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Right now.
He rounded the front end of the car and stepped into the bath of light cast by the Mustang’s beams. The night was closing in, the sky dark aside from a line of illumination throwing the jagged mountains into relief, the air dry and still warm, the sound of his footsteps muffled by the layer of dust. And there she was. Didi Storm in all her glory. He stared at the woman he’d so lusted after. Damn, but she was still beautiful. Sauntering toward him, taking her time, wearing outrageous heels and a short, short skirt, she was still sexy as hell, and she knew it. Lips shimmering in a knowing smile, she hauled two baby carriers toward him.
Two?
What was this?
A back-up car seat? Or . . . ?
Holy Christ.
Could there really be two infants?
Twins?
His stomach clenched.
Were they his? Hers?
She’d sent the DNA profile. One. Not two. A son.
But right now, there were definitely two babies; he heard them both crying. Stereo. Good Lord.
What kind of nutcase was she, deep down? Bargaining with her own child . . . or possibly children? He stopped walking in front of his car. Let her come to him.
This could all be a show. Remember who you’re dealing with.
“Brandon,” she said in that breathy Marilyn Monroe voice that he’d once found sexy. Now it sounded fake. Anxious. Well, good. “Oh, wait. That’s not right, is it? You weren’t Brandon at all,” she said. “That was just your alias, the one you used when you tried to pick up innocent girls.”
He set his jaw, felt the Glock pressing into this back, and noticed the tension in the air. The desert at night. Where some people came to find inner peace under a vast star-flung sky.
“You weren’t exactly innocent,” he reminded her. “You set me up.”
“Tit for tat, I guess.”
“What is this, Didi?” he asked as she neared. He motioned from one of her hands to the other. “Two kids?”
“Mmm. Yeah. Turned out that way.” Her cat-who-swallowed-the-canary smile made him want to strangle her. “Guess I forgot to mention that. Twins. A girl and a boy.”
“You’re kidding.” But he could tell she was dead serious.
Shaking her head, she kept her gaze locked with his. “Two babies, and they’re both yours.”
“How would I know that?”
“DNA doesn’t lie.” She was so damned sure of herself. So smug. He wanted to strangle her.
“You could have mentioned it.”
“And ruin the surprise?” She chuckled softly, but it was a nervous laugh, and for the first time, he sensed a deeper disturbance in the night. Something more was going on here, he could feel it, smell it
in the dust of the desert, hear it in whispering thump of bats’ wings overhead. The warning hairs on the back of his neck stood erect, and it was all he could do not to reach for the pistol pressing into his back.
Didi’s gaze slid to the briefcase clutched in his hand.
Of course.
“It’s here,” he said and stopped short. To prove his good intentions, he slid the locks, and the case opened. Stacks of tens and twenties were strapped into each side. “Two hundred and fifty grand.”
