Or, if he wasn’t, then Brannigan turned up within the next five minutes.
And the annoying thing of it was, he wasn’t even looking to talk to her.
Actually, it was other members of her family whom she saw Hunter talking to.
And laughing with.
She supposed that was what got to her the most. That he was sharing moments with people she considered to be exclusively part of her domain, not his. This was her family, not his. He had no right invading it just to annoy her.
Slowly, during the course of the evening, the image she had of Hunter began to peel away. Being a reasonable person, at least in all things that weren’t Hunter, she began to realize that he couldn’t be the womanizer she’d always believed him to be, not if her aunt Rose, her aunt Lila and her aunt Maeve didn’t just approve of him but really seemed to like the detective.
They, like the other women in her family, were fairly keen judges of character. Could Hunter have fooled all of them?
The obvious answer was no.
Still, Kenzie proceeded with caution before relenting and finally allowing herself to give him a seal of approval.
Wavering, she sought out Finn, who had always been Brannigan’s biggest supporter and admirer—and as honest as the proverbial day was long.
Walking up to him next to one of the many tables laden with appetizers, side dishes and beverages, she got right to the point.
“Why isn’t your pal here with his newest girl of the moment?” she asked Finn.
“Good question,” Finn responded. “To be honest, I haven’t seen him with anyone since he started working for the task force. Have you been keeping him chained to his desk?”
She laughed at the idea. The thought of being chained probably appealed to some perverse side of Brannigan. “Hardly.”
“Then I guess maybe he’s just focused on solving the case,” Finn speculated. “That cold case he had has been haunting him ever since he came into that department. Maybe he thinks he can solve it, working with you, and that’s got him walking the straight and narrow. Or maybe he’s just had a change of heart,” Finn said. “You know, they say that all it takes to change a man is the right good woman,” he told his sister. “Not me, personally,” he qualified quickly, “because that’s just not going to happen. But maybe it happened to Hunt.” Finn looked at Kenzie for a prolonged moment.
“Wouldn’t he have told you?” she asked even as she was watching Hunter talk to the chief of detectives. Whatever they were talking about, her uncle Brian certainly seemed to be amused. It was obvious that the man liked Brannigan.
She felt oddly isolated.
“Not necessarily,” Finn answered.
She looked at her older brother in surprise. “I thought you guys shared everything.”
“Again, not necessarily,” he told her.
She sighed, frustrated. “You’re of no help, you know that?”
Finn merely grinned broadly. “I do my best,” he said just before he walked over to talk to the newly appointed chief of police—their cousin Shaw.
“Enjoying yourself?”
Hunter’s deep voice was coming from directly behind her. The next second, he circled around to stand at her side.
“I was.” Kenzie did her best to give Hunter a withering look. It fell far short of hitting its mark.
“Give it up, Kenzie. You don’t dislike me nearly as much as you’re trying to pretend you do,” he told her. He smiled as he looked down into her eyes. “Face it. I’m getting to you.”
Her eyes narrowed. Again, she couldn’t quite pull it off, but she did her best to cut him off at the knees. “How do you manage to stay upright with that big ego of yours weighing you down like that?”
“I don’t have a big ego,” Hunter contradicted. “I just know what I’m capable of and what I’m not capable of. And you’re beginning to realize that I’m more than a decent detective. Face it,” he told her. “We complement each other.”
She knew being nice to him was going to come back to bite her. “Look, all I said—deludedly—was that you did a good job, but if you think that—”
“I’m not talking about verbally, Kenzie,” he said in a tone of voice that irrationally made her want to scream at him. “I mean in the way we work together. If you stop throwing up roadblocks at every turn, you might find out that you really do like me.”
The man was an egotistical jerk, Kenzie thought angrily. “I don’t—”
“As a person,” he stressed, as if reading her mind. Hunter drew a little closer to her, deliberately putting a stuffed mushroom on her plate.
Kenzie drew in her breath, bracing herself. With effort, she forced herself to relax. Getting her racing pulse under control was harder.
“What are you afraid of, Kenzie? I don’t bite,” he told her. And then he smiled that smile that had a way of slipping in under her skin, unsettling things she could have sworn had been firmly packed away when she’d terminated her engagement. “Not unless you want me to,” he said in a husky voice.
Kenzie spun on her heel, about to walk away before she wound up saying something that would give her away.
Hunter caught her arm, holding her in place. “It’s a joke, Kenzie,” he told her. “Relax. Look around you. This is the safest you are ever going to be,” he stressed emphatically.
He was right. Why was she being so nervous? No matter what she thought of Brannigan, he wasn’t the type to wantonly drag her behind the azalea bushes and jump her bones. She knew that if a woman said no to him, he would leave it at that.
Not that any woman would ever say no to him.
Except for her, she thought.
Maybe that was what intrigued him about her, she suddenly realized. She’d said no to him and he just wanted to see if he could get her to change her mind.
When hell freezes over.
She was driving herself crazy, Kenzie thought, releasing a shaky breath.
“Are you okay?” Hunter asked, peering more closely at her. “Your face just got flush.”
“Just thinking about the case,” she lied, waving away Hunter’s concern and doing her best to throw him off the trail.
“Maybe, just for the rest of the day,” he suggested, “you should forget about the case.” Hunter lowered his head and whispered into her ear so that his words were for her only. “Having it consume you like this is not going to do you—or the case—any good.”
She had always hated anyone telling her what to do, especially someone like Brannigan, a man she’d been at odds with for a long time. “Is that your considered professional opinion?”
“Yes. My professional opinion and my private one,” Hunter added. And then he said something that really got under her skin. “You might be interested in knowing that the chief of Ds backs me up on this.”
She stared at him. “You talked to the chief of Ds about the case?”
“The case, and you,” Hunter added. Then, before she could ask him why he was discussing her with the chief, he said, “The chief asked how we were progressing, so I told him. The man takes an interest in all his people,” he reminded her. “Remember?”
She could feel her back going up. If they weren’t in such a public place, she thought she would have strangled him. A torrent of emotion flooded through her. Who the hell did he think he was?
“I don’t need you to tell me about my uncle,” she informed him in what sounded like, to the casual observer, an even voice. But Hunter knew better.
“I know,” he said mildly. “I’m just giving you a friendly reminder, that’s all. But you do need to relax, Kenzie,” he told her, and she could have sworn he actually sounded sincere. “And eat,” he told her. “Why don’t you start with the stuffed mushrooms. I highly recommend them.”
He was putting himself in charge of her, she thought. She didn’t need a keepe
r.
“I can make my own choices, Brannigan. I don’t need you—”
She didn’t get to finish because he had picked up the mushroom and slipped it between her lips just as she was telling him off. Her eyes widened as both what he had just done—and the mushroom’s taste—registered. In an act of self-preservation, Kenzie stopped talking and started chewing.
“This is good,” she grudgingly admitted when she was finished.
Hunter beamed, pleased, although he was surprised that she’d actually admitted to him that she liked the mushroom.
“Told you. If I were you, I’d take another before they’re all gone,” Hunter advised. “The chief made a whole slew of them, but there’s hardly anything left now. Apparently word gets around really fast. The man’s culinary skills are excellent, but this time he’s even outdone himself.”
Well, she knew she really couldn’t argue with that now.
“You’re right,” she said, then added, “Thank you,” as he slipped the last of the stuffed mushrooms onto her plate. But just before she was about to eat the sole surviving stuffed mushroom, she looked at Hunter. “Don’t you want it?”
“That’s okay,” he told her. “You eat it.”
She was not going to have him give up anything on her account. He’d probably find occasion to bring up his so-called “sacrifice” over and over again and she had no intentions of suffering through that.
“We’ll split it,” she told him.
“Are you sure?” Hunter asked, looking from the appetizer to her face and giving Kenzie a chance to change her mind.
Why did she get the feeling that this wasn’t about the stuffed mushroom and that he was asking her something else entirely? She told herself she was imagining things, told her stomach to settle down and unknot itself, but neither was listening.
“Yes,” she answered, “I’m sure.”
Picking up a fork, Hunter neatly cut the large-capped stuffed mushroom into two equal halves. Then, as she watched him, all but glued in place, he picked up one of the two halves, brought it up to her lips and, for a second time, did what he had done initially.
Except this time, his eyes held hers as he fed her the appetizer.
This one tasted even better than the last one had. Better and, heaven help her, more arousing despite all of her efforts to block everything out—this included Brannigan. Or at least just focus on the way the food tasted and nothing else.
“Good?” Hunter asked, raising his eyebrow as he continued looking at her.
Her mouth went suddenly dry. She had to clear her throat before she could answer him. When she did, it felt as if her words were inexplicably sticking to the roof of her mouth. She had trouble forcing them out.
“We’ve already established that,” Kenzie finally told him.
His eyes dipped down, indicating what was left of the stuffed mushroom. “You can have the other half, too,” he told her.
“No, that’s yours,” she insisted. Then, seeing he was about to protest, she deliberately emphasized, “What’s fair is fair, Brannigan.”
“Yes, but—”
This time, she turned the tables on him and did exactly what he had initially done with the stuffed mushroom when he’d told her about it. Kenzie picked up the remaining half and, swiftly bringing it up to his lips, she fed it to him.
Kenzie wasn’t prepared to have him catch her hand as she was about to drop it to her side. And she definitely wasn’t prepared to feel that sharp, startling zip of electricity charging through her when he lightly kissed her fingers.
“You had some cheese on them,” he explained.
There was nothing intense, nothing prolonged about what he had done, but the effect was still the same. Lethal.
So much so that even though he had quickly released her hand, her heart went into double time, mimicking the beat of a drum solo at the start of a parade.
“I’m going to have to ask the chief for the recipe for that,” Kenzie heard herself saying.
It was inane, but she felt as if she had to say something. Otherwise, she was afraid that she was going to just give in to the incredible pull she was experiencing between them and just kiss the man she had been denouncing and derailing for the last couple of weeks.
You just couldn’t actually kiss a man like that without being certifiably insane.
Could you?
Chapter 18
“May I have this dance?”
Dinner had been served and consumed as had, for the most part, the twelve-tier cake that had been whipped up expressly for this occasion.
Pleasantly full, the guests had once again broken up into smaller groups, discussing whatever interested them as law enforcement officers, parents or, for the most part, as members of a large extended and respected family of a growing community. There was music playing in the background, seamlessly accompanying the myriad mingling conversations.
Scattered about on the patio, as well as in the living room, were a few couples dancing to that music.
Apparently, Kenzie thought, turning around to face him, this was what had inspired Brannigan to sneak up on her and make the offer to drag her unwilling body around in a circle.
“No, thank you,” she answered primly.
He seemed to think she was turning him down because she didn’t know how to dance. The next words out of his mouth bore this out.
“It’s a slow dance, Kenzie,” Brannigan told her. “Anyone can do that. All you have to do is stay in one place and occasionally sway a little.”
She gave him a dirty look. “Are you suggesting that I don’t know how to dance?”
His smile answered her before he did. “I don’t know. Do you?”
She drew her shoulders back like a cadet at attention. “Yes, I most certainly can dance.”
“Oh, good,” Hunter responded, lacing one hand through hers while encircling her waist with the other. He pressed her ever so slightly to him, and just like that, they were dancing. “That makes this a lot easier.”
“What are you doing?” she demanded as Brannigan gently guided her around the small impromptu dance area. And then, as she realized what was happening, she protested, “I didn’t say I’d dance with you.”
“No, but you didn’t say you wouldn’t,” he pointed out. The smile on his face seeped into her very soul, despite all her efforts to keep it at bay. “Go with it, Detective. It’s called having fun.”
She didn’t want to cause a scene right here in her uncle’s house, and arguing with the man seemed to be futile anyway. So, short of shooting him, she was forced to give in.
“All right, Brannigan,” she said, temporarily surrendering. “It’s clear you’re not going to leave me alone until I agree to this, so let’s do it.”
His hold on her hand became a bit tighter as he whirled her around in a circle. “Why, Detective Cavanaugh, I thought I’d never hear those words from you. Be still my heart.”
“Be happy you still have one,” Kenzie informed him. “There are sharp objects all around and I know how to use them.”
His eyes smiled at her half a beat before his lips caught up. The smile, damn him, was warm and infectious, she thought.
“Fair enough, Kenzie. Just follow my lead,” he told her.
“Ha, you should be that lucky.”
But, despite what she said, Kenzie continued dancing with him.
* * *
Kenzie told herself it wasn’t happening, but that would be lying and she knew it. She wasn’t really certain exactly when it began to take hold, but somewhere along the line during the later hours of the day, she began to understand what the mythical Brannigan charm was all about. Began not only to understand it, but to slip, at least partially, under its spell.
Not that it was anything she planned to even remotely admit to, especially not to Brannigan.
Even when he held her so close that their souls seemed to be merging and he looked into her eyes, it was a real struggle not to lose herself in him.
They danced this way for three, perhaps four numbers. And then he stopped moving. Kenzie looked at him quizzically.
“I think they stopped playing the music,” he told her.
“Oh. Right,” Kenzie murmured, embarrassed. “I was just lost in thought,” she said belatedly.
“Yes,” he told her. “Me, too.” Reluctantly, he released her hand, but he continued holding her waist just a little longer as he looked around. “I think the celebration is beginning to break up,” he noted.
It seemed like half the family members had already taken their leave and gone home. The rest appeared to be moving in that direction.
“Need a ride?” Hunter asked her. “I can give you a lift home.”
She looked at him in surprise. “No, that’s all right. I came with Finn and Murdoch.”
Even as she said it, she felt a strange reluctance turning Hunter down. Maybe the wine she’d had had gone to her head. But it had been only the one glass and she had always been able to hold far more liquor than that well.
No, she decided, wine really wasn’t the reason she was experiencing this feeling.
The cause was the man himself.
“So I guess that means you’re going to Malone’s,” Brannigan said.
“Malone’s?” she repeated. Kenzie looked at him, confused.
Malone’s was the popular cop bar where all the local law enforcement officers went to blow off some steam after hours. Some claimed it helped to put things in the proper perspective before they went home to their families.
“No,” she answered. “Why?”
“I just overheard Finn and Murdoch talking about going to Malone’s with a few of the people here to cap off their evening,” Hunter told her. “I take it from the look on your face you didn’t know.”
“No, I didn’t,” she replied.
“Do you want to go to Malone’s?” Hunter asked her.
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