Stroke of Midnight (Nightcreature #1.5)(50)

She smiled wider and then swallowed it away, taking the tray onto the bus for Mrs. Parker. Maybe her mother had been wrong? Maybe she shouldn't be frightened of every strange man she might meet along the way to her grandmother's house, visions, dreams, and superstitions notwithstanding. She was, after all, eighteen, and there was so much of the world she hadn't yet seen. So she'd had one bad experience. Her family's concept of being a cloistered healer was truly no way to live. If her grandmother could just fix one little mistake made in misguided passion…

Aghast that she'd actually gone into the tavern on a mission of mercy, the other passengers immediately bombarded her with questions. Each spoke in hushed tones.

"They're animals, Tara," one lady said, her whisper fervent. "They could have harmed you, or worse."

"They're not all bad," Tara said quietly, helping the lady she'd come to know on the ride as Mrs. Parker take a sip of water.

"Don't go back out there," an elderly man said, reaching past his seatmate. "You were just lucky."

Tara nodded. "We all were. But we have to pay the one fixing the bus."

"What!" another male passenger said too loudly, making the other passengers become even more nervous. "How much? We shouldn't have to pay. The bus company should."

Tara released her breath with strained patience while calmly cutting a piece of apple for her seatmate and placing it into her aged, shaking hand. "That's true, but we must deal with our circumstances."

"The girl is right," Mrs. Parker said. "If Tara hadn't been brave…"

"Perish the thought," another lady murmured and began digging in her bag for money. "Give him this." The action made others around her begin looking into their purses and wallets as well.

Tara stared at the crisp hundred-dollar bill and folded it away in her palm.



For the life of him, Rider couldn't figure out what was wrong with the bus. Sure, the radiator had overheated, but time and a little water would have solved the problem. The fan belt was shot, but still, a bus driver should have had enough road knowledge to fix something minor like that. It didn't add up. And why did the old buzzard keep looking over his shoulder and making the flashlight jump? The fellas weren't coming out of the tavern anytime soon. As long as he went in there with a representative knot of money in his pocket, then hey… everything would remain jakey.

Then there was that pretty girl who looked at him like she did. Made him want to buy her dinner at the next local diner, which was a foolish thought. As though a girl like her would be caught dead on the back of a bike, much less sit and eat with him. He knew better than that, and knew what the old folks on the bus were probably telling her. He focused on the engine, trying to see if the block had cracked from the heat. She was so damned pretty, so clean… had a voice that would make a man forget time. But those dark, troubled, mysterious eyes of hers drew him. They were the eyes of innocence, but also the eyes of someone trapped, and set in a face so pretty that a couple times he'd forgotten to breathe when she'd looked at him.

But all of that was stupid, anyhow. She wasn't his type. It had to be the heat, the road, and the boredom.

First off, she was too short, maybe five foot nuthin', a little bitty thing. She had no boobs to speak of, just a petite rise in her calico dress that didn't even offer a real cleavage—she was no Marianne. Her hips were very nice, he'd give her that… and, yeah, so okay, the perfect shape of her behind did nearly hypnotize him when she'd walked away, but she didn't have the full package he usually went for.

For instance, she didn't even wear makeup; no lipstick covered her lush, honey-brown mouth. Her long dark lashes didn't have that black stuff that came out of a tube caking them. All the women he knew wore that, even his mother. This babe wasn't even a blonde, he reminded himself. Far from it… far enough away to possibly get his ass kicked by the fellas if he treated her too nice, especially in this neck of the woods. Plus, she looked like she'd never been anywhere in the world… probably had the address to where she was going pinned to the hem of her dress, like a kid. Couldn't have been more than seventeen, maybe eighteen—if he stretched it—and with his luck, he'd get picked up by some sheriff on a statutory charge… were he so crazy to even attempt anything. So, what was the point? It had to be road dust and Jack Daniel's talking to him. Damn, it was hot out here.

Problem was, she'd come down off the bus again and had floated in his direction with a tray in hand and money in her fist. He could tell by the way one hand was balled up tight, like she didn't want to drop something important. He sighed. Then why'd she have to stand so close waiting for him to look up, smelling all good and like lavender? And dammit, why did she smile so sweetly, and flash him the whitest, most perfect row of teeth he'd ever seen when he bumped his noggin to stand?

He rubbed his head and looked at her hard. "You pass the hat?"

She nodded and extended her hand. "Two hundred and fifty for your trouble," she said shyly. "Thank you so much."

"Well, don't thank me yet," he muttered, taking the wad of bills from her. He paused as his fingers met her palm, the softness of it made him draw his hand away fast. He couldn't look at her, so he sent his attention to the bus driver. "Give it a try," he told him. "Gun the motor and see if this old battle-axe turns over. I don't know what the hell's wrong with it."