Jinxed!

by Jacquie D’Alessandro

  “It’s in your pants.”

  No, what was in his pants was a hard-on to rival all hard-ons. “Actually…”

  She’d been holding herself rigid, but now she gave new meaning to the phrase still as stone, and he grimaced. “It’s on the floor. Bend with me to reach for it.” Without waiting for her to protest or decide to try to unman him again, he hunkered and forced her down with him. He had his free hand on her belly, which he could feel quivering. His other hand-attached to hers by the wrist-reached out to feel around the floor. Bent as they were, with her practically in his lap, the position became unintentionally erotic.

  Or maybe not so unintentionally.

  He couldn’t seem to help himself. Feeling like a pervert, he gritted his teeth and felt around for the light, finally grabbing it. When he straightened, she did as well, and this time, she turned, facing him within the tight circle of his body and the wall now at her back.

  He held up the light, and she drew a steadying breath. “It’s you. I know it.”

  Damn it. He lowered the light to their sides. He had to be careful here, very careful. When he’d taken this case, he’d had no idea that she was involved in any way. When he’d first seen her name, he’d hoped it’d been another Chloe Cooper.

  “I know it’s you,” she said softly in the dark. “Say it’s you or I’m going to-”

  He felt the shift of her weight and knew she was going to try to kick him again. To avoid that he sandwiched her between the wall and his body, chest to chest this time, thighs to thighs…and unfortunately, everything in between.

  At that, all professionalism packed up and left him. He needed to back away, needed to put some space between them, but that was damn hard when all he wanted to do was grab her close, kiss her blind and push up into her body.

  Yeah, that was professional at its finest. He struggled to get it together and, lacking that ability, simply tried to locate some working brain cells.

  “Ian-” Accompanying her soft plea, her free hand came up, sinking into his hair, tugging his head down, and then…oh, God, and then…she kissed him.

  And it was like coming home.

  Yeah, way to back away there, champ. But she was kissing him, letting out a soft little sexy-as-hell murmur from deep in her throat, her body moving against his, her hands clutching at him, all lush and warm and needy female.

  Ah, God, it was good. So good he was already trembling, his breath trapped in his throat the way all his blood was now trapped behind his button fly.

  Get it together.

  He didn’t. Well, except to better line up their lips. Not his smartest decision, but his brain was truly no longer in control. The feel of her lips sent waves of heat and hunger and a barely repressed longing he hadn’t realized he still felt, all of it colliding within him, surprising him with its force so that he shook with it. “Wait,” he gasped.

  She didn’t. Of course she didn’t. Instead she nibbled first one corner of his mouth and then the other, while inside him the heat burst into flame. Stop, he ordered himself, but that was far more difficult then he’d imagined, and he kept kissing her for another minute, lightly, softly now, trying like hell to let them both down easy. “We have to stop,” he whispered.

  Her answer to that was to run the tip of her tongue along his lower lip.

  Unable to control himself, he sucked it right into his mouth. Oh, yeah. God. This was crazy.

  Crazy.

  She was driving him right out of his mind with that heart-stopping mouth of hers, and he let out a dark, shockingly needy sound that would have destroyed him if he hadn’t sensed she felt the same way. He told himself to back away, but he didn’t.

  He wasn’t sure what kind of fool that made him, but then she cupped his face and took that sweet tongue of hers on a tour of his and that was it, he was one, two, three, down for the count. Helplessly drowning in her and not caring, he went to band his arms around her, but came up against the barrier of his own handcuffs.

  Shit.

  How he’d nearly forgotten was beyond him. He slipped his free hand around her, low on her spine, so that he could haul her up against him. His other hand, the one linked to hers, he drew up over her head, against the wall, holding it there as he let the kiss take him.

  And take him it did. At her back, his fingers closed over the material of her thin top, fisting in it so that he felt bare skin.

  Heated, smooth, bare skin.

  Once upon a time he’d known how every inch of her tasted, and she’d tasted like heaven. He had no doubt that hadn’t changed, and his mouth watered just thinking about putting his mouth on her.

  Everywhere.

  “You kiss the same,” she murmured against his mouth. “It is you…” Her lips slid along his jaw. “The whole palm-reading thing threw me off balance, but deep down, I knew…”

  Palm reading? He had no idea what she was talking about, but he turned his head to capture her mouth again, deepening the kiss, and when he’d drowned in her, when they’d drowned in each other, she pulled back.

  “Say it,” she whispered intensely, breathlessly, completely and one hundred percent undoing him. “Say it.”

  Sunk, he pressed his forehead to hers.

  “Ian,” she urged.

  Hell. His heart was thumping against hers and he was sucking in air like a beached fish. “Yes. It’s me.” Goddammit.

  “I knew it!” She let out a low laugh. “God. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I’m sorry.” And he was. He really was one big sorry son-of-a-bitch.

  “And why are we handcuffed together? Are you a cop?”

  “FBI agent.”

  “So you thought what, that I was breaking and entering?”

  The story. He needed to remember his story. Not easy when he had her in his arms, his engines still revving. “I was here-”

  “Because of the party?”

  That worked. “Yes. The party.” He could feel her looking at him, clearly absorbing his hesitation.

  “You were on a date,” she said.

  Right. Only what kind of slime would be on a date and yet kiss another woman? “Uh…yeah. A date.”

  “She left you?”

  Yes, if “she” was his very male partner. And if by left, she meant Danny taking Ian’s car home because of a nasty case of the Shouldn’t-Have-Had-That-Whole-Pizza.

  Up until that point he and Danny had been narrowing in on their antiquities/fencing case, the one that had taken up the past six months of their lives. The case involved an entire ring of thieves involved in selling stolen antiques, apparently led by two: Steve and Al Adams, partners in the antiquities auction house that they stood in at this very moment.

  Up until last night, everything had been quiet, mostly just research and endless tailing on his and Danny’s part, but then last night they’d discovered the two dead bodies in Al’s garage-the informants who’d led Ian and Danny to the antiquities business in the first place. Yeah, things were ratcheting up. “I’m here alone now.”

  “Oh, Ian.”

  God, she bought it. She bought that he’d been on a date and then dumped, and he felt like crap.

  Her fingers were gentle on his jaw. “I can give you a ride home.”

  Lower than crap.

  “So why are you up here?” she asked. “In the antiquities office, when it’s closed? Handcuffing me?”

  Good question. And a valid one. “I came up here to see you again.”

  Or investigate you.

  Pick one.

  “Oh.” Confusion clouded her voice as she tugged lightly on the handcuffs. “I still don’t understand why you didn’t tell me.”

  Ah, hell. Hurt had replaced her fear, and while he was glad she was no longer afraid, hurting her was pretty much the last thing he wanted to do.

  Too bad he didn’t always get to do what he wanted.

  He had to tell her some of the truth. “I didn’t tell you because I can’t be seen here tonight.”

  “Wh
at do you mean? People saw you downstairs.”

  “Doubtful. I blended in. No one can know,” he repeated, lifting her face to his in the dark. “No one. Do you understand?”

  His question hit a brick wall of silence.

  In fact, she was silent for so long he nearly checked for a pulse, except that he could still feel her heart thundering against his.

  “You’re looking at me funny,” she said very quietly. “Am I in trouble, Ian?”

  He touched her hair and fought with himself against pressing his face into the sweet spot of her neck. Yeah, she was in trouble.

  And so was he.

  5

  “IAN?” CHLOE WHISPERED IN the dark. She was still touching him, one hand on his face, the other linked to his by the handcuffs.

  Handcuffs.

  She was handcuffed to Ian McCall, which, she reminded herself, wasn’t the oddest thing that had happened.

  Not when she thought about that kiss they’d just shared.

  That explosive kiss. Explosive and wildly passionate and hotter than anything she’d experienced since…well, since him. “I don’t understand,” she said. “Who are you watching? What’s going on in here that requires an FBI agent?”

  He pressed his forehead to hers and answered her question with one of his own. “Chloe, why were you in here tonight?”

  “I heard a noise.”

  “You have a key?”

  “I do their books, and when they’re out of town, I keep an eye on things.”

  “So you’re close friends with them?”

  She went still from the very inside. Still and cold. “Why does this suddenly feel like an interrogation?”

  He didn’t answer that, either, and she slid her hand down his taut arm to grab the flashlight, which she lifted to see his face.

  He didn’t flinch but looked right at her from those once dreamy eyes, which now held more than a hint of the hunger she’d just experienced.

  And something else, something that made alarms go off in her head, even more than the handcuffs.

  Worry. “Ian. You’re scaring me. What’s going on?”

  “Let’s just get out of here,” he said, turning away.

  Oh, no. She wasn’t going anywhere without answers. So she pulled him back, unfortunately dropping the flashlight to do so.

  It hit hard, and, given that the light flickered and went out, it also broke.

  “Two for two,” he murmured.

  His low, slightly gruff voice, disembodied in the dark, seemed to ruffle something within her.

  Or maybe the kiss had done that.

  Or just his close proximity. Who knew? All she knew was she couldn’t take a breath without him knowing, and vice versa. Granted they were handcuffed, but they could have made more room between them. Neither of them had. Even after all this time, even after their awkward meeting and more awkward second meeting up here, something still shimmered between them.

  It was undeniable. It could have been the dark, or the past, or simply the fact that it’d been far too long since she’d been held or touched by a man.

  No, that didn’t compute. It wasn’t being touched by a man that had taken over common sense.

  It was being touched by him.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he said again. “We’ll talk then.”

  All right, she was game for that, and she rattled the handcuffs. “Key?”

  He shifted his weight and she guessed he was searching his pockets, a suspicion confirmed when she heard him patting himself down with growing agitation. “Ian?”

  “Yeah. Hold on.”

  More rustling, accompanied by a roughly uttered, “Ah, hell.”

  “What?”

  “Just a second.”

  Okay. But the longer she stood there listening to him fumble around in his pockets, the more she knew. “Let me guess.”

  “Don’t.”

  “You lost your keys.”

  “I did not lose them.”

  “Uh-huh.” She felt like laughing. How that was possible was beyond her. “Then, where are they?”

  “Obviously, they’re in the last place I had them.”

  “So you’re still absentminded,” she said, and let go of the laugh in her throat.

  “Yeah. And you’re still a smart-ass.” He said this utterly without annoyance.

  In fact, it sounded pretty darn affectionate.

  A flash of lightning lit the room in a blue-white glow, followed by a heart-pounding boom of thunder. In that split second, her gaze locked with his.

  Not all of that flash of electricity came from the storm-not even close. Nope, most of it came from the combustible, explosive, chemical-like attraction between the two of them, and quite frankly, after all this time, it shocked her. “Can you still do that layup?” she whispered.

  “If I say yes, are you going to kiss me again?” He let out a rough breath. “No. Don’t answer that. Look, the handcuff key is a small one, all by itself. It must have dropped from my pocket in the shuffle. We need another flashlight.”

  “I have a spare in my office.”

  “Let’s go.”

  She wanted to know why it was such a bad idea to kiss him. She wanted to know a whole helluva lot of things, like why he was really here and why every time she took a step forward, he took one back.

  She moved toward the door, forgetting that one of the drawers was still open. She’d have fallen flat on her face if he hadn’t encircled her waist with an arm and hauled her back against him.

  “Careful,” he said in her ear, his voice low and thrillingly gravelly.

  She could have told him that the only thing in danger was her heart, but they shuffled their way out of the antiquities office together, which meant lots of banging into each other to keep their balance in the dark.

  Chloe had never been so aware of a man in her life. “Here,” she said when they finally got down the hallway to her office. She opened the door. Candlelight still flickered on the walls, relieving the darkness they’d had in the hallway and the auction house.

  She glanced at Ian standing at her side, letting her gaze drift over his wavy hair, his furrowed eyebrows indicating he was deep in thought as he took in her office.

  He caught her staring. “What?” he asked.

  “I just can’t believe that it’s you. You’ve changed, Ian.”

  “Grown up, I hope.”

  Yes, and developed a razor sharpness that suggested he was no longer all fun and games. His face was tanned, more rugged now than baby smooth, and carved in classic lines that were admittedly drool-worthy.

  He’d definitely changed. Where he’d once been lanky and lean to the point of being too thin, he’d bulked up some, all corded muscle and sinew wrapped in an undeniable masculinity. There was something else, too, something about him that suggested a will to walk into danger, a readiness to face whatever came his way. She grabbed her spare flashlight out of a drawer, watching as he leaned over her desk and blew out her candles.

  “Fire hazard,” he said, and when he’d blown out the last one, plunging them back into darkness, she gripped the flashlight but didn’t turn it on.

  Truth was, she liked being in the dark with him. She didn’t know what that said about her, but ever since he’d appeared at the party outside, she’d felt more alive than she had in a long time.

  “Let’s go get the key,” he said, taking the flashlight, heating her skin everywhere they touched. Oblivious to that fact, he led her back to the antiquities office.

  Together, they hunkered down by the desk searching, and Chloe stared into his profile.

  He hadn’t shaved today, and maybe not yesterday either, but the intriguing growth on his jaw made her fingers itch. He had laugh lines around his eyes and bracketing his mouth, a mouth she happened to know curved with slow, wicked intent, making his amusement contagious.

  Also, he smelled…wonderful. Knee-weakeningly wonderful, which didn’t seem fair since she probably smelled of fear and stress
-not wonderful at all.

  His hair was still lush and unruly, and as thick as ever, and she couldn’t help it, she reached up and brushed a lock from his forehead.

  Lifting his head, his gaze met hers, full of heat and a testosterone that oozed trouble. “Chloe.” His voice held warning and that sexy hunger as he looked into her eyes, his utterly unfathomable.

  “What?” she whispered.

  He just shook his head. “Nothing.”

  But she knew it was something. She knew it with every bone in her body. “No key?”

  “No. We’ll have to get one from my place.”

  His place. That probably shouldn’t have given her a shiver of thrill. “Okay.”

  They made their way out of the office and to the stairs, which they took in silence, close but not touching except for where they were linked by the cuffs. She had so many questions she didn’t know where to start, and she wished she knew him better, like she used to, so she could press him for answers.

  “Where’s your car parked?” he asked.

  And it hit her. They were going to go through the outdoor party to the lot, and all the way to his place-wherever that was-handcuffed. She knew this. She should have been upset by this. Furious.

  Instead, a frisson of arousal went through her. “Back parking lot.”

  They stepped out of the building into the courtyard, and it was as startling as if they’d walked onto another planet. In one blink they went from utter darkness, back into the festive lights, music and sounds of laughter and people conversing.

  The rain had stopped. The temperature had dropped quite a bit, making her wish for her sweater, which she’d left upstairs.

  Had it been only a few minutes ago that she’d been down here herself, standing on the dance floor, laughing over Madame Karma’s predictions?

  True love is going to walk into your life.

  She squirmed a little at that thought, and glanced at Ian over her shoulder.

  He was holding her handcuffed hand in his so that they didn’t draw any attention to themselves.

  Your karma has gone south for the winter.

  So which was he, Madame Karma’s first prediction, or the second?