Why, then, was he lusting after a woman who was a puzzling combination of Sophia Loren, Audrey Hepburn and va-va-voom Raquel Welch? One that went in for plunging necklines and short, short skirts? Didn’t make any sense at all.
The wind caught Michelle’s dark curls again, jerking Jake’s mind to those bedsheets. They would be white and crisp, a contrast against all that inky black….
Tearing his gaze from the car in front of him, he pushed the button to turn off the air, then rolled the windows down.
JUST KNOWING Jake McCoy was behind her made Michelle feel erotically appealing. She’d never had a man literally pursue her before. Okay, his reasons weren’t exactly what she’d like, but she’d bet his job wasn’t the only thing on his mind.
She turned down the radio station cranking out rock and roll oldies, then gazed into her rearview mirror. She spotted Jake and his dark Caprice immediately. He never let more than two cars separate them and stayed for the most part in the left-hand lane, except to let others pass. How charitable of him. She caught herself smiling, then cleared her throat. She should be thinking of what lay ahead of her in Akron, Ohio, south of Cleveland. Instead she watched Jake. Noticing the way he held his hands on the steering wheel in the traditional three o’clock position. His correct, upright posture explained part of the reason his suit appeared barely wrinkled.
One hand on her own wheel, she reached down and plucked off her shoes, then slid them under her seat. Her speed let up a bit, and she instantly compensated. Jake did the same behind her.
The radio announcer told her it was eleven. Would Jake do as he’d said and take her into custody at midnight? He appeared to be a man of his word. Then again, if he’d thought her a real threat, he’d have stopped her from leaving D.C.
She focused more prudently on the road. It was completely dark. The only lights were her headbeams, which illuminated the monotonous, seemingly endless white lines that separated her lane from the next.
If Lili were with her right now, she’d be giddily trying to count those lines.
Michelle bit into the flesh of her bottom lip. It often seemed that everywhere she looked, everything she did, she imagined what her nearly four-year-old daughter would see or do in the same situation. Her absence was like a colossal hole, always present, forever threatening to swallow her up, bogging her down in the details.
What was Lili doing right now? Had she had her bath? Had she eaten? Did Gerald know that a certain name brand of baby care products irritated her sensitive skin? Or that he had to comb her hair just so to get out the tangles? Was she scared?
Michelle dragged in a deep breath. While she was fluent in English, Lili only knew a few basic words, and then only when used in conjunction with French. Would constantly being surrounded by the foreign tongue confuse her?
Oh, how she missed her daughter. Missed tasting her skin when she kissed her temple. Tickling her round, hard belly. Smiling at her rambunctious laugh. Missed playing hide-and-seek with her and Julianne, her frazzled stuffed pet elephant and constant companion.
She reached out and took Julianne from her backpack, running her thumb along her nubbed belly, then lifting the toy to her nose. After nearly eight weeks of sleeping with the animal, it smelled more like her than Lili. But every now and again she swore she could make out her daughter’s sweet, little-girl scent.
The sign ahead was blurry. She blinked, realizing that fog wasn’t to blame for the haziness, but tears.
Stuffing Julianne in her temporary home, Michelle pressed her foot down on the pedal, watching as Jake dropped farther and farther back. Indulging in a bit of escapist flirtation was one thing. Allowing it to derail her plans was another entirely.
OKAY, SHE WAS finally making her move.
Jake flicked off the cruise control and eased his foot onto the gas pedal. He was mildly surprised she hadn’t tried to shake him before. Then again, she might think being so far away from D.C. put them at the same disadvantage. Smart woman.
He easily caught up with her Ford, pulling parallel with her in the left lane. She flashed him a wide smile, making that peculiar weightless sensation more acute. He saluted her. But before he could put his hand back on the wheel, she slammed on the brakes then turned off the exit ramp to her right.
Letting rip a string of hardly used curses, Jake pulled to the shoulder of the road just on the other side of the on ramp, then flicked on his hazards. With his gaze glued to the rearview mirror, he slid the top button of his shirt open, leaving his tie to cover it.
Before Michelle had made her move, he’d kept a close eye on the road signs. This particular exit had no rest facilities, and the next exit was twenty-two miles down the highway. Michelle would soon realize she had no choice but to get back onto the turnpike.
At least he hoped she’d realize that.
After five long minutes with no sign of the battered Ford, he jerked the car into reverse. Traffic was sparse, and he ignored the honking of horns from what little there was. He finally backed up far enough to exit, then raced toward the tollgate. The guard remembered Michelle—probably no other cars had exited since hers—and said he thought she’d gone east. Jake paid the toll then headed in that direction as well, scouring the dark farmland surrounding him. Nothing. No lights. Nobody driving. Nothing but a long, lonely stretch of two-lane road.
He drove for exactly three miles then stopped. He’d been had. It was as simple as that. He suspected that the instant she saw him turn off, she’d doubled back and was already well down the turnpike by now.
Then again, what she could be looking for could be here somewhere.
Trusting his first instinct, he turned around. He could only hope he was right.
On the turnpike fifteen minutes later, he saw that he was.
He pulled onto the shoulder then cruised to a stop behind Michelle’s disabled Ford. The back left tire was flat. He climbed from the car and buttoned his jacket, careful of passing traffic as he made his way toward the driver’s side.
No Michelle.
He leaned inside the open window. She’d left the keys inside. He used them to unlock the trunk. Why wasn’t he surprised that there was no spare? A tractor and semitrailer roared on by, the resulting gust of air plastering his suit to his body. He stared down the road after the truck. Just then, it began to rain.
MICHELLE CLIMBED DOWN from the monster-size truck cab then slammed the door. There was a loud grinding of gears, then the trucker rolled slowly away from her, leaving her standing at the side of the road in the rain.
She shivered. It wasn’t that she was unaccustomed to male attention. But the way the trucker had come on to her made her want to scratch something—that is, if she’d had any nails left with which to scratch. In France, men—no matter how old or attractive—at least hinted at the promise of or openly boasted of an ability to satisfy a woman. This guy had been moderately handsome, but he’d made it sound as if she’d owed him one. As though even if she wouldn’t enjoy a sexual liaison with him, he didn’t care one way or another, just so long as he could cop a feel.
Completely unlike Jake, who would probably never come on to a woman unless he were sure his attention was welcome.
She turned toward the lights on the other side of the tollbooth not too far away.
At least this exit included life of some sort. The one she’d pulled off in the hopes of losing Jake had been completely dead. She spared a glance behind her, half expecting to see the dark Caprice bearing down on her. Hiking her backpack a little higher on her shoulders, she headed in the direction of the tollbooth. She hoped they could direct her to a bus