Wrapped Up in You (Heartbreaker Bay, #8)(7)

He saw Ivy’s taco truck. He’d noticed it earlier when he’d walked into the pub with Caleb. Catching movement in the alley, he stepped closer. The back door to the truck was open, and from inside he could see a beam of a flashlight moving around.

Pulling his gun was automatic, and he stepped closer, catching a shadow of a figure inside. “Hands where I can see them,” he called out.

The figure jerked, gasped, and then whirled around. In the ambient lighting, he immediately recognized her.

Ivy.

He slid his gun away. “You okay?”

“Hell no, I’m not okay! Are you kidding me? You just gave me a freaking heart attack! What’s wrong with you?” She had a hand to her heart. She’d startled hard, and for the beat before she’d recognized him, there’d been real fear in her eyes, something that had quickly turned into pissed-off woman.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“I was at the pub.” He took in her appearance. Camo leggings, untied boots, huge black sweatshirt that threatened to swallow her whole and hit her at her knees. No makeup. Eyes stricken, mouth grim, her wild hair loose around her pale face. And he got the feeling whatever had brought her down here, it’d been without warning. “I’m going to ask you again,” he said quietly. “Are you okay?”

She exhaled a long shaky breath and then shook her head as she turned away from him. “Do you always carry a gun when you go out, cowboy?”

“Yes.”

“Always?”

“Yes.”

“How about during the day?”

He gave her a look, wasted because she still had her back to him. “Still yes.”

“How about when you’re in bed with a woman?”

He knew what she was doing. Stalling. Also clearly trying to annoy him. But he’d been to hell and back, and on the return trip he’d learned how to shut himself off enough that he didn’t get easily annoyed. “Do you always answer a question with another question?”

Again she shook her head. She moved inside to an industrial refrigerator and dropped to her knees in front of the low pull-out freezer. When she went through the drawer, she made a sound of distress.

He was at her side in a second. “What is it?”

“Someone broke in. Took some money. Left my refrigerator and freezer door open, and it’s been just long enough that nearly everything is ruined.”

“Why did you have cash in here? And how much was taken?”

“It was petty cash, locked up in my cash drawer, and it was around a hundred bucks. Which maybe doesn’t seem like a lot to you, but to me it might as well be a grand.”

Kel pulled out his phone.

This got him a reaction. She whipped around, eyes wide. “What are you doing?”

“Calling the cops.”

The look on her face defied description. Incredulous disbelief and maybe instant wariness. “No, you’re not.”

Okay, definite wariness. Cops made her nervous. Interesting. “You have a problem with the police, Ivy?”

She tossed up her hands. “Why are you even here? Go away.”

He wasn’t going to do that, for a bunch of reasons, the least being that she could be in danger. “Do you have something to hide?”

Ignoring him and his question, she pulled her phone from her pocket and sent a text. Then she went about turning on the lights. When a text came in, she read it, sighed, and slipped the phone away.

“Who was that?”

She looked at him as if surprised he was still there. “My employee, Jenny. She closed up tonight like always, and said everything was fine when she left, no problems.” She began methodically taking everything out of her fridge and freezer. When he tried to help, she “accidentally” elbowed him in the gut.

“Oops, sorry,” she said, sounding anything but. “Stand back. Better yet, get out.”

“Not going to happen.”

Turning to him, she went hands on hips and blew a strand of hair from her face. “Why not?” she asked in exasperation.

“Because someone violated your personal space.” He softened his voice. “And you seem shaken by that, as anyone would be. You shouldn’t be alone.”

“I’ll call someone.”

“Okay,” he said, calling her bluff.

She stared at him and then rolled her eyes. “I can’t, okay?”

“Why not?”

“It’s too late.”

“A friend won’t care,” he said. “Neither will a boyfriend.” He hadn’t meant to say that, but she was both the most infuriating and yet fascinating woman he’d ever met.

Her gaze shuddered and again she turned away. “Even if I called the police, they can’t do much. It was just some light vandalism, and missing cash is impossible to trace.”

He knew this to be true, frustrating as it was. “If you’re not going to call anyone, I’m staying.”

“Fine.” She gathered up her red waves of hair and tamed it into submission with a hairband she’d had around her wrist. Then she slapped a pair of latex gloves against his chest and donned her own pair. “You can make yourself useful.”

He called a 24–7 locksmith, who showed up and replaced the lock, while Kel and Ivy dumped what had to be hundreds of dollars of food since they couldn’t be sure it was still safe to serve.