The Naughty List Bundle - Kylie Adams [157]
Morgan noticed her wet hair, her pink cheeks, her bare feet. She had on a T-shirt and loose cotton drawstring pants. “You going somewhere?”
“I have to be at the diner in about an hour.”
He wanted to curse, to insist she skip work today, but he knew without even asking that he’d be wasting his breath. The woman was bound and determined to make all the money she could. Well, that’d be over with soon enough.
“All right. Then I guess we ought to get right to it.”
“You’re going to tell me why you want to marry me?”
There was no one else in the hallway, but he’d definitely prefer more guaranteed privacy. He took her arm and led her to his room. When he closed the door, he leaned against it and watched her. “Do you remember a woman named Victoria Markum?”
Misty backed up until her knees hit his mattress, then dropped onto it. “Yes. She was Mr. Collins’s girlfriend.”
He nodded. “Well, I hired some people to talk to her.”
She frowned in confusion. “You hired people?” At his nod, she asked, “But why?”
“To prove your innocence. And don’t give me that look, Malone. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to start squawking about me spending my money. This is something I wanted to do, all right?”
“I’ll pay you back—”
“The hell you will.” Morgan went to her and sat beside her, then took her hands. “Can’t you just accept that I care and I want to help?”
She searched his face for a long time before she grudgingly said, “Thank you. I don’t know what to say.”
“You could ask me what I found out.”
“All right.” She bit her lip, her face filled with anxiety. “I hope, judging by the way you’re acting, it’s good news?”
“As a matter of fact, it is. You see, Malone, I believed you when you said you hadn’t taken the money. That meant someone else did, of course. I wondered if perhaps Ms. Markum might have done it.”
Misty squeezed his fingers; her hands were ice cold. “I never even considered that. I kept wondering if someone had managed to slip into the store and open the register while I was in the rest room, or if maybe the money had just been miscounted, but…Victoria didn’t seem like a thief to me. She was…I don’t know. Too ditzy. And I think they were planning on getting married, so she’d have been sort of stealing from herself, right?”
Morgan held both her hands between his own to warm them. “Actually, they were planning on marrying, or at least, Ms. Markum was. But we found out that Ms. Markum and your boss had a falling out. He, it seems, took the money she’d been holding for him in her own savings account, and ran with it, so she was more than willing to talk to us. It didn’t even take much prodding, from what the investigator told me. You see, she didn’t steal the money…but he did.”
“What?”
“Collins had been skimming from himself. Ms. Markum may be a ditz, but she has facts and dates and exact amounts that should corroborate her testimony. All we need to do now is contact your lawyer, who can file for a motion for the first trial to be declared a mistrial, based on the new evidence. The second trial should be scheduled quickly, probably within a month, because they won’t want you serving more of a sentence than you’ve already had to.”
She shook her head. “It can’t be that easy.”
“Actually it is.” He smiled, trying to reassure her. “Well, you’ll have to see the judge again, of course, but this time I’ll be with you.”
She stared at him in amazement, her bottom lip starting to quiver.
“Now, Malone,” he said uneasily, “don’t cry. I can’t stand it.”
Big tears welled in her eyes anyway. “I can’t believe you did this for me.”
He pulled her close and kissed the tip of her nose, which was starting to turn red. “I want you to be happy.”
She launched herself against him, knocking him back on the bed. She kissed his face, his throat, his ear. Morgan laughed even as he felt himself harden. There was no way Misty Malone could crawl all over him without turning him on. He caught her mouth and held her still for the deep thrust of his tongue, but pulled back slowly before