The Mccaffertys: Slade. Lisa Jackson

the porch light. Cold air followed the cat inside. “What are you doing here, old guy?” she asked as Lazarus slunk into the living room and rubbed against her legs. She gathered him into her arms and felt tears burn the backs of her eyelids. When Nana had died, the neighbors, Jack and Betty Pederson, had offered to take in the aging cat, Jamie had never expected him to show up.

      “You escaped, did you?” she said, petting his silky head. “You’re a bad boy.”

      His purr was as loud as it had been when he was a kitten. “Like a damned outboard motor,” her grandfather, when he’d been alive, had complained.

      Now, the sound was heavenly. “Come on, I’ve got something for you,” she whispered, kicking the door open and starting down the hall. Lazarus trotted after her. In the kitchen she poured a little milk into a tiny bowl, took the chill off of it on the stove and set the dish on the floor. “There ya go.”

      The words were barely out of her mouth when she heard footsteps on the front porch. The doorbell chimed. “Uh-oh,” she said to the cat. “Busted.”

      She expected to find a frantic Betty or Jack on the front porch. Instead, as she peered through one of the three small windows notched into the door, she recognized the laser-blue eyes of Slade McCafferty.

      CHAPTER FOUR

      THIS IS THE LAST THING I NEED, Jamie thought. The very last thing. Her stupid heart skipped a beat at the sight of him and if she were honest with herself she would admit that her breath caught in her throat nonetheless. If she had any sense at all, she’d tell him to get lost.

      You can’t do that, Jamie-girl. He’s a bona fide paying client now, remember? Like it or not, you have to deal with him and you have to be professional. No matter what kind of a lying bastard he might be.

      “Something I can do for you?” she asked as she cracked open the door, then, feeling foolish threw it wide enough to let in a gust of frosty air and give her full view of the man she’d sworn to despise.

      “You said to call or drop by if any of us needed anything.” Snowflakes clung to the shoulders of his jacket and sparkled in his dark hair.

      “That I did.” She’d never in a million years thought he’d take her up on it.

      “I think you and I…we should clear the air.”

      “Does it need clearing?”

      “I think so.” His eyes didn’t warm. Every muscle in her body was tense. “The way I see it, you and I, we’re gonna be stuck with each other for a couple of weeks.”

      “Is that a problem?” she asked, sounding far more cool and professional than she felt.

      “Could be. I don’t want anything from the past making either one of us uncomfortable.”

      Too late. “I’m not uncomfortable.”

      “Well, I am,” he said, one side of his mouth twisting upward in a hard semblance of a smile. God, he was sexy. “I’m freezing my rear out here.” A pause. She didn’t move. “Are you gonna invite me in or what?”

       This is going to be dangerous, Jamie. Being alone with Slade isn’t a good idea.

      “Sure,” she said, pushing the door even wider. “Why not?” A million reasons. None worth examining. The faint hint of smoke and a blast of cold air swirled into the foyer as he walked into the small hallway. Quickly she closed the door and leaned against it. She didn’t offer him a chair. “So, what’s on your mind?”

      “You.”

      She nearly fell through the floor.

      “Me?”

      “More specifically us.”

      “Us?” Her heart catapulted. This wasn’t what she’d expected. The professional smile she’d practiced all afternoon cracked and fell away. “There is no ‘us,’ not anymore, Slade,” she said, clearing her throat. “Where’s this coming from?”

      “Guilt, probably.”

      “Well, forget it. What happened was a lifetime ago. We were just kids and…and it’s just easier if we forget there ever was. We only saw each other for a couple of months. I’m surprised you remember.”

      “Don’t you?”

      As though it was yesterday! “Vaguely,” she lied. “You know, little flashbacks, I guess, but not much. It’s been a long time, more like a lifetime,” she said, gathering steam. “You and I, we’ve got to deal with each other professionally for the next few weeks, so let’s just forget that we ever knew each other, okay? Let the past stay right where it is. After all, it wasn’t much more than a blip in our lives.”

      “Bull.”

      “Excuse me?”

      “It was more than that.”

      “At the time.”

      “I’m not buying that you don’t remember.”

      “I said I do, some of it, probably more than I wanted to when I drove back here, but let’s just keep things in perspective.”

      “Perspective?”

      “I’m an attorney working for you. You’re the client.”

      “Hell’s bells, Jamie, we slept together.”

      “That’s really not so unique, is it? Not for you. Not with the girls around here.”

      His jaw tightened and he took a step forward. “You were different.”

      “Like hell, McCafferty. I’m going to be honest with you, okay? There was a time when I would have done anything, anything to hear you tell me I was different, special, someone you never forgot…But that was eons ago, when I was just a wounded little girl. I’m over it and I don’t want to go back there and I don’t believe for an instant, not one instant, that you’ve had even the slightest bit of regret for what happened.

      “So just because I’m in town and you feel…what? Compelled to ‘clear the air,’ forget it. I have.”

      “Nice speech you’re peddling,” he said, looking down at her. “But I’m not buying it.”

      God, his eyes were blue. “You don’t have to. You can take it or leave it.” She wanted to step away from him. He was just too damned close, but she held her ground, determined to show him that she wasn’t going to be intimidated or bullied. Those days were over.

      “You’re scared.”

      “And you’ve got one hell of an inflated ego, McCafferty. But then some things just don’t change, do they?”

      “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. And you do remember, Jamie. You’re too smart to have forgotten.”