“Cream? Sugar?” Kelly asked, taking two mugs from the cupboard.
“Just cream, please.”
She accepted the mug Dylan’s sister handed to her and sipped.
“Did he even tell you he had a sister?” Kelly demanded.
“Yes,” she admitted. “But he didn’t mention you were visiting.”
“I can just imagine what went through your mind when I opened the door.”
She managed a smile. “That he has great taste in women.”
Kelly laughed. “He told me I’d like you.”
Natalie sipped her coffee, swallowing the question that sprang to mind along with the dose of caffeine.
“Aren’t you going to ask me what he said about you?”
“No.” She couldn’t deny a certain amount of curiosity, but things were so complicated with her and Dylan right now, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know.
Kelly smiled. “You aren’t like any of the other women he’s dated in the past few years. Not that there have been many,” she added hastily. “And none that he willingly talked about.”
“Dylan and I have been spending a lot of time together, working on a case. If he gave you the impression it was anything more than that—well, it’s not.”
“Hmm.” The murmured response could have meant almost anything.
Natalie didn’t dare speculate.
Then Dylan came into the kitchen wearing a pair of khaki shorts low on his hips and absolutely nothing else. Her mouth went dry, her blood heated.
He looked good—too good. All that bronze skin stretched over broad shoulders. That powerful chest sprinkled with dark hair. The rippling abdominal muscles. Those long, lean legs. He had an incredible body and she’d run her hands over every inch of it. She’d experienced firsthand the strength of that body, the power in those muscles, the surprising gentleness of the man.
He halted on his way to the coffeepot as he finally spotted her. Their eyes locked, held for a long moment.
Natalie heard Kelly sigh. “Is it just me, or is it suddenly really hot in here?”
Dylan scowled at his sister. “You could have told me I had company.”
Kelly grinned. “Natalie and I were getting acquainted.”
“I’ll bet,” he muttered, pouring himself a mug of coffee. He turned back to Natalie. “I hope she hasn’t been giving you a hard time.”
“Of course not,” she denied. “I shouldn’t have intruded on you at home but you told me you wanted to know about my meeting with Sandra Todd and I met with her today and so I thought I’d stop by and tell you about it.”
Realizing she was babbling as incoherently as her son tended to do, Natalie hid behind her cup.
“You’re not intruding,” he assured her. He inclined his head toward Kelly. “She is. She’s the only one of my sisters who has a tendency to show up on my doorstep on a whim.”
“It wasn’t a whim,” Kelly denied. “I told you I would come for a visit when I had some time off.”
“You just didn’t tell me when that might be.”
“Details.” Kelly waved a hand dismissively.
“I would think the FBI would appreciate it if you paid attention to such trivial things as details,” he said dryly.
Natalie felt her jaw drop open. FBI?
His sister just shrugged. “I’ve had no complaints about my job performance.”
“Not yet.”
“Speaking of work,” Kelly said, pointedly ignoring his remark. “It sounds as though the two of you have business to discuss, so I’ll make myself scarce.” She refilled her cup, then moved to the door. “It was nice meeting you, Natalie.”
“You, too,” Natalie responded to her back, still feeling as if she’d made a fool of herself. Not just in front of Dylan, but his sister. She should never have left the ballpark.
“Where’s Jack today?” he asked.
“He ditched his mom for a treehouse.”
He chuckled. “No self-respecting seven-year-old boy would make any other choice.”
She frowned. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
The humor faded from his eyes. “I’m sure I could think of something to make you feel better.”
She didn’t doubt it. But there was no use even entertaining such lascivious thoughts with Dylan’s sister under the same roof. She cleared her throat. “You never mentioned your sister was with the FBI.”
He grinned at her obvious diversionary tactic. “I’m embarrassed to admit that I’m the underachiever in the family.”
“I wouldn’t think police lieutenant is anything to be ashamed of.”
“Except that all three of my sisters work for the feds.”
“Wow. Law enforcement must be programmed into your DNA.”
“Seems like,” he agreed. “What about your family?”
She shrugged. “My dad was a laborer, my mom was a housewife.”
“They must be very proud of you.”
“Because I went to law school?” She shook her head. “Maybe they were, at first, but getting pregnant before graduation canceled that out.”
She shook off the residual hurt, the resentment. “My sister, on the other hand, has had some interesting jobs.”
“What does she do?”
“She’s a chemical researcher at Divine Cosmetics in Chicago.”
“The sister I met?”
“She’s the only sister I have.”
“She doesn’t look anything like a science geek.”
She smiled, relaxing a little. It was easier to talk about Shannon, safer than opening up her own life to his perusal. “What does she look like?”
“Anything but a scientist.”
“A lingerie model?”
He considered, nodded appreciatively. Natalie didn’t let his reaction bother her. She’d lived her whole life with a sister who was taller, thinner, smarter and stunningly beautiful. If she didn’t love her so much, she’d hate her.
“Was she really?” Dylan asked.
“I have the catalogues to prove it.”
“And the lingerie.” He grinned.
“She got a good discount.”
“I’m not complaining. I think you look great in emerald satin.” He lowered his voice to a more intimate tone. “Even better in nothing at all.”
She swallowed. She was really trying to keep things on an impersonal level between them, but Dylan refused to let her. She glanced at her watch, hastily gulped the last of her coffee. “I have to go. I have to pick Jack up from Kevin’s house.”
“I thought you wanted to talk about your meeting with Sandra Todd.”
“We can discuss it Monday,” she said. In her office, on neutral ground, where he wouldn’t keep unnerving her with innuendoes and suggestive looks.
She glanced at her watch again as she carried her mug over to the sink. She still had more than an hour before she was supposed to pick up her son, but she couldn’t spend that hour with Dylan without wishing he would touch her, kiss her, make love to her. She needed distance before her heart was completely lost—if it wasn’t already too late.
“Natalie.”
She hadn’t realized he’d moved until she turned around and found herself face-to-face with him. Or rather face-to-chest. She wanted to touch him, to slide her hands over the muscular planes. She curled her fingers into her fists, her nails biting into the tender skin of her palms.
“I really…”
He settled his hands on her shoulders.
“…have to…”
Slid them slowly down her arms.
“…go.”
Unfurled her tightly clenched hands.
“Not yet,” he murmured.
He linked their fingers together.
Now.
Tilted his head.
Definitely now. Her mind flashed the warning in bright neon lights. She saw nothing but the desire in his eyes; desire she knew was mirrored in her own.
Then he touched his lips to hers.
It was an easy kiss. Simple, undemanding. And it completely obliterated her defenses.
She was so afraid of falling in love with him. Terrified that she already had. She pulled away from the warmth of his embrace.
“Jack will be waiting,” she lied.
Dylan watched her go, wishing he knew how to bridge the distance she kept putting between them. She wanted him—her physical response to him was undeniable. But he wanted more than her body this time. He wanted her heart and her soul, too.
“Jack?” Kelly asked.
He turned around, sighed. He didn’t know how much of the conversation with Natalie his sister had overheard, but obviously enough for her to want to practice her interrogation skills.
“Natalie’s son.”
“I’ve never known you to date a woman with a child.”
“I’m not dating Natalie.”
“You’ve slept with her.”
He shook his head. “I am not having this discussion with my baby sister.”
“I don’t need you to admit it. I know it’s true.”
“Just because you’re a special agent now doesn’t mean you know everything.”
“I know you,” she reminded him. “And I can see that you’re halfway in love with her already.”
“Natalie and I work together.”
“Mmm-hmm. And the sparks in this room could’ve lit a powder keg.”
He couldn’t deny it. Despite everything that had happened since he and Natalie had first made love, the attraction was still there, stronger than ever.
Kelly wrapped her arms around him from behind, pressed a soft kiss to the back of his shoulder. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have pried.”
“No, you shouldn’t have.”
She sighed. “I just hate to see you throwing your future away because you can’t let go of the past.”
“They were my future. My family.” My everything. He couldn’t bring himself to say the last part aloud. To admit how empty his life was now.
Or rather, how empty it had been before Natalie.
“I loved Beth, too,” she reminded him. “But she made her own choices.”
“Drop it, Kel.”
“I can’t.”
He moved over to the coffeepot and poured a cup of coffee he didn’t even want.
“I love you, Dylan.”
He sighed. “I love you, too, brat.”
When Natalie found Dylan on her doorstep early Sunday morning, she thought he might have brought coffee. She didn’t expect a puppy.
“What…is…that?”
Dylan held the wriggling mass of butterscotch-colored fur toward her. “It’s a puppy. Some kind of golden-retriever cross, I think.”
She backed away, glancing behind her to the house with something close to panic in her eyes. “Get it out of here.”
He frowned and cuddled the squirming animal against his chest. “Don’t you like puppies?”
“Of course I do. So does Jack—too much. Now get it out of here before he sees it and gets ideas.”
But it was already too late.
“A puppy!” Jack shouted, racing across the porch, the screen door banging shut behind him.
Dylan set the animal on the ground. Jack fell to his knees, his face split by a grin of complete rapture.
“Oh, look at him.” The puppy, immediately sensing a kindred spirit, smothered the giggling boy with wet kisses. “Is he yours?” Jack asked Dylan.
“He’s a she,” Dylan told him. “And no, she’s not mine. My sister found a pair of them while she was out jogging this morning. The neighbors already took one of them, I’m just keeping an eye on this one until Kelly can find her a good home.”
Jack seized the opportunity. “We have a good home, don’t we, Mom?”
“Jack—”
“We even have a big, fenced-in yard for him to play in.”
Natalie glared at Dylan. “This is exactly what I was hoping to avoid.”
He grinned. “Every boy needs a dog.”
She watched her son scamper across the lawn with the puppy, his ecstatic giggles the most beautiful sound she’d ever heard. Ever since he’d seen Kevin Riley’s puppy, Jack had talked about little else. Natalie thought a dog would be a great companion for her son—in a couple of years, when he was old enough to take some responsibility for it. She had too much going on in her life right now to add a puppy to the mix.
“He’s seven years old,” she reminded Dylan. “Who do you think would be taking care of it?”
“He might surprise you.”
“I don’t have the time to take on this kind of responsibility right now.”
“I could help.”
She sighed. “Don’t do this, Dylan.”
“What is it you think I’m doing?”
“Making me believe you plan to stick around.”
“Maybe I do.”
She shook her head. “In the past four years, have you ever had a relationship that’s lasted more than a few weeks?”
He slipped his arms around her waist, kissed her softly. “I’ve never felt about anyone the way I feel about you.”
He was saying all the right things, making her want to believe his words. But she wouldn’t—couldn’t—fall into that trap again.
“Or maybe that’s what you’re afraid of,” Dylan continued.
Natalie remained silent.
“How many long-term relationships have you had in the past four years?”
“My situation is quite different than yours.”
“How many?” he asked again.
“None,” she admitted.
“How many short-term relationships?”
“How did this become about me?”
“I’m just curious as to why you fear commitment.”
She laughed and pulled out of his arms. “I don’t fear commitment.”
“Don’t you?”
“Of course not.”
“Then why do you balk every time I want to talk about us? Why do you refuse to consider that we might have a future together? And why won’t you let Jack have a dog?”
“All right,” she cut in. “He can keep the damn dog.”
“And me?”
She eyed him cautiously. “Are you housebroken?”
His smile didn’t reach his eyes. “You’re doing it again.”
“Doing what?”
“Using flippant comments to sidetrack a conversation. Avoiding the real issues.”
“I’m sorry. I just don’t know what you want from me.”
“I don’t want any more than what you’re ready to give.”
That was the problem—she’d already given him everything. The only thing she’d kept for herself were the words, as if not telling him how she felt could protect her heart. But in refusing to share her feelings, she’d hurt him, and that was something she’d never intended to do. So she went to him, raised herself on her toes and kissed him. If she couldn’t say the words, she could at least show him how she felt.
“Mom, can I—”
She turned to see her son standing at the edge of the porch, the puppy sitting at his heels, her tiny pink tongue hanging out of her mouth as she panted with the exertion of keeping up with a seven-year-old boy.
“Why are you guys kissing?”
Dylan grinned. “You’ll figure out the answer to that question yourself in a few years.”
“Fifteen years,” Natalie interjected. “Was there something you wanted, Jack?”
“I wanted to call Kevin to come over and see Dylan’s puppy.”
She glanced at Dylan, then back at her son. “She’s your puppy—if you want her.”
“Mine?” Jack’s blue-green eyes grew wide. “Really?”
“Only if you promise to take good care of her,” Dylan told him.
Jack flew up the stairs and launched himself at Dylan. “I will. I promise. Thank you.” Then he turned to his mother and hugged her, too. “Thanks, Mom.”
“We’ll go out this
afternoon to get her a leash and some food.”
“And some toys?”
“And some toys,” she agreed.
“She needs a name,” Dylan reminded Jack.
“Rookie,” he said without hesitation.
She frowned. “Rookie?”
“Because she’s the newest to the team.”
“But she’s a girl,” Natalie protested.
“I think ‘Rookie’ is a great name,” Dylan said.
Jack beamed. “Can I call Kevin now?”
“You can call Kevin,” she agreed.
Chapter 14
The third package of photos was delivered to Natalie’s office Monday afternoon. It was sitting on the top of her desk when she got back after lunch, and her blood chilled at the sight of the unlabeled brown envelope. She stared at it for several minutes, terrified to open it. In the end, she decided that whatever she was imagining was likely worse than whatever photos were inside.
She was wrong.
She dumped the pictures onto her desk, gasped out loud at the images spilling onto her desk. There were at least a dozen this time. A dozen photos of her child.
There was nothing in the envelope other than those pictures. She didn’t need anything else to understand the threat. Someone had been watching her son. And as terrified as she was, she was even more furious.
She picked up the package of pictures and stormed across the parking lot to the police station.
Fury raged inside Dylan as he stared at the photos. Jack laughing; Jack playing. Jack doing all the things a seven-year-old boy should be doing, except that he shouldn’t have to worry about someone watching his every move.
It was an effort to control the temper that simmered inside. He was angry at this most recent invasion of Natalie’s life, furious that someone would target an innocent child to make a point, and infuriated with himself for being caught unaware. Except that he hadn’t been unaware when he was at the park for Jack’s baseball game, he’d known someone was watching—he’d felt it instinctively. But when he found no evidence of danger, he’d disregarded the instinct.
He’d been so preoccupied with thoughts of getting Natalie naked that he’d failed to fully appreciate the threat. He’d failed to protect her and her son—just as he’d failed to protect Beth.
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