To Trust a Stranger Read online

  Her response was, Uh-huh.

  But still, coward that she was, she had wanted to believe. A stable home, a stable marriage, were precious to her. As a child, she and her mother and sister Becky had been so poor they’d sometimes lived in homeless shelters. Hunger wasn’t some abstract concept involving starving children in Africa—from experience, she knew exactly how it felt. Her looks had gotten her and her family out of that hell and had won her Sid, the handsome millionaire ultimate prize she’d been dreaming of all her life. She’d fallen wildly in love with him when she was barely twenty, and he, in turn, had seemed to adore her. But somehow, over the course of eight years of marriage, it had all gone wrong.

  The love had disappeared from their marriage like air escaping from a tiny hole in a balloon: the loss was so gradual no one noticed until the thing went flat.

  So here she was, at quarter to one, caught in a snarl of traffic on this X-rated street just around the corner from the Citadel, spying on her husband. Who had certainly not built a home anywhere in the vicinity that she knew of.

  She should just turn around and go home, Julie told herself. Sid would kill her if he caught her following him—and she’d lost him anyway. She’d seen his big black Mercedes turn onto this street and that was it.

  When she had turned the same corner just a few minutes later, nothing. At least, no Sid.

  Plenty of people who made her think that driving the Jaguar had been a bad idea, though. Like the promenading hookers eyeing her wheels from the sidewalk with dollar signs in their eyes. And the sleazy john-types who cast furtive glances her way before disappearing into the XXX doorways. And the shirtless, tattooed bald guy who crossed the street right in front of her, thumping a fist on the hood and waggling his metal-studded tongue suggestively at her as he passed.

  That was it. Abort mission. She was going home. She who turns and runs away lives to follow her husband another day.

  Julie hung a right into the nearest parking lot, swung the Jag around—and frowned to find her exit blocked by a beat-up blue pickup that pulled in behind her.

  Her frown deepened when the doors opened and a pair of muscle-bound skinheads in sagging jeans and wifebeater undershirts got out. As they approached the Jag, Julie’s eyes widened. A quick glance around told her that there was no place to go. Parked cars ringed the lot on all sides. There was only one exit—and the pickup loomed between her and it.

  Instinctively she punched the lock button again. It clicked vainly. The doors were already locked. The windows were up. The punks kept coming. What else could she do? Her cell phone was in her purse. Julie grabbed her shoulder bag, ripped open the zipper, thrust her hand inside, and rooted frantically around. A hairbrush—makeup—a jumble of miscellaneous junk—where oh where was that phone?

  Just as her fingers closed around it, knuckles rapped on her window. Julie looked up to find an Eminem clone grinning through the glass at her.

  “Hey, open up.”

  His tone was almost friendly, but the gun in his hand was not.

  Julie’s heart began to pound. Oh, God, she was about to be mugged, or carjacked, or worse. What was she going to do? What could she do? He was armed with a gun. She was armed with a cell phone.

  If it came down to a duel, she was willing to bet that he could shoot her before she could punch in 911.

  Whichever way it worked out, there would be no keeping this a secret. Sid was bound to find out. And if her husband discovered that she’d followed him into Charleston, he would kill her.

  Always assuming that she was still alive to be killed, of course. The thought of Sid knowing what she’d done was scary, but the delinquent at her window was a more immediate threat.

  “I said open the god-damned door, bitch.”

  Her assailant didn’t sound friendly at all this time. He’d just been kind of holding the gun at waist level before. Now he was leveling it at her.

  Julie imagined a bullet shattering the glass and tearing into her flesh.

  Her heart sped up until it could have run a four-minute mile. Her mouth went dry. Her fight-or-flight impulse kicked in, and it didn’t come down on the side of fighting. Slamming the transmission into reverse, she stomped the gas and rammed the heel of her hand down on the horn at the same time. The Jag shot backward. The horn blared. The thugs cursed and gave chase.

  And the Jag crashed into the side of a black Chevy Blazer that was just at that moment backing out of a parking space.

  The impact threw her forward, and brought the Jag to a shuddering stop. At about the same time her window shattered, showering her with glass. Her head whipped around in time to see the punk who had knocked on her window thrust his arm into the car and pull up the lock. Before she could do anything but gasp, her door swung open, the punk leaned across her cool as a Popsicle to unfasten her seat belt, and she was yanked from her seat.

  Her butt and elbows hit the pavement hard and she cried out. The punks jumped into the car. She barely had time to roll out of the way before her Jag and the pickup that had blocked it peeled rubber out of the parking lot.

  The bad news was, her Jag had been stolen. The good news was, she was relatively unharmed.

  The plaintive lament of a slide guitar and voices, both reaching her ears from a little distance, brought her out of her first shocked immobility. Her phone, she discovered, making a quick inventory, was still in her hand. She’d lost her car, but she still had her phone. Frantically she punched in 9, then paused, recovering enough wit to think the situation through. She was sprawled out in the parking lot of some girlie joint deep in the heart of Charleston, lying on pavement that was hot enough to toast bread even so long after sundown, wearing nothing but her hubby-come-hither sleeping attire of hot pink satin tap pants and a skimpy matching top, along with a pair of Nikes. Her butt was bruised, her elbows stung—and her car was gone. How was she ever going to explain this to Sid?

  Oh, God, what if it hit the papers?

  Maybe calling 911 was not the best idea, she thought with her finger poised above the button. But what else was she going to do?

  “Have a fight with your boyfriend?”

  The voice was masculine. The vision that filled her eyes as she glanced up in response was anything but. Pointy-toed black patent stilettos big enough to swim in. Muscular calves in opaque black panty hose. A red sequined skirt that stopped several inches above a pair of athletic-looking knees. A shiny black blouse with a deep décolletage that was filled in with a red and black polka-dot scarf. Breasts the size and shape of traffic cones. Long platinum blond hair. A lean hard chin and manly features whose gender was given the lie by garish makeup ladled on thick. All this on a broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped frame that stood easily six and a half feet tall. The overall effect was Dolly Parton morphed with the Terminator.

  She must have been gaping, because the question was repeated with a hint of impatience. It recalled her to the full dimensions of her dilemma, and the oddity of her questioner was forgotten.

  “They stole my car! Those two punks—they stole my car.”

  Julie peeled herself off the pavement and scrambled to her feet. Stabs of pain from her butt and elbows were ignored as she stared helplessly in the direction in which her car had disappeared. The street and sidewalks were still clogged with traffic, vehicular and otherwise, but her car was no longer in sight. Neither was the pickup. There was an intersection just half a block away. They could have turned left—or right.

  Her legs went rubbery, and she swayed a little before she could lock her knees into place. A surprisingly masculine-feeling hand closed around her upper arm, steadying her.

  “Are you drunk?” The voice was surprisingly masculine, too, given the appearance of its owner, and faintly disapproving. Glancing up, Julie confronted the full glory of twin arches of sky blue eye shadow above sea blue eyes and gleaming scarlet lips above a strong chin with the faintest hint of five-o’clock shadow, and knew despair. There was no help to be had here.

 
“No!” Impatient, she jerked her arm free, raised the phone, and added a 1 to the 9. Then she paused. Sid . . .

  “You know, you banged into my car pretty good. You have a license? Insurance?”

  “What?” She was so busy performing a fast mental search through the pros and cons of a variety of actions that she had pretty much blocked out everything else.

  “License? Insurance? You know, the kind of information most people exchange when they’ve had a wreck?”

  Julie took a deep breath, and tried to focus on what was being said to her. One problem at a time. Arnold and Dolly’s bastard offspring was obviously afraid that he—she—oh, whatever—was going to be stuck for the damage to his car. A glance beyond him told her that it was pretty substantial. The dent extended from the middle of the right rear door to past the wheel well.

  “Yes. Yes, of course I have a license and insurance. Oh, my purse is in the car. They stole my car. I have to get it back.” Her finger shot to the final 1 and then she paused again, glancing despairingly toward the intersection. No doubt about it: the Jag was long gone. There was no way to keep this secret from Sid. She might as well go on and bite the bullet and call the police and be done with it.

  Still she hesitated, racking her brain to come up with an—any—alternative. She glanced up appealingly, only to find that he was giving her the once-over. Julie was almost sure of it. She had been on the receiving end of enough of those looks to recognize it for what it was.

  A bubble of near-hysterical laughter rose in her throat. How much worse could this night get? Her probably cheating husband had snuck out of their home after she’d gone up to bed. She’d chased him onto a block that looked like vice cops should be swarming all over it. There she’d had a wreck and been assaulted and her Jaguar had been stolen. Now she was standing in her skimpy satin husband-bait in the parking lot of some sort of sex bar with a drag queen checking her out.

  About to call the cops.

  Life didn’t get much better than that.

  He finished his perusal of her body, glanced up, and their gazes met and held. Hers was indignant, challenging. She was not in the mood to be sexually harassed by what looked like the humongous hooker from hell. His had something she thought she recognized as being very male in it. After the briefest of pregnant moments he broke off eye contact, and his gaze dropped down her body again. Blatantly this time.

  Julie bristled and opened her mouth to slay him with a few choice words.

  He beat her to it.

  “Girlfriend, you really should be wearing heels with an outfit like that,” he said in a slow, faintly disapproving drawl.

  He’d been checking out her shoes? Julie felt insane laughter bubbling up her throat. She swallowed it along with the blast she’d been getting ready to flatten him with, took a deep, calming breath, and glanced around.

  People had entered the parking lot since she’d jumped to her feet: an entwined couple and an extravagantly dressed woman, walking separately, heading for their cars. It said a lot for the standards of the area that they didn’t even give her in her sexy pj’s and Amazonia in all her jaw-dropping glory a second glance.

  Not that it mattered. The only thing that mattered was getting her car back and getting home before Sid. The problem was, how was she supposed to do that?

  “Damn Sid anyway,” she muttered aloud. This entire disaster was every bit his fault.

  “Miz Carlson?” Amazonia asked then, on a faintly disbelieving note. Julie’s eyes widened and shot to his face. Her previous conviction to the contrary, the night had suddenly gotten much, much worse. Whoever or whatever this—this person was, he knew her name.

  Julie’s heart began to slam against her breastbone. She met his gaze wide-eyed. A denial trembled on her lips, but she realized almost at once that it would only make her look foolish, and the situation even more questionable. There was no hope of concealing anything now. Might as well just punch in the final 1 and get it over with.

  “Y—yes.”

  There was the tiniest pause as the heavily made-up eyes narrowed and the bright red lips thinned. “Well, now,” he said as his gaze ran over her once more, with an entirely different expression. “If that just don’t absolutely beat all.”

  Julie wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but she was sure she didn’t like the sound of it.

  “Hey, Deb-bie,” a slurred voice interrupted. Julie glanced around. The couple—an overweight, obviously drunken man in a rumpled suit and a beautiful blonde in an elegant black cocktail dress who clung possessively to his arm—came up behind them and paused, the woman obviously supporting the man, who was a little unsteady on his feet. The scent of booze emanating from the man was unpleasantly strong. Wrinkling her nose in instinctive protest, Julie realized that the greeting, uttered by the man, had been addressed to Amazonia. Debbie? Julie shot him a glance. The name seemed far too ordinary for such an extraordinary individual.

  “You still got the address? It’s gonna be a hell of a good time.” The man’s gaze shifted from Debbie to Julie, and moved over her in a way that creeped her out. “Your pretty friend here’s welcome, too.”

  “Oh, Clint, you know I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” Debbie smiled and spoke in a mincing falsetto that in no way resembled the growling masculine tone he’d used with her. “You and Lana go on ahead, sugar. I’ll be along shortly.”

  “Remember, we’ve got lots of blow. All you need to bring is maybe your little friend, and we’ll party all night. There’s plenty of fun to be had by all.” Clint gave Julie a leering smile. Julie recoiled. As Lana pulled Clint away, she glanced back over her shoulder at Julie.

  “You stay away, bitch,” she mouthed. Then, waggling her fingers at Debbie, she added aloud, “See you later, sweet cheeks.”

  Sweet cheeks? Debbie? It hit Julie with the force of a blow: Lana was a man. She gaped after the pair as they resumed their unsteady journey toward the far end of the parking lot. The beautiful, shapely blonde swaying so sexily in four-inch heels was a man.

  “She thinks I’m a man!” Julie exclaimed as revelation struck.

  She caught Debbie’s eye just then, and discovered that he was grinning.

  “Close your mouth, Miz Carlson, you’ll catch flies,” he chided in his masculine voice, and gently tapped her slack jaw with a forefinger. Her teeth clamped together with an audible click. “You should feel flattered. You made Lana jealous. You notice she’s not jealous of me.”

  For a moment Julie felt something like Alice after she fell down the rabbit hole. This was definitely a parallel universe. Then she remembered the mess she was in, and everything else was wiped from her mind.

  “My car,” she groaned, and started to punch in the final 1 before hesitating once more.

  “You gonna call the police or not? I got places to go and things to do here. And we’re going to need that police report for the insurance.”

  When a six-and-a-half-foot-tall transvestite crosses his arms over his eye-popping chest, gives you an impatient look, and starts tapping his pointed patent-leather toe, the effect is galvanizing, Julie discovered. She clutched the phone tighter, but could not quite bring herself to punch in that last 1.

  If she did, all hell would break loose the minute she got home.

  “Look, I’ve got a problem, okay? I don’t want my husband to find out I was out tonight,” she confessed, her shoulders slumping in defeat as she lowered the phone. Debbie knew who she was and therefore almost certainly knew Sid in some way or another, although her mind boggled at picturing mucho macho Sid having an acquaintance with a drag queen. But Debbie was such a bizarre figure that it seemed all right to confide, a little, in him. He would have his share of secrets, too. Besides, she’d wrecked his car, he wanted to call the police, and she was just now fully beginning to comprehend what a really bad idea that was. She was willing to bet good money that every cop in South Carolina knew or knew of her husband, and once she called them she might just as well take out an ad in t
he paper describing the night’s debacle and be done with. If telling Debbie a little of the truth would win her enough sympathy to give her time to think, Julie was all for that.

  “Oh, yeah?” Debbie sounded interested rather than sympathetic, but interested worked too. More people were coming into the parking lot now, and a candy-red Corvette drove past them on the way to the exit. It honked, and a manicured hand tipped in long, bright red nails waved gaily out the driver’s window. Lana and Clint.

  “If you know who I am, then you must know I’m good for the damages to your car,” Julie said. “But I really don’t want to call the police.”

  “Is that right?” Debbie was looking at her speculatively. “Suppose we get in my car where we can have a little bit of privacy and you tell me all about it. Maybe I can help you out here.”

  Debbie’s very masculine-feeling hand curled around her upper arm again before Julie could answer, urging her toward his damaged vehicle. Julie glanced up, registered once again the mind-boggling dichotomy of platinum curls bouncing against breasts roughly the size of the Himalayas on a linebacker’s broad-shouldered frame, then allowed herself to be persuaded. Turning to a flamboyant, gender-bending stranger for help was probably only a little less stupid than chasing after Sid in the first place, but under the circumstances none of the other options she could think of were any more appealing.

  Debbie opened the Blazer door for her, and Julie slid into the black leather seat. It was only as he shut the door behind her and walked around the hood to get in himself that it occurred to her that maybe getting into a car with a strange man in women’s clothes might not be the smartest thing she had ever done.

  3

  JULIE CARLSON WAS EVERY BIT AS HOT as Mac remembered. Great tits, great ass, great legs, skin the color of honey, long, tousled black hair that would look fantastic spread out over a man’s pillow, kissable lips, big brown eyes. He’d first seen her at her wedding. At the time he’d been a cop, hired for the occasion to provide security, and while he’d been full of admiration for the sexy young bride he’d been busy thinking about other things, and she had never so much as glanced his way. Her eyes had been all for her groom: John Sidney Carlson IV, born with a silver spoon in his mouth that Mac had never stopped wanting to cram up his ass instead. Back then Sid made a splash with everything he did, and his wedding—his second wedding—was no exception. There’d been a thousand guests, including the governor and more big names than you could shake a stick at, TV and newspaper coverage, and Julie Ann Williams, one month out of her reign as Miss South Carolina, for a bride.