Forged in Desire (The Protectors #1)(32)

Striker couldn’t repress the smile that touched his lips. “We were. Ray Jennings was a good man. He treated Mom like a queen and provided for his family. Unfortunately, he was taken away from us too soon.”

“How?”

“Car accident. He left for work that morning at the water plant and never came home.”

“How old were you?”

“I was fourteen and Wade was nine. We took his death hard. Like I said, he was a good man.”

Deciding he’d told her more than she needed to know, he checked his watch. It was one in the afternoon. He wasn’t looking forward to returning to her place any more than she was. Although he would never admit it to her, he was enjoying this time sitting in the car and talking to her...although he did have an ulterior motive for doing so. He couldn’t help noticing that away from her house she seemed more relaxed and at ease. However, it was up to him to make sure neither of them let their guard down, even if the authorities thought it was a closed case.

Still, they could risk a little more time out here. He eased back the seat to give his legs more room. He had backed the car in to get a clear view of what was happening in front of him. The lunch crowd was still coming, even more than before.

He glanced over at Margo. She was finished with her milk shake. He was glad of that since he wasn’t sure how much longer he could have sat there watching her mouth on that damn straw, wishing it was his lips. His mind was filled with all kinds of naughty thoughts. Thoughts he was better off not having. So he decided to go ahead with his questions.

“So, Margo, you’ve managed—and quite nicely, I might add—to once again dig into my business, so it seems fitting for me to dig into yours. Fair play and all that.”

She looked at him warily as she shifted in her seat as if to get comfortable as well. “Depends on what you want to know.”

He would start with what was really burning inside of him. Namely, her relationship with Scott Dylan. Why he was so curious about it he wasn’t sure, but he would admit inwardly to envying any man who’d been privy to her smiles. Her kisses. Her bed.

“I want to know about you and Scott Dylan. What happened? After almost a year together, why did the two of you break up?”





CHAPTER TWELVE

MARGO STARED AT STRIKER. What gave him the right to think he could ask her anything? But then, hadn’t she been doing that for the last fifteen minutes? Drilling him for things she’d wanted to know about him. She would be the first to admit that she probably knew more about him than he knew about her. Although he hadn’t wanted to, he had shared a lot with her, and she had a feeling there was more he wasn’t sharing. But why did he want to know about Scott?

“Ask me about something else, Striker.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want to talk about Scott.”

“Why not?”

When she didn’t say anything, he added, “Okay, I get it.”

She lifted a brow. “You get what?”

“The reason why you don’t want to talk about Scott. The breakup was painful for you.”

Did he really think that or was he just fishing? Should she let him believe what he liked or should she straighten him out on the matter? She preferred the second option to straighten him out. “Trust me. My breakup with Scott didn’t cause me any pain.”

“So why did the two of you break up? You’re not the kind of woman a man would easily give up.”

Was that meant to be a compliment? If so, it caught her off guard. Trying not to appear overly pleased by his assessment, she asked, “And why do you think that?”

He took another sip of his iced tea before responding with his own question. “Have you taken a good look at yourself in the mirror lately?”

“I do every day after I get dressed.”

“Well, you evidently don’t see what most men would. And don’t ask me to expound because that will take us away from our topic of conversation. So why did you and Scott break up?”

Should she answer his question? Doing so would keep the conversation going and therefore prolong their outing. It was a beautiful day, the first week in February, and she’d desperately needed to escape the confines of her home, especially with him in it. She was convinced that being around him in such close quarters was damaging her brain cells. More than once, while sitting across from him sharing a meal, she’d ached for a repeat performance of what had gotten started in her kitchen. That kiss they’d shared had been everything she’d imagined and more. And it had given her a pretty good idea of just how skillful he was when locking lips with a woman. And his taste... The sampling had been too short but oh so sweet.

It didn’t take much to recall the heat that had surrounded them, remember how just touching his hand had brought out combustible energy of the most erotic kind. Granted, the confines of this car were still generating heat, but it wasn’t like it was back at her house. Here they had people around and a lot of traffic driving by.

“Margo?”

Had she been sitting there all this time just staring at his mouth? “Yes?”

“Why did you and Dylan call it quits after a year? Tell me.”

Margo swallowed deeply. She heard a gentle plea, rather than a direct order, and that did something to her. This wasn’t the first time she wondered how someone could be so dominantly aggressive one minute and then filled with such tenderness the next. How could Striker Jennings have such an unsettling effect on her at times? Was she letting her guard down because the police thought they had their man? Although she considered the risk to her to be at a decreased level, she was well aware that Striker was viewing it just as elevated as before.