by JB Lynn
“Out of our system?” Pete practically squeaked incredulously. She wasn’t out of his system. She’d taken up permanent residence in him, having invaded both his dreams and waking thoughts since they’d first met. And now that he’d kissed her, he couldn’t imagine ever getting enough of her.
She looked away. “It was a nice diversion, but”—”
“You want to get back to work,” he interrupted dryly. What he wanted to do was kiss her senseless, but since she seemed intent on focusing on business, that’s what he’d do. For now. “Fine. Get in the car.”
“The car?”
“You’re the one who said it was cold,” he reminded her.
“Oh. Yes. Of course.” She quickly plopped herself into the passenger seat.
Closing her door with a deliberate click, he took his time walking around to the driver’s side, making her wait, and giving himself a moment to get his wayward body under control. He had to play this smart, otherwise, he sensed, he’d never see her again after this job was over.
“There’s something on your floor,” she told him as he climbed behind the steering wheel. She bent to pick them up.
He did his best to sound matter-of-fact. “Condoms.”
She froze for a moment and then sat back in her seat, empty-handed.
She looked so uncomfortable; he had to swallow a laugh. Then he noticed her cheeks were flushed. He wasn’t sure if it was because of their kiss or her current embarrassment, but he couldn’t stop himself from reaching out and pressing the back of his fingers to her reddened flesh.
“Please don’t,” she begged on a strangled whisper, staring straight ahead, as though she were afraid to look at him, frightened of what she might see in his eyes.
Grudgingly, he dropped his hand, but he didn’t stop studying her face.
She closed her eyes for a long moment and swallowed hard before she spoke again in a tightly controlled tone of voice. “Brady wanted me to watch over Mrs. M. because he thinks she’s in danger. I think the cat is just a distraction.”
“So do you want me to find out who would want to hurt Mrs. Michelman, or do you want me to discover who’d want to take the cat?”
“Can you try to do both?” She risked a sideways glance at him.
“For you,” Pete murmured, “I’ll try just about anything.”
He thought he heard a slight mewling sound as she jumped out of the car and fled to the relative safety of the house.
He made no move to follow her. For one thing, he didn’t think she’d respond well to being physically chased. For another, he had to call in reinforcements.
Chapter 9
Alyssa stumbled through the door of the Michelman home on wobbly legs. What the hell had just happened?
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that Pete had remained in his car. Thankful for small mercies, she sagged against the doorjamb, trying to catch her breath.
He’d kissed her.
Worse, she’d kissed him back.
Even worse, she wanted to kiss him again. Hell, she knew she wanted to do a lot more than that with him.
And if a floor littered with packages of condoms and the way he kissed her were any indication, he wouldn’t be opposed to the suggestion. Her entire body throbbed with the idea and she leaned against the wall for support.
The marble, cool against her skin, acted as a dose of cold water.
This wasn’t the time to be distracted. She had a job to do.
She rubbed her cheeks, trying to get rid of the heat she knew reddened them. She’d always been mortified at how easily she blushed, thinking it made her look more like a silly teenage girl than a capable grown woman, but Pete seemed to find it an endearing trait. When he’d stroked her face in the car, it had all of her self-control to rub herself against his hand like a cat demanding to be petted.
She wouldn’t have found him so attractive if he hadn’t convinced her that he respected her privacy. A man with due regard for boundaries and personal integrity had always been high on her list of ‘“must haves”‘ for a mate.
A mate? She shook her head, dismissing the foolish idea.
“She’s on the phone,” Roscoe said behind her, jolting her out of her wayward thoughts.
Turning to face him, she schooled her expression into one of cool indifference. It was the mask she wore most often, so it slipped into place easily. “Who’s she talking to?”
“Her banker. She’s raising the cash to pay the ransom.”
A strained note in his voice made her ask, “Something bothering you?”
“I don’t understand how they got the cat. The doors and windows were locked. The alarm was set. I was here the entire time.”
“It’s not your fault,” she hurried to assure him.
“That cop… the way she looked at me.” There was no mistaking the undertone of dueling fear and anger in his tone.
Alyssa frowned, remembering Brady had something about Roscoe being in some trouble a while back, but being a good guy. Now she wished she’d asked him to elaborate.
Had Alyssa made a mistake entrusting Mildred and Mr. Burberry to the big man’s care? It wasn’t like she hadn’t made mistakes before trusting the wrong people.
Pete walked through the front door, interrupting the conversation. “Hey.” Oblivious to the tension swirling in the enclosed space, he thrust a manila folder into her hands. “This is the easy list.”
“Easy list?” She flipped it open and skimmed the first piece of paper.
“People who’d want the cat.”
Silently, Roscoe marched away. She watched him go.
Flipping through the contents of the folder, she discovered Pete had printed out mini-dossiers on no less than four suspects. “That was fast.”
“I aim to please.”
She glanced up to determine whether his flip remark was supposed to have been laden with innuendo.
He raised his eyebrows in inquiry. Then, figuring out what she’d been looking for, he flashed a wolfish grin that made her go all melty inside.
Needing to focus on the task at hand, she looked away. “How’d you print this so fast?”
“I keep a printer in the car.”
She half-believed him since Mauricio had claimed that he was a cyber sleuth. “Really?”
“What do you use those USB plugs for?”
“My phone. My music.” She flipped through the pages. None of the faces looked familiar.
“And my printer.” He sounded annoyed.
“Okay, okay. I didn’t mean to insult you.”
He didn’t respond.
She looked up, prepared to apologize if it would keep him helping her.
Amusement twinkled in his eyes and a smile stretched across his face.
Slapping the folder against her thigh, she groaned. “There’s no printer in your car, is there?”
He shook his head. “But I’ve got to say that I thought my whole USB thing was inspired.”
Shaking her head, she couldn’t contain a small grin. A man with a sense of humor was on her list too.
“I pulled that information together for you before I came over.”
“You do like to be prepared, don’t you?”
“Like I said, I aim to please.” This time he pitched his voice lower when he said it and there was no mistaking the flirtation. Then he grew serious. “It’ll take some more time to come up with a list of who might be after Mildred and I also want to see if I can figure out why they’ve asked for that amount of cash.”
Alyssa nodded. She too had found it strange that the catnappers were asking for $120,000. It seemed like an odd amount. “Maybe they know it’s how much cash the Michelmans have liquid.”
“Maybe. Or it could be a specific amount someone thinks is owed to them.”
She lowered her voice to a whisper. “While you’re doing your computer magic, could you run a check on Roscoe? Brady had mentioned something about him having had some trouble, but didn’t say what it was.”
“You don’t?”
Pete tilted his head. “You’re not from around here, are you?”
She shook her head.
“Roscoe Underwood went to prison for killing his junkie sister’s boyfriend, a low-level drug dealer.”
A chill ran down her spine. What had Brady been thinking, entrusting Mrs. M.’s safety to someone with that kind of history? “Oh.”
“He didn’t do it. A couple of months later it was discovered he’d been framed and he was exonerated.”
“Oh.” Relief flooded through her. She hadn’t totally misjudged the big man.
Pete shook his head sadly. “But by then, he’d pretty much lost everything. His football career was over. His endorsement deals were gone. His friends had deserted him. Even the charities he’d been involved with wanted nothing to do with him. And he hadn’t done anything wrong. It’s really a sad, sad story.”
A painful lump rose in Alyssa’s throat. She knew too well what it was like to lose everything through a cruel twist of fate. She blinked back tears as her own sense of unfair loss enveloped her.
“Hey.” Seeing her distress he moved closer to her. “What’s wrong?”
She looked down, not wanting him to witness her painful struggle.
But he was having none of it. Lifting her chin, gently forcing her to look at him, he murmured, “Talk to me.”
She shook her head. She didn’t want to tell him about her disillusion and loneliness.
But she wasn’t about to pass up the comfort he offered. Raising herself up on her tiptoes and using a hand to steady herself against his chest, she pressed her lips to his.
He kissed her softly. Sweetly. With feather-light pressure, he cupped her cheek with his palm, barely touching her as though he knew how fragile she was and didn’t want to risk her shattering.
From a distance, she heard Roscoe clear his throat uncomfortably.
Breaking the contact with Pete, she dropped back onto her heels, her hand falling away from his chest.
“She wants to see you,” Roscoe muttered, clearly embarrassed for having interrupted them.
“Be right there,” she replied, never looking away from Pete’s face. He looked as shocked as she felt.
“I’ve got to go.” Her voice, thin and reedy, didn’t even sound like her. Without waiting for a reply, she forced herself to turn away and march down the hall.
Chapter 10
Pete watched her go, but made no move to follow.
Their first kiss, at the car, had been hot and passionate, as much about their sexual frustration with one another as attraction, but just now had been something all together different.
The mask the ice princess wore had slipped and he’d glimpsed the vulnerable woman hiding behind it. His heart swelled, recalling how she’d let him closer instead of freezing him out.
His cell phone vibrated, interrupting the memory. A quick glance at the display showed it was Jackson calling. “Hey.”
“You find the missing cat yet?” The inquiry was delivered with a side order of teasing scorn.
“Actually, it’s being held for ransom.” While he spoke, Pete examined the framed photographs on a table in the foyer. Most were a few decades old and featured a much younger Mildred along with a man Pete assumed to be her husband. One of the pictures included a young boy of ten or so. In almost all of them, Mildred held a cat.
“For real?” Jackson asked incredulously.
“I kid you not.”
Jackson let out a low whistle. “Wow. Where do you guys find these girls?”
“What do you mean?”
“Brady’s pub-crawling across Ireland trying to help Amy find the dad who abandoned her and you’ve gotten roped into helping the ice princess find a ransomed cat. Why can’t you find women with normal problems?”
“Like the ones in your life?” Pete shot back, annoyed that Jackson referred to Alyssa as an ice princess.
“I have a no strings, no drama, rule.”
“Yeah, yeah. You’re King of the Hook-up,” Pete mocked. “That was fine in our twenties, but now it’s getting kind of old, isn’t it?”
It took Jackson an extra moment to reply. “So the reason I was calling was…”
Pete winced, realizing that he’d stepped over the line with his friend who was changing the subject.
“Brady called.”
“Again?”
“He wants to know if you know how to get in touch with Geoffrey,” Jackson continued.
“No.” He kept his reply short and clipped, making it clear he didn’t intend to continue the conversation.
“Can you find him?”
“No.”
Undeterred, Jackson pushed on. “Brady says he needs his help.”
Pete closed his eyes and shook his head.
But of course Jackson couldn’t see that. “Pete?”
“I don’t know if I can find him,” he muttered, knowing full well he didn’t want to find him.
“But you’ll try?”
“For Brady,” Pete agreed.
“Maybe it’s time…” Jackson began.
“Was there anything else?” ’Pete’s tone was deliberately brusque and dismissive.
“No,” Jackson said quietly. “If you need help with the cat thing, let me know.”
“I’ll call you if I find anything.” With that, he hung up, not giving Jackson the chance to say anything else.
Squeezing his phone until his knuckles turned white and his hand ached, he frowned down at the pictures in front of him, not really seeing them.
He didn’t know where Geoffrey was. He didn’t want to know where he was.
Brady knew that.
And Pete knew that if Brady was asking him to find Geoffrey it only meant one thing: Brady was in trouble.
“Do you see something?” Alyssa asked. Stepping closer, she invaded his thoughts and personal space.
“What?”
“Do you see something in the pictures?”
“No.”
“You were scowling,” she ventured carefully. “Is something wrong?”
“Brady wants me to find someone.”
“Who?”
Pete squeezed his phone harder. “Someone he thinks can help him.”
“He’s in trouble?”
“I think so.” The idea that his friend was in danger and was going to rely on Geoffrey of all people, worried him.
She nodded. “Go home. Do what you have to in order to help Brady.”
He forced himself to keep his tone light. “Trying to get rid of me?” He stepped closer to her, delighting in the way her eyes widened and she nervously licked her lower lip.
She shrugged. “He’s more important than Mr. Burberry.”
“Don’t let Mildred hear you.” Before she could anything else, he dipped his head and traced the line her tongue had just drawn on her lip.
She swayed unsteadily.
He grabbed her hips under the guise of keeping her upright, but really it was because he wanted to catch her. The heat from her skin burned him, even through the fabric that separated them. “Sure you want me to leave,” Pete teased, but he let go of her.
Faking nonchalance, she stepped back and murmured, “The ransom isn’t due until tomorrow night. We could all use some sleep. We’ll start again tomorrow when we’re fresh.”
Pete nodded, not trusting himself to speak. Logically, her plan made sense, but all he wanted to do was convince her to come home with him.
Roscoe trudged toward them, saving Pete from embarrassing himself.
“I’m headed home,” the big man announced. “Good to meet you, Pete.” He extended his hand.
Pete shook it. “Pleasure was all mine.”
Something unhappy flickered in the depths of Roscoe’s gaze.
Not wanting him to think he’d said that because of his football celebrity, Pete added, “That was a delicious dinner. You’re an amazing cook.�
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Roscoe dipped his head, uncomfortable with the compliment.
“Really,” Pete continued. “If you ever want to do it as a career, let me know. I have a friend who is always looking to hire chefs.”
“I’m no chef,” Roscoe replied.
“Diners don’t need to know that.” He turned his attention back to Alyssa. “I’m going to head out too. You’ll be okay here on your own?”
“I’m a big girl who’s more than capable of taking care of herself,” she replied coolly, some of her trademark coolness seeping in to her tone.
“I’ll send whatever I come up with to your phone?” Pete offered.
She nodded. “Thanks.” She turned to Roscoe. “I’ll see you tomorrow?”
The big man shrugged. “Sure you want me? I lost the cat.”
Alyssa patted his arm awkwardly. “I told you it wasn’t your fault.”
Watching the exchange, and remembering how she’d reacted earlier when he’d told her about Roscoe’s history, Pete got the impression she felt a kinship with the wronged man. He wanted to know why. He knew he could find out with a few taps on his keyboard, but he wanted her to tell him, especially since he now knew it was a secret she prized keeping.
“Goodnight,” Alyssa said, her gaze darting from one man to the other. “Thanks again for your help.”
Pete headed home to find out why the kidnappers were asking for $120,000 and who might have a grudge against Mildred Michelman.
He also had to do that favor for Brady and track down Geoffrey… the brother he hadn’t spoken with in three years.
Chapter 11
Alyssa lay in bed, knowing she should get up, but not wanting to. For one thing, the guest room of the Michelmans’ home had the most comfortable bed she’d ever experienced. For another, she hadn’t gotten much sleep, and the little she had, had been filled with dreams of erotic couplings with Pete Hanlon. Dreams so intense, that when she awoke, she found herself tangled in the luxurious bed sheets, panting with desire.
Now she had to get up and face Mildred Michelman, a woman she’d let down. Throwing her arm over her eyes, she sighed her frustration.
She didn’t belong here, not in this bed, not in this situation. All she’d ever wanted was to be a cop. When that had been taken away, she’d lapsed into a weird existence, unsure of what she wanted to do next. Brady’s offer of the protection job had seemed like a good way to pursue the personal security field, but things weren’t working out the way she’d hoped.