Page 100 of A Dead End Wedding

Emily's yard.

Then he disappeared behind Emily's house.

Crap. He's got the wrong house. I should have made sure he knew which one was mine.

So I'll just have to go help him out.

Just go walk down the street, possibly into the clutches of an axe-murderer with a kinky sex fetish, and help the big, bad Navy SEAL turned P.I.

Getting out of the car now.

Damn.

Okay. Getting out of the car now.

I stared at my hand, which didn't seem to remember how to unlock the car door, let open pull the handle to open it. Then I shook myself all over like a wet dog, to shake off my fears.

NOW I'll get out of the car.

Nothing.

It's a new pair of Ralph Lauren boots if you'll just suck it up and get out of the stinking car, I growled at my stubborn self.

Magically, the car door opened with my fingers attached to the handle.

Another non-believer touched by the power of quality footwear.

I climbed out of the car and headed toward my house, my feet hardly dragging at all. As I reached the sidewalk bordering Emily's yard, the shadows deepened. The sounds of the neighborhood at dusk magnified.

The butterflies in my stomach turned into vultures.

Somebody grabbed my arm, and I shrieked at the top of my honed-from-the-treadmill lungs.

"Will you hush?" Jake said. "What is wrong with you?"

I quit shrieking and punched him in the stomach. "What is wrong with me? What is wrong withyou, you . . . youmoron? You scared the crap out of me!"

He shoved his hands in his pockets and made a tsk, tsk sound. "Which is why I wanted you to stay in the car, remember? Bad guys? The thing I do for a living, not you?"

"Right, but you were going to the wrong house, genius," I said, smirking.

"No, I was circling behind Rick's house to approach yours undetected," he said, which ruined my whole smirking mood.

Then another thought occurred to me. "How do you know Rick? And how do you know where I live, anyway? Youarespying on me for Langley, Cowan, aren't you? And, um, what about my house?"

"What about your house?"

"Well, er, is there anybody there? Any intruder?"

He tilted his head and looked at me, narrowing his eyes. "Any reason I should tell you, after you questioned my intelligence and accused me of being a spy? Oh, there's also the part where you didn't want to make out with me in the car."

Nowaywas I going any further withthatconversation. I snatched my keys out of his hand and stomped up the sidewalk to my house. Damn alpha males, anyway. I'd been a fool to leave a nice, gentle man like Mike.

Who would have hid behind me while I searched the house.

Okay, so bravery wasn't his strong suit, especially after that incident with the mouse and the hip waders, but he wouldn't make every nerve in my body jump, jangle, and jitter.

"Argh! Again with the alliteration," I muttered.

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