Free The Fall of Maggie Brown by Anne Stuart

that she’d scare Ben Frazer.
    He wasn’t a man who scared easily. The look he gave her as she climbed into the Jeep was so intimidating that a lesser woman might have quailed. But Maggie had made up her mind. She was putting her trust in Ben Frazer’s hard, dangerous hands. She wasn’t going to let him scare her as well.
    “I said five minutes,” he growled.
    “I said I needed a shower,” she responded with a false sweetness.
    “You’re wearing that?”
    She glanced down at the simple dress she’d pulled on. “Obviously. What’s wrong with it?”
    “Per your orders, we’re heading into the mountains. People don’t wear skirts in the mountains.”
    “Tell that to the grandmothers of San Pablo.”
    “You sure as hell don’t look like anybody’s grandmother,” he grumbled.
    Before she could respond Elena appeared from the back of the hotel. The sun had just risen, but Elena looked more than half asleep.
    She said something to Ben, but Maggie couldn’t make out a single bit of meaning in the torrent of rich, rolling words. Whatever she said, Frazer didn’t like it, and even if she couldn’t understand his response she recognized his sentiment.
    “As for you,
niña
, you keep him in line,” Elena said to her in English. “He’s a good man, but a bad little boy. He’s met his match in you, I think.”
    “He has not!” Maggie said in horror.
    Elena didn’t argue; she simply shoved a package into her hands. It was hard, cold, wrapped in rags. “A present for you,
señorita
,” she said.
    “Back off, Elena,” Frazer grumbled. “We’re already late due to her ladyship’s vanity.”
    “Maybe she wanted to be pretty for you?” Elena suggested.
    Ben and Maggie protested in unison, but Elena merely smiled wisely. “Go with God,” she said. “Find the little one’s troublesome sister, and watch out for El Gallito.”
    Frazer groaned something in Spanish, but this time Maggie understood at least enough of it. “Shut up about El Gallito,” he growled, putting the Jeep into gear.
    Elena said nothing, but when Maggie turned to wave goodbye she saw a faintly worried expression on the young woman’s face.
    “Just how well do you know Elena?” she asked, turning around and automatically searching for a seat belt before she remembered that Frazer didn’t seem to believe in them.
    “In the biblical sense,” he said.
    “I wasn’t asking for details. Do you trust her?”
    “With my life. Why? What did she give you? A bomb?”
    Maggie looked down at the bundle in her lap. “Maybe a charm to protect me from people like you.”
    “Elena’s not into witchcraft. She’s too pragmatic. And in case you haven’t figured it out yet, she thinks we make a cute couple.”
    “Oh, God!” she said in horror.
    “My sentiments exactly,” he drawled. “What’s in the package?”
    She unwrapped it gingerly, then let out a sound of awed delight.
    Frazer jerked his head to look at her, but he couldn’t see what lay in her lap. “What was that orgasmic sound?”
    He was trying to embarrass her, but she was too happy to let him get on her nerves this time. “Don’t be crude, Frazer,” she said calmly. “That’s not a sound you’re ever going to hear from me.” She unwrapped her treasure. “It’s a cold can of Diet Coke,” she said reverently.
    He was looking at her as if she’d lost her mind. Which doubtless he probably believed. It wasn’t her problem. The can was icy cold against her fingers, and the anticipation was heavenly.
    After a moment of respectful silence she popped the top and drank half of it down, closing her eyes in utter bliss.
    She knew he was looking at her. “Watch the road,” she said, not bothering to open her eyes.
    “Elena found that for you?” he said in a troubled voice.
    She opened her eyes reluctantly. They were already past the outskirts of town, heading into the dawn-lit day. “She did.”
    “Hmmmph
,
”
he said. “She must really like you.”
    “Hard to