Bonnie of Evidence - By Maddy Hunter Page 0,10
you only hand out sanitizer to people who know you.”
Disappointment rippled down her face in one long, gut-wrenching wave. “But, Emily, people who don’t know me have germs, too.”
“True, but they also have suspicions. How do they know the gel in those bottles won’t kill them?”
She lowered her brows over her eyes, fixing me with a grave look. “Because if I intended to hand out poison, I would have bought the bottles with the skull and crossbones on them.”
“Of course you would! I know that, and you know that, but they don’t know that.” I paused. “Where do you find travel-size bottles with skulls and crossbones on them?” My nephews would get a kick out of something like that.
“Pills Etcetera. They’re in the aisle with all the pirate paraphernalia.”
“The pharmacy carries pirate stuff ?”
“They expanded their inventory after the tornado remodel.” She sighed. “I suppose I could have bought the regular one-ounce bottles and attached warning labels, but I think the print would have been too small to read without a magnifying glass, and I’m not sure the pharmacy sells magnifying glasses in bulk. I could have tried a couple of the big box stores—”
“Margi.”
“But if I struck out at Walmart, I would have gotten stuck driving all the way to Ames, and—”
“MARGI!”
She clamped her mouth shut and blinked. “What?”
“If you distribute all your sanitizer to complete strangers, you’ll run out, and then you won’t have enough left for your friends. You wouldn’t want that to happen, would you?”
She inched her lips into a self-confident smile. “I stuffed so many bottles into my suitcase, I’ll never run out.”
Of course she wouldn’t.
“I had to play it safe, Emily. I knew I couldn’t replenish my supply with British pounds sterling. Did you get a load of the exchange rate? It’d wipe me out.”
I heard a key card being slid into the outer lock, and in the next moment Etienne strode into the room, his piercing blue eyes locking on Margi. “Ms. Swanson! Just the person I wanted to see. How fortunate to find you here.”
He crossed the floor with the wiry grace of a panther, every pore in his six-foot, two-inch frame oozing testosterone and some powerful pheromone that rendered women deaf, dumb, and dizzy. His hair was black, his shoulders broad. His dimpled smile had the same effect on the female psyche that sunshine had on flowers. In a perfect world, his picture would appear twice in the dictionary: once under “raw sexuality,” and the other under “1 percent body fat.”
“Your public is clamoring for you in the hotel lounge,” he announced as he crossed the floor toward us. “And bring a pen. They’re demanding your autograph. Who knew that your being suspected of domestic terrorism would cause such a sensation?”
She stared up at him like a puppy dog, her mouth hanging slightly open, her eyes adoring. “Okay.”
He offered her his hand, which she stared at, adoringly.
“Ms. Swanson?”
Her gaze drifted to his face. “Uh-huh?”
“Would you like to join the other tour guests in the lounge before it closes? The drinks are on them.”
“Okay.”
He helped her to her feet and slid her shoulder bag up her arm. “And if I could impose upon your good nature, would you mind distributing your sanitizer to our Destinations Travel guests only? We want your sightseeing experience to include visits to sites other than police interrogation rooms.”
She smiled dreamily. “Okay.”
I rolled my eyes. It was official. There was no justice in the world.
He escorted her to the door and let her out. “The hotel lounge,” he called after her. “Ground floor. Through the glass doors to the right of reception.” He rejoined me, looking a bit wary. “Did she seem a bit ‘off’ to you?”
“She’ll be fine once she’s outside your force field.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Let’s just say that she likes your suggestions better than mine, even when they’re the same suggestion. You kinda have that effect on women.”
“I do?” Smiling seductively, he pulled me off my chair and pressed me against him, locking his arms around the small of my back. “Well, then, Mrs. Miceli, I have another suggestion.”
Oh, boy. I knew what that tone meant.
“But it involves some minor effort on your part, like … not objecting when I do this.” He unclipped the barrette at the back of my head and tossed it onto the armchair. Tangling his fingers in my unbound hair, he tilted my head, baring my earlobe. “Or this.” He traced the curve of my ear with his tongue, electrifying