Brenda was flipping through the stack of mug shots when Jax finally came back to the living room. "I’m sorry, Lieutenant," she sighed with a soft grimace. "None of these faces rings a bell."

Jax put his hands on his hips. "I figured we couldn’t be that lucky," he groused. "We had an FBI big shot sit in on this case a while back – one of those profiler types, like in that creepy movie with Jodie Foster?" Brenda nodded. "Anyway, he seemed to think that the Slasher wasn’t a previous offender. These murders are too spontaneous and gruesome to fit anyone we had on file."

Brenda closed the folder and set it on the coffee table. "So, what do we do now?"

"*Now* we sit back and wait for the Slasher to make the next move – unfortunately," Jax replied. He glanced over his shoulder at the stairway to the second floor of the brownstone. "I checked the upper floor while you were looking through those and we’re secure for the night. All the windows are locked."

"I hardly think that those windows pose a threat to my security!" Brenda laughed incredulously. "This is an *old* building, Lieutenant. Those second-story windows have to be at least forty feet up!"

Jax shoved his hands in his pockets as he shrugged. "That’s why God made ladders, I guess."

Brenda’s face paled and a visible shudder moved through her body. "Why……." She swallowed hard and then rose from the sofa. "Why don’t we go out in the kitchen?" she asked, trying to inject a light tone into her voice. "I believe I promised to make you something to eat in return for looking at those mug shots."

When Jax smiled, a lock of his hair fell across his forehead. "My mum always did say I never met a food I didn’t like." He gestured towards the hallway. "Ladies first."

Brenda realized there was a method to Jax’s politeness when she looked over her shoulder and saw him double-checking the safety chain on the front door. {Why are you suddenly so nervous, Brenda? The man’s here to protect you! Think of how you would feel if you were alone! And besides, you’re home – and safe. Nothing can happen to you here. It’s only when you go *outside* that bad things happen.} By the time Jax found his way back to the kitchen, she had swept up the broken glass from the wine goblet and was getting the ingredients for fresh grilled cheese sandwiches out of the refrigerator.

Lieutenant Jasper Jacks had seen many things in his long career in law enforcement. He had spent more time with the SWAT team than he cared to recall. He had been called in to mediate desperate domestic standoffs that often ended badly. But the spectacle that greeted Jax when he entered the kitchen stopped him cold. Brenda was standing in front of the refrigerator, bent over at the waist, talking to herself aloud. Her rounded, diminutive derriere was presented to him in a most tempting fashion as it bounced from side to side. She hummed something unrecognizable, interrupting herself occasionally when she would find another mystery ingredient in the bowels of the refrigerator. The sight of her ponytail bouncing along with her tush as she started to sing again drew Jax’s attention to places in his body that hadn’t felt warm since Miranda died.

Jax shrugged off his bomber jacket and threw it over a kitchen chair, but Brenda was so engrossed that she still didn’t hear him. He was about to clear his throat loudly to announce his presence when she finally turned around and saw him. Just when she thought she had calmed herself down, the man had to go and take his jacket off, exposing those powerful biceps of his to the bright lights in her kitchen. Her arms were loaded down with a head of lettuce, some wedges of yellow and white cheese, two bunches of red grapes, and several ears of very small yellow corn. As her mouth formed a small "o," the food pyramid in her arms started to crumble.

He rushed over to her in time to catch the corn before it hit the floor. Of course, he had to press his body closely against hers to keep any more of the food from tumbling. As the cold air from the refrigerator swept over the both of them, Brenda’s mouth felt like the Sahara Desert. She looked into his sparkling blue eyes and somehow found her power of speech. "I……uh………" She grappled for the food and managed to scoop most of it back into her arms, kicking the refrigerator door shut behind her. "Thanks," she finished awkwardly.

"No problem." As she straightened up and pulled away from him, Jax couldn’t help but notice the way her eyes went directly to the substantial handgun in his shoulder holster and widened. "I thought you said before that my gun didn’t bother you."

Brenda smiled a little and backed away from him, shifting the food in her arms. "I guess that was before I saw it up close and personal." She turned and walked towards the counter where she dumped the ingredients none too gently. "And before I found out that you’d be staying here with me."

"Just for tonight, of course," Jax added hurriedly, and Brenda nodded her understanding. "And only if you’re sure you won’t reconsider checking into a safe room at a hotel……"

"Not a chance." Brenda punctuated her statement by loudly snapping an ear of corn in half.

Jax pursed his lips and then ambled towards a kitchen chair. "You know, you really should think about getting a gun yourself, Brenda."

"Me? A gun?" Brenda laughed loudly. "Why on *earth* would I need a gun?"

Jax sank into the chair, flexing his injured left shoulder gingerly as he did. "A beautiful woman like yourself, living all alone down here in a questionable neighborhood – I would think the reasons would be fairly obvious."

Brenda hadn’t heard a word Jax said. Her mind was still reeling from his use of the words "beautiful" and "yourself" in the same sentence. She startled slightly when the grilled cheese sandwiches behind her sizzled. "I…..uh……I really don’t think I’d ever be able to use one of those things," she said, gesturing towards Jax’s holster shoulder with her spatula. "I’d just probably end up shooting myself in the foot instead." She flipped the sandwiches and then went to the cabinet to take down two large stoneware plates. "And besides – since I don’t intend to leave the brownstone again, I hardly think I would run into any life-threatening situations."

She was still standing at the counter, clutching the plates to her chest, when the phone rang. Jax instantly jumped up but Brenda got to the wall phone before he did. "Hello?" She frowned into the receiver. "Hello?"

Every muscle in Jax’s body tensed. "Can you hear anything on the other end?" he whispered.

Brenda gave him a look that clearly said "you’re over-reacting" and sighed. "Hello?" she said firmly one more time. Then, she hung up the receiver and came to the table. "Probably one of those pesky computerized tele-marketers," she said as she set a plate down in front of the chair Jax had occupied. "They spend a lot of money to get those machines to call people and then they just don’t work."

Jax wasn’t buying it. "Have you ever thought about installing caller ID?"

"Actually, I *did* buy one of those silly boxes," Brenda answered as she set a plate in front of the chair opposite Jax’s. "It’s still hooked up to the telephone in the library, I think." She shrugged nonchalantly as she went back to the stove to turn off the gas under the corn. "Most of the time I just ignore the thing."

Jax was already out the kitchen door. "And the library would be……?" he asked, pointing down the hallway.

"Top of the stairs, second door on the left," Brenda replied. The words were barely out of her mouth when she turned and saw that thin air replaced the spot where Jax had been standing.

He took the stairs to the second floor two at a time. Never breaking stride, Jax pushed the door to the library open and flipped on a light, flooding the room with warm, soft light from several antique-looking floor lamps. A large oak desk in the center of the room became his destination when he saw the telephone and caller ID box sitting next to a computer monitor and keyboard.

The LCD screen on the caller ID box was still lit but when Jax saw the telephone number, he swore loudly. Apparently Brenda’s "computerized tele-marketer" had taken up conducting business from a pay phone somewhere in downtown Port Charles. He jotted down the number on a stray piece of paper he saw on the corner of the desk anyway – once a cop, always a cop – and shoved it in his jeans pocket.

By the time he strolled back into Brenda’s kitchen, she was filling the wine glass next to her plate with the merlot that she had been looking forward to before Jax’s arrival. She looked up at him in mid-pour. "Did you find it?"

He nodded. "Yep. And you were right. Just one of those annoying tele-marketing sales people." Jax’s eyes widened when he glanced down at his plate. "That looks – amazing!!" The simple grilled cheese sandwich he had been promised lay next to a bed of rich green romaine lettuce. Nestled in the midst of the lettuce were some slices of crisp delicious apples, whole walnuts, and flame-colored grapes. A steaming ear of pale yellow baby corn completed the visual feast.

Brenda shrugged a little and walked over to where he stood. "Thanks. Cooking is one of my favorite hobbies." She glanced down at the wine bottle in her hand. "I suppose you can’t join me since you’re technically on duty, huh?"

"I’m a big boy, Brenda," Jax chuckled. "I don’t think *one* glass of wine will impair my faculties that severely."

Brenda tried to ignore the erotic thoughts that Jax’s comment about being "big" brought to mind. She poured the wine and then set the bottle down on the table between them before returning to her own chair. When she looked up and saw him raising his glass to hers, Brenda joined in the mini-toast with a smile. "To ……new friends, Brenda."

"To new friends……Lieutenant."

Jax choked and set down his wine glass hurriedly. "Jax, please."

Brenda frowned slightly, her fork poised to spear an apple slice. "Excuse me?"

"It’s a little ridiculous for you to keep calling me lieutenant when I’m calling you by your first name." When he smiled at her warmly, Brenda felt as though the mundane kitchen appliances had faded into a fog and they were in some intimate, romantic restaurant on the Left Bank in Paris. "Call me Jax, please."

"Jacks? Your last name?" When Brenda bit off half of the apple slice, Jax knew what Adam must have felt like in the Garden. "Isn’t that a rather strange nickname?"

"No – it’s Jax – with an "x," he replied. A chagrinned blush stained his cheeks. "It’s one of the more socially acceptable nicknames that I’ve acquired through the years."

Brenda wiped her lips delicately and nodded after sipping some of her wine. "I remember now. Your sister-in-law called you that in the hospital."

"Bobbie?" Brenda nodded and Jax shook his head as he popped a few grapes into his mouth with gusto. "She married one of my older brothers."

"You come from a large family?"

"Mm-hmm." Jax bit off a large section of grilled cheese and sighed his appreciation for Brenda’s cooking. "We’re getting to be so many now with all the nieces and nephews that mum is threatening to rent a hall for Thanksgiving."

Brenda ran a finger around the rim of her wineglass. "It must be nice to have a large family. Especially around the holidays."

They continued to eat in companionable silence as the shadows of dusk crept across the kitchen. As Brenda rose to clear the dishes, Jax stretched his arms, winced, and then massaged his left shoulder. Brenda carried his dirty plate and wine glass to the sink and almost dropped them when the low, husky timbre of his voice rumbled behind her. "Can I help you with those?"

She spun around to find him standing only a hair’s breadth from her. "How did you……" She peeked around him at his empty chair. "Weren’t you just sitting over……."

Jax chuckled. "One of the many tricks you learn at the academy." The air between them seemed to vibrate with heated energy until the silence was shattered by the sound of Brenda’s doorbell. The heated intimacy of Jax’s stance evaporated. He turned towards the front of the brownstone, pulling Brenda behind him as his other hand went to the butt of his pistol. "Were you expecting company tonight?"

"It …..uh……it could be Brian, delivering the groceries." Brenda glanced up at the clock on the kitchen wall. "But he usually comes first thing in the morning – not after dark." When the bell rang again, Jax pulled his pistol out of the shoulder holster and glared towards the front door. "And you call *ME* paranoid," Brenda grumbled as pushed at his shoulder, trying to get past him to answer the bell. She caught him so off guard that she managed to get halfway down the hall before he caught up to her. Gripping her upper arm, Jax ushered her as gently as he knew how towards the staircase.

"You go on upstairs," Jax ordered as the bell rang again. "I’ll handle this. That’s my job." Brenda chewed on her lower lip but then nodded and headed up the stairs. She paused once at the top, glancing back down with a question in her eyes, but Jax waved his pistol at her emphatically.

He approached the door on cat’s feet and peered through the peephole. As soon as he caught sight of Brenda’s "guest," Jax swore under his breath and let out a long breath. He undid the security chain, swung the door open, and clicked the safety back on his weapon in full sight of his boss. "Mac, we’ve GOT to stop meeting like this!"

Mac Scorpio tried to stick his head inside the door but Jax effectively blocked him with the bulk of his body. "What are you doing here, Jax? I thought you were out sick today."

"I might ask you the same question, mate," Jax replied sardonically. He ruffled his hair with his fingers and then re-holstered the gun. "Aren’t you supposed to be home with Felicia and the kids?"

Mac gave Jax a look of pure contempt and then glanced over his shoulder. "V finally broke down and told me that you were doing the protective samba with Miss Barrett for the night." Jax arched an eyebrow at him but Mac ignored it. "She thought you might want to have your car here in case of an emergency but couldn’t figure out how to get it here and then get back home herself." He shrugged but still looked intently at the silent rooms beyond the brownstone’s entry foyer. "I just thought I would do her a favor and check up on our star witness at the same time."

Jax peered over Mac’s shoulder towards the driveway. His black Jeep Cherokee was dusted with a fine coating of the snow that had begun to fall sometime during the late afternoon. When he glanced towards the street, he saw V sitting in the passenger side of Mac’s Olds ’98. She wiggled her fingers at him in greeting and then smiled her apology for spilling the beans to their boss.

"Soooooo……." Mac tried again to get past Jax’s arm, which was firmly planted as a barrier across Brenda’s threshold. "This is where Brenda Barrett lives, huh?" He snorted in disdain. "You’d think that the heir to Harlan Barrett’s millions could do better than an old run-down white elephant like this."

"She seems to like it." Mac appeared to be bound and determined to make physical contact with Brenda. "Shouldn’t you be getting V home now?" Jax grinned devilishly. "You wouldn’t want to have to pay her any overtime just cause you were shooting the breeze with me, would you?"

Mac scowled but wasn’t swayed. "Did you bring Miss Barrett down to the station and have her look through the mug shots yet?"

{Evasive maneuvers! Evasive maneuvers!} "She glanced through them but none of the faces rang a bell." The different in height between the two men brought Jax’s arm up even with Mac’s nose. "But after what that FBI expert told us last month, I really didn’t expect her to find our boy among the PCPD’s previous acquaintances."

"Maybe *I* should have a little chat with her," Mac suggested brightly. "You know – a fresh angle and all that. Might be just the thing to discover some detail that you overlooked."

Jax bristled at his boss’s implication of his inadequacy. "Yeah – that might be a good idea any other time – but Brenda’s asleep." Mac’s face fell at the blatant lie and simultaneously Jax’s spirits soared. "Yep. She didn’t get much rest in the hospital – you know how they are, taking your blood pressure at all hours of the day and night," Jax said confidentially. "So she just had a bite to eat and then sacked out right before you rang the bell."

He wasn’t really sure why, but somehow Jax knew that the last thing Brenda needed was Mac Scorpio interrogating her. He told himself that Mac was a nice enough guy, but he certainly didn’t have the sensitivity that *he* did when it came to dealing with borderline nut-cases like Brenda. There was no way Mac would have understood Brenda’s reluctance to come down and look through the mug shots. No – the *last* thing Brenda needed after the past 48 hours was a face-to-face with Malcolm Scorpio.

"D*mn." It was Mac’s turn to run his fingers through his hair in frustration. "I was really hoping that I could call the press first thing tomorrow and announce that we had a positive ID on the Slasher."

"I know, chief, but you can’t get blood from a turnip, as the saying goes." {But you’d d*mn well try, and probably make turnip puree out of Brenda in the process.} "So why don’t you head on home to Felicia and the girls and I’ll let you know as soon as there’s any progress on the case."

Mac finally backed off and was about to turn back towards the street when he glared at Jax and pointed an accusing finger. "You’re not getting overtime for this one, Jax. The department just doesn’t have it in the budget to afford you going out and playing vigilante nursemaid, star witness or not!"

"I understand, Mac." Jax pushed him onto the porch and started closing the door with a smug grin while Mac was still blustering. "Besides – I’m still on sick leave – the injured shoulder, remember?" Mac grimaced at Jax and then turned to stomp down the snow-covered steps towards his car. Only after the Olds had rolled down the street, its turn signal blinking for a turn back towards the Port Charles suburbs, did Jax close the door and let out a sigh of relief.

He made sure that the safety chain was secured and the door double-locked before heading up the stairs. A little surprised that Brenda hadn’t come out to find out the name of her visitor, Jax kept a cautious hand on the butt of his pistol, his muscles tensed to spring at the least provocation. He cautiously peeked inside her bedroom door but the room was empty. When he saw a light coming from inside the library, he relaxed a little. The sight that greeted him when he got to the doorway caused him to pause in silent admiration.

Brenda was seated at the desk, the computer terminal on and running. Her arms were crossed on the desk, her head cradled in the softness. Her bangs fell across her forehead and her lips were pursed, resulting in a soft whistle when she breathed. She looked like an angel – and she was sound asleep.

Jax crept across the room until he took a seat in the chair in front of the desk. He indulged himself in the luxury of observing her while she slept. Obviously he had made the right decision in not letting Mac question her – he could see the faint shadow of dark circles under her eyes, even in the dim light. Her lush eyelashes fluttered slightly as movement behind her eyelids gave him a clue to the fact that she was dreaming. A notebook lay open on the desk in front of her, and just as Jax leaned forward to try to read the contents, Brenda awoke with a start.

"Jax!" She looked around and then rubbed her eyes sheepishly. "I guess I must have dozed off while I was working……"

Jax shrugged and sat back in his chair, folding his hands in his lap. "No problem. You’ve had a rough 36 hours."

Suddenly, Brenda’s eyes widened. "Are you OK? Who was at the door?"

Jax waved her off when she started to get up out of her chair. "It was just my boss." He rubbed his face with his hands in slight embarrassment. "He……uh…….he said he was helping a friend of mine drop off my car, but I think he was really just curious if you had identified the Slasher yet."

Brenda chewed on her lip. "What did you tell him?"

"I told him you were asleep, which turned out to be the truth." Jax sat up straighter and peered at the computer. "He’ll have plenty of time to question you after you’ve gotten a good night’s rest."

Brenda blushed a little and smiled. "Did you get in trouble because I didn’t want to come down and look at the mug shots so you brought them here?"

"I worked my way around it," Jax replied with a sly smirk. "If there’s anything you learn in law enforcement, it’s that there are shades of gray when it comes to telling the truth."

"Thanks." A few seconds of highly-charged silence followed. "I ….uh…..I was adding to my grocery order," Brenda added in a much louder voice, obviously changing the subject to something less personal. "I thought I might need more supplies if I’m going to have a house guest for a while, and if I logged on before 9 o’clock, I could add to the order being delivered tomorrow morning."

"The wonders of technology," Jax observed grimly. He rested back in his chair. "I freely admit to being a novice when it comes to the World Wide Web."

Brenda’s mind started to wander to dangerous territory – like how she would gladly help him gain experience in so many *other* areas – so she rubbed her hands together and sat up straighter in her chair. "Do you prefer sausage or bac……..oh, BAD WORD!"

"What’s the matter?"

"The stupid thing kicked me." Jax rose an eyebrow. "My service provider kicked me off the Internet – it happens all the time." Brenda glanced down at her watch. "And by the time I sign back on, it’ll be too late to add to my order."

"That’s OK." Jax stretched again and then rose to his feet. "But for future reference – I’ll eat anything for breakfast that isn’t nailed down."

"I’ll remember that." Brenda typed in a few more commands on the keyboard and then, after a few more beeps, Jax saw the light coming from the screen extinguish. She turned off some switches and then got to her feet. "So……." She looked out the window towards her driveway. "Do you want me to open the garage door so you can pull your car inside for the night? I mean, it’s snowing, and there’s certainly room since mine’s in the shop."

Jax shook his head. "Actually, no. It’s better if it looks like you’ve got company. Might discourage the Slasher from doing something stupid when you’re obviously not alone."

Brenda’s mouth formed an "o" of understanding. "I see." She held her hand out towards the hallway but Jax silently insisted she go first. "You…..uh……you can take your pick of bedrooms up here, I guess." Her words started to tumble over themselves as she prattled on nervously. "Some of them haven’t seen the light of day in a while, so after you decide, you’ll have to give me a few minutes while I freshen them up a little ….."

Jax’s hand on her shoulder caused Brenda to freeze in mid-sentence. "I won’t be sleeping up here, Brenda. I think I’ll just sack out on the couch downstairs for the night." Brenda’s combined relief and disappointment was the last thing Jax needed to see at that point. "I …..uh……I can probably keep a better watch on things from a central vantage point in the living room. You know …… watch the stairs, the front door, the back door, all at the same time……"

"Oh, yeah – right……" Brenda seemed to take comfort in his explanation while Jax tried to hide the effect thoughts of what she might wear to sleep in had on his body. "Well, there’s an afghan on the easy chair downstairs you can use to cover if you get cold….."

Jax walked Brenda to her bedroom door. "Remember – just give a yell if you remember anything …….." She nodded. "…..and let me get the phone if it rings," he added. "That’s why I’m here."

"If I forget to tell you later, Lieute………Jax," Brenda corrected herself, "thank you – for being here."

Jax stared down at the floor and shoved his hands in his pockets awkwardly. "Good night, Brenda."

"Good night, Jax."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

When Brenda tiptoed her way down the stairs and past the living room the following morning, Jax was snoring loudly on the couch. He had rolled the afghan around himself, his long legs trailing over the end of the small sofa. His stocking-clad feet rubbed together occasionally, which brought a smile to Brenda’s face. She watched him sleep for a few more seconds and then, when she heard a soft tapping from the back door, she hurried off towards the kitchen to answer it before it woke him.

Flipping the switch on the Mr. Coffee machine as she passed, Brenda didn’t even bother to check who it was before opening the back door with a smile. "Brian! I wasn’t sure if the weather would delay you this morning!"

"Now, Miss Barrett, you should know by now that little things like blizzards or ice storms keep *this* man from his appointed rounds!" Brian Coleridge stomped his feet briskly to rid them of the snow that clung to his boots. "You’re just lucky that I checked the cyber-orders before I started out this morning!"

Brian brushed some snow from the shoulders of his navy blue pea-coat before starting to carry in several brown bags of groceries. He was a stocky young man, probably around 24 years old, whose nondescript brown eyes were nearly hidden behind thick glasses. The stocking cap he routinely wore was pulled down so far to ward off the cold that it covered almost half of his forehead. After setting the third bag of groceries on her kitchen table, his boots leaving a damp path on each trip, Brian returned to a position on the threshold. "I’m sorry we didn’t have those capers you wanted in stock, Miss Barrett," he smiled, blowing on his hands to warm them. "So I put in a jar of pickled pigs’ feet instead to make up for us shortchanging you."

"Ummmm, yum," Brenda smiled grimly. She hardly thought that pickled pigs’ feet would add the same flavor to her tuna salad as the tiny black peppers she originally wanted, but Brian’s heart was in the right place. When the Mr. Coffee machine gurgled loudly, Brenda looked around. "Why don’t you come in and have some coffee and warm up, Brian? I mean, after making the trip on such a miserable day, you certainly deserve *some* kind of reward."

"Oh, no, I couldn’t, Miss Barrett," Brian blushed. "I really should get back to the store. Mr. Hobart’s pretty backed up with orders in this bad weather and we have a lot of elderly customers that count on me to bring their milk and bread and stuff."

"And stuff – right." Brenda felt a twinge of guilt for taking up Brian’s time delivering her order. She had two perfectly healthy legs that would allow her to walk to her car on the parking lot after picking out her own groceries. But after Gail’s words that her agoraphobia was a disability just like any other came back to her, it made Brenda feel a little better. "Well then, you could at least come inside while I get your money."

"I’m fine here, Miss Barrett – really. I already made a mess on your nice clean floor with all this drippy slush." Brian gestured towards the back porch as his face lit with an afterthought. "Oh, and I left that 50 pound bag of birdseed you ordered just outside the back porch door. Did you want me to take it on back to the shed before I leave?"

"No – that’s OK, Brian." Brenda went for a small purse that lay behind the cookie jar on the kitchen counter. "I’ve already taken up enough of your time. I’ll get someone else to help me with it if I can’t manage it myself." She opened the purse, took out several bills, and then walked back towards Brian as he clapped his arms around his chest to warm himself. "Tell Mr. Hobart that I’ll send in another order day after tomorrow……"

Brian put out a hand just as Brenda’s foot hit a large puddle near the door. "Watch out, Miss Barrett!" he shouted. "It’s wet………!"

Brenda heard his warning just as she felt her footing giving way. The money flew out of her hands as she flailed her arms, reaching for a kitchen chair to steady herself. But the only thing close enough to grab for balance was one slightly damp, *very* embarrassed delivery boy.

Brian forgot all about his good intentions not to drip on her clean floor when he saw Brenda start to slide. He rushed towards her and managed to wrap his arms around her in a bear hug just as both of her feet left the floor. Brenda instinctively clasped his arms for counter-balance, and when the dust cleared, she was staring into his shocked face, looking to all the world like she was greeting her long-lost lover.

"Ohhhh…….Miss Barrett……." Brian could only stammer in disbelief at the beautiful, soft, warm armful of woman he had the pleasure of holding. "Are you OK?"

"Yeah…….I think so…….." Brenda swallowed hard. She gripped his arms tighter so that she could try to regain her footing. But the melting slush had followed Brian into the kitchen, and when she set her feet down again, she slid like a champion ice skater. "Maybe not!!"

Brian gave a little snort of determination. "Don’t move, Miss Barrett!" he growled. He shifted her weight so that he spooned her and then wrapped his arms more firmly around her waist. With a mighty grunt, he lifted her clear off the floor and walked a few steps further into the kitchen where the floor was drier.

He had just set her down, both of them breathing hard, when they simultaneously heard a sharp click. Two sets of eyes looked up to find themselves staring down the barrel of a .457 Magnum handgun.