Twice A Target (Task Force Eagle) Read Online Free PDF

arms.
“This small talk isn’t like you. What are you getting at, Holt?”
    He drew a breath. “How’d you like to stay here
awhile?”
    Maddy’s pulse quickened. She stopped dead at the
cherry table. Had she heard him correctly? A laugh bubbled from her throat. “I
must be more tired than I thought, or maybe that beer dulled your brain. I
could’ve sworn you just invited me to stay at the Valley-D.”
    “I did.”
    She cocked her head. “Now why would you do that? A few
minutes ago, you couldn’t wait to see the last of me.”
    Crimson daubed his lean cheekbones. As if aware of the
effect, he stalked to the door and gazed out at the lowering sun. Definitely
not at her. He jammed his hands in his pockets, pulling the denim taut against
his backside.
    Still a world-class butt too. Maddy joined him at the
door.
    He nodded toward the hill behind the ranch house.
“It’ll be dark soon, and you haven’t been to the cemetery yet. You would only
have to come back tomorrow. You have no car. We can fetch your stuff.”
    He wanted her to stay, was making excuses for her to
stay. But why? He hadn’t forgiven her for jilting his brother. Nor himself for
his part in that fiasco. That was as obvious as a flash bulb.
    She didn’t get it. What was he after? No way could she
stay at the Valley-D. She could sleep in the truck another night. Maybe her
funds would be deposited tomorrow. Or the next day. Shit. “I’ll call Luke or
Will for a ride. Tomorrow I’ll rent a car.”
    “Rent a car? In Rangewood? You have to be kidding.” He
turned to face her, and his sandy eyebrows beetled. He retreated a step in
apparent dismay that she stood within arm’s reach.
    Inordinately pleased that her proximity could
disconcert the man, Maddy smiled sweetly and edged a pace nearer. If she
crossed her arms in the same power stance, they’d bump. It would be like
hitting a wall.
    A very hard, very masculine wall.
    A safe wall. Or a dangerous wall?
    She curbed her impulse. News flash—Maddy McCoy not
acting on impulse. What was he up to? “Being nice to me for old time’s sake?
Another dose of Western hospitality?”
    “Go ahead and bunk at the motel. The drunks probably
don’t make too much noise.” He sidled away and leaned back against the cabinets,
folded his arms.
    No kidding. Into the wee hours last night, shouting
from the bar across the street from the garage had penetrated the walls of her
Rover. “An early alarm.”
    “See? No five-star resort like you’re used to.”
    “Little do you know. Photography assignments pay a
living, but not that much. Most of what I own is in one blue duffel and a
couple of titanium cases like that one by the door. The rest is in storage. On
the last trip to Kashmir, I slept in a tent. With bugs you wouldn’t believe.”
    He uttered a skeptical grunt. “I have a spare room you
can stay in. With its own bath. No bunk beds.”
    “I don’t buy it, Holt.” The anxiety, the shiftiness in
his eyes began while he was on the phone. “All this thoughtfulness has
something to do with your phone call.”
    “Now why would you think that?”
    “Get real. You don’t want me here any more than I want
to be here.” That was a lie. The Valley-D had once been her second home. Holt
and Rob’s dad had welcomed her like his own. Their mother too, when she was
still here.
    For now she had no home except her duffel bag. Her
parents traveled so much that their Huntington Beach condo didn’t count. A
pitiful state of affairs for a grown woman.
    She couldn’t stay, whatever his reason for asking. They
wouldn’t get along. He’d needle her about her non-existent fancy lifestyle and
about the past. Opening her heart to his Code-of-the-West integrity and
protectiveness would bring the dulled ache of her feelings for him into
floodlit exposure. Staying would prickle them both with guilt. Staying would
confuse her choices. Staying would be too dangerous for her heart.
    Teetering on a figurative corral fence,