"Jai une grenouille dans mon bidet,"I said, and wished fervently that the worst of my problems were frogs. 2

1 hope I get major brownie points for not racing scream-ing from the house as soon as my eyes caught sight of the dead body of the woman I had come halfway around the world to meet. I hope whoever controls the karma scale rewards me for not getting the hell out of Dodge while I could, because stepping into Mme. Deauxville's apart-ment while her body swayed gently in the warm after-noon sun was the hardest thing I've ever done.

OK, I admit it; I whimpered a little bit, and I left the front door ajar because something in the primitive part of my brain was insisting on an easy escape route just in case the body should suddenly spring to life and try to grab me (in the best horror-movie style), but the whimper was small, and I stopped it as soon as I realized it was coming from my mouth.

"Get a hold of yourself," I said sternly, flinching at the sound of my voice in the dead apartment. Then I flinched at the way the worddead rolled around in my mind. "If she's really dead, she can't hurt you. Oh, shoot,if she's dead … Uck. I suppose I should make sure she's really dead."

It took what seemed to be hours to travel the seven steps needed to cross the short hall. I sidled around the ash circle, unwilling to disturb it, unwilling to touch the body. Surely she couldn't have survived being strung up like that? Surely the lack of movement was indicative of death? Surely I could get by without checking to make sure she was really dead?

"Poop," I said, and set my case down carefully on a beautifully embroidered antique chair. I shuffled forward, careful not to touch anything as I stopped directly in front of the body, my toes just brushing the outer edge of the ash circle. I took a deep breath, pushed down the horrible feeling that I shouldn't be doing what I was about to do, and leaned forward to feel for a pulse on Mme. Deauxville's neck.

'Won.'"

Startled by the man's voice behind me, I jumped just as I reached for Mme. Deauxville, sending me plummet-ing toward the body, my arms cartwheeling madly. I screamed even as I tried to twist away

from her, but it was a hand on the back of my dress yanking me back-wards that kept me from plunging into the circle.

"Ne la touchez pas!"

"Huh?" I rubbed the goose bumps on the suddenly cold flesh of my arms as I blinked at the man who loomed before me. "I'm… uh… sorry,non parlez French."

"American?" the man asked, his nostrils flaring as if he smelled something.

"Yeah," I answered, still rubbing my arms. I looked from him to the body, then back, the realization flashing through my head that I was alone in an apartment with a stranger and a dead body, which probably meant that he was …

"I didn't kill her," he said quickly, evidently reading my mind before turning away to look at the body.

I used the moment to examine him. I'm not exactly an idiot—if I find myself in a room with a murder victim, the big, tall, dark-haired, extremely handsome guy dressed in black who positively reeks of danger and who mysteriously pops up out of nowhere is naturally going to be on the top of my Potential Murderer List.

Which meant I had to get myself and my dragon out of there before Mr. Killer decided to enjoy a double-header.

I grimaced just as the man turned back to me. Something flashed deep in his dark green eyes. "Are you unwell? You aren't going to vomit on me, are you?"

"That wasn't on my list of planned activities for the af-ternoon, no, but if you really insist, I suppose I could try for a hairball or something."

His head tipped to the side for a moment as he exam-ined me from toes to nose. "I've never completely under-stood American humor. Thatwas supposed to be a joke, yes?"

"Yes, it was." Oh, brilliant, Aisling, just brilliant. Here you are trapped in a room with a murderer in a foreign country, and all you can do is make jokes when what you need to be doing is running away as fast as you can. I took a deep breath and edged toward the chair that held my case. He moved backwards a step, effectively block-ing me off from the exit. Panic, held rather tenuously at bay, rose within me. It quickly became clear that I needed to distract the handsome green-eyed murderer so I could escape.

His eyes glittered darkly at me in a way that simulta-neously scared the crap out of me and made me want to throw myself on him. "Ah. Yes. A joke. I thought that is what it was."

Distraction, girl. Don't get caught up in a pair of pretty eyes, not when they likely belonged to a cold-blooded killer. "Um. I was just going to check and make sure Mme. Deauxville was really dead." I closed my eyes for a moment, aware of just how damning that sounded. "That is, I wanted to make sure she wasn't still alive. Not that I want her to be dead, you understand. I just want to make sure that she's not. Oh, crap, it's all coming out wrong."

"You want to make sure there is nothing you can do for her," the dark man said neutrally, his voice—a sexy blend of an English accent and something that sounded vaguely Germanic to my ears—oddly flat. It

sounded just the way you'd expect someone to speak if he sus-pected you of being a deranged killer.

"Although that really is an oxymoron. I mean, what killerisn't deranged?"

The brilliant green eyes considered me for a moment. "Is that a rhetorical question, or do you wish for an analy-sis of the mind of killers?"

I groaned. "Sorry, that just kind of slipped out. Don't you think one of us should … you know, check her? To make sure she's not just gravely wounded?"

He looked back at the body. I looked, as well. "You don't believe she's really dead?"

I had to admit he had a point. The body was too still, the heavy silent atmosphere of the apartment (house, street, possibly the whole world) almost smothering. I knew without even thinking about it that there were only two living beings in the apartment, and the body that hung by her hands wasn't one of them.

The man cocked his head again, then whirled around and closed the door that was still standing open. Fear flared to life with the movement. He was going to kill me! I looked around frantically for a weapon, shrieking when his hand clamped down on my arm.

"What is the matter with you? You look like you're going to pass out."

"Me? Nothing's the matter with me. I'm fine. Although, now I come to think of it, I have a horrible memory prob-lem. I can't remember what people look like. Or sound like. Or the things they said to me, or… or… anything. So anyone who was worried about what I might have seen or heard would really have nothing to worry about at all. Because of my memory problem. It's permanent, too."