“I called. You never called back.”
“How could I forget? A month after climbing out of my bed, you did get around to leaving a message on my answering machine.”
“I was out of town. You knew I had to leave the next morning. And I left several messages, dammit, not just one!”
Eventually, yes. He’d called three times. It had been too little, too late. “If you’d really wanted to talk to me, you knew where I was—until last month, at least.”
“Yeah.” His voice was flat. “Right there in my father’s office, pretending to be his loyal assistant while you sold him out to the Kellys.”
“So I’m slime.” She stared straight ahead, determined not to cry. “You’d decided I wasn’t worth the trouble long before you found out what I’d done.”
He shifted, looking away. “It wasn’t like that.”
Right. She didn’t want to hear whatever version of “you’re just not my type” he’d cooked up to explain himself. She knew very well how little they had in common, aside from some combustible hormones. She’d known it all along.
And still she’d made a fool of herself with him. Tension knotted her jaw and neck. She took a deep breath, trying to relax those muscles. It didn’t help. “How did you find me?”
“You used your mother’s social security number at that dive I just rescued you from.”
“Rescue? Is that what you want to call it?” Temper warmed her. She shoved his coat down into her lap. “And how would you know what number I used?”
He shrugged. “Dix can find pretty much anything that’s in any computer file, anywhere.”
“He’s a hacker, you mean.” She shook her head. Rafe never made sense. Why would a computer systems analyst who specialized in corporate security have a hacker friend?
“One of the best. I asked him to check the social security records of the family members listed in your personnel file at Connelly Corporation. Earnings have been recently reported under your mother’s number—pretty amazing, considering she passed away nine years ago.”
If Rafe could track her that way, so could others. Suddenly she wasn’t warm anymore. “Maybe I’d better not go back to my apartment.” That made two apartments she’d had to abandon.
“Congratulations. That’s the first sensible thing you’ve said tonight.”
But where would she go? She had only her tip money in her pocket; the rest was in her backpack, back at Hole-in-the-Wall. She needed to go back and get it, but two hundred and thirteen dollars wouldn’t go far.
God. She was practically a street person. She knew what she had to do, but she hated it. Hated it. “I don’t like to ask,” she said, her throat tight, “but could you loan me some money? I don’t have enough to get another place to stay.”
Rafe didn’t think he’d ever been this angry. Or this scared. He didn’t like either feeling, but he especially hated the cramped, cold feeling in his chest he got when he thought about how close she had come to being hit by that car earlier.
Hell, he thought, dragging a hand through his hair. At the moment, he didn’t like much of anything—not her, not himself and for damned sure not what he had to do about their situation.
There was one small consolation. She wasn’t going to like the next part, either. “No, I won’t loan you any damned money.” He put the car in gear and pulled away from the curb.
Her voice stopped just short of shrill. “What are you doing?”
“I used to think you were fairly bright. Figure it out.”
Good thing he’d kept an eye on her as well as the traffic. He managed to snag her arm and jerk her back before she could get the door open. “Uh-uh. Jumping out of a moving vehicle is not allowed.”
He let go of her arm, but continued to divide his attention between her and the road. She might try it again when they stopped for a light. “Put your seat belt on.”
Already she was taking deep breaths, getting herself back under control. Dammit. He wished he didn’t enjoy it so much when she ruffled up like an outraged hen then carefully smoothed each bristly feather back into place. Perverse of him, and showed a sad lack of judgment. The woman was a liar and a crook, or at least in the pay of crooks. She’d betrayed his father. He needed to remember that.
“Rafe, I have to get my backpack before it’s stolen,” she said in that reasonable tone that always made him want to unbutton something. Not that she had any buttons showing right now, but she used to wear a lot of prim, buttoned-to-the-throat silk blouses to work. No doubt she’d thought covering everything up would keep the men she worked with from turning into ravening beasts.
Foolish of her. But Rafe had figured out long ago that most women had no idea how little it took to turn a man’s thoughts to sex. Her prim blouses had just made him notice the way the silk shined and shifted over those soft, round, gorgeous breasts…breasts whose shape and texture he knew now.
He shook his head and tried to banish the memory. “Forget your backpack. I’ll buy you another one.”
“I don’t want you to buy me anything. I want my backpack.”
He eased to a stop at the light. “Listen, Charlie, someone tried to kill you on the way to your job. You can’t go back there.”
“Don’t call me Charlie.”
Her rebuke was automatic, he felt sure. As automatic as the way the nickname had slipped out. How many times had he called her that in the past two years, since she took over as his father’s executive assistant?
He’d called her Charlie when he’d come inside her, too.
“All right, Charlotte,” he said, hating the name and halfway hating her, too. “Put your seat belt on. It’s not safe for the baby if you ride without one, and I’m not letting you make any escape attempts.”
She scowled, scooped his coat out of her lap and twisted around to deposit it in the back seat. Either she was warm enough now, or she didn’t want anything of his touching her. Or she didn’t want anything slowing her down when she made her break for freedom. He tapped the steering wheel with one hand, ready to grab her with the other.
“Rafe, I agreed to talk with you. I did not agree to be abducted.”
“Tough. You haven’t done such a great job of protecting yourself and our baby, so I’m taking over.”
“If you’re thinking about—about the incident today, it may not mean anything. Heaven knows Chicago has plenty of bad drivers.”
“I’ve always admired that tidy brain of yours. I wonder why you aren’t using it. Maybe you don’t think I can use my brain. Yeah, that’s probably it. You think you can persuade me there’s no connection between people trying to run over you, and people shooting at you.” The light changed and he accelerated. “That’s too much of a stretch for me, I’m afraid.”
Her hands made small, frustrated fists in her lap. “Take me back to Hole-in-the-Wall.”
“No.”
Her tongue darted out nervously to lick her lips. “If you’re thinking of taking me to the police, please don’t. The other time—when I was shot at—that happened as I was leaving police headquarters. I think someone in the department tipped them off. I don’t want to go in a safe house. I don’t think I’d be safe.”
“Amazing. We agree about something. Now put your seat belt on, or I’ll reach over and put it on you.” For a supposedly sensible woman, she sure wasn’t paying attention to sensible precautions. “My apartment’s in the Buck-town