Книга - For Her Eyes Only

For Her Eyes Only
Tori Carrington


Jake McCoy–an immigration agent with an attitude. He's known for always getting his man. Only this time, he finds more woman than he can handle….Michelle Lambert–a beautiful Frenchwoman. She's determined to stay in the country–and to convince gorgeous, uptight Jake that they'd be very, very good together….Jake McCoy prided himself on being a loner. So how had sexy illegal alien Michelle Lambert stolen her way into his heart–and his bed–so quickly? She wouldn't go home without her child and Jake couldn't blame her. Unfortunately, he couldn't keep his hands off her, either. Torn between duty and desire, Jake never guessed he'd soon be a fugitive himself–and a married man!









“I never guessed you’d be sexually uptight.”


The words came out sounding very provocative. Jake fought the impulse to kiss Michelle, even though she had just insulted him. “I’m not uptight,” he said roughly.

Michelle arched an eyebrow. “So what are you doing on that bed when you’re welcome in this one?” she asked, patting the sheet beside her.

Jake felt himself on the losing end of this battle. His pulse rate sped up. His throat tightened. And he wanted nothing more than to take her up on her invitation, consequences be damned.

Still, he had to try to gain control over the situation. “Respect. A gentleman never takes advantage. He…” Jake couldn’t think when he looked at her seductive pose, so he shifted his gaze to her hands. “He gets to know her first—her likes, her dislikes, her favorite color… He gets to know her on an emotional level before moving on to the physical.”

Michelle’s generous smile caught him off guard. “I guess I haven’t encountered many gentlemen.” She went over and took his hands. “But Jake, why would you give a woman more than she’s asking for?” Pulling him close, she whispered, “Don’t you know that all I want is you…?”




Dear Reader,

Ah, those Magnificent McCoy Men! In the first two books of the miniseries, License to Thrill and The P.I. Who Loved Her, you met Marc and Mitch. After these sexy-as-sin brothers, we thought we couldn’t possibly come up with another hero capable of eclipsing their considerable shadow. Then out stepped brother Jake…

In For Her Eyes Only, seriously single Immigration and Naturalization Agent Jake McCoy bumps into fascinating French national Michelle Lambert, and is thrown for the loop of his life. Where he’s conventional and rule-abiding, Michelle’s provocatively uninhibited and willing to do anything it takes to get what she wants…and near the top of her list is sizzling sex with Jake. Will Jake obey the rules and keep her at arm’s length? Or is he man enough to see that some rules were meant to be broken?

We hope you enjoy reading about Jake’s seduction—both in and out of the bedroom! And we’d love to hear what you think. Write to us at P.O. Box 12271, Toledo, OH 43612, or visit us at the Web site we share with other Temptation authors at www.Temptationauthors.com. Be sure to keep your eyes peeled for the next book in the series, featuring delicious David McCoy, coming your way soon!

Here’s wishing you love, romance and many happy endings,

Lori & Tony Karayianni

aka Tori Carrington




For Her Eyes Only

Tori Carrington







www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)


So many people, so little space! We wholeheartedly dedicate this book to everyone at Harlequin Books in Toronto for…well, for everything. But mostly for making it possible to do what we love doing most. Especially Birgit Davis-Todd, Randall Toye, Brian Hickey, Stuart Campbell, Katherine Orr, Stacy Widdrington, Maureen Stead, Carolyn Flear, Helen Higginson, Jennifer Tam, Meghan Dillon, Krystyna de Duleba, Amy Chen and—last but certainly not least, Brenda Chin without whom none of this would be possible. Thanks to all, named and unnamed! Without you, we’d still be writing stories that would make it no farther than our closet floor.




Contents


Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Epilogue




1


“JAKE, DO I EVER HAVE THE WOMAN FOR YOU….”

Jake McCoy tucked his chin toward his chest and squinted against the September morning sunlight. If any words could put the fear of God into him, those were it. Melanie, his younger brother Marc’s new wife, had said them at the McCoy place last night—right after his other brother Mitch’s new wife, Liz, took a perfectly good chicken and mutilated it beyond recognition for Sunday dinner.

His measured footsteps echoed off the asphalt of the parking lot across the street from the Immigration and Naturalization Service field office building in Arlington, Virginia. He hadn’t responded to Mel’s frightening proposition. Marc had answered for him, reminding his pregnant wife that Jake wasn’t interested in a woman. That none of the McCoy men were. They had to be bitten in the ass before any of them would even consider the idea of marriage.

Jake had been embarrassed by the resulting laughter.

Then again, how was Marc to know how very close he’d come to getting married? Long before his younger, brash brother had even had his first sexual experience.

He tightened his grip on the files he held in his left hand, then absently moved his other hand to pat the breast of his jacket. Perhaps close wasn’t exactly the word for his only brush with the M word. He’d been close. The woman he’d been dating, Janice Tollerby, was shocked when he’d pulled out the simple gold ring and proposed on their fourth date.

He still couldn’t figure that one out. He’d known on their first date that he and conservative Janice could form a workable union. It was unimportant that he was new to the dating scene and that they hadn’t known each other long.

For the first time he’d cut loose, taken a chance. And for the second time, he’d lost an important woman in his life.

He’d never taken a risk like that again.

He was a simple man, with simple tastes. He respected and appreciated routine, stability, discipline. He got up every morning at five-thirty, no matter what time he made it to bed. His need for simplicity was what led him to work for the INS. Those who didn’t belong within the country’s borders, or were no longer welcome, he sent home. Couldn’t get neater than that. In fact, if not for his brothers, he’d probably never use any of his vacation time. It was difficult for him to justify leaving important cases in limbo even for a day. In an unpredictable world, he liked predictability. It comforted him to find the same selections in his refrigerator. When he replaced his furniture, he bought like pieces. And he had six identical dark brown suits in his closet. One for each workday, and an extra just in case.

His older brother Connor especially took great joy in teasing him about what he referred to as his anal tendencies. It didn’t bother him. Well, most of the time, anyway.

It was a mystery still how David had managed to talk him into five days of hiking—hiking, for cripe’s sake—through the Blue Ridge Mountains. With everything they needed strapped to their backs. Jake grimaced.

He patted the left breast of his suit jacket again. The familiar billfold holding his INS agent ID wasn’t there. It hadn’t been lying on his bedroom bureau that morning when he got up. And a thorough search of his apartment and car hadn’t turned it up, either. He supposed it was possible he’d left it at the McCoy place last night, though not probable. There was no reason for him to have taken his ID out of the back pocket of his Dockers.

Then again, he wouldn’t put it past one of his brothers to lift the sucker so he’d have to take his vacation, which officially started today.

Vacation. What David had planned sounded more like hell on earth.

He crossed the street, then looked at where his identification usually filled out the front of his jacket—and rushed headfirst into someone barreling in the other direction.

Jake didn’t know how he’d overlooked the female who was pushing away from him. She had curly black hair and round brown eyes. Perhaps it was her height, which couldn’t be more than five foot four to his six two. Or maybe it was her build, which was somewhere between skinny and petite.

“Excuse me,” he said, running his fingers down the length of his tie.

She looked a million miles away even as she stared at him. In the bright sunlight her skin was a shade lighter than freshly milled paper, her lips colored a rich burgundy. She wasn’t the type of woman he’d normally find attractive. Aside from the obvious contrasts in their sizes, she was too…tousled, as if she did little more than finger comb her dark curls. Curls that a light breeze tousled even further. And her mouth… His gaze fastened on it. Her mouth was too…distracting. Provocative.

Her gaze finally seemed to focus on him. She murmured something under her breath, then brushed past him in the direction of the parking lot.

Jake stood stock-still. He felt as if he’d just been sucker punched in a way he’d never experienced, and Lord knew he’d weathered his share of punches. He couldn’t seem to draw air into his lungs; his knees felt ready to give out.

Slowly, he continued toward the building, wishing the sensations away. He’d have to make a point to watch where he was going from here on out. He held open the door for a small group exiting the building. First item on his agenda: unload the documentation he promised to bring over from the investigations unit. Second: locate his identification.

Keys jangled. He glanced over his shoulder. In the lot across the street, the woman was unlocking the driver’s side door of a battered old Ford. A once-over told him the tires were bald and he suspected she hadn’t had the oil changed in the past ten thousand miles. His inspection also told him that she had incredibly shapely calves. And that she was probably much shorter than five foot four when she took off the impractical, thick platform heels she had on.

He caught a glimpse of a man walking in her general direction at a brisk pace, likely on his way to his own car.

Jake turned toward the door he held. No one else was exiting. A statute ought to be enacted disallowing women to have legs that looked as good as hers did. He caught the ridiculous thought. Well, at least they shouldn’t be able to wear skirts that complemented those legs as nicely as hers did. It was downright distracting.

He absently patted his empty jacket pocket again, then slid another gaze at the woman’s legs.

The man moving in her direction quickened his pace. Jake dragged his attention away from her long enough to figure out that the guy wasn’t hurrying to get to his car, but was rushing for her.

He let go of the door, watching as the man knocked her over and grabbed her purse. Jake broke into a run, too far away to stop it from happening but close enough to catch up to the figure. The guy slowed to pull something out of the handbag, then dropped it. Jake swept up the purse, then lunged for the envelope the guy had taken, snatching it away. Their gazes locked. Just as Jake reached to grab him, the guy turned tail and ran. He disappeared into the depths of the city, the clap of his shoes quickly blending into the sound of car engines, blowing horns and a nearby siren.



MERDE.

The concrete pavement was cold and hard under Michelle Lambert’s behind. She stared at a scratch on the driver’s door of her car, her legs spread-eagle in front of her, her hair hanging in her face. After everything she’d gone through today, there didn’t seem to be much point in moving lest she stumble into yet another nightmare. Yes. Better she should sit there. Breathe. Pretend what was happening wasn’t. Wait until someone woke her from what had to be some sort of twisted sequence of events from an artsy, senseless independent film, the type that won awards in Cannes, not far from the town she’d grown up in in France.

Someone had snatched away everything that verified her existence: her passport, her plane ticket home, her money.

She forced herself to blink. Was it really just that morning that she’d discovered the manager of the crummy motel she was staying at had forgotten to give her her phone messages? By the time she’d called that swindling private detective she’d hired, he was gone for the day. His gum-smacking secretary had told her he’d need at least five hundred more American dollars to continue on the case. Dollars she hadn’t had before her purse was stolen by some greedy, bloodsucking American.

She clamped her eyes shut. But the simple move wouldn’t let her escape. She groaned, remembering her appointment with the INS mere minutes ago. The immigration officer’s voice had been so clear, she could practically still hear it. “Sorry, Miss Lambert, but we can’t honor your request for an extension on your B2 tourist visa. You’ll have to go back home to France tomorrow.”

Home.

France.

Without Lili.

She’d jump out of the plane window before she let that happen.

She opened her eyes, a foolish, tiny thread of hope winding through her. If she didn’t have her passport, they’d have to let her stay, wouldn’t they? At least until she could get replacement papers—

“Ma’am?”

Her gaze snagged on a shiny pair of men’s shoes, then slowly drifted upward to a man’s chest—a tantalizingly wide chest belonging to someone who towered over her like some sort of silent, handsome sentinel.

She looked into his face. “It’s you.” It was the man she’d bumped into earlier. The man who had large, slender hands and even larger calm gray eyes.

He held out her purse.

Michelle nearly burst into tears on the spot. “Merci.” She choked the word out in French, forgetting for a moment to speak in English. She rifled through the contents of her bag. Her passport. Her return plane ticket. Her compact, hair-brush, a snapshot of Lili she lingered over for a moment, multicolored receipts she’d accumulated over the past six weeks. Where was her money?

Her movements growing jerky and quick, she started looking through the contents again.

“Here.” The man held her slender bill holder toward her. She noticed the way his gaze slid over her compromised position, his pupils huge, his throat working around a swallow. A bolt of unexpected awareness spiked through her as she accepted the money from him.

“That’s all he tried to take,” he said. His voice seemed to come from somewhere very deep within him and vibrated right through her. “Are you…okay?”

Michelle pushed her hair from her face, looked where she clutched her purse in her lap, then stared at the run in her nylons. Her last pair of clean nylons. She felt like crying all over again. “No. I think you should just take me out back and shoot me.”

His quiet chuckle drew her attention from herself and zoomed it in on him. He reached down. Michelle stared at his long, tapered fingers. Nice hands. Strong. Sexy. She placed her right hand in his, his strong grip lifting her to her feet.

“You hear about the crime, tell yourself you’re being safe, you know, looking over your shoulder to make sure no one’s following you. Checking the back seat of your car in case someone is hiding there. Double wrapping the strap of your purse to make it a difficult target. Then—bam! Some degenerate pig gets you anyway.”

She sank her teeth into her lower lip. The more she babbled, the closer she moved to the tears she tried so hard to hold at bay. That’s all she needed on top of everything else that had happened that day. To collapse into an unflattering pile of hysterical female in front of this very virile man.

She shivered at the undiluted heat that traveled from his hand to hers, only then realizing his fingers were still neatly wrapped around hers.

He cleared his throat, then withdrew his hand and patted the front of his jacket as if looking for something that wasn’t there.

“You are an ex-smoker, yes?”

“Excuse me?”

She gestured toward where he patted his jacket. “I know many ex-smokers who keep the habit of reaching for a cigarette long after they’ve quit. My father is one.” She slid the money envelope into her purse, then slung the strap over her shoulder.

“No…no, I don’t smoke.” He glanced away, as if caught looking at something he shouldn’t be. Michelle glanced down. Aside from the run in her nylons and some dust on the back of her skirt, she supposed she looked all right. He cleared his throat again. “Shall I call the police? Or do you want to go to the hospital first?”

“Police?” Michelle’s mind caught and held on the word. No, she definitely didn’t want to waste any of the precious time she had talking to police. Every moment that ticked by was one more she wasn’t using to find her daughter. “No, no.” She lifted her purse for his inspection. “See, he didn’t steal anything, yes?”

The corners of his sexy, generous mouth curved upward. “No.”

“So no police.”

“No police.”

“Good.” Michelle couldn’t seem to tug her gaze away from his mouth. In every other way, this man appeared disciplined and ordered. But his mouth…. She ran her tongue along her teeth. His mouth looked downright delicious.

“Coffee then?”

“Coffee?” she repeated, blinking at him.

“Or tea.” He seemed to grow inches taller as he straightened. “You, um, look like you could use a cup. You know, to settle down before you get back on the road again.”

He nodded toward her hands. They shook slightly. No doubt the day’s events were beginning to take their toll, but she didn’t know how coffee or tea or anything with caffeine could remedy the situation.

He nodded to the right. “There’s, um, a café a couple of blocks away.”

His gaze was direct. His eyes clear. And just being near him made her feel safe in a way she hadn’t felt in a long time. In at least eight weeks. Before Lili was taken.

“Okay,” she said quietly.

The man seemed surprised by her response, which didn’t make much sense. Why should he invite her out if he expected to be turned down?

She followed him across the street where he picked up a manila file folder he must have dropped when he tore after the purse snatcher. He straightened the papers in it, looked at the INS building, then at her. “I guess I should introduce myself, shouldn’t I? I’m Jake. Jake McCoy.”

“Michelle Lambert.” She thoroughly looked him over, thinking herself certifiable for agreeing to have coffee with this beautiful stranger, much less pondering all the other possibilities his nearness presented. But those same possibilities made her feel gloriously alive in a way she hadn’t for a long, long time.



THREE QUESTIONS puzzled Jake. Who was this woman? What was he doing here with her? And why couldn’t he shake images of her naked and moving restlessly beneath him from his head?

He sat across the bistro-style table from her, slightly turned to the side because he was too tall to sit as designed. Michelle Lambert took a generous pull from a latte, or at least that’s what he thought she’d called it. She sat back with a satisfied sigh, licking the white foam from her upper lip in a provocative way that made him want to groan before he looked around to see who was watching. “It is not like mine, but it will do,” she said.

Jake found himself running his tongue along his top lip, wondering not only how the foamy concoction would taste, but how it would taste on her.

He looked away. Everything about this woman seemed to throw him for a loop. Her sweet, spicy scent was light, almost nonexistent, making him want to lean closer and breathe it in. Her accent, decidedly French, was heavy…sexy, which was a way he’d never viewed a foreign accent before.

He didn’t know why he’d suggested coffee with her. He also didn’t know why he was in the trendy coffee shop he must have passed a hundred times but had never entered. He glanced around the busy place. It seemed they served everything but coffee—at least as he knew it. He supposed part of the reason he’d extended the invitation was he couldn’t see her getting into that car in the shape she was in. Besides, for a brief, telling moment, she had looked like she’d…needed someone. And he’d felt an inexplicable urge to respond to that need.

That he battled against a completely different need of his own was another matter entirely.

“Thank you,” she said quietly, her small fingers curled around a cup that could have doubled as a soup bowl. “I…I really needed this. I haven’t had a cup in six weeks.”

He raised a brow. Six weeks? His mind clicked. He assumed that she hadn’t had a cup of whatever it was she was drinking because she’d been in the country for that long. If that was the case, and if she was in the country on a B2 tourist visa, then it should be about to expire, if it hadn’t already.

He didn’t like his train of thought. Especially since it didn’t seem to change his almost unbearable attraction to her one iota.

“My pleasure,” he said in delayed response to her thank you.

She smiled. The action sent his stomach down somewhere in the vicinity of his knees. “You don’t speak much, do you?”

“I’ve been told it’s not one of my stronger suits.”

“That’s okay. I’m of the personal opinion that people, as a rule, talk too much anyway. You know, when your friends tell you, ‘I’d really like to go back to university,’ or ‘I keep meaning to lose that last five pounds,’ my response is always that they shouldn’t talk about it, they should just do it. Sometimes it seems the moment they say it, the importance attached to the statement loses all impact, you know what I mean? Anyway, how exactly do they expect you to respond? I think it’s their way of asking you to share all those things you’ve been meaning to do but haven’t, as a type of shared misery.” She waved her hand. “I don’t go in much for that.”

He stared at her. He hadn’t known a woman could say so much without taking a breath.

She smiled. “Then tell me what is.”

“Excuse me?”

“You said talking isn’t one of your stronger suits. What is?”

He noticed that her eyes were a light, light brown, matching the color of her designer coffee. He found himself returning her smile. “Well, I’d have to talk to tell you that, wouldn’t I?” Her laugh was as smoky as he thought it would be. “Um, my job.” Oh, but that was lame.

“Your job?”

“Yes.” He didn’t offer more. It was suddenly important to him that she not know he was with the INS. He was drawn to her openness. Her teasing smile. And he suspected that if she knew what he did for a living, she’d close all that off to him. He didn’t want that to happen. Not yet, anyway.

He was relieved when she turned her attention toward the sugar decanter. She straightened it, then the napkin holder behind it, her gaze scanning the café’s interior. “I once wanted to open a café.”

His brow rose again, but for a completely different reason.

“Oh, not here. In Paris. Until Papa pointed out that the last thing Paris needed was another coffee shop.” That smile again. She tucked her mass of unruly hair behind her right ear. Jake was inordinately fascinated with the move and found himself wondering if her hair was as soft as it looked. And pondered how it would feel trailing a path across the sensitive skin of his abdomen. “So I switched my plans to a restaurant.”

Her laugh caught him unaware. What was funny about that?

“You know. If Paris doesn’t needed another café, it needs another restaurant even less?”

“Oh.” He cleared his throat again, then blurted, “You seemed distracted.”

She squinted at him slightly, as if not understanding.

“When we bumped into each other earlier.”

The light in her eyes diminished. “Yes. I was distracted.”

She took another pull from her cup, and he looked at his own. He wasn’t sure what it held. Was afraid to find out. “Any particular reason?”

He noticed then that she bit her nails. They were too short, barely crescents on her fingers. Unpainted. “Yes. There is a reason. Tomorrow, I’m told, I must leave your country full of swindling private detectives and bloodsucking purse snatchers. Go back home.”

He held his gaze steady on her. Just as he suspected.

She gestured with her hands. “They, those people don’t care that I need to stay here. That I need to find my daughter. They tell me they can’t help me. They can’t grant me an…”

“Extension.” He finished her sentence.

She squinted at him again, making him wonder if she normally wore glasses. He scanned her features, imagining her with all that unruly hair pulled into a smooth twist—

“Yes, an extension.”

“So you can find your daughter.”

Her hands stilled on her cup. “Yes. Her father, or the man who calls himself her father when he didn’t want any involvement in her life before now, came to Paris two months ago and…took her. Brought her here.”

“Your husband?”

She shook her head. “No. He and I, we had a brief—how do you say it?—relationship. No, no, an affair. You use the same word, yes? Five years ago. He was an American living in Paris. I was a waitress. Lili was the result.”

Jake stared at her. Not so much shocked by what she’d said, but shocked that she was saying what she was as easily as she was. And that he found it impossible to tug his gaze away from her animated face. She was a single mother who’d had her child out of wedlock. And she was foreign. Not that he had anything against foreigners. At one time or another, all Anglo-Americans had been foreigners to this land. But in his job as agent for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the word foreigner took on a whole new meaning.

Not knowing what to say in the situation, he asked, “So your daughter’s four?”

She briefly closed her eyes, her long, dark lashes casting shadows against her pale skin. She murmured several sentences in French. The thick, nasal sound wound around him in a way he wasn’t sure he liked. It made him feel…lustful. He found himself wishing he knew the language so he could understand what she’d said, though he was sure it had nothing to do with his increasingly uncomfortable state. “Yes. She will be four this Saturday…five days from today.” She stared at the tabletop, but he doubted she saw it. “I should have never given Gerald a copy of her birth certificate when she was born. I’d wanted to include him, yes? Instead, he used it to get her an American passport and take her away from me.”

She looked so helpless at that moment. Much as she had in the parking lot when he’d returned her purse. He was filled with an inexplicable, urgent need to pull her into his arms. To smooth her curly hair. Tell her everything would be all right.

On the heels of that sensation followed a physical pull that left him feeling as if he’d downed a pitcher of beer in a single sitting.

The reaction was so completely alien to him, he wasn’t sure how to respond. No one had ever stirred such a complete physical response in him. He had stopped paying attention to the countless hard-luck stories he heard on a daily basis about six years ago. Stopped counting the number of illegals he’d taken to the airport and put on the next plane out. Why Michelle Lambert’s sketchy situation should affect him so baffled him.

“Have you visited the States before?” he asked quietly.

Normally he might not have noticed the slight coloring of her skin, but he’d been staring at her so much, any variation was noticeable. He wished he knew exactly what it meant. “Yes…I visited the west coast years ago. Vacation.”

He grimaced. “So you’re going home tomorrow?”

A waitress approached their table. “Can I get you two something else? A warm-up, maybe? The elephant ears are fresh.”

Michelle waved her away. “No, thank you. I don’t wish for anything more.” She looked at him. “You’ve been far too generous already.”

“Please,” he said.

“No. No, thank you.” She gathered her purse and got up. “I really must be going now.”

Jake rose so quickly, he nearly knocked the table over. All he knew was a sudden, overwhelming urge to stop her from leaving. He curved his fingers around her arm. The heat that swept through him and pooled in his groin was instantaneous.

She gazed into his face, clearly puzzled. Then her expression changed. Her pupils widened, nearly taking over the tawny brown of her irises. The open sensuality he saw in the coloring of her cheeks, the softening of her mouth, made looking anywhere else impossible.

She slowly leaned forward, tilted her head and pressed her mouth firmly against his. Jake couldn’t have acted more surprised had someone zapped him with a live wire, but he’d be damned if he could pull away. She tasted of chocolate and coffee. Smelled of fresh air and open interest. He wasn’t sure, but he could have sworn he felt the quick flick of her tongue over his bottom lip before she pulled away.

He stood dumbfounded. Had that really happened? Had she just kissed him? His almost painful erection told him she had. And that he wanted her to do it again.

“Why…what did you do that for?” He barely recognized the low, gravelly voice as belonging to him.

She glanced quickly away, then gave a slight shrug. “Just curious.”

“About what?”

Her gaze slid to his face, and she smiled. “Curious as to whether your lips felt as good as they looked.”

She began to move away again, and he let her. Near the door, she turned toward him. “By the way, they do.”

She stepped through the door.

Jake stood for a long moment watching her, an ache the size of Virginia in the pit of his stomach.




2


HE DECIDED to blame it on all the time he had on his hands. Jake stood waiting for the elevator to reach the second floor, only belatedly thinking he should have taken the stairs. And thinking of the prospect of having time on his hands. He’d passed his most pressing cases to fellow agent Edgar Mollens. His desk was clean even of dust. The only thing that stretched before him was five days trekking through the Blue Ridge Mountains with David.

He cringed. He’d be the first to admit that spending the night in a tent wasn’t exactly his idea of a good time. In his mind, roughing it was being stuck in a hotel room without CNN. But even his reluctance to snap on his new backpack and tie his new boots wasn’t to blame for his unusual interest in a certain provocative Michelle Lambert.

Then there was her kiss.

He forced the thought from his mind even though his body immediately responded.

At any rate, it was better that his chances of seeing her again were zip to nil. She’d never answered his question, but he was certain she’d be heading to France tomorrow. The elevator doors opened, and he stepped out. What he couldn’t help wondering was when she was due to fly out.

Bypassing the administrative offices where he usually left any papers, he walked through the jam-packed waiting area in Room 200, vaguely aware of a number being called and an elderly woman likely of European descent using her cane to rise from her chair. He strode down the long hall leading to his office. His interest in Michelle should have been equivalent to his interest in the European woman. Less, even, because Michelle violated at least ten of his appearance rules.

Yet his mind kept venturing to her. The way she ran the small pad of her thumb across the rim of her cup while she spoke. Sat slightly leaning to the right, her legs crossed. Looked as if she could see inside him, appearing candidly interested in what was there.

Jake stopped outside an immigration information officer’s cubicle and waited for the officer to finish with a young man presumably of South American descent. The kid finally left holding a sheaf of papers that likely reflected the details of his life thus far.

Pauline turned toward her computer, putting her back to him. “Good thing you’re so tall, Jake, or else nobody would know you were there.”

Jake entered the office. “What do you got on a Lambert, Michelle?”

Pauline entered the name in her computer. “French. Point of entry, Dulles. Extension denied.” She swiveled slowly toward him. “Why?”

“Who handled the case?”

“Brad. You didn’t answer my question.”

“Thanks.” Jake stepped out of the cubicle and headed to one down the hall.

“Jake McCoy, one of these days I’m going to cut off your special privileges. Then where will you be?” Pauline called after him.

He grinned.

Brad Worthy was between cases. Jake repeated his request for information on Michelle. Information that either hadn’t yet been or wouldn’t be entered into the computer.

Brad leaned back in his chair and tossed his pen to the desktop. “The Frenchwoman? Quite a looker, that one, eh?”

“I hadn’t noticed.”

“Yeah. You wouldn’t.” He shuffled through the files on his desk. “Extension denied.”

“What else you got?”

Brad stared at him from under lowered brows. “What’s the interest?”

Jake suddenly felt uneasy. He had a hard time explaining that one to himself. Maybe if he knew she was heading out, leaving for France, he’d be able to get her out of his head. “Indulge me.”

“Okay.” He opened the file and scanned the contents. “Lambert, Michelle. Twenty-eight years of age. Chef. Came in on a B2 tourist visa, though it’s noted she tried to get a special travel visa. Claims her three-year-old daughter, Elizabeth aka Lili, was kidnapped by her biological father and brought to the States two months ago.”

Jake digested the information. Chef. A transient profession. If she chose to violate the terms of her visa and stay in the country, she could find a way to stay indefinitely. “Why was her request for an extension denied?”

Brad sat back again. “She lied on her initial application about her criminal past. Information we didn’t have when she came in but we since got.”

Jake frowned as he recalled her vulnerability when her purse had been stolen. “Kid stuff?”

“Not this one.” Brad shook his head. “Her visa’s up at midnight tonight. But I can already tell you she’s going to defy.”

“How do you know that?”

Brad grinned. “Because she told me so. Let’s see, how did she put it? That if I wouldn’t give her the time she needed to find her daughter, she’d take it. Yeah, that’s it. If she wasn’t such a looker, I’d have had her detained on the spot.” His grin widened. “Anyway, I’m planning to pass her file on to Edgar in the morning.”

“Edgar?” Jake repeated. What could she have possibly done to warrant high-profile attention? He and Edgar Mollens took on the high-risk cases. Suspected terrorists. Drug runners. Russian Mafia. Sweatshop owners. What could Lambert, Michelle, possibly have done to earn the same regard?

And would her file have been passed to him if he wasn’t officially on vacation?

He was about to ask for specifics on the conviction when Brad’s phone rang. “Hang on a minute.” He swiveled his chair away to speak to the caller. “Brad Worthy.” Jake inconspicuously turned Michelle’s file in his direction. The Four Pines Motel. He noted the address.

Jake’s cell phone vibrated in his jacket pocket. He slipped it out and stepped closer to the door. “McCoy.”

“How about that? There’s a McCoy here, too.”

Jake grimaced at the sound of his youngest brother’s voice. “What is it?”

David chuckled. “You know, one of these days you’re going to have to work on those phone manners, Jake. Then again, your entire demeanor could use a little work. Something I’m hoping to start on first thing in the morning.”

“Are you at the house?”

“Yep. Thought I’d hang around until you got here.”

“Listen, I can’t find my INS ID. Have you seen it around there?”

“Can’t say as I have. Boy, you must be feeling awfully naked. Anyway, I don’t think you’re going to need it where we’re going, unless there are some illegal aliens hiding out in a cave or two.”

“Right.” Jake watched Worthy hang up the phone. “I’ll call you back.”

“Jake, don’t you dare—”

Jake pressed the disconnect button and slid the phone into his pocket. Brad had closed Michelle’s file and was motioning a new applicant to enter. That was it. Just like that, Brad had drawn their conversation to a halt. No more information. To press the matter would not only put him at a disadvantage, it would make his unusual interest in the sexy Frenchwoman even more obvious than it already was.

With a reluctant wave, Jake left.

“Hey, you’re welcome, McCoy.”



MICHELLE HAD NO IDEA why her extension request had been denied. If she had, maybe she could have done something to fight it. But the best she could come up with was that stupid situation she’d gotten herself into in San Francisco so long ago. Though why that brief period in her life meant anything to the American government, she couldn’t begin to fathom.

She plucked her nylons and panties from the shower curtain rod, then stuffed them into her back pack on the double bed. She was blind to the crummy state of the room. The cigarette-burned carpet. The torn bedspread. The stained bathtub. Not because she’d been there long, but because in the course of the past six weeks she’d seen virtually identical rooms across the country. Truth be told, she’d lived in her share of such tacky places in Paris when she’d first struck out on her own. In Kansas, at least the rooms had smelled better, but North Carolina had to be the worst simply because of the bug population and the strong metallic smell of the well water.

The low-rent rooms were all she could fit into her budget. Actually, she’d have found they tested her budget if she’d sat down to think about it. The money she’d been saving to open her own place in Paris’s Left Bank couldn’t have run out faster had someone stuck a vacuum hose in her handbag and flipped the switch. And gone also was the additional money her father had wired to her two weeks ago. Of course, she hadn’t expected her search to be so long, America so very large.

The mattress sagged pitifully as she sat on the side and tugged on her shoes. At least she’d finally gotten a decent latte, thanks to tasty Jake McCoy. In fact, she was thankful to him for much. If not for his quick reaction, she’d be sitting here with even less than she was now.

She absently rubbed her palm along her bare leg. And why had he reacted the way he had? In Paris, she’d had her purse snatched no less than two times, a third thwarted because she’d been determined, the thief careless. She’d been surrounded by people both times, but no one had lifted a finger to help. But Jake…

She sighed gustily, remembering her impulsive kiss and the masculine taste of him on her lips.

She wasn’t certain which interested her more: the fact that she was thinking of someone other than Lili for the first time in so long, or that the someone on her mind was a man.

She pushed from the bed and smoothed the creases she’d made. Her mother had once told her, a year or so before she died, when Michelle was ten, that men were the one thing women could never live without. Michelle hadn’t believed her. She’d forgotten the advice when she’d met Gerald Evans at the Jardin des Tuileries one rainy morning. He’d offered her his umbrella. She’d given him her heart, then, nine months later, a daughter.

She smiled wryly. Awfully high price to pay to keep a little rain off one’s head. But she’d never looked back. Gerald had left Paris shortly after Lili was born. And Michelle and her daughter had forged a life of their own. A wildly variable life she loved. A laughter-filled life—shattered when Gerald had popped up two months ago.

She intended to get that life back.

A leisurely walk in the park with his daughter, he’d told Michelle. That’s all he wanted. He was only in town overnight. Could she please allow him a brief time alone with Lili?

She had. And had regretted the decision ever since.

She rifled through her purse, extracting a sheet of paper. After leaving Jake McCoy at the café, she’d paid a visit to the private detective’s office. Contrary to the information his secretary had given her that morning, John Bollatin had been in. And ten minutes later she’d left shaking with anger and clutching the address in her hand.

Canton, Ohio.

In a dusty corner of her mind, she remembered Gerald saying something about growing up in the Midwest. She had assumed it was Kansas. Going by the map, it should have been. And Bollatin had told her the same. But the address she held was in the northeastern corner of Ohio. An address for Gerald’s parents.

She took out the billfold holding her money from her purse. She sighed at the pitiful amount, then slid it back in. She supposed she could call her father again, plead with him to send her more. But by now Jacqueline had learned about his sending her the other money and would have convinced him that sending more would be irresponsible. After all, they had three additional children to think about. It was an argument that had worked especially well on her father throughout Michelle’s teenage years. And she had no doubt it was even more effective now, seeing as two of their children were still attending university.

No, she wouldn’t put her father in that position. She was the only one who understood how devastated he’d been after her mother’s death from breast cancer. It was as though a part, a very important part of him had died with her. Michelle took an odd sort of comfort in knowing that only she was aware of this. She didn’t want to cause him any more pain.

Besides, living with Jacqueline and her three brats was enough for any man to have to bear.

No, she would have to find her way on her own.

And it was time she started. Now.



THE CAR’S TIRES spit up the spotty gravel as Jake pulled into the motel’s parking lot. He put the gear in park, then shut off the engine. The sound of traffic zooming by on I-295 was deafening, making him wonder how anyone could sleep with all the racket. His apartment was located in Woodley Park, in the older section of D.C. Quiet, tree-lined. A bit of Norman Rockwell and old America in the middle of bustling downtown.

He stared at the closed door to Room Three. He couldn’t begin to explain to anyone what he was doing there, much less come up with a rational explanation for himself. He’d tried already. It hadn’t worked.

So what if Edgar was out of town until tomorrow, wrapping up a case in Georgia? Edgar was just as efficient as Jake was. And he had more years on the job. It didn’t matter if he got the case today, tomorrow or the next day. Edgar would find Michelle quicker than she could blink those latte-colored eyes.

He shifted uneasily on the leather seat. The feeling was foreign to him. Very little made him uncomfortable. But not knowing what deeds lurked in the shadows of Michelle Lambert’s past did.

At least that’s what he told himself.

He shifted again, recognizing the statement for the lie it was.

He was drawn to this woman. It was as simple…as complicated as that. She ignited something within him impossible to ignore and equally foolish to pursue. But pursuing it he was.

He scrubbed his face with his hands. He realized part of the reason he was intrigued by her was that her reason for being in the country had nothing to do with finding a better job than she could back home. Or because she was in search of the American dream. She wasn’t interested in any of that, as many foreign nationals were. She hadn’t applied for a green card. She’d merely wanted an extension on her visa. So she could find her daughter.

There. There it was again. That bottomless feeling in the pit of his stomach.

And the image of Michelle sitting in a rocking chair with a dark-haired child in her arms. Her thickly lashed eyes sparkling with warmth. Smiling.

He left out of that thought the possibility that he wouldn’t see her again. Despite that her beat-up Ford was parked a few yards away from him, she could have already skipped town. And knowing what she’d told Brad, he was convinced she would live up to her threat. There was a strength about her. A determination he couldn’t help but be fascinated with.

His hand automatically patted his empty jacket pocket. He sighed, then slipped his cell phone out of his other pocket. Within moments, his father answered his call.

“Yeah, Pops, David around?”

There was the sound of clinking silverware. Jake envisioned the kitchen of the house he’d grown up in, finding some comfort in the familiar. Of course, so many things had changed since Mitch’s wife, Liz, had moved in, but he chose to concentrate on those that had stayed the same.

“Hey, yourself, Jake,” Sean said with that ever-present smile that had been in his voice lately. “He is. But are you sure you want to talk to him? He’s mad as hell that you’re not here yet. Not that I can blame him.” There was a heartbeat of a pause, then his father’s voice lowered. “It’s not like you to be late for anything. Everything all right?”

“Just running a little behind.” Jake grimaced. There were some drawbacks to having a family who knew him so well. He didn’t doubt that if he were face-to-face with Sean, he wouldn’t have gotten away with such a vague statement. “Any luck finding my identification?”

“Nope. Turned the place upside down earlier. Not even a fiber. Wait. Here comes David now.”

Movement outside the car caught Jake’s attention. Michelle was coming out of her room, a backpack slung over her shoulder.

“This better be good.” David’s voice filtered over the line.

Jake pressed the disconnect button then opened the car door.



MICHELLE SLUNG her pack onto the passenger’s seat. This was it. All she had left was an address. Nothing more. And there were no guarantees that this address would be any better than the ones the detective had gotten before. She took one last look at the closed door to Room Three. But what choice did she have? She would not, could not go home without Lili.

“Going somewhere?”

Michelle turned at the sound of the familiar voice. Given how little he’d said to her earlier at the café, she didn’t know why it should be familiar. It was more her body’s reaction to the deep timbre than anything that told her Jake McCoy had followed her to her motel.

The funny thing was, she wasn’t surprised by his appearance—maybe because she couldn’t seem to get him out of her mind since bumping into him in the parking lot of the INS building.

She gripped the top of the door with her left hand. “Yes. I suppose I am.”

He came to a stop before her. His back straight. His hair impeccably neat. His suit clean and pressed. She felt the sudden inexplicable desire to muss him all up.

“You wouldn’t happen to be going to the airport now, would you?” he asked.

Her fingers tightened on the hard metal of the door. “Airport?”

“Yes. You know, for your flight home.” He patted the breast of his jacket the same way he had at the café, then grimaced, as if not finding something that was usually there.

“No. No, I’m not going to the airport.” She tucked her hair behind her ear. “What are you doing here?”

It occurred to her that he couldn’t have followed her to the motel, because she hadn’t gone directly 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, then stared at his lap. The last time he’d gotten a woody just thinking about a woman was when he was a teen. And he’d never indulged in fantasies about an overtly sexy, attainable female. While Farrah Fawcett had been his brother Marc’s angel of choice, Kate Jackson always had been his favorite. Trim, neat, ordinary. Watching her in her high collars and conservative slacks had really flicked his switch.

Why, then, was he lusting after a woman who was a puzzling combination of Sophia Loren, Audrey Hepburn and va-va-voom Raquel Welch? One that went in for plunging necklines and short, short skirts? Didn’t make any sense at all.

The wind caught Michelle’s dark curls again, jerking Jake’s mind to those bedsheets. They would be white and crisp, a contrast against all that inky black….

Tearing his gaze from the car in front of him, he pushed the button to turn off the air, then rolled the windows down.



JUST KNOWING Jake McCoy was behind her made Michelle feel erotically appealing. She’d never had a man literally pursue her before. Okay, his reasons weren’t exactly what she’d like, but she’d bet his job wasn’t the only thing on his mind.

She turned down the radio station cranking out rock and roll oldies, then gazed into her rearview mirror. She spotted Jake and his dark Caprice immediately. He never let more than two cars separate them and stayed for the most part in the left-hand lane, except to let others pass. How charitable of him. She caught herself smiling, then cleared her throat. She should be thinking of what lay ahead of her in Akron, Ohio, south of Cleveland. Instead she watched Jake. Noticing the way he held his hands on the steering wheel in the traditional three o’clock position. His correct, upright posture explained part of the reason his suit appeared barely wrinkled.

One hand on her own wheel, she reached down and plucked off her shoes, then slid them under her seat. Her speed let up a bit, and she instantly compensated. Jake did the same behind her.

The radio announcer told her it was eleven. Would Jake do as he’d said and take her into custody at midnight? He appeared to be a man of his word. Then again, if he’d thought her a real threat, he’d have stopped her from leaving D.C.

She focused more prudently on the road. It was completely dark. The only lights were her headbeams, which illuminated the monotonous, seemingly endless white lines that separated her lane from the next.

If Lili were with her right now, she’d be giddily trying to count those lines.

Michelle bit into the flesh of her bottom lip. It often seemed that everywhere she looked, everything she did, she imagined what her nearly four-year-old daughter would see or do in the same situation. Her absence was like a colossal hole, always present, forever threatening to swallow her up, bogging her down in the details.

What was Lili doing right now? Had she had her bath? Had she eaten? Did Gerald know that a certain name brand of baby care products irritated her sensitive skin? Or that he had to comb her hair just so to get out the tangles? Was she scared?

Michelle dragged in a deep breath. While she was fluent in English, Lili only knew a few basic words, and then only when used in conjunction with French. Would constantly being surrounded by the foreign tongue confuse her?

Oh, how she missed her daughter. Missed tasting her skin when she kissed her temple. Tickling her round, hard belly. Smiling at her rambunctious laugh. Missed playing hide-and-seek with her and Julianne, her frazzled stuffed pet elephant and constant companion.

She reached out and took Julianne from her backpack, running her thumb along her nubbed belly, then lifting the toy to her nose. After nearly eight weeks of sleeping with the animal, it smelled more like her than Lili. But every now and again she swore she could make out her daughter’s sweet, little-girl scent.

The sign ahead was blurry. She blinked, realizing that fog wasn’t to blame for the haziness, but tears.

Stuffing Julianne in her temporary home, Michelle pressed her foot down on the pedal, watching as Jake dropped farther and farther back. Indulging in a bit of escapist flirtation was one thing. Allowing it to derail her plans was another entirely.



OKAY, SHE WAS finally making her move.

Jake flicked off the cruise control and eased his foot onto the gas pedal. He was mildly surprised she hadn’t tried to shake him before. Then again, she might think being so far away from D.C. put them at the same disadvantage. Smart woman.

He easily caught up with her Ford, pulling parallel with her in the left lane. She flashed him a wide smile, making that peculiar weightless sensation more acute. He saluted her. But before he could put his hand back on the wheel, she slammed on the brakes then turned off the exit ramp to her right.

Letting rip a string of hardly used curses, Jake pulled to the shoulder of the road just on the other side of the on ramp, then flicked on his hazards. With his gaze glued to the rearview mirror, he slid the top button of his shirt open, leaving his tie to cover it.

Before Michelle had made her move, he’d kept a close eye on the road signs. This particular exit had no rest facilities, and the next exit was twenty-two miles down the highway. Michelle would soon realize she had no choice but to get back onto the turnpike.

At least he hoped she’d realize that.

After five long minutes with no sign of the battered Ford, he jerked the car into reverse. Traffic was sparse, and he ignored the honking of horns from what little there was. He finally backed up far enough to exit, then raced toward the tollgate. The guard remembered Michelle—probably no other cars had exited since hers—and said he thought she’d gone east. Jake paid the toll then headed in that direction as well, scouring the dark farmland surrounding him. Nothing. No lights. Nobody driving. Nothing but a long, lonely stretch of two-lane road.

He drove for exactly three miles then stopped. He’d been had. It was as simple as that. He suspected that the instant she saw him turn off, she’d doubled back and was already well down the turnpike by now.

Then again, what she could be looking for could be here somewhere.

Trusting his first instinct, he turned around. He could only hope he was right.

On the turnpike fifteen minutes later, he saw that he was.

He pulled onto the shoulder then cruised to a stop behind Michelle’s disabled Ford. The back left tire was flat. He climbed from the car and buttoned his jacket, careful of passing traffic as he made his way toward the driver’s side.

No Michelle.

He leaned inside the open window. She’d left the keys inside. He used them to unlock the trunk. Why wasn’t he surprised that there was no spare? A tractor and semitrailer roared on by, the resulting gust of air plastering his suit to his body. He stared down the road after the truck. Just then, it began to rain.



MICHELLE CLIMBED DOWN from the monster-size truck cab then slammed the door. There was a loud grinding of gears, then the trucker rolled slowly away from her, leaving her standing at the side of the road in the rain.

She shivered. It wasn’t that she was unaccustomed to male attention. But the way the trucker had come on to her made her want to scratch something—that is, if she’d had any nails left with which to scratch. In France, men—no matter how old or attractive—at least hinted at the promise of or openly boasted of an ability to satisfy a woman. This guy had been moderately handsome, but he’d made it sound as if she’d owed him one. As though even if she wouldn’t enjoy a sexual liaison with him, he didn’t care one way or another, just so long as he could cop a feel.

Completely unlike Jake, who would probably never come on to a woman unless he were sure his attention was welcome.

She turned toward the lights on the other side of the tollbooth not too far away.

At least this exit included life of some sort. The one she’d pulled off in the hopes of losing Jake had been completely dead. She spared a glance behind her, half expecting to see the dark Caprice bearing down on her. Hiking her backpack a little higher on her shoulders, she headed in the direction of the tollbooth. She hoped they could direct her to a bus station or even a nearby train station, any place where she could curl up on a chair out of the elements, then continue on in her trip toward Ohio.

She hadn’t counted on that flat tire. Then again, she hadn’t counted on much of what had happened to her during her trip. She’d known when she’d bought the car that it didn’t have a spare. It’s how she’d gotten the dealer to go down thirty dollars on the price. She’d figured she’d gotten the better part of the deal, since the spare had been as bad as the rest of the tires. But even that would have been better than what she had now, which was nothing.

Headbeams illuminated her from behind. She stepped farther onto the shoulder as she walked. The way her luck was running, someone would hit her from behind, and she’d be stuck in an American hospital for the next month or so. Or, worse yet, in a cast up to her neck on the next plane to Paris.

She stepped up to the tollbooth. A woman in her forties eyed her critically. “Pedestrians aren’t allowed on the turnpike.”

“My car, it broke down—”

The attendant leaned forward and frowned. “I can’t understand your accent, miss. Pass that by me again.”

Michelle grimaced. “Is there a bus or a train station nearby?”

The woman apparently understood her. She leaned back and crossed her arms. “Nope. The nearest bus station is about twenty-two miles east, at the last exit.”

Merde. She’d have to be careful, or the next thing she knew, she’d be arrested for loitering outside the tollbooth. “I don’t suppose there’s a cab service here?”

“Excuse me?”

Michelle shook her head. “Nothing. Thanks for your help.”



JAKE FLASHED his high beams, then passed another eighteen-wheeler. He glanced at the truck cab. Michelle could have been in any one of the dozen or so such vehicles he’d seen in the past five minutes. Or in one of the cars, which easily doubled that number.

“What are you doing, McCoy?” he muttered to himself.

He gripped then released the steering wheel. His reasons for following her in the first place were shaky at best. And now that she had lost him…well, there was very little point in continuing without more information or an official reason for doing so. And since he had neither, he’d be better off turning tail and starting on the long road for home.

What had he been thinking? Or, more accurately, which body part had he let do the thinking for him? He grimaced. He’d never done anything so irresponsible in his life. When he was younger, he’d opted out of stealing candy bars from Obernauer’s general store while Marc was busy stuffing his pockets full. Not because he was afraid he’d get caught, but because it was just plain wrong. Later, when Connor had surprised him with a stripper on his twentieth birthday, he’d handed her money rather than slip it in her G-string, and had kept his gaze carefully focused on a point just past her toned, undulating waist.

Why, of all times, he’d chosen now to let his hormones get the better of him, he didn’t know. Especially since Michelle was nowhere near the type of woman he was usually interested in.

It stood to reason that that’s exactly the reason he did find her so intriguing. But that didn’t help him any now.

He slowed down to exit the turnpike so he could head in the other direction when the muffled chirping of his cell phone caught his attention. He reached over and fished it from a box of Kleenex in his glove compartment. He didn’t recognize the number spotlighted in the display. Pulling onto the shoulder of the exit ramp, he clicked it on.

“Jake? It’s Michelle.”

He didn’t need to be told that. Just her saying his name made his pants a little tighter. He closed his eyes and exhaled silently. It was weird, this physical reaction to her call. More acute than the first time he’d given his number out and the girl had called him.

Michelle told him where she was, then paused before saying, “Can you come get me?”

He knew how very much it must have taken her to call him. He also knew he shouldn’t be feeling half the relief he was, either.

He glanced through the windshield at the tollbooth just ahead. He made out Michelle’s silhouette instantly. She was leaning against the side of the booth, the toe of one platform shoe on top of the other as she plugged her opposite ear.

“I’ll be right there,” he said, then flicked off the phone.

Within moments, he was pushing open the passenger’s door and paying the toll.

“That was quick,” the guard said, openly interested.

He didn’t answer her. He was more interested in Michelle as she climbed into the car and quietly closed the door. He pulled from the booth.

An air of defeat seemed to cling to her damp shoulders. Her sensual mouth was stoically unmoving, offering no babbling commentary on what the past half hour had held for her. She looked like a woman who had faced one too many disasters for one day and was ready to pack it in. He remembered who she was, who he was, and realized that the moment she’d called him, she’d done just that. She’d given in.

He fought a fierce urge to reach out and touch her. Pull her closer to his side.

“You about ready for that bite?” he asked instead.

She slowly turned to look at him. “Bite?” she repeated. “Oh, yes, food.”

“I don’t know about you, but I could eat a horse.”

Michelle smiled. “Gerald used to say that all the time. Used to drive me nuts. Especially in the beginning, when I didn’t know he didn’t mean it literally. But why would anyone want to even joke about eating a horse? I mean, yes, I get the whole size thing….” She let the words drift off, her gaze traveling the length of him, then back again. The color in her cheeks made her eyes seem to sparkle.

He smiled at the reemergence of her chattiness, then wondered why the mention of size had caused her to look him over so thoroughly. “Gerald, your…ex-boyfriend?” He caught himself before he said ex-husband.

“Lover,” she said, avoiding his gaze and crossing her arms. “And sorry, I don’t frequent restaurants that serve equine animals.”

“I’m afraid it’s not an invitation.”

Michelle closed her eyes, then looked at him. “Is it past midnight already?”

He nodded once.

“Then I’m suddenly very hungry. Ravenous, even. But I think I’ll leave any horse they might be serving for you.”




4


MICHELLE WELCOMED the vibrating hum of the hair dryer as she fluffed her freshly washed hair with her fingers. Her limbs felt rubbery. Her shoulders unbearably heavy. The long, hot shower had helped. So had dinner beforehand. At least what little she’d been able to make herself eat of the traditional American fare of meat loaf and mashed potatoes, the only selections available this late to her and Jake at the greasy spoon next to the motel. Even the tall, quiet INS agent who sat outside the bathroom door had appeared to lose his appetite as they sat across from each other. A pregnant silence had filled the air between them like so many unsaid, useless words. Unsaid and useless because Michelle knew that no matter what happened, Jake would be taking her to D.C. in the morning and putting her on the first flight to Paris.

She switched off the dryer and stared at the warm plastic in her hands. The steady drone of rain outside the slatted windows made it sound as though someone were taking a shower in the bathtub behind her.

She would be returning to France. Without Lili.

The thought that she might never see her daughter again caused a tightness in her chest that made it nearly impossible to breathe. What was she going to do without Lili crawling into her bed on rainy nights like this one, complaining about her inability to sleep, though she usually dropped right off once she’d curled her warm little body against Michelle’s? She supposed her life would come to resemble what the past eight weeks had held for her. Emptiness.

She caught a glimpse of her haunted eyes in the mirror, then reached out to wipe a small circle of steam from the surface.

A sound from the bedroom caught her attention. She realized Jake McCoy must have switched off the television. The tinny sound of voices was gone.

Jake McCoy.

Instantly, the tension in her chest unwound and snaked lower. She wasn’t sure what it was about this man that affected her so. It could be his awkward way around her. His solicitous grin. The way he blushed—actually blushed!—when he found out they would have to share the one room left at the motel and when she caught him looking at her breasts. Or when she curiously eyed certain parts of him. Whatever it was, the attraction she felt for him was strong enough to, if not fill the hole left by Lili’s absence, at least distract her from it a bit.

She cursed at herself in French. Six weeks in America and she was already beginning to overanalyze like an American. What was it with these people that made them question every feeling, every action, as if seeking a deeper meaning that wasn’t there? She was used to going with her feelings. If it felt good, she did it. And the prospect of making love with Jake McCoy felt very good indeed. It held all the promise of complete and total escape, at least for a few brief, precious hours—enough to get her through the night and on into the morning, when her situation might not look so dim.

It would also satisfy the flash of desire she felt whenever he was near. Give her an outlet for the emotional turmoil dogging her. Allow her a physical release she’d forbidden herself for far too long.

She caught her tiny smile in the mirror, envisioning Jake’s reaction when she made her intentions known. Would he run for the door? Or would he surprise her with an equally interested response? Either way, she viewed it as a win-win situation.

She took body lotion from her handbag and began smoothing it over her skin. Her neck. Her breasts. The balls of her feet. No, she would not by any means be mistaken for a seductress. Her black camisole was pure cotton, and her panties were plain. But she didn’t think even straight-shooting Jake McCoy could miss her message when she walked into the bedroom.

Fastening her attention on her hair, she smoothed it first this way, then that, frowning as strands sprang free like thick, unruly corkscrews. With the help of a little water and one of Lili’s rubber bands she found in her purse, she managed to pull it back in what resembled a twist, every wild strand smoothed, tucked and pinned in place.

Her fingers encircled the doorknob and she hesitated—likely the first time she’d ever hesitated in her life. Why, she couldn’t be sure. But in that one moment she knew a fear of rejection she was unfamiliar with.

Aside from their kiss at the D.C. café, there was no solid proof Jake was attracted to her. Yes, his gaze ignited the most delicious of desires within her. But her reaction could be based on nothing more than her need to escape the gravity of her situation.

She released a gusty sigh. There she went again. Analyzing everything too much.

She turned the knob then pulled the door open, standing in the passageway with only one thought in mind….



JAKE TURNED his cell phone over in his palm again and again. He really should call David, or someone at D.C. headquarters. But he couldn’t seem to make himself do anything more than listen to the sounds on the other side of the closed bathroom door.

He’d never been in such close quarters with a woman before. Well, yes, he’d been with a few women, and took some amount of pride in the fact that they numbered more than the fingers of one hand, but he’d never listened to one take a shower before. The images that slipped through his mind were just this side of pornographic and long past carnal. He could practically see the warm water sluicing over Michelle’s compact little body. Dampening her hair. Rolling over those soft, soft lips, tempting her tongue out to catch a drop or two. Splashing over her pointed breasts, causing them to swell and the tips to harden. He turned the phone over faster and faster as he inserted an image of himself standing in that shower with her. Bending down to claim her hot, wet mouth—

The bathroom door opened. Jake lunged for his cell phone, which had jumped from his hand.

Dear God, help me.

His gaze slid over her well-shaped frame. From the high-cut panties that gave her legs the appearance of being extremely long. To the camisole that clung to her torso and her breasts in a way his fingers itched to, to the way her hair was slicked back from her face, emphasizing the width and depth of her dark eyes, the fullness of her mouth, the long curve of her neck.

She couldn’t have provoked a more complete physical reaction from him had she walked out in nothing at all.

He forced himself to stare at the phone in his hands. “I put your pie on the nightstand next to the bed,” he forced himself to say.

She didn’t move.

He didn’t, either.

“Thank you.”

He shrugged off her thanks and reached for the remote control. But the blasted thing refused to work. After a couple of moments spent futilely punching at the buttons, he tossed it onto the round, scarred table.

“I thought you could sleep in the bed closer to the bathroom,” he said.

“So you could be closer to the door.”

He looked up to catch her smile and felt the irresistible desire to smile back. “Yes.”

She slowly crossed the room to the bed in question and began folding back the hideous bedspread. “I had another thought in mind.”

Stick to her face, McCoy. Stick to her face.

She propped up the pillows on both sides of the bed. “I thought we might share one bed.”

Jake nearly crushed his cell phone altogether.

She sat down and pulled her knees close to her chest. Far from the femme fatale her words implied, she acted as though she’d just suggested they engage in a long chat about the change in the weather. “Our being so…close would allow you to keep even a better eye on me.”

Jake cleared his throat. “Um, yes, that it would.”

“You object?”

He shook his head, then nodded. With a strangled sigh, he slipped his phone into his jacket pocket then pulled the jacket closed. “I find you very…attractive, Michelle. There’s no denying that. But it would be…” Unprofessional? Crazy? Decadent? “It would be, um, imprudent for me to entertain ideas of you and I…well, making love.”

He realized he hadn’t even considered that this might be some sort of ploy on Michelle’s behalf to gain her freedom. In his usually highly suspicious mind, he was notably unwary of her motives. Perhaps it was because of the way she looked at him, as though she was as interested in exploring the sparks that flew between them as he was. Or maybe it was the casual, unaffected way she invited him into bed with her. Either way, he knew, just knew on a deeper level he was hesitant to explore, that her desire to sleep with him was a result of just that—desire.

“Imprudent?” she questioned, the word rolling like melted sugar off her foreign tongue.

“Wrong,” he said.

“Oh.” She wriggled her toes until they were tucked under the white sheets. Her skin was as pale as the crisp linen, and appeared softer. “Because of your…job.”

“Yes, of course, because of my job.” Suddenly agitated, Jake stood. What he wouldn’t give for a little of her chattiness right about now.

“I see.”

“Good.” He stepped to the curtains and pulled them back to stare outside. Rain came down in drenching sheets, making the night dark and intimate.

He watched her reflection in the glass as she got up and went into the bathroom again, then came out with her monster-size purse. Within moments, she was on the bed, propping something up on the nightstand next to the generous helping of cherry pie from the all-night diner next door. He slowly turned, finding her running a fingertip along the surface of a picture. Then she sat against the pillows and closed her eyes.

“Your daughter?”

She blinked and looked at him. “Yes.”

He sat on the other bed and folded his hands tightly between his knees. The little girl looked nothing like he’d imagined she might. Rather than the dark hair and eyes he’d given her, she had straight blond hair that shone nearly white, and large green eyes.

Nearly four years old and she’d gone without seeing her mother for eight weeks. Jake ran his hand over his face then rubbed the back of his neck. He’d been seven years old when his mother had died. And the days afterward, recovering from the shock, had seemed like months. Years.

Michelle propped her chin onto her bended knees and gazed at him. “Explain to me why your job makes it—what is the word that you used?”

“Imprudent.”

She pressed her mouth against her skin. “Yes. Imprudent. Imprudent for us to have sex.”

Jake shifted on the mattress, which reminded him that he was sitting on a bed. And that Michelle was sitting on another bed not a foot and a half away. He focused on his white-knuckled hands. “I could lose my job.”

“If anyone found out.”

“I’d know.”

“Oh.”

“Anyway, it’s not in my, um, nature to sleep with someone I just met twelve hours ago.”

“Eighteen.”

“Huh?”

“We met eighteen hours ago. Remember? When we bumped into each other in the parking lot.”

“Oh. Yeah. Eighteen hours ago, then.”

She rubbed her cheek against her knee. “Why?”

He grimaced. “Why what?”

“Why is it not in your nature to have sex with someone you just met eighteen hours ago?”

He didn’t miss her word usage. He’d described the possibility of their coming together as sleeping together. She’d called it having sex. He cleared his throat. And that’s exactly what they would be doing, wasn’t it? Having sex? They didn’t know each other well enough for the word love to enter into the equation. He thought back, trying to remember if he’d ever done it. Had just plain sex. All six of the women he’d been with intimately had been longtime girlfriends, and he’d cared for them to varying degrees. But had he loved them? At the time, he supposed he had, which meant he’d made love to them, not had sex with them.

He gazed at Michelle. With all that wild hair pulled into that neat little twist, she looked different. More presentable. More like the type of woman he would be attracted to. Then why did he have the irrepressible urge to take it down? Watch it cascade down her back in silky, curly strands?

“Do you do that often?”

Her soft, feathery brows drew slightly together. “What? Have sex?”

He averted his gaze.

“Not nearly often enough.”

He didn’t respond. Couldn’t respond.

“I haven’t been with a man…well, since before Lili was born.”

Over four years.

Jake didn’t know why that should make him feel better. The woman had just suggested they climb between the sheets and have at it, and she didn’t know him any better than the man in the moon. But he did feel better.

His want of her also shot up a hefty notch.

Michelle’s lusty sigh pulled his gaze to her face as she leaned against the pillows and stretched her legs out in front of her. “I thought it couldn’t be true. The rumor that Americans are sexually uptight. I guess it’s the truth.”

The word sexually came out sounding like a highly provocative suggestion. Jake fought the desire to stare at her mouth, though she had likely just insulted him. “I don’t know that we’re sexually uptight. We’re just cautious, that’s all. These are dangerous times we live in.”

She shrugged, the movement making her small breasts jiggle under the cotton of her camisole. “That’s what condoms are for.”

“There’s more than that to be cautious about.”

“What? What is there that could possibly be important enough to keep a man and a woman apart when it’s apparent they want each other?”

He was unable to tug his gaze away from her openly poignant one. She looked so unimaginably sexy, her eyes alight with fire, her mouth lushly challenging. “Fatal Attraction?”

Her burst of laughter was nearly his undoing. “You’re talking about that movie, yes? The one where Michael Douglas’s lady friend boiled his daughter’s pet rabbit?”

He grinned. “Yes.”

“Do you have a rabbit?”

“No.”

“Then I can’t very well boil it, now, can I?” She rubbed her toes against the arch of her other foot, her expression shifting. “Anyway, I’m returning to France tomorrow. There’s no risk there, is there?”

He stared at his hands again. “I guess not.”





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