by LETO, JULIE
She arched her back, and with no reason not to, he smoothed his hungry lips across her collar bone and then down the edge of her square-cut bodice. “Personally or professionally?”
He didn’t know the answer. He wasn’t sure he wanted to. The instinct to remain in the moment, grab what he could while it lasted, proved more powerful than anything he’d ever felt before. He realized he’d say just about anything to taste the skin between her shoulder and neck.
“It’s all about the case,” he said.
“Which? Mine or yours?”
“Does it matter?”
“It does to me.”
She braced her hands on his shoulders and gave a push that instantly disengaged his mouth from her flesh. “I have less than three days to find the woman I’m looking for. The only lead I have is that she’s here, for this weekend only. I won’t hide in this room with you and I won’t run away on the off chance this so-called Bandit of yours has somehow managed to follow me here. Not until I’ve done what my client has paid me to do.”
The determination in her voice doused his libido.
“This man has targeted you, Claire. He won’t stop until he gets you.”
Her light laugh sparked a trail of heat underneath his skin, as if someone had injected his blood cells with gun powder and her confident smirk had lit the fuse.
“He’s never gone up against anyone like me before.”
This much was true. However, her cocky strength could just be the stressor that sent the Bandit over the edge.
He clutched her arms and forced her back a few inches, which, unfortunately, did nothing to squelch his need to kiss her again.
“Maybe not, but he’s still a serious threat.”
“He hasn’t killed anyone.”
“No, but he’s assaulted and raped. It’s only a matter of time before he goes even further, Claire. And maybe you’re the one he’s been working his way up to murder.”
He watched fear skitter across her expression—which impressed him. It was one thing to be confident, but it was something else to think you were invincible. Something incredibly unwise, if not downright stupid.
And Claire Lécuyer did not strike him as stupid.
“Why me?” she questioned. “Don’t criminals usually follow the path of least resistance?”
“Not always and not in this case. I fully intend to brief you on why he sought you out, but not here. This isn’t a game, Claire.”
She nodded, her mouth pursed in a serious, contemplative scrunch. After a moment, she locked her stare with his. “But I’m the best chance you have to catch him, right?”
His stomach constricted. She wasn’t going to give up easily.
“This is the first time we’ve had any knowledge of who he’s after before he’s attacked.”
Her increasingly confident grin bloomed into a full-on smile. “Then you need me to cooperate, Agent Murrieta. And for that, you will have to help me solve my case.”
So it had come to this: blackmail. Or if he was feeling generous, quid pro quo. He strolled to the bedside table to put down his brandy, giving him time to think. He’d had two things on his mind when he’d broken the rules in coming here. First, he would protect Claire by getting her out as soon as possible. Then, from a safe location, he would determine a way to use the knowledge they had about the Bandit’s patterns to set a trap and catch him. Except for the pull of desire that had caught him unaware, nothing had changed. He still had two goals.
Protect Claire and catch a kidnapper.
In that order.
If he delayed his plans a couple of hours to give her what she wanted, who would it harm? The Bandit would not get to her here. He’d make sure of that.
“Before we negotiate, you need to know the whole story. This unsub isn’t your ordinary wack job. According to a profile provided by the Behavioral Analysis Unit at Quantico, he’s a fast-evolving, highly intelligent, power-reassurance rapist who believes he’s the reincarnation of the famous masked bandit from colonial California, righting wrongs during the daytime and seducing beautiful women in the dead of night.”
“Seducing? Don’t you mean drugging and kidnapping and tormenting?”
“To him, he’s playing out this grand romance. He’s not sloppy or random. He’s purposeful, calculating. Patient. If he’s taken the step of sending you the scarf, I’d bet money he knows you’re here. He might have followed you or he might even have been the one to manipulate you into coming in the first place.”
Her hand flattened against her stomach, as if the thought sickened her. “Wait, you think he hired me? Lied about my case so that I’d come to the plantation tonight?”
Michael ran his hand down the length of her arm. Her skin was pebbled again, but this time with fear instead of desire. “Is it a coincidence that your great-grandmother on your mother’s side was black, so that you’re mixed race just like the women bartered for in the real placage system?”
Her eyes widened. “How did you know that?”
“It’s my job to know, Claire. The more I know, the better I can protect you. And if I know it, you can bet he knows. Your family has been in New Orleans for centuries. One of your ancestors might have taken part in the real quadroon balls. Maybe in his obsession with you, he found that out and came up with a plan to lure you here. Or maybe it’s just a coincidence. They do happen sometimes. He’s never gone to so much trouble before, but maybe he’s never had to. He’s evolving. And like you said, you’re a different kind of victim.”
She straightened her shoulders. “I’m not anyone’s victim.”
“Not yet,” he replied. “And if you cooperate with me, not ever. But how sure are you of your client? Did you meet with him? Did you have adequate time to check out his story?”
He watched her throat bob as she swallowed, watched her eyes narrow first with doubt, then with shock and finally with fury. When she jumped to her feet, ostensibly to object to him questioning her professionalism, he pulled her into his arms and kissed her into silence.
She struggled to get free, but he did not yield. If the unsub was in the building, the safest place for her to be while they worked out a strategy was this bedroom. No device was going to cover up the sound of her shouting.
“Let me go,” she insisted, her words muffled by his mouth.
“Don’t struggle,” he murmured back. “They’re still watching. For all we know, he’s watching.”
He released her arms, but she remained flush against him, her gaze locked with his. In that moment, he couldn’t resist drowning himself in the creamy jade of her eyes, in the sweet milk and toasted coffee shade of her skin.
She was stunning. Not run of the mill tanned-and-gorgeous like he saw every day in California, but instead, everything the sponsors of Nouvelle Placage promised. Like the women bartered for hundreds of years ago, Claire was exotic, erotic and fresh in a way that had nothing to do with innocence and everything to do with attitude.
“You really think he set me up?” she whispered.
To her credit, she regained her calm quickly.
“I don’t know,” he said. “But to beat this guy, we’ve got to be smarter than he is. And we have to stick together. One contingency he hasn’t planned for is you having someone to watch your back. Or other parts of you, as the case may be.”
He’d crossed the line again, but he couldn’t help himself, particularly when her lips quirked into a tiny smile. She was so gorgeous, so defiant, so unlike any woman he’d been this close to.
As much as he cared about this case—as much as he cared about keeping her safe and ensuring the legacy of his family name—he cared about her more.
At least, he cared about kissing her, touching her, tasting her.
With focused fascination, he watched her coil her finger within one of the springy curls dangling beside her cheek. If not for the music still playing beside them and the rapid pounding of blood surging through his veins, Michael might have heard her brain processing
all the information he’d just shared.
Her gaze darted to the camera hidden behind the air vent, to the shadows mingling with the light beaming from under the door, to the brandy, and then, back to him.
Of all the variables she’d considered, she assessed him with the keenest deliberation. She stepped back a few inches, looking him up and down with her eyes narrowed, her tongue tracing a hungry path between her plump, pink lips.
In an instant, their roles were reversed. He was no longer the monied Southern gentleman considering his options as he strolled through the lines of lovely ladies waiting downstairs.
He was the one on the block.
And she didn’t look at him like a sweet, innocent ingénue. The glint in her impossibly opaque green eyes was that of a distinctively modern woman, one who knew the pleasures that could be found in the arms of the right man.
With a squeal that announced she was back in character, she grabbed his hands and dragged him behind the silk screen in the corner. To anyone listening at the door, her giggles reverberated with giddy excitement. He barely had time to lock his brain on what was happening when she started to tear at his cravat.
“They can still see us from behind this screen,” she said, making short work of the loose knot at his neck. “Our shadows, at the very least. We’re going to have to make this look good.”
Despite the rush of blood roaring through his ears, Michael pieced together her meaning. She still assumed his kisses and innuendos were part of his cover—part of some plan to convince the gatekeepers of Nouvelle Placage that the two of them were just like everyone else in attendance—horny, costumed fetishists who’d come here not to dig into their secret world, but to revel in forbidden desires.
Okay. He could work with that. Especially if it meant stripping down with Claire and discovering the true lusciousness beneath her elaborate gown.
He spun her around and loosened the ties on her bodice.
“Just how far are you willing to take this?” he asked, trailing his tongue from the base of her skull, down her spine, to the gradually spreading laces of her gown.
“As far as we have to,” she said, breathless, her voice hitching when his tongue hit the spot directly between her shoulder blades.
She tasted like a gourmet dessert, a combination of flavors that played with the notions of salty and sweet.
“You?” she asked, tossing a sassy glance over her shoulder.
In another time, another place, another situation, he might have said that he’d only go as far as necessary to keep the mission intact. But here, now, with Claire, under the influence of his ancestor’s ring, all bets were off.
“As far as you want to go,” he replied.
She spun around. With her top sufficiently loosened, the stiff material of the bodice and sleeves floated around her corseted breasts like clouds of shimmering satin. Michael’s mouth instantly watered for a taste.
Just one taste.
“Care to be more specific?” she asked.
He smoothed his hands down her back, his fingers spanning her slim waist. Claire was not willowy or thin, but curvaceous and athletic. Her arms were tanned and muscled, but she possessed a natural softness that made him lift her up from her elbows so he could properly inhale the scent of the lotions clinging to her skin.
“How specific?”
He pressed her full against his body, so that she could not mistake the feel of his erection even through the layers of her gown.
“Oh.”
The sound of her surprise, coupled with the flush of pink across her cheeks, fired him even more. He tugged her to him, his lips so close to hers he could feel her breath as he spoke.
“I came here with no intention beyond getting you to safety as soon as possible. But I’d be lying if I denied how beautiful you are or how hot you look in that dress, especially now that it’s half off. Making love to you would not be a hardship. In fact, it would be my pleasure.”
Her mouth dropped open momentarily, but then she laughed. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pierced him with a stare so bold, he thought he might lose his mind.
“Then I think I’m going to like working with you, Special Agent Murrieta.”
“If we do it right, it won’t be work. And please, call me Michael.”
“By all means, Michael. Let’s give those bastards behind the camera something worth watching.”
5
“WHERE THE HELL are you, Michael?”
Special Agent Ruby Dawson muttered the question under her breath, her eyes trained on the blank screen of her cell phone. Except for one cryptic message telling her that Claire Lécuyer had taken off and that Michael was following a lead to catch up with her, all Ruby knew about her partner’s whereabouts was that he’d gone undercover without backup. If anything happened to him because he couldn’t wait six hours until she arrived on a later flight from San Francisco, she was going to kill him.
“May I buy you another?”
Ruby glanced up, momentarily surprised to discover a fine-looking man in a pale guayabera and khaki shorts smiling at her. He was holding a sweating mug of beer, nearly as empty as hers. His blond hair was cropped short. His cheeks were rough from several days of not shaving and his eyes, an arresting mixture of browns from deep chocolate to rich gold, shone with the kind of hopefulness only experienced by a man on vacation who’d just spotted a single chick in a bar.
Really? Now? Tonight?
Inwardly, Ruby groaned. Any other time, she might have grinned provocatively and enjoyed the free drink while she sized up the guy, doing a mini-profile in her head that would determine whether she said yes to his inevitable invitation to dance or declined when he offered to drive her home. Especially here, in Draper’s Dive, a cheesy, nautical-themed bar she’d been hanging out in since she was eighteen and her mom had taken an apartment two blocks over from. She’d honed her people-watching skills here, determining the winners and losers with such accuracy that the former owner had suggested she get a job with the FBI.
She’d taken his advice, and every time she came back to town, she hit the old place to drink a beer in his honor.
Didn’t happen very often anymore, but it was a tradition, much as it was a given that at some point during her tribute drink, a guy was going to make a pass.
Under other circumstances, she would not have minded. She was pushing forty, single, and lately, a little undersexed. But Michael was out of touch, and no matter how cold and delicious the local brew felt against the back of her throat, she had to track him down. She didn’t have time for a real diversion—even one with lips curved into a casual, if not arresting, smile.
“I can buy my own, thanks,” she said, turning her attention back to her cell phone, ignoring the twinge of sensation in her nipples.
That’s how it always started—with a zing. Followed by full-out flirting, laughing, usually a little more drinking and, if she was lucky, a succession of dance moves that would coat her skin with a slick sheen of sweat and inspire her to peel away her clothing, one layer at a time.
Where it usually ended, if she wasn’t on the job, was in bed. But this time, she hadn’t come home to New Orleans for fun. She was here to work…although, with Michael running around half-cocked and out of communication range, she really didn’t have anything to do.
“Of course you could buy your own,” the man said, sidling in between her bar stool and the empty one beside her, but making no move to sit. “But why would you if I’m offering?”
His bold self-confidence was interesting. He was good looking, even if in a little too familiar “movie star” way. The vibe he threw off wasn’t over-the-top pushy or creepy.
Just…persistent.
And Ruby kind of liked persistent.
“I don’t know you,” she replied, turning her shoulder so he’d get the hint.
He laughed. “I’ve only been in town for a few days. I don’t know anyone.” He leaned around her and held out his hand. “David B
randon.”
She sighed. She hadn’t traveled across the United States to flirt with some tourist in a French Quarter bar. However, what she had come here to do—provide Michael with backup while they tracked down the Bandit—was on hold until her partner resurfaced.
As soon as she’d secured her rental car from the airport, she’d verified that the Bandit’s likeliest next victim, Claire Lécuyer, was not home; and from the way the place was locked up tight, she wasn’t coming back anytime soon. Ruby had then checked in with the local FBI office and learned that while Michael had alerted their counterparts to his arrival, he’d given them no intel regarding his plans.
He had asked for the name and location of a discreet costume shop, though. That made her scalp itch with anxiety. Ever since Michael’s brother had given him their father’s ring, Michael had been different. He’d always been laser-focused on the job, but with his discovery of his new brothers—the heretofore unknown older brother, Alejandro, and the recently released jailbird, Danny—his drive and determination had hit new highs. Why couldn’t he have waited a few hours for her to show up? Instead, he’d gone off on his own, and until she found what the hell he was up to, she had nothing but time on her hands.
She gave the guy a little half-smile and said, “I’m Ruby,” keeping her last name to herself.
Mr. Handsome gestured to her pilsner glass. “May I?”
She shrugged and he took her nonchalance as acceptance. He motioned to the bartender to bring fresh drinks and then turned his assessing eyes to hers.
“You look comfortable,” he said. “You live around here?”
Her half-smile blossomed into a full grin. He was good. He turned the standard “where are you from?” into an interesting—and accurate—observation.
“Used to,” she replied.
“Lucky,” he said. “I’d move here in a heartbeat if I didn’t have obligations elsewhere.”
“Really?” she asked, skeptically. She often heard tourists make such claims, but few ever followed through. People didn’t move to New Orleans on purpose. They were either born and bred here or came here to work—and there wasn’t too much of that going since Katrina.