lady was late. Real late.
Somehow Matt D’Angelo wasn’t surprised. On the phone she hadn’t sounded like the type who would wear anything as practical as a watch, he thought in resignation, glancing at his own. He leaned back against the headrest, his gaze flicking warily to the rearview mirror of the Taurus. Then again, he admitted, she hadn’t sounded like the type who would choose a borderline neighborhood of graffiti-sprayed businesses and grim little apartments like this one to live in either. Her voice had evoked completely different images in his mind.
He’d give her another half an hour. Another hour, tops.
He was acutely aware of the fact that he could still just make Fenway Park for the start of the first inning, but even as he tapped the ticket on the rim of the steering wheel, he knew he wasn’t really considering skipping out. Like any red-blooded Boston male, he took his baseball seriously, but he took his job even more seriously. If she showed, he’d be waiting for her.
Sighing, he tossed the ticket on the dash and opened the car door. As he stepped from the government-issue sedan to stretch his legs, his attention was caught by the slim figure heading in his direction, still half a block away.
He’d never seen her before in his life, but as crazy as it seemed, that didn’t matter. Without even thinking about it, he was certain it was her.
So what the hell did she want with him?
Unconsciously raking a renegade strand of thick black hair off his forehead, Matt leaned against the side of the car and narrowed his eyes against the June sun to watch her approach.
On the phone this afternoon her voice had been soft, as if she was afraid of being overheard, but there’d been an incongruous trace of huskiness around the edges that prevented it from sounding too sweet. He definitely wasn’t a fanciful man, but that voice breathing through the receiver into his ear had sounded like…he groped for the right comparison…like honey, he thought lamely. Honey with a dash of cinnamon. Listening to her, he’d felt an uncharacteristic desire to lean back, prop his feet up on his desk and just let that voice wash over him.
He’d resisted the impulse with an effort. Straightening in his chair and conscious of the fact that all calls coming into the Bureau field office were monitored, his own tone had been strictly business as he’d asked her why she needed to meet with an agent.
The softly conspiratorial whisper had taken on a surprising stubbornness. She was calling from a pay phone on her break, she’d said, the huskiness more pronounced. There wasn’t time to go into detail and risk getting fired her second day at a new job for returning late from lunch. Irritatingly unswayable, she’d rattled off the address of her apartment, insisted that he meet her there after five and had been just about to hang up when he’d cut into her monologue.
It would help, he’d said, keeping his words even with an effort, if he knew who he was supposed to be meeting. With a contrite gasp that had instantly made him feel like a heel, Jenna—all she would divulge was her first name—had lowered her voice even further and told him he’d be able to recognize her from her dress. It was green, she’d said with absolute seriousness—the exact color of a leaf against sunlight. He couldn’t miss it. Before he could get in another question, she’d hung up.
Most likely a kook, he’d told himself. The Agency got its fair share of conspiracy nuts, alien abductees and plain old garden-variety paranoids. No one would fault him for writing her off as one of the above and forgetting about her, but he’d check her out just to satisfy his own sense of duty.
The Sox had been on a losing streak lately, anyway.
Actually, her offbeat description had been right, he thought unwillingly as he saw her walking toward the dilapidated sixplex where he was parked. The tie-dyed dress she was wearing was the exact color of a leaf against sunlight. But what she hadn’t thought to mention was the molten red-gold hair that rippled halfway down her back, the luscious legs that went on forever and the tinkling noise like little silver bells that seemed to fill the air as she came closer.
She was carrying a badly dented can of cat food. She looked like a sexy angel.
Matt grabbed his suit jacket out of the car and shrugged into it, tightened the knot in his tie too vigorously and wondered what had gotten into him. Silver bells? He had to stop skipping lunch, he told himself repressively as he approached her, the leather case containing his badge and ID already in his hand. He could still hear that damn tinkling, like glass wind chimes being stirred by a summer breeze. But although he darted a furtive look at the apartment building, he already knew this wasn’t the type of neighborhood where anyone hung out wind chimes.
Just then Jenna looked up and saw him. She stopped, and the sound stopped with her. As he got closer she took a tentative step forward, and a single silver note rang out.
Around one slim ankle she was wearing a fine chain with tiny bells on it. Relief swept through him.
“Agent D’Angelo?”
The voice was the same as he remembered, but combined with wide eyes the color of cornflowers, and spoken through those lush lips, the effect was even more sensual than it had been over the phone. For a moment he just looked at her, his brain refusing to shift into gear. Then he snapped out of it. She was way too much, he thought with sudden illogic. Too much hair, too much leg, too much satiny skin. Generous curves that even the short straight shift she wore—the famous leaf-green dress—couldn’t conceal. The ankle bracelet was like an unnecessary cherry on top of warm caramel sauce and whipped cream.
He realized that he’d been holding his open ID in front of him for the last few seconds, and those amazingly blue eyes were beginning to hold a hint of uncertainty. Snapping the leather case shut and stuffing it back into his jacket pocket, he nodded curtly and held out his hand to shake hers, but even as he did he saw what he should have noticed from the first.
She’d been crying. And as she switched the can of cat food to her other hand and automatically met his grasp, he could see a raw scrape on the side of her arm by her elbow, as if she’d fallen on pavement.
“Matt D’Angelo,” he acknowledged, the formality he’d intended to project falling away as his glance took in the pinpoints of dried blood on that smooth skin. “What happened to your arm?”
“I—I got mugged on my way home, just as I was coming out of the grocery store.” The honeyed tones shook slightly as her hand rested briefly in his and then withdrew. “I had eggs and a jar of low-fat mayonnaise, too, but they broke on the sidewalk.”
The last few words came out in an unsteady rush. When she closed her eyes, for a second Matt thought she was about to faint, but before he could make a move toward her she took a deep, controlled breath. Holding it for a long moment, she let it out slowly, her lashes fanning her cheekbones. She exhaled as softly as if she were blowing a kiss.
For some reason, he couldn’t tear his gaze from that mouth. He was beginning to get annoyed with himself.
For God’s sake, she wasn’t even his type. He liked cool-looking blondes. He liked short hair grazing a woman’s jawline in a blunt cut. He liked women who wore tailored clothes in neutral colors and women whose idea of appropriate jewelry was a pair of classic gold earrings. All of his past girlfriends had more or less fit that pattern.
Unfortunately, for the past five months he hadn’t been seeing anybody on a steady basis. That had to be why this woman’s overwhelming lushness was getting to him.
“This is the first time anything like that’s ever happened to me. Before I knew what was happening, my shoulder bag was gone and I was lying on the ground.” Again she breathed, her breasts rising against the thin cotton of the dress. “Pranayama,” she said, opening her eyes and meeting his carefully blank gaze. “Tantric breathing. It’s a yoga exercise to restore serenity.”
Her serenity, maybe. Matt cleared his throat.
“What was taken?”
Resuming normal breathing and starting up the walkway to the shabby apartment building,