Cuff Me(31)

But it was a definite smile. As rare as it was beautiful.

She stood there for several seconds even after he’d shut his door, still feeling a little off balance.

Jill shook it off and went into her motel room. It was about what one would expect from a roadside motel in a town whose borders took all of five minutes to drive through.

The carpet was less than pristine. The bedspread was standard, ugly floral print. The pillows looked flat, the lighting horrible.

But it was clean—ish. No hairballs in the bathroom, no dead bugs on the nightstand. Jill abandoned the shower idea after remembering that she’d have no clean underwear to put on after.

Instead, she set her gun in the drawer of the nightstand, pulled off her boots and bulky sweater, and settled back on the bed in her white camisole and pants. She made herself as comfortable as possible against the two pathetic pillows and pulled out her cell phone.

And got Tom’s voice mail.

She settled for a text. Call me when you get a chance. Interesting day.

Jill started to set the phone aside, then paused, and wrote another message.

Love you.

She stared down at her screen for several moments, wondering if maybe he’d respond right away with a “love you too” as he usually did.

Nothing.

Jill shrugged. Tom was still in Florida, in the last phases of that deal before he’d shift his attention to Chicago. No doubt he was out schmoozing some businessmen and -women.

He wanted her to fly down next weekend. She hadn’t seen him since last week when he’d come up to meet the Morettis, and she tried not to let herself get freaked out by the fact that since he’d slipped a ring on her finger, they’d been apart more than they’d been together.

She should go down to Florida. There was no reason not to make the short trip. She wouldn’t have to miss work if she kept it short, and she could totally go for a dose of sunshine.

And it was important—vital—somehow, that she keep Tom fresh in her memory.

And her in his.

“You’re being ridiculous,” she muttered to herself, tapping her fingers against her mouth. “You’re marrying the man. It’s not like he’s going to forget you.”

Jill dropped her hand to her lap and stood staring at the wall, wondering if this is what people meant by prewedding jitters.

Granted their wedding was still several months away, and she didn’t have jitters so much as…

She didn’t know what. But it was something.

Not in the mood to deal with it, and blaming it on the fact that she was in a small, gross motel without any clean clothes in the middle of a snowstorm, she reached for the TV remote.

“Are you freaking kidding me?” she said ten seconds later.

Every single channel was doing the staticky thing.

She pushed all the standard “fix it” buttons on the remote. Nothing. Got up and fiddled with a few things on the TV set itself.

Still nothing.

A call to the front desk confirmed her worst nightmare.

“Our fix-it guy could normally be here in a half hour, but in this snow…”

“I can take another room,” Jill said. It’s not like she had any heavy luggage that had to be moved.

“Well… I think 219 is clean, and 201 is supposed to be…”

Jill pulled at her ponytail in irritation. “Never mind,” she muttered. “Do you guys have any books? You know, a shelf of books left behind?”

Maybe she could read. A nice mystery or romance would do just the trick…

“Books?” the receptionist said.

Jill closed her eyes. “Forget it. Thanks anyway.”

She hung up the phone and gently banged her head against the wall behind her. She could probably just go to bed early… get caught up on some sleep.

Jill glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It wasn’t even seven o’clock.

Standing, Jill pulled her sweater and boots back on, grabbed her gun and purse.

Ten seconds later she was knocking on Vincent’s door.

“I came to save you—” she started to say the second the door opened.

And then she broke off.

And stared.

And stared some more.

Vincent Moretti was shirtless.

Jill didn’t trust herself to speak.

Because the only word her dazed mind seemed to be able to come up with was mouthwatering.





CHAPTER THIRTEEN


He hadn’t meant to open the door without a shirt.

But taking in Jill’s stunned expression, he was glad that he had.

Call it payback for her raunchy sex comment at Elena’s party that had kept him up for more nights than he cared to admit.

Jill still hadn’t lifted her eyes from his torso, and he put his hand on the doorjamb, leaning just slightly.

When her eyes finally met his, he was wearing an all-out grin.

“Why are you… panting?” she asked.

Why are you? he wanted to ask back.

Instead he shrugged. “Doing some push-ups.”

“You do those every night?” she asked.

“And every morning.”

Actually, his twice-daily workouts were usually a good deal more than push-ups, but he was in a tiny-ass motel room. He did what he could.

“Huh.” Her eyes drifted lower again.