“I’m not going to sleep with you,” Nick insisted

Not to be deterred, Serena reached out and lazily ran her hand over his leg. “Sure. Okay.”

Nick jumped back as if he’d been burned. “I’m serious. You’re wasting your time here, Serena. You can report back to AJ that you came, you saw and you didn’t conquer. The bet’s still on.”

She stood and stepped closer to him. “Fine.” Then, before he could stop her, she slipped her index fingers into the edge of his pants, feeling a rush at the warm satin of his skin against the backs of her fingers. “But Nick, fooling around isn’t sleeping. Can’t we still play?” She didn’t have to work at imbuing her voice with a low huskiness.

He grabbed her wrists and set her away from him. “It’s time for you to leave, Serena.”

But she couldn’t. Even though she’d love to run screaming from the room and leave behind the fire ignited by the brief touch of his hands, she had a job to do. She shook her head and scraped her fingernail down his chest. “But I just got here. We haven’t even had any fun yet.” She paused. “And Nick, I’ve heard you’re lots of fun….”

Dear Reader,

I knew when I first introduced Nick O’Malley in his big brother’s story, Really Hot!, that he was special. But I wasn’t prepared for the onslaught of reader mail I got asking for Nick’s story. And since I always listen and try to deliver when I can, here is Nick’s Blazing tale….

But not just any woman would do for Nick. She had to be someone different, someone special. And when Serena Riggs, a tough undercover cop, breezed into my imagination, I knew Nick had met his match.

It’s one of my favorite setups in a romance—putting together two people who are intellectually the worst possible choice for one another, but ultimately just what the other needs. And they need each other quite a bit in this story….

I hope you enjoy Nick and Serena’s grand adventure. I would love to hear from you. Check me out and e-mail me at my Web site, www.jenniferlabrecque.com, or snail mail me at P.O. Box 298, Hiram, GA 30141.

Happy reading,

Jennifer LaBrecque

Anticipation
Jennifer LaBrecque

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Acknowledgment

Thanks to the Boston Police Department for the inspiration. All the inaccuracies are strictly my own.

Dedication

To Robert, my Massachusetts-born hero.

I’m glad you decided to stay.

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

Epilogue

1

“I GET OFF OF work in two hours.” Cherry, a new waitress, placed the wings and a beer pitcher in the table’s center. The food and drinks were for everyone, but the sultry look was for Nick only.

Nick O’Malley smiled back at her but didn’t comment. Cherry stood, blocking the ball game. Obviously the regular staff at Dougal’s Sports Bar and Grill hadn’t taught Cherry the cardinal rule of waitressing in a sports bar: no blocking the big screen. Dougal’s wasn’t Boston’s finest or oldest, but Nick and his buddies had idled away many afternoons and evenings there in the past nine years since they’d reached legal drinking age. Cherry finally left, casting an inviting glance over her shoulder on her way to the kitchen.

“Man, you suck. You don’t even have to try to pick up chicks,” AJ groused and reached for the wing basket, shaking his blond crew-cut head in disgust.

The room groaned in chorus as Donovan struck out Perez…bases loaded…third out at the top of the ninth. The Red Sox had shot that game to hell.

“It’s gotten even worse since you hit every trashy newspaper in the country.” AJ didn’t let it go. “Amazing. You get caught embezzling half a million, your big brother goes on two reality shows to help you come up with the money you owe, the press gets wind of it and—bam—you’re famous.”

And he’d rather AJ not bring it up. It hadn’t exactly been his finest moment. His serious lapse in judgment had affected his whole family. He’d felt the worst about humiliating his parents. The look in their eyes had shattered him. It was something he lived with every day. They hadn’t been aghast as much as accepting. Irresponsible Nick had struck again.

Not a day went by that he didn’t think about it and rue what he’d done. His mom and dad had stood by him, but told him he had to take responsibility for his actions. He was determined to go one better. He’d never be his older brother, Rourke—talk about a tough act to follow—but he’d finally figured out that being Nick didn’t mean landing himself in jail. And standing in Rourke’s shadow was something he could choose to do or not.

Although, in a fatalistic kind of way, he wondered if it wasn’t supposed to happen and play out the way it had. Rourke had met the woman of his dreams, the associate producer for the two reality shows he’d been on. Portia and Rourke were now happily married and Rourke had bonded like glue with his stepson. Maybe their paths would never have crossed if Nick hadn’t screwed up. And maybe Nick wouldn’t have grown up and figured out a lot about himself and life in general. One thing for sure, he was never going to get himself into another scrape that embarrassed his family and required Rourke to rescue him.

Nick knew he was lucky he hadn’t done jail time for his crime. Lance Gleeson had declined to press charges as long as the money was returned with interest. Nick was also eternally grateful that the women of the world didn’t seem to hold it against him, even though it was sort of weird that not only did they not mind, they almost seemed to like it.

“It’s gotten better. I think my fifteen minutes of infamy have passed.” The latest celebrity couple breakup and another headline proclaiming aliens had visited the White House, and he was yesterday’s news. Thank goodness.

“Yeah. In a whole month no one’s mobbed us when we’ve been out with Nicky,” Tim said. He was the peacemaker and the only married one in the group. He agreed with whomever was making a point at the time, whether it contradicted what he’d just said or not, a trait that went a long way with his wife, Marsha.

“Chicks have always dug him,” AJ said.

Nick shrugged. He liked women and they seemed to like him. It worked. AJ wasn’t a bad-looking guy and he made decent money as a site foreman for his father’s construction company, but he had an attitude problem that women picked up on. Chicks. “I’ve been trying to tell you for years, that’s your problem. They’re not chicks. They’re women. They know you think of them as chicks.”

“Man’s got a point,” Tim said, refilling his beer. Nick held out his empty mug and Tim did the honors. “Marsha says ‘chick’ is demeaning.”

AJ shook his head. “Nah. That’s not it at all.” AJ poured extra hot sauce on his wings. Nick had tried one of AJ’s wings several years ago. Personally, he thought there was a lot to be said for still being able to feel your tongue when eating. Nick picked up a mild drummette and bit into it while AJ rambled on. AJ was fond of the sound of his own voice. “Nicky’s addicted to women. They sense it and they want to provide his fix.”

What? AJ was—

“You’re full of it,” Matt said, dipping a carrot stick in blue-cheese dressing. Between carrying a few extra pounds and early male-pattern baldness, Matt definitely looked the oldest of the four, even though he was six months younger.

AJ eyed the plastic basket of carrots and celery. “Your dick’s gonna fall off eating that. You should try some real man food.” Cousins as well as friends, AJ and Matt constantly gave one another a hard time.

Matt feigned surprise. “Damn. That’s what happened to you, man? Aunt Celeste fed you a carrot and your pecker dropped off? All these years we thought you’d just been shortchanged at birth.” He munched his carrot.

“Blow me.” AJ stabbed his chicken bone in Matt’s direction. “And I’m telling you, Nick’s addicted to chicks.”

Nick thunked his empty mug onto the scarred wood, thoroughly enjoying himself. “I’m not addicted to women.”

“Sure you are.” AJ smirked. “Name one time since junior high that you’ve gone longer than two weeks without a girlfriend.”

“There was…” Wait, that hadn’t been a week, but what about the time…“Yeah, when I had that emergency appendectomy and couldn’t take Melissa Frecht to the dance and she dumped me.”

“Sorry, loser. Remember the girl who started bringing your assignments over and doing them for you?”

Martha Crawford.

“Oh. Yeah. Okay. But that doesn’t prove anything.”

“Nicky wants proof.” AJ grinned and hoisted his beer at Matt and Tim with a smirk. “You and Trish have been quits for what, three days now?”

“Something like that.” Trish had wanted a ring, as in engagement ring, for her thirtieth birthday. Nick had been thinking more along the lines of a box of chocolates. She hadn’t liked his idea and he sure hadn’t gone for hers. Seeing Rourke and his sister-in-law together had actually left him discontented, wanting more than he had. But Trish wasn’t the woman he’d consider growing old beside.

“Five hundred bucks says you can’t go without a woman for thirty days,” AJ said. He bet on everything.

And Nick usually took him up on it. “Piece of cake,” Nick shrugged. He could do this and it went along with his new vow of being more responsible.

Matt whistled through his teeth. “Thirty days is a long time, Nick.”

“Especially for you.” Tim looked at Nick in apology.

“What?” Tim shifted like the wind. “You guys have no faith in me?” Obviously he needed to prove himself as the new and improved Nick to his buddies.

“You…thirty days…no women…” Matt looked at Tim, who grimaced. Matt glanced back at Nick and shook his head. “Sorry, dude.”

AJ smirked. “Money talks, bullshit walks.”

Nick leaned back in his chair. “We’ll see. Define going without. Are we talking no dates? Phone calls? Kisses? Nothing?”

AJ reached for another wing. “Second thoughts? This looking a little harder than you thought?”

“It’ll be a walk in the park.” Maybe an understatement, but he could do this. For his own self-respect he had to do this. It was proof of the new direction in his life. Plus, five hundred bucks would leave a big whole in his pocket.

“How many beers have you had?” Matt asked.

Two? Maybe three? “Not that many.” He looked across the table at AJ. “Now are you gonna lay out the rules or are you rethinking putting your money where your mouth is?”

AJ grinned and Nick didn’t bother to tell him he had a chunk of chicken stuck in his front teeth. “I’m putting my money on a sure thing. No dates. No kissing. No copping a feel. Absolutely no sex of any kind and, yeah, that includes phone sex, hand jobs and blow jobs.”

Matt winced. “That’s harsh, AJ.”

“You’re being pretty rough on him,” Tim said.

Nick swallowed. Obviously his three buds thought he’d cave before he even got in the game. “Not a problem.”

AJ laughed. “Right. This is gonna be the easiest five hundred bucks I ever made.”

He’d known AJ a long time, ever since the four of them had played Little League together. Nick had a few rules of his own to throw out, based on how well he knew AJ. “You can’t screw around with me and send women my way. That’s cheating.”

“Wrong. All’s fair in love and war, isn’t it, boys?” AJ glanced across the table at Matt and Tim.

“Man’s got a point,” Tim said. You couldn’t count on Tim to back you up in a tight spot.

Matt polished off the last carrot stick. “Sounds fair to me.”

“Majority rules.” AJ hoisted his beer in a mock toast. “A man on a deserted island can go without a beer, but put a pitcher in front of him and then you know what he’s made of.”

“WAIT TILL YOU GET a load of this, Riggs.” Brian Bennigan grinned and nodded toward the captain’s office as Serena Riggs made her way through the bullpen of Boston’s 151st precinct, located in the less-than-scenic heart of Boston’s most crime-ridden area.

Joe Pantoni tossed in his two-cents’ worth. “It’s right up your alley, Riggs. If you can’t catch Malone with this one, we’ll check and see if you can get on desk duty.”

“Last I heard, you had dibs on that spot, Panty-oni,” she said with her own smirk as she passed his desk. Being busted down from detective to desk clerk was a running department joke.

“Hey, Riggs, if you need to get in a little practice, Bennigan says he’s available. He’s got a little something in common with your perp,” Mike Harding piped up. Bennigan gave him the finger from across the room.

Steve Shea laughed with the rest of them, but withheld comment.

“Stuff it, boys,” Serena said good-naturedly, dropping her purse on her desk. They were a mouthy, but essentially harmless, group of guys. She, Bennigan, Pantoni and Harding had all been knocking around the 151st since their rookie days. Bit by bit, the men had insinuated themselves into the fabric of her life.

They and their families had had her on rotation for the past five years. Mike and Becca Harding commandeered her at Christmas. Pantoni’s wife, Francesca, always insisted Serena join their enormous and enormously loud extended family for Thanksgiving—although that would change this year. Francesca had decided she’d had enough of a cop’s lousy hours and the lousier pay, along with the gut-eating stress of being a cop’s wife. She and Joe were locked in mortal urban combat, commonly known as divorce. And Bennigan, the clichéd but oh-so-sweet third-generation Irish-American cop, dragged her along for St. Patrick’s Day, a holiday that ran a close third to Christmas and Thanksgiving in Boston.

She razzed them that they only had her over so she’d bring dessert—she could kick some pastry butt. Cannolis and tiramisu for the Pantonis, the Hardings were particularly fond of her éclairs and amaretto cheesecake, and she always baked several loaves of Irish soda bread and a chocolate mousse with Irish cream topping for the Bennigan clan. She liked to bake and it made her feel less of a charity case. Unlike her first several years in Boston, the past five had never found her alone on a family holiday, thanks to “the boys” and their families.

“PMS,” Pantoni surmised in a stage whisper.

“Definitely hormonal,” Bennigan agreed.

She gave them the finger behind her back as she eased into the captain’s office.

“Today’s your lucky day,” Harlan Worth announced as Serena closed his office door behind her.

“Yeah. So I gathered running the gauntlet.” She slumped into the chair in front of his beat-up desk and sipped the sludge disguised as coffee, still half a cup away from being fully humanoid. Where was it written that police station coffee had to be so bad? She vowed she’d never sleep through another alarm again and not have time to make her own coffee at home.

Worth steepled his fingers. “We’ve got a lead on Slick Nick for you.”

Finally. She’d been chasing Nick Malone, a money-laundering suspect, for months. However, she’d wait until she heard the particulars of the lead to decide whether it had validity. “Let’s hear it.” She pulled a small notepad out of her purse. She wrote everything down. More than once she’d reviewed her notes and found some obscure detail or minutia that had proven to be key.

“Got to love your enthusiasm, Riggs.”

Chasing dead ends had taught her not to get too hopeful. “I’ll see if I think it’s something to get excited about.”

“Seems Slick Nick dumped a girlfriend and you know how you women get.” She let the comment pass. If she took exception to every sexist comment uttered in the 151st, she’d be a raving lunatic. Besides, Harlan, despite his bluster, was one of the nicest men she’d ever met. He’d been married to Nancy Worth for over forty years and still worshipped the ground the woman walked on. “She’s selling her stud-muffin down the river.”

Stud-muffin? Harlan was stuck in the eighties. Serena focused on the rest of what he’d said. Depending on just how pissed off they were, ex-girlfriends could provide a wealth of info. Maybe this was something to get excited about.

She knew Nick Malone was a little over six feet with short, dark hair, blue eyes, and a medium build. That had only narrowed it down to over half the men in greater Boston. She needed a photo and a means of positive ID. The guy had been smart enough never to get caught or arrested. No fingerprints, no photo ID, and he went by several aliases. “Please tell me we have a photo.”

“We have a photo.” Harlan pushed it across the desk in her direction. “For what it’s worth.” The photo was out of focus, the man in the picture little more than a blur, with no discernable features, other than dark, short hair.

“Oh.” Yep. As disappointing as every other lead in this case. She drained the cup and bit back a grimace. She was saving every dollar for a down payment on a town house, but she might have to break down and buy a decent cup of coffee at the nearby coffee shop when she overslept. This stuff was either going to kill her or put hair on her chest—both bad options.

Harlan flipped through his notes, which Serena knew was unnecessary. The man possessed an amazing memory. “According to the girlfriend, he’s a top-notch dresser. Likes nice clothes. Said he’s obsessed with them ocean movies.”

Huh? “Beach movies?”

“Nah. Ocean’s Eleven and Ocean’s Twelve. She says he wants to be like that Clooney guy.”

Serena cracked a smile. “There are worse men to want to be like, although I personally think Matt Damon’s the looker in that lot.”

“You seen the movies?”

“Yeah.” The ending in the second one, Ocean’s Twelve, irritated the heck out of her. “So, we’ve got a perp who fancies himself a master criminal.”

“Hey, at least he’s got professional ambition.” Harlan unwrapped a Twinkie. “Breakfast of champions.” He took a bite and swallowed with minimal chewing. Watching Harlan eat reminded her why she was still single. Men could be real pigs. That and you needed to trust them to marry them. “We also know that our boy has a tattoo.”

“That works.” Finally something to really smile about. A perp could alter haircut and color, pop in colored contacts, change the way he dressed, but it was hard to get rid of a tattoo or a scar. “Arm? Neck? Chest? Back?”

“This is good.” Harlan grinned, looking like one of Santa’s elves gone bad with his full, round face, slightly pointed ears and a blob of cream filling at the corner of his mouth. She made a sign and he swiped off the cream. “It’s on his ass.”

Serena rolled her eyes. No wonder the boys had been in rare form this morning. “That’s great. To make a positive ID I’ve got to yank this guy’s pants down?”

Harlan chased the Twinkie with a slurp of coffee sludge. “You could try asking him nicely. According to the girlfriend, he’s quite a looker, but she says he’s a tiny mite when it comes to the johnson—course that could just be the woman-scorned thing.”

Serena laughed. That must be the little something Bennigan had in common with Malone. “That’s just great! This’ll make for some interesting conversation. Excuse me, you look like someone I know. In fact, you remind me of Danny Ocean. But I need to know, do you have a tattoo on your butt and a little penis?”

“Hey, it’ll guarantee a positive ID.” Harlan smirked. “Another little tidbit for when you’re trying to get those pants down to check out the tattoo—your boy likes a good spanking. You might want to dust off your dominatrix outfit.”

Sometimes she just found out more than she wanted or needed to know about people. Being in a job where she was surrounded by the worst of society was often demoralizing. “I didn’t need to know that.”

Harlan wagged a stubby finger at her across the desk. “It might come in handy. You’ve got to work on always having a backup plan, Riggs. She says he’s particularly partial to one of those little riding whips with the split leather on the end.”

“Jesus. Was there anything she didn’t tell you?”

“She was singing like a bird.” Harlan grinned.

“Please, tell me we’ve got an address.” Slick Nick was a shadow man. She hadn’t been able to find out where he lived. An address would be a huge plus. That she would definitely smile about.

“Sorry, Toots. You aren’t that lucky today. She said they always went to her place or a motel and they always took a cab. But, she did say he has an important meeting at that hotel near the airport, The Barrister. He’s going to be there for a three-day meeting from the twenty-fourth until the twenty-sixth. Just think, you can spank him till he talks and he’ll like it.”

Okay, it looked like dominatrix was about to be added to her repertoire. Serena was the department “go to” girl when light undercover was required. She liked it and she excelled at it. She’d handle the dominatrix thing without a problem.

Color her cynical, but this seemed like a surfeit of information where before they’d only had one dead-end after another. “How do you know she’s not setting us up? That’s a lot of information for her to know.”

“Nuh-uh. She’s setting him up, big-time. Apparently he thought she was just a dumb blonde and didn’t really go to any trouble to hide his day planner. So she found it and took a look.”

Serena grinned. “I like the sound of this woman.” Well, except for her poor judgment in dating a crook. Growing up with a petty criminal for a father had left Serena with zero tolerance and had been a major influence on her decision to be a cop. Criminals were criminals—bottom line. And women who had anything to do with lawbreakers were almost as bad as the men themselves.

If Serena’s mother had left her good-for-nothing father, they would’ve still been poor, but at least they could’ve claimed a little dignity. Pretty damn hard to have dignity when your old man was in and out of prison all the time and your mother lied to cover for him.

Serena had bailed when she hit eighteen. A high-school graduate with thirty-two hundred bucks in her pocket, saved from working nights and weekends, she’d tried to get her mother to come with her. Her mother had stayed because, according to Mom, Serena’s dad needed her when he got of jail. Again.

Serena had shaken Cleveland’s dirt from her feet, headed east and, even though she talked regularly with her mom, she’d never gone back. She couldn’t face the squalor and her mom’s resigned hopefulness. She definitely wasn’t interested in her father’s lies that this time he was going straight.

Becoming a cop had been Serena’s way of denouncing everything her father stood for. Plus, her father truly hated cops. Her job might keep her in contact with criminals and all the emotional dysfunction that went with a criminal’s lifestyle, but she was fighting all that instead of living it. “The girlfriend’s more than a blond bimbo. Bad news for Slick Nick. Good news for moi.”

“Don’t you want to know what kind of tattoo he has on his ass?” The elf-gone-bad’s eyes fairly danced with mischief.

Serena blew a strand of hair out of her eyes. She wanted to grow her hair out, but she might not make it through this growing out stage. And PMS just made it worse. She should come with a warning today: Bad Hair Day, PMS Bloating and a License to Carry Concealed. “I’m thinking there is a limited number of men that fit his general description with any kind of tattoo on their butts, but sure, go ahead. I can tell you’re dying to spill it. And doubtless the guys all know already. They were in rare form this morning.” Secrets in the station just didn’t happen.

“Right cheek. It’s a heart with MOM inside it.” Harlan cracked up. “Apparently that’s the side he prefers for his spanking.”

“I TOLD YOU NOT to call me before ten in the morning,” “Slick Nick” Malone said into his cell phone. Couldn’t a guy get a decent night’s sleep?

“Wake up and pay attention, Nicky, because I’m beginning to think you could fuck up a wet dream.”

Nick curled his fist around the phone. One day he’d find out who this cop was and then he’d pop him. For now it was useful having a guy on the inside. But sooner or later, he’d make him, and then the voice on the other end was history.

The cop was always so foulmouthed. His language deeply offended Nick. But Nick thought his cop-in-a-pocket knew that and went out of his way to needle him with it. When he was a kid, Nick’s neighborhood had been a dump—graffiti-covered buildings, foul language not only spouted all around him but spray painted for the world to see. Back them, no matter how many times he’d washed his hands or how clean he’d tried to keep his clothes, he’d always felt the filth of his surroundings. Eventually he’d managed to put the neighborhood behind him and all it represented. He wore nice clothes. Kept his language clean. Stayed in nice places. Ate at nice restaurants.

The woman in the hotel bed next to him, Susie maybe, was still asleep, her mouth gaping open slightly. Phone in hand, Nick slid out of bed, still naked from the night before, and crossed the room, then closed the bedroom door behind him. He stretched out on the suite’s love seat, the brocade upholstery rough against his back and bare butt.

“What are you talking about?”

The voice laughed, an ugly sound so early in the morning. “Your girlfriend or should I say ex-girlfriend, Debi, has been flapping her trap.”

Apprehension grabbed him by the balls and squeezed. He swung his feet to the floor and sat up. “What?”

“She visited the station and filled us in on all kinds of little nifty details like who you’re meeting and where and when.”

Nick stood and stalked over to the window. Fury roiled through him. “She’s dead.”

He hated it when he lost control and said stuff like that. Another reason to kill her. Jesus. He rested his forehead on the chilled glass of the window and closed his eyes.

“Nick, Nick, Nick. Don’t even think about breathing hard in her direction.” The hated voice sighed. “You know, it really annoys me when I have to think for both of us. If she turns up dead or missing or even with a broken fingernail, game’s up, bright boy. My people will figure out the information was leaked and then you and I are out of business and—who knows?—I just might be the one arresting your punk ass.” That laugh grated on Nick’s nerves like nails scraping a chalkboard. “And you’d never know it was me. So, listen up, loser, you don’t touch Debi Majette. Next time you want to dump a girlfriend, make it a body, before she talks to us. Get your shit together.”

Jo-Jo would have his head for this. His uncle Jo-Jo had been the one to offer him the opportunity to move beyond the ’hood, and Jo-Jo could just as easily send him back. Christ. He tamped down his panic. But it was fixable. Definitely fixable. He just needed a few minutes to think this through without the cop hanging on the line.

“We’ll move O’Malley into place,” Nick said, thinking aloud. “I’ll meet my contacts elsewhere and we’ll send O’Malley to The Barrister on those dates. It’s a little sooner than we’d planned, but it should work.”

“You’re sure O’Malley doesn’t suspect anything?”

Nick curled his lip. Even though he’d never met him, he despised Nick O’Malley and all the others like him out there. He’d read about O’Malley’s background in the papers. No graffiti-covered sidewalks in O’Malley’s childhood. No hookers on the corner across from the drug dealers. No, O’Malley was one of those laid-back lucky gimps who always landed on his feet. He led a charmed life. “Doesn’t have a clue. He’s so used to lady luck smiling on him, he never questioned the job offer.”

Once Jo-Jo had found out the cops were hot on Nick’s tail, he’d heard O’Malley’s story in the news and come up with a brilliant idea. Hire O’Malley to work in one of Jo-Jo’s secondary companies. Let him get comfortable, set him up and then let him take the fall as Slick Nick. O’Malley didn’t look like him, but they were close to the same build, nearly the same weight and about the same age. Every tabloid had carried the story that O’Malley had committed a crime, yet never done time. It was a beautiful plan. It’d take the heat off of him and O’Malley could enjoy the creature comforts of the state pen—and get a taste of what if felt like when lady luck spit in your face.

“Except now we all know you have a tattoo on your ass and he doesn’t,” the cop said.

Nick couldn’t think with this jerk hanging on the other end of the line. “I’ll figure something out and take care of it. Thanks for the heads-up,” Nick said. He hated thanking this piece of scum for anything.

“No problem…as long as you pay up. You know the deal.”

Nick watched the snarl of traffic on the street below. The little people rushing to and fro for their nine-to-five jobs. Pathetic slobs.

“Yeah. I know the deal.” Cash deposited into a numbered bank account.

“You know, I’m feeling generous today, so I’ll throw this in as a freebie, won’t even charge you extra for the info. Everyone in the 151st not only knows you have a tattoo on your ass, they also know you get off on a good spanking.”

Nick fisted his hand in the curtain.

The voice on the other end of the line laughed. “And the Debster says you’ve got a little dick. That’s a shame. Size really does matter.”

Giving way to his fury, Nick flipped the phone closed, cutting off the hateful laughter on the other end. He threw it against the wall and dragged in a deep breath.

One day. One day that bitch would pay for that. The same as that nameless, faceless cop.

2

“TWENTY-THREE DAYS DOWN, seven left to go. You’re never going to make it,” AJ said.

“I’m practically home free.” Okay, so maybe he’d underestimated just how prominent a factor women were in his life. But it hadn’t been as hard as Nick had anticipated, despite his buddies going out of their way to make it as difficult as possible. AJ and Matt had sent women his way left and right over the past twenty-three days. Matt had thrown a party, complete with lots of single, available, hot women. Oddly enough, none of them had even seriously tempted Nick. He didn’t expect it to be easy, but seven more days was doable.

“Home free, my ass. You’re gonna break before you manage another week.” AJ laughed. “You look ready to break now.”

“Man’s got a point.” Tim eyed him across a half-eaten Rueben, Dougal’s special of the day. “You look wound pretty tight.”

Nick forked a home fry. “You only think that because AJ’s brainwashed you.”

Matt tipped his stool back on two legs. “No one’s brainwashed me. You should have seen your face when Polly squeezed behind your chair.”

“What did you expect? Polly’s got these big…” Maybe he was in worse shape than he’d thought, he couldn’t say the word breasts without choking. “You know…and she—they brushed against my back.” And he wouldn’t even mention how good she’d smelled and how sweet her breasts had felt against his back. He didn’t doubt that AJ had slipped her—the prettiest waitress with the biggest tatas—a twenty to squeeze behind him.

“He’s sunk,” AJ said.

“A goner,” Tim seconded.

“Your hands are shaking, you poor slob,” Matt added.

“Hey, is that drool coming out of his mouth?” AJ said.

“I don’t know why I waste my time with you,” Nick said. He upended his beer.

“Because we’re your best friends,” Tim pointed out.

“Don’t depress me.”

“You know you love us.” Matt punched his shoulder.

AJ shook his head. “Easy, Matt. I wouldn’t get too close, Nicky might be getting desperate.”

“Damn right I’m desperate if you three are the best I can do for friends,” Nick said. They all knew they were just mouthing off. When he’d lost his mind and embezzled the money and then it had hit the news, he’d found out who his true friends were. Most of the guys he’d known no longer gave him the time of day. But AJ, Matt and Tim had stuck with him through thick and thin.

“C’mon, Nick. You know you’ll miss us next week.”

“Can’t say that I will. I’m looking forward to not being around.” And that was more than the truth. He could use a change of scenery—even if it was only the other side of the city. It’d be better not to be around the familiar. Like when he’d quit smoking a couple of years ago and it’d been a matter of not lighting up when he was used to. A change of scenery would probably curb his wanting a woman around. And if that smacked of habit and addiction, well, these guys didn’t have to know.

“How long are you gonna be gone?” Tim asked, bringing the conversation back to where it had been before Polly had brushed against Nick.

“Three days.” Long past were the days when he worked around money. He’d blown that career when he’d embezzled funds. His prospects had looked dim to dismal until he’d heard about this job through a friend of a cousin’s friend. Amazingly, Mack Enterprises was willing to take a chance on a guy with his history. Nick knew he was damn lucky he’d stumbled into anything better than scrubbing toilets at Fenway Park. Actually, he enjoyed his job as a booking agent for Mack Enterprises. And he was good at what he did. But for the past couple of weeks…it wasn’t anything he could put his finger on…

“So, you’re gonna be in Boston, but you’re staying in a hotel?” Tim frowned. “Man, that doesn’t make any sense.”

“I’m a company man and that’s where they want me so that’s where I’ll be.”

“Seems like this trip came up pretty sudden,” Matt said.

Nick shrugged. “It was a little last minute, but apparently the guy they were going to send was needed somewhere else. Me? I go where I’m needed.” And he’d keep his eyes and ears open. Crazy as it sounded, the people at Mack were too nice, too trusting considering his recent history. It simply didn’t feel right. But the best thing to do was to keep a low profile and his eyes and ears open. Maybe he was imagining things.

“We thought you were road tripping, so we all went together and got you a little going away present,” AJ said.

They were grinning like a trio of monkeys and Nick knew major grief was about to come his way.

AJ pulled a box wrapped in plain brown paper out from beneath the table.

“It’s a little something for your trip. When you’re sitting in your lonely hotel room,” AJ said. “Go ahead. Open it. It won’t bite.”

The three of them cracked up at that. Oh, boy. Nick tore off the paper. The vacuous grin of a blow-up doll stared up at him from the cardboard box.

“Meet Sheila. She’s got thunder from Down Under. We didn’t want you to get too lonely,” AJ said.

“Triple E’s in a box,” Matt said. Matt had a serious obsession with large breasts.

“Notice she’s a blonde.” Tim pointed out the obvious. “And she even comes with prerecorded messages, personalized just for you.”

Matt snickered. “We know how important deep conversation is to you.”

“If you don’t like Sheila, we can return her for you. She had a sister in the box next to her,” AJ said.

He looked the box over. “On no. I’ll keep her. I have a feeling Sheila and I are going to get along just fine.”

FIVE DAYS LATER, Nick set up his laptop on the small table in the corner of the hotel room. He put his underwear in the dresser, hung his shirts and slacks and stored his suitcase in the hotel closet. He crossed the room to the box sitting on one of the chairs next to the table.

“Okay, Sheila, my love, time for you to come out of the box.” Nick opened the box, laughing. He wasn’t giving AJ, Matt and Tim the upper hand with this joke. No way. He’d brought the lovely Sheila along. Now he planned to blow her up, take a digital photo of them together and e-mail it to the guys.

Sheila turned out to be five foot three and all plastic woman. Nick shook his head. He’d managed to make it to almost thirty without firsthand knowledge of a blow-up doll. The lovely Sheila should at least put on a shirt. That’s all he needed, to be arrested for Internet porn involving a blowup doll. He pulled a button-down out of the mirrored closet, crossed the room and slid one of her arms into the shirtsleeve. He grabbed her hand to pull it through.

“Ohhh, Nicky, would you like me to talk dirty to you?” said a tinny, pseudo sexy voice with a distinct Australian accent, startling him.

He’d forgotten. The well-endowed Sheila came with personalized recorded messages. Apparently the key to conversation with Sheila was squeezing her hand.

What the heck. He might as well hear what she had to say. Nick squeezed again.

“Oh. Nicky, you’re so big.”

He laughed and listened to the next message.

“Nicky, big boy, I’d really like you to put your big rod inside me.”

“Nicky, you make me so hot.”

“Nicky, I’ll do whatever you want me to do. I’m your personal love slave.”

“I’ve been so lonely without you, Nicky. Come to Mama.”

“Oh, Nicky, you’re too much man for me. Maybe I should invite my hot, horny friend over, too.”

“You’ve been a very naughty boy, Nicky. Do you need a spanking?”

Okay. Sheila’s prerecorded messages offered a little something for everyone. He pulled her other arm through the shirt and smoothed it over her shoulders, encountering a switch on the back of her neck. He flipped the switch and Sheila, the Aussie lass, took off like a plastic doll possessed, vibrating wildly from the waist down, her triple-E’s bobbing like water balloons in a juggling act. Laughing, Nick reached beneath the blond hair and turned her off.

Sheesh. He had to hand it to his buddies, when they bought a blow-up doll, they bought the top of the line.

And despite all of her attributes, Sheila didn’t do a thing for him. It’d been so long since he’d had any kind of contact, if you discounted Polly’s breasts brushing against his back, he was relieved Sheila wasn’t doing a thing for him.

He set his digital camera up on the table and positioned Sheila into a seated, semireclined pose in one of the chairs. Setting the timer, he ran over and perched on her lap, one arm draped around her shoulders. The camera went off and he checked the shot. Excellent. In no time he downloaded it to his laptop, added the caption “I think I’m in love” and sent it to AJ, Tim and Matt. He grinned. Those jerks would roll on the floor.

He was in control and decided he’d head to the bar downstairs for a burger and a beer.

SERENA CHECKED HER weapon in her purse before she left the stall of the hotel bar’s bathroom. That was one of the challenges of going undercover in a short skirt, thigh-high boots and a form-fitting top—it didn’t leave many options to carry concealed. Now she just had to find her man.

She entered the dimly lit bar, typical for a hotel lounge. As plans went, hers was pretty loose. She’d hang out in the bar, as if she was waiting for someone and pray that no one mistook her for a hooker—only because she wouldn’t be able to blow her cover by arresting any potential john that propositioned her.

She’d noticed a karaoke sign when she’d come in. If she didn’t find a guy fitting Slick Nick’s description, she already planned to get up and perform the old Devo song, “Whip It,” in hopes of catching Mr. Paddle-Me’s attention. And if that didn’t work, next she’d go to Boy George’s “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?” In the past Serena’s success came in having a loose plan and then punting—or improvising—as the situation unfolded. Although Captain Worth had argued with her more than once that she should always have a contingency plan, her way had worked just fine on all her other cases.

She hoped it didn’t come down to karaoke because she couldn’t sing, couldn’t dance and she didn’t look like a dominatrix. Not that she supposed there was a set formula for how a dominatrix looked, but she was fairly certain on most days she didn’t fit the bill.

She knew she looked like the girl next door with her honey-blond hair, snub nose and freckles. She looked like a girl you could trust and confide in, which was a big bonus in catching crooks, because for the most part, crooks couldn’t keep their mouths shut and they always thought she was the perfect person to spill their guts to.

After nine years, it still cracked her up, the look on the criminal-du-jour’s face when she whipped out her cuffs and started reciting the Miranda.

She slid onto a stool at one end of the bar, which afforded a sweeping view of the room without leaving her back exposed, and ordered a wine cooler. Lesson number one in bar crawling: Never order a drink with a wide mouth on the glass. It was too easy for a scumbag to slip in a date-rape drug. Martini glasses were the worst.

“Buy you a drink?” A guy with red hair slid onto the stool next to her. He had the look of a regular about him. She’d worked undercover long enough to recognize the signs—the casual nod to the barkeep, the ultracasual dress. And she’d found it sort of amazing that even hotel bars had a retinue of regulars, just like freaking Cheers.

“I’m covered, but thanks.” She made sure she sounded friendly and nonthreatening.

“Mind a little company?”

“Not at all. I’m waiting for my friend and it can be a little intimidating sitting in a bar alone, if you know what I mean.”

“Especially a pretty girl like you.” Cheeser. She pasted on a smile and managed not to roll her eyes. “I’m Stephen…with a ph.” His smile said he thought that was a clever line. She’d bet the farm it wasn’t the first time he’d used it.

“Serena. It’s nice to meet you, Stephen.”

“Serena and Stephen. Bet you can’t say that five times fast.”

Oh, boy, he was a live one. Small wonder he was alone. “I’d better not even try it.”

“You know, tonight’s karaoke night.”

“I saw the sign when I came in. Are you a performer?”

Stephen preened a bit. “I’ve been known to take the mike a time or two.” He pressed his knee against hers. “I’m really good in a duet…if you’re up for it…later.”

Heaven forbid. She shook her head, angling for shy and modest instead of horrified. “I don’t know. I’ve never done anything like that before.”

And if luck ran her way, she wouldn’t tonight. She basically sounded like a cat yowling in heat when she sang. Not pretty.

“I bet you’re a fast learner and I’d love to give you a lesson or two.”

“That’s a generous offer, Stephen.”

“Drink up and order another one. It helps take the edge off before you perform.”

“I think I’d better take it slow. What kind of songs do you like to perform? I’m sure you have favorites.”

Typical man. Ask him a question about himself and he was off and running. She just had to look interested and interject the occasional “hmmm,” “really” or “oh, that’s interesting,” and he’d drone on endlessly about his karaoke prowess.

Stephen was in the middle of a performance recount, when Slick Nick arrived. Serena spotted him the moment he walked into the bar. Six feet and a few inches, black hair, cut short and brushed back—a good cut, an expensive cut, not the twelve-buck, walk-in-off-the-street cut that she splurged on for herself. Nice clothes. Thirtyish. Obviously in good shape. He carried himself like a man comfortable in his own skin, assured, as if he was used to people looking at him.

A slight shiver of some second-sense recognition whispered through her. She recognized his face. Knew she’d seen him before. That grainy photo was better than she’d thought because his face definitely registered with her. This was her man. She felt it bone deep and the flush that spread through her wasn’t attraction. It couldn’t possibly be. She was merely excited she’d finally found Slick Nick.

She remained calm and zeroed back in on Stephen-with-a-ph who was generously sharing his tips on audience control when you had the mike.

Stephen’s pager buzzed. He checked it and made a face. “It’s my mother. I’ve got to run her over to bingo at the VFW.” He stood up. “But I’ll be back in time for the karaoke.” He snapped and pointed his finger at her. “Don’t sing that duet without me.”

The dark-haired man pulled out a chair a couple of tables away from the bar.

Serena bit back the observation that if she was singing without him, it wouldn’t be a duet. “I promise—no duets without you.” And she no longer had to worry about how to get rid of Stephen. Thank you, Mom and bingo at the VFW.

Stephen left and she sat alone at the bar. Heat tingled over her skin. She looked up. The dark-haired man was watching her. She held his gaze with her own. Something ancient passed between them, a recognition, an acknowledgement, an attraction that sent a tremor through her. She looked away first, thoroughly disconcerted by the potency of just that glance.

She busied herself sipping her wine cooler and reconnected with her equilibrium. Serena checked him out from beneath her lashes. Her fishnets and thigh-high black boots had definitely snagged his interest. She smiled and crossed her legs.

His answering smile, a slow sensual acknowledgement, set off a flutter low in her belly that had nothing to do with being a cop and everything to do with being a woman. Easy there, girlfriend. He was a criminal and a pervert, and all of that aside, he had a little thingie—and God knows two of the three guys she’d dated in the past ten years had fallen into the little thingie category.

He deliberately looked away from her, as if he’d caught himself staring. That was okay—he’d definitely noticed her and had liked what he’d seen. It was about time this case started going somewhere.

The waitress approached his table and Serena took advantage of his distraction to assess him, strictly for ID purposes, of course. Hair with just a hint of curl that said it would riot out of control if he skipped a trim or two. His shirt hugged broad shoulders. She’d guess somewhere between one-eighty and one-ninety-five pounds. Muscle weighed more than fat and he was definitely carrying lean muscle on that body. From where she sat, no moles, scars, tattoos—of course, she was sure he was sitting on the tattoo—or other distinguishing marks were visible except when he turned his head to look at the waitress. It looked as if his ear had been pierced, but he didn’t wear an earring now. It didn’t take a leap of imagination to envision him with a small gold hoop in his ear. There was something sexy and roguish about him. She’d seen a sleepy sensuality in his eyes when they’d locked with hers.

What was she thinking? Well, that was, in fact, the problem. She wasn’t thinking. There was nothing cerebral about his effect on her. Her heart raced. With one look, he’d managed to heat up some of her body parts long neglected.

He ordered a beer and a medium-rare burger, hold the onion. When the waitress tried to flirt with him, he shut her down with a tense smile. It certainly wasn’t the sensual zinger he’d sent Serena’s way. His cell phone chirped and he flipped it open and up to his ear. “Nick, here.”

She sipped her wine cooler to hide her triumphant smile and leaned forward slightly, the better to eavesdrop on his conversation.

“Yeah. They sent me because bookings have been down a bit and you know I’m always willing to help a fool part with his money. Okay, yeah, that really wasn’t funny. I know, Rourke. Prison’s not something to joke about. Okay, that was in bad taste. I know I’m lucky.”

She had hit the mother lode. This had to be Slick Nick. Your average Joe off the street didn’t consider prison an option. Could life get any sweeter?

“Yeah. Catch you later. By the way, I’m staying at The Barrister, room 583, if you need me and can’t get me on my cell.”

That answered that question. Life could get sweeter and it just had. If she was into astrology, she’d think her stars or planets or whatever they were had just aligned. Now, she just needed to stall him in the bar while she checked out room 583.

“HERE’S YOUR BEER. Should I bring another one when I bring your burger?” the waitress asked, putting his drink on the table in front of him.

“No thanks. I’m good.”

He looked past the waitress, avoiding the eye contact she sought. That was a big mistake because it left him looking at the leggy blonde sitting at the bar. He’d been so good when he came in the room. He’d made sure he didn’t look around the room. Better not to even know what he was missing out on.

And then he’d seen her at the bar and his whole world had shifted, tilted, come into focus. It was as if every cliché of meeting a stranger’s eyes across a crowded room had blossomed inside him at that moment in time. For the span of several heartbeats the people and all the noise of the bar had faded to nothingness and it had only been him and her.

Damn it to hell. Twenty-eight days and none of the women AJ and Matt had thrown at him had interested him, certainly none had tempted him.

And now, he saw this woman. She definitely tempted him. She wasn’t particularly beautiful but she was pretty in a fresh-scrubbed way and those legs in those boots…His sex drive had returned from its twenty-eight day hiatus with a vengeance.

Damn. The smart thing would’ve been to order room service and eat in with Sheila. He almost told the waitress to box it up to go and then he stopped himself. He was made of sterner stuff than that.

Nope. He was not going to think about running his hand over the smooth curve of her calf and along the delicate line of her ankle. No sir. Not even going to imagine those legs wrapped around him. Nuh-uh.

He glanced up from those incredible legs and found her watching him with faint amusement. A little thrill coursed through him until his brain cells caught up with his hormones. He deliberately looked away. He’d concentrate on his beer. Two days. He had two lousy, long days to go. He could he do it. He would do it.

He definitely didn’t need to look into those eyes or ogle those legs again. Why torture himself when he couldn’t even introduce himself? What would he say? “Hey, I’d like to get to know you a little better. Mind if I call you in three days when this bet is off with my friends?” She’d think he and his friends possessed the mentality and maturity of adolescent schoolboys. While that might well be the case, he didn’t need to advertise it.

The waitress delivered his burger and a bottle of catsup. “Can I get you anything else?”

Nick demurred and forced himself not to look at the blonde at the bar. So, they’d exchanged a look and a smile. Big deal. He bit into his burger and concentrated on savoring the flavor of ground sirloin, a toasted Kaiser bun, fresh lettuce, a ripe juicy tomato and a thick slice of pungently sharp cheddar cheese. But he was still conscious, in his peripheral vision, of those shapely legs shifting.

Nick was two bites into his burger when he saw the woman stand in his peripheral vision. No. Please don’t let her stop by his table. He was in a weakened state. She walked past and, idiotically, he found himself disappointed. But there was nothing wrong with his sense of smell and she smelled as good as she looked. A light and airy scent with an underlying tone of seduction. Hell, who was he kidding? At this point the damned hamburger smelled seductive.

He watched her walk, mesmerized by the length of her legs, the sway of her hips in that short skirt. And those black, thigh-hugging, stiletto-heeled boots made him ache. She was obviously a woman who worked out. She looked toned and lean. Nick forgot he had a mouthful of ground beef and swallowed, promptly choking.

Dangerously close to needing the Heimlich maneuver, with his eyes watering, he missed where she went. That was just as well, since she was none of his business.

He concentrated on his burger and the ball game playing silently on the bar TV. He was relieved the blonde with the boots had left. Really, he was. He wasn’t in the least disappointed. So, she’d started his engine in a major way just by walking by. It was his lucky day that she’d left. He’d take his time, have a nice leisurely meal and watch the game. He could relax now that temptation had left the building.

He winced as Bastion, a new closer for the Sox, allowed a grand slam. Another Sox game down the toilet. The waitress arrived with another beer.

“I didn’t order that,” Nick said.

“Compliments of the lady at the bar.” The waitress, who didn’t look old enough to drink beer, much less serve it, winked at him.

“What lady?”

She pointed to where the blonde had been. “She was over there. She said to send this over and she’d be back in a few minutes.”

Nick made a strangled noise. “I need my check.”

“Was something wrong with your burger?”

“No. Yeah. Maybe. I just need to leave.”

The waitress gave him a look that said he was cute but seriously psycho. Let her think he was psycho. He didn’t care. All he knew was that he didn’t plan to wait around for Ms. Legs to return. His willpower was already stretched thin. In fact, he was fresh out. He needed to get the hell out of Dodge before those legs and that cute freckled nose showed up at his table.

Forget the rest of his burger. He upended the beer—a fresh beer was a terrible thing to waste. His best course of action was to put as much distance between him and that long-legged, sweet-smelling siren. He couldn’t get back to his room fast enough.

3

SERENA EASED the hotel room door closed behind her. She turned and saw a woman sitting in the chair across the room and nearly jumped out of her skin. Adrenaline surged through her. Was the woman dead or tied up? Serena realized she was neither, because she wasn’t a woman, she was a freaking blow-up doll wearing a man’s shirt. What the heck?

She shook her head and crossed the room, eager to have a look at the laptop open on the round table. Her luck had definitely taken a turn today. Who knew? Maybe she’d find all the incriminating evidence she needed at once.

What she saw on the screen was incriminating all right. Slick Nick perched on the doll’s lap, nuzzling her neck. And the sicko had even posted a caption across the bottom. “I think I’m in love.” Ick. With a plastic doll.

Just went to prove you should never, ever judge a book by its cover. Slick Nick looked like a regular, sexy, hot guy. He looked nice. Certainly not like you’d expect him to cozy up with a blow-up doll and get off on a little spanking. This guy’s kink factor was way off her meter.

She rifled through the folders in his briefcase, taking care to leave everything the way she’d found it. Nothing definitive there, except the name Nick O’Malley, plus a phone number and address. They knew Slick Nick used a number of aliases. O’Malley was close enough to Malone to make sense as an alias. People tended to pick names similar to their own. But the address…She grinned. Sweet.

She stepped back and turned around, bumping the chair behind her. The doll started to fall and Serena grabbed it to keep it from tumbling to the floor.

“Oh, Nicky, would you like me to talk dirty to you?” a canned woman’s voice asked, startling Serena. Serena realized it was the doll. This guy was a bonafide freak. Serena righted the doll, feeling slightly intimidated in the face of what were extremely large breasts. Apparently Slick Nick did not find more than a mouthful a waste. Those monsters would require a quarterback to make a two-handed pass. Wait till the boys in the station heard about this.

And then because she figured Nick hadn’t even finished his burger yet and it was sort of akin to watching a train wreck or Jerry Springer when you were late-night channel surfing, she squeezed the doll again.

“Oh, Nicky, you’re so big.”

Oh brother. This guy was pa-thet-ic. And then, because she wasn’t sure that it wouldn’t come in handy one day and because she was simply curious, she listened to the rest of the doll’s messages. Sheesh. Love slave. Mama. Threesome. Spanking. Well, Slick Nick certainly had some hot buttons.

She did a quick recon of the drawers. Not much there except for the usual socks, underwear—kind of boring tighty whities, not exactly what she’d figured for a kinky kind of guy—and a pair of cotton drawstring pants all jumbled together. Nick might be a nice dresser but he wasn’t exactly tidy or organized.

She only had one more place to check. Maybe he had something in the closet, something in his suitcase. She slid open the mirrored closet door and checked the pants pockets. Nada. The door lock clicked. She froze for a second, then she ducked into the closet, sliding the closet door behind her just as the room door swung open. Her heart pounded. Two seconds later and she’d have been an unwilling doorstop.

The deadbolt clicked into place, a sure sign that whoever had come in—she assumed Nick—didn’t plan on going back out any time soon. She was amazed she could hear anything over the deafening pounding of her heart. That had been a close call. Nick walked past the closet and Serena held her breath, careful to remain still and not bump the hangers at shoulder level. Thank goodness he’d left half the closet empty. She inched the closet door open, just a hair, so that she could survey the room.

Slick Nick sat at the table next to the blow-up doll and did something on the computer. “Ah, sweet Sheila, you’re still here.” Double ick. His plastic fantasy had a name. And where the heck else did he expect her to be? Sheila wasn’t going far on rubber legs. “I should’ve ordered in and eaten with you, my sweet.”

It was one of those universal injustices that such a weirdo had such a sexy voice, a warm, slightly husky baritone that slid over you, through you.

“There was a woman in the bar…my God, those legs. I was seriously tempted.”

He was talking about her. She wasn’t sure whether she was flattered or grossed out. Well, that wasn’t true. Maybe all his perversion was rubbing off, because, dammit, she was flattered that he was out there sighing over her legs and confessing to the plastic Sheila.

“They were get-your-dick-hard legs. Oh, honey. And those eyes and that cute nose. Sheila, she was a turn-on and I was close to caving, but I stayed the course, even if it meant leaving half my dinner. I didn’t give in to temptation. I was true to you, my love.” He closed his eyes and ran a hand over his head. “I swear I can even smell her perfume in here. She seriously flipped my switch.” He opened his eyes and shook his head, as if to clear it.

Serena couldn’t believe that it turned her on to hear Mr. Perve talk about getting a woody looking at her legs, especially since he was describing her to his blow-up doll girlfriend. She didn’t want to feel the moisture gather between her thighs, didn’t want to feel that flutter low in her belly. It was even worse when she considered that his “giving in to temptation” meant betraying an inanimate object with a permanently gaping mouth.

Oh no. No flaming way. Not going to do it. No way she was going to sit in this closet and watch him “enjoy” Sheila. But hey, Sheila was there, available, permanently willing and he was turned on. Of course that was what was going to happen.

Cripes, a guy with a little willie going at it with a blow-up doll. Well, it wouldn’t be any better if it was a guy with a big willie.

The upside, however, to witnessing that freak show in action would be she’d see his bare butt and have a positive ID. Sometimes her job sucked. Increasingly, she felt permanently slimed by the bad guys.

“Okay, little Sheila, I think it’s time you went in the closet.”

What?

Nick picked up the doll and carried her under one arm across the room.

No. No. No. A blow-up doll was about to totally blow her cover. She inched back but couldn’t go too far because his suitcase was on the foldout stand and his clothes were hanging. If she was really lucky, he’d only open the door far enough to shove the doll in. But she wasn’t feeling lucky about right now.

Nick reached for the closet slide and must’ve hit Sheila’s hand. “Oh, Nicky, would you like me to talk dirty to you?”

“Thanks for the offer, Sheila, but I don’t think so.” He laughed but turned back toward the bed, away from the closet. “But I guess you can just stay in the chair. You’re really too nice a girl to be stuck in the closet.”

Reprieved! Blood rushed to Serena’s head.

“Enjoy your chair while I shower.” He placed the doll in the chair and crossed to the dresser where he pulled out the cotton drawstring pants.

Shower meant naked. Bare tush. All she needed was one good look, just a glimpse of that tattoo. No. She was not looking forward to checking out his bod. She was just doing her job—even if that meant watching a buff, good-looking perve strip naked.

Serena wasn’t sure how much longer she could hold this position, scrunched over. Nick went into the bathroom. Don’t close the door. He pushed it behind him, but it only closed about a quarter of the way, leaving her with a line of sight and the reflection from the bathroom mirror.

He tossed the cotton pants onto the counter next to the sink and reached into the shower, turning on the water. Serena took advantage of the moment to kneel on the closet floor, closer to the crack, giving her a better view without her eye being level with his in the mirror. She didn’t need him to see her watching him from the closet. That could be a bad scene. But from what she knew of this guy, he’d probably get off on it.

Nick tugged his shirt over his head and tossed it onto the floor, taking her right back to that life-not-fair deal. He had a gorgeous chest, broad with a smattering of hair that was masculine without looking like a hairy beast. And the mirror reflected his back—no hair, thank you, but plenty of sculpted muscle. And arms—cut, defined. He was buff without being Cro-Magnon.

He stepped out of a pair of loafers and unzipped his pants, sliding them down well-muscled legs. Now who was the freaking pervert? She was crouched in a closet watching a man undress. She felt as if she should close her eyes or look away, but that would defeat the purpose of getting a look at his butt and that was, after all, why she was here. She kept her eyes trained on the nearly naked, very fine male specimen before her.

Nick hooked his thumbs in his underwear and pulled them off, stepping back slightly, so that his butt was just behind the door. Serena gaped. Sweet mother of…oh my. He had a magic wand waving that looked pretty big from where she crouched. He pivoted on his right foot and turned toward the door, giving her a bird’s eye, full-frontal nudity view. She bit back the sound that almost escaped her. Case in point, one woman’s stallion was another woman’s foal, because there was nada wrong with the equipment he was packing up front. If his ex-girlfriend wanted to see little…well, Serena should introduce the woman to Serena’s last two boyfriends. Nick here made them look like they needed to shop in the boy’s department. Wow. He flipped the switch for the fan and then pivoted back around. Blocked by the door, he got in the shower.

Damn. She ought to smack herself. She’d been so busy ogling his package, she’d missed the perfect opportunity to check out his rear which would’ve been reflected in the mirror. Now, when she would have had the chance to slip out the door while he was in the shower, she had to wait around in the closet, hoping she’d catch a glimpse of it when he stepped out.

There was no use beating herself up about it. That had definitely been a distraction. She was pretty sure there wasn’t a woman alive who wouldn’t have found herself…interested in that view.

She might as well try to stretch a bit and switch positions while he had the shower going, although she didn’t dare risk sliding the closet door open. She carefully moved the empty hangers to the other end so she wouldn’t bump against them. God knows how long she was going to be stuck in here. She hoped he wasn’t a night owl. She sat on the closet floor, yoga style.

The scent of his cologne clung faintly to his clothes. Tempting. Tantalizing. Even his clothes smelled sexy. He looked good—make that great. He smelled good. He even sounded good. What a shame he was a bad guy. And what the heck was wrong with her? All she’d ever felt on any other case had been a sense of detachment and loathing for the perp. Hard as she tried, she couldn’t find that detachment now. Nick Malone, aka, Nick O’Malley, was fully deserving of her loathing. Unfortunately, she couldn’t muster it. Somehow he had slipped in under her radar. Something about him had felt intensely personal, intimate, from the time she’d met his eyes across the room, to when she’d listened to him talk to a blow-up doll about how Serena affected him, until now when she sat surrounded by his scent. Something about this man pierced the protective armor she’d always instinctively cloaked herself in and touched her, engaged her. She felt betrayed by her reaction, her attraction to him, but it was something she couldn’t seem to quell and she couldn’t deny. And in that moment she learned something important about herself and choices and mankind in general. This man was reprehensible, and against all rationale and against everything she stood for and believed in, she felt a connection, a pull to him that was totally out of her control. She could despise herself, she could berate herself, but it didn’t seem to change her instinctive response to Nick Malone. What she could control, however, was what actions she took. She’d make a positive ID and then she’d turn the case over to Worth and he could reassign it. Any of the boys should be glad to take on a case that was almost in the bag.

A sound from the shower interrupted her train of thought. There it was again. Was it a moan? Maybe she’d imagined that deep, throaty sound. She heard it again. It wasn’t her imagination. She wasn’t exactly naive, but it took a moment for her to figure it out, a few seconds before she recognized the noise of a man aroused. God. She was sitting in a closet alone and she still blushed—she could feel the heat wash over her. Obviously his hand and his imagination were both being used on that impressive erection she’d seen not too long ago.

She wet her suddenly dry lips. She’d done that. She’d heard his confession to his plastic girlfriend. The intensity and frequency of his moans increased and another type of heat fired through her. Just as she’d been helpless against the attraction she’d felt earlier, she couldn’t seem to suppress her reaction to him masturbating in the shower. She bit down on her lower lip but still her nipples tightened and her thighs grew wet in response to what she overheard. Please. She really couldn’t take much more of this. She was embarrassed and frustrated, and dammit, suddenly and incredibly turned on. It was uncanny, almost as if he shared some cosmic wavelength with her, but he came then in one long moaning release.

The water stopped. She knelt again, making sure her body wasn’t visible through the crack, and peeked out. He reached for a towel, his dark, hair-covered arm dripping water. Steam rendered the mirror useless. She couldn’t see him while he toweled off—he was too far into the room. He stepped forward, picked up the loose cotton pants and stepped into them. Talk about frustrating. Between the door angle and a streak of bad luck, she couldn’t see his butt.

While he brushed his teeth, she stared at what was a very nice butt, peering hard, hoping for a glimpse of a tattoo. If his pants had been white, or off-white, or muslin, the tattoo might have shown through, but it was a lost cause with a dark plaid print. Even though it was pointless, she watched him floss, put on deodorant and run his hand through his wet hair. Of course, it wasn’t as if she had much else to do or look at, stuck in the closet.

He grabbed another clean towel, turned off the bathroom light and the vent fan, and walked out of the bathroom, his dirty clothes still heaped on the floor. He was a slob and a pervert, but he was clean. And breath-stealingly sexy. Her breath caught in her throat. When he passed the closet, she smelled the intoxicating mixture of soap, warm skin and deodorant.

From her vantage point, she could only see about half of the bed. Nick spread the towel on the floor at the bottom corner. Oh no, now Sheila was about to get it. This guy was insatiable. Wasn’t once in the shower enough for him? Apparently not.

And at this point she wasn’t so sure she knew herself any longer. Once upon a time, she would’ve known with certainty that watching a guy with a blow-up doll would disgust her. But once upon a time, she also would’ve bet the farm she wouldn’t hide in a closet while a guy got off in the shower. She would not, however, watch him engage in sex with a blow-up doll—once she got a look at his tush. She’d study the edge of frayed carpet butting up to the metal track of the sliding closet door.

Nick stretched out on the towel and propped his feet up on the edge of the bed. Serena almost laughed out loud. Sit-ups. The guy was powering through flaming sit-ups. Which explained that body—the nice flat belly with its six-pack of rippling muscle. After about a minute, she started counting. He just kept going and going, the muscles in his shoulders and his back a fine sight to watch. Hey, she was stuck here, she might as well make the most of it.

Nick stood, picked up the towel and tossed it onto the other chair. His cell phone rang. Serena held her breath, hoping it was a call about his impending meeting.

“Hi, Ma…. No, you’re not bothering me. I’m just getting ready to go to bed. How’s Da feeling?…Yeah, make sure he takes his medicine. We need him well for his surprise birthday party, don’t we?…Yep. I mentioned it to the boys and they can all come…Right. Sure, Ma, I’ll take my vitamins…Love you too. Talk to you later. ’Night.”

He sounded like such a nice person. A good son, loving, concerned, dutiful. Did his mother have a clue what her son really did? She doubted it, if the woman was reminding her thirty-year-old son to take his vitamins. She hardened her heart. It was tough when you thought about the innocent people criminals hurt with their lifestyle, all the parents, spouses and children that lived with the consequences of those actions. Did his mother know about his tush tattoo? Did she know about his little spanking fetish?

Nick turned down the cover on the king-size bed and grabbed the remote. He flipped the TV to a sports channel. She heard him sign off the laptop and close it. He stretched out on the bed, folding his hands beneath his head.

Serena settled on the closet floor.

She was so screwed.

A HAZE OF CIGARETTE SMOKE hung in the air and a cold sweat trickled down Nick Malone’s back. Jo-Jo was not going to be pleased and Nick was about to get a taste of that displeasure. Big Al, looking every inch the thug he was in a suit that didn’t quite fit his bulging biceps and thick bull neck, walked over. “Jo-Jo’ll see you now.”

Big Al shadowed him to the door where another equally massive guard, Marcel, stood. Nick reached for the doorknob. Big Al wrapped a meaty hand around his arm. “Leave the piece with Marcel. You’ll get it back when you’re done.”

Nick pulled the 357 from the shoulder holster beneath his suit jacket and handed it to Marcel. Big Al still held on to his arm. “And don’t forget about the one on your ankle.”

It’d been worth a try. He lied through his teeth. “I hadn’t got that far yet.”

“Just hand it over.”

Big Al had the stereotypical thug build, but what made him even more intimidating was that he wasn’t your typical garden-variety big, dumb guy. Big Al was cunning and ruthless and big—an intimidating combination. No one saw Jo-Jo without going through Big Al and no one went through Big Al if he didn’t want them to. Big Al reminded Nick of a crocodile he’d seen once at the reptile house. It owned the same cold, unblinking stare.

Nick fished the double-shot derringer out of the ankle holster and straightened his pant cuffs. He might be in trouble, but he wouldn’t go in with his pant leg stuck in his sock. He’d go in with panache.

Big Al released his arm. “Don’t keep the boss waiting.”

Nick paused and deliberately brushed his suit jacket arm where Big Al’s hand had just been and then he opened Jo-Jo’s office door. He didn’t have to worry about closing it behind him. Two more beefy guys flanked the door inside. Nick’s legs shook as he crossed the room. Big Al was dangerous but he didn’t frighten Nick. Neither did the two goons behind him. Jo-Jo, however, scared the hell out of him.

Silence, fraught with disapproval, shrouded the room like a heavy velvet curtain. The carpet’s thick, plush pile absorbed his footsteps as he crossed the room. Nick settled into a club chair in front of the ornately carved desk. His uncle’s tall chair, upholstered in the finest leather, was turned, its back facing him. Jo-Jo appreciated the finer things in life.

Even as a young boy, that had been something he’d had in common with his uncle Jo-Jo. It had pained Jo-Jo to witness the dismal living conditions his nephew Nick and his sister Angelina had endured as Nick’s father—a good, kind man, but inept—had failed at one endeavor after another, shackling them in poverty. Nick had been fourteen, a boy transitioning into manhood, when his father had met with an “unfortunate accident,” one Jo-Jo had manufactured. Nick’s beautiful, fragile mother had been devastated by the loss of her husband. Nick had never recounted the chilling conversation he’d overheard that had left no doubt about who had been behind his father’s death. Nick thought it would totally destroy his mother to know the brother she adored had disposed of her beloved husband like offending offal. And Nick had enough street smarts that he’d made sure Jo-Jo never found out just how much he, Nick, knew. But, at fourteen, he learned a quick, harsh lesson about where kindness and good intentions got a man versus cunning and power. He saw who was alive and who was dead.

With his dad out of the picture, Jo-Jo had stepped in as Nick’s father figure. He’d pulled them out of the rat-infested, graffiti-covered neighborhood. Jo-Jo had brought death and destruction to his family, but conversely had plucked them out of poverty and given Nick access to the finer things in life and given him opportunity. Nick regarded Jo-Jo with a mix of fear, loathing, admiration and respect. In Nick’s world, his uncle was pretty damn near God. Jo-Jo giveth and Jo-Jo taketh away.

The chair swiveled slowly, bringing Nick face-to-face with his uncle.

Jo-Jo leaned forward and put a Game Boy on his desk. He leaned back in his chair and smiled at Nick. Nick’s gut tightened. As usual, Jo-Jo looked affable and mild, the personification of a vague, favorite uncle. And as usual, his smile never quite reached his eyes. Nick always found Jo-Jo’s smile chilling.

“I’m disappointed, Nicky. I get a call from a mutual friend and you know what he says to me?” Nick kept his mouth shut. It was a rhetorical question. “He tells me, ‘Your nephew could fuck up a wet dream.’” Of course, that cop wasn’t original enough to come up with something new. He kept recycling the same insult. “Do you know how that makes me feel, Nicky? It doesn’t make me feel good. All my careful planning, months of setting this up. I see a man in the paper who has committed a crime and yet he hasn’t gone to jail. And I ask myself who would hire such a man now? Who would give him a decent job? Who would trust him? I think he would be grateful for a good job. And I also think he looks like you, same build, same height, close in age. And my wheels are turning, because I’m a very smart man. I work it so that he gets hired by my company. I have all the pieces in place. I hand you opportunity on a platter and you repay my genius with carelessness. Without our mutual friend, you would be enjoying the comfort of a very small jail cell right now. How can you respect me and be so careless?”

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