Mr. Perfect (Page 17)

"Not bad," she said, turning to examine the result. "Not bad at all."

Luckily her hair was no problem. It was thick and glossy, a nice dark reddish brown, and had plenty of body. Her current style was a sort of modified shag that required no more than brushing, which was good, because raising her arms made her ribs hurt. She made short work of the brushing.

But there was a bruise on her cheekbone. She scowled in the mirror and gingerly touched the small blue spot. It wasn’t sore, but it was definitely blue. She seldom did a full makeup job – why waste it on work? – but today she would have to bring out the big guns.

By the time she sashayed out the door in her chic serendipitous outfit and with full battle paint in place, she thought she looked pretty damn good.

The jerk – Sam – was unlocking his car door when she stepped out. She turned and took her time locking the door behind her, hoping he would simply get into his car and leave, but no such luck.

"Are you okay?" he asked, his voice right behind her, and she nearly jumped out of her skin. Stifling a shriek, she whirled. Bad move. Her ribs protested; she gave an involuntary groan and dropped her keys.

"Damn it!" she shouted, when she could breathe again. "Stop sneaking up on me like that!"

"It’s the only way I know," he said, his face expressionless. "If I waited until you turned around, I wouldn’t be sneaking." He paused. "You cussed."

As if she needed him to point that out. Fuming, she dug in her purse for a quarter and slapped it in his hand. He blinked as he looked down at the quarter. "What’s this for?"

"Because I swore. I have to pay a quarter when I’m caught. That’s how I’m motivating myself to stop."

"Then you owe me a hell of a lot more than a quarter. You said a couple of words last night."

She curled her lip at him. "You can’t go back into the past and collect. I’d have to empty out my bank account. You have to catch me at the time."

"Yeah, well, I did. Saturday, when you were mowing your lawn. You didn’t pay me then."

Silently, her teeth gritted together, she dug out another quarter.

He looked extremely smug as he pocketed his fifty cents. Any other time she might have laughed, but she was still mad at him for scaring her. Her ribs hurt, and when she tried to stoop down to retrieve her keys, they hurt even more. Not only that, her knee refused to bend. She straightened and gave him a look of such frustrated fury that one corner of his mouth twitched. If he laughs, she thought, I’m going to lock him under the chin. Since she was still standing on her stoop, the angle was perfect. He didn’t laugh. Cops were probably taught to be cautious. He bent down to pick up her keys. "The knee won’t bend, huh?"

"Neither will the ribs," she said grumpily, taking the keys and easing down the three steps.

His brows lowered. "What’s wrong with your ribs?"

"He landed a punch."

He blew out an exasperated breath. "Why didn’t you say something last night?"

"Why? They’re not broken, just bruised."

"You know this for a fact, huh? You don’t think maybe they could be cracked?"

"They don’t feel cracked."

"And you have so much experience with cracked ribs you know how they feel."

She set her jaw. "They’re my ribs, and I say they’re not cracked. End of discussion."

"Tell me something," he said conversationally, strolling beside her as she stalked, as best as she was able, to her car. "Is there ever a day when you don’t pick a fight?"

"The days when I don’t see you," she shot back. "And you started it! I was prepared to be a nice neighbor, but you snarled at me every time you saw me, even though I apologized when BooBoo got on your car. Besides, I thought you were a drunk."

He stopped, surprise etched on his face. "A drunk?"

"Bloodshot eyes, dirty clothes, getting home in the wee hours of the morning, making a lot of noise, grouchy all the time as if you had a hangover… what else was I to think?" He rubbed his face. "Sorry, I wasn’t thinking. I should have showered, shaved, and dressed in a suit before I came out to tell you that you were making enough noise to raise the dead."

"Just grabbing a clean pair of jeans would have sufficed." She unlocked the Viper and began to consider another problem: how was she going to get into the low-slung little rocket?

"I’m refinishing my kitchen cabinets," he offered after a short pause. "With the hours I’ve been working lately, I’m having to do it a little at a time, and sometimes I fall asleep with my dirty clothes on."

"Did you ever think of leaving the cabinets until your off days and getting a little more sleep? It might help your disposition."

"There’s nothing wrong with my disposition."

"No, not if it belongs to a rabid skunk." She opened the car door, stowed her purse inside, and tried to psych herself up for the effort of sliding behind the wheel. "Hot set of wheels," he said, looking the Viper over. "Thanks." She glanced at his Pontiac and didn’t say anything. Sometimes silence was more charitable than words.

He saw the glance and grinned. She wished he hadn’t done that; the grin made him look almost human. She wished they weren’t standing out in the early morning sun, because she could see how dense his black eyelashes were and the rich brown striations in his dark eyes. Okay, so he wasn’t a bad-looking man, when his eyes weren’t red and he wasn’t snarling.

Suddenly his eyes went cold. He reached out and gently rubbed his thumb along her cheekbone. "You have a bruise there."