teased the low-riding waist of her rumpled tan cargo pants. Thick-soled sneakers finished the outfit. She looked… “How old are you?”
“Legal and then some in every state.” She leaned across him, snagged the passenger seat belt and pulled it across his lap. While she fumbled with the latch, he slumped into the seat, enjoying her closeness and the warm scent of vanilla that clung to her skin.
Memory surfaced just as she settled back into her seat and latched her own seat belt. “Aw, hell.” He tried to raise his left arm. The handcuff had him manacled to the frame of the car seat, next to the seat belt buckle. “It’s you.”
Elf turned the key in the ignition and the engine purred to life. “Perfect timing.” She pulled away from the curb.
“That’s a matter of opinion.”
She shrugged as she turned onto a busy one-way street. “I needed to get you out of there with a minimum of fuss. Your hungover cotton-brain zoned in on the clues it had to work with and produced the desired results. You’re here and we’re on our way.”
“This is kidnapping, you know.”
She pulled a pair of sunglasses off the dashboard and slipped them on, hiding behind them.
“False imprisonment.” He took another poke at her, testing her level of discomfort.
She turned left onto another busy street. Lyndale, he realized, as they drove past the coffee shop and tattoo parlor. They were headed towards downtown. Maybe she was going to take him to the county jail after all.
“I’m a bail bond enforcer.” She enunciated each word. “I’ve taken you into custody, not kidnapped you.” That she didn’t like the situation came through loud and clear.
She eased up on the gas as they neared an intersection with a red light. The signal changed to green and she sped up again.
“Except, I’ve never jumped bail, and you said your client was a private party. That doesn’t work so well, does it?”
Traffic slowed in front of them. He spotted a police car parked on the cross street and, for a split second, considered trying to signal for help or trying to overpower her. But he wanted to find out who her client was more than he wanted to escape. At the moment, anyway.
She changed lanes to bypass the backup of cars turning into and out of the Wedge Co-op parking lot, then shifted back into the right lane in time to squeak through a yellow light. They hit the on-ramp to Highway 94, heading east.
“Where are you taking me?”
“I told you earlier, before we left.”
“Yeah, well, the last few hours are pretty hazy, thanks to the drug-induced stupor I seem to be in. Why don’t you refresh my memory?”
A gap in traffic opened and she changed to the exit lane for Highway 35W north. “My employer didn’t expect me to catch up with you quite so quick.”
“Gee, I’m sorry I was such an easy mark. If I’d known I was being hunted, maybe I could have made it more of a challenge for you.”
She ignored his sarcasm. “He’s not ready to meet with you and asked me to take you out of town for a few days, until he has some other details in order.”
“If all he wanted was a meeting, why the kidnapping?”
She clenched her jaw. “This isn’t a kidnapping.”
“You couldn’t tell by me.” He rattled the handcuff. “From where I’m sitting, it sure feels like one.”
She glanced at him but didn’t respond.
“Come on, Elf. Give me a good reason, just one, why I don’t turn you in for what has got to be a major ethical breach.”
This time she glared at him. “Elf?”
That got a rise out of her. He smiled. “It seemed to fit when you were crouched next to the bed. I’ll admit, you’re a bit tall for an elf, but you’re still plenty shorter than I am.”
“There is nothing elfish about me.”
“I don’t know. You’ve got the pixie haircut, a pointy chin, big eyes. The bleach job and nose ring aren’t quite in keeping with the concept, but I’m a tolerant guy and can allow a little creative license in the interpretation.”
She snorted—a decidedly unelfish expression.
“Maybe,” Frank continued, “if I knew your name, I wouldn’t have to make one up for you.”
“Angel.” The road split, and she shifted lanes again, staying with the northbound traffic.
“Angel. No, I don’t think so.” Frank looked her over. “What happened to your long, brown hair? And your gray eyes?”
“They served their purpose. As did the auburn curls, the black pageboy, the brown eyes, the green eyes.”
A soft whistle escaped his lips. He leaned toward her and studied her features in profile. Satisfied, he nodded and settled back against the seat. “You’ve been following me for a few days, haven’t you?”
“Almost a full week, actually.” She flicked a glance in his direction. “You lead a particularly uneventful and rather predictable existence.”
“Like I said, if I’d known I was being hunted, I could have made it a little more interesting.” A week. And he hadn’t spotted her. Even if he wasn’t expecting a tail, he should have spotted someone following him for that long.
He ran through a quick mental log of his activities over the past seven days. Her mastery of disguises was very impressive, and he needed to find out if she might have stumbled onto anything that would jeopardize his investigation. He didn’t think so, but he’d have to be sure.
The city landscape dwindled and changed. Elf/Angel settled a little deeper into her seat and accelerated. The speedometer crept higher, leaving sixty behind and pushing seventy. He waited for the car to protest the speed with various vibrations and rattles. Instead, the engine purred like a very contented cat.
“You still haven’t told me where you’re taking me.”
“It’s Friday afternoon. We’re going where all the good Minnesotans go on a summer weekend.”
“I’m not from around here. Enlighten me.”
“On the weekend, everyone goes up north to the cabin on the lake. We’re going up north.”
“That I can see. Where up north?”
“To the lake.”
“The lake. According to your license plate, there’s more than one.”
“True. But the only one that counts is the one we’re going to.”
“And that would be…?”
“The one where the cabin is.” She smiled
