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“What?’’
“I refuse to sleep with you just so you’ll let me come along with you!” Appalled, she snapped her mouth shut. What had she done?
His eyes twinkled. “Shucks.”
She wanted to die. How could she have embarrassed herself like this? She swallowed hard. “Forgive me if I’ve leaped to an incorrect conclusion. I know I’m a homely woman, and I’m certain you wouldn’t be sexually interested in me anyway.” Her face grew redder as she realized she was making things worse instead of better. “Not that I would be interested, either,” she added hastily.
“Now, Gracie, there’s no such thing as a homely woman.”
; “You’re being polite, and I appreciate it, but that doesn’t alter facts.”
“See, now you’ve piqued my curiosity. You may be right about being homely and everything, but it’s kind of hard to tell with the way you cover yourself up. For all I know, the body of a goddess might be hiding underneath that dress.”
“Oh, no,” she said with brutal honesty. “I assure you, my body is quite ordinary.”
Once again the corner of his mouth kicked up. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but I trust my judgment a little more than I trust yours. I’m sort of a connoisseur.”
“I noticed.”
“I believe I already commented on your legs last night.” She flushed and struggled for an appropriate response, but she had so little experience conversing on a personal level with virile males that she found it difficult to know exactly what to say. “You have very nice legs yourself.”
“Why, thank you.”
“And a pleasant torso, also.”
He gave a crack of laughter. “Damn, Miz Gracie, I’m going to keep you around today just for the entertainment value.”
“You are?”
He shrugged. “Why not? I’ve been acting crazy ever since my retirement.”
She could hardly believe he’d changed his mind. She heard him chuckle as he retrieved her suitcase and asked Bruno to return her rental car. His amusement had faded, however, by the time he’d once again settled behind the steering wheel, and he gave her a stern gaze.
“I’m not taking you all the way to Texas, so get that out of your mind right now. I like to travel alone.”
“I understand.”
“A couple of hours. Maybe as far as the state line. The minute you start to aggravate me, I’m dropping you off at the nearest airport.”
“I’m sure that won’t be necessary.”
“Don’t bet on it.”
3
Bobby Tom drove the freeways of the Windy City as if he owned them. He was king of the town, mayor of the world, top cat of the universe. As the radio blasted out Aerosmith, he drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, keeping time to “Janie’s Got a Gun.”
In his red Thunderbird convertible and pearl gray Stetson, he was highly conspicuous. To Gracie’s amazement, drivers began pulling alongside the car, their horns blowing, windows lowered to call out to him. He waved and drove on.
She could feel her skin flush from the hot wind and the sheer delight of speeding down a big-city freeway in a vintage red Thunderbird with a man who wasn’t respectable. Strands of hair escaped from her lumpy french twist and whipped her cheeks. She wished she had a hot pink designer scarf to wrap around her head, a pair of trendy sunglasses to slip on her nose, a tube of scarlet lipstick to slide over her lips. She wanted big, full breasts, a tight dress, a sexy pair of high heels. She wanted a gold ankle bracelet.
And, perhaps, a very discreet heart-shaped tattoo.
She played with this enticing vision of herself as a wild woman while Bobby Tom placed and received calls on the car phone she’d noticed earlier. Sometimes he used the phone’s speaker feature; other times he held the receiver to his ear and spoke privately. His outgoing calls seemed to involve various business deals and their tax effects, as well as charity functions he was involved in. Most of his incoming calls, she was interested to note, seemed to come from acquaintances hitting him up for money. Although he conducted these calls with the phone to his ear, she received the distinct impression that, in every case, he ended up offering more money than had been requested. After less than an hour in his presence, she’d already figured out that Bobby Tom Denton was an easy mark.
As they reached the outskirts of the city, he placed a call to someone named Gail and spoke to her in that lazy drawl that sent shivers up Gracie’s all-too-receptive spine.
