Free Thief of Hearts by MaryJanice Davidson

to lean on, certain he was about to be sick. Kara was there, not letting him touch anything, letting him sag against her.
    “Those men—”
    “And children, yes.”
    “Filthy goddamned perverts!”
    “Yes and they’re having terrible luck,” she said sympathetically. He stared at her; she sounded genuinely sorry for them. “The film from their last drop-off was intercepted by the cops. And now they’ve been robbed. When the cops come, they’ll find…this.”
    In a flash, he saw her brilliance, saw the trap she had lain for the pedophiles. “The police can’t search without a warrant,” he said slowly, “but if there’s a robbery…and they happen to find pictures, say, all over the hallway…” He paused. “But you’re never caught.”
    She grinned at him. “We’re going to trip the alarm on the way out. Cops’ll be here in about five minutes.” She opened another drawer full of filth and waved a spare pair of surgical gloves at him. “Want to help?”

    * * * * *

    “That was fun,” he said half an hour later, feeling more deeply satisfied than he ever had. Saving lives was fabulous, but preventing the further brutalization of children was even better. “Now where are we? Is it time for ice cream?”

    “Pross house,” she said shortly, getting out of the car and striding, unafraid, through the worst neighborhood in the city. There were more streetlights out than on, more shattered store windows than whole and entirely too many rough-looking men giving his Kara the once-over. Jared could feel himself bristling and singled out the meanest looking one for a good glare. “Keep up, please.”
    “I don’t like the looks of those guys,” he said, nodding to a gang of thugs clustered under a broken streetlight. “Ya want I should rough ‘em up for ya?”
    She laughed. “Aren’t you cute. Jared, trust me. Worry about the ones you don’t see.”
    She bounded up the steps to a battered brownstone, nodding politely to the two teens—either of which could have given your average beat cop a run for her money—and ringing the buzzer. The teens appeared to completely ignore her, but Jared noticed they both made way. He reached out and snagged Kara’s elbow just as she was buzzed in. “I’m with her,” he told the teens, who ignored him as they had Kara, “and don’t get smart or I’ll have her whup you both.”
    Inside, he was pleasantly surprised to find a homey entryway. Shabby, but dignified. “Well, this is something,” he said, looking around. “First, the Playboy Mansion. Then the fence…that’s the guy who cashed in the necklace, right? Now we’re…I have no idea where. What’s a pross house?”
    “This isn’t a pross house,” a warm, pleasant voice said. Jared jumped and spun; Kara turned unhurriedly toward the voice; Jared realized Kara had known they weren’t alone in the hall. “That’s a place where prostitutes…ah…ply their trade. This is a shelter for soiled doves trying to make new lives for themselves.”
    The woman who spoke was astonishingly beautiful, despite the knife scar that bisected her right cheek.
    Far from detracting from her beauty, the scar served to accent the flawless state of the rest of her face.
    She had shoulder-length, rich brown hair the color of dark chocolate, eyes the color of a sea lagoon and skin the color of a really good espresso. She was quite a bit shorter than Kara and if she weighed more than a hundred pounds, Jared vowed to eat the scale.
    “Ma’am,” he said politely.
    “Madam, actually,” she said and tittered. “Well, former madam. But you know.”
    “Present for you, Mag.” Kara handed her the shoe box in which, Jared knew, there nestled close to half a million dollars.
    “Awwww…” Mag caught the box and tucked it under her arm like a football. “And I didn’t get you anything. Who’s the stiff stud?”
    “I happen,” he said with as much dignity as he could muster, “to be the young lady’s personal