Read Online The Ring on Her Finger by Elizabeth Bevarly - Free Book Online

mistaken. What she felt at the moment went way beyond panic. Fear was a much more appropriate word. So were terror and abject horror .
    “Phoebe, what have I gotten myself into?”
    “You didn’t get yourself into anything,” Phoebe told her firmly. “That moron Archie did. And we’re going to get you out. Don’t worry. It’s just going to take a little time, that’s all.”
    “But what if the mob is looking for me, too?”
    “Sing a couple choruses of ‘Tomorrow.’ God knows that scared the hell outta me when I saw it. Of course, it was the traveling production...”
    “Ha-ha.”
    “Look, just sit tight,” Phoebe instructed. “I’ll keep up with things at this end. No one could possibly find you where you are. You’re perfectly safe there.”
    Except for wild dog Max living across the hall, Lucy couldn’t help thinking. Naturally, she said nothing of that to Phoebe. Instead, she said, “Hurry, Phoebe, okay? I’m not sure how long I can do this.”
    “You’ll be fine,” Phoebe said. “Just...don’t panic.”
    As she hung up the phone, Lucy glanced down at Alexis Cove’s list again, focusing intently on the collection of letters and numbers. Maybe if she just concentrated really hard this time, it would all make sense. But the harder she tried to understand it all, the less sense all of it made.
    Different learning pattern, she told herself. That was why she had so much trouble with this kind of thing.
    Don’t panic , she repeated morosely to herself.
    Yeah, right.
     
    Max was pondering what to do about the funny ca-chunking sound coming from beneath the hood of Justin’s 1937 Bugatti Type 57SC Atlantic-Electron coupe—man, did that guy know cars—when he decided to call it a day. Everyone else had done that hours ago, back when it still actually was day, so why shouldn’t he now that the sky was smudged purple in the west? Just because he hated to quit when there was something left undone? Just because when he wasn’t working on cars, it left his mind open to think about other things he’d really rather not think about? Just because it meant he had to go upstairs and spend the rest of the night—the long, lonely night—in his apartment—his quiet, lonely apartment—knowing that right across the hall slept the lovely and talented Juicy—ah, Lucy—French?
    Carefully, he lowered the black Bugatti’s hood, stroking his hand over the smooth metal surface as it clicked lovingly into place. He loved cars. More than anything else in the world. He loved their luscious curves, their well-toned figures, their elegant beauty. He loved the way they handled, the way they rode, the way they sounded, the way they smelled. He loved the pump of their pistons, the murmur of their motors, the tremor of their tires as they took an unexpected, curve. He loved the volume, the vibration, the velocity. He’d been born with a carburetor for a heart and petrol flowing through his veins, and he never quite felt comfortable unless he was seated in the driver’s side of a well-honed machine.
    You could trust cars. The good ones, anyway. And you could always tell the good from the bad. They weren’t like people. With cars, even the worst lemons you could spot with one test drive.
    He wiped a clean rag over the hood of the Bugatti, rubbing away the evidence of his fingerprints upon it. Would that life could be cleaned up so easily. Unfortunately, there were stains on Max’s life that weren’t ever going to come out, no matter how hard he scoured. So he might as well just learn to live with them.
    And he was learning to live with them. Pretty much. Or, at least, he had been. Until pretty Lucy French and her short, snug skirt came along. Now she would be living only a few feet away from him for months. Then again, there was something kind of appropriate about that. Max had taken this job five years ago because he’d wanted to punish himself, surrounding himself with beautiful cars that would never—could