Exposure Read Free

her mother's breast again. "Itsy, bitsy spidoo . . ."
    Elvis shrugged his massive shoulders uncomfortably. "My mother's a big fan of the King," he explained. Then, his expression hardening, he turned to Bill. "I'll tell you what, Bill, why don't you leave the lady's anatomy out of it and just flush out her cylinders like she wants."
    "The hell you say! It's a friggin' rod bearing, I'm tellin' ya!"
    "Then you have nothing to worry about, do you? Of course, if the problem clears up the way Mrs. Sands here seems to think it will, she'll have to make a decision about pressing charges against you for fraud. If you prove correct, however, I'm sure she'll give you a nice, big, public apology."
    "Oh, on my knees, cher," Emma assured the enraged mechanic.
    "Yeah? Well, while you're down there why don't you suck my big red di—"
    Never in her life had Emma seen a man so large move so fast. Before the mechanic could complete his indecent suggestion, Elvis Donnelly was across the space separating them and his hook had flashed out to open and then close around the button placket at the collar of the man's greasy striped overalls. It lifted, bringing Bill up onto his toes.
    "This isn't the first complaint I've had about the way you run this business," Donnelly said in a low, intense voice, bending his head to bring his face close to the mechanic's. "But it damn well better be the last, Gertz, or I'm going to shut your operation down so fast it'll make your head spin. Now, I'll thank you to keep a civil tongue in your head until your business is concluded. Get your mind out of the gutter and your butt in gear." Straightening, he allowed the hook to open up, releasing the fabric, and permitting Bill to settle back onto his heels.
    Straightening his collar, Gertz stretched his neck first to the left and then to the right. "Well, big surprise that you'd take the side of a whore, Donnelly," he spat out, but took a hasty step backward at the look in the sheriff's blue eyes.
    "Excuse me?" Insulted right down to her fingertips, Emma stepped without thought in front of the big law officer. It never occurred to her to let him handle the slur to her name; she was accustomed to fighting her own battles. Drawing up to her full height of five feet, nine and three-quarter inches, Emma faced the mechanic squarely.
    "How would you like to find your scraggly little rear end in a court of law defendin' against a slander suit?" she demanded in a low but combative voice. Her brown eyes, boring into his, burned with outrage. "I've been in this town less than two hours and y'all don't know me from Adam, sir, so where do you get off castin' aspersions on my virtue?" Taking a deep breath, Emma felt her shoulders brush against the sheriff's chest, and she was curiously tempted for about two seconds to lean back and let it support her weight.
    How ridiculous. She stood taller, blowing out an impatient little breath. "Legally, you're already treadin' a thin line here with my car," she informed Gertz coolly and then warned the belligerent mechanic, "I'd take heed if I were you, Mistah Bill Whoever-the-devil-you-are, because I'm tellin' you right now as clearly as I possibly can. If I hear one more obscenity uttered in front of my baby, we won't be talkin' a nickel-dime-let's-settle-out-of-court lawsuit. I'll go out and hire myself the biggest legal gun this side of the Mississippi Rivah and y'all can bank on the fact that we won't rest until this sorry little garage is mine!" She gave her surroundings a disparaging glance, then met the mechanic's eyes levelly once again. "The place is obviously in need of somebody who knows how to run it right."
    That's when she ran out of steam. Yeah, sure, Em, she thought with derision. Big Talk. As if she'd dare do anything that would draw attention to her and Gracie's whereabouts. But she neither blinked nor looked away from Bill Gertz's stare. She'd learned to bluff at a tender age and no crooked little backwater mechanic was