He shook his head at his own reaction to her. This was absolutely not what he needed right now.
He turned away from her to look at the traffic and then turned back again, letting out a pent-up breath. "Here's what we're going to do. We're going to pull into that parking lot over there and figure this out. If you have a problem with that, I'm calling the police."
"No, I don't have a problem. I'll follow you," she agreed quickly.
Marco pocketed her license instead of returning it to her, turned to his car and with economical movements slid behind the wheel and eased back into the flow of traffic.
He watched the rear-view mirror carefully for any sign that she might bolt, but she seemed to be following him as promised.
****
Natalie breathed a sigh of temporary relief and followed the jaw-dropping, incredibly handsome man in the suit to the parking lot of the Holiday Inn Express that was off the feeder directly across from where they had collided. She took a deep breath to steady her nerves. At least there was a chance she wouldn't be getting a citation. She hoped, anyway. Unless he changed his mind.
She pulled in beside him and tried to brush the wrinkles from her shirt as she climbed from the car. He was already standing between their cars, talking into his phone, and she tried to listen unobtrusively to the conversation he was having. It appeared he wasn't on the phone with the police, thank God, but was speaking to someone about cancelling his afternoon appointments.
Damn. She'd made him miss something that was probably important. Another bad point against her. Could this get any worse? Her life sucked right now. So badly. "F.M.L," she muttered under her breath as he was ending his call.
He turned to face her with what seemed to be a perpetual scowl on his granite features. "I'm sorry?"
"Nothing." She blushed.
"Answer me. What'd you just say?" His eyes had narrowed on her.
"F.M.L," she repeated softly. At his blank look, she continued in a stronger voice, "You know, eff my life?" God, now he was going to think she was crude. Just a ridiculous, stupid woman who didn't know how to drive and had the vocabulary of a sailor. Way to go, Natalie.
He frowned as his eyes ran over her. "I haven't heard that one."
"You know, Superbad--the movie?"
He continued to look at her with a blank expression and she tried to move past it, realizing that a man of his caliber probably didn't make a habit of watching comedies that involved teenagers. "Never mind. It just means my life sucks. Have you ever heard that one?" she asked with a small hint of sarcasm that she couldn't contain. Looking him over, with all his tallness and maleness and hotness, she imagined he'd never had a bad day in his life. Unless he was having one today, because of her.
"If you'd been paying better attention, you wouldn't have nailed me from behind," he admonished harshly.
He took a step toward her and suddenly Natalie was hit with how very tall he was. And how freakin' sexy he was. Why hadn't she noticed just how sexy he was? Men in suits had never really done it for her before; she wasn't from the big city and had never seen their appeal--she was more of a Wranglers and boots kind of girl. But as he stood two feet in front of her, with the words 'nailed from behind' wringing in her ears, she felt a shocking quiver of sexual heat slide down her spine and mingle with the trepidation the situation was inducing. She took a deep breath and stoically tried to hide it.
She swallowed hard and watched as if in slow motion as he put his hand out toward her. "Marco Donati." His voice was hard, business-like and in control.
Very slowly, she put her hand in his. "Natalie Lambert."
"I'd like to say it's a pleasure, but--" His words trailed off suggesting he was experiencing anything but pleasure at the moment, but the hand that held hers was telling a slightly different story. His fingers wrapped around hers in an iron grip, holding her hand too long for comfort.
Natalie jerked her hand from his as quickly as she could manage. His touch was hot, scorching, and she felt the sudden need to take a step back from him. She turned and took the few steps toward the passenger door of her car and opened it, holding her breath unconsciously as she began searching the glove compartment for Justin's insurance information. She came up with a clear plastic sleeve that contained what she was looking for. And then her eyes fell on the expiration date, two months past. A sliver of very real fear, and a hazy premonition of being owned, body and soul, by the man in front of her infiltrated her entire being.
Frozen in place, she felt rooted to the spot, but knew she needed to face him again. She left the car, carried the insurance information with her and handed it to him. "I need to call my cousin, but my phone's dead," she announced as calmly as she could manage.
Marco tried to shake the memory of her perfect ass bending over in the car, and focus on what she was saying. "Dead?" In his experience, everyone had a cell phone, from his cousin's six-year-old twins to the custodians who cleaned his office.
"I don't have any minutes left. You know, it's a pay-as-you-go?"
The girl's situation kept getting worse. Marco grimaced and pulled his phone from his pocket and handed it to her. "By all means."
Natalie took his cell with fingers that trembled. The phone was warm from the heat of his body and she couldn't suppress a small shudder as she keyed in her cousin's number from memory.
She turned away slightly, and put the phone to her ear while she wrapped her other arm around her torso in a defensive posture that she couldn't quite hide.
Justin answered, breathless, on the third ring. "Yeah?"
"Justin, it's me, Natalie." She was aware that her voice was trembling and that Marco Donati stood only feet from her, watching her, and only barely seeming to contain his growing fury.
"What's up? I'm getting on the helicopter in about twenty seconds." Her cousin worked offshore on an oilrig and Natalie knew he would be gone several months this time.
She hurried to say what she needed to. "I had a wreck. I'm okay, but it was my fault and the insurance card is expired."
"Fuck!" His expletive had her lifting the phone away from her ear.
Natalie began speaking in a hurry again. "I'm so sorry. You said it was okay for me to drive it. It has insurance, right? You just forgot to put the new card in the glovebox?" she asked hopefully. The car was fourteen years old, and she knew he only kept it for emergencies. He drove a new truck and had said the car was reliable enough for her to drive around town while she searched for a job.