So Tempting

by Jean Brashear

  "Gonna shine brightly tonight, I think."

  Barely glancing over her shoulder, she challenged him. "Yeah?"

  "Count on it."

  Licking her lips slowly, Jace met his gaze.

  Message received.

  * * *

  Cassandra Sabanne was sick of seclusion. At eighteen, she'd been a prisoner for six years, orphaned to the care of her much-older brother Dante. Her last escape from the Swiss convent school three weeks ago had paid off—sort of. She'd been liberated from the nuns, but backwater Santa Fe was hardly what she'd had in mind.

  Action, that's what Cassie wanted. Sins of the flesh, glamour, adventure...all that she'd been missing while the world danced on without her. Everything her jailer brother would deny her.

  She grimaced at the sunshine gilding the firs, dancing over the fluttering aspen leaves, the brilliance of the day doing nothing for her mood. "Even Switzerland wasn't this boring."

  Melinda, the housekeeper's granddaughter, looked at her new friend in horror. "Easy for you to say. You've lived in Europe most of your life. I've never been outside of New Mexico."

  "But I've been locked away in a Swiss convent school." Cassie evaded her friend's too-seeing eyes and sighed. "I guess you're right. It's just..." With a shake of her head, Cassie turned to pick out a new CD. "I'm tired of being in jail. I want some action."

  "Some jail. Four families could fit in this house and never cross paths."

  Her eyes crinkling at the corners, Cassie burst out laughing. "Okay, maybe I'm spoiled. But I'm still bored out of my skull."

  "So change it."

  "You don't have a warden."

  "He's scary, all right." Melinda chewed on her lip again. "What do you want to do?"

  "Go to The Club."

  Melinda gasped. "Where did you hear about it?"

  Cassie arched an eyebrow. "Do you know how to get an invitation?"

  "Are you kidding me? We're too young for that crowd."

  "Says you. In Europe they don't treat eighteen-year-olds like infants."

  "Cassie, that's a dangerous place. You don't have any business going there."

  "Afraid? I'm not. And I'm going to The Club, believe me."

  "How?"

  "You're going to help me."

  "Oh, no. No way. My grandmother would kill me. Right after my father locked me up for the rest of my life. Besides, he wouldn't agree—" Melinda cut a glance toward the door. "if he knew."

  "Dante will never find out."

  "How are you going to make sure of that?"

  "If I can break out of that convent he put me in, I can escape from this place. Mark my words, Melinda. We're checking out The Club."

  Melinda pulled her shoulders in closer. "I don't know if I want to."

  Cassie's lip curled. "Then I'll go by myself."

  "No, I can't let—" With an elaborate sigh, Melinda gave in. "All right. If you can wangle an invitation and if we can get in, I'll go."

  Cassie clapped her hands in delight. Curling Melinda's equally long dark hair up into a twist, Cassie turned her toward the cheval mirror standing in the corner of her room. "We will. Just leave it to me. One look at us, and they won't know what hit them."

  Seeing her friend chewing her lip, Cassie pulled her away from the mirror and toward her closet. "Come on, let's figure out what to wear. My clothes should fit you."

  "But Cassie, I can't—" Eyes round as saucers, Melinda entered the closet as though she'd been given the keys to a magical kingdom.

  "I have all these clothes Dante bought me and nowhere to wear them. It's the least I can do for my partner in crime."

  With a tremulous smile that grew wider by the second, Melinda turned toward the contents of Cassie's kickass wardrobe.

  GREECE

  Thirty-two years ago

  "This is cinquefoil, Papa?" Five-year-old Dante Sabanne frowned fiercely as he pointed to the dainty plant.

  The man beside him smiled with pride. "Yes," he murmured. "And what are its uses?"

  "A de—"

  "Decoction," his father supplied.

  "Decoction," Dante repeated. "The root is for toothache and fever. The bark can stop nosebleeds. The tea..." He halted.

  "Go on," his father urged.

  Dante's mouth pursed. "I don't like the part about scaring witches." He craned his neck to look upward. "We are magos, Papa, and Light Walkers. You said we carry the blood of ancient sorcerers in us. Aren't sorcerers and witches friends?"

  A fond smile crossed his father's face. "Often they have been."

  "Witches can be good, right?"

  "Many of them are, yes. Healers and protectors."

  "Like the amulet," Dante said. "Please, may I see it, Papa?"

  His father reached inside his shirt for the unnaturally green stone set in a silver disc carved with runes so ancient that the original language had been lost to all but the fathers and sons chosen to guard it through countless generations. "Do you want to touch it?"

  Dante nodded and brushed back the dark hair falling into his eyes. One finger uncurled from his palm. "The Eye of the Magos," he whispered, closing his hand around the amulet.

  The stone glowed. Power crackled.

  He shuddered but held on, his eyes squeezed against the longing and grief and wild, reckless joy surging through his veins. Behind his eyes rushed a river of lights, all the colors of the rainbow and more...singing to him, a harmonic both terrifying and achingly sweet, power singing in his bones, his breath, his belly...calling to him, luring him—

  "No, son." His father reclaimed it.

  The connection snapped. Dante's eyes fluttered open. "Papa, not yet—"

  His father's eyes held both love and sorrow. He tucked the amulet back inside his shirt. "You are not yet strong enough to protect it." He gentled his tone. "But one day you will be." His eyes grew distant, but Dante was too caught up to notice, grieving for what had been taken from him.

  "I am only small, not weak, Papa. I can Walk the Light. I hear the Song of the Soul Star."

  His father's gaze warmed. "I know you can, and one day you will, my boy, but the amulet and its power would harm you now. To wield it requires a wisdom that comes only with time.

  "The Eye of the Magos—" he began the chant. "—heals when honor defeats hate, when love vanquishes lies—"

  Dante joined in, his childish voice twining with his father's deeper one. "Love breeds Light. Light grants Power. Only in Darkness does the Eye lose the True Path."

  His father smiled and pressed him close. "For generations, we have guarded its might. Ours is a sacred duty. I will carry the burden for a while longer. Even a Protector is allowed to be a boy first. Play and laugh and grow, my son. Your time will come soon enough."

  Dante's mother entered, her face gone stiff. He knew it meant his father was going away. "Your driver is outside."

  "Papa, why must you always leave?" He looked up to his tall father, but Papa was watching his mother.

  He flicked a glance down at Dante, summoning a smile that did not reach his eyes. "I'll be back, my son. Very soon."

  He knew he wasn't supposed to ask, but it wasn't fair. They could be so happy. His mother wouldn't have to spend the rest of the day crying. "Why can't you stay with us? I'll be good, I promise."

  His mother's eyes welled with tears. His father took his face in both hands. "You are already perfect. I wish..." His father sighed, then kissed his forehead before stepping away. "You are young yet. Someday I will be able to make you understand."

  "Liar." Dante's mother turned her back.

  His father's face looked scary. His mother's shoulders were rigid. Dante longed to go back to the moment when his father was happy, telling him about the potions and magic.

  He stood very straight. "When you return, Papa, I will show you that I know other plants as well." He bit the inside of his cheek hard so he would not cry. Papa might not come back if he cried.

  His father's face was sad. He dropped his hand to the
boy's hair. "Son, I—"

  Dante shook his head. "I understand," he said, though he didn't, not really. Mama had told him last time about the other family. Papa had another son, but Dante didn't know why they couldn't all live together. He would like to have a brother, but Mama told him he could never, ever ask or Papa might not return.

  More than anything in the world, he wanted Papa to be with them, so he smiled and stepped away so that his father could leave.

  As he thought about the spells his father had told him were in his blood, Dante wondered if there was a spell he could use to make his father stay.

  But the only person he could ask was the man getting into the big black car to leave him behind.

  Chapter Two

  Jace headed up the mountainside toward her cabin after a bitch of a day. Pulling to a stop in front of her door, she leaned back against the seat and rotated her head, groaning at the tight muscles in her neck.

  She wanted a hot bath, soaking for a little bit of forever. She wasn't even sure she cared if she ate. Oh, for a nap before Gabriel arrived...

  Gabriel. Their paths had crossed a year or so back when she'd testified in one of the cases he'd prosecuted. Gabriel understood her ambitions and the demands of her job, as she did his. He was divorced with no interest in another marriage, and they shared an appreciation for the pressure relief valve of good—make that very good—sex. Beyond that, they lived separate lives, and it was exactly what she wanted.

  She relished the solitude, the independence she'd waited so long to have. From the day her father died, the family's survival had depended on her, and a dreamy-eyed girl had been slammed into reality. She'd learned hard lessons about the price of being soft, of feeling too much, of counting on anyone but herself.

  Jace emerged from her jeep and picked up the sack of groceries that would keep her for days, as seldom as she cooked. Then she paused for her nightly ritual.

  After a year, she still hadn't tired of the view, the crisp, clean tickle of high-country air...the stillness so complete that you could hear your own blood pulse. She spent most of her time on the job, always promising herself a day off to do nothing but drink in the beauty. Instead, she got this one brief burst of mountains every day. If she got home before dark, that is.

  It's the life you wanted, Jace.

  True. After years of being a parent to her own mother and Jimmy, after an endless line of nothing jobs to keep body and soul together, she'd almost lost everything in a car accident five years ago—and she'd resolved not to put off her dreams any longer. She'd taken that disaster and put it to use. A scar on her hip and a limp when she was too tired served to remind her that she'd wanted to be a cop forever.

  Now she was. If it meant twenty-eight-hour days and little time to smell the roses, so be it. She didn't care about flowers much, anyway; one glance at the plants on her porch was proof. She kept meaning to water the gifts from her landlady, Myra, but she did as little on the domestic front as possible. She'd been cook, laundress, mother and father, provider for her family since she was twelve. Dad's benefits hadn't covered much, and her mother still was no help; left to her, every cent would go to Southern Comfort.

  Once Jimmy had moved away, Jace had left her mother to a boyfriend and her own devices. She'd done all the caretaking she ever wanted to do, except that Jimmy kept showing up and needing more. She and Gabriel had argued more than once over that.

  Gaze traveling over the half-dead plants lined up on the steps with begging bowls out for the summer rains, Jace consigned her regret to the four winds. "You're on your own, guys. I don't have it in me anymore."

  The job was enough. She might feel the occasional gnawing for more, but life had taught her it wasn't likely to happen. She could barely remember the little girl who'd been such a dreamer.

  Unlocking the door, Jace shoved it open, wincing as it stuck halfway. Got to tell Myra—

  The bag was torn from her hands, dropped to the floor. A muscled arm grabbed her from behind, hand clapped over her mouth.

  She jerked straight, leg lifted to smash her foot down on his arch—

  —until she caught the familiar scent.

  And smiled.

  One quick shove against the wall, face first, hands lifted above her head, wrists trapped in one big fist. With a whoosh, the air left her lungs as a big body pressed against hers.

  Jace pushed back, brushing her bottom across his groin.

  Gabriel growled and fastened his mouth to her nape.

  Arousal stirred, deep and low. Her nipples hardened in a rush, gooseflesh peppering her skin. A guttural moan forced its way up her throat.

  Heated, silken tongue slicked a path up her neck, fastened on her right ear lobe. Sucked gently. Nipped.

  Jace rocked against him, all but purring.

  Gabriel chuckled. Relaxed against her.

  Jace seized the advantage. Yanked down her arms, punched her elbow into his stomach, whirled. Doubled over, he couldn't straighten quite fast enough before she hooked one foot behind his right knee and wrenched his leg from beneath him.

  With a thud, he landed on the floor, instantly coiled to rise again.

  Jace dropped, straddled his belly. Laughed when air whooshed from his lungs. "Losing those cop reflexes, Counselor?" She gripped the opening of his expensive white shirt.

  "Oh no, you don't."

  Jace lifted her eyebrows, then jerked the panels apart. Buttons popped to the floor like hailstones.

  "Don't what?" she asked in her silkiest voice, eyes wide. "Can dish it out but you can't take it?"

  Faster than she could blink, she found herself on her back, a great deal of man blocking out the fading sunlight slanting into the room. Strong thighs bracketed her waist while big hands each circled a wrist. "I wasn't through."

  Jace studied the firm, muscled chest, dark curls bisected by the thin white scar from long-ago shoulder surgery. Her gaze zeroed off to the side.

  He glanced over to see what she was staring at.

  Jace bucked to topple him.

  He chuckled. "Not so fast, slick." He pressed her down. "Uncle?"

  Jace narrowed her eyes. Shook her head.

  "Tut-tut. Guess you need more...persuasion." His mouth fastened just below the right ear lobe still wet from his tongue. Then marked a tingling trail down her neck, inside her blouse and into the valley between her breasts.

  She tensed to resist him. Moaned instead.

  His fingertips drifted over her curves. Mirrored her earlier grip on his shirt.

  Jace grabbed his wrists. "Oh no, you don't."

  "Should have thought of that before you made free with mine. I just hope you're good at finding buttons."

  "Don't you dare—"

  Too late. With one clean yank, he separated the halves, the second shower of buttons on wood floors as loud as the first. "I'll buy you a new one," he muttered, lowering his head to the lace covering one breast.

  Jace drove her fingers into his hair and gasped.

  All teasing fled.

  She fumbled at his belt; opened his zipper. Plunged fingers inside his briefs and closed around him, her thumb teasing the tip.

  God. She'd had limited sexual experience before Gabriel, but he'd helped her make up for lost time. For all his sharp mind, his hard-as-nails courtroom manner, there was within this man a willingness to throw away all pretense and play with her. However she wanted, hot and dirty, slow and dreamy, any fantasy she had and several she'd never even imagined.

  The swollen head wept one perfect pearl at the tip; he pulsed in her hand. Jace shoved at his shoulder, twisted her body to get closer to his shaft while his lips slid across her belly on the way to—

  "Sis?" The front door, still open, squeaked as it was shoved wider.

  "Shit!" Gabriel kicked it closed. A yelp sounded from behind the door.

  They scrambled to fasten their clothing.

  "What the—?" Curly auburn hair came first, then a hand rubbing the man's forehead, followed by ha
zel eyes sparking with anger.

  "Damn it, Jimmy," Jace shouted. "What does this look like, Grand Central Station?" Chest heaving, she glared at her brother.

  Then at Gabriel for snickering.

  Jimmy Carroll's eyes widened as he studied his sister, clasping her blouse together. "Sorry, Sis." One corner of his mouth quirked. He stuck out his hand to Gabriel. "Jimmy Carroll. I'm—"

  "Jace's brother. She's told me about you." Gabriel returned the gesture. Stood, pants zipped but belt unbuckled, shirt hanging open, gaze direct and challenging. "Gabriel McMullen."

  Clamping down hard on the adrenaline, Jace surveyed the red-rimmed eyes, the shadows lining his face, the dust-streaked clothes. "Give us a minute, will you?"

  "Sure." He stepped toward the door with a smartass grin. "Nice meeting you."

  Gabriel glanced at Jace and frowned. He smoothed at the line she knew must be carved between her eyes.

  She blew a puff of air that fluttered her uneven bangs. "I'm sorry about that." Dealing with Jimmy made her tired, and she'd been doing it so long. Would he ever grow up?

  "Want me to stay?"

  "No. I can handle it. I've had plenty of practice."

  Gabriel tilted her chin up and studied her eyes. "I didn't let you get much sleep last night."

  A pang of longing shot through her, a spike of need for what had been snatched prematurely by Jimmy's arrival. She'd been primed for Gabriel ever since he'd spoken their code words in the hall. She just hadn't expected to find him lying in wait.

  "Where's your SUV?"

  He smiled. "Out back. Like the surprise?"

  "You don't wrestle so bad, Counselor, for a soft lawyer type."

  "Nothing about me feels soft right now, Detective."

  "His timing sucks."

  "Ain't it the truth? Want me to come back later?"

  Regret pressed in on her. "I don't know why he's here, but I'll come to you later if I can."

  He slid one hand into her hair. Delivered a scorching kiss, then released her. He stuffed in his shirt and buckled his belt, hooked his tie and jacket over his shoulder. "I'll leave the light on, Detective." With a two-fingered salute, he waved goodbye and strolled to the door.