“If it killed you, ya mean.”
Witt took her arm and pulled her across the street to the beige sedan she’d seen earlier. Except for the cars rushing by on the road, causing the heat and dust to swirl around her, the street was empty. No one had run out of a shop to help. No other cars had stopped. She could have died on the four-lane road, and nobody would have cared.
Witt opened the car door and plunked down on the edge of the seat, feet planted firmly on the ground, to reach across for the radio. He ignored her as he called in the near hit-and-run.
Max looked him up and down from her vantage point outside the car. Not a hair out of place, his breathing even, his black suit unrumpled. Only one smudge of dirt on his sleeve and dust on his shoes. He hadn’t even broken a sweat. Or gotten a hard-on. Though that was kind of difficult to tell with him still seated. “So, did you get the number?”
He sighed. “Plates had been removed.”
“Hah. You did look regardless of the danger to my life.”
He raised one blond brow. “It’s a fallacy perpetrated by feminists that men aren’t capable of doing two things at once.”
Yeah, like squeezing her breast and saving her life all at the same time. Men never missed an opportunity.
“Did you recognize the guy?” she asked
“Guy was a figure of speech. Tinted windows. Didn’t see the driver.”
Damn. He made her feel ornery. Or maybe it was the way she’d had other bizarre sexual thoughts about him in those split seconds he lay on top of her. Tingling-thigh syndrome. Oops, there it was again, when she looked at his big hands. She was partial to big hands. Big hands and Ram trucks.
She narrowed her eyes on him, so much easier to take out her every frustration on him right here, right now, sexual or otherwise. “You were following me again, Detective. Why?”
“Murder follows you, Max. I’m just along for the ride.”
“How did you know I’d be here?”
“Charlene Finklemeyer called. Said some strange woman claiming she knew Wendy Gregory had requested an immediate appointment.”
“Charlene Finklemeyer?”
“Divinity. ‘Strange woman’ couldn’t have described anyone but you.”
“So you followed me instead of checking out real leads?”
“Case was cold until today. Nothing on Wendy. Nothing on Lilah.”
“Until today?”
“You aware that Nicholas Drake owns a green Toyota 4Runner?”
Max gulped. “No.”
It was obvious he knew Wendy had a lover, and Nickie was it. She was sure Cameron, always lurking nearby, bit his tongue on his “I told you so.”
I told you so.
“Bastard.” There, that would get them both going.
“Why, Miss Starr, I’m unused to such epithets.” Witt rose from the car seat and towered over her.
“Mrs.,” Max corrected and backed up a step or two. It wasn’t just his hands that got to her. The man did indeed have an impressive height and breadth to him. “About the Toyota?”
“Reported stolen this morning. Coincidental, don’t you think?”
“So coincidental that it seems staged, doesn’t it, Detective?”
His lips moved, tensed. He closed the space between them by one step, spread his legs in a militant stance, pushed his suit coat aside, then jammed his fists on his hips. “Are you really that stupid, Max, or do you just do this to irritate me?”
“Goodness,” she cooed, enjoying every moment. “I seem to have pushed some sort of button here.”
“You know damn well your life is in danger. I wasn’t the one following you. He was.” He pointed down the street in the direction the Toyota had gone. “Next time, you might not be so lucky.”
“There you go with that ‘he’ again. You must have seen something.”
“I didn’t see anything except your butt about to be flattened. He’s killed twice, and if you don’t stop playing cat and mouse with him, it’ll be three times.”
Wow. Full sentences. A lot of them. “If I didn’t know better, Detective, I’d think you cared.”
He moved, and suddenly she found herself backed up against his car, the beige metal warm through the seat of her slacks. With less than six inches between them, heat emanated from Witt.
“Let me spell it out for you, Mrs. Starr.”
Yup, he was definitely pissed. His usually blue eyes were dark, and his blond brows were pulled together with an angry slash line between them. And he pointed. She pushed at his jabbing finger. “It’s rude to point.”
“Don’t interrupt. In case you haven’t noticed, I’m on a roll.”
She flapped her hand at him. “I wouldn’t dream of disturbing you.” Of course, she might expire first from spontaneous combustion.