The flight from New York to Chicago had first been delayed. Then they had encountered a storm front over Pennsylvania, sending half the passengers scrambling for their airsick bags. The man in the seat next to her had snored, and his hand had fallen in her lap three times. Given that she didn’t even want to be on this insultingyou’re a girl so you do itassignment, she was not in a good mood.
Then walking across the garage, struggling to keep her flipping suitcase rolling without toppling over sideways, she had looked up and met the gaze of the most gorgeous guy she had ever seen. Caramel brown hair. Chocolate eyes. A deep summer tan and shoulders as wide and rock solid as the Grand Canyon.
The smelly damp garage had receded, replaced by images of rolling in a floral meadow with him, naked in a world of sensual pleasure where problems don’t exist.
But then the whole fantasy had been shot to hell when he had started towards her, an intense and somehowdangerouslook in his eye.
Dangerous was sexy in theory. The reality was less than titillating in a dark secluded parking garage.
A total stranger running intently towards her was a little nerve-racking, no matter how cute. Ted Bundy had been cute, and look how he had turned out.
It was a sad testimonial to her pathetic social life that the only man to show interest in her in ages had probably intended to rob her.
Exiting the garage, she put double chocolate fudge eyes out of her mind and tried to figure out where she was.
“Shoot!” Reese saw immediately she had turned the wrong way down a one-way street.
Doing a quick U-turn, she hit the control on the car panel to talk to her GPS.
For being an investigative reporter, she had an appalling sense of direction. She had estimated that she had been rerouted at least forty-seven times in the last two years. She was starting to feel like she was besties with her phone’s personal assistant.
“I need to get to the Crowne Plaza Hotel on North Wabash, please.”
“What, like it’s hard? One moment.”
She had changed the voice on her GPS to be in the style of Reese Witherspoon from Legally Blonde, which always entertained her. Reeses needed to stick together.
Reese flipped the rearview mirror down as she idled at a red light, checking her lipstick. Just as she had suspected. Gone. Good thing the society wedding she was covering for the paper wasn’t until tomorrow. They would slap an apron on her and send her to the kitchen with hair like this.
She flipped the mirror back up, then frowned. What was that flash of green behind her? Why did that car look familiar?
“Head towards the airport exit on 1-190 East for two point seven miles.”
“I can do that.” She checked the mirror again. The green car was still behind her. And there was something about the driver…she was terrible at placing faces.
“I’m on 1-190 now.” Not that Elle Woods cared, but it made her feel better to have a back and forth exchange.
The green car stayed right behind her.
“Now continue on 1-90 East for five point eight miles.”
Darting her eyes back and forth from the road and the mirror, Reese felt a flicker of annoyance. She knew who that was. It was the guy from the garage. He was following her.
Of all the nerve.
Her hands tightened on the steering wheel as she tried to tell herself it was a coincidence. It was possible that he needed to go in the same direction she did. People did that. Go in the same direction.
It was also possible he was following her on purpose.
Without thought, she jerked the wheel hard to the right and squeezed onto the exit ramp, just missing the guardrail.
“You’ve gone the wrong way. Return to the route.”
The car was still behind her.
She went left at the light at the exit, her tires squealing as she took the corner at forty-five miles an hour, her high heel slipping on the gas as she floored it.
“Rerouting.”