by JoAnn Ross
“You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” He smiled absently and wondered how it was that the pretty words of flattery that usually came trippingly off his tongue had deserted him.
Although Cait would fling herself off the top of the Hollywood sign before admitting it, Sloan didn’t look all that bad himself.
He was wearing cream linen trousers, an ivory Egyptian cotton shirt with the sleeves rolled up almost to the elbows and buttery soft loafers. If she’d been a casting director, she would have found him ideal for the role of The Great Gatsby. He looked rich and successful and outrageously attractive.
Sloan rocked back on his heels and continued to peruse her. “You need a hat.”
“A hat?” She instinctively raised a hand to her hair.
“You look as if you should be pouring Earl Grey from a Royal Doulton teapot in some English country garden. All you need to complete the image is a wide-brimmed straw hat with a full-blown white rose stuck in its ribbon band.”
Here were the clever words Cait would have expected from a man who made a very good living with words. Before she could come back with a snappy response, he’d lifted a hand to her hair.
“I take it back,” he murmured, seemingly entranced by the strands he was sifting through his long fingers. Cait tried to ignore the tingle of response his seemingly innocent touch inspired.
“What?” Her breath caught as those tantalizing fingers grazed her neck.
“A hat would hide this magnificent hair. And although I’ve never claimed to be the slightest bit religious, even I know that—” he lifted a thick swathe and inhaled “—would undoubtedly be a cardinal sin.”
He annoyed her. Fascinated her. And worst of all, Sloan Wyndham frightened her in ways Cait couldn’t begin to understand.
“Mr. Wyndham—”
“Sloan.” He trailed his fingertips down the satin flesh of her throat and felt her pulse leap. “I’m not much on formality.”
“Too bad.” A puff of breeze caused a strand of hair to drift over her eyes. Frustrated, she blew it away. “Because I am. And if you don’t take your hand off me right now, you’re going to be sorry.”
He grinned unrepentantly, but nevertheless did as she instructed. “Are you threatening me with police brutality, Officer?”
“I’m only telling you that you might be accustomed to women throwing themselves at your feet, but I’m not most women.”
“Now that I’ve figured out for myself.” Because he wanted to touch her again, he slipped his hands in his pockets and continued to look at her.
As she stared back at him, unwillingly transfixed, Cait vaguely heard a familiar voice call out her name. Glancing over toward the rock garden, Cait saw her mother headed toward them, like a sleek racing yacht at full sail.
“Cait, dear.” Natalie touched a powdered and perfumed cheek against her daughter’s. Her face, thanks to a secret, ridiculously expensive Swiss complexion formula and a recent facelift and chemical peel, looked at least a decade younger than her years. “I’m so pleased to see you.” She turned to Sloan. “I see you’ve met my daughter, Sloan darling.”
Darling? Cait’s eyes narrowed as she watched her mother’s hand settle on his arm. Diamonds from past failed marriages glittered like ice on three of her graceful, manicured fingers.
Although Cait had been telling herself that she didn’t even like Sloan Wyndham, a sharp, green shaft of jealousy struck with the accuracy of an arrow hitting a bull’s-eye right in the tender center of her heart.
Cait would have had to have been living these past years on Venus not to have heard about Sloan’s reputed womanizing tendencies. But her mother?
“Actually, Cait and I met the other day,” Sloan answered. Now that he realized LA’s most gorgeous cop was actually Natalie Landis’s daughter, he could see the resemblance.
Mother and daughter shared the same expressive emerald eyes and remarkably flawless complexion. Natalie’s hair, worn today in a sleek French roll—all the better to display her chiseled cheekbones—was the color of winter wheat. Cait’s unruly waves reminded him of the wildfires that tore through these hills during the dry season.
Natalie’s body, while kept firm by daily visits from a personal trainer, was far lusher than her daughter’s, but having always been a leg man himself, Sloan personally preferred Cait’s long, coltish curves.
“I never realized you had a grown daughter,” Sloan told the actress. “You could be sisters.”
It was not false Hollywood flattery. It was pretty much the truth. Natalie Landis hadn’t stopped the passage of time, but if her still stunning looks were any indication, she had managed to slow it to a crawl.
Natalie laughed, the musical, silvery bell sound designed to please a man’s ear. “I was a child bride.”
“Obviously you were still in your cradle,” he agreed without missing a beat.
“That’s what I adore about you, Sloan, darling.” Her glossy lips curved in a pleased, intimate smile. “You always say precisely the right things.”
She turned back to Cait. “You certainly look lovely today, dear. Doesn’t she, Sloan?”
“Exquisite.” His words were directed at Natalie, but his eyes were on Cait’s face. And Lord, what a face it was, Sloan thought. “I’m amazed LAPD doesn’t have every male in town drag racing down all the major streets, hoping to get pulled over by Officer Carrigan.”
“Oh, please.” Natalie groaned dramatically. “It’s been such a lovely day. Let’s not ruin it by discussing Cait’s little rebellion.”
Cait could not—would not—allow her mother’s blatantly dismissive remark to go unchallenged. She raised her chin.
“It’s not a little rebellion, mother. It’s my career.”
“So you keep telling me,” Natalie agreed with a sigh. The deep breath caused her still remarkable breasts, clad in a thin, above-the-knee sheath of ivory silk, to rise and fall attractively. “Honestly, anyone would think you’d grown up in the Valley.” She turned toward Sloan.
“Tell, me, darling,” she practically crooned as her fingers stroked his arm, “were you a rebellious child?”
He almost laughed. The irony was too perfect. Sloan wondered how Natalie would respond if he assured her that he’d definitely been the least rebellious member of his infamous family.
“I think all kids need to find their own way, Nat.” He gently, discreetly, took his arm away, a gesture that was not missed by Cait’s sharp eyes.
“I suppose you’re right,” the older woman agreed with another sigh. “You usually are.”
“I hadn’t realized you two knew one another,” Cait said.
“I know everyone,” Natalie reminded her daughter sharply. Her tone immediately softened. “As a matter of fact, I’ve been trying to talk Sloan into working on a project with me.” The famous voice turned signature sultry. “I think we’d make a simply marvelous team.”
Cait shot him a sharp look; Sloan returned it with a bland one of his own. “Well, as delightful as this has been,” Cait said, “I really do need to leave.” That much was the truth. Another few minutes of watching her mother blatantly flirt with a man nearly half her age had Cait in danger of suffocating.
“Oh, you can’t leave before the fashion show!” Natalie protested. She turned to Sloan. “It’s going to be so absolutely precious. Karen—the volunteer from the Humane Society—has brought all these darling little dogs and kittens up from the animal shelter. We’re dressing them up like characters from famous movies.”
“Sounds cute.” Sloan was beginning to understand Cait’s discomfort.
“Adorable,” Cait agreed dryly. “But I’m due at work soon.”
“But I thought you had the day off.”
“I thought I did, too. But I got a call transferred here a little while ago. They want me to come in to headquarters.”
“I do so hate that horrid place,” Natalie complained.
“So you’ve said.” Cait glanced around, in search of Blythe.
“Lookin
g for someone?” Sloan asked.
“Just Blythe. We came together.” Cait saw her friend deep in conversation once again with Walter Stern III by the pool. Although both had their public faces on, she could tell they were arguing.
“I was just leaving,” Sloan said. “Why don’t I give you a lift?”
“Oh, you can’t leave yet!” Natalie protested. “I was going to ask you to present the Norma Desmond award.”
“Gee, Nat,” Sloan apologized, “I’m truly honored. But I have to visit a sick friend.”
“Really, Sloan.” A lifetime of practice allowed Natalie to somehow frown without causing a single line in her smooth forehead. “If you don’t wish to take part in the contest, just say so. But to tell such a blatant lie—”
“It’s not a lie.” He flashed her an appealingly boyish grin. “I really am sorry, but I only planned to drop by, say hello and give you my contribution.” He pulled a check out of his shirt pocket.
Emerald green eyes widened. “Gracious. This is quite generous.”
“It’s only money. And it’s for a good cause.” He took hold of Natalie’s hand and lifted her rose-tinted fingertips to his lips. “Nat, it’s been delightful seeing you again. I’ll give you a call next week. We’ll have lunch and discuss a proposal I have for you.”
To Cait’s amazement and chagrin, her mother beamed like a starstruck fourteen-year-old when meeting her favorite rock idol. “Anytime,” she agreed breathlessly.
Seeming not to notice the effect he’d had on the forty-something actress, Sloan turned toward Cait. “Ready to go?”
“I told you, I already have a ride.”
“Blythe won’t mind if you change your plans. Besides, I’d like a chance to prove to you that there are no hard feelings after our encounter the other day.”
“Encounter?” Natalie pounced on his words like a sleek Siamese cat attacking a plump mouse.
“It’s a long story,” Sloan said quickly. Beside him he could feel Cait reaching the boiling point and considered that perhaps he’d pushed his luck. “And we really do have to go. Don’t we, Cait?”
She wanted to inform him that she’d rather get into a car with Attila the Hun. But Cait also knew that if she remained here, she’d be subjecting herself to her mother’s third degree. And in her own way, Natalie Landis could be every bit as unrelenting as the toughest downtown homicide cop.
“You need to tell Blythe I’m driving you home,” he said. “And I need to talk with her about something.”
“You are not driving me home,” Cait continued to argue even as she allowed him to lead her away with a broad palm against her back. One thing she did not want to do was create a scene that would draw attention to them.
“Don’t be such a hard-ass.” Although his smile didn’t flicker, Cait didn’t miss the brief flare of irritation in his eyes.
She was forestalled from further argument when they reached Blythe, who’d just finished yet another frustrating conversation with Walter Stern.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think he was stonewalling,” she said to Cait and Sloan, after revealing the gist of her encounter with the studio head. “It may just be that he wants to keep me in those horrid woman-in-jeopardy films, but whatever the reason, he’s proving horribly uncooperative.”
“How about hiring someone who knows how to uncover old secrets,” Sloan suggested.
“Like a private detective?”
“Exactly.”
Blythe turned toward Cait. “Do you know anyone?”
“You’re in luck.” Cait reached into her purse and pulled out one of the business cards she was never without these days and handed it to Blythe.
“Gage Remington?”
“My ex-partner on the force,” Cait said. “Gage taught me everything I know about the street side of being a cop. He’s gone into business for himself these days.”
“There’s no office address.”
“He doesn’t exactly have one. He lives on a boat in Marina del Rey, which he uses as a base of operations.”
Despite Cait’s recommendation, Blythe thought that Gage Remington sounded a bit too unconventional for her purposes.
“Give Gage a call,” Cait urged, sensing her friend’s hesitation. “He might not be the kind of stuffy, button-down guys you seem to prefer these days, but he’s definitely one of the good guys.”
Blythe glanced over at Sloan.
“If Cait is willing to vouch for him, I think we ought to give the guy a try.”
Cait ground her teeth as he slanted her a smile that was both charming and effective.
“I suppose it won’t hurt to talk to the man,” Blythe decided. She slipped the card into her own purse.
“Why don’t you give him a call now?” Sloan suggested. “So we’ll know where we stand.”
“You can call from the library,” Cait volunteered, eager to help Gage’s business take off. “He’s been out of town. But he was due back this morning. If you’re quick, you might be able to hire him before he takes on another case.”
As luck would have it, Gage Remington agreed to meet with Blythe within the hour. Which, since Marina del Rey was in the opposite direction from Bel Air, effectively precluded Blythe driving Cait home before her meeting.
“Let me know how things go,” Sloan said. “Meanwhile, Cait and I have places to go. People to see.” Taking hold of Blythe’s shoulders, he bent his head to kiss her cheek. “It’s going to be fun working together, Blythe. I have a feeling we’re going to make one helluva team.”
The kiss was a friendly one with no sexual overtones. Blythe smiled up at him. “I’m looking forward to it.”
“I suppose you think you’re clever,” Cait huffed as they waited for the valet to bring Sloan’s Porsche around.
“Clever?”
The car arrived. When the valet—another gorgeous, obvious Hollywood wanna-be—opened the door, Cait settled into the passenger seat with a swirl of flowered skirt. “Manipulating me this way.”
Sloan didn’t answer until he was behind the wheel and had driven halfway down the long, curving redbrick driveway. “Not clever, merely desperate.”
“Desperate?” Icicles of disbelief dripped from her tone. She couldn’t imagine this man desperate. Sloan Wyndham was the most arrogant, self-assured male she’d ever met. And in this town, that was really saying something!
Frustrated from four long nights spent dreaming about this woman, and five equally long days fantasizing about her, Sloan pulled over to the side of the driveway and cut the engine.
“Desperate,” he repeated. “Do you have any idea how much I’ve been wanting to do this?”
Before she could perceive his intention, before she could make the slightest move to stop him, Sloan pulled Cait into his arms.
5
FOR A LONG SUSPENDED moment, Cait stared up at him, a hundred—a thousand—feelings battering away inside her, fighting for control. Her breath caught, then shuddered out as she watched. And waited.
He took her mouth with the easy confidence of a man who’d kissed more women than he could count. He didn’t rush. His lips somehow managed to be firm and soft at the same time. They plucked at hers, tasting at their leisure, lin-gering, trapping her in gauzy layers of sensation.
Cait was twenty-five years old. She’d certainly been kissed before, beginning with the time Johnny Matthews had cornered her in the history section of the school library, although she wasn’t certain that counted because she’d slugged him in the jaw, causing him to bang the back of his head against the shelf.
By the time he’d come to, sneaky little Kristy Longview, who’d been watching the aborted kiss, had called the teacher, who’d called the principal, who sentenced both Cait and her would-be lothario to a week of erasing chalk boards after school.
The Matthews—Mr. Matthew being an attorney—threatened to sue, but Cait’s father, no lightweight himself at making threats, had pointed out the ridicule that would be heaped on the eleven
-year-old boy if it became public knowledge that he’d been KO’d by a mere girl.
After that less than auspicious introduction to romance, other boys had followed in Johnny’s wake, and although Cait had welcomed their kisses with varying degrees of enthusiasm, none—not one in all the intervening years—had ever caused her mind to empty. Until Sloan.
She should stop him, Cait told herself.
She would stop him, she promised herself.
Soon.
With his mouth on hers, coherent thought vanished, disappearing into the soft silvery mists clouding her mind.
His hands were wandering through her hair as if they had every right to be there. Restrained passion flared in the dark whiskey depths of his eyes. Fascinated and a little frightened, she wanted to keep her eyes open, but when his teeth began nibbling at the soft flesh at the inside of her bottom lip, Cait’s lids drifted shut on a soft, shimmering sigh.
Sweet. He never would have suspected that Officer Cait Carrigan could be so impossibly sweet. Tasting her was like dining on honeyed nectar. He ran his hand down the side of her face and discovered that touching her was like touching warm satin.
Sloan wanted to taste her all over.
He wanted to touch her everywhere.
He wanted her. In every way possible. And a few they’d discover for themselves.
Against every vestige of common sense she possessed, Cait wanted to thrust her hands into the shaggy chestnut waves skimming his collar, but just in time, some last little vestige of reason remaining in the back of her mind counseled restraint.
Instead, she forced herself to be satisfied with holding on to the tops of his arms. He was as hard and muscular as he’d looked when she’d first spotted him up on that gate. The difference was he was proving to be far more dangerous than she’d first thought.
Seductive images swam giddily through her mind. Lush, erotic images that made her blood hum and her body ache. When his tongue traced a slow, lazy circle around her parted lips, she experienced a rush of need so strong that if she’d not already been sitting down she would have gone weak in the knees.
On the heels of that jolt came another realization every bit as unexpected. And as painful. She was, Cait realized through her swimming senses, afraid.
