TEMPERATURE'S RISING

by Donna Sterling

  "You and Grant," she noted in surprise, lifting each photo to examine it. She saw two young friends grinning and clowning for the camera. Pals.

  "We went to the same college. I got to know him pretty well. Or so I thought." He handed her another photo.

  A wedding picture.

  "Becky." She peered in admiration at the lovely, glowing young bride in the photo. She was blond like Jack, but with wide-set blue eyes. His younger sister. Callie's gaze then shifted to the groom. "And Grant!"

  "She married him the day she turned eighteen. He was twenty-seven. It didn't take long for things to turn bad."

  "If his marriage with your sister didn't work out, I can understand why you might hold a grudge against him, but I'd rather not discuss it. Frankly, it's none of my business."

  "Look at this, Callie," Jack ordered fiercely, pushing a photo into her hands.

  At first, she didn't recognize the haggard, rail-thin woman in the photo. After a moment, though, she realized it was Becky, her face pale and drawn with dark circles under her eyes and a haunting bleakness in her expression.

  "What happened to her?" Callie whispered, horrified.

  "Tierney happened to her, that's what. After the wedding, he became pathologically possessive. He forbade her to have any contact whatsoever with family or friends. Kept her a virtual prisoner. She was afraid to tell anyone how bad it was—even me. After two hellish years of marriage, she needed four years of therapy to bring her back to life."

  Callie closed her eyes in sympathy for the girl she'd once loved as a little sister. Glumly she handed the photo back to Jack. She didn't know what to say, what to think. Could he possibly be lying about this to portray Grant in a bad light, as Grant had predicted he would? The photo itself proved nothing. Any number of things could have caused the change in Becky.

  Yet, Callie believed Jack. He wouldn't lie about something like this. She would never look favorably on Grant Tierney again. Her disapproval of him, however, would make no difference to her investigation of the malpractice suit. She worked for Meg and would do her best to help her prepare the case. Grant's personal life didn't enter into it at all. "Where's Becky now?"

  "Living halfway across the continent. She doesn't want anyone from the Point to know her location. She's afraid Tierney might wheedle it out of someone and come after her."

  "Do you think he would?"

  "He stalked her after the divorce, if that's what you mean. Threatened her. Said he'd never let her go."

  "How frightening for her." Struck with a sudden thought, Callie searched Jack's face. "Did you … do anything?" she asked, almost afraid to hear. "To stop him, I mean, or to retaliate?"

  "He didn't listen to warnings." He lifted his wide shoulders in a casual shrug. "So I beat the hell out of him." A muscle moved in his jaw. "He gave up stalking for a while, but he also had the sheriff pick me up for assault. The charge didn't stick, though. No witnesses. He had no proof."

  She wished he hadn't told her. An assault charge, even if it hadn't "stuck," was just the kind of dirt she was being paid to gather about him. Anything to make a jury dislike him. Anything that might tarnish his name and force him to settle.

  "After Becky left Tierney, he married another woman," Jack said. "She divorced him, too. I know from mutual friends that he treated her the same way. The third time he went to marry, I warned the bride."

  "The bride?" Callie repeated. "You can't mean … at the wedding itself!"

  "There wasn't any way around it. I didn't know her, or how to get in touch with her before the wedding, but I couldn't let another woman blindly throw herself into that hell. It turned out that she hadn't known about his first two wives at all, before I'd mentioned it. She called off the wedding and asked me to drive her home from the chapel."

  "Grant must have been furious."

  A sardonic twist of his mouth sent a chill down her back. "You could say that."

  His gaze held hers, and a suspicion gripped her. "The scar." Her hand involuntarily rose, her fingers feathering over the jagged white line on his cheek, as if the puckered texture within his smooth-shaven face could possibly tell the story. "And there's one on your shoulder, too," she recalled. "I saw it yesterday, when you took off your shirt."

  Darkness flickered through his gaze, and his jaw squared.

  "What happened?" she demanded, suddenly feeling sick, shaken and inexplicably angry—at him, at Tierney, at everyone.

  "The scars are nobody's business."

  She angrily rose from the bed. "I figured they were from something stupid you'd done," she lashed out. "And I was right. For God's sake, Jack … stopping the man's wedding! Leaving with his bride! You're lucky he didn't shoot you."

  Jack's expression didn't change.

  That very fact alerted her. She felt her own eyes widen and her face drain of warmth. "Did he? Did he shoot you?"

  He frowned in annoyance and stood up with a cool, dismissive air. "As far as I'm concerned, these scars don't exist. We won't talk about them again."

  His sudden refusal to answer her questions distracted her from her anger. She'd obviously hit a nerve. "You're well aware they exist, or you wouldn't mind talking about them." Her prodding only succeeded in tightening his jaw to granite hardness. "If the scars bother you that much, why don't you have them surgically removed?"

  "Damn it, Callie, they don't bother me. But since you've asked, my surgeon pals did all they could. And they did a damn fine job. But I guess their magic wands didn't work as well as you feel they should have."

  She stared at him in stark dismay. She hadn't meant to imply that the scars bothered her. They did, but only because of the pain, the danger, the life-threatening conflict they represented. If the surgeons had done all they could and the scars were still visible, he must have been grievously injured. She couldn't bear to think about what he'd gone through, and yet she couldn't stand not knowing. "Please tell me what happened."

  "The subject is closed."

  She'd never known him to clam up like this. She sensed deep, dark emotion swirling just beneath his surface. Ignoring his cold, forceful words, she peered past his anger, trying to divine the feelings he hadn't expressed. "You won't acknowledge those scars or tell anyone how you got them," she guessed, "because you don't want to admit he permanently marked you."

  Surprise flashed through his gaze, and she knew she'd read him correctly.

  "The scars haven't hurt you, Jack," she pressed on, sensing a crack in his armor. "I'm sure the women still go crazy over you, like they always have. Probably more so."

  "Drop it, Cal," he warned. "I don't need your pep talk."

  "Jack!" She caught his rugged face between her palms and held him tightly. "Your anger at Tierney must be horrendous. Don't bottle it up and refuse to talk about it, or it'll scar you in the worst way—on the inside." She stared at him with earnest concern flowing straight from her heart.

  He absorbed the message, it seemed, but somehow delved deeper than she'd expected, beyond her words, to the chaotic, vulnerable place where they'd originated.

  The moment grew too poignant. She slowly lowered her hands from his face, feeling shaken.

  He let out a short, rough breath. Closed his eyes, opened them. "As pesky as you are," he whispered, "I can't believe how damn much I've missed you."

  Warm emotion crowded her chest and blurred her vision. She wanted to say she hadn't missed him, but he would know she lied. She wanted to turn away and dodge the issue. She wanted, more than anything, to kiss him. "We can't be friends," she said, her whisper heavy with regret.

  He swept his hand up the curve of her face in a lingering caress. His voice grew thick and soft. "Then what can we be?"

  She didn't have an answer.

  In a gruff whisper, he swore, "I'll take anything I can have of you."

  Their gazes intensified. His strong, hard fingers slipped into her hair. He leaned in and touched his mouth to hers. A light, tentative touch. Barely a kiss. But he stayed ther
e, sustaining that feather-light contact, his eyes closed, his warm, heart-pounding stillness a silent plea for more.

  Sensuality radiated from their lightly joined lips to the most intimate hollows of her body. She inhaled slowly, deeply, savoring his heat, his scent, his nearness, until the urge for more overpowered her.

  She wasn't sure who moved first, who began the seductive brush of mouth against mouth, the slow, gliding tastes, the nibbles and tugs, the thrust of tongues.

  A strange, hot magic possessed her.

  She pressed closer, needing to satisfy a sudden craving. Her arms slid around his muscled shoulders. Her fingers dug into the thick, silky hair at his nape, and she plunged into the keen pleasure of his kiss.

  The kiss grew hotter, deeper, rougher.

  A groan tore from Jack's throat as a powerful need burgeoned within him. He'd fantasized about this for so long. Kissing, tasting, savoring these very lips. Holding this very woman. Making love to her.

  Good Lord, he wanted to. Needed to.

  He ran his hands beneath her suit jacket, up and down her slender back and curvaceous sides, hungry for her softness. Her low moan vibrated through their kiss, and she rocked her hips in sensual response to his caresses.

  His blood heated. His hands coursed down to her backside and cupped her against him, lifting her for a closer fit.

  "Jack," she whispered against his mouth, sounding worried, "I'm not being fair to you. I should stop now instead of leading you on, making you think there's any chance that I might—"

  "Let me worry about what's fair." He kissed her again, angling for deeper access. She welcomed him with silken heat and a sinuous movement of her body that made him groan.

  "I'll be stopping soon," she warned in a throaty murmur.

  He gazed into her slightly dazed green eyes and nipped at her voluptuous bottom lip. "Okay."

  They came together in another deep, moving kiss. He pressed her against him in every way he could, craving the feel of her. A low, pleasured sound rolled from her throat, and his need intensified into an ache.

  He pulled her down onto the bed, kissing her face, her jaw, her neck.

  "Jack," she said in a shaky whisper, lying now beneath him, "you understand I'm going to stop, don't you?"

  "No," he breathed. He drew his tongue along her jaw, and when he reached her ear, whispered, "I don't understand it."

  She closed her eyes with a sexy groan and arched her long, slender throat, enticing him into a downward path. "There's no way I can get involved with you."

  Losing himself in the subtle wildflower fragrance of her hair and the alluring feminine scent that was only Callie's, he took his time sampling the taste and texture of her skin.

  She skimmed her hands along his back and made small, writhing movements of her body, inflaming him.

  He pushed her suit jacket off her shoulders and searched for buttons on her blouse. Frustration rose within him. The damn thing buttoned in the back. He took the edge off of his urgency by returning to her mouth. She met him in a hot, passionate kiss.

  He ran his hands over her breasts, cupping and kneading through the interfering silk and lace, rousing her nipples to hardness. He'd seen her breasts yesterday. He'd spent half the night remembering. He wanted to take each dark, flowery crest into his mouth and make her burn for him—

  "Jack!" She stopped him with a breathy gasp as he reached behind her to unbutton her blouse. Her eyes shone with sensuality and her face blazed with color. "I'm going to leave here and conduct an investigation against you. Nothing we've said or done will change that. I'm going to gather every miserable piece of dirt I can find to blacken your name—"

  He stopped her with another kiss.

  She punished him in a skirmish of tongues, of bodies, shoving him away while drawing him in deeper, arching against him but deflecting his hands in a sensuous wrestling match that soon gave way to mutual passion.

  His hand traversed the length of her—breast, waist, hip, thigh. She writhed beneath his touch like a cat being petted. He pushed her skirt up to savor the hot satin smoothness of her thigh.

  "No, wait," she panted, trapping his hand. "You have to listen. I misled you before, Jack. I'm not only going after the truth about this case. I'm going after dirt. Dirt."

  She nudged his hand off her thigh and tugged her skirt back into place.

  With her silky dark hair tousled from his fingers plowing through it, her mouth puffy and glistening from his roughhouse kisses and her green eyes stormy with emotion, she was so beautiful it hurt to look at her.

  It would hurt more to let her go and know he couldn't kiss her again. It would probably kill him to watch her work to destroy his name.

  But he'd learned over the course of his career how to deflect all manner of pain, in himself and others. How to treat the worst of cases and turn off his caring, his hope, his frustration, his grief, whenever the job was done. He'd taken that hard-earned skill with him into his personal life, and he put it to good use now.

  "Dirt, did you say?" He lifted a brow. "I love it when you talk dirty." He dropped a kiss alongside her jaw.

  She groaned and shoved against his chest. "You're not taking me seriously."

  He propped up on his elbow and stared down at her. She had no idea how wrong she was. He'd never taken a woman more seriously. She intended to remain aloof despite the deep, hot kisses that had set him on fire like none ever had. He took that very seriously, indeed.

  He intended to make love to her.

  "You think you're so tough, don't you?" he scoffed lightly, tugging at a wavy tendril of her hair.

  She rose up on one elbow to confront him eye-to-eye. "As a matter of fact, I do."

  "If you're so tough, then what we do here shouldn't matter, since it has nothing to do with the case."

  Her dark brows drew together. "You would make love to me knowing that I'm going to try to destroy your reputation?"

  His pulse sped up at the very mention of making love to her. "Yes."

  "Which means—" her gaze skittered away from his "—it wouldn't mean anything to you, either."

  He frowned. He hadn't said that. How the hell did she put words in his mouth? He hooked a finger beneath her chin and turned her face toward his. "I told you before, Callie. I'll take anything I can have of you."

  Their gazes clashed. The silence grew taut.

  "Why?"

  She couldn't have posed a harder question. He didn't know the answer. He'd convinced himself earlier that he wanted her friendship, and that sexual involvement would destroy his chance of renewing it. But that had been before he'd kissed her. Before he'd known about the sweet, hot passion that burned away every doubt, leaving only a gut-wrenching need for her.

  He ran his thumb slowly across her voluptuous mouth. Her breath caught. Her eyelids fluttered. A pulse began to beat in her throat. He knew she would let him kiss her again, and his voice went hoarse with desire. "A better question is, why not?"

  His logic, it seemed, won her over. She met him halfway. No sooner had his lips grazed hers than the telephone rang. The pattern of the rings alerted him to a call forwarded from his answering service.

  An emergency.

  He shut his eyes, wanting to curse. Why now? Why, when his gut was telling him the time was right to make her forget every scruple?

  He pulled away from her, muttered a curse and answered his bedside phone.

  Callie let out a shaky breath and collapsed on his bed. She'd literally been saved by the bell. What had she been thinking? She hadn't been thinking. She'd been responding mindlessly to his potent allure and her own wicked desire.

  She had to get the hell away from him.

  She scrambled from the bed and searched for her purse and shoes, unsure of what she'd done with them.

  "Calm down. Take a deep breath," Jack ordered. It took her a moment to realize he was speaking into the phone. "Is she breathing? Good. Conscious? Good." He held the receiver in the crook of his neck while he buttoned hi
s shirt and tucked its tails into the waistband of his tan trousers. "Don't move her. I'll call an ambulance. Yes, I'll be there, too."

  He hung up the phone, then placed a call to the paramedics, rattling off medical information about the patient as he snatched his key ring from the dresser.

  Callie slipped into her shoes, adjusted her clothing and peered into his dresser mirror. Quickly she freshened the lipstick that had been kissed away and combed the tangles from her hair. Her linen suit was sadly wrinkled, as if she'd been sleeping in it. Or making love in it. Her heart turned over at the thought. She'd almost made love to Jack Forrester!

  Shaking herself to dispel maverick emotions that only confused her more, she tried to smooth the wrinkles out of her suit. She'd wanted to present a competent, businesslike image to the community. Perhaps she should return to the inn and change before continuing with her investigation.

  The realization then hit her that she didn't have a car. Her sister's Mercedes was still stuck in the mud. She glanced at her watch, hoping that Dee from the inn might drop by and pick her up. But Dee had mentioned she wouldn't be available after noon, and it was now twelve-fifteen.

  "Mrs. Sanchez fell on the stairs," Jack told her, setting down the phone. "Sounds like she might have broken her hip."

  Callie turned to him in concern. "Mrs. Sanchez? Gloria's mother?"

  "The one and only. Best guacamole and tortilla chips on the Point. I doubt if she'll be making them anytime soon, though." He ushered Callie out of the bedroom with a hand at her waist. Even that casual touch sent warmth spiraling through her. "I won't have time to pull your car from the mud right now."

  "Of course not."

  "I'd let you have the tow truck, but Bobby Ray wouldn't want anyone else driving it." He paused in the great room, near the front door, and eyed her uneasily. "I'd offer you my car, but my medical supplies and equipment are in the trunk. I'm not sure what I'll need of it."

  "No, no, I wouldn't take your car." She didn't want to risk interfering with his treatment of Mrs. Sanchez in any way. Besides, how could she explain to the community why she was driving Jack Forrester's car?