telling the truth this time.
***
When the explosion ricocheted around the warehouse, Nate instinctively lunged toward Ali while simultaneously reaching for the Para Ordinance CCW .45 he kept concealed in the waistband of his shorts. Luckily, before he could take her to the ground and cover her with his body, he realized what’d happened—namely, Rebecca “The Rebel” Reichert doing what she did best. Making an unholy ruckus.
He managed, just barely, to halt his flying lunge.
It was a good thing, because Peanut was now stuck to Ali’s head like some weird feline version of the Daniel Boon raccoon hat.
“Oh my God, get him off me,” she whispered as a trickle of blood oozed from her left temple where Peanut secured himself to his precarious perch with one sharp claw.
The sight of that crimson drop sliding down her pale, flawless cheek made Nate want to kill someone. At the moment, he figured he’d start with Peanut and work his way over to Becky and then up to Boss, who wasn’t helping to calm the stupid cat by yelling at Becky.
Go figure. The guy was always yelling at Becky.
Man, the list of friends he was ready to murder was mounting at an astonishing rate since Ali minced her sweet ass into the shop. Just before the uproar, he’d been ready to cap Ozzie for his unnecessary interest in her lingerie.
“Be still,” he whispered as he reached for the cat. The animal was foolish enough to lay back his ears and hiss a warning.
“Um, yes,” she said as she tightened her hold on the rail. “Being still is certainly the plan since movement might cause one of two outcomes. One, it’ll unset the hefty Peanut here and break my neck. Or two, it’ll result in a scalping. And though I’ve been thinking for a while now about cutting my hair, I’m seriously considering keeping the roots.”
“Be quiet, too,” he instructed as he made another attempt to reach for Peanut. It was impossible to concentrate when he was this close to her, especially with her jabbering in that adorable way she had.
He spared a glance at her distressed face and knew it to be a mistake instantly.
He was momentarily arrested because…man, six feet away she was pretty.
Up close like this? Total gut-shot.
Of course, having just seen all of her unmentionables didn’t help matters. Unmentionables?
Whoever came up with that ridiculous term? Underwear that fantastic deserved to be mentioned on a regular basis.
Shit, he wasn’t going to think about her underwear. Which, of course, only made him wonder what color she had on under those tight, distressed jeans and that thin T-shirt. Pink? Her shirt was pink. Women often matched their underwear to their outfits. At least that’d been his experience. So…probably pink.
Holy shit! He was not going to think about her underwear!
“Being quiet might be too tall an order.” She nervously licked her lips and he couldn’t help but eye the movement. “Y-you see, when I’m nervous or in pain I tend to talk. It helps me not dwell on the fact that I’m…well, n-nervous or in pain. Like right now? I’m both. So it’s best if I just keep talking. So I’m gonna keep talking, okay?”
He watched her slightly frantic eyes swing toward the table where it looked like a panty-bomb had gone off. Ozzie was standing wide-eyed with a bra in one hand and his pocket knife in the other. “I take it there actually was something in my clothes. Either that or Ethan, er, Ozzie has an aversion to purple satin.”
“Yeah,” he told her as he gently reached toward Peanut, determined not to think about pink silk or purple satin. “You’re bugged. Devices in all your underwear.”
“My underwear? My gosh, that’s so sick—”
“No, not sick,” he interrupted and managed to snake an arm around Peanut’s substantial middle. “It’s smart. You always wear underwear, therefore, you’re always bugged. Whoever tagged you knew what they were doin’, not to mention they were able to get their hands
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