Free Strangers in Paradise by Heather Graham Page B

couldn’t imagine him being alone, either. He was a man who liked women, who would attract them easily—with or without fame and fortune. But once burned... She knew the feeling well. He was quiet in his way; he spoke plainly but gave away very little emotion.
    Maybe it wasn’t there to give.
    But she had been determined to come into the shower and scrub her hair and herself and be as...perfect as she could be. For when she saw him again. She didn’t want to be breaking in; she didn’t want to be running because she’d blown a hose in the car. She wanted to be composed and poised. Perhaps even cool...cool enough to regain the control that seemed to be slipping from her.
    Alexi sighed and turned off the shower. She had steamed herself until the water had gone cold as she’d thought about Rex Morrow. If she could put that much concentration into the house, she’d have it a showplace in no time.
    Alexi opened the shower door and groped for her towel. She found it and patted her face, blinking to clear her eyes. The mist from the shower should have cleaned her lenses somewhat, but they felt grittier than ever. It must have been all the dust from last night, she reasoned.
    She started to step out of the stall, then noticed a curious dark line on the floor. A wire? She blinked, wishing again that she had better luck with her lenses. There shouldn’t be a wire on the floor.
    Nor did wires move by themselves.
    Alexi gasped, hypnotized at first. There was something on the floor about a foot long and as thick as a telephone wire. Except that the top of this wire was rising and moving, and it had a little red ribbon of color right under the...
    The head!
    â€œOh, my God!” she breathed aloud.
    It was a snake—a small one, but a snake nonetheless, slithering, slinking across the bathroom floor.
    Her throat constricted; she didn’t move. She didn’t know whether the snake was poisonous or not, and at that point it didn’t really matter. She hated snakes; they scared her to death.
    The creature paused, raised its head again, then started slithering toward the toilet bowl.
    She swallowed. She had to move.
    Trembling, Alexi reached out for her robe. Soaking wet, she slipped into it and belted it, still standing in the shower stall—and barely blinking as she kept her eyes trained on the snake. In desperation she looked around the little bathroom. A little tile side pocket in the wall held a magazine. Alexi grabbed it and rolled it up.
    Panicked thoughts whirled through her mind. If she didn’t kill it on the first swipe, would it bite her? She could just run....
    No. Because if it slithered out of sight, she would never, never be able to sleep in the house again.
    She stepped from the shower stall with her rolled-up weapon. She inhaled sharply, then smacked the snake. She jumped back, screaming. The blow hadn’t stopped the creature in the least. It was just writhing and slinking more wildly now.
    She attacked again—and again. Somewhere in her mind she realized that paper would not kill the serpent. It might not be big, but it had a tough hide.
    Finally, though, the thing stopped. Or almost stopped. She had most of the body smashed against the base of the toilet. Only the head wavered a bit.
    She swallowed sickly. What was the damn thing doing in her house? She felt like a torturer—but she was terrified.
    Alexi dropped the paper. She had to get something. A spade—something with which she could scoop the creature up and out.
    And kill it. It wasn’t dead—and even though it was a snake, she hated to think of herself torturing the thing.
    She backed away, then ran—into the kitchen and into the pantry. She wasn’t sure what lay in the bottom shelves, but she had seen a number of tools there.
    She found a heavy spade. Armed with it, Alexi made her way back to the bathroom, where she stopped dead still. The snake had disappeared.
    â€œIt