caught sight of that illuminated third-floor window was all the answer I needed.
Fuck! I started sloshing my way through the pool toward the stairs, but quickly realized it was going to take me until next Tuesday with those water-and-steel-filled wrecking balls on my feet. Walking through quicksand on the lunar surface would have been easier than getting out of that pool with those goddamn cement shoes on.
That’s when I heard the sirens.
Luckily, Hans had the reaction time of a fucking ninja. Within five seconds he had scooped me up and set me on my ass on the edge of the pool, hoisted himself out, made a mad dash for the covered porch, and returned wearing his shoes and clutching our clothes under his tattooed arm like a football. Although his face was playful, Hans wasted no time in pulling me up with his free hand and whisking me and my eighty-pound boots away from that twinkling fairyland.
Hand in hand, we tore through the neighbors’ backyards in the direction of my car. The sound of our shoes sloshing and slapping the earth ricocheted through the darkness and silence and affluence surrounding us. I just prayed that the owners of the million-dollar yards we were destroying were adrift on a creamy turquoise Ambien-induced sea somewhere and couldn’t hear us cursing and giggling and tromping all over their perfectly manicured flower beds and shushing each other every time we accidentally knocked over a water feature or bumped our heads on their Corinthian wind chimes.
With every hot, humid panicked yet elated breath I sucked in, the approaching sirens grew louder. Finally, the ’stang was in sight. Hans and I tiptoed around the far side of the castle it was parked in front of and peered around to see if the coast was clear.
I looked at Hans and exaggeratedly grabbed my fisted arm in what I hoped was the universal TV cop show signal for hold. He waited next to the house as I scampered across the front yard, remembering on the way that I’d locked my purse in my trunk and tied my car key to one of my bootlaces since I’d worn a dress with no pockets to the concert that night.
Thank fucking God I still had my boots on! If Hansel had untied and taken them off before our little tryst in the pool, that key could have been anywhere!
I slung my forty-pound foot up and rested it on the ledge of the driver-side window. Although I was topless, I at least still had on my red thong, which had somehow shifted back into place during my five hundred yard dash. Inexplicably, the realization that my cooter wasn’t hanging out as I stood in the middle of the street with one leg up, water pouring out of my boot, while fumbling with my car door at three in the morning made me feel about a thousand percent better about the situation. I mean, I was practically wearing a whole bikini. I’d just lost the top part.
No big deal, officer. I’m sure this sort of thing happens all the time.
Finally!
I got the door open and hit the unlock button as I dived inside. I watched in awe as Hans’s naked, muscular six-foot-three-inch silhouette sprinted across the yard toward me. I knew he’d played soccer when he was in high school, but with that physique and speed, he could have been a professional.
Could this man be any more perfect?
Just as he slammed his door shut, my rearview mirror was illuminated by flashing blue lights.
I spun around to look behind us and let out a relieved sigh when I saw that the cop car had stopped in front of the McMansion and wasn’t right on my tail. Although I was parked at least a block away in the shadow of a huge magnolia tree, I still didn’t want to draw any attention to the suspicious 1996 Ford lurched on the curb in an obviously garage-kept-import-car-driving kind of neighborhood, so Hans and I just slid down in our seats and decided to wait them out.
Even though we were naked and hiding from the police, Hans flashed me a confident rock-star smile and reached over to brush my cheek with his thumb. “That was amazing.”
“Best night of my life,” I muttered, quickly looking away as a familiar heat crept into my cheeks.
Thank God it was too dark for him to see me blush.
Hans was just so, so fucking sexy. I’d been trying to play it cool and