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“Those dark eyes … Wow.” Luna fanned herself with her hand. “Plus he has a really nice set of shoulders, in case you haven’t noticed.”
Jaine refrained from saying that she had noticed everything about Sam. They didn’t need to know about the kitchen-window episode. Funny, she thought, she had regaled them almost every day with tales about her fractious encounters with him when she still thought he was a drunken jerk, but once things started getting more personal between them, she had stopped talking about him.
“He’s hot for you, too,” T.J. added. “That man wants to jump your bones. Take my word for it.”
“Maybe,” Jaine said vaguely She didn’t want to discuss how badly her bones wanted to be jumped by him, or how close they had already been to making love.
“You don’t have to be psychic to know that,” Luna told T.J., her tone wry. “He came right out and said so.”
T.J. laughed. “So he did. He isn’t shy, is he?”
No, shy was one thing Sam Donovan definitely wasn’t. Brash, cocky, arrogant, smart, sexy, sweet—those words described him down to his bones. She doubted he had a single shy gene in his body, thank God.
T.J.’s cell phone rang. “It’s probably Galan,” she said, sighing as she fished it out of her purse. She flipped it open and punched the receive button. “Hello?”
Jaine watched as her face turned red. “How did you get this number?” she snapped, and punched the off button. “Bastard,” she muttered as she returned the phone to her purse.
“I take it that wasn’t Galan,” Jaine said.
“It was that creep.” T.J.’s voice quivered with anger. “I’d like to know how he got my cell number, because I don’t give it out a lot.”
“Is there an information for cell numbers, maybe?” Luna asked.
“The account’s in Galan’s name, not mine, so how would he know I’m the one who carries the phone?”
“What did he say?” asked Jaine.
“The usual ‘Which one are you?’ crap. Then he said, ‘Marci.’ Just her name. Damn him, that’s a sick thing to do.”
Jaine put down her slice of pizza. She was suddenly cold all over, the fine hairs at the nape of her neck standing up. My God, what if those phone calls had something to do with Marci’s murder? Maybe it was a stretch, but maybe it wasn’t. Maybe it was some weirdo who really, really hated them because of the List, and now he was coming after them one by one—
She was hyperventilating. T.J. and Luna were both staring at her. “What’s wrong?” Luna asked in alarm.
“I just had the most horrible thought,” Jaine whispered. “What if he’s the one who killed Marci? What if he’s after us all?”
Twin expressions of pure shock crossed their faces. “No way,” Luna said in instant rejection.
“Why not?”
“Because! That’s so crazy. Things like that don’t happen. Well, maybe to celebrities, but not to normal people.”
“Marci was murdered,” Jaine said, still unable to get much volume to her voice. “Was that normal?” She shivered. “The phone calls at home I didn’t think much about, but you’re right, T.J., how did he get your cell phone number? I’m sure there are ways, but most people wouldn’t know how. Are we being stalked?”
Both of them stared at her again.
“Now I’ m scared,” Luna said after a moment. “You live alone, I live alone, Galan doesn’t get home until almost midnight, and Marci was alone.”
“But how would he know that? I mean, Brick was living with her until just the day before,” T.J. protested.
Her intuition gave Jaine another kick in the gut. She thought she was going to be ill. “It was in the newspaper—’no sign of forced entry.’ I heard Sam talking on the phone. They thought it
was Brick because he was her boyfriend and he had a key, but it wasn’t Brick, so they think it was someone else Marci knew. She let him in and he killed her.” She swallowed. “It’s someone we all know.”
“Oh, my God.” Luna clapped both hands over her mouth, her eyes wide with horror.
T.J. dropped her slice of pizza. She looked sick, too, and suddenly afraid. She tried for a shaky laugh. “We’re scaring ourselves, like little kids telling ghost stories around a campfire.”
“Good. If we’re scared, we’ll be more careful. I’m going to call Sam as soon as I get back to the office—”
