style="font-size:15px;"> “It’s not the clothes,” he said. “Some women just radiate flash.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Oh, so now I’m ‘some women?’”
“Ah. I suppose you’re used to being singled out. Put on a pedestal. Worshipped. Is that it?”
She shrugged and tossed him her sauciest grin. “What can I say? Slavelike worship has always worked for me.”
“Well, if it’s any consolation, you’re definitely not run-of-the-mill.”
“Oh gee, my heart is all aflutter, Sheriff.”
Now he grinned. “I do my best.”
“So, if I’m nothing special, why are you standing on the street in downtown Canyon with a sweater hiding your smiley faces, stalling me from leaving?”
He took another small step forward. There was still plenty of space between them. To anyone passing by, it would look like a simple conversation between two adults. But she knew better. The air between them all but crackled. “Do you want me to keep you from leaving?”
“Maybe I just want you to admit that I’m special.”
He smiled. “Surely you’ve heard that enough times, from enough men, to believe it by now. Why would hearing it from me make any difference?”
She’d just been playing with him, not serious at all, but his question made her pause. It shouldn’t make any difference, anything he said to her. She didn’t even know him. But she did know what he wasn’t. He wasn’t a player. He wasn’t part of the machine, part of the hype, part of the world that never said anything, did anything, for anyone, without there being some angle, some hidden agenda. So, in that respect, it did make a difference hearing it from him.
A shame she’d just been teasing him. He didn’t know her, couldn’t possibly make an informed judgment on anything about her. “You’re right,” she said, feeling vaguely depressed by the admission, ridiculous as that was. “I guess it wouldn’t.”
He cocked his head. “Why are you in Canyon Springs, anyway?”
“I’m on my way home from a wedding.”
“Albuquerque? Santa Fe?”
She shook her head. “Wyoming.”
He laughed. “Sort of a circuitous route you’re taking back to California, isn’t it? Either that or you’re really lost.”
“You can’t get lost when you don’t have an itinerary.”
“I guess that’s one way of looking at it. But you do have a destination. Which is west of here, you know. West and a state or so away.”
“I’m aware of that. I don’t have to be back anytime soon.”
“No new job waiting?”
She shook her head. “I’m on an extended…sabbatical.”
“Must have been successful in your old job, to take an open-ended leave like that.”
“Yeah, well, success isn’t measured only in money,” she said, then smiled. “But it does make sabbatical-taking a whole lot easier.”
“Sort of like running away from home, but with an expense account, huh?”
“Is there any other way to run?” He really was an intriguing guy, she thought. Intuitive. Sexy as hell, good sense of humor, but with something a little dark and edgy on the fringes. Probably the part of Vegas he still carried inside him. A shiver of awareness raced over her skin as she wondered what he might have been like if she’d crossed paths with him when that darkness was still fresh. Visions of those authority-figure fantasies popped into her head again, complete with handcuffs, leather belts and—
And that was quite enough of that. She clasped her hands, surprised to find her palms a bit damp. “I guess I’ll be on my way, then.”
“I guess you will.”
Neither of them moved.
“Head west, go past one state and hang a right, huh?” she said, after the silence stretched until her thighs got twitchy again.
“Or you could keep heading south. Since you’re in no hurry.”
“True. I’m not sure I’m done running away yet. I’m sort of enjoying my little adventure.” Or I am now, she thought.
His eyes suddenly narrowed and his entire body language shifted even though he didn’t move a muscle. “You aren’t running from something, are you? Someone?”
Liza felt the hairs all over her body lift at that sudden shift in intensity, all focused so deliciously on her. “Just the old me.” She smiled when he only fractionally relaxed. “Although she does seem to be dogging my steps today.”
“Meaning?”
“Old habits die hard.”
He thought about that for a moment. “Rescuing men is a bad habit of yours?”
She laughed. “You could say that. Be thankful, though. My price used to be pretty steep.”
“Hey, I tried to buy you lunch.”
“No, you tried to buy your way out of lunch. There’s a difference.”
“You didn’t honestly expect me to go in there dressed like this?”
“Half the town has probably driven past by now and seen you dressed like that. And, frankly, you don’t strike me as the sort whose masculinity is threatened all that easily.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment. And typically, you’d be right. Anywhere except here. Hometowns have a way of making you feel you have to prove you’re a grownup.”
“And not the roughneck rascal you used to be?”
He laughed. “How’d you guess?”
She could tell him her body knew a bad boy when it was around one, but he was so many things she’d never been around, it wouldn’t have been entirely true. “So, why come back?”
“I was done being gone.”
“Interesting answer. Surely there are other places besides Vegas and your hometown that needed a sheriff.”
“I’m sure there are. I guess I needed to be someplace where I mattered on more than just a professional level. Good or bad, and there’s some of both, Canyon Springs is that place for me.”
Liza smiled. “So, is this a good day or a bad one?”
“Maybe a little of both.”
“Ouch.”
“Well, you did wreak a bit of havoc that I’m going to have to clean up.”
“Guilty
