River Road

by JoAnn Ross

  In fact, one frustrated former lover had, just before their brief affair ended, accused him of hiding all his feelings—if he even had any—behind a damn impenetrable stone face. He hadn't challenged her accusation since she was pretty much right. Any FBI Special Agent who revealed emotion wouldn't last long on the street, or in the Bureau. If there was a way to compartmentalize his feelings, Finn hadn't found it. Not that he'd ever looked all that hard; his life, both professionally and personally, had always suited him just fine.

  So how was it that both seemed to be spinning out of control at the same time ?

  The thing to do now was to prioritize. First he'd regain control of this immediate situation with Julia. Then he could tackle the problem of how the hell he was going to get through the next week and a half.

  "Sure, I enjoyed it." He might not volunteer information, but neither did he lie. "You're a dynamite kisser." Because it was too tempting to kiss her again, Finn sought something, anything, to say to cool things down. "Of course, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. Since you've had a lot of practice."

  Finn could have taken out his Glock and shot himself the minute he heard the words coming out of his mouth- If either Nate or Jack had heard him screw up like that, they'd probably be on the floor howling with laughter.

  Instead of crumbling into a little puddle of hurt feelings, she fired right back at him. "Correction: Amanda's had a lot of practice. If you can't tell the difference by now, you're even more clueless about the opposite sex than you let on."

  "Okay." You can defuse this situation, Finn assured himself. Hell, you aced hostage negotiation and terrorist training. Handling one woman, even one who was as pissed off as this one seemed to be, should be a piece of cake. "You're right. I misspoke."

  "Now there's a governmental bureaucratic word for you," she muttered.

  "I may be clueless when it comes to women—"

  "May be?"

  Finn forged on. "I may be one of the most socially inept guys you've ever met—"

  "Oh, believe me, Callahan," she interrupted him again, "you win the crown."

  He ground his teeth. "The thing is, you're understandably upset right now. And probably, although you've been doing a bang-up job of hiding it, a little scared. I had no right to take advantage of you that way."

  "You weren't taking advantage of me. I wanted you to kiss me. Are you going to try to tell me that you haven't wondered what it would be like? That you haven't been at all curious?"

  Truth warred with the desire to get out of these treacherous waters, he was already in way over his head. "Sure. But I shouldn't have allowed it to happen."

  "Allowed!" That had her on her feet in a flash. "You allowed? Listen, you insufferable, arrogant—"

  "Dammit, you've got a short fuse."

  "Only when I'm forced to be locked up in close quarters with a bossy, humorless control freak." Her finger jabbed against the front of his shirt; Finn grasped her hand and held it against his chest.

  He sighed heavily, then tried again. "Look, I'm probably all you've accused me of and a lot more. I also think you're gorgeous, sexy as hell, not to mention being a very nice woman."

  "Nice," she muttered. Finn was encouraged when she didn't yank her hand away. "A glass of wine with a shrimp salad at the beach is nice. TV weather forecasters are nice. The guy who greets you at Wal-Mart is paid to be nice. Excuse me if I don't find nice that huge a compliment. As for being gorgeous, I honestly don't see it, though others seem to. But I can't take credit for great genes. My mother's stunningly beautiful."

  "I know." Once again, Finn could have bit his tongue off. For someone who never spoke without thinking first, he was definitely bypassing his brain today.

  "That's right." She shot him a frustrated look. "You've been busy digging up dirt on me and my family, so you've undoubtedly seen all our mug shots."

  "As a matter of fact, I have. Are you going to slug me if I say yours looked pretty damn good?"

  "For a woman with a number across her chest." A reluctant smile teased at the corner of her lips. "Damn it, Callahan, you really do know how to sweet-talk a girl, don't you?" It was her turn to sigh. "I can't believe we're even having this conversation. I can't believe I kissed an FBI agent. I especially can't believe that even as irritated as I am at you right now, I want to do it again."

  That made two of them.

  Kissing her had been a huge mistake. Instead of easing his hunger, now that he knew she tasted every bit as good as she looked, he was starving for more. Forbidden fruit was always the most appealing.

  "Probably not as much as I do.” In a gesture more suited to Nate, one he would have groaned at only a few days ago, Finn lifted their joined hands and skimmed a light kiss over her knuckles. "The thing is, it can't go anywhere."

  "What makes you think I want it to? We're just talking a kiss here, Callahan. Basic physical attraction. Did you hear me say anything about needing orange blossoms or ever-afters?"

  "No. But don't most women want them?" Frustrated, he rubbed the bridge of his nose. If he screwed up his work as badly as he had this, he wouldn't be able to get a job as a meter maid.

  "A woman doesn't necessarily need marriage these days to be fulfilled."

  "I know that." He had women friends in the Bureau who'd drilled that into him. "What's your favorite Fleming novel?"

  "What?" She blinked at the apparent sudden change in subject.

  "Your favorite Bond book. Which is it?"

  "That's easy. On Her Majesty's Service. Why? And what's yours?"

  "It changes. I suppose right now I'd have to say Thunderball." Finn could definitely identify with the disgraced spy who was sent off to a health farm for two weeks to get his act together. "And it's interesting that yours just happens to be the one book in which the guy gets married."

  "His wife also gets killed in the end. Which blows any theory you might try to be formulating about my reading tastes and my own personal feelings about matrimony."

  "Okay, maybe you'll follow in your parents' footsteps and skip taking the vows, but I'm pretty good at profiling and I'd peg you as the type of woman who believes in the happily-ever-after kind of storybook love."

  "Don't you?"

  "I believe in it for some people."

  His parents came instantly to mind. Jake Callahan had doted on his dark-eyed Marie and she'd openly adored him. In fact, there'd been times when their penchant for public displays of affection had embarrassed the hell out of their three sons.

  "Now you have me curious." She tilted her head. "Are you saying you've never thought about spending the rest of your life with one special woman?"

  "Not really."

  He wasn't like Nate, who was open about his desire to go to his grave playing the field, but Finn's work precluded any sustained relationship.

  His last had been in the early days of his hunt for Lawson. He'd been dating a bright, ambitious senatorial aide who, while her work might keep her up on the Hill until all hours of the night, was not at all pleased when he stood her up for one of the inaugural balls.

  He'd been notified that another girl's body had been found in the desert outside Las Vegas, the MO too close to the first murder in San Diego to be ignored. In his rush to catch the first plane out of National, he'd forgotten to call the aide, which had resulted in a blistering message on his voice mail, complete with sexual suggestions that were as physically impossible as they were graphic.

  Since then his relationships had been kept to brief, no-strings affairs with women he knew well enough not to risk playing sexual Russian roulette. Sometimes they'd go out to dinner, have a few drinks, then return to her place for some hot steamy sex, after which, more often than not, he'd return to his own apartment before morning.

  Other times they'd skip the preliminaries and go straight to the sex. Since the women were every bit as career driven and no more interested in a long-term relationship than he was, everyone stayed happy.

  After his brother Jack's w
edding a couple months ago, there were times when Finn had tried to imagine himself settling down with a wife and kids. He could see himself possibly getting married. Someday. Years from now, when he was retired, settled down, and wanted companionship for his old age.

  "So, how about you?" he asked, partly because he wanted to move the focus away from him and partly because he was curious. "Is there some special guy in your life these days?"

  She seemed to be living alone in her Venice house, but that didn't necessarily mean she wasn't involved with someone. He hadn't had time to do an in-depth investigation.

  "Do you honestly believe that if I was in an intimate relationship, I would have kissed you like that?" She shot him a seething look. "You're the hotshot profiler. Do you think I'm the kind of woman who'd cheat on anyone I cared about?"

  "I take it that's a no."

  Julia folded her arms. "One thing I love about you, Callahan, is how good you are at reading subtleties."

  The bitch of it was, he'd always been good at picking up nuances. But it was difficult to think clearly when his body craved her and his mind was so full of her all there was room for was hunger. He'd spent the past nights twisted into a pretzel on that hard, too-short couch, unable to get his mind off the woman sleeping just on the other side of the bedroom door.

  Did she sleep in the nude? Or in some slinky bit of Hollywood siren's satin? Right before dawn this morning, he'd imagined her in a brief bit of lace and silk designed to make a man's mouth water.

  He'd envisioned skimming his hands over her slender curves, thought about how he'd nudge the thin straps down with his teeth. A mental picture of her sitting in the middle of that king-size bed, amid tousled sheets, the bit of froth clinging provocatively to the rosy tips of her breasts, had filled his mind.

  Two hundred push-ups later, he'd still been edgy, itchy, and, although it wasn't her fault he couldn't keep his mind reined in, a little angry at her for his inability to do so.

  He shook his head. "It would be a mistake."

  She didn't need to ask what he meant. "Perhaps. But I've always believed that we regret most the things we don't do. Things we're left wondering about after the opportunity has passed."

  Finn didn't have to wonder what being with her would be like. Even before he'd made the mistake of kissing her, he'd known that sex with this woman would be hot and explosive. And dangerous. A need this strong could make a man weak. Vulnerable.

  "Point taken. But we're talking about more than just sex. Even if I didn't have a rule about mixing my personal life with my professional one—"

  "This isn't exactly professional. Despite what you keep saying, I'm not an official FBI case you've been assigned to. You told me that you agreed to baby-sit me as a favor to your brother. That, to me, seems to move it into the personal arena."

  He blew out a breath. "Do you have to argue every little point?"

  "When something's important to me. I was brought up to question the status quo and never take things at face value. And in case you haven't dug up a copy of my yearbook, I also happened to be captain of my high school debating team."

  "Now why doesn't that surprise me?" Finn's brain was finally beginning to clear. "Yeah, I want you. Any man in his right mind would. I haven't felt this way about a woman since I fell for Jaclyn Smith when she was one of the Angels."

  Her eyes narrowed. "I have difficulty picturing you watching Charlie's Angel's."

  What did she think? That he'd spent his adolescence glued to PBS? "Hey, I wanted to be a cop. So I watched a lot of crime shows." When she arched a challenging eyebrow, he grinned again. "Actually that one was a lot better with the sound off."

  Her light laughter touched her eyes and made them sparkle appealingly. "There may be hope for you yet, Special Agent."

  "That's debatable."

  "You're a hard man, Callahan."

  "I'm a realist."

  "A pessimist," she shot back without heat.

  She'd splayed her hands on her hips, drawing his attention to bare flesh as smooth and tasty-looking as cream. All-too-familiar smoke clouds began billowing again in his mind.

  "Dammit, don't you own anything big and baggy and ugly?"

  The humor in her gaze brightened to delight.

  Finn saw the exact moment she remembered. The light in her eyes went out, like a candle snuffed out by an icy winter's wind.

  "Well, at least I can't say you're not a distraction," she said on a soft, exhaled breath. "For a minute I'd almost forgotten what you're doing here."

  She pressed her fingers against her eyes. "Okay, I admit it. Whoever he is, he's got me scared."

  He hesitated, reason warring with the need to comfort. This time when he took her in his arms, it was to soothe rather than arouse.

  Chapter 15

  Two Hours later, while he watched Julia flutter around the ballroom dance floor in a scandalous scarlet gown, flirting outrageously with the men and scandalizing the women, Finn decided that while she may look as delicate as a magnolia blossom, the lady definitely had a steel core. Not a single person would ever guess that she'd received another threat this morning.

  Except, of course, the person who'd slipped it into her trailer.

  They'd pulled out all the stops today. The room, which Jack had restored to its original glory earlier in the year, was crowded with the cast and extras from as far away as Lafayette.

  The women's hoopskirts swayed like colorful tulips as they danced in the arms of formally dressed men to the sounds of a string ensemble hired from New Orleans.

  Finn was standing on the sidelines, watching her take advantage of a break in shooting to get her picture taken with one of the extras, an elderly woman dressed in mourning, when Nate came up to him.

  "She looks good."

  "She always looks good." Finn frowned at the scores of Blue Bayou parish residents who had come out to Beau Soleil to watch the goings-on, as they'd been doing every day. Even knowing that having a movie company come to town was on a par with waking up one morning and finding Disney World had moved its magic kingdom to your front yard, he wasn't comfortable with the crowds.

  Unfortunately, his arguments to Kendall and Hogan to close the set had been rejected. Making matters worse, a crew from Entertainment Tonight was scheduled to arrive this week. Apparently showing stars mingling with local folks made for good TV.

  "You thinking of calling in reinforcements, now that she's gotten that second photograph?"

  "I don't know."

  "With so many people on the cast knowing about that first photograph, it's going to be hard to keep it under wraps." Nate said what Finn had already been telling himself.

  "It's just Kendall, Hogan and the primary cast. At least it's supposed to be. To everyone else, we're sticking to the friends story."

  "Looks like you're getting to be pretty close friends." Nate's quick grin belied the seriousness of the topic. "I watched the two of you earlier, between takes. You probably had a dozen people between you, but you could have been the only two people in the room."

  "I'm just doing my job."

  "Come on, Finn. You're talking to your brother here. A man who's pretty damn good at picking up women's signals. And she's broadcasting at 100,000 watts." His gaze skimmed over Finn's face, taking in the bags beneath his eyes, his unshaved jaw. "She's not the only one."

  "Sleeping with her would mean putting aside my personal code of ethics."

  "I've always admired you, big brother. But I hadn't realized you'd become a monk since leaving home."

  "I'm supposed to protect her. Not take advantage of her vulnerability."

  "I can understand that." Nate nodded. "And it's a good excuse. But why do I get the feeling that it's not just Julia you're trying to protect?"

  The woman had not only disturbed his life, she'd unsettled his entire universe. For as long as Finn could remember, he'd been the rock. The big brother Jack and Nate could turn to when they'd had problems, or fucked up, which Jack had done a lot
more often than Nate. Though Finn had always suspected that his youngest brother had had his own way of dealing with their father's death.

  He'd become the responsible one; Jack had turned rebel. Nate, who was the most gregarious of the three, seemed to decide that it was his duty to ease those horrendous days with unrelenting smiles, easy humor and charm.

  Nate had been the only one of the Callahan boys who could make their mother smile through her tears. And less than a decade later, when she'd been dying of breast cancer, it had been Nate who, despite her protests, immediately dropped out of college and moved back home to be with her. Marie Callahan had died with her eldest and youngest sons at her side, smiling at some foolish joke Nate had made.

  Finn figured he'd always owe Nate for that one. He also knew that, like all of them, Nate had inherited Big Jake's Irish tenacity and could, in his own cheerful way, be as unrelenting as water carving away at a stone.

  "My life's messed up enough right now," he said. "I've got the Wicked Witch of the West back in D.C. to contend with, and even if Jansen wasn't in the picture, my career takes up all my time and energy. Besides, there's no future in getting involved."

  "Who's saying anything about a future? Ever think about just loosening up and enjoying the moment, cher?"

  Nate was smiling but Finn thought he heard a hint of friendly censure in the mild tone.

  "No." As if sensing his gaze on her, Julia looked up from a discussion of the script with the writer and director. When her lips curved in a luscious Bond Girl smile, Finn nearly forgot he knew how to breathe.

  Oh, God. He was so getting to her, Julia thought. Having become attuned to Finn in the few days that they'd been forced together, it had seemed perfectly natural to feel his gaze from across the room. He stirred her senses, warming her blood as if he was touching her with those big wide hands, instead of his eyes.

  Did he know what he did to her? How he made her feel? Most men had a strong sense of their seductive powers. The majority, at least in Los Angeles, seemed to possess an inflated opinion of their ability to charm a woman into their beds.