“What would it take to make you cry out, Gem? Have you ever come so hard you forgot everything else?” Damien asked

His bold words jarred her, excited her. They made her realize that, no, Gemma Duncan had never been rocked like a hurricane in her life.

“Don’t talk to me like you know me,” she said, trying to stay in control of herself. “You don’t. Not at all.”

“I don’t?” He laughed softly. “Certainly I know when a woman wants to be touched. What’s your favorite spot, Gem? A long kiss behind the knee? A finger tracing up your spine?” He brushed his mouth over her ear.

Gemma ached, literally hurting because of the burn, the throb inside her. Only pride was keeping her from touching herself.

Because once she stepped over this line with Damien Theroux, there was no going back….

Dear Reader,

What’s your fantasy?

When Gemma Duncan meets Damien Theroux, this is what he asks her. And—you guessed it—he’s more than willing to carry out her most exotic requests. I was lucky to travel the steamy streets of New Orleans in order to flesh out their fantasies: the vivid historical atmosphere, the joie de vivre, the “I’m-willing-to-gain-ten-pounds-for-this-food.”

Tough job, but someone has to suffer through it.

The hot-blooded adventures of Damien and Gemma were great fun, and I hope to write many more stories in The Big Easy. I also hope you have a good time with this saucy undercover reporter who decides to expose the city’s biggest bad boy!

Dare to dream….

Crystal Green

www.crystal-green.com

Born To Be Bad
Crystal Green

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To Scott, aka “Duncan”:

Thanks for your help with Club Lotus!

Now go out there and conquer the world.

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Epilogue

1

IN GEMMA DUNCAN’S FANTASIES, sweat would bead on her skin. It would trickle down her body to dampen the satin sheets while strangers—bad boys who never turned good—trailed their mouths over her belly.

They would dip their tongues into a navel pooled with summer heat, drag their kisses upward, over her writhing torso, her ribs, under the tender swell of her breast, drinking her in. They would never leave their names, but they would leave her tapped out physically, filled only with a surging need for more.

Gemma never talked about these fantasies.

But there were safer ones she would share with her new friends over happy-hour cocktails. Fantasies such as winning a Pulitzer at the tender age of twenty-six. Fantasies where she would uncover the nefarious activities of crime lords while crusading as a journalist at the New Orleans Times-Picayune. Fantasies where she could bake a perfect soufflé, do a triple axel like Michelle Kwan and come home to a Garden District fantasy mansion full of fantasy puppies saved from the pound with her fantasy fortune.

As far as vivid imaginations went, she was number one. Heck, her fantasies even included knowing how to position a cell phone so that it always received perfect reception.

Needless to say, reality was a little different for Gemma Duncan.

“Jimmy?” she asked for the third time, walking five steps to the left and cocking her head to the right as she exited a French Quarter souvenir store. Taunting her, the phone fuzzed and stuttered in denial.

She’d had her older brother on the line only a second ago. “Jimmy? Can you hear me?”

The shop’s zydeco music, with its energetic pulse of percussion and accordion, caused Gemma to plug one ear and wander through the muggy July air toward Dumaine Street. The threat of an afternoon rain braided itself with the smell of battered crawfish and spices from a nearby café.

“Hello?” She clutched her shopping bag, eager to talk to Jimmy and be back on her way to the Weekly Gossip offices in the Central Business District. Today she’d been interviewing a psychic who was integral to her latest headline: “Swamp Girl Finds Love with Tarot Reader.”

Truly. That was it. This was why Gemma used a pen name—Duncan James—as opposed to her real one.

As she wandered farther down the street, away from the tourists and toward her second destination, a voodoo shop, her older brother’s voice squawked in and out of range.

Lunch-hour efficiency, she thought, somewhat proud of her scheduling skills. On Dumaine, she would not only achieve possible reception but also buy gris-gris bag souvenirs for an out-of-town friend. Oh, and then there was the antique shop where she could see if that white-satin-gowned jazz-singer painting was still for sale….

“Jimmy,” she said again. “I’m trying to… Aw, forget it. If you can hear me, I’m running errands anyway, so I bought that grotesque shellacked baby gator head for your wife. I’ll send it priority mail tomorrow, okay? By the way, tell her happy birthday, you sicko. If I had a husband with a yen for weird gag gifts like you, there’d be some damage. And I say that with all the love in my heart. Talk to you later.”

In one last, hopeful attempt to achieve reception, Gemma paced near a courtyard. It had a wrought-iron gate, and banana-tree leaves that leaned over the brick wall like a bored woman passing time while watching the street’s infrequent traffic. Beyond the barriers, a man’s raised voice competed with Jimmy’s tinny bark.

“Gemma, I heard that. When you finally get it into your thick head that you’ve moved to the wrong city, and listen to your family and move back here—”

Oops. Not…understanding…a…word…you…say….” She snapped shut her cell phone, tucked it into the purse she’d slung crosswise over her chest and rested her spine against the courtyard bricks. She wiped at the heat steaming the straight tendrils of her upswept hair into curlicues while the man’s disembodied voice continued to bluster behind the wall. A fountain tinkled in the background.

Water. The splashes reminded her of Orange County, California, where the dog days of summer were tempered by beach winds and afternoons by the swimming pool.

But that’s not where she belonged. She’d visited New Orleans and had never left, especially after the Weekly Gossip job had come along. The tabloid had sounded good because she’d been desperate for income and experience.

Besides, the “Big Easy” had always sounded adventurous, a bit scary. Naughty.

The last place anyone who knew “nice” Gemma Duncan would’ve expected her to end up.

Over the courtyard wall, another male voice had joined the first one. Gemma idly closed her eyes, listening, lulled by the southern afternoon sounds.

“You’re playing with some fire, here, Mr. Lamont. I’ll leave now, before our meeting humiliates you further.”

Gemma’s eyes eased open, lured by the second man’s voice. His tone had the rough undertow of a bayou night, where unknown dangers were hidden by darkness, the buzz of crickets, the lap of black water against crumbling docks.

A warm ache shocked her lower belly, then pulsed lower, urging her to press her thighs together. Man, if a mere voice could get her going, she really needed a date. Maybe it was time to start meeting more people and doing less work.

People such as…

She strained to hear him again, that echo of her fantasies—shadow-edged and wild, with just a hint of foreign danger.

Right, she thought. Only in my craziest dreams.

Most disappointingly, the first man was talking again, his N’awlins accent charged with anger. “You rigged that roulette wheel and bled me last night. Did you invite me to that gaming room with ruination in mind, Theroux?”

Theroux? She knew that name.

An intimidating pause spoke volumes, and she could imagine the accuser, Lamont, backing up a few steps.

“Anything else?” Theroux asked. “After all, you invited me to meet with you alone, and I expected to deal in some true business with a man of your stature. But your threats don’t interest me, Lamont. Neither does your desperation.”

“I resigned from the company three months ago, so you can’t hold anything against me now.” Lamont’s voice shook a little. “I’ve become a better man.”

“After you’ve tasted what your employees had to endure? I think so.”

“What are you, Theroux? Some self-appointed avenger? Yes? I lost a lot of money in your joint. I could—”

“But you won’t. You’ll keep your voice down and go back to your home unruffled. Understand?”

Had Theroux stolen from this Lamont? And what was all this talk about employees and revenge?

Heart fluttering during the ensuing hesitation, Gemma shrank away from the gate, sheltering herself behind the brick wall. Maybe she should leave, but her inner journalist wouldn’t allow it. Sometimes the best stories were the ones you stumbled over.

Damien Theroux was gossip gold, a city legend. A fixture in the good-old-boy network.

Just by picturing what kind of man went with that kind of voice, she grew a little feverish.

Was he suave? Graying at the temples? As bearish as Tony Soprano?

While she considered it, Theroux’s victim, Lamont, was no doubt taking a moment to gather himself. He finally responded with more respect. “All I want is my money back, Mr. Theroux. I’ve worked hard for it.”

“Not as hard as I did. And, rest assured, the proceeds will go to a proper place.”

“Please!” Lamont’s voice cracked. “I’ll have to sell my home, you realize.”

More silence cut through the humidity, and Gemma held her breath. The brick wall scratched against her cheek as she slipped down an inch, knee joints turning to liquid.

This was ridiculous, hiding like a child. Eavesdropping. But she couldn’t leave. Wouldn’t leave.

Heavy footsteps neared the gate. With a guilty start, Gemma opened her eyes, then darted behind a long, exhausted bronze Buick parked streetside. She held her crinkling plastic souvenir bag against her thigh, hoping it wouldn’t make another sound.

She’d hit rock bottom, spying like this.

As the iron gate moaned open, Lamont’s tortured voice echoed the rusty hinges. “You’re not getting away with this. You are not all-powerful, Damien Theroux!”

Damien Theroux. Confirmation that this was the shady man she’d read about in the newspapers.

She could hear Theroux’s steps come to a halt.

“I wish I had the power of gods,” he said. “Then I’d fleece you in the afterlife, too, when we’re both in hell.”

Oh, what a quote that’d make. Gemma only wished she had her tiny recorder on.

From the sound of it, Lamont was getting braver, closer, as if he was at the gate, too. “Wouldn’t the public love to know about these other dealings? Your weaknesses? I think a few of your competitors read the papers, if you catch my meaning.”

Theroux merely laughed—but not because he was entertained, obviously. Or maybe he was.

By now, Gemma’s head was swimming. This could lead to a real story. Maybe an exposé of one of New Orleans’s most intriguing characters?

Her ticket to respect.

If she could just find out exactly what these “other” dealings were.

After the seemingly endless lack of response, Theroux spoke. “I think you’re too smart to talk about my business, Mr. Lamont, if you catch my meaning.”

That must have done the trick for Lamont because Theroux continued swinging open the gate. He shut it with finality and walked away.

Oh, thank God, thank God, thank God he hadn’t seen her crouched by the Buick.

As she waited a beat, a car drove by. Nonchalantly, Gemma flashed a smile at the miffed driver while he watched her hiding.

When he’d passed, she paused another moment, peeking around the car, watching an overweight, bald man—Lamont—as he trudged back toward his foliage-obscured brick home. Moments later, he slammed his door.

Quivering with the buzz of career success, Gemma peeked around the other side of the Buick, focusing on a tall, broad-shouldered, wiry figure as he moved down the street with the walk of a predator—slightly hunched, wary.

He had black shoulder-length hair that echoed the lazy wisps of a fine cigar’s smoke. Hair that reminded her of a hallway in the dead of night when you have to drag a hand along the walls to find your way. A hallway where something might be waiting for you to pass, to feel the smile on its face when you discover it’s there.

Was she going to pursue this? Damien Theroux wasn’t a woman who lived in the sticks, professing to be a swamp thing in love with a psychic. He wasn’t anyone else she usually wrote about, either—not the reincarnated Elvises or the women who claimed to be the next Marie Laveau.

Damien Theroux was her chance to make it big, to be taken seriously by everyone who’d expected more out of her than tabloid reporting. Even herself.

Hell, yeah, she was going to do this.

Gemma slyly removed herself from behind the Buick, trailing Theroux’s panther stride, his black designer suit, the brightness of her future.

He rounded onto Royal Street, and she took care to act like a tourist, gawking at brightly hued buildings with their jolly paint-flaked shutters, the lacy iron fences, stray drops from this morning’s rain shower dripping on her head from galleries and balconies.

As Theroux moved onto St. Philip, the streets grew more deserted. Gemma wondered if she should stay on the beaten paths, if she’d entered an area that concierges warned their hotel guests to stay away from.

A hungover man without shoes told her in passing that he’d fallen asleep in front of a bar and someone had stolen his wallet and boots, and she just about turned right back around to safer territory.

“Brave Reporter Breaks Open the Truth About Notorious Criminal!” screamed the headlines of her mind.

She kept going.

Finally, Theroux disappeared into a crumbling, two-story wooden dwelling that squatted on a corner. The word Cuffs was painted in green over the awning-shrouded door.

Cuffs, huh? Gemma grinned, liking the place already. Her California-suburb family and friends would be shocked, but she was curious.

Not that she’d ever admit that out loud.

As she ventured closer, she wondered if this was Theroux’s place. Everyone knew the man owned aboveboard businesses such as restaurants, bars and souvenir shops. Ironically, he was said to own the exact store where she’d purchased the gator head today.

But she was more interested in other establishments—especially the ones Lamont had mentioned.

Gemma took a big breath, fortifying herself. She could barely even walk straight with all the adrenaline attacking her system.

When she finally made it inside, she didn’t have long to absorb the murky atmosphere—the T-shirted, buzz-cutted, beefy men clutching the handles of mugs and watching a TV game show at the four-sided bar. The smell of booze and perspiration mixed by the slow blades of a ceiling fan. The clank of balls rolling over a pool table in the far corner.

Instead, a pair of strong arms engulfed her with the quickness of a flashing bite. One hand sprawled over her belly, pressing her back into a hard, lean body covered in linen. The other gripped her chin, turning her face toward her captor while he guided her into a deserted corner.

Theroux.

Only now, this close, could she see the feral glow of his pale blue eyes set against skin the color of a tobacco leaf.

Gemma tried to bite into his hand, but he loosened his hold while refusing to let go. Mouth quirked, his smile was mean, his gaze was narrowed.

“It’s not nice to follow people, chérie.”

Fear choked her throat, and she was painfully aware that her only weapon was a dime-store gator head wrapped in a plastic bag. Her heart jackhammered in her chest. He could feel her crazy pulse, couldn’t he?

This wasn’t a fantasy anymore.

Something shifted in his eyes, the shards of a broken kaleidoscope changing form. He released her, except for the fingers that kept a hold of her skirt waistband.

God, she couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t run, either.

Yet, inexplicably, she took a step toward him.

His heavy eyebrows shot up. His half smile returned.

Her instinctive response had caught her unaware, also. But Gemma gathered all her courage and shed her old skin—the girl next door who’d made the honor roll and the dean’s list throughout school. The editor of every academic newspaper she’d worked on. Her family’s great hope.

She shot a cheeky glance at his hand. His fingers had gone from grasping her waistband to settling on her hip, his thumb looped inside the skirt’s rim.

Now that she could breathe again, she detected his scent—cool, mysterious, brandied.

“Do you mind?” she asked, directing her glance from his encroaching hand to his face.

“I mind being tailed, yeah,” he said. “Is there something you want? My day’s been full of demands, anyway.”

Didn’t she know it. “Your hand’s still on me.”

“So it is.”

His smile widened, but it wasn’t playful. No, this was what sin looked like when it was amused.

Gemma’s blood rushed downward, making her stir uncomfortably. Making the inside of her thighs slick with the excitement of the chase. Making her swell and throb.

Dammit, she needed this story, and the enigmatic Damien Theroux was right here, ready for the unmasking.

She wasn’t going to lose this chance.

Instead, she stilled the trembling in her lower stomach, hoping it wouldn’t travel to her limbs.

It did.

But her voice was strong, even as she played dumb. “You own this place?”

He merely stared at her.

“I take that as a yes.”

“Take it any way you want it.”

Her appreciation for the art of a good double entendre tickled her nerves. Luckily, she found her steel again.

“I was wondering…” what you’d feel like inside me “…if there were any openings. You know, for a waitress.”

Genius, she thought. Working for him would be a good way to gather some sly information about these “other” dealings Lamont had hinted at.

But Theroux just continued staring.

“No?” she asked.

His thumb unhooked from her waistband, coasting lower, brushing over the center of her belly. Gemma jerked and grabbed his wrist as a bolt of desire shot through her. With emphatic meaning, she pushed his hand away.

“We’re not hiring,” he said. “For waitresses.”

Gemma gulped, dreading her next question.

HAVING GROWN UP IN A DOWN-at-the-heels section of the Faubourg Marigny, Damien had been raised to watch his own back. That’s why, halfway through his trip from Lamont’s, he’d been aware of someone following him. Usually, he kept much better track of his surroundings, but today he’d been distracted by Lamont’s threats to go to the media with what he knew. None of Damien’s marks had ever been that stupid.

Would Lamont actually chance it?

Damien highly doubted so, because the price was too high. Still, he didn’t like being targeted. Trailed. You always felt it in your spine—the watching. The way a potential threat sought out your vulnerable spots.

And blondes like this woman standing in front of him were one of his biggest weaknesses.

Now, as she glanced up at him with those baby-doll-blue eyes, Damien knew better than to let down his guard for the second time that day.

She had Barbie packaging, but the innocence of her heart-shaped face was thrown out of whack by a surprisingly square jaw. Delicate, to be sure, but still strong.

“So,” she said, cool as a mint sprig in an iced cocktail, “what kind of work is available here?”

He ran a gaze over her body, starting from the flats of her sensible shoes upward—the long, tanned legs, the career-girl khaki skirt that covered slim hips and a trim waist, the humidity-soaked blue top that clung to a pair of small, rounded breasts. As his attention lingered there, her nipples hardened, pebbling the material in two strategic locations.

Deliberately, he returned his focus to her face. Her cheeks were flushed, probably because she was insulted. Either that or… Could she be turned on by his interest?

Did this girl play dirty? And had her game started when she’d followed him here?

Lust speared through Damien, a raging grumble reaching from gut to cock. He could play dirty, too. In fact, that’s the only way he wanted it. Dirty, and easy to dust off.

“What kind of work do you do?” he asked.

“Waitressing.”

“And?”

She pursed those lips. Blow-job lips, as he’d grown up calling them. “I’m not sure I understand, Mr….?”

“I’m asking about your experience, Ms….?” He mocked her by grinning.

Refusing to back down, she laughed. “Call me Gem. Gem…James.”

She rested a hand on her hip, and Damien ached, remembering how his palm had molded those curves.

“I waitressed at an Italian restaurant in high school. In college, I worked at the same trendy bar for four years. I’ve also done time at a few chain restaurants recently. So what do you say? Are you hiring?”

“No.”

She glanced at the floor, but not before Damien saw a flash of disappointment. When she looked back up, she was giving him the puppy-dog treatment.

“I swear, I’m a great server.”

Was she now?

He must’ve been wearing the happiest grin he could manage, because she perked up. “I really need a job. I moved out here a few months ago, and I haven’t gotten on my feet yet. I’ll work my ass off for this place.”

“That’d be a shame, because even though I’ve only seen the front of you, I expect the back to be just as divine.”

She gasped slightly, and her eyelashes lowered over an appraising gaze, not because he’d offended her, Damien guessed, but because he’d broken her code. Unlocked her.

Again, he wondered if she’d come into Cuffs for more than a waitressing job.

It wouldn’t be the first time a woman had wandered into one of his establishments seeking to test the rumors about Damien Theroux. There were females who liked the taste of bad boys, and he was only too happy to oblige when the need suited him.

Truth to tell, he thought, moving forward, looming over her, it suited him now.

Eyes a hazy blue, her soft lips parted, forcing him to stifle a pleased groan at the thought of how they’d feel on his penis. Without thinking, he slipped his hand into her waistband again, knuckles skimming against her hip bone. He pulled her closer, his cock hardening.

For a second, neither of them moved. But within the blink of an eye, she recovered, cleared her throat, backed away. He kept a hold of her silk tank top, not wanting to let go. The material slithered out of her skirt.

Damn, how he wanted to help her out of the rest of those clothes.

As he rubbed the sinuous material between his thumb and forefinger, she ignored the gesture, acting as if it wasn’t happening. Her aloofness got him worked up because he couldn’t get a bead on this woman.

Outside, rain started to patter on the roof.

“Why would you want to work at Cuffs, anyway?” he asked in a low voice, as if they were in a bedroom, three inches away from a mattress. “Why don’t you go to Hooters? Crescent City Brewhouse? Somewhere ‘trendier’?”

To her credit, she didn’t back down. “I like the name. Cuffs. What exactly does it mean?”

Should he tell her it was an homage to the retired cops and blue-collar fellows who liked to hang out here?

“Use your imagination,” he said instead.

“Well, you’re not one for hiding behind social niceties, are you?”

“Never.” Not since his dad had gotten worked over. Not since Martin Theroux had died from the shame brought on by the ruins of his life. Not since his son had decided that being bad was the only way to live good.

“You’re not the type of guy who’d take pity on a woman in need and hire her out of the kindness of your heart?”

“Not as a waitress.”

“Then what…? Oh.”

There it went. The lightbulb. That’s right, Damien thought. Think the worst.

New Orleans cathouses were notorious, especially with men who dealt in Damien’s area. He didn’t know if Gem realized he ran a private gaming room in addition to his legitimate businesses, but going along with her assumption that he engaged in illicit dealings didn’t bother him in the least.

Prostitution and drugs were part of the scene. They drew in customers, served as perks. Gaming downstairs, sex upstairs. That’s how it worked.

Except for Damien. He was in it for the “marks”—victims—and the fleecing. Not that anyone needed to know why he kept his gaming clean of hookers and dope.

The more horrible his reputation, the easier it would be for him to survive.

“I’m not…” Gem gestured with her hands, waving them somewhere around her chest. “You know…”

“That sort of girl?”

She didn’t say anything.

Their gazes caught, and something unspoken passed from her to him. His blood jolted in his veins, warming, boiling.

What the hell was she about?

“Damien!”

He let go of Gem’s shirt, knowing that voice. “Roxy.”

A buxom redhead with streaks of gray framing her elfin features sauntered over to the dark corner, a jaded gleam in her eyes. “Who’s this here?”

“Ms. James was just leaving.”

“I’m needing help, you fool.” Roxy grabbed Gem’s hand, tugging the young woman toward her. “I heard the two of you. She asks for a job, and you putter around the subject. Look at her, would you. She’s what our customers like—pretty and young. I tell you, Damien Theroux, no more interviews for you. Stick to the upstairs work.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He gave her a lazy salute. Only two people in the world could ever talk to him like this— Roxy and his maman, bless her soul. Everyone else could go to the devil.

With a long-suffering sigh, Roxy took Gem’s hand and placed it between both of hers. “You need a job, baby, here it is. I’m shorthanded since Eva quit days ago, and Damien could care less. I hope you can look past him and be my savior?”

Gem’s smile almost lit the room. Damien sucked in a breath, then moved away, creating distance.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Gem hugged the older woman, then clapped her hands once. “When do I start?”

“How ’bout now? Our busy time is some hours away, and I’ll want you up and running. We’ll consider this a test run tonight. How does that sound?”

“Great. I’ll be great. But may I make one quick phone call first?”

“Please.” Roxy snapped an impertinent glance to Damien, then shook her moneymaker in the direction of the bar. Gem herself gave him her own saucy look and made her way toward the entrance.

Damien watched her go, noting that her ass definitely was divine, just as he’d predicted. Firm and full in all the right places.

Before he did something ill-advised, he headed out of the bar and toward the stairs leading to his office. So Roxy had taken his departed maman’s place once again. Nice for her. Now Damien had a screwable waitress who could provide a few nights of distraction.

And he certainly needed it.

As Damien settled down to his desk to shuffle through his accounts, he lost himself in his work, happy to see what a profit he was making.

Happy to find his next victim so he could bleed the worst men dry.

2

WHEN GEMMA GOT BACK TO the Weekly Gossip that afternoon, she was pumped up, and it wasn’t just because she wanted to pitch the story of the decade to her editor.

Damien Theroux had done something to her. Flipped a switch, pushed a button…something to turn on the inner furnace.

Even now, as she sat in front of her editor’s desk, she couldn’t shake the feeling of Theroux’s thumb while it slid along her stomach, the drag of her silk top whispering out of her skirt as he tugged it toward him.

But this wasn’t the time for daydreaming, or for ducking into a restroom stall to press her fingers between her thighs to assuage the throb of excitement.

This was the time to finally rock and roll.

“So I trained for a couple of hours at Cuffs,” she said, relating the afternoon’s events to Nancy Mendoza, editor in chief, “and I’m in like Flynn with the head waitress, Roxy. The job is comparable to riding a bike. All those pizzas and beers I served in the past amount to a perfect cover.”

“Gemma…”

“I’m going back tonight, and that’s when I’ll really put the pedal to the metal. See, I want to find out about these ‘other’ dealings Lamont mentioned. We all know about the Damien Theroux in the papers, but what drives this man? How did he get into a life of gambling, drugs and prostitution? And if I could talk to people who know him and work for him, or sneak upstairs to chat with a couple of his girls—”

“Gemma!”

She stopped, mouth open to deliver another round of plans. From the corner of her eye, she could see through the office’s window. The other tabloid reporters punched away at their keyboards or stared at their computer screens.

She wouldn’t be one of their kind for much longer. No how, no way.

Nancy braced her hands against her desk, probably gearing up to break Gemma’s spirit. Again. It happened with every idea that didn’t exactly “fit” into the Weekly Gossip’s pages.

Holding up a hand, Gemma interrupted. “I know what you’re going to say. ‘Go back to your human-interest stories, Gemma.’”

“You’re good at them. Very good.”

“Is that why they’re referred to as ‘freaks and geeks’ pieces?” Gemma sighed. “Where’s the dignity for the subjects? And for me?”

Nancy’s brown eyes went soft with understanding. Every once in a while, when the editor tippled a drink or two at Friday happy hour, she’d lose her armor and tell Gemma that she’d never expected to work on a tabloid publication, either.

Funny. How many people actually did end up with the life they’d pictured while doodling on their Pee-Chee folders during high school algebra?

“Leave Damien Theroux for 60 Minutes or the newspapers,” Nancy said. Her brown hair was in a tight bun, and she was wearing her typical uniform of a crisp button-down and gray skirt. Her efficient manner had won her the nickname The General. “Theroux is beyond our scope.”

“An exposé on Theroux would take this publication places we’ve never been.” Gemma couldn’t help arguing. This story had reached epic proportions in her mind. “Imagine. We’re a national publication. If we could reveal even half of this city’s corruption to Molly Supermarket Mom of the Heartland, that would be the first step. The story would be picked up by more prestigious mainstream publications because, of course, it’ll be so well researched by me. A drop of water won’t even be able to slip through my reporting, the corroboration and evidence will be so tight. Heck, maybe we’ll even be getting calls from Bill O’Reilly or Diane Sawyer to consult on their shows….”

The four-star General hadn’t stopped her, and that was encouraging. Gemma allowed the dreams to dangle between the two of them for a moment as the editor covered her mouth with an ink-stained hand. The woman tapped a finger, deliberating.

Time for the coup de grâce. “Damien Theroux is Pulitzer material.”

Nancy uncovered her mouth to reveal a reluctant smile, miraculously devoid of black smudges. But the positive sign disappeared quickly.

“This isn’t our typical headline.”

“Dream big, Mendoza!”

The editor held up a finger. “If he sued for libel, he’d decimate us. Or maybe he’d do worse, based on his reputation. Rumor has it that he’s got ties to the mob.”

“I’m not afraid. And you’re not talking like a journalist.”

Pow. Gemma could see the damage in Nancy’s gaze. Any self-respecting reporter put the truth above all else.

Gemma continued. “Even if I’ve only worked with you a couple of months, I know we’re both more than the Weekly Gossip allows us to be, Nancy. This is our big shot, and you can depend on me to get it right.”

“You’re not brassy enough for this.”

Gemma gulped, hearing the judgment of her first real editor on the day she’d gotten fired. You’ve got no guts, Duncan.

With more humility, she said, “You should’ve seen me this afternoon. You would’ve been proud. I gave Theroux as good as I got from him.”

“Oh, Gemma.” Nancy leaned over her desk, more a budding friend than an editor. “Right now, I just want to tell you to go back home and forget about this. We’re talking about the underworld, here. It’s not the Lalaurie haunted house or a story about UFOs. This is real.”

Gemma pounded on the arms of her chair. “So is my need to investigate this man.”

She pressed her lips together, regretting the outburst.

Yes, she was desperate. Among other things, she hated the way her family defined her career. Years ago, when she’d been an eager cub reporter at the Orange County Register, they’d bragged about her in Christmas newsletters. Now, they told their friends that she was “in between jobs.” And that was true enough, because she didn’t intend to write below her ability forever.

“Hey.” Nancy reached out, laid a hand on Gemma’s. “You all right?”

Actually, no. She hadn’t been since she’d gotten canned at the Register. What a blow—being scooped on a pivotal story about a sleazy politician because she’d been too mousy to pursue every angle.

“I’m fine,” Gemma said, forcing a grin, “if you give me a chance with this. I won’t let you down.”

Nancy sat back and expelled a huge breath. Behind her on the white wall, Weekly Gossip covers screamed headlines: “Miracle Baby Saves Whale!” and “Wronged Wife Takes Gory Revenge on Hubby!”

Tilting her head to an almost beggarly angle, Gemma burned with hope. Please say yes.

The editor crossed her arms over her chest. “I’ll give you two weeks to turn up something solid and marketable on Theroux. Something explosive we don’t already know about him. And if it looks good…”

Gemma’s pulse started racing.

“Plus,” Nancy added, “you keep your day job here, writing about your ‘freaks and geeks.’”

At this point, Gemma would’ve agreed to do a naked Irish jig on a float during Mardi Gras. “Will do!”

When she stood, latent doubt twisted through her conscience. She was about to go undercover to dig up some dirt on an unsuspecting man. A man who’d touched her with arrogant heat, and burned her body from the inside out this afternoon. There would be no straightforward questions, no honesty with him.

Once again, his hungry gaze consumed her, making her blood sing.

Did she really have the guts to layer lie upon lie to him? To disrupt a man’s life by offering it bare for the world to see? Was she really that ruthless?

Sure. If rumor was correct, this bad boy deserved his comeuppance. Reporters lived to see justice dealt to men like him. Right?

Right.

Gemma opened Nancy’s door, newly invigorated. “Needless to say, I’m working nights now. I can’t come over for a movie and daiquiris tomorrow.”

“I guess I’ll have to keep Russell Crowe all to myself, then.” Nancy waved Gemma out. “Go. You’ve got a story due. And, Gemma? As your friend, I’m telling you to be careful.”

“I’ve got it under control, chica. Chill.”

Then, with a tiny wave, she left, heading straight for her desk.

She’d actually gotten the green light for this story! Sort of. More like a yellow light, but she was still ready to go.

Even if she ended up ruining Theroux’s life.

Somewhat torn, she arrived at her workstation to find it cluttered with more than notes for her most recent project.

Every office has a pain in the ass, and Waller Smith was the designated hemorrhoid for the Weekly Gossip. A snore ripped out of him while he slumped in Gemma’s padded chair, his ash-blond hair ruffled and in sore need of a cut, his scuffed Bruno Magli knockoffs propped near her keyboard, his gumbo-stained button-down and crumpled tie as washed out as the green of his bloodshot eyes—when they were open. When she’d first met him, her first impression had been of a sun-cooked Robert Redford. But Gemma now knew better.

She managed to ignore him while simultaneously guiding his feet off her desk.

The shift of position awakened him. He blinked at her, focusing. “Duncan.” Then he stretched, a canary-eating grin on his face. “Kissing up to our chief again?”

“Anything to get your panties in a wad, Smith. I believe you’re in my chair?”

Waller acted surprised to be sitting there. “Well, pardon my butt.”

Yawning to a stand, he offered her the seat with a grand gesture. Then, with deadline purpose, she pretended to get to work, but Waller wasn’t leaving.

“What can I do for you?” she finally asked, giving him a smile that one usually reserves for a salesman who rings the doorbell during dinner.

“Reaching a little high for your talents, aren’t you?”

The comment felt like a sucker punch. “Aren’t you the last person to be judging talent? Since you don’t have any yourself, I mean?”

An indefinable emotion passed over Smith’s face, and Gemma wanted to take her smart-ass comment back. Actually, that really wasn’t true. He was exasperating, and deserved a return helping of everything he dished out.

Not that Smith probably cared about what she’d said to him. He had a way of not giving a tinker’s damn about anything.

“Duncan, congratulations. You’re growing a spine. Now all you need to be a decent reporter is the ability to read lips, which I was doing a few minutes ago. Ah, the miracle of office windows.”

“You…?” Gemma stopped herself, remembering some sort of happy-hour rumor about Smith having a deaf sister.

With the smug laziness of a sunning gator, he leaned against another reporter’s empty desk. “It’s easy to distinguish the name ‘Theroux’ on a woman’s lips. So you overheard him and a crony arguing today?”

“You tell me.”

“Yes, you did. And you think, sweet little thing, that you’ll be the one pen-slinging warrior who’ll hit his heel and bring him down.” He shook his shaggy head. “Another well-meaning crusader bites the dust.”

“Don’t you have work to do?”

“Sure, but there’s always enough time to write about sleaze and sex at my desk. I’m more interested in how you’re going to survive.”

Gemma accessed her waiting story in the computer. “How adorable. You’re fixated on my safety.”

“I said I’m interested.”

His meaning dug into her skin. She whipped around in her chair to face him. “You’ve got your own assignments, so don’t even think about mine. Concentrate on those cheating wives and crimes of passion. I’m busy.”

For a second, it seemed like Smith himself wanted to be writing about more than tabloid fodder, too. But this was Waller Smith, the guy who wandered in an hour late every day, then alternated power naps with every other sentence he punched into his computer. This was a “reporter” who mindlessly reached his word count, collected his check and called it a day.

He proved Gemma right by shrugging and ambling away, but not before he said, “Watch your back, Duncan. In every direction.”

Was that a warning about Theroux or Smith?

Feeling surrounded, Gemma cleared her mind and attacked her story.

She’d get her man. No matter what her co-worker—or her conscience—said, Damien Theroux was all hers.

AS THE SUN CHASED THE RAIN from the sky, then disappeared beyond the horizon itself, customers walked into a swanky, jazz-soaked restaurant two blocks off the well-worn paths of the French Quarter.

Some came to Club Lotus to eat the contemporary Creole food—the almond-crusted soft-shell crab, the turtle soup, the shrimp remoulade. Some came to listen to a saxophone mixing with a moody bass guitar.

But the ones who’d received crystal markers etched with a panther from the bartenders who worked in Damien Theroux’s other establishments had come to gamble.

The process was easy, just like the city itself. If you had a lot of money—or if you didn’t mind losing what you had of it—you would be invited to the hidden game room. On designated nights, you would dress in elegant clothing, stroll through Club Lotus and its tables of curious diners, go straight back to the waiting elevator. There, you would drop your crystal marker down the chute and wait for an employee to send up the car.

After taking the elevator down, feeling your pockets weighted with money you hoped to double, you would emerge into another world—one that not every person was fortunate enough to frequent.

In Theroux’s gaming establishment, you would find burgundy walls lined by mahogany wood, a fortified room with a small window where you would exchange your money for chips and ceiling fans that cut into the smoke from gratis Cuban cigars, the Cristal and brandy fumes. You would scent the sweat from gamblers who weren’t having much luck.

You would search among the one-armed bandits for the tables—blackjack, poker, roulette and craps—picking your game for the night. As the music of clanking chips and slot songs urged you on, you would settle at that poker table, knowing you were bound to win.

A hostess might ask if you needed anything, but she wouldn’t be talking about women or nose candy. Not at Theroux’s place. You were here to win money, to take advantage of the high-dollar markers that legal casinos didn’t offer.

No limits.

Tonight would be your night.

An hour into your game, as your pile of chips grew into several columns, you would see the man himself walking the exposed upper floor, trailing his hand along the railing, dressed in a tailored suit as black as his reputation. When he nodded, you would return the gesture.

After all, you would be taking Damien Theroux’s money home, and he deserved your appreciation.

DAMIEN TORE HIS GAZE FROM the nodding man at the poker table and strolled to a corner of the upper floor, where Jean Dulac, a childhood friend who wore a ready smile and Armani threads, awaited him. Jean’s dark brown hair was spiky, a bit wild, but the man’s pedigree was much slicker. He was the son of the local mob boss.

“I see that tonight’s bird knows you’re here,” Jean said.

Damien didn’t need to look at the poker tables again, but Jean did, locking on to the latest retired CEO to grace the room. Gerald O’Shea, former chief executive officer of Havishau Corporations, had gotten rich off the sweat of his employees by helping himself to a few generous bonuses while bankrupting the company. Consequently, the peons who’d worked for him were suddenly left without jobs or retirement accounts.

Men like O’Shea were the reason this gaming establishment existed. Damien took their crimes personally.

“I kind of like this moment. The calm before the storm that sweeps the bird into its own trap.” He extracted two cards from the lining of his Versace jacket. “See. Twenty-one, Jean. I hit the big hand this morning.”

His friend ignored Damien’s reference to a ritual—superstitiously drawing cards at the crack of dawn to predict if the day would be a winner…or a loser.

“Don’t underestimate your feelings. I’d say you relish this, Damien.” Jean shook his head. “Too much, if you ask me.”

“Who did ask?”

“Sorry for having a history with you. I thought maybe I was allowed to give a damn, considering we used to raise some hell together.”

“You’re worried?”

“Concerned.”

“I’ve got Roxy for that.” Damien shot a sidelong look down at Jean. “As long as you and your papa get a cut from tonight’s take, there shouldn’t be a problem. Life remains good.”

As Damien focused on O’Shea again, he could feel the burden of his friend’s gaze on him. Jean had helped him through Papa’s mortification, his suicide, the years of poverty when he and his mother had eaten ketchup mixed with water—soup, she’d called it—and beyond.

In fact, Jean was one big reason Damien was able to run the gaming room during this, its first year, with minimal suffering. Armand Dulac, Jean’s father—and a few key local law-enforcement officials, among others—took a percentage of Damien’s profit and made sure he was left alone to do business. Since Armand had mentored Damien from poverty to success, the good-old-boy network took care of Theroux, spreading the word that he wasn’t to be touched.

Jean leaned on the railing. “I wish you would get out of this pattern, Damien. Me? I have no choice. I’m to take over for the old man one day. But you don’t need the money from gaming. Not with your other holdings.”

“You know my other businesses don’t take care of O’Shea’s or Lamont’s ilk. Here, they get what they deserve.”

Here, Damien took the money the CEOs had stolen from their companies. Here, he made certain the screwed employees got their cut.

Jean’s pause was ripping at Damien. His judgment hurt.

“All of this won’t bring your father back,” Jean said.

“Nothing will.” Damien stuffed his twenty-one—ace of spades and queen of hearts—back into his jacket. “But watching O’Shea take a fall right now makes me feel a lot better.”

As Jean sighed and said his good-nights, Damien dismissed his faint sense of guilt and felt the first stirrings of comfort. He’d set up O’Shea, to be sure, researching him, making certain one of his bartenders would present the man with a crystal invitation, then hoping he would be tempted to increase his ill-gotten savings by showing up tonight.

At the moment, a few of Damien’s employees were loitering behind O’Shea at the poker table, signaling the dealer as to what cards he held. The other table players also worked for Damien, and a hostess was keeping him up-to-date on O’Shea’s incredible run of good luck.

Incredible. Not really. Damien just wanted him to get cocky before the big fall.

Before he gave the signal to start bleeding the ex-CEO, he took a minute to remember his papa.

Damien’s boyhood hero lived on the back of his eyelids. At night, he’d only have to attempt sleep to see him again. Now, he pictured Papa—a kindly, sideburn-wearing man who’d taught him how to fish and play Hearts—standing on the opposite side of the table from O’Shea, dealing the cards that would ruin him.

With the slight lift of Damien’s index finger, an employee caught the signal. O’Shea’s luck was about to change.

Settling against the railing to watch, Damien’s jaw tightened, his hands fisted.

Someone came to stand next to him, waiting patiently to be noticed.

Damn it all. “Yes?”

When Damien looked over, he saw it was Kumbar, his stocky, dusky-skinned security pro. Next to him stood another security expert—a new guy who looked quite nervous to be in the presence of the big boss. As usual, Kumbar allowed someone else to do all the talking.

“Mr. Rollins is back,” the other man said. “Blackjack. He’s losing pretty big.”

Rollins. A neighborhood antique-store owner who’d been having financial problems lately. An honest man.

“How’d he get a marker?” Damien asked.

“I’ll check it out, sir.”

In order to emphasize his underling’s promise, Kumbar allowed himself the expansive luxury of a lethargic nod.

Damien shook his head. “People like Rollins aren’t supposed to be in here.”

But they always found their way somehow.

Thudding a fist against the railing while glaring at O’Shea’s table, Damien saw tonight’s victim frown as he surrendered his first pile of chips.

With a spark of satisfaction, Damien dismissed the security worker to check on Rollins. That left Kumbar.

“It’s things like this that bring a business down,” Damien said.

Kumbar gave a firm nod.

“Last night’s mark—you recall Lamont?—threatened to go to the press.”

Kumbar jerked a thumb toward Jean, who was saying his farewells to an attractive cocktail server on the floor. Damien knew what his right-hand man was asking: had he told his best friend—the mob boss’s son—about Lamont’s threat?

“The last thing I want to do is get a bird killed, Kumbar. I hesitate to even tell you. I’m certain Lamont won’t say a word. When I left him, he looked scared as a rabbit. No, I think more about what could happen if someone braver did tell the media about how this place really works. Where the money goes.”

Another Kumbar nod.

Damien didn’t want to say it out loud. He cherished his dark reputation; it kept him from being touched, destroyed by the competition. It was the more critical dealings Lamont had referred to that would get Damien into trouble.

It was what he did with most of the profits after the cash was shuttled out of the casino, taken to a counting house, then laundered through one of his souvenir shops.

“My image is what protects me,” Damien said instead. “I’d like it to stay as poisonous as possible.”

Kumbar glanced at the blackjack tables, and Damien’s gaze followed. There sat Mike Rollins, sweating, arms protecting a few scattered chips.

He shouldn’t go soft on him. That wasn’t how to run a gaming operation. Still, the way the older man slumped in his seat….

His father used to wear the same expression after he’d lost all his money, too.

“Go to him,” Damien said. “Get him out of here and find a way to give him back what he lost. Quietly, without him suspecting. Maybe someone shows up in his store tomorrow and buys that expensive white elephant he can’t sell. Make sure he knows he’s not welcome back.”

Kumbar took off to do his duty.

God, Damien thought, I’m an easy sell.

He couldn’t revive the interest in watching O’Shea get fleeced. Not now. But there’d be other crooked men, so the lack of entertainment didn’t bother Damien so much.

Instead, he decided to go back to Cuffs, because now that he thought about it, there was a certain new waitress there who might be able to take his mind off his troubles.

His body steamed up just picturing Gem James, with her pinned-up Brigitte Bardot hair, her wide blue eyes.

If he couldn’t watch O’Shea fall on his back tonight, he’d settle for a woman instead.

3

GEMMA HADN’T FORGOTTEN how exhausting being a waitress was.

Roxy had told her that the help wore high, strappy black pumps, short black skirts and the tightest tank tops in creation. No stranger to a nightlife wardrobe, Gemma had pieced together a decent serving ensemble, complete with a small apron and a black top decorated with silver studs and a skull and crossbones.

So, she had a thing for pirates.

Now, as Aerosmith played on a corner jukebox, she served drinks to a mellow crowd of cops, local blue-collar men and a contingent of hip, artsy types who sat in the corner booths. She was counting the minutes until her first break. Then she could rest her aching tootsies as well as her tray arm.

Past midnight, Roxy finally caught Gemma after she’d delivered a round of Hurricanes to a table of slumming lawyers.

“Those fellows aren’t our usual crowd,” Roxy said, sliding her words together lazily. It gave the older woman the air of a sophisticated nineteenth-century madame fanning herself in a fancy parlor.

Or maybe that was just Gemma’s overactive imagination.

She set her tray on the bar counter, rolling her head to work the kinks out of her neck, feeling the night’s humidity cling to her chest like a veil of moisture. “This does seem more like a local watering joint, but that’s the fun in a place like this—getting to know the customers.”

And picking their brains about Theroux. Not that she’d found out much tonight. When she’d had time to ease any questions into a conversation, the answers had been limited to, “Damien’s not much for socializin’ with the likes of his neighbors anymore,” or, “Damien’s done right by himself.”

Soon, she’d talk to Roxy and the other staff. Maybe they would shed some light on the man. And as for the prostitution angle? Well, there hadn’t been much traffic up and down the stairs tonight. Just a short, muscled African-American man and a woman dressed in what could only be called Irish-lass-fetish garb who’d gone up about a half hour ago.

She’d have to explore to see what was going on.

Roxy placed a pale, vein-etched hand on Gemma’s arm, squeezing it. “You done well tonight, Gem. I checked on those references you left, and I’m hoping you’re one to stick around this place.”

Good. Gemma had asked some California friends to pretend that they were ex-employers who’d hired Gem James. They’d obviously come through for her.

Roxy added, “I still need that paperwork, though.”

“I’ll get it to you.” She was procuring some false documentation, complete with a fake Garden District address, that would be ready tomorrow.

Patrons were starting to leave the bar, slowing the night’s pace. Gemma sighed and slipped a hand to the back of her bared neck, kneading her nape.

“How about you go into the back room and get me some napkins?” Roxy asked. “And take a few minutes off those feet while you’re there.”

“Thanks.” Gemma thought about staying to talk with the waitress for a second, but decided instead to seek privacy and scribble down some notes. There would be time to gab with Roxy and the other workers later.

After winking at the string-bean bartender, Wedge, who pointed his finger like a gun at her and winked back, Gemma entered a room stacked with cardboard supply boxes and bottles of liquor. She found her purse where she’d tucked it on a shelf between two pillars of paper napkins, then attacked her notepad with gusto.

She scribbled colorful details about the bar and the customers for about ten minutes, realizing how little she’d turned up so far.

Back at the office, she’d done some preliminary research on Theroux, not finding anything she hadn’t already known. Thirty-four years old, business owner, New Orleans native. Real exciting stuff. Tomorrow she would have more time to do a deeper search, but still…

She wanted more. What she had—even for day number one—wasn’t nearly good enough.

Heavy footsteps sounded on the hallway tiles, and Gemma scrambled to put away her notes.

The door swung open, revealing Damien Theroux.

Her blood twisted direction, shocking her system, leaving her weak with a mix of attraction and guilt.

Whoo, he was tall. Slim, but solid enough to fill out that black suit. It wasn’t hard to picture toned abs and cable-muscled arms under those fancy clothes. Unlike this afternoon, when his dark hair had been loose, he’d secured the top strands away from his face with a band, allowing the bottom to wave down to his wide shoulders.

Time to go to work again.

She forced herself to meet his blue-diamond eyes. “I’m just taking a break,” she blurted.

Suave. Could her words have been any more spastic?

“Roxy says you’re back here for napkins.”

He leaned against the brick wall, taking his time, bracing himself with one shoulder as he ran his other hand over his angled jaw. He smoothed a gaze over her.

From her pumps…up her bare legs…over her skirt…her torso…her breasts…still on her breasts…still on her…

Gemma covered her chest with her arms, blocking him.

He smiled, doused it, then glanced up at her from beneath his dark brows. “I like your pirate motif.”

The skull and crossbones. Right. “Don’t you mean ‘motifs’?”

“Those, too.”

There they went—the motifs—hardening into sensitive peaks that brushed the cotton of her shirt. As she adjusted position, keeping her arms crossed and leaning nonchalantly against the shelves, her nipples scraped against the outsides of her thumbs. A flush roared over her body, prickling her skin with new sweat and heat.

“Am I disturbing you?” he asked.

She tried to stay unaffected. “You walked in the door just as I was trying to relax. Scared me half to death.”

As if to prove it, she raised a hand to massage her neck again, leaving the other arm to still cover evidence of her inconvenient desire.

Theroux unfolded himself from the wall, stepped forward.

Fear shot through her, but not because she felt threatened. No, this was the safe fear of her fantasies, where unknown men would approach her, cover her with their shadows, slip into her, then disappear into the corners of her mind.

A stirring, a warm shivering, bloomed in the pit of her stomach. She slid her palm there, liking it. Hoping it would stop.

He was still moving toward her.

The rational part of her panicked. “So, do you hit on all the new waitresses, like some sort of initiation?”

Why had she said that? Because she thought it would create some kind of distance she didn’t really want?

He paused a mere foot away, his taut body remaining as still as a held breath. “If you think I’m hitting on you now, chérie, you’ve got some lessons to learn.”

Another blush prickled over her skin. “It’s just… My space bubble. I don’t think you’re aware of the concept.”

“Am I getting a little too close now?”

“For a stranger.”

Tilting back his head, he surveyed her, a grin quirking his mouth. He had a full lower lip. Sensuous, soft.

“Stranger,” he repeated, rolling the word over his tongue, savoring it.

That slightly exotic accent—a tinge of French?—stretched over her, bare and slick, burying her under its promising weight.

By now, Gemma couldn’t contain the excited quiver traveling her limbs, settling between her legs with electric anticipation.

Theroux must have sensed that she liked the way he’d touched her this afternoon. That she wanted to test the dark waters outside of her wading pool. And maybe…

No.

Yes. Maybe this was a good way to ask a personal question or two. It’d worked for Mata Hari.

He moved closer to her. Closer. Inches away, until he was staring down, arm curved over her head as he rested it on the shelves, body slightly hunched, eclipsing everything else around them.

His scent filled her—rain, brandy—making her giddy.

“A stranger?” he whispered. “I’m easy to know.”

While Gemma pressed her arm against her sensitized breasts again, the hand she held against her neck tightened involuntarily. “Listen, you’re not my type.”

“Yeah?”

He took up where they’d left off this afternoon, with him skimming his palm up her arm to capture her hand—the one rubbing her neck. The weight of his touch reduced her next words into a quiet struggle to suck in oxygen.

“I usually…go for more…of the roses and…chocolates guy.”

Theroux pressed his thumb up her wrist, up the middle of her palm, finding a spot that made her want to giggle, cry and rub herself against him all at the same time. He traced circles, reducing her to helplessness.

“You get that sort of pansy boy in California, for certain,” he said, watching her.

She couldn’t meet his gaze, not straight on, so she glanced up at him through her eyelashes. “How do you know I’m from…?” She gasped as he gave her delicate palm nerve an especially persuasive nudge. “Ah. Oh. Right. You must’ve talked to Roxy about me.”

Dammit, she was supposed to be questioning him.

“She’d have all the information, being the boss round here.” With unexpected care, he lowered her hand, then slid his own around her neck, massaging her tense muscles.

“Mmm.” In spite of her caution, Gemma leaned into the pressure. “And what else do you know about me?”

“Not much. Just that you follow…strangers…down streets and into dark bars.”

“I told you, I need this job.”

Theroux kept rubbing, watching. Gemma’s chest rose and fell, marking the seconds.

“Let me guess what you’re about,” he said. “I think you’re a ‘never left.’ One of many who came to this place just to visit. You fell in love with the jazz, the Creole sauces, the romance of not knowing what goes on behind the lace curtains. Then, as we say, you never left.”

He’d gotten most of it, except the part he’d skipped about coming here with the hopes of finding a life, too.

“And you?” she asked. “Why are you in New Orleans?”

Theroux paused, then trailed his hand from her neck to her collarbone, running his fingers under her tank top’s neckline until his nails smoothed against the tender skin of her upper chest. Without thinking, Gemma took her arm from her breasts, reached out to grab his jacket’s lapel, leaving herself open.

Obviously encouraged, he slid his fingers outside the material of her shirt, cupping a breast, tracing his thumb over the awakened crest of it. Gemma winced, arching into his caress. Her other hand mindlessly shot out to cover his knuckles in pleased wariness.

What the hell was she doing?

“I think maybe you like strangers,” he said, ignoring her personal questions.

Not that she could remember what they’d just been talking about.

Fascinated by his aggression, her fingers moved with his as he absently toyed with her nipple.

“I think,” he continued in that soft, lethal whisper, “that you aren’t what you seem.”

Her heart punched against her ribs, then wavered in real fear. He couldn’t know she was a reporter. How…?

Theroux lowered his lips to her ear, his breath warm. “You tease. You act nice. But that’s not what you want, a nice man.”

Thank God, he didn’t know. The buzz of passing danger melted downward, coating her with dampness, readiness. She wanted him to touch her there, to give her what she really wanted.

“I do want a nice man,” she said. “I’ve been looking for one, but…”

He skimmed his hand down her ribs, over the curve of her butt, the back of her thigh, searching.

“…it never seems to work out.”

“I wonder why.”

She did, too. She did like nice guys, even if they’d never been enough to hold her interest. But that was her fault, not theirs. She’d tried a few normal, home-by-six-for-dinner relationships, tried men her family approved of.

But there was something untamed in Gemma. Maybe something might be wired wrong in her. Was it normal to lust after men like Theroux? To find yourself in a position like this?

She reached down and captured his wandering hand with hers, putting an end to the spell.

For a moment, he froze. Without moving, he created a space between them with the sting of his gaze.

“I think my break’s over,” she said, voice wavering. She cleared her throat. “First night. Good impression. All that.”

A calculating smile settled on his mouth. Reaching up, he grabbed a packet of napkins, deposited it into Gemma’s hand, then backed away.

“Roxy’ll wonder what took you so long,” he said. “Should I tell her?”

He was baiting Gemma, so she sent him her toughest glance. “Your call, boss.”

“As I said, Roxy’s in charge. I’m inconsequential to this bar.”

She’d see about that.

He ushered her away from the shelves with a sweep of his arm. “After you.”

Had she alienated him with her hot/cold change of reaction? Way to go, Duncan. Gemma could almost hear Waller Smith congratulating her on messing up already.

Much more painfully, she could hear her first boss saying, When you’re assigned a story, you get your ass out there and do it. Don’t piddle around. Your scaredy-cat caution has no place in this business, girl.

She left the room, feeling her redemption—Theroux—following right behind her.

Toughen up, she thought. Next time, don’t stop. Get your man, no matter the consequences.

When she emerged into the bar again, she turned around to fire a parting shot at her mysterious subject.

But he’d already disappeared.

WALLER SMITH LIKED A proper nap.

So, as he sat at the Cuffs bar, his body relaxing on the scuffed wood, Waller sighed, content.

In his forty-four years of life, he’d sat on a lot of bar stools across the country, liking how the chattery, friendly voices made him feel a part of something. In fact, even if he nursed one gin and tonic all night, he always fell asleep to the lullaby of conversations.

New York, L.A., Dallas, Miami, Chicago. He’d lived in all the big cities, getting jobs at local papers to support himself and trolling the bars for a kind voice or two. Tonight, he’d decided to try Cuffs, not only because he wanted companionship, but because it’d come highly recommended by Ms. Gemma Duncan during her unsuspecting story pitch to The General.

And speaking of the little devil, Gemma had emerged into the bar again.

See, not only could Waller sleep on a dime, he could wake up with the best of them, too. It just took a sound, a feeling. The best sleepers could all stay slightly alert in their slumber.

Screw the fact that his ex-wife had chalked up the ever-increasing number of his naps to depression. Waller merely believed he was getting older. More used up and worn out.

Fully awake now—except for some blurred vision—he watched his co-worker, the newest reporter at the Weekly Gossip, strolling out of a back room, tailed by none other than Damien Theroux himself.

She’d made quick time, hadn’t she?

Waller wondered just how much information she’d gotten out of the guy. How she’d gotten it out of him.

Young pup. Reporters were always bright eyed and eager until a few years passed. Years of seeing bullet-riddled corpses at drive-by-shooting crime scenes. Years of seeing crack babies who’d been stranded by their strung-out mothers living on the street and prostituting themselves for their next fix.

Like Gemma, Waller used to love chasing a story.

That was before the stories chased him, caught him, burned themselves into his memory until nothing on earth could erase the pImages**. Except a good sleep.

As Theroux disappeared into a patch of darkness behind Gemma, she straightened her tank top, turned around and found herself alone. After a beat, she raised her chin and extracted her order pad from a tiny apron while walking to a table of three old men. The few grizzled patrons who hadn’t gone home yet watched her progress, enchanted.

The back room.

Tank top adjusting.

Waller sighed. He remembered the days when reporters had ethics, but if this girl wanted to use her body to get her ink on Theroux, he’d stay out of it. After all, this was New Orleans. Anything went.

After taking the order, she swayed to the bar in her heels. Waller tried to catch her eye.

When she saw him, he saluted with his full glass of booze. She hightailed it over, jaw clenched.

“Good evening,” he said jovially.

“What the hell are you doing here?”

Waller pulled a pained expression out of his collection of reactions. “I’m having a drink, just like everyone else. What are you doing here?” He aimed a disapproving glare at the back room.

“Perv. It’s not what you think.”

“You don’t want to know what I think.”

“You haven’t answered yet.” Her voice lowered. “Are you crowding me?”

“Sweetness,” he said, holding a hand over his food-stained heart, “I’ve got no ulterior motives. Remember, someone with no talent wouldn’t have such drive.”

She seemed to regret what she’d said at the office earlier. Truthfully, the words had whiplashed Waller. He knew he was useless, but the problem came when everyone else knew it, too. Not that he gave a crap.

“Smith.” Gemma crept closer, eyes wide and Bambilike. “Don’t blow this for me. Please.”

Unable to counter the clear ambition—no, it was desperation—in her words, Waller could only stare at his drink. In its clear depths, he saw his past swirl right by him—the hard-earned headlines, the awards he’d so proudly displayed on his desks, the divorce papers he’d burned in the flame of a dinner candle one lonely, bitter night.

He’d never expected to find himself huddled over a bar in the middle of the French Quarter by himself, beaten, mocking a young reporter because of her shining future.

Or was he here because she could still track down a good lead when he didn’t have it in him anymore?

Gemma was shaking her head. “Why would you want to pull one over on me, Smith? You’re already established.”

“Actually, I’m at a dead end.” His words tasted sour. “Isn’t that what you meant to say?”

“No, I—”

“Listen. Maybe I came here to show you that going fishing for shark won’t be as easy as you think. Maybe I came here to see if I could give this a go, myself.”

Now that he’d said it out loud, Waller wondered if it was true. Why else had he taken a detour from another boredom-filled night in his apartment?

“Gem,” said a raised female voice from the other end of the bar. “You okay down there?”

Waller kept his gaze fixed on Gemma, almost daring her to tell him he wasn’t good enough. But she didn’t.

Instead, she nodded at the voice and ran a fidgety hand over her done-up hair. “I’m so onto you.”

“Feisty,” he said. “That’s another excellent quality for a girl in your profession to have.”

With a cautious look, she left him and proceeded to wait on a group of former cops. Their bygone career was obvious from the way they sat—still wary in their advancing age, but less arrogant than they probably had been in their heydays. They joked with Gemma, turning their chests toward her, open books.

Look at that. She was already back to questioning sources. Seeking answers about Theroux. Well, best of luck.

The waitress who’d talked to Gemma was now cleaning glasses two feet to the left of him. He could barely see her fuzzy figure out of the corner of his eye.

“What is this place?” he asked. “Mustang Ranch?”

She didn’t stop her task. The tall stick-shape of a bartender floated past, also pretending Waller didn’t exist.

Raising his voice, Waller repeated, “Just what is this place? Look at what you women wear around here—Band-Aid skirts and linguini tops!”

“You fool.” The waitress, still a blur except for some flaming red hair that was layered down to her bare shoulders, sauntered over to him. “You’re a mess, and it ain’t from havin’ enough of our booze, I tell you that.”

“So, I’m naturally loaded.”

She came closer, and Waller hitched in a breath. God, she was a beauty. Two gray streaks of hair framed her face—lightning in a red sky. Fine smile lines surrounded soft, whiskey-hued eyes. Her skin was pale, the color of smooth writing paper before you mark it with the scar of stories.

“A man with eyes so red should go on home to bed,” she said in a mother-hen scold.

Waller blinked, donned his most charming smile. He hoped it still worked. “Tell me you’re my guardian angel.”

“Not likely.”

The waitress leaned on the bar, showing ample bosom. Waller’s vision cleared to an even greater extent.

“I deal with drunks every night of my life,” she added. “Your sober imitation of one is not impressing me.”

“No?” Waller’s pulse actually slowed to almost nothing. Funny. He hadn’t felt keen embarrassment in a while. There’d only been a numb string of days holding his life together.

“What would it take to impress you…?”

It was a cue for her to reveal a name. She shrugged. “Roxy St. Clair. If you want to look good to me, you change your messy shirt. Easy enough, huh?”

Waller checked out his lunch-decorated button-down. Was it that bad? “I suppose that’s simple. What next?”

Roxy stood, smiled. “You walk out of here and get a good night’s rest.”

“I’ll try.” The dog in him wanted to ask her if she’d escort him home, but he knew better. “Anything else?”

“I need time to think on it.” Roxy started to walk away, still looking at him. “Maybe we see tomorrow night?”

“That’s a sure way to draw repeat business.”

“It’s my trick,” she said.

“And a smart one.”

She offered a careless gesture, sort of a curtsy, and joined Gemma and the ex-cops while the young reporter served them drinks. Their sudden explosion of laughter shook Waller to the core because he wasn’t in on the joke.

Then again, when was he ever?

Grabbing a bowl of pretzels, Waller munched on them, content to hear Roxy laugh for the time being. It beat sitting in front of a TV that only got three channels.

An hour later, after the jukebox had been put to rest and Roxy was cleaning the empty tables, Waller tore his gaze away from her long enough to see the man himself, Damien Theroux, come down the stairs.

In a purely objective way, Waller could see why a woman would go gaga for him. He was tall, wide through the shoulders as a me-hunter-you-gatherer male should be. Lazily cocksure in the way he moved.

Some guys had all the luck.

With the confidence of a gambler who held a winning hand, Theroux gave a slight nod to Roxy and walked out the door. Not long afterward, Gemma wandered over to the older waitress, exchanged a few words with her and glanced toward the stairway.

Good gravy, the kid was going snooping. Her eagerness would blow this story right away. But, hell, she’d learn from her mistakes.

As Roxy went into the back room, the young reporter crept toward the steps, folding her hands together as she caught Waller’s eye and sending him a pleading look that clearly said, “Shhhhh?”

Then she made her way to the second floor.

Not that Waller gave a crap about what she did. He just shrugged and went back to waiting for Roxy St. Clair to smile at him again.

4

IT WAS OBVIOUS, GEMMA thought as a stair creaked under her high heel, that Waller Smith thought she was crazy for coming upstairs so soon.

His jaded, be-my-guest glance had told her as much after she’d made sure Roxy was occupied, then sneaked up to the second floor.

Really, all Gemma wanted to do was take a quick look around, to see if that man and woman who’d climbed the stairs earlier in the night were still engaged in business. To see if anyone else could’ve been lured upstairs for…what? Sex? Drugs?

Damien Theroux’s “other matters” that Lamont had mentioned just this afternoon?

Discovering Smith in the bar tonight had given Gemma a swift kick in the rear. Clearly, the older reporter was interested in Theroux’s story, too. That meant she was really against the clock because not only did she have to impress her editor with some earth-shattering information about Theroux within two weeks, but now a co-worker was threatening to scoop her.

And she’d be damned if that happened again.

Besides, Roxy said that Theroux had left for the night, so Gemma had a few minutes to poke around before the head waitress wondered what her new employee was up to. Since most of the patrons had gone home, too, Roxy was busy taking liquor inventory, buying Gemma some time.

Another stair protested as she put her weight on it. Gemma closed her eyes, stood still, listening to see if she’d attracted any attention.

Nothing. All she heard was an animalistic cry from somewhere down the hallway.

Yup, they were still up here—that horny couple.

Heart pumping, pulse beating in her ears, Gemma quietly climbed to the top of the landing. The hallway was dark, lit only by a flickering lantern encased by a copper-and-glass box and attached to a plank wall. The striking mélange of old wood, mustiness and sweet cigar smoke accompanied the rusty yawp of the floorboards as she walked over them. Several closed doors greeted her, but one had been left ajar, a thick, buttery light melting through the cracks.

Naturally, she headed toward that one, pushed it open just enough to look inside. As she did so, a cataclysmic thump from down the hall shook the wooden floor. Laughter followed.

Gemma’s hyperimagination provided a reason for the crash: two bodies falling out of a bed during the throes of sex.

Gemma talked herself down. She wasn’t going to get caught nosing around up here, and prizewinning reporters never let a little fear stop them.

Or even a little guilt.

So she forged ahead into the lit room, ignoring the loud giggling of her hidden, rollicking neighbors.

A Tiffany lamp offered quiet light to this… Was it an office? Damien’s workplace?

Excellent. Sometimes a man’s cave could tell you a lot about the guy himself.

An Asian-detailed carpet pooled under an antique cherrywood desk. A laptop computer with a laser printer contrasted sharply with the elegance of bronze sculptures, a French Empire couch, potted palms and redhued paintings of a sleeping woman.

The good life, Gemma thought. That’s what Damien Theroux was all about. Riches, decadence, excess.

Pleasure.

Spellbound, she started toward his desk, her reporter’s instinct telling her to open some drawers, go through paperwork, search for something that would give her a story. At the same time, she hesitated to go through a person’s belongings, souvenirs of privacy.

Then she heard it—a creak on the stairwell.

Hadn’t Roxy told her that Theroux had gone home?

Darting out of the office, she shut the door to a slit, trying to leave it the way she’d found it. Then she stepped into the hall, seeking a hiding place, glancing around at all the closed rooms.

She tried one knob. Locked.

Dammit!

Then another. Locked again.

As she tried to find a deep shadow that would make for a decent cover, she perked up her ears.

Only to hear nothing more than a long, satiated female groan from the occupied room.

Great, Gemma, she thought, almost laughing at herself. You’re hearing things. Theroux is safe and snug at home, and here you are, thinking he’s dogging you.

Nonetheless, she didn’t move for a few minutes, just in case he was walking up the steps really, really slowly.

While she waited, the woman’s moans became rhythmic, and there was a muted thumping against the wall, as if the man had her body pinned to it, ramming into her, making her dig her nails into his back with the force of his thrusts.

Gemma leaned against her own wall, pImages** coating her mind, dripping down her body like sweat—or the light path of a man’s fingertip.

She remembered Theroux standing near the supply room doorway, watching her until she couldn’t take in air. Remembered him hovering over her, his breath moistening the side of her neck. Remembered his fingers cupping her breast, molding it like an artist skimming over his work.

Caught up in the moment, Gemma slid her hand up her ribs, under her breast, separating her fingers and catching her nipple between them. Rubbing, she felt it harden under her tank and lace bra, felt it throb with yearning.

She closed her eyes, dizzy, moving her fingers in time to the drumbeat of a body thudding against old wood.

Behind the door.

“Don’t tease.” It was a female voice, urgent, threaded with need. “Touch me there.”

Gemma’s other hand glided over her belly, wishing Theroux’s hand had nestled there tonight. There…and slightly below. She eased her fingers upward, under the bottom of her tank top, over her sweat-misted skin.

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