Present Danger Read Free

appear to be looking down her nose at him when she had to tilt her head way back merely to meet his eyes.
    “Who the devil are you, mistah,” she demanded, “Superman or somethin’? I purely don’t recall him havin’ such a filthy mouth.” She tossed her head, making her shiny brown hair swing away from her bruised jaw. “That apartment is mine, paid for and signed on the dotted line, and I am movin’ in on the first. I don’t know what you’re in such an uproarabout, anyway; nobody requested your assistance handlin’ my problems.” She conveniently chose to forget her momentary excitement over his and Otis’s obvious street-aware toughness. It was beside the point, anyway.
    “I came here to rent an apartment, period,” she informed him with cool disdain, “not to find myself a big brotha to fight my wars for me. But for the record, suh, if Ah did need someone, I think I’d ask Otis here. He looks a whole lot tougher than you, so you can just give your superhero cape a rest. I won’t be requirin’ it.”
    She swung away and plucked her coat and purse off the couch. Controlling her outrage with an effort, she managed a weak smile. “Lola, thank you for your warm hospitality,” she said. “I look forward to gettin’ to know you much better. Otis, it was a real pleasuah to meet you.” She turned to James and nodded coolly. “Mistah Rydah.”
    And then she was gone.
    Otis looked at the stunned expression on his enraged friend’s face and tried to control his grin, but it refused to be subdued. “Well, I guess you can rest easy, Jimmy. I doubt she’s a victim of wife abuse, anyway.”
    “Why the hell not?” James demanded indignantly. “She’s such a midget, it wouldn’t take much to subdue her.”
    “Yeah, well, she may be tiny, Jimmy, but she’s got attitude,” Otis disagreed. “She backed you into a corner, didn’t she?”
    “Yeah, Superman,” Lola murmured with a throaty laugh.
    James muttered something truly foul, turned on his heel, and slammed out of the apartment.
    Otis put his arm around his wife and dragged her down onto the couch next to him. “You’ve really stirred up something this time, baby.”
    Lola shrugged. “She needed a place to stay and she loved the apartment,” she replied calmly. “Was I supposed to turn away the steady income because she was sportin’ a few bruises?”
    “Hell, babe, it is James’s apartment house and you know his feelings. You had to know that little gal would be expressly contrary to what he wants.”
    “That mon doesn’t know what he wants.”
    “And you do, I suppose?”
    Lola just gave him her mysterious, three-cornered smile—the one that drove him mad and had led him to pursue her some years back until she had finally agreed to marry him. Laughter rumbled like distant thunder deep in his massive chest. “Yeah, I suppose you do, at that.” With a mock growl, he grabbed her up and rolled her over.
    After the fact, Aunie was quite amazed at her temerity in standing up to James Ryder. She sat in her rented car ten minutes later, shaking with reaction. Had that really been she, the Aunie Franklin who, up until a year ago, had never made a wave in her life, angrily defying a man with such dangerous eyes? Perhaps she really was going to be able to make all the changes in her life she desired to make.
    She’d better. It wasn’t as if she had any other options.
    The first thing she did when she reached her downtown hotel room was call her lawyer in Atlanta. The phone rang several times before she remembered thethree-hour time difference. She disconnected and dialed his home number.
    The phone there rang several times also and she was just on the point of hanging up when he answered.
    “Hello?”
    “Jordan? This is Aunie.”
    “Aunie! Where are you? Are you all right?”
    “I’m at the Westin Hotel in Seattle; I’m fine, and guess what? I’ve already found a place to live.”
    “That was quick.”
    “Oh, Jordan, I wish you