Luck Be a Lady - Cathie Linz [31]
She pulled the photos of her mother out of her clutch bag and studied the young woman in them. “She looks so young. I can’t believe she was at Woodstock. My mom, the hippie.” She shook her head. “The question is, where is she now? Any why is she so hard to track down? Do you think my dad did that? Covered her tracks so she couldn’t be found?”
“West Investigations is a big fish in Chicago, but there’s no way they have the kind of power to erase data on the Internet.”
“What if she’s in the Witness Protection Program or something?”
He shook his head. “Jeez, you do have an active imagination. First you worry that she’s going to somehow die before you find her and now you think she’s in the Witness Protection Program. What’s next, that she’s been abducted by aliens?”
“How far arewe from Roswell?”
“That’s in New Mexico and we’re far enough away.”
“Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m not that hysterical. I’m not hysterical at all. I think I’ve been very calm, considering the things I’ve been through in the past twenty-four hours. A wedding, a crazy man trying to break up the wedding—”
“Hey, I’m not crazy—”
“I didn’t know that at the time,” she said before continuing to list her experiences.“The discovery that my grandmother’s fiancé already has a wife, the discovery that my dead mother is alive after all, my first visit to a Nevada brothel, and now I’m marooned in a semi-ghost town and a motel with only one bed.”
“I can sleep in the car.”
“Are you protecting my honor or your car?” she asked.
“It’s not my car. It’s my buddy’s car. He trusted me to take care of it.’
“Are you afraid someone is going to vandalize it or steal it? Last Resort doesn’t seem like a high-crime area.”
“Looks can be deceiving.”
His ominous words stayed with her as she showered in the tiny bathroom. The pink tile around the tub was vintage but the toilet and sink were new. The towels were surprisingly soft and thick. The T-shirt went down to her knees and a pair of shorts took the place of her lacy black underwear, which she’d washed and left hanging to dry on the shower rod.
When she’d put them on yesterday afternoon, she’d never dreamed that she’d end up taking them off in the Queen of Hearts Motel in Last Resort with a sexy half-naked man of the other side of the bathroom door.
There was no way she could have anticipated the things that had happened to her in such a short time. Wiping the steam from the mirror, she stared at her reflection. Her wet hair curled damply around her shoulders, and her freckles stood out on her flushed cheeks. She looked like what she was . . . the girl next door. She tugged the baggy T-shirt off one shoulder and tried to strike a pose like Pepper had. The result made her crack up. No, she was definitely not sex kitten material.
Logan knocked on the door. “You okay in there?”
“Yeah.” She turned the lock and stepped out. Her floral flip-flops were from the gift shop and went with her present outfit better than her other shoes.
“I heard you laughing in there. What was so funny?”
“Me.” She pointed to herself.
Logan eyed her from head to toe. She didn’t see a smidge of humor in his gaze. Instead, there was plenty of heat and sexual tension. He’d told her that looks could be deceiving, but he hadn’t warned her that hislooks at her could be downright heart-stopping.
That’s when Megan realized she was in danger of having her heart stolen, and that was a felony she simply couldn’t risk.
Chapter Seven
A three-hour nap had Megan feeling a little rested but still somewhat on the groggy side. Before she’d fallen asleep, Logan had muttered something about a recon mission to check out their surroundings and left her on her own.
She sat up as he returned to the room.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” he said.
“You didn’t. What did you find out?”
“That we are definitely in the twilight zone.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I didn’t see anyone but Rowdy, Chuck and Pepper.”
“Maybe