by Nina Bruhns
Glancing at the clock, Grace went back to the kitchen and ate a quick breakfast while trying to come up with a plan for another day of searching for her sister.
Somewhere, there had to be something she'd missed. A clue to Muse's whereabouts that lay hidden in her desk or files which Grace had somehow overlooked. Or someone she hadn't thought to talk to. Muse just could not have disappeared without a trace.
She resolved to make another visit to Leavy, Dell and Roland and go through everything once more. Maybe there would be a message or word from Muse waiting for her when she got there. Or one of her sister's co-workers might have remembered something. Hopefully, after that she'd have a direction to search in. Otherwise, she'd have no choice but to head for Bourbon Street.
According to practically everyone she'd spoken to, Bourbon Street was Muse's favorite place to hang out and have fun. Grace had hoped to avoid it—being no fan of drunken tourists herself—but unless she came up with something better, she'd have to set aside her distaste and investigate the many bars along the famous street.
If posing as her sister had been uncomfortable up until now, she positively dreaded having to act like Muse in a place like that. But if it was what she had to do, she would.
She hurriedly cleaned up her breakfast things, grabbed her lidded coffee mug and headed out the door. As she descended the stairs, she mumbled a little prayer that she wouldn't run into any Cajun cops on her way to the office. She didn't think she could face her neighbor after last night. Even though this morning she'd made up her mind that her reaction to him could not have been nearly as intense as she remembered, she didn't care to test her conclusions anytime soon.
She made it all the way to Camp Street before she sensed him behind her.
Chapter 5
Compared to Creole's mood, the blossoming heat of the summer morning was positively Arctic. He'd had to follow her for five blocks composing himself before he could even approach the little liar without risk of exploding into a raging inferno.
He'd spotted her on a cross street as he'd stalked back from the Eighth District station where he'd passed a sleepless, uneasy night brooding and trying to regain his focus on locating his brother's killer. He'd spent hours going back over all the information available on Gary Fox and his boss James Davies, hoping for a flash of inspiration as to where they might have gone to ground that he hadn't already looked. But try as he might, other than dumb luck, the only avenue he saw was to continue working with Muse Summerville. Every other possible lead Creole had already chased down with no results. As he'd known all along, the woman was his last, best chance.
Unfortunately, thinking about Muse Summerville only made things worse. His usual rational, dead-calm detective's instincts were in a state of total chaos regarding her.
It had just been a kiss, for crissake. So why did he break out in a sweat every time he thought about it?
He'd finally given up any pretense of trying to research Davies and had thrown himself into digging up all the info he could find on Muse Summerville. Somehow he had to deal with this intense, uncharacteristic reaction to the woman. Regain control over the situation and over his gut-deep confusion about her. And figure out why she was nothing like the woman described in every interview contained in her short stack of background files.
He snorted in disgust. No freaking wonder.
It had taken him nearly two hours of chain-smoking concentration to spot the one word that had triggered his epiphany. Sister. It had then taken him exactly six minutes on the Internet to discover the existence of Muse's twin, and within another hour he'd tracked down everything there was to find on Grace Summerville.
Grace Summerville. The woman who had played him for a class-A fool.
He muttered a string of Cajun epithets, but it didn't help his mood. He couldn't believe he'd done it again.
He should know better than to trust his feelings when it concerned women. Il se fie pas les femmes—they always betrayed him. Always. He swallowed down a thick, black swirl of memories. Memories best forgotten, of a boy abandoned too many times ever to willingly trust tender emotions again. Emotions like those aroused in him last night.
But Grace Summerville had lied to him. Taken him for a sucker's ride. And he intended to find out why, even if he had to kiss a confession from her deceitful little mouth.
His blood jolted at the thought of their kiss last night. The one that had sent him running for the safe sterility and orderliness of the Eighth District station. The one that, even now, knowing what she'd done, left him gasping for breath and hungering for more of the taste of her.
His strides lengthened on the hot pavement with a desperate need to confront her. Or maybe to kiss her again.
Dieu, what a sap he was! A frustrated growl rose in his throat. By now he was right behind her, and she must have heard it, for she stopped and turned to him.
"We've got to stop meeting like this," she said, all calm and cool and composed. As if last night hadn't even been a blip on her radar.
He ground his jaw in an effort not to snap.
"I thought we had an understanding," she went on, "about you following me. I said I'd—"
He continued to glower, still not trusting himself to speak, or even to move. Her poise faltered as it began to dawn on her that he was furious. Furious? More like a powder keg about to go off.
She stepped back. "Is there, um … something wrong?"
Confrontation was safer, he figured. "You tell me, chère." He banded his arms across his chest and glared at her belligerently.
She blinked and stared back at him, gnawing her lip. "Uh-oh."
"Yeah. Uh-oh."
"I guess we'd better talk."
With that she swung around and made for the entrance to Leavy, Dell and Roland, which was just a couple of doors down. She said a few words to the girl at the reception desk before leading him into a small office in the back. When she closed the door behind them, he couldn't bite back his anger any longer.
"I could arrest you for lying to a police officer. It's called obstruction of justice."
She swiped her tongue over her lips and suddenly found his shoes fascinating. "I didn't lie. Not really. I never said I was Muse. You just assumed. How did you find out?"
"Your behavior."
"Excuse me?"
"This." He reached out with two fingers and tugged none too gently on the sleeve of her dress. It was another one of those come-get-me numbers. The color of a hot Caribbean sunset, it clung to her like a limpet and showed enough skin to make a man dearly wish for a bottle of suntan lotion.
"You look like Muse, you dress like Muse. You live in Muse's apartment, go to Muse's office and play Muse all over the Quarter. But you don't act like Muse."
He pulled his hand back and rammed it in a pocket. "Muse Summerville would have gone to bed with me the first time I offered. Instead, you get all prissy and offended," he said scornfully. He felt a moment of satisfaction when her mouth dropped open. "And when I kissed you, I wasn't kissing a calculating, experienced woman who goes through men like butter. The woman I kissed was shy and naive, full of sweetness and innocence, too curious to stop me, but too damn scared of what she was feeling to go on. A woman who almost made me believe—"
Le bon Dieu. Good Lord. He halted, mortified at what was about to come out of his mouth. Her eyes rounded, and he realized his sarcastic, acid tone had made his description of her sound like poison, rather than the compliment it would have been coming from any other man.
Her mouth snapped shut and her spine straightened to a steel rod, then she turned on a high heel to stride behind the desk. He was grateful for the distance.
"I tried to tell you last night," she said, the words clipped with an emotion he pegged as resentment. "But you interrupted me." She graced him with a curdling look. "Something about knowing me better than I knew myself."
"Yeah, well." He jammed his other hand in his pocket.
"Maybe I should ask to see that badge a
fter all."
He conceded the slam as deserved and in the simmering silence tossed his shield wallet onto the desk, accepting her unspoken challenge.
"I want to know what's going on, Grace. And don't jerk me around. I'm not in the mood."
"Very well."
She carefully set her purse on the desk and walked to the window, staring out through the sparkling glass to the busy street below. The sound of traffic drifted up, along with the distant clatter of a streetcar bringing another load of tourists back from their walking tour of the Garden District. He could almost feel the tension rolling off her in waves.
"I'm looking for my sister," she began, and proceeded in five short minutes of explanation to annihilate all the anger and bitterness he'd worked up against her through the long night.
He uttered a single oath that succinctly summed up the entire situation.
"I doubt that would help," she replied, and turned to face him.
He wasn't so sure.
But he had to give her credit. Most women would still be high on their horse of indignation, unable or unwilling to speak to the man who'd delivered her a cutting insult moments before. But in her obvious worry over her sister, Grace seemed to have forgotten all about it. More luck than he deserved.
"I'll help you," he said before he could think better of it.
"That's not necessary."
"I want to," he assured her, and found he meant it. "We can help each other. Look, we both want to find Fox. It only makes sense to work together."
He could see it in her eyes. She wanted to turn him down. Send him as far away from her worried sight as she could get him. And suspicion, plain as the water in Lake Ponchetrain. Again she surprised him.
"All right. I can't afford not to. Except for Bourbon Street, I'm fresh out of ideas."
"Bien." He tentatively closed some of the space between them. "Good," he repeated. He was lousy at apologies. But suddenly he needed to set the record straight. "Listen, about what I said earlier. About the way you kiss—"
"Forget it," she interrupted, a faint blush sweeping her cheeks. She straightened a couple of files sitting on the desk. "It doesn't matter."
"It does. The fact is, I meant every word. It just didn't come out the way … well, the way it should have."
She shook her head, intently avoiding his gaze. "Oh, I don't know. You're absolutely right. I'm not experienced … and I'm sure that's something men like you don't find particularly attractive in a woman they're trying to seduce."
"I wasn't—" He stopped in frustration. Oh, yes, he was. And under normal circumstances she would have been right. But not this time. "You're wrong, Grace. I do find it attractive. I find everything about you attractive. And that's what had me so angry when I realized you were deceiving me. 'Cause the one thing I don't find attractive in a woman is betrayal."
She squirmed a little. "I'm sorry. I just didn't know if…"
He took a few steps closer. "If what, chère?"
"If I could trust you."
She looked up at him, and his heart squeezed in a fist. Hell, no, she couldn't trust him. Not as far as she could run in those ridiculous spiky heels. He'd have her for breakfast, lunch and dinner before he let her fly off home to South Carolina when this was all over. Well before. But he was pretty sure that wasn't what she was talking about.
"Mais, yeah, you can trust me," he said, surprisingly easily for someone who didn't believe in deception of any kind. "You can trust me to do everything in my power to help you find your sister," he added, more to assuage his guilt than to give her an oblique warning.
"Thank you," she whispered, gratitude and relief shining in her beautiful blue eyes.
"Don' thank me yet," he said, moving in on her. She started, and he quickly bracketed her with two hands on the windowpanes behind her. "I'll want somethin' in exchange," he said, continuing their echoing game.
Twin flags of red appeared on her cheekbones, and her eyes widened. "Like what?"
"A kiss."
"A kiss?" Alarm rocketed through her expression.
"Uh-huh. I wanna see if that kiss we shared last night was as incredible as I remember. I couldn' stop thinkin' about it all night. About you. About how good you tasted, how good you felt in my arms."
She swallowed heavily.
"Were you thinkin' about me all night, too, Grace? About my lips caressing you? About my tongue slidin' inside you? Tasting you? Wantin' me to do it again?"
"No," she whispered shakily.
But he knew better. "You're lyin' again, chère." He threaded a hand in her soft fall of hair, breathing in its distinctive scent. Her distinctive scent. The scent that had haunted him all blasted night. "Tell me you don' want me to kiss you and I'll leave you alone," he murmured, slanting his mouth over hers.
She trembled once, then seemed to gather herself. "I don't want you to kiss me," she said more steadily and before he knew what was happening she'd slipped out from between his arms.
For a second he was so stunned he couldn't move. He'd been so certain … was so certain that, despite everything, she wanted him as much as he wanted her.
What was going on? He pushed off the window and stared after her as she stepped behind the desk again, bracing her hands on the back of the padded chair.
"Grace?"
"No, I don't want you to kiss me again. I'm just not interested."
"That so?" He leaned his weight on one hip and folded his arms. "I could have sworn you liked it as much as I did. You gave every indication you were enjoyin' yourself last night. I'm the one who stopped. 'Cause I knew you were scared and I didn' want to push you into anything you'd regret." Or he'd regret. "I'm talkin' about a kiss, here, nothin' more."
"A kiss for now. But what about later? No, I never should have let you kiss me last night. It was a mistake. I'm not Muse, Creole. I knew all along I would never get involved with a man like you." She looked away abruptly, gripping the chair like a lifeline.
Male outrage reared up to block the hurt that skipped through his body. "So, what you're sayin' is I'm good enough for Muse, but not for you."
"Don't be ridiculous."
His jaw tightened. She'd stopped before the kicker, but he wanted to hear it. Needed to hear it. The whole, unvarnished, insulting truth about what was wrong with him as a potential lover—other than the real truth, which she had no way of knowing about.
"A man like me," he said calmly, despite his rising anger. "Tell me, chère. What exactly do you mean by 'a man like me'? A cop? A Cajun? A man a little too dark, a little too poor, a little too uncouth for comfort?"
She glanced at him in surprise. "No. Of course not."
"Then what? Tell me. I'm dyin' of curiosity, here." He'd named all the usual reasons. He couldn't wait to hear hers. His character must surely have hit an all-time low. He ground his teeth together to keep from lashing out.
She studied him for a moment, as if deciding how much to reveal. Finally she said, "Dangerous. That's what kind of a man you are. Just plain dangerous."
He jetted out the breath he'd been holding. "Dangerous?" Hell, that's what women usually liked about him. He lifted an incredulous brow and waited her out, interrogation-style.
"You want the whole picture? All right, fine," she said, caving in to his subtle pressure. Then commenced to pin him like a bug. "You are charming, cunning and handsome enough to have women throwing themselves at you right and left, competing with each other to please you. But you don't get involved. Ever. Oh, no doubt you give your body willingly, but never your heart. When you get bored, which is inevitable, you move on without a second thought. You are used to having your way in all things, at all times, and you'll use any means at your disposal to get what you want. Including walking all over the hearts of those women who only want to please you."
She looked him right in the eye and said, "I've had my heart walked all over enough to last a lifetime, and have no desire to repeat the experience."
For a moment he couldn't
speak. She'd pegged him so accurately he could feel the boreholes. Well, except for the hearts part. He'd always made sure the women he'd been with knew exactly what the score was. No strings, no expectations, just a good time, if they were into it. Hearts had never been involved.
He took a breath to compose himself. "That was quite a little analysis there. You ought to do that for a livin'."
"I do."
"Mais, yeah, I almost forgot. You're a psychologist."
"Yes."
Her eyes watched him with increasing apprehension as he strolled over to where she was standing behind the tall, padded desk chair. Before she could turn around to face him, he moved in, stepping right up against her back.
He could taste her nervousness at his close proximity. Her breath came fast and shallow, her shoulders dipped forward, as if she could escape him if she leaned far enough away. Her white-knuckled fingers dug into the dark-gray fabric of the chair.
"There's just one li'l bitty thing wrong with your theory, chère," he murmured, bringing his mouth close to the delicate shell of her ear.
"And what's that?" she answered in a ragged voice, doing her level best to appear unaffected by his breath fanning over her cheek. But he could see the slight tremble in her chin when he deliberately exhaled.
"Everything you say is true." He paused for effect, then whispered low and rough, "But you want me anyway."
She shook her head and her hair tickled his cheek. "No."
"Sure you do." There was no doubt in his mind, and he aimed to show her the truth of it.
"No."
He slid his fingers up her arms, then ran them lightly over her shoulders. A shiver sifted through her.
He knew he was just proving her accusations, but he couldn't stop himself. He wanted her too much. "Feel how your body reacts to me, to my touch," he commanded softly. He leaned down and brushed his lips over her neck, just below her ear. Her breath sucked in. "To my kiss."
