Wanted by a Dangerous Man

by Cleo Peitsche

Henry was still standing in the vestibule when I finished sending the email. I stooped to put on my boots.

  “Look at that pile of Most Wanted papers. You’re obsessed.”

  You have no idea. “Always wanted that notch on my belt, though my dad jokes that I wouldn’t know what to do if I caught one. Like a dog chasing a car.”

  “Why would he say that? You were more than capable with Jones.”

  Why, indeed. I had theories ranging from overprotection to sexism to meanness. Though it wasn’t something we’d ever be able to talk about. My dad was too old school to believe in therapy, talking, or even hugs.

  Henry picked a paper up and flicked it with his finger. “This guy, Lagos. I’d love to get my cuffs on that sumbitch. He tops the list over the summer, then disappears even though he hadn’t been apprehended. Now he’s back on the list since early November.” He shook his head. “You better believe I started to track him, but I got so much conflicting information that I gave up.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, trying to stay casual, glad that tying my boots gave me a reason to keep my head lowered.

  “Top levels of enforcement giving me the runaround. He’s probably mafia, top mafia, and they want to keep that off the official record. I’ve seen it before.”

  I straightened and put on my coat. “Weird,” was all I could think to say.

  “It happens. Sometimes I wonder why they bother putting people on the damned list if they don’t want them caught.” He put the paper back with the others.

  I filed that away to think about later, though like a car or Corbin himself, I had no idea what I’d do with the information.

  At the theater, Henry insisted on paying for the movie as well as the popcorn. We were early enough that the screen still showed homespun ads for neighborhood businesses while a local radio station played in the background. “So what did you find out about Lagos?” I asked.

  “Nothing useful. None of my usual contacts were any help. Couldn’t get anyone who might know something to actually talk about it.”

  The lights dimmed before I could dig for more.

  The first half of the movie was fine, but then something changed. Henry seemed to be inhabiting more of the right side of his chair—the part closest to me—than the left, and I suspected he wasn’t just keeping the popcorn conveniently close. I couldn’t even focus on the film because I was so worried that Henry was going to squeeze my knee or start sucking my face.

  Ten minutes later Henry put an arm around my shoulders. I chose that moment to lean over and scratch my calf, and when I sat up again, Henry’s hand was back in his lap where it belonged.

  But then he flung an arm around me, turning my shoulders toward him. He pulled me close.

  I froze. Did I want this?

  Henry decided for me. His mouth pressed softly against mine, then he released me. “You have soft lips,” he murmured.

  It wasn’t a bad kiss, but I wasn’t ready to explore that avenue. “Henry, I… I’m not looking for a relationship right now. Or for a fling,” I added quickly.

  “Ok,” he said. The movie flashed to a dark scene, so I couldn’t see his face, couldn’t know if he was accepting what I’d said or if he was secretly planning to make another play later. “Watch the screen, not me,” he said, patting my arm, and I heard a smile in his voice.

  That was the end of that.

  Henry drove me home in silence, and when he reached the apartment building, he started to park his pickup truck.

  Time to nip this in the bud. “Keep the engine running. I’ve gotta be up early tomorrow. It’s a weekday after all.”

  There was a brief flash of annoyance on his face, but then a smile wiped it away. “Yeah, of course.”

  Maybe men and women couldn’t be friends after all. I opened the door and stepped into the cold night.

  “Audrey, I had fun.” He leaned over into the seat I’d just vacated, his hand touching where my butt had been. It occurred to me that the seat was still warm from my body heat.

  “Me, too, Henry,” I said neutrally. “Thanks for the ride. And the movie and the company.”

  He looked like he wanted to say something else, but I closed the door and quickly walked into the building.

  A few minutes later, a tentative knocking at the door interrupted my post-platonic-date pity party. I considered not answering, but Henry would know that I was ignoring him.

  The guy hadn’t done anything except kiss me. And he’d clearly gotten the picture, right? Otherwise he would have tried again.

  I opened the door, some irrational part of me hoping that it wasn’t Henry, that it was Corbin. But Henry stood on the doorstep, his handsome face creased in anguish. His pickup was still running in the middle of the street, which I took as an excellent sign that he would be on his way soon.

  “About tonight. I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable. Won’t happen again.” He stuck out his hand. “We cool?”

  Being gracious never cost anything, so I placed my hand in his. Despite everything, I couldn’t help but notice how warm and strong he was. “Of course.”

  He smiled. “Great. By the way, there’s a new Indonesian place in Midway Plaza. Let me know if you want to check it out. No pressure.”

  “I’ll do that. Good night.”

  I closed and locked the door, then went to bed. Then I got up and navigated my apartment in the dark until I reached Corbin’s shrine. I checked the phone. Nothing. I reread Corbin’s only text and my response.

  Good morning (afternoon?) my lovely. The offer still stands. Work for me.

  My response: Next time you’re in town, all bets are off.

  I’d already deleted the needy messages wondering where he was, plus the one telling him to pick up his damned SUV. I wanted to delete these messages, too, but I couldn’t bring myself to. Not yet.

  At the very least, it was proof that I’d been right to never get attached to a man. I needed to seduce a hot, silent stranger in a bar and allow him to fuck Corbin’s memory away.

  But I wasn’t ready for that either, and anyway I suspected it wouldn’t work.

  My dad called me into the office a few days later.

  “Bond jumper. Embezzling. Wrap it up fast and you can have a few days off.” He handed me a folder, and I flipped through it. There was a private reward in addition to our cut of the bail. Catching the guy would bring in just under $125,000.

  I looked up, surprised. “For me?”

  “You and Rob. Where is he?”

  Yeah, that was more along the lines of what I was used to. I sighed. “I am not my brother’s keeper.” That didn’t even get a hint of a smile. Why did I bother?

  My father turned off his computer and stood. His belly hung so far over his belt that it made my back ache.

  “I’m heading out. Martha wants me to help her go through the stuff in the attic, so might as well get it over with.”

  “Tell her hello for me.” Martha never came into the office anymore. There was a time when she showed up daily, but that was before she married my dad. She hadn’t been the first to set her sights on him, and she definitely wasn’t the first to get him to date her—Rob would have said “get him into bed” but the concept was a little too upsetting for my delicate mind—but she was the first to make it work.

  I opened the file. Hoboken Syre. I shook my head. Poor Hoboken was surely teased mercilessly as a kid. Who could blame him for turning to crime?

  I poured myself some coffee and started going through the information, making a tentative plan. Rob wouldn’t mind. Sometimes fraternal twins were similar, but Rob was like a negative image of me. I was conscientious and he couldn’t be bothered. I preferred to be the leader and he didn’t mind taking orders so long as it didn’t cut into his personal time.

  The office was completely empty. Katrina still hadn’t shown up, and Rob was likely pretending to be working. After two hours of internet searches and Facebook stalking, my phone rang.

  “Feel like Indone
sian?”

  “Henry, I—”

  “My treat, to make up for the other night. That was inappropriate. Look, I’d like for us to be friends. Please give me a chance to fix things.”

  Geez. I tipped back in my chair and eyed the scattered papers spread over my desk. “Ok,” I said, already suspecting that it was a bad idea.

  Not wanting to take any chances, I opted to meet Henry at the restaurant. I arrived early and decided to meander along the street. The Christmas displays were still everywhere; the businesses put them up in October and sometimes left them into mid-February. The hardware store always had the nicest presentation; the longer I looked at the train winding through the cozy village, the more I wanted to buy a snowblower like the ones that the little plastic people rode on.

  “Look at that!” A kid bumped into my leg.

  “Sorry,” his mother said, tugging him out of my personal space. I smiled and moved away.

  It was a cold night but not windy. As I looked through the windows, I saw the reflections of happy couples, arm in arm, walking behind me. The weeks before and after Christmas always made me wonder if I should feel bad about being single.

  My phone rang, and I fumbled it out under a streetlight, moving slightly off the crowded sidewalk. Blocked number, but it had to be Henry because who else would be calling me?

  “Are you canceling?” I said as a greeting.

  There was the briefest of pauses, then an amused, deep voice said, “I would never cancel on you.”

  I literally stopped breathing for a few seconds. The holiday music was so loud that I wasn’t sure I’d heard correctly. I moved away from the speaker just as the Midway Plaza’s advertising jingle started to play. “Who is this?” I asked even though I knew exactly who it was.

  “Don’t tell me that you’ve replaced me already.”

  I gritted my teeth. “What do you want?” What I meant was, “Where have you been, and why did you desert me, you goddamn bastard?” But I was too polite to say that in public, so I seethed quietly.

  “To see you.”

  Anger and hurt boiled up, eclipsing the relief at knowing that Corbin was alive and well. “Then you should have been here weeks ago.”

  He actually laughed. “I deserve that. First I want to apologize for work keeping me away. Then I want to make it up to you. I will atone for each of my sins, Audrey. Over and over.” His voice practically dripped sex, and I could imagine his gorgeous blue-green eyes glazed with that intense lust that haunted my dreams.

  Damn him. Not fifty words out of his mouth and I wanted him so badly that it hurt. I sat on a freezing park bench and hunched over, wanting to be alone with him. “Work kept you away?” I managed to fill the words with every bit of derision I could wring out of my voice. It was difficult because I couldn’t stop shivering. “Work?”

  “I am sorry.” He wasn’t laughing now. “Believe me when I say that it wasn’t up to me.”

  “Call me after you retire because I don’t sleep with criminals. If I see you, I’m hauling you in. And by the way, yes, I am seeing someone.” I hung up and immediately regretted it. The phone rang again, but I ignored the call. I waited for him to try again, but he didn’t.

  Wow. That had been insultingly easy.

  Mittened hands covered my eyes. “Surprise!”

  I jumped up, heart pounding. But it wasn’t Corbin. My face heated. “Jesus, Henry! Don’t you know better than to walk up behind a woman in the dark and grab her? What’s wrong with you?”

  His eyes were wide in shock. “I’m so sorry. You’re on a bench in the middle of a shopping area…” He trailed off when he saw the look on my face. “My apologies.”

  “Whatever.” I knew my irritation wasn’t at him, but I couldn’t control myself at the moment. Corbin’s phone call was turning the world on its head, and all my emotions had come unbundled and were flying wild. I took a deep breath. “Didn’t mean to yell at you.”

  He held up a hand. “No, you’re right. Sometimes I forget that not everyone is a martial arts black belt who carries two concealed weapons.”

  I tried not to interpret his comment as saying that I couldn’t defend myself. Better to change the subject altogether. “I’m starving.”

  “I’m Henry,” he quipped. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Bad jokes? Now you’ve gone too far,” I said, forcing a smile as I slowly began walking.

  Henry fell into step beside me. When we reached the restaurant, he quickly opened the door. He then ducked around me and said something to the host, who led us toward a semi-private area.

  “Actually, what about this one?” I asked as I stopped by a perfectly fine table in the center of the room where everyone could see. Fool me once, Henry Heigh…

  “Of course,” the host said with a little bow and slid the menus onto the tabletop.

  Henry insisted on pulling out my chair. I grudgingly sat. “Not necessary to do that.”

  His only response was a little smile. I hoped he wasn’t getting ideas again about us getting frisky. But he probably was. Because that’s what guys did, apparently. They kept trying until the woman gave in or gave him a black eye. I wasn’t far from the latter.

  Henry wanted to talk about work stuff, and I listened to him boast about how he had cleverly tracked down a missing teenager. The job had been subcontracted from a private investigator. Henry knew quite a few tips and tricks, and unlike my father, he didn’t mind going into the details of getting around some of the legal impediments that made finding people difficult. I could learn a lot from him. If Corbin hadn’t just called, I would have been thrilled for the tips. As it was, I couldn’t relax, couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  The food wasn’t great, and half the city seemed to be there. “Why’s this place so popular?” I asked, poking my fork at the tangle of soggy noodles.

  “You don’t know? The chef was on a reality show. There were cameras here the night they opened.”

  “Ah.” Apparently there really wasn’t anything else going on in town. I shoveled the noodles into my mouth and started the long process of chewing them.

  My gaze wandered across the room as I wondered if any of these people were enjoying their dinners.

  And then I saw him.

  Him. Corbin Lagos. The man who had saved my life, spanked me until my ass burned, and then left me yearning for something I could never have.

  He stood barely inside the doorway, his large shoulders slightly hunched. His dark hair was mussed, flipped forward so that the curled ends skirted his eyes. It made him look younger and much more innocent, like a teenage football star. He cut his gaze toward me, and those electric blue-green irises of his seemed to shine. His full lips moved, and even across the room, I could nearly hear his whispered summons.

  Corbin looked pointedly toward the bathrooms, then moved away, practically disappearing despite his large size.

  I swallowed, forgetting where I was and what I was doing. The mouthful of half-chewed starch caught in my throat, producing a gasping coughing fit that stopped every conversation in the room.

  Henry jumped up and patted me on the back. I pushed him away. Repeatedly.

  “If she can breathe, let her be,” a woman said.

  “Excuse me,” I said, my voice raw and thin and high. I scrubbed tears from my eyes. Henry hovered, too close. I picked my napkin off the floor and dropped it on my plate. “Ladies room,” I squeaked out.

  “Are you ok?” the woman asked.

  “Need a few minutes to pull myself together. That was a bit humiliating—” I paused for another bout of coughing. “I’ll be back as soon as I’m feeling human again,” I told Henry.

  “Take your time,” he said.

  As I reached the bathrooms, a noise caught my attention, and I discerned Corbin in the shadows near an emergency exit. After a nervous glance behind me, I ducked toward him.

  For weeks I’d been fantasizing about what I would say when I saw him again. But now that he was in front of me, I
was dumbstruck. He’d been so kind to me, and so warm, that I’d almost forgotten how damned hot he was. Broad shoulders wrapped in a light coat. Tight jeans, the denim molded to his muscular legs. Electric blue-green eyes. Sideburns gave way to stubble that darkened his square jaw, and I wanted to throw my arms around his neck and lick him.

  I also wanted to punch him until he hurt as much as I did. “Where have you been?” I hissed.

  “Audrey,” he murmured, his voice rich with contained amusement, though there was a glimmer of dismay in his eyes. “That’s your new boyfriend?”

  Despite my fury, I couldn’t help my visceral reaction to the idea of Henry being my boyfriend, and Corbin had his answer. He grabbed my hand, and I tingled from head to toe, certain that I must have started glowing the moment he touched me. He pushed open the emergency exit. I braced myself for alarms, but nothing.

  We were standing in a narrow alley, the kind of sinister, shadowy spot a director might tap for a brawl. It was full of trash, soggy cardboard boxes, and splintered pallets. The door clanged shut behind us.

  Corbin dragged me around behind the dumpster, then farther down. I slipped a little on the uneven ice, but Corbin had a firm grip. Cold and nervousness set me quivering.

  Now we were out of sight if anyone opened the door or happened to look down the alley.

  I pulled my head back and stared him in the eye, refusing to be distracted by his raw sex appeal. “If you want the keys to your SUV, they’re at my apartment.”

  “I’m here because of you, Audrey.” He touched my chin, and I jerked away with a snort.

  “Really romantic meeting place, but then I shouldn’t expect more from a murderer. Did you plan it out ahead of time, or is this your idea of a spontaneous rendezvous?”

  Hurt briefly flashed in his eyes. “I wouldn’t have needed to improvise if you’d stayed on the phone like a reasonable woman. We aren’t children, Audrey. This isn’t a game.”

  My glare was severely undermined by my trembling, and Corbin pulled me into his arms. Heat spread from the places where our bodies touched, enveloping me in a soothing warmth. Corbin. I’d missed his smell. I’d missed the way his solid body felt pressed against mine.