Jenna cornered McKenzie by the bar, ignoring one of her old high school friends—who really hadn't been much of a friend at all, come to think of it—who was trying to get her attention on the dance floor.
"He knows," she hissed.
McKenzie didn't seem to hear her. Her gaze was fixed on Hunter, who was trailing behind at some distance. He would reach them soon enough, and Jenna needed her stepsister's attention. Unfortunately Mack’s attention was captivated. "Hubba hubba," her stepsister murmured.
Jenna hated being ignored but the fact that her stepsister was ogling her date annoyed her even more. "Would you stop that? He will hear you."
Jacob leaned in from where he was standing on the other side of Mackenzie. "Don't worry about me, Jenna. I’m secure enough to acknowledge that another man is attractive.”
Mackenzie patted her fiancé’s arm sweetly. “That’s right. Jacob knows I have eyes for one man only. But that doesn’t mean I’m blind.”
Jenna turned to glance back at Hunter and found herself staring. He really was hot.
She’d known that, obviously, but seeing him now from Mack and Jacob’s points of view… She hadn’t been lying when she’d said he cleaned up well.
Unlike the other morning, this suit fit well. Too well. She could practically see his muscles outlined beneath the jacket.
Whipping around she hissed at her stepsister. "Would you pay attention? I'm trying to tell you that he knows."
Mack stared at her blankly. “Knows what?"
"He knows that I know." She widened her eyes trying to make her point silently as Hunter approached.
Mackenzie's brows shot up. "Are you sure? How would he know?"
"You and your questions," Jenna said.
Mack winced. “Sorry."
Jacob was looking from Mackenzie to Jenna. “Am I supposed to be following?”
Just then Hunter reached her side and Jenna and her friends grew quiet. Possibly too quiet judging by the awkward silence that descended on their little group. Jacob broke it first. “Hi,” he said a little too loudly as he thrust a hand in Hunter’s direction. “I’m Jacob.”
Jenna watched as Hunter reached a hand out for a handshake and her mind went into overdrive processing what she’d learned—or what she’d thought she’d learned. He hadn’t outright admitted he knew, but he’d hinted. More than that—she’d read him. She didn’t know when it had happened, but at some point she’d developed the ability to read the look in his eyes as if they’d known each other for decades and not a week.
There was a connection there, she’d felt it from the start. Heck, she’d felt it way back when she worked for the DA.
What did that mean? She wasn’t exactly the type to believe in some sort of mystical connection. She was practical. Rational. Some might say cold. But she did believe in instincts—she trusted them. More than a few times her instincts had helped her win in court. And her instincts were telling her that he was a good guy. An honest guy. One she could trust, even.
“I’m Mark,” she heard him say. Without thinking it through, she interrupted.
“No, he’s not.”
All three of them turned to her with varying looks of surprise and confusion. Jacob definitely looked the most confused. “He’s not Mark?”
Apparently Mackenzie hadn’t kept him up to speed.
“No,” she said, turning toward Hunter. “His real name is Hunter McCaffrey. Formerly Detective McCaffrey with the NYPD.”
Hunter’s answering smile was slow and heavy-lidded. The smile of a predator who’d caught his prey. No, that wasn’t quite it. His gaze was filled with respect. Maybe it was the smile of a predator who’d met his match.
Either way, the smile made her blood turn to lava. Her mouth went dry and her knees grew weak. She’d be fantasizing about that smile for years to come.
Jacob turned to Hunter. “You’re a cop?”
“Retired cop.” His gaze never left hers even as he answered Jacob’s questions. “As Jenna here could tell you, I’m now a private investigator.”
“Huh.” Jacob opened his mouth and looked ready to launch into more questions when Mackenzie placed a hand on his arm. “Come on, hon, I’ll explain everything on the dance floor. Our former classmates have yet to be dazzled by our moves. We shouldn’t disappoint them.”
After Mack dragged Jacob away, she and Hunter faced one another in temporary silence. “How long have you known that I know?” she asked, out of curiosity more than anything.
“Not long. How long have you known?”
“Since I saw you by the elevators on Monday morning.”
He arched a brow, clearly surprised by that answer. “You recognized me?”
She rolled her eyes. “Though your suit and tie were a clever disguise, Clark Kent, amazingly enough, I still somehow managed to place you.”
He took a step closer. “Had we met before?”
She shrugged one shoulder and tried not lean toward him despite the gravitational pull he seemed to be emitting. “Not exactly. We were involved in the same case a couple years ago.”
He opened his mouth and she knew he was going to ask more questions. What case? What was her role? But she didn’t feel like taking a trip down memory lane. They had more important things to discuss.
Crossing her arms in front of her chest, she leveled him with her no-nonsense look—the one she used on her more recalcitrant clients. “What are you doing at Knight & Knight?”
The look didn’t work nearly as well on him as it did at her office. His lips twitched up just the tiniest bit but enough for her to see that he was amused by the question—or maybe he was laughing at the look. Either way, he clearly wasn’t intimidated.
“What are you doing at Knight & Knight?” he asked, crossing his arms over his chest just like she had.
They stood there like that for several moments, neither answering the question. Finally, he dropped his arms and some of the tension eased. “Look,” he said. “It’s obvious that neither of us is at the firm for the reasons we’ve given.”
He looked at her questioningly as if waiting for confirmation. She hesitated briefly before giving a grudging nod.
“If my hunch is right, I’d say we’re both there for the same reason.” He gave a little shrug. “Or for similar reasons, at least.”
He paused again. The man probably thought she would just open up and tell him everything then and there. No chance. “You first.”
Did she sound juvenile? Maybe. But there was no way she was going to reveal all her cards. Granted, she had a pretty skimpy hand at the moment, but that was all the more reason to see what he knew first. Surely he had more information, if he was there for the same reason.
She watched him study her, those dark eyes seeming to read more into her set expression than she’d intended. When he’d finished his perusal, he let out a world-weary sigh. “Okay, fine. Margaret hired me to go undercover because someone attempted to hack her information.”
Jenna’s eyes widened despite her resolve to stay completely unmoved. But this was news—relevant news. There was no way her former stepmother’s hacking incident and her father’s office burglary were unrelated.
“If you tell me why you’re really at your father’s firm, maybe we can help each other.”
His voice was low and gruff. Intimate. Which was a stupid thought because they were standing in a tacky hotel ballroom surrounded by drunken idiots and listening to cheesy pop music. There was nothing intimate about this scenario.
She turned her attention to the dance floor where Mackenzie and Jacob were the center of attention as they bopped in time to the music with their eyes glued to one another with those sappy, lovesick looks on their faces. Ugh.
That did it. She turned back to Hunter with all thoughts of romance and intimacy refreshingly washed away by that dose of sickeningly sweet affection. Again, good for Mackenzie—she was happier than Jenna had ever seen—but if she were ever to fall like that, she sincerely hoped her
friends and family would be kind enough to host some sort of intervention.
Squaring her shoulders, she met Hunter’s gaze and this time she managed to do so without internally commenting on their particular shade of brown or how they looked so deep and warm when he was standing close.
Nope, she was finally able to focus on the issue at hand. The firm. Her investigation. Her father. She rapidly ran through her options, but there was nothing to debate, really. He’d told her why he was there. It was her turn now. Maybe if she opened up a bit, he’d reveal what he’d discovered so far. Surely if they combined forces they could figure out who was behind these shenanigans and she could be on her way—with her money in hand.
With that in mind, she spit it out. “My father thinks his office was broken into.”
Hunter’s face remained impassive. “Was anything stolen?”
She shook her head. “Not that his assistant noticed, but he’s convinced that someone in the office is trying to take advantage of his current condition.”
Someone being Margaret but with this new revelation she found it hard to believe that Margaret was behind the burglary. That would mean that while Margaret was spying on Jenna’s father, someone else was spying on her. That would be quite the coincidence—too much of one for Jenna to believe.
“I’m assuming your father thought Margaret was behind the burglary.” It wasn’t a question but she nodded anyway.
“And I’m guessing Margaret thought my father was behind the hacking.”
Hunter dipped his chin in acknowledgement.
She broke the silence. “So where does that leave us?”
Hunter leaned over so he was speaking directly into her ear as the music cranked up another notch. “It looks like you and I are going to be partners.”
She couldn’t stop the shiver that raced down her spine at the sound of his voice so close to her ear and the feel of his breath on her neck. Partners?
Something strangely similar to panic had her jerking back a few feet where she could no longer feel the warmth radiating from him or be tempted to close the distance between them.
Jeeze, what was wrong with her? This infatuation had to come to an end…preferably yesterday.
Apparently he took her move as a rejection because he started speaking to her in an annoyingly rational manner, which only irritated her raw nerves even more. Why was he so calm and unaffected when she was ready to launch herself into this man’s arms like some kind of needy ninja?
“It makes sense,” he said. “We’re clearly working toward the same end goal, so why not join forces?”
His practical words and the fact that she’d gotten some distance helped ease some of the tension and her brain was once again able to function. “Yeah, but who gets the credit?”
He stared at her as if she’d spoken Greek. “Excuse me?”
“Who gets the credit?” she repeated slowly. This guy could be dense. “If we were both hired to do the same job, only one of us will complete his or her assignment.” And she intended it to be her.
His brows pulled together in confusion. “We were both hired, surely we’ll both get compensated.”
His tone had taken on a quality… Yup, there it was in his eyes. Judgy Judgerton over there was finding fault with her mercenary question.
She resisted the sudden urge to explain why she needed the money. No way. Screw that. If he wanted to believe the worst of her, so be it. Besides, it was hardly a flaw to think about the end result. It was called real life. She wasn’t some retired cop with a hero complex who was out to save the day for the joy of it.
She had clients waiting for her. She also had a mortgage to pay and a firm to open but this man didn’t deserve to hear about any of that. “If you think my wicked stepmother and my jerk of a father will happily pay us both for coming to the same conclusion, you’re delusional. They think the world thrives on competition. ‘May the best man win’ pretty much sums up their wedding vows. They don’t acknowledge second place.”
His expression darkened. “How about you worry about whatever deal you’ve worked out with your father and I’ll worry about honoring my contract with my client.”
She pressed her lips together to keep from doing something incredibly unprofessional. Like sticking out her tongue. But really, that patronizing holier-than-thou tone was grating her nerves. “Fine,” she said. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
He leaned back and his eyes scanned her face. “Does this mean you don’t want to team up? Because if you’d rather do this on your own just to make sure I don’t find the culprit first—”
She let out an unladylike snort. “Do we have to call this guy a culprit?”
“What would you prefer? Also, we don’t know that it’s a guy.”
She rolled her eyes. “Fine. But he or she is clearly a petty crook at best. I mean, a botched hack job and a burglary where nothing was stolen but the intruder didn’t cover his tracks? This is hardly a criminal mastermind.”
He shrugged. “Call him or her whatever you want. The question remains, are you willing to be my partner or not?”
She tried not to read into it and failed. A little, crazy part of her brain heard the question and went rogue. Did she want to be his partner?
In life? No—not for her. At work?
“Sure. Why not?”
His eyes narrowed with suspicion. “So you’re not hung up on who gets credit?”
She met his gaze. “I’m concerned about who gets compensation, yes. You should be worried too if you’re counting on the money you’ve been promised.”
He stiffened a bit—just enough that she noticed. Ah, so she’d struck a nerve there, had she?
“Do you really think they’re so stingy?”
“Yes.” She didn’t even have to think about that one. “But it’s not just stinginess. My dad and his nasty ex are cut from the same cloth. They eat, sleep, and breathe competition. It’s all they know and it’s all they respect.” She gave him a lopsided smile filled with an age-old bitterness. “Trust me, no one in my mess of a family ever got an A for effort. It’s kill or be killed for the Knights and that’s how this firm is run.”
His silence and searching stare had her shifting in place, acutely aware that she’d said too much. Revealed things she shouldn’t have. Now he was standing there reading her like an open book.
“But we’ll deal with that when the time comes,” she said quickly. “In the meantime, you and I will work together to catch our man.” He opened his mouth to correct her and she rolled her eyes. “Or woman.”
“Sounds good…partner.” He reached out a hand and she shook it, ignoring the churning in her stomach that told her she was making a mistake. Not that she didn’t trust this man—if there was any man who could be trusted it was this guy.
But she didn’t trust herself when she was around him. How was she supposed to keep her distance and break free of this crush if they were working together?
The word “partner” had felt strange coming off his tongue—like a word from some forgotten language. It had been years since he’d had a partner—and Eddie Gonzalez was not exactly Jenna Knight. She was a species unto herself. A woman like no other.
Ah crap, he had to quit that kind of thinking. The more he raised her up on some pedestal the harder she’d come crashing down. Hadn’t he sorted this out already? As far as Jenna went, she was someone to fantasize about but not fit for real life.
So then why was he still holding her hand? Good question.
He looked down and stared at the sight of her pale, slim hand tucked into his. Dropping it quickly, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his suit pants.
She was looking around the room, at anyone but him, it seemed. “So, now what?”
Now he wanted to take her out of this crowded, awful ballroom and kiss her until she let down the cold, reserved façade. And it was a façade. She might not be his type, but she wasn’t the unflappable, unfeeling woman he’d first thought, eit
her. The woman he’d held in his arms the other day was far from frigid and he could have sworn he’d caught real emotions there in her eyes, flickering in their depths.
She could try and hide it, but there was more to her than just career, money, and success.
Spinning to face him, she nodded toward the front door. “Should we get out of here and get to work? The faster we figure this out, the sooner I can get my money.”
She started off without him, surprisingly quick in her high heels.
There was more to her than money and power, he reminded himself as he followed in her footsteps. But someone needed to tell her that.
Chapter Nine
Once in the car, Jenna suggested they go back to her place and the ride there was filled with a heavy silence. He had no idea what she was thinking about but his mind had gone to some dirty places at the suggestion that they go back to her place.
They came to a stop in front of her townhouse, almost exactly where he'd parked earlier in the week. Jenna made no move to get out of the car. Maybe her mind had drifted to the same place. Maybe she was also replaying that kiss.
"I promise to keep my hands to myself this time if that's what you're afraid of."
She whipped around to face him. "I'm not afraid of anything."
But her response had been too quick and he could see it there in her eyes clear as day. Fear.
Ah heck, he'd never meant to scare her but maybe he'd come on too strong. He ran a hand through his hair and tried to figure out what he could say to put her at ease. Before he could, she turned to him with a smirk, all traces of vulnerability gone, hidden behind that icy mask.
“What, do you think you’re the first man to kiss me?” She tilted her chin up as she openly laughed at him. “You really are old-fashioned, aren’t you? Please don’t tell me you’re reading too much into a couple of kisses.”
Her condescending tone should have rankled. And it did, to some extent. But there was something beneath it that made his chest squeeze on her behalf. He didn’t believe her. Not entirely, at least. She was too in control. Too rigid.
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