Hot in Hellcat Canyon Read Online Free PDF Page B

Help.”
    If only there was a big brass bell just like that for every occasion in life that warranted it, he thought.
    She was about the same age as the motherly woman at the Misty Cat, and her hair color, the only flamboyant thing about her, was the same flame red. Either they were related or that particular color was on sale at Costco last week.
    She glanced up.
    She froze in place, one hand on the adding machine, the other on her ledger.
    Then she whipped off her reading glasses as if they might be causing her to hallucinate.
    She stared a moment longer, then a bemused smile spread all over her face.
    “Well, what lucky wind blew you off course, hon? Need a room? A wife?” She gave her lashes an exaggerated flap.
    He perked up. He did enjoy a big personality. And he could field that line like Babe Ruth.
    “Well, that all depends”—he paused for effect—“on whether you’re single.”
    “Let me just pack a bag and write a farewell note to my husband.”
    “Okay, but hurry it on up. Just think of all the time we’ve wasted up until now.”
    She clapped a hand over her heart as if Cupid had pierced it then and there.
    He grinned. One magazine article had described him as an “Olympic-caliber flirt” and he’d considered it an honor. There was nothing to it, really. You had to like women. A lot. And they had to like you. A lot.
    Her cell phone chirped an incoming text and she reflexively flicked her eyes down.
    She went absolutely motionless again.
    Her eyebrows dove into a puzzled frown.
    She jammed her reading glasses back onto her face.
    She remained absolutely still.
    Then she levered her head up very, very slowly. And stared at him again.
    Word certainly does travel fast in small towns, he thought dryly.
    “You would probably be Mr. McCord,” she said, sounding somewhat subdued.
    “I am indeed Mr. McCord,” he agreed pleasantly. Sorry that she was subdued.
    Her aplomb stuttered for a millisecond as she stared at him and decided how one addresses a movie star, or whatever he was now. Moments like this had never stopped being odd for him. He was exactly the same person now as he was two minutes ago.
    “Well, it’s an honor, Mr. McCord.”
    “Pleasure’s all mine,” he said smoothly.
    Another funny little silence went by. He suspected this woman was thrown for the first time in her practical, efficient life.
    “I can’t say I watched your show,” she blurted finally, as if confessing a crime. It was a blend of apology and defensiveness. “ Blood Brothers , was it?”
    “Not everybody did. Not even my own mother.” Then again, his mother had died when he was ten.
    But she relaxed visibly, as if she’d been excused from a breach in etiquette.
    She got brisk again. “As luck would have it, we’ve got one room left. Real pretty and has a view of the peak.”
    “Sounds perfect.” He didn’t ask what peak.
    “Has its own bathroom.”
    “Always a plus.” He could predict right now what the soap smelled like here. He had a manly sandalwood-scented or something or other in his overnight bag. Which he might have to use to scrub the potpourri scent out of his hair.
    “Right next to the honeymoon suite.”
    “That’ll do just fine.” As long as he wasn’t in the honeymoon suite. He’d enjoyed an unbroken streak of remaining out of honeymoon suites for most of his adult life and that was the way he liked it.
    “We do get a lot of young couples in love here,” she added proudly.
    “It does make the world go round.” The “L” word. Probably the only four-letter word J. T. had never willingly uttered in his life, at least to a woman.
    She smiled at him. “No smoking, no hijinks, and breakfast buffet is served in the lounge from 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. If you need anything you can just call the front desk. My name is Rosemary.”
    “Just out of curiosity, if a person had hijinks in mind, where in Hellcat Canyon would he go?”
    She licked a finger and swiped a bright pink flyer from a little