"Twelve years."
"You like it?"
He frowned at her, hoping she"d get the message and cut it out. She gazed back at him, unfazed. "It"s a living," he said.
She forked a piece of broccoli. "You"re also with a search and rescue team?"
"Rocky Mountain Search and Rescue." He wondered if she was merely curious or if she was going somewhere with all the questions. "Don"t ask me if I like it."
"That was my next question."
"Eat your dinner."
"Hey, I"m just trying to make conversation."
Silence fell between them again when she reached over and used a small container of salt. "You ever been married?" she asked.
He shot her another dark look. "No."
"Why not?"
"Because I never met anyone I wanted to marry."
"No need to get testy."
"Yeah, well, no offense, but I"m not real big on conversation."
"Now there"s a surprise." She forked a carrot, then chewed it thoughtfully. "You believe I"m innocent, don"t you, Jake?"
"What makes you think that?"
She shrugged. "I can tell."
He tried to concentrate on his meal, but the chicken and vegetables had lost their taste. "This is your last meal until we get back, Blondie. I suggest you eat it while it"s hot, try to enjoy it, and stop talking so d.a.m.n much."
"You want to let me go, but you can"t because it goes against your grain, doesn"t it?"
He continued eating, avoiding her gaze. "I"m not going to have this conversation with you."
"Really?" she asked sharply.
"Really."
"You want to know what I think, Jake?"
"Not particularly." Sighing, he set down his fork and glared at her. "But I reckon you"re going to tell me anyway, aren"t you?"
"I think you can"t trust me because someone hurt you. My guess is it was a woman. Am I close?"
Jake nearly choked on a piece of carrot. Clearing his throat with a sip of water, he set his plate down and shook his head. "Look, Abby, I really don"t want to talk about this."
"Am I right?"
"No."
"Who was she?"
"n.o.body."
"I think she would have had to be someone, Jake. I mean, you"re not the kind of man who would...get involved with just anyone."
"I"m the kind of man who likes to keep my private life private."
"Since we"re stuck here together for the next few hours, I thought we could use this time to get to know each other."
"I know all I want to know about you."
"That may be so, but I"m curious about you."
"I"m boring, believe me. You don"t want to know."
"You"re closed."
"Closed? Well, h.e.l.l, maybe you could take a hint."
"You"re dying to know what I mean by "closed" aren"t you?"
He scowled at her. "Not in the least."
"It means you don"t invite people into your life. You don"t let them get inside your head, so you don"t have to care about them. It means you"re not comfortable talking about yourself. You don"t like people to know what you"re thinking or feeling-"
"And people with hard heads like you just keep digging, don"t they?"
Undeterred, she continued. "I mean, look at you. I ask you one little question and you go into a panic."
"Now that"s a hoot."
"You"re touchy about it, too."
Determined to ignore her, he forced a laugh and resumed eating. "I suppose you moonlight as a shrink in your spare time."
"What did she do to you?"
"What did who do to me?"
"The woman who hurt you."
"Oh, for crying out loud!" Rising abruptly, he took the empty container to the trash bin in the kitchen area. Abby hadn"t finished with hers, so she remained by the fire. But Jake could feel her eyes on him, like sunlight coming through a magnifying gla.s.s, burning him. d.a.m.n, the woman knew how to drive a man nuts.
He went back to the fire, and sat cross-legged on his sleeping bag. Maybe if he turned the tables, she"d stop with the questions.
He shot her a hard look. "While we"re playing Twenty Questions, why don"t you tell me how you broke out of Buena Vista?"
She looked up from her food and considered him. "Are you asking as a cop, or are you merely curious?"
"I"m asking because I have absolutely no intention of talking to you about my personal life. How"s that?"
She took a sip of water, trying to look casual, but Jake could tell the conversation they were about to have was anything but casual for her. "After that night in the shower room, and I figured out that someone didn"t want me talking to the wrong person, I realized I wasn"t going to survive unless I got out. I knew someone would eventually catch me off guard. That I"d get a knife in my back or have an accident."
"The D.O.C. guys said you had a gun."
"It wasn"t a gun...exactly."
"What exactly does that mean?"
She bit her lip. "Can I tell you this in confidence?"
"I"m a cop, Abby. I can"t-"
"You can, Jake. It"s just you and me here. We"re stuck together. When this is over, you"re going to go back to your cop life. I"m going to go back to prison for a crime I didn"t commit."
He sighed, not liking the way she"d put that. "Okay. Off the record."
"I called...a friend. I told her what was happening. I didn"t want to involve her, but I was scared and desperate and we finally...came up with a plan over the phone."
"What was the plan?"
"She came to visit me."
"How did you get the gun?"
"She smuggled it into the prison in her-"
"Whoa!" Jake threw up his hands. "Stop right there."
"-panty hose."
A relieved breath slid between his lips.
"And it wasn"t a gun." He must have looked at her blankly, because she explained. "It was a squirt gun."
"A squirt gun?"
She nodded. "I"ve never used a gun, so I probably couldn"t hit the broad side of a barn. And then there"s that nifty metal detector at the prison entrance."
"You mean to tell me you broke out of Buena Vista Corrections Center for Women with a squirt gun?"
"Turns out I didn"t need it." She bit her lip. "I know it sounds crazy."
"That appears to be the theme we"ve been keeping."
"Evidently."
"How did you plan to clear your name?" he asked after a moment.
She slanted him a look, her eyes cool. "Are you asking as a cop, Jake?"
He stared back, realized he was-and that he would use it against her if he had to. He hoped it never came to that. Her status as an escaped con aside, he"d grown to like Abby Nichols. h.e.l.l, he"d even developed a strange sort of respect for her. "Maybe I am."
"In that case, I"ll take the fifth." Turning away from him, she walked over to the duster hanging near the mantel and pulled it down. "Nice and dry," she said to no one in particularly.
The duster made him think of that morning. She"d been wearing it when she"d left the cabin. When he"d tackled her off that horse and come down on top of her. He stared at her, willing himself not to remember the way she"d felt beneath him. The smell of her hair. The way her body had conformed to his. She"d fought surprisingly well for such a small woman. And when that hadn"t worked, she"d kissed him, and Jake had lost his mind and kissed her back.
h.e.l.l.
He looked down at his hands, realizing he couldn"t let what happened between them pa.s.s without comment. This situation, his relationship with this woman, was getting more complicated by the minute. If he wasn"t careful, he could find himself in serious trouble-if he wasn"t already. If she got back to the prison and yelled foul-or G.o.d forbid, accused him of s.e.xual contact-Jake could very well find his career down the tubes.
"There"s something we need to talk about," he said gruffly.
She didn"t even bother to look at him as she folded her sleeping bag and spread it on the floor. "Oh, yeah? What"s that?"
"Well, we need to discuss what happened today."
"A lot of things happened today, Jake." She sat on the sleeping bag, pulled the duster around her shoulders and shot him a challenging look. "Do you think you could be a little more specific?"
"I guess you"re not going to make this easy on me, are you?"
"I guess not."
Jake scowled. "The...kiss, d.a.m.n it."
"Oh. That." She busied herself smoothing the duster over her. "It was no big deal."
The offhand way she"d said the words shouldn"t have ruffled him, but it did. He didn"t want to admit it, but that kiss had definitely been a big deal. Considering he was an officer of the law and she was an escaped convict in his charge, Jake figured the entire fiasco was pretty d.a.m.n monumental.
"Don"t pull that again, Abby."
"Me?"
"Yeah, you."
"If I"m not mistaken, it takes two people to engage in a kiss."
He would have argued the point if she hadn"t been right. But she was. He"d kissed her back, and he hated himself for it. True, she might have initiated it, but he should have shown a little restraint and stopped it. Why was it so hard to do the right thing when it came to this woman?
"It was...improper. I"m a cop. I shouldn"t have...done that."
"Worried I might tell someone, Jake? Get you into trouble?"