Worth the Trip Read Online Free PDF

don’t you go arrest them instead of wasting time with me?”
    “I don’t know who they are.”
    Norah stopped walking, half turning so she could zero in on his face while she talked to him. Trip didn’t like it. Then he reminded himself he wasn’t spinning the story for her, so it was okay.
    “Let me get this straight,” she said. “There were two guys in the audience you thought were suspicious.”
    “Yep,” he said, thinking she was just laying out the situation, getting her mental bearings, so to speak.
    “And I was sitting on the stage, in front of three cameras, where my biggest danger was humiliation at the hands of a blond mouthpiece.”
    “Um, yeah.”
    “So those guys probably wouldn’t have tried anything, not in the studio, anyway.”
    “No.”
    “So instead of staking them out or calling for backup, or any of the other law enforcement tactics, you kissed me.”
    Trip decided not to answer this time. He was only playing into her hands.
    “And when we got outside, they tried to run me over.”
    Trip heaved a sigh, wondering how the hell it happened. One minute he was in control of the conversation, and the next he felt like an idiot.
    Psychologists, he thought darkly, that’s how. But this situation wasn’t about mind games. “I don’t know if those guys were in the Lexus. In fact, I bet they weren’t. They didn’t have time to get out of the studio, retrieve their car, and come after you. Which means it was somebody else.”
    She looked over her shoulder, seeming to realize for the first time what had just happened.
    “This won’t be the last time you’re targeted,” Trip said, “and that probably won’t be the only guy who comes after you. Your father has a pretty big fan club—treasure hunters, insurance investigators, and your basic nutcases, just to name a few—and they’re all about to go into a treasure hunting frenzy. They all know he’s due to get out of jail soon, they’ll all be after the money, and they’ll all see you as a possible avenue to getting it.”
    “And you think you can protect me.”
    “Not unless you let me stick around, and that means at work and in your house, all the time. Night and day.”
    “Really? Is that what all the time means?”
    “It means there’s nothing you can do about it. I’m your shadow.”
    “Gee, I feel all warm and fuzzy now.”
    There, he thought, that snippy, sarcastic, pissed off tone. That was how he knew she understood what he was saying and she was on board with it. “I just want it to be clear.”
    “It’s clear. And stop looking at me like that,” she said, heading off in search of her car, “in fact, stop looking at me, period. And don’t touch me, either. And switch to unscented soap.”
    Trip chuckled, hooking his thumbs in the pockets of his jeans. “My soap is unscented.”
    “How about your shave gel?”
    “Nope.”
    “Deodorant?” She waved that off. “Never mind, I’ll have to deal with your aroma, especially since scent is one of the biggest . . . never mind,” she finished. “Just keep your distance.”
    “Because I smell?”
    “Yes. No, because you’re blowing this all out of proportion. I don’t think the guy in the Lexus missed us because he didn’t want to scratch the car. If he’d wanted us dead, we’d be splattered all over the sidewalk.”
    “Nice visual. But you’re right. He didn’t want you dead. He wanted to kidnap you and use you as leverage to get your father to give up the loot. Then he’d kill you.”
    “And you can stop with the scare tactics.”
    He blew out a breath. “Since we’ve already had this conversation how about I fast-forward? I think it ended with me saying ‘night and day,’ and you getting snotty about it.”
    “You remind me of my father—handsome, charming, and deceitful as all hell.” And there was the added complication, the huge complication, of her physical reaction to him, Norah admitted. And with her, it was a short trip from physical to