More Blazing Bedtime Stories: Once Upon a Mattress by Julie Leto, Leslie Kelly Read Free Book Online

carried to his hypersensitive ears.
    “Goodnight, Penny. Thanks again for working a double shift. Sorry you couldn’t run off with that sexy guy this morning.”
    “Run off?” Penny said with a grunt. “You have no idea.”
    “Well, if you get the chance again, you go for it,” the other woman said, reaching out and touching Penny with what appeared to be a tender hand. “I know you haven’t been happy since you came back here. As much as I love having you around, please don’t feel like you need to stay because of me.”
    “Here’s as good as anywhere,” Penny replied, sounding wistful, resigned. Which merely cemented what he already suspected about her feelings for her homeland.
    You don’t belong .
    “Besides, you’re here.” Though it didn’t seem like something that came naturally to her, Penny put her arms around the other woman’s shoulders and hugged. She just as quickly stepped back. “And you need me. Who else is going to haul your butt out of the fire when Gina calls in sick?”
    “She’s going to have to grow up one of these days.”
    The princess smiled. She looked younger now, softer in the darkness without the sun spotlighting the thick, unnatural makeup. “Keep dreaming.”
    The women exchanged goodnights, then separated, heading in different directions. As she walked, Penny rubbed the back of her neck with one slim hand. The slump in her shoulders and the trudge of her feet told him she was exhausted. Not paying close enough attention to her surroundings.
    Obviously she didn’t notice him , though he felt sure his heated stare must be burning her from a block away.
    Knowing the danger was directed at Penny, not at her coworker, who’d walked off the other way, Lucas followed the princess. He remained on the opposite side of the street, hugging the buildings and the shadows and the silence. At one with the night.
    As she left the puddle of light from the streetlamp behind her, Penny was completely swallowed by darkness. The next streetlight wasn’t working.
    Coincidence? Possible. But he doubted it.
    The full moon played a game of hide-and-seek with the thick clouds that had followed him steadily from the west, so even it wasn’t able to provide much illumination. Yet he saw her, heard the soft scrape of her rubber-soled shoes on the sidewalk. If he stood still and concentrated all his attention on it, he thought he might even be able to hear the beating of her heart.
    He also smelled the light, flowery scent—feminine, and at odds with her tough-girl appearance—wafting from her skin. Just as he’d smelled the wanton need arising from her this morning.
    She lived a few streets away and apparently assumed this town was a safe one. She seemed fearless as she walked home, alone, late at night, without a care in the world beyond the pain in her tired feet and aching arms.
    You’re not safe . The words screamed in his head yet didn’t emerge from his vocal cords.
    A second later, he was proved right. He spotted a movement in the shadows ahead of her. Five, seven paces, no more.
    The danger. The presence he’d sensed stalking her waited directly in Penny’s path.
    Lucas didn’t think, didn’t shout, didn’t do anything except run, silent, furious, afraid for her. His feet nearly flew over the street even as rage clouded his vision and grabbed him in its blind, ruthless grip.
    But he didn’t make it. Even at his fastest, he still wasn’t quick enough to stop Penny from being grabbed and violently hurled to the ground.
     
    I T HAD BEEN one long, miserable day. Nonstop customers and nonstop drama had led to a nonstop headache. By the time ten o’clock had rolled around, Penny had wanted nothingmore than a steamy-hot shower and an icy-cold beer, both of which awaited her at her small house a few blocks away.
    The attack came out of nowhere. She had been oblivious to any threat. Entirely comfortable back here in LeBeaux, she hadn’t foreseen the dangers she would have routinely