Page 28 of Steel

“Which was?”

“What was that kid doing?”

“That kid is my son, Damon, and are you braindead? He was rescuing a puppy.” Her eyes opened wide again and she glanced toward the forest where she’d come from. “A puppy. Oh, shit.” Now her face was flushed. With her chest rising and falling, she finally glanced at me once again. “It’s you.”

This time as if seeing a ghost. “What? What do you mean it’s me?” Had we met before? No, I would have remembered meeting someone so gorgeous.

“Nothing. Fuck. Fuck.” The last two words were hissed under her breath. “Not happening. This is not happening.”

There was something entirely different about her behavior. When she closed and reopened her eyes, she didn’t just do so once but three times. Was she hallucinating, possibly seeing me with horns?

The little devil in me grinned and I wasn’t certain why.

Hold on. She’d told the kid to go through the trees back home. Oh, great.

“Oh, yes, it is. Do you live around here?” This had to be the new renter. Fantastic. “If not, I just might call the sheriff.”

Whatever dark spell my appearance had provided was instantly shattered, her harsh glare returning. “Look, buster.My handsome, talented, precious son was exploring his new environment. I’m sorry he stepped foot on your oh-so precious property, but he cares about abused animals.”

“Abused? Are you insinuating that I abused that dog?”

“He’s a puppy and yes, I am. Let’s take a look at where you were keeping him.”

I’d be damned if she didn’t stomp off toward the back of my shed. I stood in awe and shock, watching as her long thick hair whisked back and forth as she went.

And me being me, a man some people would call a cad, thoughts of using her mane of hair like a leash while doing some very naughty things to her luscious body popped into my mind.

And rarely did a woman excite me.

She disappeared around the corner and I threw my face toward the sky. “Un-fucking-believable.” This wasn’t how I wanted to spend my day.

And she still hadn’t told me what I needed to know.

Still in some level of shock and awe, I followed her as she tromped around to the back. How far did she think she was going to take this? I was curious as hell. She certainly had a set of balls on her.

Her head snapped up quickly with my approach. In her hand was a suspicious looking thick rope. Which did not belong to me. When she noticed me, she issued a hiss that held venom deep within the tone. Thank God she wasn’t a witch.

Or maybe she was.

She wrangled the piece of rope until she managed to free it from the dying scrubby bushes I’d yet to cut down, almost falling on her butt in doing so. As if in one of those comedy movies, she jumped to her feet, holding the rope inches in front of my face.

“This is how you were tying up your dog, your tiny baby puppy? No wonder he cried. You’re a horrible monster.” She huffed and puffed, shaking her head when I didn’t say anything right away. Few people caught me completely off guard. “You have nothing to say for your horrible actions?”

I finally cleared my throat. “Look at the condition of the wood on the back of the building. That kid damaged my shed.” Something had occurred, although the deep scratches could have easily been created with thick nails from a dog.

“That kid? Thatkidis my child. My perfect child and my guess is that he was trying to rescue the poor, sweet, abused animal any way he could. He’s a little hero.”

Her sickeningly sweet smile was just enough to briefly fluster the hell out of me. “A hero? Pouring it on a little think, aren’t you?”

“Every bit the truth.” As she rose to her feet, she smacked one hand on her hip. “Am I going to find other sick and hurt puppies in your shed or poor little dead bodies?”

“Huh?”

She tossed the rope and scooted around me with a wide berth, disappearing all over again. This woman had some nerve. I threw my hands into the air, glaring at the sky.

I found her trying to open the door, jerking on it even though the wooden entrance was obviously locked. Although the lockappeared scarred. Had the kid tried to get inside? Without thinking, I slapped my hand over hers.

In perhaps the most shocking moment of all, I was driven into utter silence and immobility with only my heart thudding. Not because she’d hit me with a tree like before, but because of the heavy jolt of electricity that slammed into my hand, within seconds traveling down the length of my body.