The Hotter You Burn

As a matter of fact—

“Good luck finding one.” Laughing with glee, he put the pedal to the metal and blazed forward, flinging dirt and gravel at her.

Coughing, she waved a hand in front of her face. Can’t complain. Just another dose of medicine.

She hit Fragaria Street by late afternoon, fatigue threatening to turn her limbs into jelly. This time of year, the scent of strawberries always coated the air, wafting from hundreds of acres of wild patches.

A handful of cars motored by, and multiple people meandered along the sidewalks. The buildings around her were different colors, from blue to yellow to red, and different sizes. Some were tall, some short. Some were wide, some thin. Some were made of brick and others of wood. A true hodgepodge of design, and she loved every inch of it.

Virgil Porter and Anthony Rodriguez each sat in a rocker, playing checkers in front of Style Me Tender, Mr. Rodriguez’s salon. Harlow stuck to the shadows and most people never noticed her, which she preferred, but as usual, those two managed to spot her right away.

“How you doing, Miss Glass?” Mr. Porter called. He owned Swat Team 8—“We assassinate fleas, ticks, silverfish, cockroaches, bees, ants, mice and rats”—and he was one of the few people who actually seemed to care about her well-being, but she had to be mistaken. Back in her heyday, she’d called his son terrible names.

“I’m well, thank you,” she muttered, discouraging further questions. Lying always made her feel guilty, but the truth was never palatable. Well, you see, Mr. Porter, I’m homeless, I’ve been found out as a thief on my own property, and I’m currently unemployed. How about you? Still having trouble with your liver spots?

“I’m willing to listen if you’d like to rephrase your answer, Miss Glass. We can talk over a nice glass of sweet tea.” He shook the one in his hand, ice rattling. “Maybe we can even eat the strawberry scones Brook Lynn brought me.”

Her mouth watered, her stomach twisting with painful hunger, but she forced herself to say, “No, thank you.” The sooner she got out of the town square, the sooner her spirits would rally.

“Harlow?”

The familiar male voice came from across the street. As she turned, her nervous system nearly blew a gasket—there he was, Beck Ockley. And, oh, it so wasn’t fair. He looked good enough to eat. The gold streaks in his hair gleamed brighter in the sunlight, and his flawless sunkissed skin somehow appeared painted on by a master artist. Did he even have pores? He’d rolled up the sleeves of his white button-up, revealing muscled forearms with a slight dusting of hair.

“Uh, hi,” she said, offering the lamest wave.

He grinned at her, both wicked and virtuous, stealing her breath.

Lincoln West stood beside him, slightly taller but just as well muscled—just as gorgeous—with the smoldering intensity of a man on death row, whose last meal would be the females he trapped in his sights. Not that he’d ever made good on the silent promise. Unlike Beck, he practiced restraint, not going on a single date since coming to town.

The two were with an unfamliar man and woman dressed in business-formal clothes. Both were attractive, and though the male looked to be in his late thirties, the woman, an elegant redhead, looked to be in her late twenties. Roughly the same age as Harlow and yet a thousand times more successful.

Talk about a knife through the heart.

Was Lady Successful a new conquest of Beck’s? Or a soon-to-be conquest? Did she know he’d move on in the morning?

Beck muttered something to the group, and Harlow took off. No reason to stick around, and every reason not to. But he shocked her by racing across the street and keeping pace beside her.

“I’m surprised to see you out and about,” he said.

Oh, his voice! She’d forgotten how deep and husky it could get, every word he uttered a promise.

Gaze drawn to him by a force she couldn’t control, she looked up. He was peering at her, too, and between one moment and the next, the air charged with electricity. Whispers of sensation brushed over her skin, leaving goose bumps behind.

“Expected me to still be slaving away in your garden?” she managed.

“Something like that.” Heavy-lidded eyes swept over her, powerful, sensual...almost possessive. “Are you headed into the city for your shift at the Boobie Bungalow?”

Her cheeks burned as she remembered the story she’d told him. It wasn’t a lie if she believed it, right? As a lover of romance novels, she’d often fantasized about being a woman down on her luck—could be a stripper, why not—rescued by the prince of some distant land.

“Maybe I’ve got the week off. Maybe the other girls lose money when I’m there, and I thought I’d give them a chance to make rent.”

“How kind of you.” The corners of his mouth curled up, his amusement as seductive as the rest of him. “Where are you headed, sweetheart?”

Sweetheart. Her heart skipped a treacherous beat, her blood heating dangerously, making her sweat, and dang it, she hated herself for reacting so strongly to something that meant absolutely nothing to him. He called every woman he met by an endearment. Which irritated her because... Just because.

He needed a spoonful of his own medicine, the way she was often forced to taste hers.

“I’m going to the library, sugar tush. Why?”

“That’s my question.” He flattened his palm between her shoulder blades, sliding it down the ridges of her spine, stopping just above the curve of her bottom. The touch was innocent, nothing overtly sexual to it, and yet it frazzled her nerves. “Why are you going to the library?”

As she opened her mouth to respond—what she would say, she didn’t know—Tim Whatson sidled up to Beck’s other side.

“Hey, man. Can we talk?”

Beck stiffened before fisting the hem of Harlow’s shirt, forcing her to stop with him. The backs of his knuckles brushed against her, skin to heated skin, and tendrils of something hot and dark shot through her.

Need more. Now.

“Hey,” he said to Tim, whom he obviously knew. Was he oblivious to the cravings he’d just stirred inside her? “How’s it going?”

“Not so good. I need your help. My girlfriend is tee-icked. I forgot our three-month anniversary, and she’s threatening to leave me. What should I do?”

Beck, the new Dear Abby? “You should give her a thoughtful, personal gift. There’s nothing more thoughtful or personal than a portrait, and I happen to have an opening in my schedule. I could—”

“What do you think, Beck?” Tim said, interrupting her.

“Give her a thoughtful, personal gift,” Beck replied. “There’s nothing more thoughtful or personal than a portrait.”

Tim nodded as if he’d just received the answer to every prayer, and Beck released her to gently push her forward.

“Now,” he said. “Where were we?”

Your skin against mine... “Uh, I was telling you how I ruined your rosebushes this morning—by accident!—and how I’m headed to the library to learn how to fix them. You were in the process of forgiving me.”

“Hold up a sec.” He darted in front of her.

Unprepared, she slammed into his powerful chest and ricocheted backward. His arms wrapped around her to cage her and hold her steady.

“Whoa. I’ve got you.”

Her every pulse point suddenly leaped, and as she peered up at him, the rest of the world vanished, every second revolving around Beck alone. Her chest pressed against his, her breath coming faster and shallower, as if the air between them had somehow thickened.

“You okay?” he asked, the gleam in his eyes anything but concerned. Instead, the hot and dark thing she’d felt earlier was now reflected back to her.

“No. I mean yes. Maybe. I don’t know.”

His hand swept up, up, his fingers soon toying with the hairs at her nape, tickling. “I think you mean yes, Beck, you make everything better.”