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Petrino—Christy to her family and friends, of which he was neither—was letting loose with fire-alarm caliber cries for help between pauses in which she appeared to be glancing over her shoulder. He hadn’t noticed the shrill sounds before now, probably because before now he’d been busy inside her house. He barely had time to rip the earpiece from his ear and stuff it inside the pocket of his shorts before she slid down the last dune and came bounding right at him.
    Time to think fast. Stand and bullshit, try to hide orrun? Since he was caught on her tiny concrete patio, with her house behind him and a rickety privacy fence rising six feet high to his left and right, both running and hiding were pretty much out. To get out of there he’d have to head straight toward her. Considering the moonlight, there wasn’t much hope that he could just blend in with the night and escape notice. As soon as she got a little bit closer, she was going to see him. Likewise, if he chose to move, the instant he stepped out of the narrow shadow cast by the overhanging eaves he would be visible. Since the name of the game here was covert operation, doing anything that might make her suspect that her house had been invaded while she’d been out was obviously not a good idea. The alternative was to hold his ground … no, advance … no, rush forward as if he were hurrying to her assistance, having used his keen powers of perception to discern from her cries for help that she was a damsel in distress.
    And turn his bullshit generator on high.
    As a plan it was cobbled together but it would have to do. He was out of time. Because she’d seen him. There was no mistaking that. Her eyes found him as he stood motionless as a statue there amid her knee-high shrubbery. They widened with horror. Her mouth dropped open. Letting go of her long skirt so that it fell like a curtain over truly admirable legs, she skidded to a stop just feet away from the patio’s edge and raised her hands defensively as though to ward him off.
    “Hey there, what’s the problem?” he asked in hearty good-guy mode, and, operating on the theory that thebest defense was a good offense, strode out into the moonlight toward her.
    Bad move. Backpedaling, she shrieked like she’d just come face-to-face with Son of Sam. Luke blinked, recoiling at the blast, then watched in bemused surprise as her foot caught on something and she abruptly sat in the sand, just missing planting her sexy little tush in a well-established fire ant hill. A small flashlight, a large cigarette lighter, something shiny and cylindrical that she’d been holding, flew out of her hand to land in the sea oats at the base of the nearest dune. She glanced behind her as if to see where the object had gone. Then her head snapped back around. Wide-eyed and clearly terrified, she looked up at him.
    “Get away from me! Help! Help!”
    “Hang on now …” He moved toward her with the clear intention of assisting her to her feet.
    “Keep away!”
    She frantically crab-walked backward, getting a little hung up in her loose dress but still managing to propel herself away from him at a pretty good clip. He couldn’t help it: he succumbed to a flicker of purely male appreciation even as he watched her retreat. Her legs, long and slim and tanned, were phenomenal, as he remembered from his previous observations of her. They were also bared clear up past No Man’s Land, which unfortunately for his continued appreciation of the view was covered by either shiny black panties or a shiny black bathing suit bottom. Her breasts—nice breasts, not too big but round and perky, constrained by either a flimsy bra or bathing suit top beneath thedress—jiggled like the real things. Her dark hair flowed down her back, her big dark eyes were wide as Frisbees, and her pointy-chinned, high-cheekboned face was turned up so that her delicate features caught the moonlight. Mob honey or not, she was a babe, and right at that