there after they left the café. She’d stopped at the detective’s office.
That meant he was either a stalker or else he’d known where to find her.
“Don’t tell me. You work for the INS, don’t you?”
He stood a little straighter, if that was at all possible, stretching that lean torso, drawing her gaze to his slim hips and legs that appeared muscular even through the light material of his slacks. “Yes, I do.” He held out a business card. She took it, running her thumb over the raised lettering. Jake McCoy, Immigration Agent.
She closed her eyes and swore in French. “This day keeps getting better and better. Only I could meet a guy I’m attracted to for the first time in what seems like forever, kiss him, then find out his mission in life is to make mine miserable.” She stared at him. “Does this mean you’re taking me to the airport?”
He seemed to hesitate. “Do you want me to?”
She tucked the card into the waist of her skirt. “Do I have a choice?”
He glanced at a plain silver watch on his wrist. “Until midnight, you do.”
She slid her hand from the door. “You have to be kidding.” She regarded his clear, direct gaze and realized he wasn’t.
“Have you eaten yet?” he asked.
“Eaten?”
“Yes. Supper.”
She thought of the granola bar she had stashed in her backpack. With the meager amount of money she had left, she didn’t have enough to splurge on little extras like food.
“Do you want to, you know, go catch a bite?”
“A bite?”
“Yes.”
She crossed her arms under her breasts. On another woman, the move might have been provocative. Not with her. Like everything else about her, her breasts were small. Nonetheless, she watched his gaze skim the front of her shirt, the darkening of his eyes telling. Her nipples hardened beneath the thin, soft cotton, and a slow, arousing shiver tickled her spine. “Let me, um, get this straight. Isn’t that how they say it? You’re telling me you’re with the INS. But you’re not taking me to the airport. You can’t. At least not until midnight. But you want to take me out to dinner. Is that right?”
He cleared his throat. “Yes.”
She glanced at her digital watch. “It’s only seven. Where were you planning on taking me?”
A glimpse of a grin played around his full lips. “I know this nice place that serves great French food.”
She raised a brow.
“In Baltimore.”
Her burst of laughter surprised even her.
There was no playing with this guy. He was as straight as they came. If she asked him how many times a week he took his suits to the cleaners, he’d probably not only answer her, but answer her accurately, down to the time of day he took them in.
She wondered if those same painstaking characteristics would make him thorough in his lovemaking, as well. He’d take his time. Explore every crevice and hollow. Make sure he was giving more pleasure than he was taking.
She caught her bottom lip between her teeth. “Sorry, but I’ve already eaten.” She grasped the door again. “Thank you, though.”
She climbed into the car, half expecting him to stop her. He didn’t.
She rolled down the window.
He leaned over, his hands tucked into his pants pockets. “Mind if I ask where you’re going?”
“No, I don’t mind. But even you’d have to agree I’d be stupid to tell you.”
He nodded. Her gaze was riveted on his mouth. While everything else about him bespoke discipline and order, his lips hinted at a passion she didn’t think even he knew the depths of. She remembered the firm, silky feel of them against hers. His initial hesitation. Then his soft groan, and the confident pressure of his mouth as he returned her instinctual kiss. She could almost still taste him there, on her tongue.
She started the car’s engine. “You’re not going to follow me, are you?” The thought both excited and scared her, but not for the reasons she would have thought. While Jake McCoy posed a threat to her freedom to find Lili, she got the distinct impression it was an altogether different autonomy he threatened.
Then again, one night with this man who looked at her in a mixture of wonder and desire might not be such a bad idea.
“Probably,” he answered.
She settled on excited.
“Okay. Guess I’ll be seeing you on the road, then.”
“Yeah. On the road.”
3
THE NERVE-GRATING CHIRP of the cell phone filled the otherwise quiet interior of the car. Jake fumbled in his jacket pocket then pulled it out. McCoy Place, the display read. He reached over and chucked the phone into his glove box. Until he saw what was going to happen over the next few hours, there was no point in talking to David. Michelle Lambert and her intentions took priority over a hiking trip. He glanced into the back seat, where all his new gear was tucked neatly into an oversize blue nylon backpack. The manager of the sports equipment store had told him everything he’d bought was top of the line. A sleeping bag no thicker than his linen bedsheets was guaranteed to keep him warm when the temperatures dipped below freezing, and dry when it rained for days on end. He leaned forward and stared at the sky. It definitely looked like rain.
He put both hands on the steering wheel and zoomed in again on the rusted Ford two car lengths ahead of him in the right lane. He was sure there was a law against the amount of exhaust the tailpipe was spewing out. And the wire holding her back bumper in place looked ready to snap. His gaze trailed to the open driver’s window. Every now and again, tendrils of Michelle’s curly hair trailed out and whipped in the wind. Like now. He watched her run her fingers through the unruly mass, casually gathering it on the other side of her head.
Jake adjusted the car’s interior temperature. It was the first time he’d ever turned it past the sixty-seven-degree point. But that didn’t bother him. What did was the irrepressible urge he had to turn the damn air conditioner off and roll his windows down. To feel the early evening air skim through his short-cropped hair like a woman’s fingers.
He smoothed the front of his jacket and focused on the overhead sign coming up. Welcome To Pennsylvania. He’d driven this route before many times. Up through Maryland to Penn State, then either west to Pittsburgh or Cleveland or east to New York or Boston. When possible, he preferred driving to flying, and often times he got there faster on these shorter routes. They had yet to make a business-class airplane seat with enough leg room to keep him happy.
He relaxed a bit. The Pennsylvania turnpike was the only direct route through the mountainous state this far south. Not even he would attempt navigating off the four-lane thruway.
Off to the west, the sun was sinking toward the horizon, thin summer clouds throwing off shades of pink and purple. The vibrant colors made him think of the woman in the car ahead of him. Of her provocative nature. Of her small, round breasts. Her great legs. Her chattiness. His mind wandered, and he let it. As his doctor told him last week, there was no safer sex than mental sex. No one ever got pregnant or contracted an STD by indulging in fantasy. And sex with Michelle Lambert was—and would stay—nothing more than a harmless fantasy.
Images of rumpled bedsheets, an empty wine bottle and a Do Not Disturb sign on the door conjured a scene that made him squirm in his seat. She would be a talker in bed, that one. Pleading with him to touch her just so. Knowing instinctively just where to touch him. She would be insatiable….
Whoa.
Jake made a quick steering correction,