Playing Dead in Dixie (10 page)

His expression said no.  She sighed.

After a moment's silence, he asked, "Is whatever you're running from going to hurt my aunt and uncle or anybody else in this town?"

It was a question she'd been asking herself since she arrived in Bangor.  Was she putting the Stricklands in danger just by being there?  She wasn't sure.  Leaving her purse and I.D. behind should have put both the FBI and Dominick Manning off her trail.  But how long would they be satisfied if her body never showed up?

Already Floyd knew her real identity.  He'd probably tell Bonnie, since she was part owner of the store.  Carly had set things up with Floyd so that he wrote her checks instead of Sherry, who handled payroll for everybody else, but she didn't trust Sherry not to snoop around just out of nosiness.  She was definitely the type.

How much longer could she safely stay in Bangor, really?

"I'm not here to stay," she said finally.  "And I promise, I would never do anything to hurt Floyd or Bonnie.  I'd leave town before I let that happen."

Her answer didn't seem to ease the anxiety she saw in his eyes.  "I'm going to do everything I can to find out the truth about you, Carly.  You realize that, don't you?"

She nodded slowly, her stomach coiling into a hot knot.  She should have left town that first night, while she had the chance.  Now, that chance had passed her by.  She owed things to the Stricklands.  Money to Shannon for the clothes she was making.  Obligations tied her to Bangor, to these people.

She felt an invisible noose tightening around her neck.  "I should go.  Tonight."

"Where would you go?"

She pressed her fingers against the hollow of her throat, as if she could loosen the bands of tension starting to strangle her.  "There's always another place, isn't there?  New town, new faces.  I told you, I don't usually have trouble finding a job."

"I could help you."

She looked up at him, taken aback. "You could help me find a job somewhere else?"

"I could help you with whatever you're running from.  Whoever you're running from."  He looked surprised, as if he hadn't meant to make the offer.

Whether he had or he hadn't, the kindness in his voice was enough to bring her to the brink of tears.

She closed her eyes, forcing herself to breathe deeply, in and out, filling her lungs with the fragrant night air.  Slowly, the constriction in her throat eased, the sting behind her eyes faded and her heart settled to a light thud in her breast.

She could handle her obligations.  Fulfill another week or two at the store, shell a few more bowls of peas and mop the kitchen floor for Bonnie a few more times.  Another week or two and she'd have earned enough to pay Shannon Burgess for the new clothes.  Maybe even enough to hit a local yard sale or two for a few more pieces to round out her wardrobe.

She could stick it out a couple more weeks.

Couldn't she?

"I'll think about it," she said.

But she didn't mean it.  The last thing she needed was to put her problems on Wes Hollingsworth's broad, muscular shoulders.  She'd known him, what, a week?  And already, he could turn her inside out with a casual look or the brush of his fingertips on her arm.  Even the sound of his voice sent little shockwaves up her spine.

And the more time she spent with him, the worse it got.

In a couple of weeks, she just might be able to leave Bangor behind with no regrets.  Over the years, she'd made an art of leaving, after all.  But if she let Wes Hollingsworth get too much closer, all bets were off.

And that scared the hell out of her.

Wes pulled up outside the Stricklands' house and shut down the truck's engine, cutting off Trisha Yearwood in mid-lament.  Silence filled the void, thick and tangible.  Carly dared a glance in his direction, wondering if he was thinking about the same thing she was thinking about.

Which was how damned badly she wanted him to kiss her.

It was a bad idea.  A really, really bad idea.  But when he turned to her, she leaned in, closing the distance between them.

Wes lifted his hand to her face, cupping her jaw.  "This is not a good idea."

She nodded, even as she slid closer, until her thigh pressed against his.  "I know."

His other hand came up and threaded through her hair, his fingers tangling, curling to urge her head back.  He bent his head and brushed his lips against the side of her throat.  "We hardly know each other."

"Hardly at all," she gasped as his teeth nipped lightly at the tendon where her neck met her shoulder.

She slid her hand over his chest, stroking the hard muscles through his cotton shirt.  His heartbeat hammered against her fingertips, tangible proof that he was as affected as she was.

He drew back an inch or two, gazing at her in the faint glow coming from the porch light a few yards away.  "I'm not going to stop asking questions about you."

"I know."  She licked her lips, wishing he would just stop talking and kiss her already.

"If whatever you're hiding hurts my family . . . ."

She nodded, tired of the preamble.  She knew it all already.  Nothing good was going to come of any of this.

But right now, she didn't care.  She curled her fingers around the back of his neck and pulled him down to kiss her, cutting off the rest of his warning.

He slanted his mouth over hers, hard and hungry.  Her lips parting under the fierce, sweet pressure, she dug her fingers into his shoulders, anchoring herself to him as the world around her shattered into sparkling sensations of pleasure and need. She drank from his kisses, tried to quench the fire building in her belly, but his passion only stoked the flames.

Wes slid his hand up her body, slowly tracing the ridges of her ribcage before his fingers settled, warm and tantalizing, against the curve of her breast.  Through the flimsy fabric of her tank top and scrap of a bra, his thumb brushed over her nipple, circled and brushed again.  She arched against him, needing more.

Suddenly, Wes pulled away from her and turned back toward the front of the truck, his hands gripping the steering wheel so hard his knuckles glowed white in the darkness.

Carly slumped back against the passenger door, her pulse thudding loudly in her ears.  The handle dug into her hip, a painful reminder of harsh reality.  Her breathing sounded harsh and uneven.  Somewhere, a dog bayed, mournful and distant.

"You should get inside before Bonnie and Floyd start worrying about you."  Wes's voice was low and raspy, a little out of breath.

"Not gonna walk me to the door?" Carly tried to keep her voice light, even though her entire body felt like it had been set aflame and abandoned to burn itself to ash.

"It's late."

Well, that was a sad excuse for an excuse, she thought.  "You don't date much, do you?"

He finally turned to look at her.  "You're not going to be here in a month or two.  Are you?"

She didn't reply, but he already knew the answer.

He sighed.  "I don't even know your name.  I don't know, maybe you're even married.  Maybe he's who you're running from.  I mean, how would I know?"

She nodded.  "You're right.  It was a bad idea."

He nodded as well, his dark gaze moving over her, as if trying one last time to see who she really was.

For a minute, she wanted him to.

She wanted to tell him that she was Carlotta Marie Sandano, that she was twenty-seven years old, that her mother was a second generation Irish American lass who'd made the tragic mistake of tying herself to a handsome Italian stallion with big dreams, small resources and a lazy streak as long as the Garden State Parkway.  She wanted to tell him about her fear of spiders and her fear of attachments.

She wanted to explain how she took a bookkeeping job at the Palais Royale Casino under the false impression that Human Resources Manager Dom Manning had seen past her showgirl looks to recognize the sharp brain in her pretty little head, only to find out that Manning was as crooked as her Nonna Maria's arthritic back, secretly routing millions of dollars through the casino to launder it for a half dozen different criminal enterprises while stacking the accounting and audit offices with yes men and incompetents.

Dom had thought she'd be easy to handle.  He'd been wrong.

She wanted to tell Wes about going to the FBI and agreeing to stick with the job long enough to give Agent Phillips the evidence he needed to put Manning away, until she'd come home one day to find the sweet little stray cat she'd been feeding hanging upside down from her shower curtain pole, gutted and bled out.

About going to work the next day and pretending nothing had happened, right up to the moment she'd grabbed the bag she'd hidden in her car and hopped the first tour bus out of A.C.

She wanted to tell Wes that if she let herself think about the trouble she was in for more than a minute, the world started to go black around her as panic closed in, cold and suffocating.

But she said none of those things when she opened the passenger door and slid out of the truck.

All she said was good night.

Chapter Six

Carly hadn't expected to see Wes again anytime soon.  But to her surprise, when she returned to the hardware store after lunch the next day, he was there talking to Floyd.  Both men looked up when she entered.  Floyd smiled.  Wes didn't.

Well, this is awkward
.

Floyd waved her over.  "Carly, can you close for me this afternoon?  Wes needs help with something at J.B.'s place."

"Sure," Carly agreed, looking curiously at Wes.  "Is something wrong?"

He shook his head.  "J.B. finally admitted the linoleum on his kitchen floor is so old, it's gotten slick.  He can't keep his footing."

"So that's why he fell."

"Looks like it."  Wes nodded.

"I'm going to help Wes put down some new flooring in the kitchen tonight," Floyd said.  "I'd thought Sherry was going to close tonight, but she's got to take her mama to the doctor in Savannah this afternoon.  Reckon you could cover for me?"

"I'll be happy to."  A ripple of anticipation ran through her belly.  Closing up would give her a chance to look over the store's books without anyone asking questions.

She'd been wanting to take a look ever since she found out the store was having financial trouble.  She was a trained auditor, after all.  She'd kept her eyes open her first week of work, trying to figure out where losses might be happening.  But the store did a brisk, steady business, and a lot of the items sold were high-end tools and hardware.  Strickland's Hardware should be turning a comfortable profit.

She wanted to find out why it wasn't.

"Thank, darlin'.  I'll show you what you'll need to do before I leave."  Floyd patted her arm and turned back to Wes.

Carly headed back to the employee break room to get her uniform smock, denying herself another quick glance at Wes.  The sooner she conquered her inconvenient crush on the sexy police chief, the better for all concerned.  She pulled the smock over her head and shook her hair out of her eyes.

And found herself looking at Wes, who stood in the break room doorway, watching her.

Immediately, the air in the room went thick and hot.  Carly's heart squeezed hard in her chest, then took off like a racehorse.  She licked her lips and tried to speak in a normal tone of voice.  "Can I help you?"

One corner of his mouth twitched, but his dark eyes were deadly serious, the intensity of his gaze unnerving.  "I just wanted to see if you were okay.  After the other night."

A brief flicker of pleasure at his concern quickly fell beneath a torrent of irritation.  How arrogant, to think that a few kisses and a brush-off could knock her off her feet.

Never mind that it damned near had.

"I'm not the kind of girl who swoons after a little good night kiss."  She dragged her gaze away from his, pretending to smooth non-existent wrinkles from the front of her smock.

"That's not what I meant."

"Look, I've got to get back to work."  She brushed past him, trying to pretend that her whole body didn't vibrate from the brief touch of his arm against hers.

He caught her hand.  "I meant what I said last night.  I can help you.  Whatever you're afraid of—"

She pulled her arm away, worried that if she listened to him much longer, she might spill everything.

Which would be a disaster.  He was a cop.  He couldn't keep what she told him in confidence, even if he wanted to.

She forced herself to look up at him.  "Be sure to tell your father I said hi."  Then she turned and left, not waiting to see if Wes made any reply.

Floyd immediately directed her to a customer in aisle four who seemed to be having trouble choosing between table saws.  By the time she'd gently convinced the man to buy the more expensive one, Wes had left.

Which was fine with her, she told herself firmly.

Really.

"DO YOU THINK IT'S A GOOD idea to leave a woman you've known for less than two weeks to close up the store by herself?" Wes asked Floyd as he helped his uncle position a square vinyl tile in the middle of his father's kitchen floor.

"You brought that mouthy gal into my house.  Why ain't you worried about that?" J.B. asked from his perch on a ladder back chair just outside the kitchen door.

Wes scowled at his father.  "I was here with her."

"Yeah, you're with her a lot, ain't you?"  J.B.'s eyes glittered with dark humor.  "Bonnie Jean says you're practically livin' over at her place these days.  Ain't that right, Floyd?"

Floyd grinned as he settled the tile into the bed of glue.  "Been seein' a whole lot more of you these days than I used to."

"I'm looking out for you and Aunt Bonnie.  You don't seem to realize you've let a complete stranger into your house."

"And you let her into my house," J.B. groused.

Wes threw up his hands.  "Don't worry, J.B., she won't be back here again, okay?"  He grabbed the glue dispenser and laid the adhesive for the next tile, biting the inside of his jaw.