by Janzen, Tara
“I’ll be going to Honolulu in the morning and staying over the weekend,” he said, stepping aside and letting her precede him into a serpentine bower of latticework and grapevines. The arbor was lit from within by more of the tiny lights, but there weren’t enough of them to do more than hint at the intricacy of their home. “I would appreciate you checking the office in the afternoons while I’m gone. I’m expecting some information on Fang Baolian. It will either come down by modem or over the fax, less likely as a telephone message. Regardless of how it’s delivered, I don’t want it lying around. You can store it, file it, download it, or transcribe it. I just want to make sure it isn’t lost or seen by anyone else.”
“Okay. I’ll check in twice on both Saturday and Sunday,” she said.
It was the kind of dedication he was paying for, and he would have been more surprised if she hadn’t made the offer. Nevertheless, he was grateful.
“Thanks. I’ll be back Sunday night. I’ll leave my itinerary on your desk, in case you need to get in touch with me.”
They walked a few more steps before she asked the question he’d been expecting.
“Do I need to worry about Chow Sheng?”
“No,” he said without hesitation.
“You sound pretty positive,” she said, not sounding at all positive herself.
“I am.” Chow Sheng valued his life too much to trespass where Cooper had warned him not to go, and that was within a mile of Jessica Langston.
She looked up at him as if she expected more of an explanation, but she wasn’t going to get it. Cooper saw no reason to repeat to her what he’d said to Chow. He was in a vengeful mood, he’d told the old man, a terribly vengeful mood. Only a fool would cross him in such a mood, a fool or a man intent on his own death.
“I didn’t realize you spoke Chinese,” she said, resigning herself to his answer with an ease he appreciated.
“I lived in Hong Kong with my mother for a few years, from when I was about seven until I was ten, and Jackson and I went back after she died. Her family is still in the trade and shipping industry there, Burnett and Company.”
“I went to Hong Kong once on a business trip.” She lifted her hand to brush back a hanging leaf. “The city is amazing. It must have been a very exciting place for you as a child.”
“Not nearly as exciting as when the old man came to haul us back to the States,” he said with a humorless laugh. “My mother became involved with another man, a Chinese. As much as my mother’s family loved her, and as much as they hated my father, they couldn’t tolerate adultery when it crossed color lines. They called the old man and told him to come get his estranged wife.” He caught the shocked look Jessica gave him and knew he’d startled her with his revelation.
“How . . . uh, awful for you,” she said. “I know adultery is very hard on—on families and children.” She was floundering, and it took him a moment to figure out why. When he did, he wished he’d phrased his words less bluntly.
“I guess that sort of thing would be hard on kids as sweet as yours. But my mother only had me at the time, and sweetness wasn’t my long suit. At one time I even liked the man.”
“I wasn’t talking about my children,” she said in a flustered tone that made her impossible to believe.
“It’s nothing to feel guilty or be embarrassed about, unless you were the one who strayed.” He didn’t expect her to reply to his veiled question, but neither did he need her reply. He’d done some checking on Ian Langston, enough to know what had caused Jessica’s divorce.
When she didn’t answer, he continued his story, partly to make up for embarrassing her, and partly, for reasons he didn’t fully understand, because he wanted her to know what had happened.
“The fireworks really went off when good old Dad came and dragged her out of Hong Kong. Nobody thought she deserved the abuse he dished out, but once he got her back to San Francisco, nobody could stop him either. She died just before my sixteenth birthday. Physically, he didn’t kill her, but he made her life a living hell. I always thought she just gave up when she couldn’t take any more. I was angry with her for a long time for leaving Jackson and me like that, so angry, I packed us both up and took off for Hong Kong. Her sister took us in.”
“I’m sorry, Cooper. I’m sorry you had to go through so much.” Her voice was full of compassion for him, as if she truly felt and understood his childhood pain and wanted to wish it away.
She was years too late, but that didn’t stop him from being uncomfortably aware of his emotional response to her sympathy. The urge to draw her into his arms and kiss her, to connect with her and offer her the comfort she was offering him, was almost overwhelming.
“It’s always been even money on who raided the Damn Line to death, the Burnetts or my mother’s Chinese lover,” he said, hoping a few hard, cold facts would help him shake off the strange feeling he was having. He could admit to lust. Wanting to give and receive comfort was something else altogether, implying an emotion he hadn’t suffered from in a long time.
He let his gaze drop to where the faint light rimmed the gentle contours of her face and haloed her hair with reddish highlights. He curled his hand into a fist to keep from touching her. Soft, soft, soft. Everything about her was so invitingly soft, making him want to hold her, to feel her in his arms. Her curves were soft, her skin, her voice, her mouth, her heart.
“You make me talk too much,” he said, moving deeper into the arbor, leading her farther from the house. The smell of cedar and ripening grapes melded together in a rich fragrance, adding an intimacy he was all too aware of.
“Is Hawaii business or . . . um, pleasure?” she asked, making an awkward change of subject.
By the slight wince he detected crossing her face, he could tell she wished she’d said something different. Her question had sounded more personal than professional, but that was fine with him. They were going to get a lot more personal before they reached his car, and he appreciated any help, however subtle, she gave him.
“Business. I’m picking up Pablo Lopez.”
Her head came back up. “You know where he is?”
“Everybody knows where he is,” he said, moving aside a trailing vine overhead. She stopped just on the other side of the vine, still well within the bower, her partially illuminated face reflecting her confusion.
“Then what was London all about?” she asked. “If everybody knows where he is, why didn’t they pick him up themselves instead of wasting a lot of my time and contracting to pay you a small fortune?”
He looked down at her, taken back by the extent of her naïveté. He was a bounty hunter. She’d met George Leeds and been in the Boarshead. What did she think? That he spent a lot of time in boardrooms?
“They don’t want to get hurt,” he said, putting it to her as simply as possible. With a gesture of his hand, he suggested they continue walking.
She obliged him, hesitantly, for about three steps, before coming to an abrupt stop at the end of the bower. “And you do?” she asked, the concern in her voice edged with anger .
“I don’t get paid to get hurt,” he said.
“But there’s always a possibility.” It wasn’t a question, because he knew she knew the answer.
“I would like to get started early on Monday morning. If you could be in the office by—”
“Is that what happened to your leg?” she interrupted, showing the same tenacity he’d earlier thought was a virtue. “Did you get hurt trying to bring somebody in?”
“No. I was with Jackson.”
He hadn’t expected to tell her. He didn’t know why he had. Everyone knew, but it wasn’t something he’d admitted out loud, not in the nine long weeks since Jackson had died.
From the shocked look on her face, he shouldn’t have told her .
Damn her for getting to him, and damn her for making him want her so much.
Stunned by his admission, Jessica could hardly breathe, yet she felt the sudden change in him, felt the
tension in him escalate, moving another degree closer to the edge. He was unpredictable, dangerous. He was off-limits. Any fool could see it, and she wasn’t any fool.
Moonlight slanted down through the trees, silvering his hair and the hard chiseled planes of his face, and exposing the deep weariness in his gaze .
She shouldn’t care, she told herself. The man was a self-proclaimed bastard.
But she did care.
He turned to face her, and their gazes locked.
“You do make me talk too much,” he said, running his thumb along her cheek.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, instinctively reaching for him, wanting somehow to give him her support .“So very sorry.” My God. He’d been with his brother when Jackson had been killed.
He moved closer, blocking the light. “I don’t want your sympathy. I want your kiss.” His hand slid to the back of her neck and his mouth lowered to hers.
He’d taken away the excuse of surprise. She’d known he was going to kiss her, and she didn’t make a move to stop him. Worse, when his lips touched hers and parted, she instinctively complied with the silent suggestion that she do the same.
Without another preliminary advance, he slipped his tongue in her mouth, deep and sure, and she felt her knees weaken. He caught her with his arm around her back, drawing her closer and more intimately into his embrace.
No battle raged in her heart, no thought of retreat crossed her mind. If she’d had a minute, she might have been able to analyze her complete and unconditional surrender. She didn’t have a minute. He tasted of wine and needed solace - and even in his sadness, he brought pleasure, sweet and satiating pleasure. It infused her senses and lit a flame of long-lost desire in her core. His mouth moved over hers and she clung to him, feeling only his strength and the gentle force of his intentions. When his hand glided down the length of her back and molded her to his body, she melted against him. When she felt his arousal, she melted even more.
Cooper felt the submission of her body, and everything in him tightened with ever greater need. The sweetness of her acquiescence swirled through him like wildfire, touching his chest, and his hands, and his groin . . . where her hips ground so gently against him. Soft. He’d known she’d be soft and giving.
He groaned into her mouth, unable to control the sound. He hadn’t meant to take the kiss so far. He hadn’t meant to let himself get to the point where his mouth was blatantly priming her for the act of love, where his tongue was stroking down the length of hers in a way that left no doubts about what he wanted to do with the rest of his body. He hadn’t meant to get so hard so fast. He’d meant to taste, not to plunder.
But she had flowed against him with the first touch of his mouth on hers. She had responded, opened herself, and totally disarmed him of his planned restraint. A moment ago all he’d wanted was a kiss. Now he wanted to sink himself into her and slide deep. He wanted her softness to consume him, to soothe him and release him.
He’d lied, Jessica thought through a haze. It wasn’t just a kiss. It was the destruction of her expectations. When he kissed, he meant sex, not “hello” or “goodbye,” or “It’s nice to see you.” His kiss didn’t say, “Honey, I’m home.” It said, “I want to take you to bed. Now.”
He desired her, and for a few sweet seconds she let herself revel in the knowledge. Then, of course, it was time to get back to reality—or so she told herself. She wasn’t listening to herself, though. She was listening to him, to the rough sound of his breathing and the seductive noises made by the shifting of their clothing and the shifting of their bodies. She’d missed those things, the sounds of intimacy, since long before her divorce, and now this most inappropriate man was giving them back to her and setting her hormones on fire.
I am a mother, began the hallowed litany of reason, the prime directive, and Jessica latched onto it like a lifeline.
To no avail. As if sensing her attempt at withdrawal, he angled his mouth over hers to deepen the kiss. Her thoughts of motherhood fled before the sensual onslaught. He teased her with his mouth and body, moving in ways that were purely carnal in their intent and their effect.
She knew what all the sensations she was feeling meant, and she knew she had no business feeling them with Cooper Daniels, the fair dragon with the green eyes . . . and the body made of steel. It was a seduction in and of itself, the strength and power of him, the slow contraction of the muscles in his arms as he tightened his hold, the pressure of his groin rubbing against her in a rhythm guaranteed to make her lose her senses.
She moaned and tried to find a shred of inhibition to hold on to. When she did find one, she wished she hadn’t. What was happening was suddenly so clear. Her own husband hadn’t desired her, and she’d been the mother of his children. To a man like Cooper Daniels, she had to be an absolute charity case. He knew she’d been divorced for a long time, and tonight he’d found out she lived with her brothers. He’d decided to have a quick roll in the hay with the poor, man-deprived single mother, knowing he wouldn’t have to work too hard for it. After that, he wouldn’t want her hanging around.
Mortified by her conclusions, she broke off the kiss and pushed away from him. He wasn’t quick enough to waylay her again. He did catch her hand, though, and when she tried to pull free, he made it clear he wasn’t letting go.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, his voice husky with frustration and need.
“Let go of my hand.” She meant it despite the weakness of her delivery and the catch in her breath.
“No. If I let go of you, you’re going to run, and I don’t want you running away from me.”
“I ought to bring you up on charges of sexual harassment.” Her voice stiffened enough to sound at least serious, if not exactly threatening. But she was trembling, and she knew that robbed her words of even the slightest substance.
“Right,” he drawled. “And I might do the same to you.”
She blushed and was only grateful he couldn’t see her in the dim light.
“Fine. I confess to kissing you.” She was more than willing to accept guilt if that would help her cut her losses. She desperately needed to get away from him before she did something truly awful, like cry.
“That’s not good enough, Jessie. I know you kissed me. What I want to know is why you stopped.”
He’d called her Jessie. Only her friends and family called her Jessie, except for her ex-husband. Toward the end of their marriage, he’d never called her anything except Jessica, and disorganized, and boring. Cooper Daniels did not qualify as a friend, and he was as far from her family of upstanding citizens as a person could get without being arrested.
“I would rather not say,” she said, putting as much professional distance in her voice as was possible under the circumstances. It was a pitifully inadequate amount.
“I’d appreciate a little consideration here.” He tightened his hold on her. “I’m ready to make love with you, and thirty seconds ago you felt the same way. Now you don’t. I want to know why. I know you’re not a tease, and I know you don’t scare easy.”
He was being generous again; she felt like a tease. Her response to his kiss, to being held by him, shocked her. It had been a long time since she’d been kissed, but she knew that wasn’t the reason he’d short-circuited her common sense. No matter what he must think, she wasn’t that easy.
“Women have a lot of reasons for saying no. You’re old enough to have figured that out.” She hoped her answer would suffice and wished he would let her go so she could run away from him just as he’d predicted. If a person could die from embarrassment, she was in critical condition, and those damn tears were still waiting for a chance to complete her humiliation.
“I’m not interested in other women’s reasons,” he said, his voice softening as he released her hand. “I’m interested in you, and you can take that any way you want. Confession. Understatement. Indecent proposal.”
She didn’t look at him—she couldn’t—but neither did she run. Afte
r a moment she heard him sigh, a heavy sound filled with resignation.
“Jessie.” He tilted her chin up with his hand. His eyes met hers, steady and uncomfortably perceptive. “I’m as surprised as you are by what happened, but instead of standing here shaking, I’m standing here praying we can make it happen again. The next time we get this close, remember that. The next time we kiss, remember I want more, a whole lot more.”
Jessica didn’t think it was likely she would forget.
Seven
The information Cooper had been expecting arrived at Daniels, Ltd. during Jessica’s Sunday-morning office check. One look told her she wouldn’t be able to store it, file it, download it, or transcribe it. What she could do was offer it a cup of green tea and a chair.
Everything about the “information” was foreign, from her short-cropped black hair, to the exotic tilt of her eyes, to her gray cotton pants and tunic, to the Chinese characters on the sheaf of documents she carried in a padded cloth folder. Everything about her was also very beautiful.
Her name was Cao Bo. Her eyes were a luminous amber-almond color and her skin a delicate golden hue. She spoke barely a word of English, but the few she had mastered were clear in their meaning. She had come for the Dragon, Cooper Daniels, for him alone, and she would not leave, or budge an inch, or say another word, until she had delivered her message.
After deciphering the woman’s purpose and gauging the strength of her conviction, Jessica smiled politely and retreated to the sanctuary of Cooper’s office. She wasn’t up to another wait-and-see match with a beautiful Oriental woman, who undoubtedly knew more about Cooper’s whereabouts than Jessica did.
His itinerary showed his arrival time as eleven-thirty that night. If there had been a change, and he’d informed Ms. Cao and not herself . . . well, he was under no obligation to keep her informed of his every move. He’d only kissed her. That was all.
