The Missing Maitland. Stella Bagwell
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you.”
Her retort didn’t surprise him. Part of the woman’s job was being skeptical, and he could already see that she was someone who viewed all angles of a situation. Not just the obvious. For that alone he had to admire her.
With a lazy shrug of one shoulder, he said, “Well, that’s your prerogative. I’m just telling you that I didn’t hire on with the Maitlands as a security officer. And you can do what you like with that information.”
There were two things Blossom would like to do with his information. Prove it wrong, then throw it back at him. But that would have to wait. The first and most important thing she had to do was get away from the man.
“You still haven’t told me your name,” she reminded him.
“Does my name really matter? You don’t know me. It couldn’t mean anything to you.”
“I have to call you something,” she reasoned.
One corner of his perfectly chiseled lips lifted ever so slightly. “I’m sure you can think of plenty of things. Women have a knack for giving me labels.”
Her nostrils flared as she drew in another long breath. “No doubt. But I think I’d rather stick to a birth name.”
He didn’t say anything for long moments, and although her eyes remained on him, she was acutely aware of the fact that they were getting farther and farther away from the city of Austin.
“You can call me Larkin,” he said finally.
In spite of herself and the precarious situation she was in, Blossom couldn’t stop her gaze from traveling up and down the long length of him.
He was wearing a dark gray khaki uniform shirt with a pair of blue jeans and dark brown work boots. The Maitland Maternity logo, a simple oval with the initials MM, was sewn to a spot over his left breast. There was no name tag below it, and no name or job title was embroidered into the heavy material.
Yet none of those things were the real focus of Blossom’s attention. It was the massive width of his shoulders, the corded muscles of his neck and arms, the leanness of his waist and the big brown hands on the steering wheel that all combined to mesmerize her. No one had to tell her he was a strong man. She’d felt his strength firsthand when he’d manhandled her into the truck.
“Is that all?” she prodded.
“That’s all I’m telling you.”
Her back teeth ground together at the idea that he thought he had the upper hand with her. Raking back a wave of hair that had slipped toward her right eye, she looked out the window and tried to catch sight of a highway sign.
“I get it,” she muttered. “You imagine yourself as one of those stars who like to believe they’re so grand they only need a single name.”
If she’d been anyone else and the circumstances had been different he might have actually enjoyed sparring with her. But, as it was, he had too much on his mind, mainly what he was going to do with her now that they’d managed to escape the spray of bullets back at the clinic.
From the corner of his eye, he watched her cross her legs, then fold her arms against her breasts. He had to admit it was nice to see a woman in a skirt with silky stockings on her legs and high heels on her feet. He’d always been a sucker for high heels, and the pair on Blossom Woodward’s dainty feet were the exact color as her classically tailored skirt and blouse.
She was petite and slender, but far from fragile. Her body was taut and curved in all the right places, and he wondered if she found time in her busy TV schedule to work out at a gym or if she was just naturally fit.
“Believe me, Ms. Woodward, there’s nothing grand or starlike about me.”
Maybe he wasn’t a star. But he was far from ordinary. And how she’d ended up here with him like this was incredible. One minute she’d been on the sidewalk outside the clinic and the next moment loud pops were exploding all around her. Before she’d known what was happening he’d suddenly appeared beside her and whipped a pistol from a holster inside his shirt.
She wasn’t sure how many rounds of bullets he’d fired at the vehicle skidding wildly through the parking lot. Thinking back on it, he’d probably emptied the whole magazine before he’d shoved her into the truck and yelled at her to stay down.
“In case you haven’t noticed, we’re out of the city,” she told him. “No one is behind us. You can stop at the next gas station and let me out.”
“I’ll stop when we get to where we’re going.”
Panic sliced through Blossom, but she did her best not to let it take control. She had to keep her wits about her. She had to find out what this man was going to do with her and why. If his intention had simply been to take her out of harm’s way at the clinic, his job should have been over thirty minutes ago.
“If you’re thinking the television station will pay a ransom for me, forget it.”
Before he could stop himself, he threw back his head and laughed.
“Now, who’s thinking they’re grand?” he asked between chuckles. “If I’d planned to kidnap someone for money, I would have picked a much bigger fish than you, Ms. Woodward. Any one of the Maitlands would be worth millions. What do you think you’re worth?”
Blossom grimaced, mainly because he was making sense and she wasn’t. Added to that, she couldn’t think of one person who valued her life that much. She was a loner, a woman who cherished her independence. She didn’t allow people to get very close to her.
“Not much,” she answered. “Tattle Today has a cheap producer. And there are plenty of people standing in line to take my place.”
Her answer was not what he’d been expecting. From what he’d learned about her and the show, she was a rising star and had already earned the nickname of Blossom the Barracuda. She was known for digging up people who preferred to remain anonymous and shoveling out stories that shocked and scandalized. Exploiting other people’s problems was quickly making her famous.
“Your attempt at modesty is hardly convincing,” he said with easy insolence. “There’s not a line of people to take your place. Thankfully not everyone is capable of doing what you do.”
Blossom was used to people insulting her work. Mostly because her stories hit too close to home and no one liked to be reminded of their faults or weaknesses. Whether public or private, more often than not, she ignored the insults. She’d learned early on that she would have to have a tough hide to survive in her job and in life. Yet there was something about the barbed sarcasm in this man’s voice that stung her more than usual. Maybe it was because she was already cross with him. Or maybe it was because she’d sensed, sometime during this crazy flight, that he was a keenly intelligent man and she wanted his respect. She wanted him to understand that she wasn’t a barracuda. She was a woman who wanted to be the best at her job.
“Is that why I’m here in this truck with you? Because you don’t like what I do and you plan to whip me into some sort of submission? Force me to denounce Tattle Today TV?”
He shook his head with wry disbelief. “My, my, you do have quite an imagination, Ms. Woodward.”
Her hands balled into tight fists as she twisted around in the seat to face him once again. “You’re being deliberately evasive! I want you to tell me what’s going on! Now!”
He looked over at her, his black brows cocked with mocking inquisition. “Is that how you get your stories? You demand that people spill their guts to you?”
Realizing that her temper was getting the better of her, that he was getting the better of her, she forced her fingers to uncurl and her lungs to draw in a deep, calming breath.
“I’ve never encountered anyone I couldn’t get information from,” she said in a cloyingly sweet voice, then added, “one way or the other.”
“Hmm.