Dangerous Curves. Pamela Britton

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СКАЧАТЬ word that came to Cece’s mind, never mind that Blain’s brows rose like twin drawbridges at her tone of voice. She lifted an index finger in the universal sign meaning just one moment, and turned away to try and find a quieter area. Quieter? Hah.

      “Blain right there?” her boss asked when she told him to hold on a sec. At least she thought that’s what he said. It sounded more like, “Brain dead?”

      Yeah, she felt pretty brain dead at the moment. Here she was getting all excited about being in a stock car garage when what she should be doing was focusing on the job.

      She walked to the end of the building, that ever-present cold wind poking rude fingers through her mesh shirt.

      Note to self: no more cute shirts.

      “Now what’s this you say?” she said, crossing to the fence.

      “Someone at the airport saw Sanders make a call on his cellphone just before you two boarded.”

      “So?”

      “We looked into it. It was to the airline.”

      She tipped her head back for a second, a part of her noticing those storm clouds had gotten closer. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, Bob. He could have called the airline for any number of reasons. Besides, he’s the one that keeps insisting on an investigation. You told me yourself the president of the stock car association would rather this whole thing go away.”

      “Yeah, but he wouldn’t be the first twisted mind to insist the Bureau investigate a crime he’d committed.”

      “If a crime was committed,” she felt the need to say.

      “One might have been.”

      “What do you know that I don’t know?” she asked, instantly suspicious.

      “Nothing, nothing. I’m just telling you to keep your eyes open.”

      Ridiculous. The whole thing was ridiculous. She would like to have told Bob all the various reasons why she doubted Blain Sanders was the perp, starting with the fact that he’d been the most disgusted with her when she’d been arrested all those years ago. “Boy Scout” didn’t begin to describe Blain Sanders. But just then she saw the man of the hour himself round the corner of the building, waving her toward him.

      “Will do,” she said.

      But when Cece stuffed her phone in her pocket, she couldn’t help but shake her head. Blain, a suspect. Hah! And, dang it, what was wrong with these jeans? They were too tight to get her damn cellphone back in her pocket.

      Blain Sanders, stock car stalker. The thought of him as a bad guy was almost laughable. A man who refused to drag race on the street because it was illegal would not threaten to blow up a racetrack, much less kill his own driver.

      “Trouble?” he asked as she joined up with him again.

      “Nah. Just some office stuff.”

      The way his eyebrows arched like a cat’s back made her think he didn’t buy her excuse…not one bit, but that didn’t stop her from saying, “You ready to go?”

      He stared at her for half a heartbeat—long enough that she found herself thinking how odd it was to be here with him. After all the times she’d watched him on a giant TV, after all the times she’d fantasized about meeting up with him again.

       Fantasize?

      No. Not like that. Well, maybe once.

      Or twice.

      “Yeah. And we’ll need to hurry if I’m going to show you around before the next practice.”

      She nodded, stepping up her pace alongside him. “Is your car all fixed?”

      “Yeah. Thanks to you.” But he didn’t seem all that relieved.

      “More troubles?”

      He glanced at her in surprise. Cece glanced away, ostensibly to check out what was going on the garage, but more because she felt suddenly weird gazing at him. He looked so worried.

      “Our lap times at this morning’s practice weren’t as good as they should be,” he admitted.

      “Yeah, but you practice again tomorrow.”

      “Yeah, but qualifying is today. If the weather holds.”

      Blain motioned toward the grandstands. Cece followed his gaze. She could see the leading edge of those giant, bubblelike clouds.

      “We just can’t catch a break. Ever since…”

      His driver had died. He didn’t need to complete the sentence. Cece could read the look in his eyes. Worried. Tense. Not like a suspect. Jeesh, she almost felt sorry for him.

      Sympathy? For Blain Sanders? The man responsible for her one and only felony? Who’d given her such low self-esteem as a teenager that it’d taken a year of working at Bimbos before she’d started to think she might not be such an ugly duckling after all? Who’d blackmailed her into working this case? She must have bolts for brains.

      They reached the rear of his car, but the moment they arrived, a white-coated racing official said, “Blain, I need to see you for a moment.”

      Blain motioned for her to stay put, then followed the guy into the garage. Secret, confidential meeting. Must be important stuff. But that was okay because it gave her a moment to think.

      Blain a suspect?

      Not.

      “You here with Blain?”

      Cece jumped, turned.

      And there he was. Lance Cooper. Blain’s newly hired driver. Tall, handsome, and with such a warm smile on his face, it completely contradicted Cece’s mental image of cocky race car drivers.

      “Uh, yeah.”

      His smile grew wider, his white teeth startling against his tan face. Must be professionally bleached, Cece thought, even as she found herself wanting to return that grin.

      “The crew told me he was with a woman,” he said with a gleam in his light gray eyes. “One who fixed my car.”

      “That was me,” she said, thinking that he seemed nice.’ Course, he was new to this particular level of racing so maybe it hadn’t sunk in yet that he was a “big star.”

      “Thanks.”

      “My pleasure,” she said, giving in to the temptation to smile. He reached out a hand to shake hers. Cece automatically took it, thinking his messy blond hair gave him an almost boyish look.

      “How’d you figure out it was the coil wire?” he asked.

      “Lucky guess,” she answered, realizing there was nothing boyish about the look that suddenly entered his eyes.

      “Then СКАЧАТЬ