Free License to Thrill by Lori Wilde

Lila.
    And what about Charlee?
    What did he want from her?
    Stunned, Mason paused. Nothing. He wanted nothing from her. He only wanted to find his grandfather, bring him back home, and get on with his life. If things went according to plan, bright and early Monday morning, he’d walk into his father’s office to close the Birk-weilder account, successfully wresting his deal back from Hunter.
    At the thought of the look on his brother’s face when he showed up to overturn his competitive coup, Mason smiled.
    And the sooner he and Charlee got on the road after that camper, the better. Even if it meant throwing himself into the nerve-wracking crucible of Charlee’s hot rod Corvette and enduring her gawd-awful driving for the next several hours. Whatever it took to achieve his goal, he would do it.
    What about the Bentley?
    What indeed? The idea of leaving his baby in the airport parking garage gave him hives. He would insist Charlee follow him to the Bellagio to drop off the Bentley before they headed for Tucson.
    He turned to her, but she’d already sprinted ahead of him, running through the automatic doors to the passenger loading zone where she’d parked.
    “It’s gone!” she trilled and threw her arms in the air. “They towed my Corvette. Dammit!”
    Mason opened his mouth to murmur a smug, “I told you so,” but before he could get the sentence out, she whirled around and shook a finger under his nose.
    “Not a word. Don’t you dare say a word.”
    He clamped his lips together.
    “And stop smirking. I know a smirk when I see one.”
    Mason shrugged and tried hard to stop smirking.
    “Crap.” She paced and smacked a palm repeatedly against her forehead. “Crap, crap, crap. I don’t have the money to get it out of the police impound and both my thirty-eight and my cell phone were locked inside the glove box.”
    She looked so distraught that his temptation to gloat disappeared. He had the strangest desire to haul her into his arms, hold her close, and promise her that everything would be all right. He had no explanation for the urge. She wasn’t the damsel in distress type and he knew she’d sooner poke him in the ribs with her elbow as thank him for his attempt to comfort her, so he sensibly kept his hands to himself.
    “Calm down,” he said. “I’ll pay to get your car out of the impound.”
    “No. I can’t let you do that.”
    “Why not?”
    “I’ve had bad luck when it comes to borrowing money from men. It never works out. When you owe men money, they have certain expectations.”
    “Expectations?” He arched an eyebrow.
    “Oh, come on, don’t force me to spell it out for you.”
    Startled, he met her gaze. “Do you mean sexual favors?”
    “Well, duh.”
    “There have been men in your life who have given you money and then expected sexual favors in return?”
    The idea of someone treating her like a disposable sex object caused a ball of anger to clog his throat.
    “I said men expected it from me, not that I did it. Jeeze, what do you think I am?”
    “I didn’t mean…er…that’s not what I meant to suggest.”
    Oh, great. Way to stick your foot in your mouth, Gentry. You basically called her a prostitute.
    “So you can understand my reluctance to accept your offer of financial assistance.”
    “Charlee, I am not other men. Besides, this is an emergency. We need to get on the road as quickly as possible if we have any hope of overtaking the camper before it reaches Tucson. They’ve got several hours on us.”
    Hesitating, she pursed her lips and looked as if taking his money would literally kill her. “Okay. But the minute we find Maybelline, I’ll get the money from her and pay you back.”
    “That’ll be fine.”
    He reached in his jacket pocket for his wallet. Hmm. He almost always placed his wallet in his front left pocket. Maybe in the haze of hurrying to the airport he’d put it in the right pocket instead.
    He patted the other side.
    Nothing.
    A sickening feeling