Chapter Two

He couldn't figure out who the other voice belonged to, so he started to back toward the  apartment when the black-haired threat leaped up on the truck's horn, eliciting a shout  from the other girl and Derek's head banging into the window. The icepick in his head  twisted, and he saw stars twinkling behind his eyes. Before he could stop, Derek cracked  open the window and spoke in his most commanding lieutenant voice: “Hey, not everyone  has to be there on moving day!” and all the chatter stopped. He slammed the window shut,  put on his hat, grabbed his keys, and walked toward the door. It was the end of the long  hallway leading to his apartment, and he locked the door as he went by. Across the hall,  the door stood open, propped up by a huge porcelain sculpture of a blonde woman with  huge breasts. Derek thought: “Oh, my God, move to the other left! Put that down! I’m  losing my hand.” 

He turned to see the horn-waving, black-haired threat staggering down the hall beneath the  weight of what looked like a dining room table. She looked half-frightened, half-delighted,  and Derek's attention went to the girl who was carrying the opposite end of the table and  walking backward towards him. He couldn't make out her face, but she had the most  amazing ass he had ever seen. She was wearing jeans so low cut they should have been  illegal, and her long, perfect legs were stuffed into her brown leather cowboy boots. A  picture of her riding him came flooding back to his brain: "God, please don't let me get a  hard-on with a teenage girl, be legal so I can go to sleep at night knowing I'm not a pervert." 

Derek nearly had a heart attack as she bent down to put down the table, and her purple  lace peeked through the waistband of the jeans. His mouth dried up, his vision went blurry,  and his hat and keys fell to the floor. 

The girls yelped at the sudden noise, and the girl in the cowboy boots turned to face him. If  Derek thought he was in trouble when he saw her, he had just sped past the sign that said  "Danger: Road Ends Ahead" and was going over the cliff.  

At least I'll die happy. 

As she turned toward him, her cloud of chestnut hair spilled over her shoulder, and he was  lost in her eyes.  

Her hazel eyes were almost golden in color and narrowed over her high cheekbones. Her  pouty lips were pursed in annoyance.  

She had a sprinkle of freckles on her nose that made her look like a cross between a sex  goddess and a girl next door.  

If Derek's reaction to her was any measure of how dangerous she was, he let his gaze fall  for exactly three seconds on her flat stomach and a hint of cle**age just below her  waistband.  

For that moment, all he wanted to do was drop to his knees, open mouth kiss her with an  intensity that would knock him over. 

Guilt and irritation swept through him. She’d distracted him at a time when he should be  thinking about his fallen officer. How selfish could he be? A man lay dead and all he could  think about was dragging Ms. Low-Rider Jeans inside his apartment to assuage the growing  ache in his pants. 

Pull yourself together, Tyler. 

“I am that ass**le from upstairs.” 

Dang it, they had gone and moved across the hall from the sexy cop, if you could call him  that, and she had just called him an idiot.  

She didn't like the roughness on his freshly groomed face, or the way he made her feel  naked in one sweep of those dark green eyes.  

Someone should have told him that a smile can go a long way when you're looking at  someone you want for dinner. 

I'm sorry to disappoint you, neighbor, but I'm sure I could do much worse if I wanted to.  

He was the kind of guy who could lift you up and carry you over his shoulders with little  effort, though the sexy tilt of that upper lip did little to conceal the ruggedness of his face.  

The way he looked at her with that steady gaze was like he was aware of his obvious  attraction but didn't want to use it. 

Should she be afraid to live next door to a young, too-close-to-get-a-burn cop? No, Ginger  thought immediately. Even if Valerie had known they were leaving Nashville in the first  place, warning the cops would have been the last thing she would have done. If she knew  where the money had come from, she would have had to explain it to the police, which  would have been out of her way. Valerie's relationship with cops had always been strained,  if not downright hostile. 

No, Ginger had nothing to fear from this man, except for the way his intense scrutiny of her  belly button had made her toes curl.  

Ginger steeled her spine, refused to look away from his scrutinizing eyes, and frowned,  wondering why this officer-needs-a-Nap was eliciting such a peculiar reaction from her.  

She had never been afraid to be checked out before, even though she had learned at an  early age that men liked to look at her face and body shape. It hadn’t done her much good. 

He looked up at her and stayed there, determinedly.  

Ginger smiled at him and said, “I'm sorry to bother you, officer. We thought you might not  be home since it's so late. It's Lieutenant, of course.”  

Ginger could almost feel Willa's sarcastic oh, don't say! look on her face, even though she  was turning her back on her sister.  

She was having trouble keeping the same look off her face. 

If she had any teeth in her smile, she didn't show it.  

I apologize, Lieutenant, she said stiffly.  

And that's my second apology of the day.  

Ginger turned her back on him and lifted the end of her desk and caught a smirk on his face.  

Not that she cared. 

The phone rang in her front pocket for the twentieth time that day, and she knew who it was  and why they were calling. She also knew that she would not pick up the phone or listen to  the voice mail that would follow.  

The first thing she did was cancel the plan and buy new cell phones for her and Willa.  

They both nodded in her sister's direction and picked up the table, intending to go on into the apartment.