She told herself to stop thinking about David and Burke, but it was no good. She felt as if she’d gone back four years. Burke was still a threat. David was still trying to help her. She was more in love with him than ever. And he was still trying to get back with his ex-wife. Why hadn’t anything changed?
She couldn’t stay on guard for the rest of her life….
Shoving away from her computer, she massaged her temples. She had to do more than send out another flurry of press releases. David wouldn’t like it, but maybe she needed to be aggressive rather than sitting and waiting and hoping for the best. Maybe she needed to become more familiar with Burke and his lifestyle.
Maybe it was time to fight fire with fire.
After standing for more than five hours, Jane’s feet ached. She needed a break, and there finally seemed to be enough of a lull to take one. Sitting in her own salon chair, she lit a cigarette and gazed out the large front window advertising haircuts for ten bucks. The kind of cheapskates who wanted a ten-dollar haircut rarely remembered to tip. The last guy had handed her a fistful of change, which he said equaled ten dollars, but by the time she finished counting up all the pennies, he was gone and she was a dollar short.
“Jerk,” she muttered. She’d even worn a low-cut shirt. It increased her tip average. The men liked a good view, and she didn’t see how that hurt anything. A woman had to get by. But this last loser had leered, then stiffed her anyway.
“Hey!” Danielle, a fellow stylist, wagged a finger at her. “You can’t smoke in here. The State of California doesn’t allow it.”
“Screw the State of California. Nobody’s in here but you, and you smoke more in a day than I do.”
“The boss will smell it,” she warned. “And you’ll get yourself fired.”
“Who’s she going to replace me with? No one else will work so hard for so little.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. There’s a line of hopefuls right behind you, sugar.”
Jane didn’t want to hear it. “So? I won’t be needing this job much longer.” Oliver was getting out on Friday, and he was an educated man. Before their lives had gone to hell, he’d been making over a quarter million a year and they’d lived in a home that was the envy of all their friends. They’d regain what they’d lost. It was just a matter of time.
“You’re quittin’ then?”
Disgruntled that she couldn’t even smoke a damn cigarette in peace, Jane finally stubbed it out. “Happy?”
Danielle gave her a dirty look. “I didn’t make the law. Besides, you have to sweep up the hair around your chair before you take a break.”
Getting up, Jane grudgingly swept and straightened her station, then went out next to the smelly Dumpster in back, which was their designated “smoking area,” and lit up again. But she’d barely taken her first drag when Danielle stuck her head out the door. “Someone’s here to see ya.”
“Is he cute?” she asked.
“I’d go home with him.”
“That’s not saying much.”
Danielle scowled. “Shut up! You’re in such a crappy mood today.”
“You know I’m kidding,” Jane said, although she hadn’t been kidding at all.
“Doesn’t matter, anyway. Neither one of us could get this guy,” she responded with a shrug.
Jane studied her coworker. “He’s that hot?”
“We’re talking two hundred pounds of lean muscle, the tightest ass I’ve ever seen and the kind of lips that could keep a woman on her back for weeks.” With that, the door closed.
Choosing between her desire to smoke and her avid curiosity, Jane put out her second cigarette and followed Danielle inside. Then she wished she’d asked for a name. The guy was gorgeous, all right. With close-cropped dark hair, so dark it was almost black, light-green eyes and a rugged, well-sculpted face, he definitely made an impression.
Too bad he was the detective who’d put her husband away.
“What do you want?” she asked.
Danielle glanced up at her waspish tone.
“This guy’s a cop,” Jane told her.
“Must’ve heard you were smoking in the shop.” Danielle sent him a smile that showed her dimples, but also revealed her crooked teeth. “I hope he brought his handcuffs.”
Detective Willis’s eyebrows went up, but the grin he wore said he wasn’t uncomfortable with the compliment.
“Danielle’s getting desperate,” Jane grumbled. “The extra weight’s affecting her love life.”
Looking more surprised by her insult than Danielle’s shameless flirting, Willis didn’t comment on either. “Will you step outside with me for a minute?”
“Are you taking volunteers?” Danielle asked.
Giving her a more practiced smile, the kind of smile meant to be polite while maintaining a certain distance, he flashed a wedding band, the sight of which surprised Jane. Last she’d heard, the detective was divorced.
“Damn,” Danielle muttered. “The good ones are always taken.”
“Don’t let him fool you,” Jane said. “My husband could tell you a thing or two about the great detective.”
Willis’s intriguing eyes focused on her. “Do you really want to talk about your husband in here?”
His sober tone made Jane nervous. Did he have bad news? She knew he thought Oliver had murdered three women. She already battled nightmares featuring a policeman knocking at her door to tell her it was true. If this turned out to be that visit, Jane didn’t think she could cope. Not with the stress of ending her relationship with Noah while hanging in there for Kate.
“I can’t leave right now,” she said uncertainly. “You took away the breadwinner in my family, and now I’ve got bills to pay.” You’ve brought me enough grief. Please, God, make him go away.
But her prayers went unanswered.
“How long does it take you to do a haircut?” he asked.
“Twenty, thirty minutes.”
He handed her a twenty. “I just bought a half hour of your time. Would you prefer I sit in your chair, or can we go for a walk?”
She made a show of tucking the money into her bra, but his eyes didn’t lower to her cle**age. Danielle was right. She couldn’t get Detective Willis even if she wanted him. At forty-two, she was older, and the years were beginning to show. She had more years on him than she did on Oliver. Would her husband find her unattractive when he came home?