Harper was coming back around the pile of furniture when Levi cornered it with such speed that she nearly collided with him.
"What the actual hell?" she squawked, swinging her purse around defensively in front of her.
"Where were you?" he demanded.
"Taking a leak, if you must know." She brushed a sweep of hair out of her face. "I've got tissues in the purse."
She didn't tell him that she'd taken her phone, too, and had texted her housemate Madisyn, the reliable one, letting her know not to expect Harper until late that night. She'd also considered calling the police. It probably would have been a good idea, whatever Levi claimed. After all, he had stolen her car, and he'd even admitted to stealing something else that, by his own admission, was worth way more.
But she had a weakness for bad boys, and Levi fit that description to a T, though she'd bet cold, hard cash that he wasn't a bad guy-which was quite a different thing. That was her favorite combination, even when it wasn't in a form as appealing as the long-bodied, amber-eyed one that Levi had.
She felt safe falling for a bad boy because she never had to waste time wondering whether it'd work out and he'd stick around. It was perfectly obvious from the beginning that such relationships had an expiration date, so she was never tempted into fooling herself that it might last.
And maybe he was telling her the truth about the thing he'd stolen. Maybe for once, she'd fallen in with someone who was fighting for the cause of truth and justice and all that, even if in a roundabout, backhanded way. Harper had never found herself in that kind of situation, and she found more than the novelty of it appealing, if she was honest with herself.
And anyhow, she had her car back now-more or less.
"Fine," he said, still frowning.
"So what are we doing now?" she asked. He was close enough to touch.
"Waiting. We'll leave after sunset," he said.
"So we're behind the search lines, you said." She shook her head at him. "Why am I supposed to believe you?"
"It doesn't much matter what you believe," he said. "It's true."
She looked up into those delicious amber eyes above that hard jaw and she wondered what the hell she was doing there with him. Without a conscious decision, she reached out and stroked his cheek with one finger, running it across the stubble that was just long enough to start to turn soft.
He caught her wrist, his gaze going sharp in a way that made her breath catch and her heart stumble over a beat. Oh, he was interested in her, all right.