White Hot by Sandra Brown

the pickup and supported herself there while she checked her foot.
    “Any permanent damage?”
    “No. It’s all right.”
    “I’m terribly sorry. He thinks he’s a lapdog.”
    Although her foot was throbbing, she said, “It startled me more than hurt.”
    “What were you about to ask?”
    It took her a second to remember. “How you got from assisting my brothers in a brawl to becoming chief counsel for Hoyle Enterprises. After the night at the Razorback, how long before Huff hired you?”
    “As soon as I recovered from my hangover.” He chuckled. “Actually, Chris invited me to stay for a few days, go fishing, hang out. Over the course of the visit, it became clear to him that I was unhappy with the law firm I was in. By the end of my stay, Huff had made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. Relocation was no problem for me. I hadn’t come to Destiny intending to stay, but ultimately the decision was a no-brainer.”
    He had sunk his fingers into Frito’s dense pelt and was idling rubbing the back of his neck. The dog’s eyes were closed. He looked drunk with pleasure.
    Snapping her attention back to the subject, Sayre asked him what had happened to Calvin McGraw. He had been Huff’s lawyer for as far back as Sayre could remember. Beck Merchant had replaced him.
    “Mr. McGraw retired.”
    “Or Huff retired him,” she countered.
    “I don’t know what their arrangement was. I’m sure Huff offered him an attractive retirement package.”
    “Oh, I’m sure of that, too. Ensuring McGraw’s silence would have been expensive.”
    “His silence?”
    “About bribing the jury during Chris’s murder trial.”
    Beck’s fingers stopped their mindless movement, and gradually he withdrew his hand from the nape of Frito’s neck. The dog whined a complaint, but his owner seemed not to notice. His attention was focused on Sayre. Purposefully he walked toward her and didn’t stop until he was standing directly in front of her, effectively trapping her between him and the truck.
    She recoiled. “Back up.”
    “Not yet.”
    “What are you doing?”
    “Confessing. I lied to you.”
    “I would expect that. You’ll have to be more specific.”
    “The mosquito.”
    She stared up at him with incomprehension.
    “This afternoon, down at the bayou, when I brushed the mosquito off your cheek? There was no mosquito, Sayre. I just wanted to touch your face.”
    He wasn’t touching her now, except with his eyes, and their touch was almost as effective as fingertips. He shouldn’t have been standing this close to her. It was an inappropriate distance between strangers. Furthermore it was physically uncomfortable. It was too sultry for two people to be standing this close, close enough to feel each other’s body heat, forced to share the inadequate air.
    “I don’t remember that,” she lied. Pushing him aside, she headed for her car, which was parked a short distance away. By the time she reached it, he had caught up with her. Hooking her elbow, he brought her around.
    “First of all, the hell you don’t remember. Second, you’ve been tossing out some mighty bold allegations tonight. You intimated that Chris got away with murder, then accused your father of jury tampering. Those are serious crimes.”
    “So is tampering with evidence.”
    He raised his shoulders. “You’ve lost me.”
    “Yellow mud.” She pointed toward the pickup truck. “Your tires are caked with it. So are your boots.” Simultaneously, they looked down at the muddy boots poking out from beneath the stringy hems of his worn jeans. Looking into his face again, she said, “There’s only one place in the parish where the soil is that ocher color. On Bayou Bosquet. Where the fishing camp is.”
    His jaw bunched. “Your point?”
    “You went out there tonight, didn’t you? Don’t bother lying. I know you did. I just wonder what you did while you were there.”
    “You know,” he said, “if your design business ever tanks, maybe you could