Smart Mouth

by Erin McCarthy

Genres: Women's Fiction; Contemporary Romance; Romantic Comedy

Synopsis

"I'll leave as soon as you give me what I want." In another time and place, that might have a nice ring to it. But standing in a Chicago hotel room with a cub reporter as obstinate as she is hot, FBI agent Derek Knight knows he has to play it charming. Something like, "By holding on to that evidence, you're interfering with FBI business, ma'am, and by the way, those long, gorgeous legs of yours would look awfully good wrapped around my. . ." Sure, losing all sense of professionalism may not help his career, but the off-duty perks would be sensational. . . "Yeah, right, you're an FBI agent. And I can bake a cake from scratch." Reese Hampton is not giving up the envelope she found in her rental car--the one with the story that could take her from journalistic Siberia straight to the front page. She'll just have to outsmart the certifiably insane Fed with the movie-star good looks. Dodge and weave. Distract and bed. No! Bad hormones, bad! Still, spending time with that unbelievably broad chest up close and personal might just add, um, depth to her story. If only she can let her robe down while keeping her guard up. . .

Release date: April 6, 2010

Publisher: Brava

Print pages: 352

Sample

“Where is it? You said it was going to be here.” Derek Knight looked around the front and back seats of the rental car again in impatience as he spoke into his cell phone.

Nothing. No envelope.

Which meant his informant was an imbecile and he was dead meat.

He was so close to busting this case wide open. All he needed was a little more evidence, which was supposed to have been dropped in this car by the speaker on the other end of the phone.

“Well, I put it there,” came the anxious whisper.

Derek rubbed his eyes. Jesus. Dealing with this guy was giving him heartburn like he hadn’t experienced since the first messy days after his divorce. He fumbled in his pocket for antacids and popped two in his mouth, chewing the chalky tablets rapidly.

Movement to the left caught his attention. He looked up and saw nothing but legs. Female legs. That stretched firm and smooth from the ground right to eye level as he sat in the driver’s seat. At one point those legs were covered by a short skirt the color of an olive, but it didn’t matter.

They still beckoned him, toying with him, distracting him from the task at hand. He sent the window down with a soft purr and listened to the sound of her heels hitting the concrete, echoing around the dark garage as her hips rolled and swayed and those legs bent seductively at the knee with each step.

He looked past the legs to the narrow waist, the luscious chest, and to the straight auburn hair flowing across her shoulders. She turned, met his gaze. Her eyes went wide with awareness, her plump lips opened as she clutched her rolling suitcase tighter.

Do something, he thought through an unexpected haze of lust, painfully aware that it had been months and months since he’d been on a date.

Talk to her.

Then the voice coming over the phone line repeated insistently, “I’m telling you I put it there myself thirty minutes ago. In the red Ford Taurus.”

Derek heard the last words and snapped to attention. “Hold it. You said the green Ford Taurus.”

“No, I didn’t. I said the red one. It’s parked in the far corner under the second floor sign.”

Derek swore. He had to be the only agent in the history of the bureau to have a color blind whistle-blower. “Okay, I’ll call you back.”

He could see the car in question. It was across from him. And damn if it wasn’t Legs unlocking it and popping the trunk.

“Excuse me,” he called over to her as he threw open the car door and stood up.

She flung her suitcase in the trunk and ignored him, heading to the driver’s side door of the car with her cute little backside to him.

“Excuse me, miss, I think you have the wrong car.” Derek started to jog over to her, images of his butt hung in an FBI sling by Nordstrom, his less-than-happy boss, flashing through his mind.

She opened the door and turned to enter the car. She frowned as she hastened to get in the car. “Don’t come near me,” she yelled. “I have Mace.”

He stopped and stared in astonishment as her hand popped out holding a spray can in a threatening manner.

Christ, she thought he was attacking her. “No, you don’t understand. There’s been a mix-up with the cars and . . .”

The door slammed shut, the lock clicked, the engine roared, and Derek had to leap back to prevent a broken foot as she backed up with the speed of a NASCAR driver.

“What the hell?” he muttered, then realized that months worth of planning and negotiating were fleeing in that car with her. Not to mention those awe-inspiring legs.

With his own burst of speed that made his bad knee scream, he went back to the green Taurus and followed her, on her tail in sixty seconds as she swung around the first floor curve of the garage.

After his last case, when he had skirted procedure a time or two, Nordstrom would be more than happy to see him in the basement pushing papers for the rest of his life.

He was not giving up those documents without a fight.

Reese Hampton tossed her purse and the Mace on the passenger seat, her eyes trained on the exit sign in front of her. She was exhausted. A hot shower and room service were the next order of business, and the only things that could redeem a flat-out lousy day.

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 lame you’re a girl so you do it assignment, 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 STD’s don’t exist.

But then the whole fantasy had been shot to hell when he had started towards her, an intense and somehow dangerous look in his eye.

Dangerous was sexy in theory. The reality was less than titillating.

A man running towards her in a dark secluded parking garage 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 life that the only man to show interest in her in ages was probably a psychiatric ward escapee.

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 that would call Map-Star, the live service that tracked down the car you were in and offered directions. It was why Reese always used this particular rental car company.

For being an investigative reporter, she had an appalling sense of direction. She had estimated that she had called Map-Star at least forty-seven times in the last two years. She was starting to get to know the employees by name.

They had even sent her a Christmas card the year before, which was thoughtful.

“Thank you for using Map-Star. This is Paula. How may I help you?”

“I need to get to the Crowne Plaza Hotel on North Wabash, please.”

“One moment.”

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?

“Okay, you need to head towards the airport exit on I-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 I-190 now.”

The green car stayed right behind her.

“Now continue on I-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.”

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.

“Miss, you’re not supposed to be turning.”

There was no question now that he was following her. He was right on her tail, the psycho, and Reese checked the doors to make sure they were all locked.

If this were New York, she would know where she was going and could head to the police station to file a stalker report. Or call a friend to meet her. But here, in Chicago, she had no idea where she was and no one she could call.

But Reese had no fear of speed.

She weaved in and out of traffic, a certain thrill racing through her. “Heh, heh, think you can catch me?” she gloated to the rearview mirror.

“Ma’am?”

A beer truck cut her off, causing her to slam on her brakes. The green car was back on her tail.

“Shoot! Okay, maybe you can catch me.” Along with alarm, she felt grudging admiration. Clearly this guy was a professional weirdo, as opposed to your run-of-the-mill weirdo.

“Ma’am?”

“What do I do now?” she wondered out loud, gliding through a stop sign.

“I don’t know, because you’re not following my directions,” came the exasperated voice of the Map-Star employee.

She jumped and threw her hand over her heart as her pulse leapt in fear. Yeesh. She had forgotten all about the Map-Star call she was still connected to.

Reese took another left turn and said, “Someone’s following me! I need you to call the police.”

There was a long silence. “Are you sure?”

“Yes!” What, like she was making it up? Call her what you want, she’d never been paranoid. She knew a lunatic when she saw one.

It was eight o’clock and any minute now Reese knew that daylight would be disappearing and night would cover the city in a shroud of creepy darkness. She would be utterly vulnerable, and annoyance was about to turn to fear if this guy persisted.

“Call the police.”

“I can’t call the police if you don’t stop and park somewhere. They’ll never find you spinning in circles.”

Okay, the attitude from Miss Map-Star wasn’t helping. She would call the police herself from her cell phone.

Reese slammed on her brakes at a red light and said, “Fine.” She clicked the button to disconnect the call, making a mental note to complain to Map-Star. Shouldn’t they call first and ask questions later? She could have been being carjacked or having a heart attack, for crying out loud.

Knuckles rapped on her window.

“Aahh!” She let out an involuntary scream. It was him, the gorgeous guy, who apparently was certifiably insane as well as movie star good-looking.

“Go away!” Some people had a really hard time taking a hint.

“No, you’re in the car I was supposed to get. There’s something . . .”

Reese didn’t wait to hear the rest. She turned right, ignoring the no turn on red sign. She was really starting to freak out. She’d seen a lot of strange things as a journalist, and come to think of it, even stranger things as a single woman trying to date, and every one of them was running through her mind right now.

She cut her thoughts out right there. That wasn’t going to help her get out of this situation alive and intact. This was no trickier than fending off her boss Ralph’s groping hands. The idea was to dodge and weave.

Glancing in the mirror, she saw that the green car was no longer behind her. Her foot eased on the gas, and her shoulders relaxed. Well, see. He had given up.

Much better. She reached for the Map-Star button to get step-by-step directions to her hotel. She hoped like hell the paper hadn’t gone cheap on her and gotten her a crummy hotel room. She deserved a freaking feather pillow after this, at the very least.

Without warning, the green car came from nowhere and pulled out in front of her, cutting her off and forcing her to slam on the brakes. Her car skidded as she screamed, and rode up onto the sidewalk a little. She was reaching for her cell phone to call the police, someone, anyone, when the man appeared at her window again.

“Listen, I’m sorry to bother you like this. Can we just switch cars, please? I left something in the car you have.”

He sounded normal. He looked normal. But there was nothing normal about nearly running her off the road in pursuit of his forgotten wallet or whatever it was he’d left in the car.

Thoughts tumbled in Reese’s head. If she opened the door, he could push her in and abduct her. But if she didn’t open the door, he would stand here all night, she was sure. She could throw the car in reverse, except a produce truck had slipped into the spot behind her. She couldn’t go forward. She could call the police, but she didn’t know where she was, and there were no street signs visible.

Telling the police you were somewhere near O’Hare outside a bookstore and a deli wasn’t going to cut it.

She could handle this. No problemo. Even if her knees were vibrating.

Trying to sound authoritative, she said, “Get back in your car and I’ll get out, okay?”

She would dash into the deli and abandon the stupid rental car. Let him have it. Of course, her suitcase was in her trunk, along with her laptop computer, but she could live without her PJ bottoms and her purple toothbrush. The paper probably had insurance for her laptop. If they didn’t, tough toenails, this was her safety in question here.

Estimating distance, she figured it was only fifteen feet to the front door of the deli, and people were entering and exiting on a regular basis. He couldn’t murder her in a deli, she didn’t think.

“Listen, lady, it’s not what you think. I’m with the FBI.” He started to put his hand in his pocket.

With hours of cop TV under her belt, Reese said, “Freeze! Get your hand out of your pocket.”

He stopped, startled. “I’m trying to show you my badge.”

“Yeah, right, you’re an FBI agent, and I can bake a cake from scratch.” Like she’d fallen off the turnip truck yesterday.

His lip twitched.

The loony was laughing at her. “Get back in your car!” she ordered him, fury overcoming fear.

“Okay, that’s fine.” He held up his hands as if to reassure her and went back to his car.

The minute he closed the door, she grabbed her purse, her briefcase, and her Mace, and flung open the car door. Stumbling a little as her heels hit the sidewalk, her briefcase slipped out of her hand.

Instinctively, she bent to get it and the white Tyvek envelope that had slid to the ground with it.

“Hey, that’s my envelope!”

Oh, no. His voice sounded like it was coming from outside the car. She should have known not to trust a lunatic. Reese grabbed everything and ran for the door, still half hunched over. With her free hand, she pushed open the door and tumbled in just as she sensed his presence behind her.

His voice was smooth, low. It sent shivers dancing up her spine.

“I just want the envelope in your hand. If you hand it to me, I swear I’ll walk away and you’ll never see me again. Or at least let me show you my badge.”

When she bit her lip and paused, he added, “You realize you’re interfering with official FBI business.”

She wondered if she should believe him. He looked sexy enough to be a federal agent. Way better than that wimpy paranoid Mulder.

Besides, he didn’t really look like a lunatic. But who really knew what a lunatic looked like?

Taking stock, Reese realized she had not recovered the Mace after dropping it outside. Clutching her purse and briefcase, she looked around the room at a total loss as to how to act.

His hand touched her elbow just as she caught the eye of the twenty-year-old clerk behind the counter. She shot the clerk a pleading look, then took a deep breath.

Her dad had taught her always to speak up for herself.

“Don’t touch me!” she yelled, her elbow slamming into her pursuer’s stomach. “Someone call the police! Help me, he’s attacking me.”

She heard a grunt, stomped on his foot for good measure with the spiky heel of her shoe, and started running towards the kitchen, wishing she hadn’t quit aerobics back in ninety-nine after the ripped leotard incident. Crap, she was out of shape.

A middle-aged woman behind the deli counter beckoned her forward. “Come in the back while we call the police.”

Reese fought the urge to look back to see if she was still being pursued. The fear must have been obvious on her face.

“Don’t worry, there’re about three guys wrestling him to the ground right now,” the woman said, slipping a maternal arm around her.

Reese’s teeth were making a clattering sound like a baby’s rattle. She squeezed her lips shut and sank onto the hard wooden chair the woman pointed out to her in the stockroom.

“You poor thing. It’s not even safe to walk the streets anymore, for crying out loud.” The woman wiped her hands on her apron. “You just sit there and try to relax. I’ll get you some coffee, and the police should be here soon.”

Reese crossed and uncrossed her legs, waiting impatiently. It was a solid five minutes before the woman came back and the look of sympathy on her face had evaporated. There was no coffee in her hand, either.

“Did you know that man is an FBI agent?”

Reese snorted. “Don’t tell me you fell for that. Just saying you’re an FBI agent doesn’t make you one.”

The woman threw her a chastising look as she headed back towards the door. “The badge, the gun, and the police patting him on the back were enough for me.”

Reese sat up straighter. Okay, this could be bad. “You mean . . . he really is an FBI agent?”

“Umm-hmm.” With that and a toss of her head, she left. “I’m going to get an autograph for my grandson. He’s into law enforcement.”

Darn it. Reese jumped out of the chair and started pacing. FBI agents should know better than to pursue an innocent civilian before identifying themselves. She wasn’t a mind reader.

She conveniently ignored that he had tried to tell her and had tried to show her his badge.

If he had been less weird she wouldn’t have elbowed him in the gut.

Which technically speaking, meant she had assaulted him.

There was only one thing to do. Grabbing her briefcase and purse she headed for the back door. She was going to hail a cab and put as much distance as she could between her and the crazy man with the chocolate eyes before she found herself in the slammer instead of the Crowne Plaza.

Derek stared at the floor and tried not to groan out loud. Man, he hadn’t handled a case this badly since he was a rookie. It had never occurred to him that Legs would think he was stalking her.

Nor had he anticipated she would put up such a fight.

Thanks to her quick thinking and tenacity, he was face-down on a dirty deli floor with four guys behind him, holding his arms and threatening to sit on him if he made one move.

“Listen, this is all a mistake,” he said to the floor, trying to twist his head. Of all the humiliating things to have happened. He hoped this little escapade wouldn’t get around the office.

They never would have gotten him on the ground if there hadn’t been four of them, and he hadn’t been preoccupied with watching to see where Legs was going. Not to mention the agonizing pain in his foot where her heel had penetrated.

He still might have been able to take them, but at the last second, his bad knee had buckled and he’d gone down when one of these idiots had jumped on his back. Now here he was on the damn floor, and his evidence, the compilation of months of planning, was in the back room with a woman who thought he was a serial killer.

“The only mistake you made was pulling your scumbag act here in front of us,” a voice from behind him said, squeezing Derek’s arm for emphasis.

It figured he would encounter an overzealous bunch of Good Samaritans.

“If you get out my wallet, you can see for yourself. I’m a federal agent, and you’re interfering with an investigation.”

“Yeah, right,” the voice scoffed.

He attempted a shrug, but his shoulders were pinned to the floor. “Look for yourself.”

“I’m not digging in your pocket.” Horror was clear in the young deli clerk’s voice.

Derek pulled hard on his hand, freed it a little and pulled out his wallet. He tossed it next to him. “Have a look.”

A moment later, hands eased up. “Is this real?”

Derek took the opportunity to move out from under his captors’ hands and sit up. He brushed dirt off his sweatshirt. “Yes.”

He spotted the men in blue coming through the front door as the four guys in their early twenties gaped at him. Derek said, “Ask the cops.”

The kids nudged each other and looked sheepish. Derek found he couldn’t be that angry with them. Hey, at least they were sticking up for what they thought was a defenseless woman.

The deli clerk said, “No way. Did we like totally screw up? Was that woman like a major criminal?”

The one with fluffy poodle hair nodded. “I bet she’s one of those madams running a call girl ring for senators and stuff.”

His friend scoffed. “There are no senators in Chicago.”

Derek sighed. He was strongly starting to suspect this day wasn’t going to turn out the way he had hoped. Which pretty much summed up every day for the last two years.

The two patrolmen sauntered over. The older of the two glared at them each in turn and said, “What the hell’s going on here?”

“Dude, we didn’t know he was FBI, man. We just saw him grabbing the chick and we were trying to help her. Totally innocent, that’s what we are.” The deli clerk started to scoot back away from Derek, his hands in the air.

His three friends nodded vigorously. One said, “Seriously, man. We were just trying to protect the hot babe, and then it turns out he’s FBI. No way we could have known that.”

The cop turned to Derek, who had managed to get himself and his stiff leg off the floor. Jesus, he was like an old man as things popped and creaked when he righted himself. His knee throbbed, giving him just one more reminder of his past poor judgment.

“What’s your story?” the cop asked, tucking his hands into his belt and looking resigned to his life.

“I’m a federal agent. I was in the process of apprehending a female who has pivotal evidence in her possession when I was ambushed by the Mob Squad here.” Derek glanced over to the door where Legs had retreated. “I need to see if she’s still on the premises.”

The cop, who had taken his badge from the clerk and was studying it, said to his partner, “Go check i. . .