called out over the deafening wail of the alarm.
“My bag is in that car,” she reminded him breathlessly.
The bag with her little .22. He ran faster, rounding the concession stand and keeping them both low as they reached the car. In the shadow, he could see a man at the passenger side, crouched over.
He took a warning shot over the car and over his head.
The thief pivoted away from the car and took off.
“Is he alone?” Maggie whispered in Dan’s ear.
He squinted into the dim moonlight, the waning quarter giving him enough of a shadowy glimpse to sense a familiarity in the clothes and the muscular build and crisp moves of a highly trained runner.
That was no street thug breaking into a Porsche in an empty lot.
That was the Greek fortune hunter.
CHAPTER THREE
“I NEVER TOLD him about Quinn.” Maggie slumped on her sofa, the move fluttering the credit card receipts Brandy had laid on the coffee table while she completed her Saturday morning accounting. “Does that make me a liar, on top of a slut?”
“First of all, you didn’t sleep with him, you made out on a beach. Little wild, but not bona fide slutty. Second, you didn’t lie, you just didn’t tell him your entire life history.” Brandy tapped the calculator. “Honey, we kicked ass last week.”
No one knew her entire life history, Maggie thought as she lifted a mug and powered down more coffee. Only Smitty, and he was gone. “Good thing we kicked ass, since I sent the rich guy packing before he got through the front door. I just didn’t want to tell him I have a son. It’s such a mood-killer.”
“Mood-killer? Who are you kidding? You use that kid as a freaking shield.” She held up her hands in front of her face. “ ‘Back away from my body. I have a child. Do not try to get close. I have a child!’ “
Maggie smiled and tucked her bare feet under her, smoothing the sleep pants she still wore and imagining what she’d have on, or not, if she hadn’t sent that man away last night. “Very funny, but I told you the real reason I changed my mind about sleeping with him.”
“Uh-huh.” Brandy fought a smile. “That would be the ‘stop before you do something you seriously regret’ message from the great beyond, in the form of an attempted carjacking.”
“It wasn’t a carjacking. But don’t you think it’s completely weird that Dan is certain the guy who did it was the same one who was in the bar chatting you up all night?”
Brandy cleared the calculator. “As much as it pains me to admit it, the chatting was about you. Sorry, I don’t buy his theory. They were just two alpha dogs growling over you, and he just wants you to think he’s some superpowered bodyguard so you’ll have sex with him and not the other dog.”
“Except we were already on our way to having sex when that happened, and he was dead certain it was the same guy.”
“Right. Some customer followed you to Bahía Honda to steal the Porsche? Then what was he doing while you were doing the horizontal hoo-ha up on the hill?”
Maggie sipped her coffee. “And, if he wanted to steal the Porsche, why would he have been on the passenger’s side?”
“To steal your purse. Or maybe he was going to hide in the back and attack when you got in,” Brandy suggested as she tapped the receipts into a neat pile. “Now, would you like to know exactly how much money we made last week? Another year of weeks like this and you can pay off the second mortgage. Then one more year and we can start the renovation.”
Maggie dropped back on the sofa with a groan. Years of debt, followed by years of renovations, followed by years of more debt before they ever saw a real profit. That wasn’t going to get the money in her bank account soon enough to pay for Quinn’s college. And speaking of Quinn… Regret took another stab at her chest.
“What kind of mother am I, hiding my son? Now how do I tell him? ‘Oh, by the way, when we were “talking” last night and I shut you up with the total maneater kiss? I didn’t want to come clean about my son.’ “
Her gaze moved to Quinn’s seventh-grade school picture on the table, filling her with love. “I live for the kid, and I would die for him. It’s just that