Simon Says...

by Donna Kauffman

Besides which, he already knew that Sophie Maplethorpe was hardly the dallying kind. And a more unlikely beginning to any other sort of a relationship there could never be. If he was a man who wanted that kind of thing. Which…he wasn’t.

  At the last possible second, with her breath on his lips, he groaned and pushed away from the bed, stalking to the window where she couldn’t spy just how fiercely aroused he was. He stared out the window but saw nothing, as he contemplated telling her the truth about why he was here. She had heroine stamped all over her.

  But even though she might have bent the rules by breaking into his room to help a friend, he’d bet money she would have a hard time living with herself if she was made to do something truly against principal. She’d talk herself into it, whether it was because she believed in it, or because she wanted to preserve her career, her good name, whatever…but afterward, she’d wrestle with it, lose sleep over it, and eventually end up going to her superiors and regretfully informing them of her actions. Even if it cost her everything.

  He knew this because he was here, risking everything, for the same reasons.

  Only he wasn’t leaving here without what he came for. So lines would be crossed at some point. Which meant the risk had already been taken. She might not know much, but she already knew enough.

  He paced. She remained silent. It was rather unnerving, really. How she alternated between nervous babbling one moment, and absolute quiet the next. It was almost as if she knew him. As if she knew letting him stew and think things through would eventually get her what she wanted.

  He finally sat down on the edge of the bed again. “Okay. Here’s the thing.”

  Her soft gray eyes went on full alert. Her china doll lips pursed in anticipation.

  And, dammit to hell, he really, really had to find a way to stop noticing both of those things. “There is something here, in this hotel, that rightfully belongs to someone else.”

  “What sort of thing is it?”

  “That’s not important.”

  “It is if I’m going to help you get it back.”

  “Sophie—”

  “Fine,” she said, then looked at him with that intent gaze again. “Are you sure you’re as good at this as you think you are?”

  His eyes narrowed at the taunt. “I’m quite good at what I do,” he said flatly. “And that is due partly, if not wholly, to the fact that I rely only on myself to get the job done. I shouldn’t have to point out which one of us is currently tied to a chair.”

  “How about you untie me, and I promise I won’t scream or try anything foolish while we talk about what I’m helping you steal back over breakfast?”

  He scooped up the bathrobe belt and she immediately looked nervous.

  “Okay, okay, so you don’t have to feed me.”

  “Trade-off,” he said. “I’ll untie you, but then this has to go on. At least until after the food is delivered.”

  She seemed to consider that for a moment. “I can’t persuade you to trust me?”

  “No more than you would trust me if the situation were reversed.”

  “I’d like to think I’d be this hard-core about things, but I know myself too well.”

  “Which is why you’re not a thief.”

  “And you are?”

  He walked around behind her and crouched down. “You know, I’m beginning to think the gag might be a good idea for a couple of reasons.”

  “Very funny,” she said, then averted her head when he tried to tie it on. “Silas, please.”

  He paused because of the earnestness in her voice. And because it felt wrong, somehow, not hearing his real name on her lips.

  So much for being hard-core.

  He stood and tossed the belt on the bed as he walked to the nightstand phone.

  “Thank you,” she said, as quietly as he’d ever heard her.

  “Don’t thank me yet,” he muttered, and snatched the phone off the hook.

  5

  SOPHIE DIDN’T SCREAM and for that, she got scrambled eggs, a croissant, freshly squeezed orange juice and the use of her hands. She wasn’t sure what it said about her that she felt like this was major progress. Or that she was able to eat at all, much less inhale the food on her plate like a half-starved supermodel the day after retirement. It was the closest she’d ever come to feeling like a supermodel, retired or otherwise, so she tried to embrace the moment.

  And ignore the man sitting across the table from her.

  Neither worked, really.

  Of course, there was that moment by the bed. And it was a moment. She was sure of it. The way he’d looked at her, like a man who wanted…things. Possibly, her. And she’d wanted. In that moment, she’d wanted. Okay, so there had been a lot of wanting moments in the time since she’d flung panties in his face. Which seemed a lifetime ago now. But he’d leaned. And for a brief, heart-stopping second, she’d been certain he was going to kiss her. And she’d wanted that, too.

  Still did, if she were being painfully honest with herself.

  “So,” she said, shoving away those very foolish thoughts, trying to look completely cool and collected. But mostly trying not to choke on the pulp in her orange juice as she took a sip to clear the sudden tightness that gripped her throat every time she looked at him and remembered “the moment.” She coughed and took a renewed interest in her eggs. “You were going to tell me about your occupation.”

  “Was I?”

  She braved a glance at him, before the eggs lured her back. Whoever thought of putting cheese and cream in scrambled eggs should be canonized, she thought, as she scooped up another heaping forkful. Had she ever been this ravenous? Why was she so ravenous? Nerves usually made her nauseous. “Yes,” she said, around another bite, “you were. How does a person get started in the field of…recovering things?”

  “You mean did I start my life as Oliver Twist, picking pockets and running scams, then find some way to romantically turn those ill-gotten skills into a legally responsible profession, at which I went on to shine like the brightest star and am now, sitting here before you, a humble, yet noble hero, champion of the poor and downtrodden?”

  She paused with the fork halfway to her mouth and stared at him. “Wow.” She took the bite, thought for a moment, chewed, swallowed, then nodded. “Yeah, pretty much.”

  “That’s exactly how I got started.”

  She wrestled with the tiny lid to the jar of blackberry preserves.

  He reached over and plucked the jar from her hands, and she was so momentarily stunned by the warmth of his skin brushing hers, the blunt feel of his fingers, that her brain sort of short-circuited for an instant, her senses all reveling in that brief contact.

  He popped the lid and handed the jar to her and turned his attention back to the omelet he was very precisely cutting pieces from, and thoughtfully chewing, in between sips of tea—yes, tea—and reading the morning paper.

  To anyone else it might look as if they were a longtime couple going through their morning ritual. Of course, if anyone else were looking, they might also wonder why her ankles were tied to the chair, but, all things considered, it was a minor aberration to an otherwise quaint domestic scene.

  “Have you ever been arrested?” she asked him as she polished off the last of the croissant, wishing she had another.

  “You mean during my long life of crime?” He folded the paper and laid it beside his plate. “No, I’ve managed to avoid getting thrown in the slammer, as you Yanks call it.”

  “Good to know,” she said, reluctantly putting her silverware on her plate, still hungry. She’d heard that being put in sudden danger could amp up all kinds of emotions in people, like making them want to have sex with someone they would otherwise never consider getting naked with. Maybe for her, it was exhibiting itself as hunger. She looked at Silas. Nope, it was sex for her, too. Except she was pretty sure it wouldn’t have taken a crisis situation to make her want him.

  He looked up then, and caught her staring…only he didn’
t look away. He didn’t say a word, and she couldn’t have if she’d wanted to; her throat had completely closed over. He kept his gaze on hers until her thighs were all kind of quivery and her skin felt tingly, and all she could do was think about how warm his skin had felt, and that the bluntness of his fingertips had been so incredibly…. male. And how they might feel playing out on other parts of her body. She jerked her gaze away, and would have gotten up from the table to put some much needed distance between them, but realized quite quickly that she couldn’t go anywhere.

  His expression flickered, and for just a split second, it was like the moment all over again. The way he looked at her, like he was the one with the ravenous appetite. It made her want to squirm, when it should have downright terrified her. She was tied to a chair for God’s sake. The last person she should be lusting after was the man who’d put her there.

  Just then the phone rang, making her jump.

  The moment mercifully ended, she took a deep, steadying breath as Silas shoved his chair back and went to answer it. She craned her neck, almost tipping the chair sideways, in hopes of getting at least a hint of who was on the other end. No matter how hard she listened, though, she heard nothing. He barely spoke a word. Everything else that was going on rushed back through her mind. She tried not to think about what was happening with Delia at that very moment. Or if anyone had missed her yet. Of course, pretty much everyone else in her orbit would assume she was at home sleeping. Oh, if only. She put her napkin on the table and took a steadying breath. She needed to stop thinking about wanting Silas to put his hands on her again, and formulate an exit plan.

  She glanced at the bed, but quickly looked away. No naked thoughts! Seducing him probably wouldn’t have worked anyway. It was highly likely he slept with actual supermodels.

  He hung up the phone and then it hit her. Idiot! He’d been standing far from the door with his back to her and she’d had perfectly free hands to untie her ankles! Well, the knots were behind her, but surely she’d have been able to do something. Saw through the cables with her jam knife, something. Instead she’d sat there like a sex-starved dork—which, okay, so there might be some truth to that. She sighed as Silas crossed back to the table, and mentally added thief and spy to the list of things she’d suck at doing, right after supermodel.

  He didn’t look all that happy as he took his seat across from her. Now that breakfast was over, would he tie her up again? That would significantly reduce her possible exit strategies.

  “So, the good news is I won’t need your help getting into the hotel safe.”

  She blanched. Up until then, even with the gun and tying her up, it had all seemed somewhat surreal. But now there was talk of safe-cracking and actual plans being made and it felt a lot more real. And she was suddenly a lot less hungry and a lot more nauseous. “Good to know,” she managed. “It would be next to impossible for me to take anything from there anyway, given how it’s set up. I—I thought you needed to get into another room.”

  “I wasn’t a hundred percent sure where it was.”

  “But you are now.”

  “Close enough. I’m still going to need that passkey of yours.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay?”

  “I’ve decided I can’t be a party to whatever else it is you’re doing, even if it is for a good cause. I mean, it’s bad enough, yes, that I broke in here, and I apologized for that. So, it’s my fault if my passkey gets stolen and used inappropriately. To steal God only knows what.” She flung up her hand. “Which I do not want to know! I’ve changed my mind about having to know things. Just take it already and do whatever you have to do. I want to go home, get some sleep, find out if my best friend’s life is over, then go back to work.”

  Silas looked at her so intently her thighs went all tingly again. “I wish it were that simple.”

  “It is that simple. I will take the blame for losing my passkey and I might lose my job over that alone, especially as it will be tied to a robbery. So you’ve got nothing really over me. That’s the worst that can happen. Right?” She looked at him. “Never mind, I don’t want to know that, either. I would be horrible in jail, really I would. I wouldn’t fare well.”

  He smiled then. “You might do better than you think. But if all goes as planned, there won’t be jail time in either of our futures.”

  She thought she’d had a clearer mind, but maybe that was the sugar rush from all that jam talking. That apparently had subsided now, because she was both very scared and very tired. “Well, that’s certainly a relief.”

  “I’m sorry, but I also need your help. Personally.”

  “Just take the damn key,” she said, already trying to figure out how she could be as inconspicuous as possible in prison. They didn’t target the quiet ones, did they? Why hadn’t she watched more prison chick movies? She had no idea what to expect.

  “Sophie.” He’d said it gently, and she was looking up, responding, before thinking better of it.

  “What?”

  “I need you to break into the room. I can’t go in there.”

  “Why? Why can’t you go?”

  “I can’t be seen entering or exiting that room. You’ll have to be quiet when you go in,” he went on, as if it were decided already.

  “Who cares about how quiet I am? It’s not like there’s going to be anyone—” She broke off and her mouth dropped open for a second, before snapping back shut. “No. No way. You know firsthand that I don’t do well sneaking around in occupied rooms.”

  “You can pretend you’re the maid. I’m sure we can get the right gear for that.”

  She started to spout right back at him, until she realized that he was talking about her moving about the hotel, getting uniforms, which meant going to other floors, other areas. Where there were people. Even if he went with her every step of the way, there would have to be moments where she could break free. It was risky, but sitting here tied up wasn’t going to get her anywhere except in jail. Or worse.

  “We could, but why not just wait for whoever is in there to leave, then go in yourself?”

  “It won’t be there unless the room is occupied.”

  “Oh.” She frowned. “What is it, exactly, that you’re stealing back?” She held up a hand. “I’m sorry, re-retrieving?”

  “I won’t need your help until this evening,” he said, ignoring her question. “I won’t be needing the bed and I know you worked all last night, so it’s yours. For now.”

  “I have to work this evening,” she said, trying not to care that he seemed entirely unmoved, much less tempted, by her being in his bed.

  “You’ll have to ask for the night off.” He raised his hand as she opened her mouth. “If I could make this happen earlier and set us both free, trust me, I would.”

  She clamped her lips together. Great. Not only wasn’t he tempted by her in any physical way, he couldn’t get rid of her fast enough. Clearly she’d misread that moment earlier. Not that this wasn’t a good thing in the big scheme of things, but it was kind of insulting.

  “It’s all going to be over by tonight,” he said. “We’ll both get what we want, and never have to see each other again.”

  “What, exactly, do you want me to do? Because, as it stands, you have me for breaking and entering, and now it sounds like you want me to do the actual stealing—”

  “Retrieving,” he said.

  “Right. I’m sure the police will be mollified by that distinction when they haul me in. Anyway, if I retrieve whatever it is for you, then basically I’m the one who is screwed and you, pretty much, haven’t done anything wrong.”

  The corner of his mouth quirked. “Funny how that works out, eh?”

  “Funny how I’m not really all that amused.” A totally hot accent only went so far. Okay, it went pretty far, but this was too far.

  “If I could do this any other way, I would. If it makes you feel any better, I can assure you that you are doing a good thing, a favor, if you will, for som
eone completely deserving, and I’m not speaking of myself here.”

  “So, why won’t you tell me what’s going on, then? I mean, if it’s a good deed—”

  “I believe you said you didn’t want any additional information.”

  “That was before I found out I was the one doing the stealing.”

  “Re—”

  “—trieving. Okay.” She sighed. “You’re going to have to tell me at least part of it, or I won’t know what to retrieve.” She made finger quotes in the air with that last part, which didn’t seem to amuse him. Too bad.

  “It’s an old—very old—velvet case. You don’t need to know more than that. I am trying to keep you from being any more involved than necessary.”

  “Right. I feel very cared-for in this scenario.”

  “Sophie—”

  He really had to stop saying her name. It sounded way too good the way he said it. “What’s to keep me from just taking it myself? Or telling whoever is in that room that you’re making me steal against my will?”

  Any vestiges of a smile or amusement vanished completely. “You cannot do that.”

  “Well, I could, but if you tell me what I’m doing this for, or who—”

  “It would only put you in real trouble.”

  “As opposed to the fake trouble I’m in now?”

  He leaned his weight onto the table, bringing his face closer and his gaze that much more intently focused on her. It wasn’t anything like the last time they’d leaned. This time it scared her a little. More than a little. Which, she suspected, it was supposed to.

  “My goal is to get what I came for and set you free, unharmed, to go back to the life you were living before I met you. The person in that room will not be similarly motivated. And is also far more equipped to cause harm, and not nearly as reluctant to do so. Of that, I assure you.”

  Yep, she was officially scared.

  6

  SIMON’S HEART HAD SQUEEZED like someone had it in their fist at the thought of Sophie being cavalier around Tolliver. He told himself it was because he didn’t want anyone getting hurt, but looking at Sophie, he had to at least admit that there might be more at play there. She…did something to him. Made him care. Certainly more than he should. She also made him want. If he caught her looking at him like she had that jamladen croissant, then looking at the bed, one more time, he might not be responsible for his actions.