And really she could use some help right now. Especially from someone who was a local and knew the area well. Someone who might even know Chad. But this man had already admitted that he didn’t, and frankly he unsettled her. She’d thought he was dangerous when she’d first spotted him from across the room and, while closer inspection might have confirmed that he was incredibly good-looking, it hadn’t shifted her initial impression one bit. Which was strange because he hadn’t made a single threatening move towards her. Still, she listened to her instincts and there was something about him she didn’t trust. ‘Thanks anyway, but I’m good.’
‘Good?’ He gave a humorous laugh. ‘You’re a foreign woman in a bar, alone at night in a city you don’t know. Exactly how are you good, America?’
She pursed her lips at both the nickname he had given her and the element of truth behind his words. When she’d first set out it had been early evening and she hadn’t given much thought to the time. All she’d considered was finding information that might lead to Chad. But she wasn’t completely vulnerable, was she? She had her mace. ‘I just am. I’m from New York. I know what I’m doing.’
‘Really? So what’s your plan now? You going to go bar-hopping and hold up your little photo to every person you come across?’ He made the only idea that had come into her head sound ridiculous. ‘That’s fine if you’re looking for trouble as well as your brother.’
‘I’m not looking for trouble,’ she retorted hotly.
His gaze narrowed at her haughty tone, his inky black lashes making his blue eyes seem electric. It was totally unfair that she should have brown hair and brown eyes while this man was one of the most beautiful creatures she had ever seen in the flesh.
‘Take a look outside. You have been in my country for less than twenty-four hours and you know nothing about it. You should be glad that I’m offering my assistance.’
Regan narrowed her eyes suspiciously. ‘How do you know how long I’ve been in Santara?’
‘Any longer and you would know not to swan into a bar in this part of town without an escort who could take on fifty men.’
Regan felt a trickle of unease roll down her spine. She glanced around the room to find it even busier than before. ‘I’d like my photo back, please,’ she said, standing to go.
He watched her, unmoving. ‘Where are you going?’
As if she was silly enough to tell him that. ‘I’ve taken up enough of your time,’ she said briskly, ‘and it’s getting late.’
‘So you’re just going to turn around and walk out of here?’
‘I am,’ she said with more bravado than she felt. ‘Do you have a problem with that?’
‘I don’t know, America; can you take on fifty men?’
Regan shivered at the husky note in his voice, her body responding to him in a way she really couldn’t fathom. Their eyes clashed and something raw and elemental passed between them. Again, he hadn’t moved but she got the distinct impression that he was a bigger threat to her than fifty other men could ever be.
Not wanting to put that to the test, she gave him a tight smile. ‘We’ll have to see, won’t we?’
Once more conversation slowed as curious eyes surveyed her and Regan stuck her hand in her bag, palming her can of mace, before turning and striding towards the entrance of the bar as if her life depended on it.
Relieved when she made it outside without incident, she sighed and hailed a cab that by some miracle pulled into the kerb in front of her.
‘Hello? Are you free?’ she asked the pleasant-looking driver wearing some sort of chauffeur’s hat.
‘Yes, miss.’
‘Thank heavens.’ She jumped in the back and gave the driver the name of her hotel, only feeling as though she could fully relax when the dark car started moving. Which was when she realised that the stranger in black hadn’t given Chad’s photo back to her.
She glanced out through the rear window, half expecting to find him standing on the pavement watching her, but of course he wasn’t. She was being silly now. And the photo didn’t matter. She would print off another one tomorrow.
JAG STOOD OUTSIDE the door to Regan James’s hotel room and questioned the validity of his actions. He’d been doing that the whole drive over.
After meeting her in the bar it was clear that she knew nothing about her brother’s whereabouts. She also seemed to know nothing about his sister being with him. But then she had grown cagey when he’d probed her about the last time her brother had contacted her, and he didn’t know if that was because her sense of self-preservation had kicked in, or whether she had something to hide.
Regardless, she was his only link to Chad James and she would undoubtedly have a wealth of significant information about her brother that could lead him to find his sister.
A predatory stillness entered his body as he raised his hand to knock at the door. Regan James had been a revelation at the bar. He’d been right when he’d first seen her photo. Her eyes were not brown, they were cinnamon, and her hair was a russet gold that reminded him of the desert sands lit by the setting sun. Her voice had also been a revelation; a husky mixture of warmth and pure sex.
She had evidently reminded some of the other men in the bar of the same thing because Jag had noticed the sensual speculation in more than one male gaze as she had moved through the bar. She had a slender grace that drew the eye and her smile was nothing short of stunning. Even his own breathing had quickened at that first sight of her, and when she’d stood in front of his table, her doe eyes wide and uncertain, he’d had the shocking impulse to reach across the table and drag her into his lap.
It had been a long time since he’d responded to a woman with such unchecked desire and the only reason he was even here was because he’d realised that he couldn’t interrogate her in the bar. As it was, some of his people had started to recognise him despite the fact that he’d shaved off his customary neat beard and moustache. He rubbed his hand across his clean-shaven jaw, quite liking the sensation of bare skin. Instantly the thought of rubbing his cheek along Regan James’s creamy décolletage entered his head and altered his breathing.
He scowled at the unruly thought. It had been a long time since he’d been influenced by his emotions rather than his intellect as well; some might have said never. Milena often accused him of having ice running through his veins, of being inhuman. He wasn’t. He was as human as the next man, as his physical reaction to Regan James earlier had proven.
The fact was, Jag had learned to control his emotions at an early age and he didn’t see anything wrong with that. As a leader it was essential that he keep a cool head when everyone else was losing theirs. He had certainly never let a pretty face or a sexy body influence his decision-making process and he never would.
Irritated that he was even pondering emotions and sex, he raised his fist to bang on the door.
He heard the sound of water being shut off and a feminine, ‘Just a minute.’
He let out a rough breath. Excellent; she was just out of the shower.
The door opened wide and he found himself staring into Regan James’s gorgeous eyes. Seconds seemed to lengthen into minutes as his eyes automatically travelled down her slender form.
‘You!’
‘Me,’ Jaeger growled, his voice roughened by the swift rise of his body at the sight of her in a cotton dressing gown and towel around her head. He pushed past her into the room before she had a chance to collect herself and slam the door in his face.
‘Hold on. You can’t come barging in here.’
Jag