Hidden Riches

couple hours in the tank would cool you off.”
    He would, too, she thought viciously. Dora huffed, tapped her foot, folded her arms. “Give me a—”
    He already had a cigarette lit and was handing it to her.
    “Thanks.” She fell into silence.
    He knew her routine. She would take three, maybe four quick shallow puffs, then stab it out.
    One, he counted. Two. She shot him a furious glare. Three.
    “I didn’t start it.” Her lips moved into a pout as she crushed out the cigarette.
    Jed decided it was safe to sit. “I didn’t say you did.”
    “You didn’t threaten to have her arrested.”
    “I figured she was going to have enough problems picking pimentos out of her hair. Want a drink?”
    “No.” She preferred to sulk. “Look, Skimmerhorn, she was insulting me, my family, women in general. And I took it,” she said righteously. “I took it even when she called me a tramp, a slut, a whore.”
    A great deal of his amusement faded. “She said that to you?”
    “And I took it,” Dora barreled on, “because I kept telling myself she was just a crazy old lunatic. I was not going to cause a scene. I was not going to lower myself to her level. Then she went too far, she went one step too far.”
    “What did she do?”
    “She called me a—a floozy.”
    Jed blinked, gamely struggled to swallow the tickle at the back of his neck. “A what?”
    “A floozy,” she repeated, slapping her fist on the chair.
    “Let’s go take her down.”
    Dora’s chin came up, her eyes narrowed. “Don’t you dare laugh.”
    “I’m not. Who’s laughing?”
    “You are, damn it. You’re biting your tongue right now to hold it back.”
    “I am not.”
    “You are too. You’re slurring your words.”
    “It’s the scotch.”
    “Like hell.” She turned her head away, but he’d caught the quiver of her lips. When he brought her face back to his, they grinned foolishly at each other.
    “You made it an interesting evening, Conroy.”
    “Well.” Her temper spent, she giggled, then leaned back to rest her head on his shoulder. “I was trying to think of some way to distract you so you wouldn’t be upset from the mayor and Riker.”
    “Why should I be upset?”
    “They were pressuring you, weren’t they?” Though he didn’t move, she felt a part of him shift away. “Lucky for me, Mrs. Dawd came along so I didn’t have to invent something.”
    “So you dumped food on her head to lift my spirits.”
    “No, it was strictly a selfish act, but it did have a nice side benefit.” She turned her head. “Give me a kiss, will you?”
    “Why?”
    “Because I’d like one. Just a friendly one.”
    He put a finger under her chin to tip it up, touched his lips to hers. “Friendly enough?”
    “Yeah, thanks.”
    She started to smile, but he shifted his hand, cupped it around her throat. With his eyes open, he lowered his mouth to hers again, teased her lips apart with his tongue and tasted the arousal on her first shaky breath.
    It was like water, pure, sweet water after an agonizing thirst. He sipped easily.
    She felt the rush of need, the hard, sharp-edged wave of it that left her limp. He didn’t bring her closer, nor did he deepen the kiss. Instead it was slow, cool, devastatingly controlled.
    When he drew back, she kept her eyes closed, absorbing the flood of sensation. Her heart was still pounding in her ears when she opened her eyes. “God,” was all she managed to say.
    “Problem?”
    “I think so.” She pressed her lips together. She could have sworn they were vibrating. “I think . . . I think I’ll go.” Her knees wobbled when she stood. It was very difficult, she thought, to be in charge of a situation when your knees wobbled. She pressed a hand to her stomach where the hard ball of need had hotly lodged. “God,” she said again, and walked away.

CHAPTER
ELEVEN
    T he new security system on Dora’s building brought DiCarlo a great deal of irritation. The extra time needed to bypass it, and to get through the sturdier locks, completely wrecked his schedule. He’d hoped to get in and out of the storeroom by midnight. For surely if the Conroy woman had bought the damn painting, the damn painting was inside, regardless of what the idiot redheaded clerk had told him on Christmas Eve.
    Now he’d be lucky to be inside by midnight. And worse, a nasty sleet was beginning to fall. His surgeon’s gloves were hardly adequate protection against the cold.
    At least there was no moon, he thought as