“You have only my welfare in mind?”
“Quit sneering.” He felt a smile tug at his lips and firmly repressed the urge to grin at her. “Come now, you must be in your mid-twenties at least. Surely you can’t claim all that much modesty. I promise not to be impressed no matter what you unveil.”
She looked ready to strike him, so he quickly added, “I’ll make the grand sacrifice. My coat is still fairly dry on the inside, given that it’s made for this weather and water repellent. You can wrap up in it after you’ve gotten out of your wet clothes.”
She chewed her lips, thinking of heaven knew what, and finally shaking her head. More hair slipped free and clung to her forehead and cheeks. She didn’t look like a boy now; she looked like a drowned rat. A wide-eyed, nervous rat. “No.”
“What if I insist?”
She went stiff as a poker. “Insist all you want! I’m not taking anything off and I’m not—” Her voice dwindled into a very ratlike squeak when he started toward her. “Don’t you dare touch me!”
“You’re being unreasonable, Charlie. I hadn’t thought you the type to submit to hysterics, but what else can it be? You can’t be comfortable and if there was enough light to see, I have no doubt you’d be a pale shade of blue.” He caught her arm and she tried to jerk away. He easily caught the neck of her jacket and stripped it off her, despite her efforts and the volume of her rank curses. The woman had the vocabulary of a sailor. “It’s too dark in here for close observation anyway. What exactly do you suppose I’ll see?”
“You’ll see nothing because you’re going to take your hands off me right now.”
That calm tone of hers should have given him a warning, but he was too intent on forcing her to accept his benevolence. He was wet also, yet he’d offered her his coat, which would leave him with only his dress shirt and undershirt. Contrary to popular female opinion, men were not impervious to the cold. She should be thanking him, not cursing his ancestors. Why were women always so stubborn?
And then he felt the gun press into his ribs. He almost laughed. She’d done nothing but surprise him since he’d first spotted her. It was entertaining when it wasn’t so annoying.
“Ah, you’re fast. Don’t tell me. You were a pickpocket once, weren’t you, as well as a saloon girl? No, don’t lie to me.”
“I wasn’t going to lie! I’m not a saloon girl, I’m the owner, and no, I was never a pickpocket. It’s just that you weren’t paying attention.” She pressed the gun harder against him. “And you’re slow.”
In the next instant he jerked up her wrist and snatched the gun from her hand. In the process, it fired, the sound loud and obscene, sending particles of ceiling plaster to rain down on their heads. They both heard a flurry of scurrying from around them.
The shock left them still as statues. “Good grief, what was that?”
Harry was aware of her uneasiness, even her breath held. “Rats. And at the moment, they’re the least of your worries.” This time he stuck the gun a good distance inside his pants, then dared her with a look to try retrieving it. “Now.”
She quickly regained her aplomb. “You’re lucky you didn’t shoot me!”
“I’d say you were luckier, being that you would have been the one shot.” He took a firm step toward her.
“All right.” She held up her hands. “Give me your coat, then turn your back and close your eyes.”
“No.” The silly woman persisted in her belief that he was an idiot.
“You’re not going to watch, Harry.”
“In case it’s escaped your notice, it’s exceedingly dim in here. What miserly moonlight there is can hardly penetrate the rain and the dust on the broken windows. I can’t see my own hand in front of my face.” That was an exaggeration; he could see just fine, but she didn’t need to know that.
“I’ll give you the coat, and if you’ll promise not to do anything else foolish, I’ll try to find a propitious spot for us to nest in until this storm completely blows over.”
She curled her lip at him. “Your diction is astounding.”
“Thank you.” He handed her the coat and turned away, kicking debris with his feet as he carefully walked.
“It wasn’t a compliment!” she called out, her voice heavy with sarcasm. “You’re what the regulars at my bar would call a fancy-pants.”
“I’m wounded to my soul by their censure.” The station stunk, literally. He could smell oil and rotting vegetation and heaven only knew what else. He preferred not to ponder the possibilities. He retrieved his tiny flashlight, flicked the light around in a wide arc, avoiding Charlie’s dark corner, then settled on an area that would have to do.
“I’ve found a spot that’s fairly dry and empty, and there’s an old car bench seat. I suppose it’ll support us and keep us off the cold cement floor.”
He heard a “plop” and knew she’d dropped part of her disguise. He smiled in the darkness. “What exactly did you have on under your shirt?”
“Some old linen, pinned in place.” Another plop. “Why don’t you sit on the bench just to make sure nothing else is nesting there. I’m not keen on sharing with rats.”
“I’m sure they feel the same about you.” He kicked the seat with his foot. Nothing happened. Holding the flashlight in his teeth, he lifted one end and dropped it. And then did it again. “Nothing but an abundance of dust.”
Another plop.
He turned off the flashlight before the temptation became too overwhelming. His eyeballs almost itched with the urge to peek. “Exactly how many layers did you have on?”
“Enough to get rid of any lumps or bumps, which was easy since my femaleness isn’t all that noticeable anyway.”
Temptation swelled. He looked toward her voice, but could only see a vague outline. He felt cheated and stared harder, but still only got shifting shadows and a stinging sense of guilt.
A wet length of toweling slapped up against his face. “You can use that to wipe off our nest.”
Grumbling, he did as instructed then turned to her again. “I beg to differ. About your femaleness, I mean.” He noticed her voice shook when she talked, more from cold now than anything else. His concern doubled. “If you’ll recall, I knew right away that you were a female sort of person.”
“I don’t understand that. No one else noticed.”
He could hear the chattering of her teeth. Definitely the cold. “Come here, Charlie. Let me warm you.”
Not a sound. Not a movement. The irritating little twit.
“Oh for pity’s sake.” Though he tried to hide it, his irritation came through. “Charlie? Come on, I’ve proven myself by now, haven’t I? We may have the entire night ahead of us, with nothing but the rain and the rats for company. Regardless of how stoic you might be, I don’t mind admitting I’m cold. Let’s at least make the attempt to get warm.”
She took a step out of the shadows and he could see her vigorously rubbing her hair with her discarded shirt. His coat covered her from neck to ankles, enormously big on her petite frame. “What, exactly, did you have in mind?”
“A little cuddling.” He smiled, already feeling the anticipation which was surely odd considering she really wasn’t all that attractive and