”
All the jitters in her veins swirled together and her heart gave a big ol’thump.
This man was dangerous.
And lately, danger was exactly what she wanted.
Kaci could firea potato gun without flinching, even if she could never aim the darn thing straight. She could set off fireworks with her eyes closed. And she could stare down a uniformed military manwithout so much as a twitch.
But she wasn’t sure she had it in her to knock on the door of the gray brick cookie-cutter mini-mansion where she had it on good authority that Lance lived.
If he rejected her proposal, she might just crawl into a hole and never come out again.
Not that shelikedhim.
Not like that. Why would she? First of all, she didn’t date flyers. Secondly, he was entirely too young for her. She liked her men with some experience under their belts.
But having a…afriendwas never a bad thing. Right?
Of course,friendsprobably didn’t need to call in favors to figure out where theirfriendslived. But he’d found her apartment—and temporarily commandeered her Jeep—so turnabout was fair play.
Or she could leave.
Nobody had to know she’d been here.
This was a stupid idea anyway.
James Robert College had a perfectly good psychology department. She’d go talk to an acquaintance or two over there, and?—
“Huh. Am I supposed to be surprised or terrified?”
So much for the chicken way out. She lifted her eyes to look at the man who had just opened the door. “Honored, sugar.”
His eyes went smoky and black holey, sucking her in while his lips curved in that maybe-I’ll-smile, maybe-I’ll-smirk kind of way he’d apparently mastered. “Don’t hold your breath.”
His green flight suit shouldn’t have been sexy, but something about the way it hung off his broad shoulders all the way down to his boots was doing weird things to her belly.
Like the suit saidI am man and I can fly.
Like men and flying were suddenly sexy.
