Page 5 of Beauty and the Bounty Hunter

I sighed. Parking Lot Guy probably wasn’t the only one chasing me. “I don’t know. He was bigger than you. Lots of tattoos crawling up his face. Not to stereotype, but he looked like he could be in a motorcycle gang or something.” Or a bounty hunter, which had been my first instinct, but that would open up a line of questioning with this stranger I wasn’t prepared for. I glanced over at him, but he studied the road with grim determination. “If we keep going this way, we’re going to hit water. Unless you have a hovercraft extension. I wouldn’t mind heading for Michigan.”

He paused, his hands sturdy on the wheel. There was a scar running up the side of his neck from below the collar of his winter coat. “No hovercraft.” He pulled over to the side of the road, looked every which way, and made an illegal U-turn.

“I’m Katrina.” My heart pounded in my chest. “And you are?”

“Harbor.” He still didn’t look at me. “Nice to meet you, Katrina.”

We neared the resort exit again. “I messed up your vacation,” I said. I knew nothing about this man, and I should have done everything in my power to leave him out of my mess. “You can drop me off here. I’m sure that guy is gone. I can get to my car, and you can enjoy the resort. It’s lovely.”

He shook his head brusquely. “Not a good idea, Ms. Katrina. If someone was chasing you, they’re probably tracking your car.”

“Oh.” I colored. I hadn’t thought of that, and I should have. I should have done lots of things before I skipped out on my court appearance, but it was too late for all of those things now.

“You didn’t mess up my vacation.” Now he turned his gaze toward me, and I heated from the inside out at the warmth in his dark brown eyes. “I like to help people. I might not look like it, but I do.”

“I appreciate it.” I gestured down the road. “I have a place to stay. No one else knows about it, so it should be safe.” Safe. Hah. I’d jumped into a stranger’s car because a bounty hunter was chasing me. I was heading to a cabin I had no connection with, no idea what waited there. There was nothing safe here.

He turned his gaze back to the road, leaving me cold again. “Happy to drop you there.”

I shifted in my seat. He hadn’t turned on the radio, but the heater blew warm air across my face, so I loosened my winter coat. No use in boiling myself to death. There was no way in hell I’d make Pete’s day like that. “Where are you from, Harbor?”

“Philadelphia.”

Not a chatty guy, then. That was better. Definitely. Too much chatting and I’d give myself away.

Unfortunately for my resolve, the restless adrenaline from before still pulsed through my veins. I couldn’t run it off or drown myself in sculpture. So instead it all fell out of my mouth like a torrent of nonsense. “I’ve never been to Philadelphia. I’m a Midwest girl, myself. Born and raised. Furthest away I’ve been is Iowa. Have you ever been to Iowa, near the Mississippi River? It’s really pretty. Hilly and green with that massive river churning through the state.” I stared out the window at the ice-covered landscape. Now he was going to think he’d picked up someone who had escaped from a state institution.

He cleared his throat. “I grew up on the East Coast. Haven’t traveled a lot in the Midwest.” His voice sounded gravel-filled, like he didn’t use it often. “But I’ve been overseas. I was in the military.”

“What branch?”

“Army.”

He paused, and I supposed that did say mostly everything that needed to be said.

I pointed to a right hand turn up ahead that led into the Elk View neighborhood. “Turn up there.” I removed my phone from the pocket of my coat and checked the address Clara Dryden had sent me. “It’s not far. Maybe three or four houses down. I’m sure it’s easy to see.”

It wasn’t. We passed it twice before we realized the divot between two trees was the driveway. To Harbor’s credit, he didn’t say anything. He merely turned down the snow-packed drive and we bumped and jostled along.

I sat in the passenger seat, silent but restless. What was I going to do? It was sheer luck I hadn’t been caught by Parking Lot Guy and then had been picked up by this man who did not seem to be a serial killer. Wasn’t that what people always said?

Luck, especially mine, was a finite resource.

The cabin was small, but I wasn’t complaining. It looked old but serviceable. The roof sagged a little in places, but the wooden walls of the cabin appeared sturdy.

Harbor parked in front of the small wooden porch, snow piled on the steps and in the shape of an Adirondack chair, which must be buried beneath the powder. He kept the car running and frowned at the house. “You live here?”

“Renting. I’m passing through town.” I pulled out the key Clara had given me. All my politeness reared its head, but I squashed it all down. I didn’t have any idea what waited for me in that cabin. I doubted there was food or firewood. Hell, there might not even be running water. I would—no, I had to— face it on my own. “Thank you again. I don’t know how to repay you. Maybe you could give me your number? I can send you something. A gift, maybe.”

He turned toward me. “I think I should come in with you.”

“No!” I recoiled, and a flash of pain crossed his face that he quickly squelched. It drew me to him, that recognition that he had suffered rejection, too. “I mean, you don’t have to. You’ve already done so much, and you don’t even know me.”

He stared out the front windshield. “My mom would never forgive me if I picked up a girl in trouble, then didn’t make sure there wasn’t more trouble waiting for her in her house.” Then he turned that warm, dark brown gaze on me again, and it did all sorts of interesting things to my body. Things that I should have chocked up to adrenaline, but made me feel warm and wanted.

I liked this man. I knew nothing about him except his hometown and his name, but I liked him anyway. That was dangerous, for both of us.

“I’ll be fine.” I stepped out of the car into the frigid February air, my boots sinking into the snow. “Really.”

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