Carrie Alexander - Sinfully Sweet

But she had covered for him. He wondered why.

Not because of the kiss. It had been even more fierce than he’d intended. Once he’d felt her mouth under his, sensation had taken over. Yes, his intentions had been manipulative and crude. But the emotion that had resulted was unexpected.

Blame it on auld lang syne. High-school reunion. Lost youth. A handy excuse, said the distant, stubborn, ethical part of him that refused to die.

“So then why don’t you call the cops,” he said, getting an idea.

Her head jerked up. “What?”

“Tell them there are two suspicious men prowling the area. You don’t have to leave your name.”

“But…” She blinked a couple of times, scowling deeply as the various scenarios hit home. He could tell when she figured it out. She inhaled with amazement, her mouth dropping open. “Those men aren’t the police.”

He ticked a finger at her.

“Who are they?”

Sloss and Bonny were in charge of a ring of thieves and petty criminals who fenced their goods at Cheney’s pawnshops. Devlin was supposedly one of their minions. For now Mackenzie would have to believe that.

“You don’t want to know.” He cut her off when she started to protest. “Trust me, the less I tell you, the better.”

“God, Devlin. What are you involved in?”

He shifted, becoming more and more aware of that uneasy, niggling voice inside him. Enough common decency was buried somewhere in there that he knew he shouldn’t be using Mackenzie this way. His being in her neighborhood wasn’t as complete a coincidence as he wanted her to believe. Ever since he’d seen the reunion invitation and class roster a month ago, he’d been thinking about her. Curiosity, he’d told himself, and nothing more. No way was he planning to come near her—that was too dangerous for both of them.

Yet here he was.

The irony was not delicious.

“I know, I know,” she said. “If you tell me, you have to kill me.” She laughed with a hollow sarcasm.

“That’s not even funny.”

Her face fell. She nipped at her bottom lip, then winced when that hurt. “Why do you want me to call the cops? I would think you wouldn’t want them anywhere near here.”

“They’ll do at least a drive-by and Sloss—” He tilted his head toward the street. “Those two will leave. Then I can leave.” He paused. “That’s what you want, right?”

“Yes, of course. But I don’t want you to get killed, either.”

“I’ll go out the back.”

“There’s not much cover back there. What if they’re waiting for you?”

Devlin had thought of that. Sloss was a bulldog—slow, thorough and unrelenting. He’d nose into every building and sniff out every avenue of escape before he was satisfied that Devlin had given them the slip. Even police intervention wouldn’t keep Sloss out of the way for long.

“Are you arguing for me to stay?”

Mackenzie looped the blanket over her shoulders, shawl-style. Her hair had dried into spikes and her nylons bagged at her knees and ankles. She looked like a punk grandma. “I guess you can sleep on the couch.”

“Thanks.” He let out a soft groan as he settled back. His ribs ached fiercely from Bonaventure’s vicious kicks. Judging by the stickiness where his shirt was plastered to his skin, the nasty thug had managed to draw blood, as well. After Bonny had caught Devlin supposedly stealing from the latest haul, he’d called in Sloss and they’d taken him to a waterfront warehouse and alternated between questioning and beating him. He hadn’t given up a single incriminating detail. After three months on this job, there was no way in hell he’d be made by two small-time crooks.

Mackenzie sat forward, rocking nervously. “Okay. I’ll make the call, if you think that will scare them off. But first you have to tell me the truth. How did you land on my doorstep? Were you waiting for me to come home?”

“No. This isn’t a social call, Mackenzie. I swear I wouldn’t be here if those two thugs hadn’t been breathing down my neck. I never meant to endanger you.”

“Yet you were ‘in the neighborhood.’ You knew my address.”

“I explained that. It was coincidence.” A slight exaggeration. He’d thought he’d lost Sloss and Bonny the first time, after he’d worked free of the ropes and slipped out of the warehouse while they argued over what to do with him. Getting out of their neighborhood had seemed like a good idea—until he realized that he had no money, no weapon, no ID and nowhere to go. It wasn’t as though he could walk into a pawn shop and cash out the ruby he’d managed to squirrel away.

He’d headed for Broadway, where there would be plenty of people around for safety. Because Mackenzie had been on his mind—he had to think of something pleasant and real to keep himself from crossing the line into the dark side—he’d thought of crashing with her as a last resort, but only if it had been a one-hundred-percent safe situation. By a twist of perverse luck, Sloss and Bonny had spotted him on Broadway, heading this way. Desperation had brought him running to Mackenzie’s door, minutes ahead of the pair of henchmen.

Devlin would have rather kept on going, but when he saw her on the street and knew she’d recognize him there was no other option.

If lady luck was shining on him, Sloss and Bonny had believed her when she’d spoken to them at the door and wouldn’t be back.

If not…Mackenzie would need watching. Now that he’d dragged her into this, he’d have to protect her. A complication he didn’t need, even though she sure was a sight for sore eyes. And a deadened heart.

She grimaced, still not trusting him. “You should have come to the reunion instead, and spared yourself the…whatever it is you’re up to.”

“I’m not one of our old high school’s shining success stories.”

“Yeah, well, maybe you should reconsider your career path, huh?”

He wasn’t going to follow that line of discussion. “Make the call, Mackenzie. Then we can get some sleep.”

She stood and moved silently through the living room on unshod feet, picking up a cordless phone from the desk beneath the window. Despite her disheveled state, she was even prettier than he’d remembered. In school, she’d been plump and quiet, something of a wallflower who’d been overshadowed by her active, outgoing sister. The past ten years had been good to her. The baby-fat face had gained more definition, and the womanly figure now suited her. Suited him, too. The feel of her breasts pushing against his chest had been quite the distraction.

Thoughtfully, she touched the phone to her chin as she walked back across the room. “Let me get this straight. You memorized my address from the sheet sent out with the invitation to the reunion. Then you just happened to be on this particular street, needing a hideout…at the very moment that I was coming home from our tenth high-school reunion. And then, instead of saying hello and introducing yourself properly, you attacked me and pushed me inside because you were in a—” she made quotation marks in the air “—hurry.” She plopped down beside him on the couch. “Have I got it right?”

“More or less.”

She shook her head as she dialed. “Just so you don’t think I’m swallowing that baloney.”

He grabbed the phone and hit the hang-up button. “Don’t use 9-1-1. They can trace your call.” He punched in a number. “Here, I dialed the precinct direct. But be brief and hang up fast.”

She hesitated before taking a breath and speaking in the querulous high-pitched voice of an old lady. “I want to report suspicious activity. West 17th in Chelsea, between Sixth and Seventh. Two men. They’re busting into apartment buildings.” She cut the connection. “How was that?”