My Sinful Temptation (Sinful Men Book 5)

by Lauren Blakely

  “Thank you all for coming. More than fifteen months ago, there was a building here. One with uncomfortable, even painful associations for many—not just me and my family. The people who ran that place left a trail of wreckage behind them, hurting far too many innocent families. They can’t hurt anyone now, and though the White Box club had been shut down for a while, it seemed nobody wanted it. But we did. My brothers and my sister and I bought that boarded-up property. We had no dreams of opening a restaurant or club. We thought it was time that building came down, and something that everyone could enjoy went up. Something that would bring peace, solace, and happiness to many. So, we donated the land to the city as the site of the future Thomas Paige Library. We hope this will be a place that will better lives and not tear them apart. Thank you.”

  Sniffles abounded. Plenty of them. I handed a tissue to the woman to my left, my prep work coming in handy. But none of the sniffles were mine. I simply wasn’t a crier, but I was definitely a stiff upper lipper. While I hadn’t known Thomas Paige, I was glad to have played a part in finding and capturing everyone involved with his murder. Two important things stood out in the process: (1) justice had been served, and (2) life was short. So much shorter than it should be for some people.

  “This was . . .” John trailed off as if he wasn’t sure what to say, and I didn’t know how to fill in the blank. Perhaps it was the uncharacteristic note of emotion in his voice that stumped me. The man was stoic, and with good reason. But right now, he seemed . . . not stoic as he said softly, “It’s good to have closure.”

  As the lead detective on the Thomas Paige investigation, surely John needed the closure too, maybe in a different way than the Sloan family. In a way that gave him the drive to move on to solving the next crime.

  I turned my focus back to Michael and the mayor as they went through the ceremony of breaking ground, Michael taking the shovel and spearing it into the earth and turning over a chunk of dirt. A bubble of tension popped, and the assembly broke into applause as the mayor shook Michael’s hand and they both smiled for the flashing cameras.

  “I’m not sure it’s closure,” I said, picking up where John left off, “since it feels like this library might open doors for people.”

  John regarded me sideways, as if deciding whether I was going for a pun or something deeper. “That was oddly profound for a Thursday morning.”

  I shrugged. “It’s what I think.”

  He nodded, standing with his hands in his pockets, still thoughtful. Then our eyes met. “So do I. I feel the same. It’s the kind of thing you hold on to so you can keep doing what you do, you know?”

  I did know, and we both broke eye contact and turned, watching the people who had become as much family as they were friends pose for press photos, their smiles ranging from peaceful to bittersweet.

  When we left, John walked me to my car, held the door open for me, and said goodbye. As I slid into the driver’s seat, his gaze seemed to linger for a little longer than usual.

  “You know, I was going to . . .”

  Intrigued, I waited for him to finish. But then he shook his head.

  “What is it?” I prodded. He wasn’t seriously going to leave me wondering, was he?

  “Nothing.” He shook his head again. The frown unknotted from between his brows. “I’ll see you at the gym.” He gave me a smile and pushed my car door closed before hopping into his LEAF.

  As I drove away, one thought played over and over in my mind. What was it that he hadn’t allowed himself to say?

  2

  Mindy

  The hostess didn’t bother giving Brent and me menus anymore. We’d been meeting at the restaurant in the Luxe for breakfast for years. Even the new staff was used to us—especially Brent, since he worked in the hotel.

  Food was good. Friendship was better. Usually.

  “All right,” Brent said, leaning back in the booth after the server had brought our drinks. “Tell me if I’m crazy, but did I detect a vibe between you and the detective yesterday?”

  “At the groundbreaking?” I stared at him over my coffee mug. “You’re crazy.”

  Brent broke into a grin that didn’t bode well for my keep-it-under-wraps efforts. “What’s so terrible about making flirty eyes with him at a groundbreaking ceremony, your majesty?” he asked. “Does it lack decorum? I proposed to my wife in a cemetery.”

  “Aw!” Covering my heart with my hands, I pretended to swoon. “You are so romantic!” I dropped my hands and the act. “Said no one ever.”

  Though I doubted that was true. Shannon, I bet, thought he was the most romantic. And he probably agreed with her.

  “Also,” I went on, “can I just point out the ridiculousness of using yourself as a model of decorum?”

  He considered that for a moment. “Good point,” he conceded, then leaned his elbows on the table. “Now, if you’re done changing the subject, I’ll ask again. Are you ever going to tell Detective John Winston how you’re crushing on him, and that you write his name with little curlicue hearts in your notebook?”

  I considered a range of tactics—denial, avoidance, change of subject. But why pick one when I could go with a cocktail mix? “You miss the stage, don’t you? Your moments of stand-up? Have your fun, but let the record reflect those are lies.” I stabbed the table with my finger. “Vicious lies. Because I’m not in middle school. I didn’t do that back then, and I don’t do it now.”

  “I bet you do.” Brent leaned farther in. “It’s just the kind of thing you’d do—scribble a note to your secret crush in your diary, then lock it up and hide the notebook under your bed.”

  I wanted to swat him with a pancake. Where was our food? “Brent,” I said, more patiently than I felt. “I have three sisters. I’d have been an idiot to put anything in writing.”

  “Fair point,” he said after a beat. Then he raised a not-so-fast finger. “But you live alone now. I’m not going to believe you until you show me your diary.”

  “Good luck with that, then, because, one, I don’t have a diary, and two . . . no.”

  I was saved by the server arriving with our food, and we both sat back so she could put the plates on the table. I asked for a warm-up on my coffee, hoping that by the time she was done, Brent would have changed the subject. After all, John was damned attractive, but I’d had him inked in under “professional contacts.” Or maybe “colleagues.” Now that we worked out at the gym together, I’d say he’d stepped out of the “friend of a friend” column and into the “friend of mine” box, but he couldn’t be anything more than that.

  “Well, I think there’s something there.” He raised his eyebrows as he stabbed his pancake. “I could just see the two of you doing coupley things together. Going on dates to the movies, hands touching in the popcorn box. Dancing . . .”

  “I do not dance.” My cheeks burned, but in reality, I did. Dance, that was.

  We’d danced at Sophie and Ryan’s wedding. The two single people in a party full of couples.

  Pairing off was inevitable. Unavoidable. And, quite simply, irresistible.

  At least, that was my memory of the night. It still brought a flush to my skin, but I held on to every detail of dancing with John as Ella Fitzgerald had crooned “Let’s Fall in Love.”

  3

  Mindy

  Several months ago

  Everything about the wedding was wonderful, from the food to the music to the fit of the tux on the man who gave the bride away. He wore it well, and he still looked good later at the reception at Mandalay Bay. He also looked happy, and that was a good look on him too.

  John and I were the only ones left at our table as the dancing started and coupled-up guests took to the floor. A few songs in, Ella Fitzgerald crooned, beckoning us.

  “Want to take a spin?” John asked.

  “Sure.”

  Once on the dance floor, he placed his arm around my waist and his hand clasped mine, his gaze intent and curious. Almost as if he was taking in all my
features to remember later.

  I never blushed, so the heat spreading from my chest and tingling to my fingertips had to be something else.

  I didn’t know what. Stranger still, I wasn’t sure what to say, which was incredibly unlike me.

  When the silence stretched longer than I could stand, I said, “You’re a pretty good dancer.”

  “For a cop, you mean.” He grinned.

  “For anybody,” I told him, laughing. “But you could use some work on accepting compliments.”

  “Let’s turn it around, then.” He still held my gaze, his blue eyes crinkling at the corners. “You have a lovely laugh.”

  “Thank you,” I said softly, loving the sweet words, tucking them away someplace inside me so I could recall them later.

  John didn’t seem desperate to fill the silence, but it pushed hard on me, pointing out this was an opportunity I shouldn’t waste. With the investigation into the Paige murder now closed, maybe this was what I’d hoped for—the chance to let John know I wanted to learn more about him. I needed to show I was interested in John Winston, the person. Because I was.

  “So . . . you dance.” I laugh. “What else do you do that defies expectations?”

  He seemed to appreciate the question, giving it some thought. “I’m a fan of classic crime fiction.”

  I narrowed my eyes playfully. “That doesn’t really come as a surprise. You’re a detective. Of course you identify with . . . who is it? Philip Marlowe? Sam Spade?”

  “Sherlock Holmes.”

  “Hmm . . . duly noted.”

  He looked a little wary, but then I caught the glint of humor in his eyes. “Is it important, which one I identify with?”

  “Not at all, which is, as Agatha Christie would say, what makes it so interesting.”

  “Ah, I see. You’re a Miss Marple fan.”

  I shook my head. “No . . . I mean, yes, I love those stories, but if I had to pick, I like them hard-boiled. It’s Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler all the way.”

  “Hmm . . .” he said, echoing me. “That tracks.”

  I shot him a sharp stare. “Are you saying I’m hard-boiled?”

  “No.” He slowly trailed his studying gaze over my face, my blonde hair, to my shoulder. Finally, his gaze trailed along my collarbone. I could feel it like a feathering touch running up my neck to below my jaw. And I could feel, too, the depth of my wish that he’d trace a finger over my hair. “You look soft and goddamn—”

  He broke off, and I held my breath. One beat, two beats . . .

  They were fast, my heartbeats, and they were drowned out by the pounding rhythm coming from the speakers.

  When had the music changed? And who’d put on “Mamma Mia”? Unacceptable—bring back Ella Fitzgerald, please. I hadn’t even noticed that we’d stopped at the edge of the dance floor, out of the way of people getting their dance on, and out of the figurative spotlight.

  What did I look soft and goddamn like?

  “You can’t leave me hanging like that, John,” I said, almost as exasperated as I pretended to be.

  He dropped his arm and released my hand but didn’t step back. The wheels were clearly turning in his head, but I couldn’t tell what he was thinking.

  A waiter circled by with champagne.

  John glanced at the tray but didn’t take any.

  “We should get . . . coffee sometime,” he said, spinning me around with his sudden suggestion.

  “Coffee?” I repeated. Had he meant to ask me for coffee? Because he’d been looking at the drinks tray. His voice was champagne.

  “Yes, coffee.”

  We’d had coffee before. To talk about work. To trade theories on the investigation. The case was now closed, and his tone said drinks. But he’d definitely said the word “coffee”—twice.

  And I wasn’t one to lean on subtext.

  He ran his hand over his hair like he was nervous, which was not a word I would have associated with John Winston. Then the awkwardness was gone, and he seemed to regain his footing. “Let me know when you’re free.”

  4

  Mindy

  Perhaps I had lingered too long on that memory.

  It was one of my favorites, despite how it had ended.

  But now, at breakfast in the Luxe, I stirred cream into my coffee. And continued to stir.

  Until Brent reached across the table and stilled my hand. “Mindy, stop. I give up. Just, please—I can’t take one more clink of that spoon.”

  Apparently, I’d been stirring for a long time, lost in my thoughts. “Wait, what are you giving up?”

  “Bugging you about your not-as-unrequited-as-you-think feelings for John.”

  With a huge sigh, I dropped my spoon on the table. “I’m telling you the truth, Brent. If something were going to happen between John and me, it would have already happened.” I picked up my cup in both hands and sighed more softly. I was going to need another reheat. “We had a chance. After the Thomas Paige investigation finally wrapped up, we even set up an appointment for coffee.”

  “Coffee as in work-colleagues coffee or coffee as in a starter date?”

  “Hard to say. The man is a bit inscrutable.”

  He shot me a look that spoke volumes. “And your talent is reading people.”

  “True. But I haven’t mastered reading that man. If I were a betting woman, I’d say yes, it seemed like a potential date. But I don’t like to assume. And maybe that’s for the best. Because the maybe-date coffee never happened. John was called to a homicide and had to cancel. And then the next time, I had an emergency at work.” I made a and so on gesture. Because so it went. “Then we started working out together, and now he’s my sparring partner, and . . .” I shrugged. “This is where we’ve settled, and it works for us.”

  Brent frowned, but gently. “I think ‘settled’ is a telling word, Queen Mindy.” The affectionate nickname took any sting out of the comment. “If you have time to be friends, you could make time to be more.”

  But did I? Could I? I wasn’t so sure. I’d always trusted signs, and they all pointed to the fact that we were buddies. John and I were best that way. Besides, I didn’t crave the same things my friends had in their lives. “Just because you’re all married and popping out babies, doesn’t mean everyone should be.” I stared into my lukewarm coffee. “Not everyone is meant for that.”

  “I know.” He held up his hands in surrender, but he was serious when he added, “But I worry about you.”

  I looked away. Truth was, sometimes I worried about me too.

  Brent didn’t dance around the topic, which was one reason we were friends, but he spoke gently. “I worry that you put your heart on ice when Cody died in Afghanistan.”

  My fiancé and I had been together for four years, engaged for one. He’d proposed when we both came back from deployment. I didn’t reenlist when my time was up, but Cody went back for a second tour and was killed.

  That was six years ago.

  Brent wasn’t wrong—I’d grieved hard, and, yes, it did feel as if the part of me that could love someone had died with Cody. But scars healed. I’d made it through, leaning on my friends and my job. Security work was not nearly as challenging as the military had been, but it was rewarding in its own way.

  And it had provided a soft landing for me after Cody’s death.

  Now, six years later, I still had work to fall back on—such that it was right now—and my friends and my sisters. Plus, I had a sacred duty as book supplier for my nieces and nephews—the ones in Colorado and the new ones I’d unofficially adopted here.

  “You say ‘settled’ like it’s a bad thing,” I said. “I know what you mean, but when you feel unsettled—like you’re in zero gravity and nothing is bolted down to hold on to—stability and consistency trump romantic drama.”

  Brent stared at me, looking dissatisfied with my answer and making sure I saw him looking dissatisfied with it. His eyebrow arch seemed to last a long time before he let it go. “Don’t
think we won’t come back to that another time. But you just reminded me to ask how things are going at the Jade. It’s been almost a year since you left the Wynn for the new gig. I’m sensing lately it’s not all you’d hoped it would be.”

  “Understatement of the year.” I leaned back in the booth, demonstrating how tired I was of the runaround. “My boss—”

  I jerked my head up, making sure no one was in earshot. I even stretched up to look into the next booth. Las Vegas, especially the Strip, could be such a small world.

  Satisfied we had a window of privacy, I went on, but didn’t name names. “I always thought that buyouts by soulless new owners were a cliché. But here I am, working on a temporary contract in a job I’ve been doing for nearly eight years. And there they are, stringing me along with the promise of a permanent job and benefits and a 401K. A 401K would go a long way toward making me feel more settled.”

  He tapped his fingers on the table. “No promises, but if you want, I could check around—”

  “Nope.” I held up my hands like double stop signs. “Do. Not. Want.” At Brent’s frown, I softened my tone. “Seriously, Brent. I don’t want favors.” I paused. “At least, not right now.”

  “What do you want right now?” he asked. “Besides a retirement plan?”

  “I’d settle for a freaking hot cup of coffee.”

  And it came—the jolt of energy I needed for a nonstop day. The kind of day that invigorated me. That reminded me why I loved my job.

  In spite of a classic sexist boss, I still loved every damn thing about this gig.

  If only it came with a little more security.

  When my boss called me into his office that evening, I sent a wish out to the universe that he’d finally offer me a permanent post.