But, let’s face facts. She was presently lying belly down in gross, damp weeds, hiding, while a hot, time-traveling bounty hunter took on a psychopath who’d apparently also just come through time into her little florist shop, intent on abducting the nearest woman – her, for the sake of argument – for the twenty-
sixth-century slave trade.
Still, why was she lying here? In hopes that her Aussie Greek god of a hero would rush in, save the day, then come back and . . . what? Yeah, what, exactly, Dani? Make mad, passionate love to you in a drainage ditch? Then beg you to join him and go back to his time?
And she’d been shaking her head, trying to decide just what kind of brain tumor would create such a completely involved, highly detailed psychotic break like the one she was obviously having. Something like that couldn’t possibly be operable, could it? Because, if that were true, then what harm was there in waiting for her space cowboy to kill the bad guy and come back for her, because at this point, psychotic-
break sex sounded pretty damn good. What little foreplay she’d had so far had been quite excellent, in fact. Win-win really, if she was going to die either way.
Which was why, when the sky over her shop exploded in a yellow-orange haze of smoke, she’d peeked.
What she saw was pretty damn impressive. Jack was facing the back entrance to the shop with some kind of small gadget in his hand, aiming it at the door, which – more or less – dissolved in front of her eyes. Then he palmed some other sort of weapon from the side of one of his boots and, crouching low, went inside the building.
Did she stay in the ditch and wait to see what happened? Or did she run to get help? Or did she go inside and make damn sure that the man who’d just kissed her like she was the last woman on Earth didn’t go and get himself killed before he could finish what he’d started?
She was up and running low across the alley before allowing herself to really think the plan through.
But then, she’d never been much of a sideline-sitter. Not since Tommy Decker had goaded her into diving into the lake at summer camp, despite the fact that she didn’t know how to swim. But the girls in her cabin had discovered Beemer and were incessantly taunting her, and drowning felt like a potentially acceptable alternative to a summer bunking with a hit squad of mean girls. Plus, Tommy was already showing asshole-guy tendencies. So, she’d dived in. And lived. Take that, Cabin Three bitches!
Of course, she’d been right about Tommy. Turns out he’d just wanted to see her in a wet T-shirt. He’d been all of nine at the time. If only she’d been more focused on that lesson learned instead of shutting up her bunkmates, she might have saved herself from the world of grief she’d suffered one year, four months, two weeks, and a couple of days ago. Because idiot boys like Tommy grew up to be asshole jerks like Adam.
But she wasn’t thinking about Adam, Tommy, or the mean girls of Cabin Three. She was thinking about the flower shop – her flower shop, dammit! Aunt Teddy and Uncle Deacon were both gone now, the family dairy farm long since sold off. Then, sixteen months ago, on that fateful, much recalled date, she’d discovered – as in, before-her-very-eyes – that Adam, her tax-accountant fiancé, was cheating on her with his much younger bookkeeping assistant. Whom he’d happily agreed to marry right away. This, after hemming and hawing over setting a date with Dani for four long years. That news had been capped recently when, while being maid of honor – again – for the last of her single friends, she’d overheard that the blissfully happy newlyweds were already expecting their first child.
Yeah. She was so over all of it now. Except, apparently, the prolonged sex deprivation. Which left her with her little fledgling florist business and not much else. If she lost that, then what?
She ducked behind her Jeep, straining to hear what sounds, if any, came from inside the shop. “Like what, Dani?” she muttered. “Gunshots?” Because, it was doubtful, given Jack had just vaporized the door to her shop without making so much as a whisper of sound, that whatever that little weapon thingie was, it would make any noise either. Of course, the person getting hit by whatever that weapon produced might at least scream. Right?
“Oh, for the love of—” She edged around the front of the Jeep, trying to decide what her best bet was, and what she could arm herself with. When a crashing sound came again, like shelves – many shelves – being toppled over, accompanied by much grunting, and what sounded like old-fashioned fists on flesh, she was on the move again. That they were killing each other was one thing, but she’d be damned if they’d just trash her shop while they did it. She didn’t think her new insurance policy covered destruction by alien invasion. Or . . . whatever.
She peeked around the corner of the door, wincing suddenly as a bite of heat hit her on the shoulder.
She looked down to see that the doorframe – what was left of it – had pretty much melted her shirtsleeve.
She edged inside the building. With the door gone, the moonlight penetrated the back room of the shop and bathed it in a dim glow. She scanned the storage shelves for anything that might help her defend herself and her shop. She wondered, briefly, if this Stoecker guy would fall for the toxic-glue gun thing, but figured it wasn’t worth the risk. Instead she palmed the biggest, heaviest crystal vase she could wrap one hand around, then crept closer to the swinging door that led to the front of the shop. More grunting, more crashing. More of what sounded like fists on flesh. Apparently men didn’t change much over the centuries. Not particularly surprising.
Without a set plan in place, other than to help Jack so the destruction of her shop would end before it was completely leveled, which had the dual win of thwarting the threat against her apparently black-
marketable person – and, well, yes, she hadn’t exactly forgotten that a win against Stoecker would allow them to get back to what they’d started out back by her Jeep – she quietly edged through the swinging door. Was it wrong that it was that last part that had provided the most motivation?
She didn’t have time to ponder that, as she was immediately confronted by two men, locked in mortal combat. Telling them apart was easy, even in the dim interior. Assuming it was Stoecker that Jack was currently wrestling with, the future world slave trader was as pale and blond as Jack was swarthy and dark. Plus, he had more clothes on. What he also had was a good fifty pounds and a few inches in height on Jack. He looked like a Nordic Incredible Hulk.
Neither of the men saw or heard her as she slowly moved toward her work table, intending to use it as a shield. Of course, they could probably just vaporize it, but she didn’t see weapons in either of their hands at the moment. She crouched down, gripping the vase more tightly. She edged behind the table, scanning the area now – in between wincing as they sent another display, then another, crashing to the floor – for any sign of Jack’s weapon.
Then she saw what looked like a cell phone, just out of Jack’s reach, on the floor, and realized it was what both of them were trying to grab at, while keeping the other from getting it first. She was trying to decide how good her chances were to grab the weapon herself, when Stoecker managed to get free from Jack and palm the small weapon. He writhed to his back, and lifted it – aiming it right at Jack, who was lunging at him, making Jack vulnerable for a shot right to the chest.