Free Strong and Sexy.2 by Jill Shalvis Page B

nipple. “Shayne—”
    At the knock on the window, they both jumped so high they nearly bumped their heads on the roof.
    A cop stood there, looking an awful lot like...
    Shayne.
    In a moment that summed up all the moments of poor timing in her life, his brother had arrived.

Chapter 8
     
    Dani watched as Patrick Mahoney walked through her apartment, jotting notes on a pad of paper. She couldn’t tell if he’d believed a word she’d told him. She couldn’t tell if he thought she was crazy.
    The only thing she could tell was that he really did look like Shayne’s twin, which is to say tall and rangy and effortlessly sexy with that untamed wavy hair and see-all golden eyes. Except his weren’t nearly as warm as Shayne’s.
    She tightened the belt on her coat and tried not to picture exactly what Patrick had seen when he’d knocked on the window of Shayne’s car. Tried not to think what might have happened if he hadn’t knocked on the window of Shayne’s car.
    Seriously, she couldn’t believe she’d—
    That he’d—
    That they’d nearly—
    Strangers. They were complete strangers, she reminded herself. Strangers who couldn’t keep their hands off each other.
    Why was that, anyway? She had no idea, but whatever was happening between the two of them, it had to stop. Immediately. Mostly because she appeared to be in the middle of a breakdown. That, or someone was stalking her. Neither was exactly conducive to a well-rounded relationship.
    Not that she was thinking about a relationship.
    Oh, no. No, no, no. Because Shayne? He was a walking, talking heartbreaker if she’d ever seen one. And if she was stupid enough to even think about taking this to the next level, a level that she hadn’t been to in an embarrassingly long time, then she had no one to blame for that certain heartbreak than herself. Because once she slept with someone, she tended to get her heart involved, and...
    Oh, hell, who was she kidding? She hadn’t slept with him, at least not yet, and already her heart felt involved. She couldn’t help it, Shayne Mahoney was a combination of some of her favorite things—sharp and quick-witted, willing to put himself on the line for whatever he believed in, not to mention an even more attractive willingness to help a perfect stranger.
    Or in this case, a not-so-perfect stranger.
    God. She pushed back her hair and wondered how much longer she could stay awake on her feet.
    And wondered something else too, something she’d already voiced to Shayne. “What if it’s the same gun that I saw at Sky High?”
    The two brothers, taking up all the spare room in her living room with their big, built bodies and undeniable presence, exchanged a long look.
    Had she thought she couldn’t read Shayne’s thoughts? Because she knew exactly what he was thinking.
    That she was as crazy as everyone said.
    They spoke softly to each other, so softly she couldn’t hear the words, and then Shayne walked Patrick to her front door, and when she looked up again, Shayne was standing in front of her, hands in his pockets, hair still wet from the rain, expression unreadable. Through all of this, his proximity had always been able to affect her, and now was no exception. He still smelled good, delicious in fact, and though he wasn’t looking at her with his usual heat, it didn’t matter because he was looking at her with a gentle kindness.
    Devastating, really. She wanted to put her hands on his incredibly soft shirt and feel his incredibly hard body beneath. Instead, she tried to joke. “Let me guess. He recommended you run far and fast from me, right?”
    He didn’t respond to that, but pulled his hands out of his pockets and set them on her arms, stroking up and down over her coat. “You look beat.”
    “A very true statement.” She resisted setting her head on his shoulder, barely. “So what did he say?”
    “Who’d want to scare you, Dani?”
    “Well...”
    “You piss anyone off lately?”
    “You have a lot of