by Julie Miller
Rule number one. Look a man in the eye.
She ran her gaze past the flat, flexing plateau of his lips and up beyond the slightly bent angle of his nose to those eyes. This close, she could see the silvery sunburst of color around his pupils, bewitching irises of dove-gray and steel and flint, rimmed by a darker shade of charcoal.
She’d never seen such beautiful eyes.
“Just like that,” he whispered, his words stirring a caress of air against her cheek.
Grace’s lungs expanded, as if just now remembering to breathe. The sudden intake of oxygen seemed to stir some coherent thought inside her brain.
“Does that mean you’re taking the assignment?”
“You’re going after Mitchell no matter what I say, aren’t you?”
Trapped by the unexpected warmth in those beautiful gray eyes, she could only nod.
“You’re clueless enough that somebody needs to watch your back.”
His shoulders shifted in her peripheral vision, and a moment later she felt the weight of silk-lined leather settling around her, enveloping her in Logan’s warmth and scent. She clutched his jacket together at her neck, but wondered if the tender gesture was the equivalent of another dismissive pat on the head.
“Will you be the one watching my back?”
He raked his gaze down along the swell of her breasts, giving her the distinct impression that he might be willing to watch even more. She pressed her lips together to quell the anticipation that raced through her, not trusting her ability to read a man’s thoughts.
“You have the raw materials to get the job done. But a rookie like you needs the best in the business to pull this off. You need me.”
There was less cocky arrogance in his statement than there was a reluctant acceptance of fact.
“So you’ll have me ready to go undercover by the end of the week…partner?”
“I won’t promise miracles. You still have nine rules to learn.” He pushed her glasses back onto her nose, plunging her back into plain-Jane obscurity and reminding her of the enormity of his task. “And don’t call me partner.”
WHO’D HAVE THOUGHT? The stunned question played through Logan’s mind again as he unpacked a second helmet from the back of his Harley-Davidson.
His body still ached from that torrid encounter back in the administration building with Grace. He thought he could scare her off from her foolish notion of going after Harris Mitchell. Knock some sense into that virginal determination of hers. But she’d been so soft to the touch, so responsive to his hands and mouth.
Teach her how to seduce a man?
She’d damn near seduced him.
And she didn’t even know it.
Grace Lockhart was deliberately disguising a national treasure. She was plain as a bucket until she lost her temper. But a little bit of makeup would get her noticed no matter her state of mind. She was blind as a bat, but contacts would help. She had soft hair with a tendency to curl that she controlled in an unflattering bun. A reputable salon would know what to do there.
But beneath that gray, shapeless suit—
Who’d have thought?
She might be the brainy strategist Carmody claimed, but she had inexperience written all over her. Sexual and professional. He had to make her smarter. Teach her survival skills. Teach her to mentally detach herself from a man’s touch when she was working undercover, to look at him with those liquid green orbs and make him think he had just given her the best sexual rush of her life.
A look like that could make a man think the cuddling and fondling and kissing they shared was the real thing.
Logan raked his fingers through his hair and struggled to find a similar detachment. He had five days to mold Grace Lockhart into a savvy, sexy field agent who could bring Harris Mitchell to his knees, and then walk away unscathed. Did he really think he could pull this off? Or was he just too afraid that nobody else understood the consequences of failure?
A sobering image of Roy Silverton’s bullet-ridden body blipped into his mind and reaffirmed his decision to take this assignment. He had to do this right. He hadn’t prepared Roy for every contingency. But he’d make double sure Grace knew how to take care of herself. How to think on her feet.
And what he couldn’t teach her, he’d take care of himself. He’d keep her alive.
To do that, he couldn’t let himself be distracted by the temptation of that goddesslike figure. He had to play this like a pro. Keep his mind focused on the mission. Keep Grace in one piece, not take her to his bed.
The scuff of her flat-heeled oxfords on the asphalt pavement announced her arrival long before she said a word.
“You’re joking, right?”
He watched her look down at the slim fit of her skirt and up at the back seat of his Harley. She thumbed over her shoulder toward the center of the parking lot. “My car’s just over there. We could take it to lunch, instead.”
“Sensible sedan, right?”
She nodded. “Safe. Good mileage—”
“We’ll requisition a new car for you. Something sporty. Red, I think.” Lustful thoughts of long blond hair blowing across the back seat of a red convertible eased the doom and gloom that had consumed him. A nice roomy back seat where…
“I would prefer blue. Or green.”
Logan opened his eyes and shook his head at her earnest expression. She’d rebuttoned her gray-suited armor up to her neck, and fastened her hair back into that tight little bun. She hadn’t even left any curling wisps free to soften her face. Instead, she’d added a functional black shoulder attaché to the outfit. Probably where she carried that ever-present notebook.
She just didn’t get it, did she? Men would salute that body of hers. Harris Mitchell would voluntarily go to prison for that body. He, personally, would sacrifice a well-earned vacation for the opportunity to know that body better—once he got her through this assignment.
He had to teach her to get comfortable with her fantasy-proportioned figure. To use it to her advantage.
Oh, yeah.
“Definitely red.”
Logan reached into his jeans and pulled out his pocketknife. Confused, distrusting perhaps, Grace took a step back when he knelt in front of her. “What are you—?” With a grasp and a twist, he slit the seam of her skirt. “Hey!”
He preferred that flash of fire in her cheeks to her usual pasty-faced demeanor.
“If you want to work undercover, you have to be willing to take risks. Willing to do what you don’t normally do. Willing to do whatever’s necessary to get the job done.” He punctuated his first bit of advice by ripping the seam of her skirt up to the hemline of her jacket.
“Oh, my God. You ruined it.”
Logan stood, smiled, put away his pocketknife, and enjoyed the twists and turns of her body as she struggled first to assess the damage, and then to tuck her slip up beneath the thigh-high slit. “Don’t worry, just make a note of it. The agency will reimburse you. C’mon.”
He put on his helmet, buckled the second one around the flushed fury of her face and climbed onto the Harley. When he had the engine purring smoothly beneath him, he extended his hand for Grace.
“I’ve never been on a motorcycle before.”
He’d guessed as much. He steadied her while she tested one foothold and then another, finally climbing aboard as if it were a horse waiting to buck her off. She settled astride the seat, behind him, leaving a good five inches of space between them. “What do I do?”
Logan grinned. “Hold on, sweetheart.”
He could barely feel the pressure of her fingertips at his waist. Definitely not the way a sexy woman held on to her man. Time to teach her another lesson.
“Just hold on.”
He revved the engine and kicked it into gear, pulling the bike up to forty miles per hour before even reaching the security gate. By the time he had her on the highway cruising toward New York City, Grace had become a second skin to him, her face buried in the middle of his back and h
er arms cinched around his middle. He glanced down at her white-knuckled grasp on his belt buckle.
Oh, yeah.
Between her body and his guilty conscience, the next five days were going to be one hell of a ride.
3
GRACE WATCHED Logan slip twenty dollars to the maître d’. “Is the agency going to pick up the tab for that, too?”
Logan smiled at her sarcasm and urged her along in front of him.
Despite his casual attire and her torn skirt, they were seated in the center of the plush Willingham Hotel restaurant, amid tables filled with businessmen and women dressed more appropriately and impeccably in suits. Keenly conscious of several curious stares, Grace opened her menu and hid her face behind it.
Once their arrival became old news and the patrons returned to their own conversations, she slapped the menu shut and leaned forward. “What the hell are we doing here?”
Logan had unzipped his jacket and sprawled back in his chair. With his long legs hidden beneath the white linen tablecloth, he sipped on a glass of water topped with a twist of lime. “I believe it’s called lunch.”
“I said I was happy to eat at the hot dog vendor’s down on the corner.”
At the snap of her whisper, Logan set down his glass and leaned forward, as annoyingly relaxed in their posh surroundings as she was self-conscious. “Hot dogs are a whole other lesson. You want to seduce a big-time crime lord. So we have to learn the big-time lessons first. Mitchell’s got money out the wazoo. You’re going to have to look like you’re at home in places like this.” His eyes lit with amusement at her expense. “So far you’re not doing very well, Gracie.”
She stiffened at the nickname, hearing the cutesy, belittling appellation like a hundred bad memories slapping her in the face. “Never call me Gracie. I am a twenty-six-year-old professional law enforcement officer. Grace or Agent Lockhart will do just fine.”
He patted the air with his hands, placating her. “Don’t be so eager to defend yourself. Keep your temper. Grace, it is.”
At least he’d allow her that one smidgen of respect. She had a feeling she’d have to swallow plenty of pride before this mission was accomplished. She pulled out her steno pad and opened it to the page where she’d listed ten numbers.
“Is that one of your rules?” She clicked her mechanical pencil and prepared to write. “Play it cool? I can do that.”
He reached across the table and stilled her hand. Sensing her instinct to jerk away from the personal contact, his long, calloused fingers wrapped around hers, pencil and all, trapping her in a vise of velvet and steel. Short of stabbing him with a fork or screaming her head off, she was his prisoner.
She shot him as damning a glance as she could muster through her glasses.
“Control, Grace.” Logan shook his finger at her like the recalcitrant pupil she was. “I’m talking about control. A man likes the challenge of breaking that control. You want to be his match, not easy pickings. He wants to earn his reward.”
Something about the softly articulated movement of his lips distracted her from the need to assert herself. The husky pitch of his voice, whispered for her ears alone, seeped inside her like a promise.
She heard her voice in the same soft whisper. “What’s your reward in all this?”
“Walking away from this assignment with you in one piece.”
“I can handle myself.”
Without blinking, those silvery eyes fixed on hers, capturing her curiosity, demanding her attention. Logan pulled her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist. Grace jumped in her chair, shocked by the bubbling heat that simmered beneath the firm, warm pressure of his lips against her pulse. The whiskers on his chin abraded an apparently sensitive patch of skin there, sending out thousands of tiny little aftershocks in the kiss’s wake.
What surprised her more though, was the lingering, languid warmth that seemed to turn her arm into molten putty, rendering it useless. Rendering her useless for the time being.
“If you can’t handle this, you can’t handle Mitchell.”
“What? Oh.” Grace pulled her hand away and tucked it beneath her napkin in her lap, subconsciously hiding the betraying appendage until she could gather the good sense to compensate for such a mind-numbing reaction to a simple kiss.
Logan settled back and nodded toward her notebook. “You’d better write that down, too. Rule number three. Know your erogenous zones. But don’t tell a man where all of them are. He likes the thrill of discovering some for himself.”
The discovery part hadn’t been all that bad for her, either. She was honest enough to chart that bit of research in her memory. But, good God, it was just a kiss! The world hadn’t shattered beneath her feet. She’d seen no fireworks. After all, men and women had been kissing for centuries, eons, in fact. No need to make a big deal of it. He hadn’t even touched her mouth, just a silly little nibble on her wrist.
She quickly jotted down seduction rules numbers two and three—stay in control; know erogenous zones—embarrassed to admit that, though the earth hadn’t swallowed her up whole, she had, for a few moments, lost all capacity for rational thought. Logan had a point. If she couldn’t stay focused in Harris Mitchell’s company, she wouldn’t be able to plant the computer virus that would expose all his contacts. And she’d be endangering both her and Logan’s cover.
In an act of self-preservation, she quickly turned to the front of her steno pad and wrote a word at the top of the first page.
Research.
Only, she went back to add, in capital letters. No sense getting confused by the education process. Logan was teaching her what she needed to know about working undercover. She was the student who needed to know about catching Harris Mitchell’s eye, winning his trust, and becoming part of his organization. This was research.
This wasn’t real.
Getting trapped in those silvery eyes, collapsing after a kiss on the wrist or a sweep of Logan’s tongue against her neck—none of that was real.
She caught a glimpse of her torn skirt. What was left of her self-righteous anger deflated in a heartbeat. She was Grace Lockhart, frumpy computer nerd. She’d spent her formative years developing her brain and a defensive suit of armor to compensate for the developing shape of her body and a fear of repeating her mother’s mistakes.
Logan Pierce was a secret-agent hero. A handsome, dangerous man who could have any woman he wanted around the world.
She was a curiosity, perhaps. One of those challenges he said men liked. He might even be intrigued by the outrageous proposal to turn her into a seductress. But no way could she be on his list of desirable women. No way.
She went back to the Research Only note and added five exclamation points and a handful of stars.
GRACE HAD JUST POLISHED off her grilled chicken and mushroom pasta when she heard the voice.
“Gracie!” That high-pitched, whispery voice managed to carry across the entire restaurant. “Gracie, darling!”
Her fork clattered on her plate and she scanned the room for the nearest exit.
“Friend of yours?” Logan set his napkin on the table beside his coffee.
“Not exactly.”
Though she’d already been spotted, she nevertheless tried to shield her face behind her hand.
But the woman would have found her one way or the other. Something about a special bond she claimed they shared.
She felt a hug around her shoulders and a kiss on her cheek. Automatically, Grace wiped the spot with her napkin, knowing there would be a splotch of crimson lipstick.
Odd, she thought, when she looked at her napkin. Pale pink.
“Honey. Aren’t you going to get up and give me a hug?”
The different shade of lipstick had thrown her enough to respond without thinking—the way she had when she was a child.
“Mother.” She stood and hugged the woman she matched physically, inch for inch, although the outside trappings were considerably different.
>
Mimsey Lockhart leaned back and held Grace’s hands. “I never thought I’d run into you in the city today. What a glorious coincidence.”
“May I get an introduction?” Grace recognized a touch of more-than-polite interest in Logan’s husky voice.
“Mother. This is Agent Logan Pierce. My mother—Mimsey Lockhart.”
“Delighted to meet you.” His dangerous charm turned on to full magnetism was practically blinding. He clasped Mimsey’s hand between his and lifted it to his lips. Grace caught her breath.
He kissed her mother’s hand! Not quite the way he had kissed her wrist, but still… Grace averted her face, ashamed to recognize a stab of jealousy. She quickly derailed the emotion by remembering two things. Logan was a natural charmer. If he didn’t have the ability to please all the ladies, she wouldn’t have requested him for this assignment.
And, second, she knew that beaming smile on her mother’s face could have been achieved with considerably less than a kiss on the hand.
“Won’t you sit down?” Oh, God, had Logan really invited her mother to join them?
Grace shot him a look across the table. “We were just leaving.”
“No, we weren’t.” Logan absorbed her subtle plea for help with a smile of feigned innocence. “We haven’t finished our coffee.”
“Who needs coffee?” she muttered between clenched teeth. “The caffeine’s bad for us.”
Ignoring her not-so-subtle hint, he pulled out a chair and Mimsey perched on the edge. “I can’t stay long, anyway. Grant’s checking into the hotel and then he’s taking me down to his new theater.”
Logan sat, angling his body toward Mimsey, a gesture of interest and acceptance that irked Grace. “Grant?” he asked.
“Grant Stewart.” Mimsey patted her platinum coiffure and turned to Grace. “You remember him from our California days, don’t you, dear?”
What had he been, paramour two? Seven? Twenty?
But Mimsey hadn’t really been expecting an answer, so she turned back to Logan. “Grant’s a producer, mostly Hollywood stuff. But he’s expanding into the New York theater scene now. He’s putting together an off-Broadway play, and is thinking about casting me in the role of the aunt.” She reached for Grace’s hand and squeezed it. The excitement playing over Mimsey’s painted features was contagious. Almost.
