Page 30 of Kiss an Angel

After that, they rode in silence until Daisy eventually dozed off. In her sleep, she searched for a comfortable pillow and found it on Alex’s shoulder.

A stray lock of her hair flipped up in the breeze and grazed his lips. He let it play there for a while, brushing across his mouth and jaw. She smelled sweet and expensive, like wildflowers growing in the middle of a jewelry store.

She was right about last night. He’d acted like an ass. But the whole thing had taken him by surprise, and he didn’t want any kind of public celebration of something he was trying his best to minimize. If he wasn’t careful, she’d get it into her head to take this marriage seriously.

He didn’t think he’d ever met a woman who was so much his opposite. She’d said he was like a robot, without any human feelings at all, but she was wrong. He had feelings, all right. Just not the ones she thought were important, the ones experience had taught him he was incapable of having.

Even though he told himself to keep his eyes on the road, he couldn’t resist looking down at the small, slender body snuggled so warmly against him. She’d tucked one leg under the other, displaying the soft curve of her inner thigh, and his old T-shirt had lost the battle to keep her covered. His gaze fell on the meager strip of ice blue lace that passed between her legs. As the heat gathered in his groin, he looked away, angered by his self-inflicted torture. God, she was beautiful.

She was also silly and spoiled, vain beyond belief. He’d never seen a woman who could spend so much time looking into a mirror. But despite her faults, he had to admit that she wasn’t quite the selfish, self-centered socialite he’d originally thought her to be. There was a sweetness about her that was as unexpected as it was disturbing because it made her so much more vulnerable than he wanted her to be.

As Daisy came out of the truck-stop rest room where she’d managed to bum a cigarette from a female driver, she saw that Alex was flirting with another waitress. Even though he’d made it plain that he had no intention of committing himself to their marriage, the sight depressed her. As she watched him nod at something the waitress said, she realized she had a perfectly good excuse to turn her back on the vows she’d taken. Between the awful scene with the wedding cake and what he’d said afterward, he’d made himself quite clear. He had no intention of upholding his vows, so

why should she?

Because she had to. Her conscience wouldn’t let her escape.

She garnered her courage and, plastering a smile on her face, headed toward the orange vinyl booth. Neither the waitress nor Alex paid any attention to her as she slid into her seat. A name tag shaped like a teapot identified this particular woman as Tracy. She was overly made up but still undeniably attractive. And Alex was Mr. Charm, complete with a lazy grin and wandering eyes.

He finally pretended to notice her presence. “Back already, Sis?”

Sis!

He smiled, the glint of challenge in his eyes. “Tracy and I have been getting to know each other.”

“I’m trying to talk your brother into hanging around for a while,” Tracy said. “My shift ends in an hour.”

Daisy knew if she didn’t put a stop to this sort of thing right away, he’d think he could get away with it for the next six months. She reached over and patted the waitress’s hand where she’d rested it on the edge of the table.

“You sweet, sweet girl. He’s been so self-conscious around women since his medical problem was diagnosed. But I keep telling him—with the wonders of antibiotics, those pesky little sexually transmitted diseases are hardly a problem for anybody anymore.”

Tracy’s smile faltered. She stared at Daisy, then at Alex, and her tanned skin seemed to take on a faintly gray hue. “My boss gets mad if I talk to the customers too long. See ya.” She hurried away from the table.

Alex’s coffee cup clattered onto his saucer.

Daisy met his gaze dead on. “Don’t mess with me, Alex. We took vows.”

“I don’t frigging believe this.”

“You’re a circumstanced man. And circumstanced men don’t flirt with waitresses. Please try to remember that.”

He yelled at her all the way back to the truck, throwing out words such as “immature,” “grasping,” and “conniving.” Only after they were under way, did he finally give it a rest.

They had traveled in silence for less than a mile when she heard something that sounded very much like a chuckle, but when she looked over at him, she saw the same stern face and unsmiling mouth she’d seen from the beginning. Since she knew Alex Markov’s dark Russian soul didn’t possess more than a shred of a sense of humor, she decided she was mistaken.

By late afternoon, she was bleary with fatigue. Only by pressing herself to the limit had she been able to finish cleaning the trailer, shower, fix herself something to eat, and still make it to the red wagon on time to take over at the ticket window. The job would have lasted even longer if Alex hadn’t cleaned up the wedding cake last night. Since she was the one who’d thrown it, his help had been unexpected.

It was Saturday, and she understood from overhearing brief snatches of conversation that the workmen were looking forward to getting their pay envelopes that night. Alex had told her that some of the workmen who handled the canvas and moved the equipment were alcoholics and drug addicts, since the circus’s low wages and poor working conditions didn’t attract the most stable employees. A few had been with the circus for years, simply because they didn’t have anywhere else to go. Others were adventurers attracted by the romance of the circus, but they generally didn’t last long.

Alex glanced up from the battered desk as she stepped into the trailer, and his mouth set in what she was beginning to believe was a perpetual scowl. “There’s a discrepancy in yesterday’s receipts.”

She’d been exceptionally careful as she’d made change, and she was certain she hadn’t made any mistakes. Coming around behind him, she gazed at the neatly printed figures. “Show me.”

He pointed toward the paper lying on the desk. “I’ve checked the ticket numbers against the receipts, and you’re short.

It took her only a moment to figure out what was wrong. “That discrepancy came from the complimentary tickets I gave out. There were only twelve or thirteen.”

“Complimentary tickets?”

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