pinned him in his sights. “Then track this rental car down—it’s a place to start.” Shrugging, he swung his heels atop his desk and blew a stream of smoke at the ceiling. “At least we have in our favor the fact that she thinks her parents are in the States and doesn’t realize they’re being held at the farm.”
Joaquin opened his mouth to correct Munoz’s mistaken assumption, but then snapped it shut without revealing what he’d done. He didn’t plan to end up like the last hombre who had displeased the boss, staring with fixed, sightless eyes at this very ceiling while his blood pooled on the tiles beneath his body.
So he forced a smile. “Sí,” he agreed as strongly as he could. “At least she doesn’t know that.”
* * *
MAGS STARED AT the water dripping from the rental car’s radiator hose onto the potholed macadam and felt her frustration grow. When it came to most things mechanical, she was hopelessly unqualified. Still, needing to do something, she gave the nearest tire a hard kick.
And oh, crap. That hurt.
Determined not to let her travel companion see the result of her childish fit of temper she turned her head away so that even if he looked, which he didn’t show any actual sign of doing, he wouldn’t see the tears that rose in her eyes.
She blinked rapidly to help speed their retreat. But the tears kept mounting because she couldn’t ignore the fact that she and Finn Kavanagh were in the middle of nowhere. Admittedly, that wasn’t unusual in this country where most of the population centered around a handful of cities, but they were still who knew how many miles from even the smallest township. With a dead car.
“Worthless piece of crap,” she muttered.
“That’s not necessarily true.” Finn, squatting on the road in front of the car’s raised hood, quit pawing through his backpack to look up at her.
Strictly to disagree, of course. They’d only known each other a few hours and already she understood that they looked at darn few things through the same spectrum. Turning away, she hastily wiped away her stupid, stubborn tears.
“This car’s actually in better shape than she looks,” he said with an irritating good cheer that made her want to kick another tire. She turned back to see him once again digging through his bag. A second later, he made a satisfied noise deep in his throat and pulled out a roll of red tape. “This oughta fix her,” he said and surged easily to his feet.
“What? Really?” Her tears evaporating along with her foul mood, she stepped forward to see. Not that she had the first idea what was so magical about the tape that it could restore function to their rental—and probably wouldn’t even if it came with detailed instructions.
“Yep. Here, hold this.” He handed her the roll. “Put your fingers through the spool like so.” He touched his index fingertips together to demonstrate.
She did as directed and, standing this close, gained an unwelcome awareness of the clean scent of his skin. To keep herself from staring at the damp cotton that banded his biceps and stretched across his strong chest, she looked down at the roll slowly rotating around her finger bridge as he unspooled a length. It had some kind of plasticky substance that kept the layers from touching. “What is this stuff?”
“Silicone tape,” he said as he separated a good foot of it from the roll. “Best invention ever. It tolerates high temperatures and sticks to itself. That adhering part’s no small deal, because it eliminates the need for clamps.” He looked around and, with a jut of his jaw, indicated the knife he’d liberated from Joaquin. “Hand me that, will ya?”
Sliding one hand free of the roll, she reached for the knife and passed it to him. Finn sliced off the length he needed, then turned back and bent over the engine compartment. Mags leaned to watch over his shoulder as he peeled the plastic strip from the tape a few inches at a time, wrapped the revealed silicone tape around the damaged hose and repeated the process, meticulously overlapping each rotation around the tube.
To distract herself from the display of muscle that shifted beneath his skin with every flick of his wrists, she said, “You always bring an emergency roll of tape on your vacations?”
“If I’m going hiking, I do.” He gave her a dark-eyed glance over his shoulder. “Which was my intention, you might recall.”
It was difficult to forget, since guilt over the way she’d dragged him into her mess still made her squirm. But she’d said she was sorry umpteen times since they’d gotten away from Joaquin, so she bit back the fresh apology rising her throat. She had to keep reminding herself that she hadn’t deliberately drawn him in to her mess, that he’d actually inserted himself. Working to let go of her tendency to make it all her fault, she merely said, “Yes.” But she couldn’t resist giving his shoulder a commiserating little there-there pat.
It was unyielding but hot under the damp cloth beneath her fingers and she whipped her hand away. Because, really, it was one thing that she’d kissed the man when she believed she’d never see him again. But now that they were practically living in each other’s pocket, she’d be wise to keep her hands to herself. She cleared her throat and forced lightness into her voice when she said truthfully, if with a slightly sarcastic tone, “You’re a handy guy.”
“I am that, darlin’. There!” He straightened.
She was still hovering over him and his shoulder blades made contact with her boobs, flattening them against the wall of her chest. She took a hasty step back.
And almost fell on her butt when the molded rubber heel of her Tevas caught in a divot in the optimistically termed highway.
Long, work-roughened fingers closed around her upper arm to halt her backward momentum. “Easy there.” He pulled her upright and gave her a comprehensive once-over before he turned her loose.
“Thank you. But I could’ve—”
“Done it your own self,” he said sardonically before she could complete her sentence. “Yeah, yeah. Been there, heard that.”
She huffed out a put-upon sigh and rubbed a hand over her lips with enough vigor to shift them about as though they were made of Silly Putty. The feel of them beneath her fingers reminded her of what she could do to features with her tool kit of tricks. That in turn reminded her of what she was good at—and what she wasn’t. She dropped her hand to her side.
“Yeah,” she sighed. “I do like doing things myself.” A girl was much less likely to be disappointed if she didn’t allow herself to become dependent on others. “But, much as I hate to admit it, I would’ve fallen on my keister without your help. So thanks again.”
He looked down at her, his dark eyebrows drawing together. “Dammit, I wish you’d stop doing that.”
“What? What did I do wrong this time?”
“Acted reasonable.”
She felt her mouth drop open and snapped it shut. “And that’s a bad thing?”
“It is when it messes with my conviction that you’re a thoughtless, spoiled brat.”
“Excuse me?” Her hands hit her hips. “I’ll cop to being thoughtless at times. But I’m here to tell you I’ve never been spoiled in my life.”
