Travis glared at the impishly grinning child.
“That’s right,” Dianna said. She, too, smiled. “Say please, Travis.”
Saying “please” wasn’t in his job description. Still, if it got what he wanted… “Please,” he muttered. Damn, that hurt.
“Pretty please with sugar on it,” prompted Julie. “Don’t press your luck, kid,” Travis growled. But when he glimpsed the challenge in Dianna’s raised eyebrows, he gave in. “Pretty please with sugar on it. Now, let’s go into your office and talk strategy for tonight.”
Chapter Thirteen
Standing once more outside Englander Center later that day, Dianna was relieved that Travis insisted he would accompany her home that night. She didn’t want to be alone. Not after all that had happened that day.
Poor Wally. Upset…upset. His voice moaned over and over in her mind. How could A-S Development continue without the man who had tempered Jeremy Alberts’ daunting perfectionism?
For once, she was glad when Travis issued commands that brooked no resistance. She wasn’t to do anything on her own. He was going to hang out with her. And, in the interest of keeping his damned cover viable, he made it a point, before they left Englander Center, to juggle beside Manny’s cart as she watched.
“Fare to keep you awake and alive,” read Manny’s sign. It took on a whole new meaning now. Wally was not alive. And she would be awake all night thinking about him.
Travis was magnificent as he twirled four lethal-looking knives and snatched their hilts from the air, his blue eyes dark with concentration. He wore his usual uniform of a snug Cart à la Carte T-shirt over even more snug jeans, and she watched his biceps flex as he tossed and caught the daggers.
The crowd behind Dianna oohed, aahed and gasped at his every movement, and no wonder. What he did was dangerous. He seemed dangerous, particularly when he glanced away from his spinning blades and grinned so devilishly at his audience.
Bill Hultman from Legal Eats was in the crowd, scowling. He didn’t look impressed. In fact, he appeared to Dianna to be willing Travis to miss and let one of those blades stab into him.
That didn’t happen, thank heavens. And when Travis finished, he laid the knives on the cart, then grabbed Dianna and gave her a big kiss.
It’s part of his act, she reminded herself as her knees wobbled and she hung onto his hard body for support. She was supposed to play the part of a woman in the throes of seduction so it wouldn’t look odd for this street performer to accompany her home.
Play the part? Heck, she only wished that Travis was about to seduce her. She had never before met a man who sent desire charging through her like a flash fire the way he did—not even Brad. Maybe, if she actually satisfied her lust with Travis once, she’d get over wanting him so much.
More likely, she’d find making love with him addictive.
“Ready to go home?” he asked, loudly enough that people around could hear. His cover was secure for that night.
And her reputation as a cool, professional manager? Shot to smithereens. She had no idea how she would regain it, with Bill Hultman or anyone, when this was over. If it ever was over…
“Sure,” she told him, making her voice sound as turned-on as she could. Which, basking under Travis’s sexy gaze, was pretty turned-on. “Let’s go.”
IT WAS ALL Travis could do that night to shoo Dianna into her bedroom…alone.
He left the door ajar in the room next to hers as he removed his gun from its holster and stripped for bed. He heard her moving around, the sound of the shower in the adjoining master bath. Imagined her under the spray.
He growled aloud and yanked the covers down. Not that he would sleep. And it wasn’t just watchfulness that would keep him awake.
Sure, seeming to seduce Dianna was part of his cover. But he wanted her. Really wanted her.
And couldn’t have her, for though she had responded to his kiss in the plaza, had pretended she had the hots for him, too, it was part of the act.
If she were really interested… He still couldn’t do a damned thing about it, for she was under his protection, and she was much too vulnerable.
A friend of hers had been murdered that day, and she had found him, dying. Then she’d had a scare of her own. All of that while she still wore bruises from her earlier attack.
He flicked off the lamp beside the bed. Wearing only his boxers, he pushed the pillows against the headboard and leaned back against them, reaching between the mattress and springs to make sure his gun was right where he needed it.
A light spilled from beneath Dianna’s door into the hall outside. He imagined the illumination growing brighter as she shoved open the door and came into the hall. Into his room. Wearing nothing at all…
“Dumbo,” he muttered aloud as the light in the hallway went out.
FOR THE NEXT FIVE DAYS, Dianna waited anxiously for the next shoe to drop.
Where was Farley? she wondered for the umpteenth time one morning as she sat at her desk. Her hands held the press release she was about to distribute about the Englander Center’s first anniversary gala, but her eyes didn’t really see the page.
Why hadn’t Farley done anything else? Was he waiting for the birthday celebration? Jeremy still refused to postpone it.
Dianna took a sip of coffee from the blue ceramic mug she lifted from her nearly empty desk. It tasted bitter. Chilly.
Mirroring the way she felt.
Farley might be lying low because he’d murdered Wally. Not that he’d suddenly developed a conscience. But the police weren’t shy about conducting their investigation. They were all over the Center, still asking questions, searching for clues that would bring the murderer in.
They hadn’t found Farley.
The cops didn’t discuss the case with her, of course. But she could tell from Travis’s irritability that not much useful had happened.
“Where are you, you miserable killer?” she demanded as she stared into the impenetrable brown liquid in her cup.
“What’s that?”
Startled, she looked up.
Travis had spoken from her office door. His T-shirt that day was a brilliant blue that brought out the brightness of his eyes. Not to mention the breadth of his muscular chest. “Talking to yourself?”
She felt a warm flush inch up her face. “Just reading my promotional copy aloud,” she fibbed.
“Fair enough. So, with your promotional copy to keep you company, you don’t mind if I go downstairs and juggle a little?”
“Not at all.” Of course, the image of him pumping knives turned the heat suffusing her face up a few degrees—not to mention the flame that was continuously lit inside her every time he was around.
Especially at night, every night since Wally’s death.
In keeping with his cover, Travis went home with her. But because his presence was simply that—a cover so he could watch for Farley and keep her safe—he merely watched TV with her and gave her an occasional juggling lesson. He’d allowed her to graduate to more potent knives—only one at first, from his box of prized juggling utensils. And he always left her at her bedroom door. Each night, she took an icy shower. For he had been a perfect gentleman. Damn it.
Irritation made her peevish. “Is juggling like twiddling your thumbs? It looks as if you’re just biding your time.”
His wide jaw tightened. “I am. As I keep close watch for anything—or anyone—suspicious.”
“Don’t you think by now that Farley’s on to you?”
“Could be. I’m also on to him. And I’ll get him.”
Sure you will, Dianna thought, but kept the sarcasm to herself. It was only her own taut, edgy nerves that made her so cynical anyway. They would get Farley. They had to.
But could they do it before he harmed anyone else?
“You’ll stay here till I get back,” he said, not making it a question. “Snail will hang out in the reception room to keep an eye on things. Beth’s making that assignment easy on him.”<
br />
Dianna had also noticed that the A-S receptionist and the youthful undercover cop had a flirtation going.
Maybe theirs, at least, would come to something….
“Fine,” she snapped, then eased up. She smiled at Travis. “Is it appropriate to tell a juggler to ‘break a leg’?”
“As long as you don’t tell him to break an arm,” he riposted with a grin so sexy it made her toes curl. He saluted crisply with one of those sinewy arms, then left.
You’ll stay here until I get back. With a sigh, Dianna replayed his command in her mind. Not hardly, she thought.
There was someplace she needed to go.
Not that she’d be foolish about it.
When enough time had passed to be sure Travis had left the suite, she grabbed her purse and headed into the hall. Jeremy strode by as Dianna passed the closed door to Wally’s office.
Their eyes met. “How are you doing, Dianna?” The throatiness in her boss’s voice hadn’t been there last week. Though he didn’t express his emotions aloud, he obviously grieved deeply for his partner and friend.
“Okay.” It wasn’t a lie. She was doing okay, but she was certainly not doing well. “And you?”
“Surviving.” He added hesitantly, “Would you have dinner with me one evening?” He must have sensed her hesitation, for he added, “Julie, too, of course. She’s not taking Wally’s death well at all.”
“I’d love to join you both,” Dianna said. Poor Julie.
Poor all of them…
Jeremy headed for his office, and Dianna continued toward the reception area.
Her ubiquitous shadow Snail was there, of course, sitting on the edge of the desk and grinning sappily at Beth. The A-S Development receptionist, an expert at flirtation, had turned all her wiles on the undercover cop. Snail didn’t stand a chance.
Dianna rescued him. “Snail, I need to go somewhere.”
His posture straightened. “I’ll go with you,” he said.
“I figured.” Dianna didn’t look at Beth. Bad enough that she’d been subject to such frustration for the last week. She didn’t want to see it mirrored in someone else’s eyes.
“WHAT IS THIS PLACE?” Snail asked.
“A children’s day-care center.” Dianna flicked on some extra basement lights. She had called more subcontractors who could do this kind of work, and in a week or two, after the anniversary celebration was over, she’d start getting bids to convert this dingy, decrepit room into a cheerful, fun one. The need remained for a safe place for kids to be while their parents negotiated in the Center’s alternate dispute resolution facilities.
The operative word was safe. Would she feel safe putting kids here before Farley was caught?
No. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t get her plans underway. And once the anniversary bash was over, she’d have more time to devote to it.
“A day-care center? If you say so.” Snail sounded dubious. “Look, Dianna, it’s awful isolated down here. If Travis knew where we were, he’d fire me—after kicking my butt but good.”
“He doesn’t have to know.” She reached into her purse for a pad of paper and the retractable measuring tape she’d tossed into it. Instead, her fingers touched her cell phone, so she kept searching. “I need to take some measurements since one of the subcontractors I’ve called—”
She gasped aloud as the lights went out.
“You all right, Dian—?” Snail’s shrill voice ceased abruptly, as she heard a heavy thud.
Frightened, she grabbed in the direction of the young cop—just as something stiff and huge and smelling like death was thrown over her.
It pitched her to the floor. “Snail!” she tried to call as her knees struck concrete, followed by her outstretched hands.
In a moment, she lay flat on her face beneath it, unable to breathe, as a muffled but haunting cackle assailed her.
TRAVIS HAD LEARNED, after many years of experience, to trust his gut. Today, it told him things had been too quiet too long.
He didn’t find juggling balls relaxing, let alone knives. With a growl, he told Manny he had to go. He headed up the stairs, not the too-slow elevator, to the sixth floor. To Dianna.
His unfulfilled need for the beautiful woman so beyond his league could be what caused his damned gut to rib him as it did. After all, every organ in his body had taken to teasing the part of him that stood at attention every time Dianna was around. Even when she wasn’t around. Like at night, when she was in the next room. As far removed from him as if they were in different states.
He burst through the A-S Development door, ready to rag on Snail for flirting with the receptionist. He had to take this mood out on someone.
Only Snail wasn’t there. “Where is he?” he barked at Beth.
The receptionist, who was on the phone, raised one finger signifying she wanted him to wait a minute. He didn’t have a minute. “Where—” he began again.
“Excuse me a second,” she said into the phone. “They’re gone.”
“They’re gone?” Travis roared. “Where?”
“The basement, I think. I got Dianna a subcontractor’s number before, and that usually means—”
Travis didn’t wait for the rest of the explanation. He raced once more for the stairwell—just as his cell phone rang.
“Bronson,” he barked into it.
“Travis.” The voice was weak, muffled. “It’s Dianna. Please help.”
“WHAT THE HELL were you thinking, Snail?” Travis demanded.
His subordinate sat on the floor, looking dazedly up at him in the dirty yellow light of the basement. Soot smudged his pale cheeks, and he held one side of his head with his hand.
“Don’t yell at him,” Dianna demanded. “He’s hurt.” She stood beside Travis…now. When he’d gotten down there, gun drawn, and turned on the lights, she’d been nowhere to be seen.
Until he’d noticed the huge black tarp covering the floor begin to move. Covering whoever stirred beneath it with his weapon, he’d yanked it up.
Dianna had been facedown on the floor. His heart had nearly stopped—until he reminded himself she was moving.
Only then did he stoop beside her and help her up.
“He could have been hurt a lot worse,” he said to her now. “You, too.”
“I…I know. And I was surprised my cell phone worked down here.” Her voice quivered. He glanced at her. She gnawed on her bottom lip, and tears glistened in her eyes as she leaned heavily against the filthy, cracked wall.
If she started crying now, he’d hate himself even worse.
He could have lost her….
He could have lost another person he was assigned to protect, he reminded himself.
“I don’t suppose you saw who it was.” He forced himself to talk quietly.
“No,” she said, “but I heard him. It was Farley. He was laughing. It was a game to him. Just a game. He hurt Snail, smothered me, and—” Her voice rose until she sounded near hysteria.
“It’s okay.” Travis pulled her against him. She shook all over, and he held her tight, trying to soothe her even as his body responded to her closeness. He ignored his inappropriate response.
“It’s not okay,” she whispered brokenly as she regained control. “He could have killed Snail.”
And you. Travis didn’t voice that thought for fear of frightening her even more. Instead, he grasped her tighter. “It won’t happen again,” he promised.
“But—”
“It won’t happen again.” But his repetition didn’t make it so. His resolve did. For he would not put anyone else in the position Snail had been in before.
It was his job to keep Dianna safe.
And he would.
SHE WAS ALIVE.
At home that night, lying in her bed beneath the sheets scented with familiar laundry soap, in her familiar sleek satin nightgown, Dianna could think of little beyond how it had felt lying beneath that stinking tarpaulin, knowing Farley was there laughing at he
r. Laughing because she was in his control.
He could have killed her.
He hadn’t. She was alive.
Why? So he could taunt her further? Toy with her, until he decided it was her time?
No!
She despised controlling men. She’d hated that about her own otherwise dear husband.
And yet…when Travis told her what to do, even if she didn’t like it, she knew it was with one goal in mind: his mission. And that meant keeping her safe.
Travis. He was there. In her house. He had vowed he would not trust anyone else to take care of her. That he would become as close to her skin as her own underwear…
The image had driven her nuts with desire. Maybe tonight, she’d thought.
And yet, when they had gotten here, to her house, nothing had changed. Once again, he’d given her a juggling lesson at her insistence—but she’d been too shaky to do any good. And Travis had remained the perfect gentleman….
Screw him.
Oh, yes. That was exactly what she wanted. She was alive. She needed to feel alive.
Shuddering, praying she wouldn’t regret this in the morning, she threw off her covers—even as the door to her bedroom opened. She could tell in the faint glow from the tiny nightlight she had left on in her bathroom.
“Travis?” she whispered.
“Just want to make sure you’re all right,” he said. The huskiness to his voice told her what she needed to know. He wanted her, too. Even if he’d promised himself to remain the perfect gentleman.
“I’m not all right.”
“What’s wrong?” The next moment, he was sitting on the side of her bed. “Tell me.”
“Only this,” she said, reaching for him.
She felt him flinch as she put her arms around him. But when her lips found his, he didn’t hold back.
He tasted of the yearning that caused aches inside her that she hadn’t felt in years. Had never felt, for there was a promise, as he deepened the kiss, of passion yet unawakened deep within her.
“Travis,” she whispered against him, only to feel his tongue capture her words, her mouth, her breath.
He eased her back gently onto the bed, settling himself on top of her. She felt the stretchy fabric of his T-shirt against her bare arms. His slim jeans scratching at her legs. His stiffening hardness…
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