The McRae Series 01 - Twelve Days Sam and Rachel

of you, do they, princess?"
    "Yes, they do— Ahhh!"
    She probably would have kept going, but the dog came up and licked her cheek again, effectively silencing her once again.
    Okay, maybe he'd keep the dog for a few days. No matter how much of a pain in the ass he was, he was better than having the girl screaming. Aidan had planned to stick the barrel of his pistol in her back again to hopefully silence her, but this was probably better and less threatening.
    "What is that thing?" she asked, breathing hard, but she wasn't screaming anymore. It was more stunned amazement as she turned her head to stare.
    Tink danced a bit, coming close and then retreating, barking once, then again, maybe asking her to get up and play with him. Aidan couldn't be sure.
    "Some people claim he's a dog. I'm not convinced," he told her. "Be still for a second so we can talk about this, and I won't hurt you. Give me a hard time, and I'll order that thing to lick you again."
    Now, if she didn't figure out that he had no control over the dog, they'd be okay.
    "Who are you?" he asked.
    "Who are you?" she shot right back.
    Aidan sighed, exasperated. "I can sit here on top of you as long as you want. You're not going anywhere unless I let you, so I suggest you start talking."
    "My name is Grace, although I don't understand why you'd want to know. Is that some quirk of yours? Wanting to know your victim's names?"
    "Victim? How did you get to be the victim here? You broke in, remember?"
    "I didn't break in. I know where the spare key is. My family owns this cabin," she claimed.
    "Owns it?"
    "Yes, owns it."
    Could it be that simple? A mix-up in who was going to be here when? "I've been here for almost three weeks. Zach told me the place was empty, that I was welcome to use it as long as I want. He said no one wanted to be here when it's this cold."
    "Zach? Really?"
    "Yes, really."
    "Prove it." She was being still at least, and she wasn't screaming. "Call him. I want to hear the conversation, so put your phone on speaker."
    She was giving orders? Did she not understand she was pinned to the floor, and he was calling the shots? Plus, she was dead-wrong about one thing, which had him doubting her whole story.
    "Cell reception here sucks on a good day," he shot back. "Which I suspect you'd know, if you'd been here before. In this storm, it's probably impossible to get any kind of signal anywhere on the lake. And there's no land-line."
    "Okay, yeah. I remember that now. It's been a while since I was here."
    "And if it does really belong to your family, what's with you tossing the place? You steal from your own family?"
    "No! And even if I did, there's nothing here to steal. I was looking for something. Not to steal. Just... there's something I need to find, and I think it might be here. Could you get off me, please?"
    Aidan thought about it. His shoulder ached. So did his side and his hip. He wasn't going to be able to move off of her quickly or easily, so if she threw another elbow—or worse, a knee—it was going to hurt.
    He pressed the gun between her shoulder blades, just to the left of her spine. "Feel that, princess?"
    "What? You sitting on me and trying to break my arm?"
    He pressed the barrel more firmly into her skin.
    "Oh, my God! Do you have a gun?"
    "Hell, yes, I have a gun," he said.
    And if she'd spent any serious time in trouble before, wouldn't she have realized that when he'd first grabbed her? But maybe she wasn't the kind of girl who'd been in serious trouble before. Maybe she'd been too startled to pick up on exactly what was going on, like the fact that she had a gun at her back.
    "Okay... just... what do you want from me?"
    Her voice trembled, and if he wasn't mistaken, she was crying.
    He ran his hands over her as quickly and matter-of-factly as he could, pushing to the back of his mind the knowledge that it had been a long time since he'd touched anyone with curves like these. She was petite and—he sincerely hoped, so he didn't feel like such a letch—at least over the age of twenty-one. She tensed, whimpered, but stayed still and quiet.
    "Good, you're not armed."
    "Of course, I'm not armed. I'm not a criminal. I just didn't know Zach had loaned someone the cabin. Please, don't hurt me."
    "But you didn't ask before you came up here? Why is that?"
    "Because I didn't want anyone to know I was here."
    Aidan laughed, couldn't help it. "Princess, you're just digging yourself in deeper. Why didn't you want anyone to know you were