Missing In The Glades

He cleared his throat and met Faye’s look of impending doom with a smug smile.

“Faye, Faye,” Amy yelled from the other room. “Sammie’s in trouble out front. CeeCee has him wrapped up tight and it doesn’t look like he has his alcohol with him.”

Faye whirled around and ran down the hallway toward the front of the store.

Jake cursed and ran after her. CeeCee? Alcohol? He couldn’t begin to imagine what he was about to see.

He caught a mind-numbing, lust-inducing view of Faye’s gorgeous derriere as she raced out the door, her short, ruined skirt lifting up behind her before the door shut in his face. He yanked it open in time to see her pulling on the silver chain that hung around her neck. She lifted it out of her shirt and there were three small pouches hanging from it. She unsnapped the red one and dropped to her knees.

Right beside a man with an enormous snake wrapped around his neck and chest.

Ah, hell. Jake grabbed his gun and dropped to his knees beside her and a small group of people who’d gathered around the man being squeezed to death by the snake.

“Someone find the snake’s head so I can shoot it without shooting this guy,” Jake ordered.

“No,” the man writhing in the street choked out. “No one kills CeeCee.”

Everyone looked at Jake as if he’d just threatened to shoot a baby, or kick a dog.

Faye spilled the powdery contents of the red pouch into her hand. “Bubba, there’s his head, against Sammie’s throat. Grab it, hold it.”

Two older men, probably both in their fifties, reached for the snake’s head at the same time.

“Not you,” Faye said, motioning to one of them. “The other Bubba.”

The stronger-looking of the two grabbed the snake’s head and forced it back away from Sammie.

“Hurry,” Sammie whispered.

Faye leaned toward the snake.

Jake grabbed her around the waist, holding her back.

“I’m not letting you near that thing,” he bit out. “It could kill you.”

She gave him a surprised look. “I know what I’m doing. Let me go before CeeCee squeezes so hard Sammie has a heart attack.”

He hesitated.

“Trust me,” she said. “At least with this.”

Since everyone was staring at him as if he were the devil, he reluctantly let her go.

She immediately slathered the red powder on the snake’s nostrils and head. “Okay, everybody jump back. Bubba, release CeeCee.”

Jake swung Faye up in his arms and backed away from the now violently twisting snake. Faye blinked up at him, confusion warring with some other emotion on her face.

“Catch him, Bubba,” Sammie yelled. “I need to wash him off or he’ll hurt himself.”

Faye and Jake looked back at the street, but everyone had scattered. They were all running toward the trees between two of the buildings, including the man who’d had the constrictor wrapped around him just seconds earlier.

“I guess Sammie is okay.” Faye laughed.

“This happens a lot around here?”

She grinned. “Often enough for me to always carry a pouch of snake repellant. I’ve told Sammie to keep some rubbing alcohol in his back pocket to use if CeeCee ever confuses him with food. It works almost as well as my repellant. But Sammie tends to forget.”

Jake carried her into the store. “Sounds to me like he needs to let his pet go before it kills him.”

“That pet is the only reason he gets up every day. It’s what he lives for now that his wife is gone. He’s all alone except for CeeCee.”

He grunted noncommittally and headed down the hall.

Faye stiffened as he neared the staircase that led to her apartment. “You can put me down now. I’m not in any danger, not that I needed you to rescue me in the first place.”

“You’re welcome,” he grumbled.

She rolled her eyes.

He started up the stairs.

Her eyes widened in panic. “Wait. What are you doing? Put me down.”

He tightened his hold. “Not a chance. We need to talk. No guns. No knives. And no man-eating snakes. Just you, me and the truth.”

Chapter Five (#ulink_94e92dcf-8728-5173-9fdb-19eef647db2b)

Faye tensed in Jake’s arms. She waited until he reached the top of the stairs and set her down to open her door. As soon as he let her go, she rushed inside and whirled around to shut and lock the door. He shoved his boot in the opening, blocking her efforts. There was no way to win against his superior strength, not in a direct confrontation without any tricks. She reluctantly stepped back and let him inside.

Her skirt slid dangerously low. She was forced to grab the tattered edges and retie the veils holding it together. Her face flushed as Jake’s gaze followed the movement of her hands, lingering on her exposed tummy before sliding past the skirt to her naked thighs.

She’d flirted with him the first time she met him. But that had been so she could distract him and escape. Maybe he thought it was okay to stare at her like this because of how she’d acted last night. If he were anyone else, she’d have decked him already. But even though she was worried about his investigation, and what his presence here meant for her, she couldn’t ignore the punch in her gut every time she looked at him. Attraction sizzled between them. Why did she have to be so turned on by a man whose very presence threatened her entire world?

She stepped back to put some much-needed distance between them, and so she could meet his gaze without craning her neck back at an uncomfortable angle. “How did you figure out where I lived? And how did you manage to turn my friends against me in just a few short hours?”

“Mystic Glades isn’t exactly a big city. I drove down the main street and as soon as I saw a shop called The Moon and Star, I figured it had to be yours. When I pulled up front, Freddie came out of the bar across the street. I think she thought she was protecting you by asking me why I was there.”

“Let me guess. That’s when you lied and told her I was, what, your girlfriend?”

“I might have hinted at something like that. Freddie and Amy both thought the idea was sweet and helped me surprise you. Don’t be mad at them.”

“Oh, don’t worry. You’re the one I’m mad at, not them. You might as well turn around right now and leave. You’re trespassing.”

In answer to her edict, he kicked the door closed behind him. He moved farther into the center of the tiny living room-kitchen combo. “You live here? Above the store?” He peeked into the guest bedroom that opened off the right side of the living room. It was empty, except for the twin bed and chest of drawers that had come with the place.

“Where I live isn’t any of your business.”

As if she hadn’t spoken, he crossed to the left side of the living room to her bedroom and went inside. He flicked the ballerina-pink comforter on her bed before examining the collection of figurines on her dresser. When he picked up the centaur holding a set of scales, she marched forward and plucked it out of his hand. Had she really found him appealing a minute earlier? She never could stand a bully. And she resented him forcing his way into her private sanctuary. She carefully set the figurine back on the dresser.