Книга - One Night In Texas

One Night In Texas
Jane Sullivan


All covert operative Derek Stone wanted was to get in and get out. The job was simple. Unfortunately, getting caught by Alyssa Ballard wasn't part of the plan. Six months ago they'd had a week of wild, wonderful sex. Then he'd left without a trace.Derek's undercover work allows him to get close to no one– though he can't help wanting another under-the-covers experience with sexy Alyssa. His mission in Dallas wraps up in twenty-four hours, and he wants to make them count. While he knows he should walk away again, Derek wants Alyssa…and one more night in Texas.









“Don’t you know what you do to me?”


“What?” Derek whispered. “Tell me.”

Alyssa’s throat was too tight to release the words.

Still staring at her intently, Derek encircled her wrist with his fingers, pressing his thumb to her pulse point. “Never mind,” he murmured. “I can feel it.”

He was right. Her heart was racing like mad. And she wanted him, no matter how wrong it was.

“I’m such a fool,” she said.

“Why?”

“I believed everything you told me before, and here I am believing you all over again.” From the first moment Derek had caught her eye, she’d had the feeling he could read her every thought.

“I haven’t lied to you. Not this time,” he murmured, edging closer to her.

“No lies, maybe. Just a few gaping omissions.”

“You can believe this,” he said, slipping his arm around her waist. “Not a day has gone by in the last six months that I haven’t wanted you.”

With that, he dragged her to him and kissed her.


Dear Reader,

What if you had a scorching one-week affair with a sexy, mysterious man, only to have him disappear without a trace? What if you found out every word he’d told you during that week was a lie, including his real name? What if fate brought you face-to-face with him again six months later in a luxury high-rise apartment penthouse, and he appeared to be robbing the place?

In One Night in Texas, this is the situation Alyssa Ballard finds herself in. But during the next twenty-four hours she discovers the secret behind the man she was once so infatuated with, and suddenly she’s falling for him all over again.

I love to create stories where my characters end up together through unusual circumstances neither one of them could have anticipated. I hope you enjoy One Night in Texas, and that it holds a few surprises for you, too.

Visit my Web site at www.janesullivan.com, or write to me at jane@janesullivan.com. I’d love to hear from you!

Best wishes,

Jane Sullivan




Books by Jane Sullivan


HARLEQUIN TEMPTATION

854—ONE HOT TEXAN

898—RISKY BUSINESS

960—TALL, DARK AND TEXAN

1002—WHEN HE WAS BAD…

HARLEQUIN DUETS

33—STRAY HEARTS

48—THE MATCHMAKER’S MISTAKE


One Night in Texas

Jane Sullivan






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


This book is dedicated to the people who have read my Harlequin Temptation novels over the years, with special thanks to those of you who have written to me with such kind words or shared my books with other readers. I hope you enjoy this one!




Contents


Chapter 1 (#u4ce127af-d4d3-5e09-92b6-44e2aeb341fe)

Chapter 2 (#ua5a19c4a-d851-5cc2-9bea-3dfd63fc05ae)

Chapter 3 (#u015bcec2-464d-52aa-8759-adc8f63ab9ae)

Chapter 4 (#ub8ceb1a7-017c-5fea-8e4d-d7d5408fcb2e)

Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)




1


HE SAT ALONE at the bar, a darkly handsome man surrounded by an aura of mystery that made the very air around him quiver with tension. Underdressed for the trendy Seattle hotel club, he wore a pair of jeans and a fitted black T-shirt, but after one look at those eyes, not a soul would have suggested he adhere to a dress code.

At least fifteen minutes had passed since the drink in front of him had touched his lips. He paid no attention to the lively atmosphere in the club. Ignored the bartender when he spoke to him. Barely moved a muscle.

He only had eyes for her.

Sitting at a nearby table, she felt the power of his presence like a knockout punch. No matter how many times she looked away, when she glanced back, his gaze was still fixed on her, his eyes like daggers that could rip right through the fabric of her dress and leave her completely naked.

The game continued between them for several more minutes. At his unrelenting attention, her cheeks flushed and her skin grew taut and prickly.

He wanted her. She knew it. They’d never exchanged a word, yet still she knew it.

Then, inexplicably, he turned away. Rising from the bar, he tossed down a bill and then headed for the door of the club.

Disappointment surged through her. She told herself it was for the best, that she had no business messing with a man who exuded danger, but the sexual tension he radiated still made fantasies spring to her mind.

But as he neared the door, he slowed down. Stopped. Turning around, he met her eyes again.

And waited.

But even as he issued the invitation, his eyes flashed a warning. He was telling her that if she gave in to temptation, she did so at her own risk.

Some unfathomable force drove her to stand. Saying nothing to her friends, she sidestepped the table and walked toward the doorway, as if an invisible thread were drawing her to him.

Even if she was having second thoughts, he didn’t give her the chance to reconsider. Without a word, he took her by the hand and headed for the elevators, forcing her to keep up with his long, purposeful strides. He led her straight into an open elevator, and as the doors closed, the tension between them reached a crescendo. He backed her against the wall and kissed her, bringing those fantasies to life in ways she never could have imagined. And by the time they reached his room—

“Hey, lady! Watch where you’re going!”

A hand clamped down on Alyssa’s arm and pulled her backward at the same time a car horn blared. She whipped around to find that the hand on her arm belonged to an older man who had just pulled her out of the path of an oncoming car.

She stared at him dumbly, then glanced at the traffic whizzing by. Good Lord. What was the matter with her?

She blinked, bringing herself back to reality. “Thank you,” she told the man. “I—I don’t know what I was thinking.”

He gave her a smile. “You must have been daydreaming.”

“Yes,” she said. “I guess I was.”

“Better be more careful next time,” he said as he continued down the street.

Alyssa stood there for a moment, collecting her wits and chastising herself for walking around in traffic like some kind of loony romantic with her head in the clouds. She’d spent a lot of time in the past six months thinking about what had happened in Seattle, but this was the first time that preoccupation had nearly gotten her killed. In every other aspect of her life, she had her head on straight. So why was it that the memory of that man could still make her behave like an idiot?

Oh, hell. She knew why. Because the week she’d spent with him had been the most incredible experience of her life and no man since had measured up. Not one of them had even come close.

Particularly the man she’d met today.

She’d left the restaurant a few minutes ago, thankful she’d agreed to meet him for an early lunch and not dinner. Of course, for the right man, she could have stretched her hour-long lunch into two, but this guy hadn’t even been worth a coffee break.

Not that he was unattractive. He was tall and blond with surfer-boy good looks—every woman in the place had noticed him. Unfortunately he’d turned out to be the most smug, self-centered, self-important man she’d ever met.

The light turned red and the Walk sign came on. Alyssa had just stepped off the curb when she heard a voice behind her.

“Alyssa! Wait!”

She turned to see her sister, Kim, hurrying down the sidewalk toward her, moving clumsily in her too-tall heels, the breeze swirling her hair into a copper cloud around her head. She stopped in front of Alyssa, breathing hard.

Alyssa looked at her incredulously. “Kim? What are you doing here?”

“I was sitting in the coffeehouse across the street from the restaurant, waiting for you to come out. But you left so quickly I had a hard time catching up.” She wiped a strand of windblown hair from her face and flashed Alyssa a big grin. “So? How was your date with Tom?”

Oh, Lord. That goofy smile again. Ever since Kim had gotten engaged, she’d become The Stepford Sister, with a mission to make Alyssa as ecstatically happy as she was. Unfortunately that meant setting her up with anyone she could find who was male and had a pulse. Since Alyssa had been transferred from Seattle several months ago, Kim had talked her into four blind dates, and every one of them had been a disaster. And this guy—a neighbor of Kim’s fiancé—had been the worst one yet.

“How was it?” Alyssa said. “Well, let’s see…have you ever listened to somebody talk about himself?”

“Sure.”

“For an entire hour?”

Kim’s buoyant smile sank into a frown. “Oh, come on. He couldn’t have been that bad.”

“Do you know what he does for a living?”

“Yeah. He sells luxury cars. Jeff says he makes a lot of money.”

“Oh, yeah. He told me he made big bucks last year, but—hush, hush—what the IRS doesn’t know won’t hurt them.”

Kim winced. “Well, if he sells cars, he probably drives a nice one, right?”

“Sure he does. It’s very expensive and classy and prestigious, you know, and he told me if I’m very, very lucky, he might take me for a ride in it someday. Wouldn’t that be fun?”

Kim’s expression grew progressively more pained. She shrugged weakly. “Okay. But at least it sounds as if he likes to talk. Beats the silent type.”

“Only if we’d had an actual conversation. It was more like pontification. I got to hear about The World According to Tom. Religion, politics, sex, the stock market—I heard it all. I’d be willing to bet he couldn’t even tell you my name.”

“Come on, Alyssa. There must have been something good about him.”

“Kim,” she said sharply, “the man could barely eat because he was so busy patting himself on the back!”

Kim held up her palm. “Okay. I get the picture. I just thought you two might get along, you know? After all, you went to the same university.”

“So did ten thousand other people.”

“So you have nothing in common?”

“Yes. We do. We both have opposable thumbs and walk upright. But I’m looking for a little more compatibility than being part of the same species.”

“But opposites attract. Everyone knows that.”

“No, they don’t. That’s a myth perpetuated by people who screwed up and married somebody totally wrong for them and now they’re looking for a way to explain the dumb choice they made.”

“Okay, so this one didn’t work out. But there’s still that other guy Jeff works with. The one who—”

Alyssa held up her hand. “No. No more blind dates. Just let me make my own choices from now on, okay?”

“So the men you pick will be better?”

“Yes!”

“Like Mr. Wonderful in Seattle? The man who had an affair with you for a week, lied to you about who he was, then disappeared without a trace?”

Alyssa cringed. Whenever she thought about that time in Seattle, she tried very hard to edit out the way it had ended. The week they’d spent together had been incredible, and not just because of the sex. He said he’d never been to Seattle before, so she’d shown him the sights, taking him to museums and parks and restaurants and enjoying his company more with every moment that had passed. She’d shared more intimate details about her life with him than with any man she’d ever known. She’d told him about her family, her job, her volunteer work, and he’d listened with rapt attention, as if she were the most fascinating woman he’d ever met. She knew she couldn’t have been. Not even close. She didn’t consider herself to be an unattractive woman, but fascinating she wasn’t.

Still, in spite of her rational, reasonable nature that told her how crazy it was, she’d begun to imagine what forever with him might be like. Then she’d awoken one morning to find him gone, with only a cursory note left behind. It’s been fun, but I have to go. Derek.

She’d told herself to let it drop, to forget him, to pretend the week had never happened, because it clearly hadn’t meant as much to him as it had to her. But she couldn’t stop herself from trying to find him. And that was when she’d made the most painful discovery of all: every word out of his mouth had been a lie.

Derek Stafford didn’t exist. Not in Kansas City, anyway. He’d never worked for Primus Engineering, because it didn’t exist, either. He hadn’t attended the University of Kansas and Oak Park High School had never heard of him. And slowly she’d realized that while she’d told him everything about herself, he’d offered her almost nothing in return aside from a few basic facts, all of which had turned out to be lies.

She’d felt like a fool. How could she have fallen so hard for a man who hadn’t cared about her in the least? Of course, she was acting like an even bigger fool now for wasting time thinking about him at all.

Kim was right. Anything beat a man who was there one day, gone the next, with no goodbye, not even a halfhearted attempt at the old “It’s not you, it’s me” excuse. Just a note on his pillow and a trail of lies to remember him by.

“He was probably married, you know,” Kim said.

“I know.”

“Or just a world-class jerk.”

“I know.”

“Or both.”

Alyssa sighed. “I know.”

“You need to stay away from guys like him. Go for ones who’ll offer you some kind of future.”

“Who are also self-important snobs?”

“Okay, then, tell me. If Tom was a dud, what are you looking for in a man?”

She didn’t know, exactly. It was so hard to describe the man she saw in her head sometimes that it would sound stupid to say it out loud. She wanted a man who was interesting. A man who was exciting, who knew how to excite her.

Her mystery man in Seattle.

He lied to you and left you, and you’re still obsessing? What’s the matter with you?

Kim sighed. “Look. All I’m trying to say is that you may be looking for something that’s just not reality. If you’re still waiting for that dashing man to ride up on his white horse and sweep you off your feet, you’re going to be alone for the rest of your life.”

Intellectually, Alyssa knew her sister was right. Still, something inside her said it was better to be alone than with a man who demanded everything and gave nothing.

“After all,” Kim went on, “you’re pushing thirty. You need to be thinking about settling down.”

“I’ve got a good job. I don’t need a man to take care of me.”

“You’ve got a job that requires you to work twelve hours a day and pays you for eight. Lawrence Teague is a gazillionaire, but does he pay you what you’re worth? If you didn’t get an apartment out of the deal, it’d be slave wages.”

“I make enough. And I like my job.”

“Right. Running in circles for a bunch of rich people. Sounds like a real blast to me.”

Kim just didn’t get it. Yes, the people who lived at the Waterford were wealthy. After all, it was arguably the most prestigious apartment building in the city of Dallas, one of seven identical buildings owned by Starlight Properties in major metro areas across the country. It climbed twenty-three stories into the North Dallas skyline, offering housekeeping services, a state-of-the-art security system, an on-site spa and hair salon, as well as a health club. As Tenant Relations Manager, it was a challenging task for Alyssa to keep everyone in the building happy and life running smoothly, but she thrived on it.

“Speaking of Mr. Teague,” Alyssa said, “he’s flying from Houston to Dallas early tomorrow morning. I’m picking him up at the airport.”

“Good. That’d be a great time to ask him for a raise.”

Alyssa ignored her sister’s remark, thinking instead about her most important task whenever Mr. Teague came to town: making sure he got star treatment. That meant picking him up in a limousine, putting fresh flowers in his suite, having his clothes cleaned and pressed if necessary, making reservations wherever he chose to dine. He might own the building, but she was the hostess there to welcome him to his home away from home.

Alyssa’s cell phone rang and she pulled it out and put it to her ear. As soon as she heard the panicked voice speaking broken English interspersed with Spanish expletives, she knew her problem-solving abilities were about to be put to the test.

After determining the gist of the problem, Alyssa hung up and turned to Kim. “One of the housekeepers accidentally broke a vase in the penthouse apartment.”

“Oops. Better hope it’s something cheap.”

“Up there, nothing’s cheap.” Alyssa shoved the cell phone back into her purse. “Gotta go.”

“I’m sorry your date sucked,” Kim said. “I’ll try to do better next time.”

“Kim? Didn’t I tell you there isn’t going to be a next time?”

Kim just flashed one of her “that’s what you think” smiles. Alyssa wanted to scream with frustration. But instead of fighting it, she merely said goodbye and double-timed it up the street to the Waterford. Right now the problem in Gerald Owens’s penthouse was more pressing than her problem with her sister’s matchmaking.

Okay. A broken vase. That was only a minor crisis, one she could deal with long before Mr. Teague arrived tomorrow morning. By the time he got here, he’d see nothing but a smoothly operated building and four hundred happy tenants.

AS DEREK STONE strode through the parking garage of the Waterford, he felt that familiar rush of adrenaline that pulled every nerve taut and heightened all his senses. Even though the intelligence he’d received about this situation was reliable and the job had been scripted right down to the last footstep, that trace of uncertainty kept his head up and his body on full alert.

He passed one late-model luxury vehicle after another, testimonies to the wealth of the people who lived in this building. If Gerald Owens occupied the penthouse, his business of gathering blackmail information on U.S. government officials had to be pretty lucrative. Maybe even as lucrative as Derek’s business, which today just happened to involve retrieving blackmail information before it could cause a government incident.

Derek adjusted his earpiece to make sure the communication was loud and clear between him and the surveillance van parked across the street, and then he pulled his backpack more securely over his shoulder. When he reached the door that led to the private elevator lobby, he glanced over his shoulder and saw no one else in the vicinity.

“I’m at the door,” he said softly.

Through his earpiece, Derek heard the soft clacking of Kevin’s fingers on his computer keyboard. A moment later the door lock clicked open. Derek entered the lobby and headed for the private elevator that led directly to the penthouse suite.

“I’m in,” he said.

Derek listened to a few more seconds of Kevin’s keyboard clacking and then the lock clicked behind him.

Perfect.

Derek loved tightly integrated high-tech security systems like this one, because it made his job so much easier. Once they were breached, all it took was a few keystrokes to open doors all over the place. Not that the average hacker could penetrate a sophisticated system like the one at the Waterford, but the men on Derek’s team left average in the dust.

“Okay,” Derek said. “I’m at the elevator.”

“I’ve bypassed the circuit that reads the key card,” Kevin said in his ear. “Just punch in the code. It’s sixty-eight, fifty-four. That’s six, eight, five, four.”

Derek entered the numbers and the elevator doors opened.

“You’re a genius, Kevin.”

“Uh-huh. Can we talk about that raise now?”

“Don’t get cocky.”

As the elevator ascended, Kevin said, “The doors will open into the apartment itself. You can head to the safe right away.”

Two days ago, Derek’s contact in Washington had approached him about Congressman Galloway’s problem. In spite of the tight time frame and the possibility of a dozen things going wrong, Derek took the job. His team, as always, had risen to the challenge. They’d begun analyzing the intelligence, planning a breach of the building’s security system, and surveilling Gerald Owens.

Fortunately for Owens, Derek’s contact in Washington didn’t want him arrested or charged. He merely wanted the blackmail material Owens had gathered on Congressman Galloway to be retrieved and destroyed. Owens was only the hired help, anyway. Derek’s contact didn’t know who had ordered the man to gather the blackmail material, and he didn’t care. Making arrests in this case would only bring out into the open what needed to stay firmly under the rug—namely, that Galloway had a fondness for dressing in women’s clothing. If Derek didn’t retrieve the DVD that showed the congressman’s fetish in action, one of two things was going to happen on Monday morning. Either Galloway would vote against the trade bill coming to the House floor, a bill that would greatly restrict the import of certain Chinese goods to America, or Galloway would release the DVD to the press, revealing that Galloway was one of those men who knew Victoria’s secret. Once his redneck, gun-toting constituency from east Texas got wind of that, Galloway’s chances of reelection were nil.

As the elevator neared the top floor of the building, Derek pulled a ski mask from his pocket and put it on. If something went wrong inside the apartment, the last thing he wanted was for somebody to give his description to the police, which could lead to an artist’s rendering of his face being splashed all over the evening news. His team worked independently from contract to contract, sanctioned by the federal government but with no traceable ties to it. Translation: if something goes wrong, you’re on your own.

Derek mentally reviewed the floor plan of the apartment. A study of the architectural drawings of the building had told him where the safe was and the most direct route to it. He couldn’t say for sure that the blackmail material would be there—nothing was one-hundred-percent certain—but the intelligence reports had all pointed to this man, this building and this safe. A pair of Derek’s men were tailing Owens right now, ensuring that he stayed on the golf course long enough for Derek to break in. The housekeeping staff maintained a rigid schedule, which meant that the maid had already come and gone, and with Kevin in the van opening doors and keeping watch, this job was going to go off without a hitch.

And, most importantly, his team’s perfect record would stay intact.




2


AS ALYSSA TOSSED the last piece of broken vase into a trash bag, she reluctantly upgraded the crisis from minor to major. The magnitude of the mess and the size of the empty pedestal beside it told her that the vase had been at least four feet tall. And judging from the quality of the rest of the art in Owens’s apartment, it had undoubtedly been worth thousands of dollars.

The moment she’d arrived back at the building, she’d taken the lobby elevator to the penthouse floor to find the housekeeper in tears in the master bedroom. The woman told Alyssa that she usually cleaned the penthouse in the morning, but she’d had a doctor’s appointment, which meant she’d been late getting to work. Then, because she was running behind, she’d been in a hurry when she was sweeping the hardwood floor and accidentally bumped the pedestal, sending the vase crashing to the floor.

Alyssa assured the poor woman that of course it had been an accident and of course they had insurance to cover such things, but the housekeeper had been so freaked out that Alyssa had sent her to work on another floor. Then she’d taken off her jacket, tossed it onto the bed and cleaned up the mess herself.

In her mind she was already formulating a plan. She’d phone Owens’s decorator for the name of the gallery that had sold him the piece to see if they had a similar one. With luck, she could have it in place before Owens returned from his golf game—a weekly appointment he kept without fail—and discovered the empty pedestal. A similar piece of art couldn’t replace the one-of-a-kind vase that had been broken, but at least it would let Owens know that she’d made an effort to rectify the mistake in the most expedient and effective way possible. Since he’d only lived in the building a short time, she was especially motivated to solve the problem to his complete satisfaction.

Then, as she was twist-tying the trash bag, she heard a soft whirring noise. The rear elevator?

She froze. It couldn’t be. Mr. Owens wasn’t due back for two hours. The man never cut short his golf game. Never.

Sensing that something wasn’t right, Alyssa stood motionless, the strangest chill skating across the back of her neck. She peeked out of the bedroom into the living room. A man came into view and her heart jolted hard. It wasn’t Gerald Owens.

It was a man in a ski mask.

Suppressing a gasp, Alyssa backed away. A burglar? How had he bypassed the security system?

Her jacket was lying on the bed across the room, her phone in the pocket. All she had to do was dial 9-1-1. She started in that direction, only to hear footsteps and realize he was coming toward the bedroom.

With no time to grab her phone, she shifted her gaze wildly around the room, looking for a place to hide. She hurried to the closet and slipped inside, closing the door silently behind her. The closet light was on. But just as she reached up to turn it off, she heard his footsteps and pulled her hand away from the switch. If he saw the light go off, he’d know someone was in the closet.

With every step he took, her heart rate escalated. She clasped her hands together to stop them from trembling, sure he could hear the slightest move she made.

Then she heard nothing. She felt a shot of relief, only to realize that the absence of footsteps indicated that he’d reached the bedroom rug.

Which meant he was right outside the closet door.

DEREK KNELT on the rug in the master bedroom, flipping the corner back to reveal the floor safe. Again, the state-of-the-art technology offered in this building was working against Owens. With the software Derek had access to, the electronic keypad lock was a whole lot easier to crack than a combination lock.

Derek took off his jacket and stuffed it into his backpack, then pulled out his small laptop computer and flipped it on. Using a wireless connection, in a matter of seconds he set up an interface with the lock at its programming port. He hit a few keys, then sat back to wait as the computer ran the possible combination sequences.

“It’s only a five-digit combination,” he said to Kevin. “We’ll be out of here in no time.”

“Good. That means I might be able to go fishing this afternoon after all. I hear they’re really biting up at Lake Dallas.”

Unlike Kevin, Derek was glad this job had come up at the last minute. If it hadn’t, he’d have been at a wedding rehearsal right now, of all things. Talk about dodging a bullet. What would have been the point of him being there, anyway? How tough could it be to stand up with Gus at the front of that church and hand him the ring at the right time?

Derek didn’t like weddings. They seemed like a whole lot of time and expense to accomplish something that had the same end result as going to a justice of the peace, assuming a man were crazy enough to get tied down in the first place. Unfortunately once Gus had met Sally, Derek hadn’t stood a chance of keeping him. Gus had quit the team a year ago, started a security business and then asked Sally to marry him.

Derek couldn’t imagine that kind of life. He thrived on the excitement of crisscrossing the country to solve problems that had to stay under the radar of standard law enforcement. He loved the autonomy he had to get the job done any way he saw fit. He had so many aliases for his undercover operations that sometimes he had a hard time remembering his real name. Because of his profession, he’d never even considered tying himself down to a lengthy relationship, much less a marriage. Likewise, was it really fair to expect a woman to tolerate his here-today-gone-tomorrow lifestyle?

Suddenly the words flashed on the screen: combination found.

“I’m in,” Derek told Kevin. “How’s it looking downstairs?”

“Coast is clear.”

Derek returned his laptop to the backpack, punched in the code on the keypad, then opened the safe door. He pulled a penlight from his pocket and flicked it on. A sweep of the interior of the safe revealed a small stack of folders. His intelligence said that Owens had yet to deliver the DVD of Galloway to his client, and when Derek opened the top folder, he saw just how dead-on that information was. In the left-hand pocket of the folder, he found a DVD that was labeled clearly with Galloway’s name. Owens was a meticulous record-keeper. Derek smiled to himself. Anally retentive criminals made his job so much easier.

“Got it,” he told Kevin.

He was about to close the folder and tack it into his backpack when his attention turned to the right pocket of the folder, which contained photos, lists and other information about the blackmail operation. As Derek flipped through the pages, he came to a stunning realization.

He might have solved one problem, but he’d just found five more.

“Holy crap,” he said.

“What?” Kevin said.

“It looks as if Galloway isn’t the only congressman Owens is blackmailing.”

There were photos of several more congressmen, as well as detailed plans for blackmailing each of them. One other congressman shared Galloway’s predisposition toward women’s clothing. Two had been caught cheating on their wives. Two more were victims of setups that only made it look as if they’d been cheating. But real or staged, it didn’t matter. Either one could send a man’s reputation right down the toilet.

“How many are we talking?” Kevin asked.

“Five others besides Galloway.”

“Why didn’t we know about them?”

“Apparently, Galloway is the only one who came forward and asked for help.” Derek flipped through a few more pages and saw a schedule of delivery dates. “Right now it looks as if Galloway was the last guy Owens collected information on, and it’s the only DVD he hasn’t yet sent to his client.”

Derek wasn’t sure what to do with the file. If Galloway was the only one being blackmailed, he’d take it, along with every other file in the safe. But now that it was clear that other congressmen were involved, he didn’t want Owens to know that somebody had broken in. Owens would alert his client in a heartbeat, which meant they wouldn’t stand a chance of locating the rest of the blackmail material that had already been delivered.

“Call Washington,” Derek told Kevin. “Get in touch with Sedgewick. Tell him the situation. We need some new marching orders.”

Derek waited impatiently as Kevin made the call, anxious to get the hell out of this apartment before something else went wrong. Only two minutes passed before he heard Kevin’s voice again, but it felt like a hundred.

“What’s the word?” Derek asked.

“We need to grab Owens and get him to Washington for interrogation. They need to find out who his client is so they can have a shot at locating the blackmail material before Monday morning. And bring everything else in the safe, too. They want to know what else this guy is up to.”

“Okay,” Derek said. “Get on the phone to Wilson and McManus and tell them to pick up Owens and deliver him to the Learjet at Love Field.”

“Gotcha.”

Derek was confident that that part of the plan would come together. His men were as proficient at kidnapping as they were at surveillance.

“Then call Lambert and tell him I need him to fly the plane,” Derek said. “Have him meet us at the airfield ASAP.”

“Will do.”

“I’m coming down now.”

Derek grabbed all the folders from the safe and stuck them into his backpack. After closing the safe, he flipped the rug back into place. Then he stopped short.

Had he just seen a shadow move beneath the closet door?

He froze, barely breathing, his gaze fixed on the shadow. Several seconds passed. It moved again.

Someone was in the closet. And whoever it was had undoubtedly heard every word he’d spoken.

ALYSSA SHIFTED nervously from one foot to the other, thinking that an hour had to have passed while she’d been in this closet. And the longer she stood there, the more she realized something was very strange about this situation. Just the fact that the burglar had gotten past the security system to enter the apartment through the back elevator astonished her. Equally amazing was the speed with which he’d broken into the safe. Pretty soon it became clear to her that his running monologue was actually one side of a conversation he was carrying on electronically with someone who was downstairs keeping watch.

And he was saying the strangest things. Blackmailed congressmen? DVDs? Learjets? What was all that about?

Right now, though, she really didn’t care. She just wanted him to grab what he’d come for and leave the building so she could get out of this apartment, call the police, then go somewhere and have a good, stiff drink.

Then all at once, the closet door flew open.

Before she could react with anything but a quick yelp of surprise, the man in the ski mask took two steps into the closet, grabbed her and spun her around. He wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her against him, her back to his chest. When he pressed the barrel of a gun against the side of her neck, she let out a strangled gasp.

“Not a sound,” he said. “Not one.”

She fell silent, with only the hiss of her panicked breathing breaking the stillness inside the closet.

“Everything’s under control,” he murmured. “Just sit tight.”

Alyssa knew he wasn’t talking to her, but to whomever was on the other end of whatever hands-free communication device he was using. For a long time the man stood motionless, his arm clamped tightly around her. Fear raced through her.

“Tell me your name,” he said.

“My name? Why—”

“Tell me.”

“Uh, Alyssa. Ballard.”

The man’s chest expanded with a deep, silent breath. “Damn.”

For some reason her name seemed to have made him unhappy. Given that he had a gun pressed to her jugular right now, she really wished it hadn’t.

“Do you work in this building?” he asked.

“Yes.”

Even as Alyssa’s heart pounded with apprehension, a sense of sudden recognition came over her. That voice. She’d heard it before. Despite the fact that his words were threatening, the deep, melodic tone of his voice still came through.

But it couldn’t be. She was imagining it.

He shifted his hand against her rib cage. She looked down at it and she couldn’t believe what she saw. A ring. Sterling silver. Alpha and omega symbols intertwined.

She glanced at his arm wrapped around her, his bicep bulging beneath his black T-shirt, and saw a long, irregular scar that extended the length of his forearm, faded to white but still distinct. The ring she was just now remembering, but his body she’d never forgotten. She’d memorized every inch of it, up to and including that scar.

For a moment she was too stunned to speak. Every second seemed sluggish and protracted as the reality of who he was slowly bared itself. She swallowed hard, trying to find her voice.

“Derek?”

His body stiffened, an involuntary reaction that told her just how right she was. Good Lord. She didn’t know how, she didn’t know why, but…

It was Derek. He was here. In this building, two thousand miles from the last place she’d seen him. And he was robbing this apartment.

“It’s you,” she said. “I know it is. Your voice. Your ring. The scar on your arm.”

He was silent.

“So this is why you left me in Seattle?” she said, her voice escalating. “Because you’re a burglar?”

He said nothing. She squirmed in his arms. “Let me go!”

When he continued to hold her tightly, suddenly all the pain and frustration he’d caused her, both here and in Seattle, welled up inside her in a hot mass of anger. The man she’d been so crazy about, the man who’d intrigued her to no end, the man with whom she’d spent one wonderful week and had imagined a thousand more to come…

He was a criminal. And he wasn’t going to get away with this.

She lifted her knee, then slammed her heel down hard on his instep. He grunted in pain, loosening his grip on her just enough that she wrenched herself from his arms and shoved him aside to head out of the closet. But before she cleared the doorway, he snaked his arm around her and yanked her back. Only this time he didn’t stop there. He pulled a tie off a nearby rack and bound her hands behind her.

“What are you doing?” she shouted, yanking hard against the tie, unable to believe he’d done it. Unable to believe how fast he’d done it.

Ignoring her, he grabbed another tie and gagged her with it, then led her out of the closet and over to the bed, where he sat her down, bound her ankles and tethered her to the bedpost. She fought him every step of the way, but he was bigger than she was and infinitely stronger, and within a few minutes, he had her completely subdued.

He walked away and stood near the wall, his back to her, his shoulders heaving with a few deep breaths. She could almost feel the tension radiating from him. Was it from anger? Indecision? She couldn’t tell. When he turned back around, though, he seemed to sigh with resignation.

Then he reached up and pulled off the ski mask.

Alyssa had already known beyond all doubt that it was Derek, but seeing him again like this made emotions swirl wildly inside her. Fear. Surprise. Anger. All of those made sense. But mingling with them was something that made no sense at all—an unwanted rush of the elemental desire she’d felt the first time she’d laid eyes on him. But he was a burglar and a kidnapper. How could she have any feelings of attraction toward him at all?

He came back to the bed and sat beside her, tossing the mask aside. To her surprise, he also disconnected the tiny microphone clipped to his collar. He regarded her silently for a moment, then lifted his hand to brush a wayward strand of her hair gently back over her shoulder. His fingertips grazed her neck, sending shivers all the way down her spine.

No. He had no right to touch her. None at all. She turned away sharply, glaring at him out of the corner of her eye.

“Alyssa,” he said, “listen to me. I’m in a tight spot here. No matter what this looks like, I’m not a burglar. Not the kind you think I am, anyway. And as far as tying you up like this, I have no choice. I can’t risk you telling anyone what you just overheard. I’ll explain everything to you later, including what happened in Seattle, but I have to take care of a few things first.”

He lifted his hand and rested his palm along the side of her neck, trailing his thumb in soft strokes just beneath her jaw. In spite of the situation, her mind flashed back to those scorching nights they’d spent together in a tangle of bedsheets, making love far into the night. Just the memory made her want to believe everything he was telling her.

No. She had to stay focused. No matter what he said, he was a burglar, and a hell of a good liar. God only knew what he really intended to do with her.

When she jerked her face away from him again, he let out a soft sigh, trailing his hand down her arm before finally pulling it away altogether.

“You’ll be here alone,” Derek told her. “Owens won’t be coming back.”

When her eyes widened, he shook his head. “Take it easy, Alyssa. We don’t kill people. Owens is just being…diverted.”

Diverted? What did that mean? And who the hell was “we”?

Derek rose from the bed and disconnected the phone cord from the wall. He picked up his gun from where he’d tossed it on the bed and stuck it into his jeans, then took a lightweight jacket from his backpack and put it on, pulling it down over the weapon. He grabbed the ski mask and stuffed it into the pocket of the jacket. Slinging the backpack over his shoulder, he turned to Alyssa one last time.

“I should be back within the hour.”

He left the room. Alyssa heard his footsteps as he walked to the elevator and the faint sound of the doors opening and closing.

And then he was gone.




3


DEREK STEPPED OFF the elevator and walked through the parking garage, moving quickly and decisively even as his mind was spinning in a dozen different directions.

When he’d grabbed Alyssa in that closet, for a few seconds he hadn’t been able to move. To think. To believe who he had his arms around. But there was no mistaking that mass of blond hair, those green eyes and that slight, willowy figure he remembered as clearly as if he’d seen her yesterday. He’d known she worked in a building that was identical to this one in Seattle, but he’d never imagined that he’d find her here. He’d asked her what her name was just to ensure that the concept most people believed in—that everybody has a double somewhere—hadn’t come into play.

It hadn’t. It was Alyssa.

And then she’d said his name. Softly. Tentatively. Even after six months, she’d still recognized tiny details she never should have remembered. His ring. His scar.

His voice, for God’s sake.

He’d hated like hell having to manhandle her the way he had, not to mention having to tie her up and leave her there. But he had to make sure Owens got to the airport ASAP, and she clearly hadn’t been in the mood to listen to anything he’d had to say. Until he had the chance to calm her down and find out just how inclined she was to tell the world what she’d overheard, restraining her had been his only option.

He exited the parking garage and walked to the van waiting on the street outside the building. After climbing into the driver’s seat, he tossed his backpack down and shut the door.

Kevin emerged from the back of the van and flopped into the passenger seat. “What the hell was going on up there? I lost communication with you for a few minutes.”

“Somebody was in the apartment. She heard everything.”

“She said your name. She knows who you are.”

“Yes. She’s…” The last thing Derek wanted was to delve into his history with Alyssa. “She’s an acquaintance.”

“Oh, boy. So where is she now?”

“Tied up in the bedroom.”

Kevin stared at him, dumbfounded. “What?”

“I left her tied up in the bedroom.”

“So what are you going to do with her?”

Derek paused. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure. Once we get Owens on the plane, I’ll come back and deal with her. By that time I’ll have something figured out.”

“And if you let her go and she talks?”

“I’ll make sure she doesn’t.”

“But how—”

“I said I’d handle it.”

Kevin looked at him skeptically, but he’d never been one to overstep his bounds. Finally he simply nodded.

“Did you get in touch with the team?” Derek asked.

“Wilson and McManus say they’ll have no trouble grabbing Owens. But there’s a problem with Lambert.”

“A problem?”

“He’s got the flu. Woke up with it this morning. A hundred and three fever. Can’t stop puking. Says he couldn’t possibly get a plane off the ground.”

Derek just stared at Kevin, unable to believe that not a damned thing was going right with this job. First, the blackmailing problem he’d set out to solve was far bigger than he’d realized. Then he’d had to take a woman hostage to keep her from talking—a woman he never would have considered tying up in bed unless she’d smiled pretty, got naked and asked him to. And now he had a pilot who couldn’t stop hugging the toilet long enough to fly to Washington.

Derek hated this. Hated it. His team’s reputation was built on jobs going off cleanly without a hitch, and now he was on the verge of having to phone Washington and admit he couldn’t pull this one off because he had no pilot.

No. He wasn’t going to do that. Failure was not an option.

Derek started the van.

“Where are you going?” Kevin asked.

“St. Andrews.”

“The church?”

“Yes.”

“Wait a minute. Isn’t that where Gus is getting married tomorrow?”

“Yes.”

Derek wheeled the van away from the curb and hit the gas.

“You’re gonna get him to fly the plane?” Kevin asked.

“That’s right.”

“But he quit the team a year ago.”

“Do you know any other pilot we can get on short notice who can fly a Learjet to Washington and who won’t wonder why he’s transporting a guy in handcuffs and handing him off to federal agents?”

Kevin sighed. “Good point.”

Ten minutes later Derek pulled up in front of St. Andrews. He turned to Kevin. “Get in the back. I don’t want Gus to see you and think we’re double-teaming him.”

“And if he won’t come?”

“That’s when we can double-team him.”

Derek parked behind a black stretch SUV. Nearby, several men milled around whom he took to be the other groomsmen. A white limousine was parked in front of the black one. Clustered around it was a group of young women who appeared to be the bridesmaids.

Derek checked his watch. It looked as if the rehearsal was over and the men were heading out to the golf course before the rehearsal dinner tonight.

As soon as Derek stepped out of the van, Gus spotted him and walked over.

“About time you showed up,” he said with a smile, clapping Derek on the shoulder. Then he lowered his voice. “Tell me the truth. You asked for that job just to get out of the rehearsal, didn’t you?”

Derek was relieved to see Gus in a better mood now than he had been when Derek had phoned earlier to tell him he had to miss the rehearsal. Of course, as soon as Gus found out why he was here now, that smile would be history.

“Sorry, man,” Derek said. “Duty called.”

“That’s the story of your life.”

“Used to be the story of yours, too.”

“Not anymore.” Gus leaned in and spoke quietly. “Guess I should have expected something like this when I asked you to be my best man, huh? ‘Sorry, buddy. Can’t make the rehearsal. Gotta tend to a congressman with his pants down.’ Or his panties down, as the case may be.” He gave Derek a smile, his voice still low and confidential. “So how’d it go this morning?”

“Not well,” he said quietly. “That’s why I need a favor.”

Gus’s grin evaporated. “What favor?”

“I need you to fly the Learjet to Washington.”

Gus just stared at him. “Come again?”

“Learjet. Washington. ASAP. I’m in a bind, and I need you.”

Gus held up his palms. “No way. I’m out of that business.”

He turned and walked away. Derek followed, finally grabbing his arm, but he shook it off.

“It’ll take a few hours, max,” Derek said.

“I’m getting married.”

“Not until tomorrow.”

“So why aren’t you sending Lambert?”

Derek sighed. “He has the flu.”

Gus looked flabbergasted. “The flu? The flu?” He glanced over his shoulder, then dropped his voice to an irate whisper. “I once flew a C-5 Galaxy over enemy territory when I had malaria, for God’s sake. Tell him to get his ass out of bed and fly the freakin’ plane!”

“I was with you when you flew that plane. My life flashed before my eyes.”

“This is my wedding we’re talking about. Find yourself another pilot.”

Derek glanced over to see a few of the groomsmen staring at them. He lowered his voice. “Look, I know it’s a hell of a lot to ask. But there’s a guy I have to get to D.C. for interrogation, and I have to do it right now. I took this job, and it’s my responsibility to see it through.”

“Right. Your responsibility. Not mine.”

“Gus—”

“No! There’s a reason I’m out of the business. So I can have a life that doesn’t involve having to do this short-fuse crap anymore.”

“Fly to D.C., hit the tarmac, unload the cargo, do a one-eighty and head back. That’s all I need.” Derek could see his friend starting to waver. “Come on, Gus. Haven’t we always watched each other’s backs? Always?”

Gus blew out a breath. “Playing the loyalty card is really low.”

“Hey, I’m stuffing myself into a tuxedo for you tomorrow. The least you can do is fly to Washington for me today.”

Gus closed his eyes and shook his head.

“It’s really no big deal,” Derek went on. “You’ll be back in time for the rehearsal dinner tonight. Hell, all we were going to do this afternoon is play golf anyway.”

“I like golf.”

“You also like to fly. Get in the van, and I’ll fill you in on the way to Love Field.”

“I need to talk to Sally first.”

“No. If you talk to her now, you’ll never get out of here. Phone her from the airfield. Tell her something came up, but you’ll be at the rehearsal dinner tonight.”

Derek opened up the passenger door. Gus stared at the van, then back at Derek. “You owe me for this.”

“You bet. Just name your price. After you get the guy to Washington.”

Gus hauled himself into the van. Derek stepped into the driver’s seat, started the engine and hit the gas. He wanted to get out of there before Gus saw his bride and changed his mind.

“Unbelievable,” Kevin said from the back of the van. “He talked you into it.”

Gus gave Kevin a deadpan look. “I’m a sucker for a sob story.” He turned back to Derek. “So, fill me in. Who’s my cargo?”

Derek gave him the short version of the predicament they were in, judiciously leaving out the part about Alyssa. No need to go there, particularly when it was a loose end he planned to tie up on his own later.

“So we’ve got to get this guy to Washington for interrogation,” he told Gus, “or come Monday morning, either the president’s trade bill is going down because a few congressmen don’t want to see themselves in compromising positions all over cable news, or cable news is going to have a field day when they get hold of—” He stopped short, looking in the rearview mirror. “Damn it.”

“What?”

“Somebody’s following us.”

Gus glanced in the side mirror. “That blue Mustang?”

“Yeah. He’s been hugging my bumper for the past few miles. This makes the fourth time I’ve changed lanes and he has, too.”

“It’s Barry Sutton,” Gus said. “Hard to miss that car. I saw him getting into it as we were leaving.”

Derek came to a red light and braked to a halt. “Any idea why he’s after us?”

“He’s a reporter who used to cover big stories but got busted to the society section. Maybe he’s looking for news from my wedding that’s a little more interesting than what color the mother of the bride is wearing.”

“Then we’d better lose him.” Derek put two hands on the wheel. “Hang on.”

Derek hit the gas and wheeled hard to the left, hopped the curb to the median and made a U-turn against the red light. He gunned it for fifty yards, then turned into a strip-center parking lot and headed down the service alley. Checking his rearview mirror, he saw Sutton’s Mustang still sitting at the red light.

“He’s not following,” Derek said.

“Hell, no, he’s not,” Gus muttered, rubbing his neck. “Did you have to jump the damned curb?”

Derek grinned. “You’ve gotten soft, Gus. That’s tragic.”

“No. Tragic is having to miss my golf game this afternoon.”

“Golf. Now, there’s some excitement.”

“It’s all the excitement I’m looking for these days.”

“Come on. Think about all the fun we used to have. You loved every minute of it.”

“Yeah. I did. But I love Sally more.”

He spoke with such conviction that Derek knew there was more to his relationship with his fiancée than some hot sex with a pretty lady. Gus had quit the team and started his own business for one reason only: so he could have that one special woman to come home to for the rest of his life.

When Derek thought about that, for some reason Alyssa’s face flashed through his mind.

No. Stop thinking about her like that.

He told himself, as he had for the past six months, that thoughts like those would eventually get him into trouble. Soon he’d be roped and tied like Gus, playing house with his wife and golfing with his buddies. But he just wasn’t cut out for that kind of life, and he had yet to meet a woman who could convince him that he was.

FORTUNATELY THE REST of the job went off like clockwork, which was a big relief for Derek after everything that had gone wrong. Wilson and McManus had Owens waiting at Love Field when they arrived. In fewer than three hours, the blackmailer would be in Washington. With any luck, Owens would crack and give the interrogators the name of his client and the location of the blackmail material. Then they’d call Derek in one more time to retrieve it, and this problem would be put to bed once and for all.

But right now he had to deal with Alyssa.

Kevin stayed in the van across the street from the Waterford, punching his computer to let Derek back into the building. As Derek ascended the elevator to the penthouse, his heart was pounding a little harder than usual. He’d rather take a beating than face Alyssa after what had happened in there.

As the elevator doors opened, he spoke into the microphone, telling Kevin he’d be out of touch for a short time and to stay put until he contacted him again. Then he flipped the microphone off and made his way to the master bedroom.

Alyssa sat on the bed exactly where he’d left her, but the anger she’d displayed earlier seemed to have disappeared. Instead, when she looked up at him, her green eyes were full of the pain of betrayal. And he was the reason why.

Stop beating yourself up. You had no choice.

When he settled beside her on the bed, she shrank away from him. He sighed heavily.

“I’m going to untie you,” he told her, “but I can’t let you leave yet. We need to talk. Agreed?”

She nodded.

He removed the gag first, easing it away carefully, wincing when he saw the red, irritated skin at the corners of her mouth. She stretched her jaw stiffly, refusing to look at him. When he untied her ankles, then her hands, he was dismayed to see the ties had left their mark there, too.

“I can’t believe you did this,” she said, rubbing her wrists. “I can’t believe—”

He touched his hand to her arm. When she jerked it away from him and stood, he wondered if she intended to bolt from the room. Instead she merely walked several paces away and stopped, her back to him, rubbing her upper arms with her palms.

“You left me in Seattle,” she said, her voice quivering as if she were on the verge of tears. “After a whole week together, suddenly you were gone. And now…and now this.”

“Alyssa—”

“How could you do this to me?”

With that, she dropped her head to her hands and began to cry.

Derek felt a shot of apprehension. He’d sailed through military combat with flying colors. He ran a team of stealth operatives, keeping his cool in situations unimaginable to the average man. His pain tolerance was legendary. He had very few weaknesses.

But watching a woman cry was one of them.

He’d expected her to be fighting mad. That he could have dealt with just fine. But now that she was falling apart, he had no clue what to do.

“Alyssa…”

He rose from the bed and went to her, putting his hand on her shoulder. To his surprise, she turned quickly, ducked her head and fell against him. He automatically wrapped his arms around her and she laid her head against his chest, her body shaking with sobs.

“You’re a liar,” she said, crying so hard she could barely speak.

“I know, but—”

“And a thief.”

“Well, technically I am, but—”

“And a bully.”

A bully? Now, wait a minute. He’d been called a lot of things in his life, but never that. He liked to think he wasn’t one of those guys who acted tough just for the sake of intimidating people, but clearly she thought he was.

But even as she berated him with one accusation after another, she clutched her arms more tightly around him, as if she was begging him to tell her that none of her words were true.

Unfortunately most of them were.

“Alyssa, sweetheart, listen to me. I had no choice. I had to—”

All at once she slid out of his arms and pushed him away, so hard that he stumbled backward. It startled him so much that a second passed before he realized what else she’d done.

She’d grabbed the gun from the small of his back.

He started toward her, but she’d already raised the weapon. Stopping short, he held his palms in the air, unable to believe that the woman he’d thought was crying had a face as dry as dust.

“You’re right, Derek,” Alyssa said. “We have some talking to do.”




4


ALYSSA WASN’T too thrilled to be holding a gun on anyone, particularly this man, because even with a firearm she wasn’t completely sure she was the one in control. But she wasn’t about to let him see her apprehension. And after all, it was a dream scenario, wasn’t it? Getting the opportunity to hold a gun on him and demand answers to the questions that had been driving her crazy for the past six months?

“I thought you were crying,” Derek said.

She made a scoffing noise. “Over you? A man who used me, lied to me, then left me? Hardly.”

She hoped to see him at least wince at that, but his expression held steady. The only indication of any emotion was a narrowing of his eyes as he assessed the situation. The gun felt heavy in her hands and she shifted it a little to get a better grip.

He held up his palms. “Be careful with that gun, sweetheart. The trigger’s pretty touchy.”

“Stop patronizing me.”

“Ever fire a gun before?”

“No, but it can’t be all that hard. All I have to do is pull the trigger.”

He eyed her carefully. “You and I both know you won’t shoot me.”

“Maybe not. But I might take out that picture window over there. I’ll bet a little glass raining down twenty-three stories would draw a crowd.”

He flicked his gaze to the window, his brows pulling together as he seemed to consider the consequences of that. Slowly he looked back. “Okay, then. What do you want?”

“First of all, let’s see some ID.”

“It wouldn’t tell you a thing.”

“It would tell me your real name.”

“It would tell you what my name is today.”

“Which is not Derek.”

“Yes, it is. That part is the truth.”

“But the last name you told me was a lie.”

“So you tried to look me up?”

Suddenly she felt silly about that. Chasing after a man who clearly hadn’t cared about her in the least? What would she have done if she’d found him?

“Call it curiosity,” she said. “And I found out everything you told me was a lie.”

When Derek gave her nothing in return but cold silence, Alyssa felt a shot of irritation. “Never mind. I don’t care about all that. Just tell me why you broke into this apartment.”

He paused for a moment, as if deciding just how much to reveal. “I work for the government.”

“Since when do they employ burglars?”

“That’s not what I am.”

“You sure look like one to me.”

“I retrieve things that can’t be recovered in conventional ways.”

“Such as blackmail material on half a dozen U.S. congressmen?”

His gaze held steady. “So you heard.”

“I heard. And Gerald Owens is doing the blackmailing?”

He paused. “Yes.”

“Why does he want to blackmail congressmen?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“What’s on the DVDs you’re after?”

“I can’t tell you that, either.”

“Tell me about the Learjet hangared at Love Field.”

He was silent.

“Oh, I get it. You could tell me, but then you’d have to kill me?”

His jaw tightened with irritation. “You don’t have any idea what you’ve stepped into here. It’s not a good thing that you overheard what you did.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yes. Whenever there’s a breach of security, standard operating procedure is for me to report it to my superiors. But if I’d done that, you’d be in the company of federal agents right now, being persuaded that it’s in your best interest not to tell a soul what you know.”

“That’s kind of B-movie, isn’t it?” But a tremor of uneasiness crept up her spine.

“Even the most outlandish fiction has some basis in fact.”

“But if you really are the good guys—”

“The good guys sometimes do wrong things for the right reasons.”

“So if you’re one of those good guys, what stopped you? Why didn’t you just turn me in?”

He took a casual step toward her, but there was nothing casual about the expression on his face. It had shifted into the one he’d worn that first night she’d seen him in the hotel bar, full of the kind of sexual promise that had captured her attention at a single glance.

“Because,” he said, “I wanted to be the one doing the persuading.”

Involuntary shivers of excitement raced through her, filling her mind with images of their sweat-sheened bodies as they’d made love for hours on end…

Wait a minute. What was she thinking?

She jerked her mind out of the past and back to the present. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…

She stood straighter, tightening her fist on the grip of the gun. “Derek?”

“Yes?”

“You can take your sexual manipulation and shove it.”

He bowed his head with frustration, then looked back up. “Alyssa—”

“I have control of this situation, and you don’t like that. So you don’t mind manipulating me however you think you need to so I won’t talk. You seduced me in Seattle, then lied to me, and you’re not above doing it again.”

“I haven’t lied to you. I told you why I’m here.”

“You’ve admitted only what you know I overheard.”

He was silent.

Alyssa’s anger escalated. “I want the whole story. I want to know why you left me before and exactly what you’re doing here now, or I swear to God I’ll blast a hole right through that window.”

Derek said nothing.

“Damn it, after what you did to me, you owe me the truth!”

“I can’t tell you the truth!”

“Fine. Then I’ll just let the authorities deal with you.” She swung the gun around and pointed it at the window.

“Alyssa, don’t!”

Derek dove at her, wrapping his arms around her waist. The moment their bodies collided, she inadvertently tightened her finger on the trigger.

A shot exploded.

As Derek’s momentum knocked them both to the ground, whatever glass wasn’t on its way to the pavement twenty-three stories below clattered to the bedroom floor. Alyssa lay beneath Derek, feeling totally disoriented and flabbergasted beyond words, because she hadn’t actually intended to pull the trigger. She’d just been so angry, and threatening him had felt so incredibly satisfying.

Derek yanked the gun from her hand and stuffed it into the back of his jeans. Slapping his palms on the floor, he levered himself to his feet, then hauled her up beside him. He pulled her over to the bed, grabbed his backpack and her jacket, and dragged her out of the bedroom.

“Derek!” she said. “What are you doing?”

“Security’s going to be up here any minute. And the cops won’t be far behind.”

“No! I’m not going anywhere with you!”

He continued to pull her along, though, giving her no choice. She saw the elevator ahead and he hauled her inside, then hit the button. The doors closed and the elevator descended.

Alyssa felt a glimmer of fear. After all, she didn’t know this man. He’d danced around his true identity the entire week they’d spent together in Seattle, so she’d never known who he really was. Even if he was telling her the truth now, that he worked for the government…

Sometimes they do the wrong things for the right reasons.

Maybe he did, too.

They reached the first floor and the doors opened. The lobby was empty. Derek strode out of the elevator and tried to open the door leading to the parking garage.

It was locked.

He rattled the door, then turned back. “What’s going on?”

For a moment Alyssa wasn’t sure. Then she remembered. “Security has probably overridden the main system with the emergency circuit that locks down the building. Nobody can get in or out.”

“Will the guards come to check out the back elevator?”

“If they don’t, they’re not doing their jobs.”

Derek spit out a curse. Alyssa couldn’t help feeling a glimmer of satisfaction. “Looks like you’ve got a problem, doesn’t it?”

He spun around. “Damn it, Alyssa! Don’t you get this?” He strode back to her. “My team operates under the radar. If I’m caught, nobody in Washington is going to admit I exist. That means that if I’m arrested, they won’t do a thing to help me. I swear to God, I’m one of the good guys, but if you blow the whistle on me when the security guards show up, I’ll likely be convicted and do jail time. Now, is that what you really want?”

Alyssa swallowed hard. Could he be telling her the truth?

The pieces fit. Everything she’d overheard pointed to him being exactly who he said he was—a government operative with orders to retrieve blackmail information on congressmen. If all that was true, if he really was one of the good guys, then if she turned him in…

“Alyssa?” he said. “Can you get me out of here?”

The soft plea she heard in his voice gave her the feeling that his life really was in her hands. She pictured him in a jail cell, lost to the world for years, all because he’d followed government orders. Her resolve began to disintegrate.

Trust him.

Even though there was no logical reason for her to act on those words, they sounded inside her head until they screamed so loudly she couldn’t ignore them.

She let out a breath of resignation. “Yes. I can get you out of here.”

“How?”

“My key card will override the lockdown mechanism. It’s in the pocket of my jacket.”

He pulled out the card, tossed her jacket to her, then turned to look at the door. “There’s no reader on the inside.”





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