“It’s not fair to ask you to put your business, your whole life, on hold while you baby-sit me. I’m not your responsibility.” Not anymore.

“Yes, you are.” Ray took the two steps that separated them and placed his hands on Grace’s face, forcing her to look up at him. “You came to me,” he said softly. “When you were scared, when you didn’t know where else to go, you came to me. Do you think I can turn my back on you now? Pretend nothing has changed?”

“Nothing has changed,” she said weakly, trying, so hard, to mean what she said.

“Gracie Madigan,” he whispered, his mouth moving toward hers. “Everything has changed, and you damn well know it.”

Dear Reader,

You’ve loved Beverly Barton’s miniseries THE PROTECTORS since it started, so I know you’ll be thrilled to find another installment leading off this month. Navajo’s Woman features a to-swoon-for Native American hero, a heroine capable of standing up to this tough cop—and enough steam to heat your house. Enjoy!

A YEAR OF LOVING DANGEROUSLY continues with bestselling author Linda Turner’s The Enemy’s Daughter. This story of subterfuge and irresistible passion—not to mention heart-stopping suspense—is set in the Australian outback, and I know you’ll want to go along for the ride. Ruth Langan completes her trilogy with Seducing Celeste, the last of THE SULLIVAN SISTERS. Don’t miss this emotional read. Then check out Karen Templeton’s Runaway Bridesmaid, a reunion romance with a heroine who’s got quite a secret. Elane Osborn’s Which Twin? offers a new twist on the popular twins plotline, while Linda Winstead Jones rounds out the month with Madigan’s Wife, a wonderful tale of an ex-couple who truly belong together.

As always, we’ve got six exciting romances to tempt you—and we’ll be back next month with six more. Enjoy!

Leslie J. Wainger

Executive Senior Editor

Madigan’s Wife
Linda Winstead Jones

www.millsandboon.co.uk

LINDA WINSTEAD JONES

has loved brooks of all kinds for as long as she can remember, spending her leisure hours with Nancy Drew and Miss Marple, or lost in worlds created by writers like Margaret Mitchell and Robert Heinlein. After years as an avid reader she decided to try her hand at writing her own story. Since 1994 she’s been publishing historical and fantasy romance, winning the Colorado Romance Writers’ Award of Excellence for her 1996 time-travel story, Desperado’s Gold. With the publication of Bridger’s Last Stand, her first book for Silhouette Intimate Moments, Linda stepped into the exciting arena of contemporary romance.

At home in Alabama, she divides her time between her husband, three sons, two dogs, reading whatever she can get her hands on and writing romance.

For my brother Tom,

who introduced me to Lyle Lovett’s music

and even graciously loaned me a few CDs. Thanks.

Now might be a good time to tell you—

you’re not getting them back.

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

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 1

The effect of a Ray Madigan grin could be devastating on the unprepared female. Grace popped a potato chip into her mouth as she watched him smile at the waitress and ask for a refill of his coffee and a piece of lemon icebox pie. Darn it, he should be older, slower, less attractive than she remembered. How else was she supposed to get him out of her system once and for all?

Not a speck of gray marred the honey-toned softness of his light brown hair. She knew plenty of almost-thirty-four-year-old men who had a liberal dusting of white around the edges, or the beginnings of male-pattern baldness. Not Ray. Just a little bit too long, a mixture of wavy dark blond and golden brown strands curled at his neck and over his ears.

He apparently hadn’t gained a pound in the past six years, either. In fact, he might’ve lost a couple. Tall and lean with wide shoulders tailor-made for resting a head upon, he looked just as she remembered; too good-looking for his own good and tempting as hell, darn his hide.

These days, Ray always wore the same uniform: a T-shirt, a plaid or checkered button-up shirt over that tee, blue jeans and well-worn leather work boots. He wore the loose shirt, she knew, to conceal the gun he tucked in the waistband at his spine.

No, nothing had changed. Ray played the good ol’ boy flawlessly, when it suited him. To the casual observer he looked like a hundred other rednecks interested in nothing more than a good time, a faithful truck and a six-pack of beer. They didn’t always see the spark of intelligence in his eyes, the way he watched everything and listened to every word. Grace saw, though. She always had.

His eyes had always done her in.

As the waitress walked away Ray planted his eyes on Grace once again. She did her best to appear calm and uninterested. Unaffected. Casual to the point of aloof.

“So,” he said, stirring a single pack of sugar into his coffee. “How’s Dr. Doolittle treating you these days?”

“Dr. Dearborne,” she corrected without rancor. “And I have to admit,” she said with real admiration, “you were right. I went to his office the morning after we had lunch last time, and told him I expected to be treated like a professional. I told him I’d have to start looking for another job if he didn’t stop making improper suggestions when we found ourselves alone. He hasn’t made a pass at me since.”

“He doesn’t want to lose his office manager,” Ray said, his smile gone. “Folks aren’t exactly lining up, panting to go to work for smarmy dentists.”

“Dr. Dearborne isn’t smarmy,” she said without enthusiasm. “He’s just…challenged in the personality department.”

“He’s a creep,” Ray muttered as the waitress placed the lemon icebox pie before him. “Trish went to him with a toothache a few months back, and he actually made a pass at her while he had his hand in her mouth. The bastard called her every day for two weeks.”

“Trish. She was your second wife, right?” Grace asked, as if she didn’t know perfectly well who Trish was. Wife number two, blond, a party girl. She and Ray had met in a bar, gotten totally wasted and decided they were perfectly suited for one another. The marriage had lasted all of three months. Well, officially the marriage had lasted for three months. Word was they hadn’t lived together a full two weeks.

Ray nodded. “I called Patty and she fixed Trish up with her dentist.” The look he gave her was censuring. “I can’t believe you’re working for that jerk.”

Patty was wife number three, a nurse who’d tended Ray in the emergency room more than once. A more level-headed woman than the flighty Trish, she’d made her marriage to Ray last almost eight months. They’d parted amicably, or so she heard.

Grace thought it damned unnatural that the three of them, Ray and Trish and Patty, were friends. Of course, it was kinda unnatural that she and Ray were sitting here, together, right now.

Unnatural for most, maybe, but not for Ray. She’d rarely seen him angry; he took everything in stride. Sadly, she suspected he didn’t care enough about anything or anyone to get truly angry. People came and went, in and out of his life, and he carried on as if nothing had changed.

She tried to steer the conversation away from her boss and Ray’s ex-wives. He never seemed satisfied with the explanation that she worked for Dr. Dearborne because the pay was good and the benefits were better, and talking about Trish and Patty always made her teeth ache.

“How can you eat like that and not get fat?” she said, pointing accusingly at his huge piece of pie.

“I inherited my father’s metabolism,” he said with a grin.

“One day that metabolism of yours is gonna give out,” she said, wondering if it was true. Last time she’d seen Ray’s father he’d been fifty-nine years old, fit as a fiddle, and wolfing down a meal fit for three teenage boys. That had been nearly nine years ago. Ray and his father were not close, and didn’t visit one another often. Of course, on the few times she’d seen them together there hadn’t been any animosity, either. They acted like old acquaintances who got together now and again because they felt like they should, not because they wanted to see one another. “You should come running with me sometime.”

He made a face as he dug into the pie. “Run? On purpose? I don’t think so. Besides,” he cocked one eyebrow at her. “You run at the crack of dawn.” He shook his fork at her and deepened his lazy, honeyed Southern drawl. “It ain’t natural.”

With his pie finished and the last of his coffee drained, Ray settled his eyes on her in a way that told her he was about to say something she wouldn’t like. She saw the man behind the charmer, the intensity flashing in the friendly blue eyes he locked to hers. Her stomach flipped uneasily. This look hadn’t changed in years.

“You remember Stan Wilkins?” he asked.

“Sure. He moved south a few years back, didn’t he?”

Ray nodded, a slow, deliberate motion. “Yep. He’s in Mobile. He called me a couple of days ago.”

Grace wanted to believe it had been a purely social call, but the fluttering in her stomach suggested otherwise. “Great,” she said indifferently. “How’s Mary?”

“Fine,” Ray said with a small smile. “Their oldest is in high school, can you believe it?”

Had it been so long? Deep down, she shivered. Yes, it had been. One day melted into another, and then another, and then another, and the next thing you know years have passed. Days you can’t get back are gone. “Hard to imagine.”

Ray leaned forward, forearms on the table, eyes clear and guileless. He looked like a man who could do no wrong, who knew what he wanted and would do anything to get it, the rest of the world be damned. Darn his hide, she knew this look, too. No good ever came of it. He hesitated, drummed his fingers on the tabletop, and in an instant Grace knew what was coming.

“Stan’s heading up the narcotics unit in Mobile, and he’s looking for someone to come in and work undercover. When he heard what had happened up here…”

“You’re not considering it,” she said softly. Her face paled—she could feel it, as if her skin turned suddenly cold. “Tell me you’re not even thinking about…”

Unrepentant, Ray said casually, “I told him I’d call in a few days and let him know.”

Taking a deep breath, Grace reminded herself that she shouldn’t be angry. She should be able to take anything and everything Ray Madigan did in stride. Unfortunately, that was easier said than done.

“You’ve been off the Huntsville force for a year,” she snapped, trying to keep her voice low. “Your P.I. business is going well, you told me so yourself. And you haven’t been shot once!” Her heart leapt into her throat, but she worked hard not to show it. “Dammit, Ray, you know what happens when you get involved in something like this.”

He didn’t look surprised by her response. “I told Stan I’d think about it.”

All of a sudden she remembered, too clearly, why she’d left him in the first place. The worry, the horror, the feeling that at any moment someone would knock on the door and reach deep inside and yank her heart out again were too much for her to bear.

She started to slide from the booth, but Ray’s quick hand on her wrist stopped her. His fingers manacled her, long, strong fingers tight and warm against her pale wrist. She stared at his hand on her arm for a long moment, marveled, for a heartbeat, at the size and power and undeniable masculinity of that hand.

She’d been so careful not to touch him, so cautious on the occasions they’d met for coffee or lunch, like any two civilized human beings might be. They didn’t hug hello, they didn’t kiss goodbye, they didn’t even shake hands. And now here she sat motionless while he held her in place, his hand firm and heated on her wrist. The sensation brought back so many memories…good and bad.

He peeled his fingers away from her skin, slowly, as if he’d just realized what he’d done. “Sorry.”

She settled back in her seat, still rattled but no longer furious. “You were shot three times while you were working narcotics, Ray. Three damn times!” Her heart clenched as she remembered that third, most horrifying time. “What on earth would make you want to walk into that again?”

He didn’t have an answer for her, but he wasn’t ready to give in, either. She saw the determination in his eyes, the flicker of restlessness. He hadn’t yet told her why he’d quit his job with the Huntsville Police Department, but she knew there had to be more to it than a simple early retirement or the need for a change. He’d loved his job too much, he’d devoted too much of himself to it. He’d given up too much for the job; including her.

Grace hadn’t looked up many old friends since her return to Huntsville, but she had called Nell Rose and Sandy. Cops’ wives, both of them. They were more than happy to catch up, have lunch, go shopping and gossip about Trish and Patty, but when Grace had asked why Ray left the force she got the runaround. Nell Rose said she had no idea and then decided she wanted dessert after all, launching into a glowing rave about chocolate. On another afternoon, Sandy’s soft answer was, “same ol’ same ol’,” just before she reached for a pair of suddenly exciting half-price black heels.

“I told him I’d think about it, that’s all,” Ray said softly. “I haven’t made any promises.”

No, Ray Madigan didn’t make promises.

The waitress came back and dropped two tickets on the table. Separate checks, always.

Grace dug in her purse for a ten-dollar bill, more than enough for her barbecue plate and a generous tip.

“At least listen to me,” Ray said softly. “I know you don’t like what I do…”

“I don’t care what you do, not anymore,” she said coolly, hoping her fury didn’t show. She tried so hard not to care. “If you want to go to Mobile and get yourself killed, go right ahead.” She slid quickly from the booth and tried to walk past him.

“Dammit, Gracie, sit down.” Ray reached out and grabbed her wrist again, effectively restraining her as she tried to make her escape.

“Let me go.” Her voice didn’t rise above a whisper. Something unwanted welled up inside her and made her long to sit beside him, lay her head on his shoulder and beg him not to go to Mobile. She’d fought these feelings for a long time, and she fought them now.

“Just sit back down,” he insisted softly, refusing to release his grip as he assaulted her with his most cajoling, most seductive voice.

“No.”

“Gracie…”

“No,” she said, just a little bit louder.

The waitress walked by to pick up Grace’s check and the ten-dollar bill. Maybe she sensed the tension, maybe she was concerned about the other customers who stared over their own coffee and pie. To defuse the situation she smiled, winked and said, “Why don’t you just marry the poor guy and put him out of his misery?”

Grace gave the young girl a wide, unconcerned, very calm grin. “Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.”

The waitress’s eyes widened in surprise. Ray lifted a lazy hand. “Tamara sweetheart, this is Grace. Mrs. Ray Madigan number one.”

He leaned back in the booth and watched Grace walk away, and the smile he’d worn all through lunch faded. Her thick dark hair, longer than she used to wear it, bounced around her squared shoulders. She didn’t toss a glance back as she walked away; he didn’t expect her to. Gracie Madigan didn’t look back, ever.

In her silly moss green suit and sensible low-heeled shoes she looked joyless. Annoyed. And too damn good. His gaze lingered on her legs, well revealed beneath an almost too-short green skirt. She’d always had great legs, he mused as she disappeared from sight.

Well, he’d known she wouldn’t like the idea of him going back into narcotics, though he hadn’t expected her to lose her temper. After all, they weren’t married anymore, hadn’t been for six years now. As of two months ago, they’d been divorced as long as they’d been married.

He knew too well what Grace thought about his chosen profession. She hated it. After all, that was the reason she gave for leaving him. Yeah, she was real good at walking away when the going got tough.

“So that’s number one,” Tamara said as she began to efficiently clear the table, balancing plates and glasses on a small round tray. She flashed him a wicked smile; too wicked for one so young.

“Yep,” he said.

“She’s pretty,” Tamara said, careful to keep her tone conversational. Just a trace of curiosity crept into her soft voice to give away her interest.

“Yep.” Pretty and sexy, the kind of unforgettable pretty and sexy that got under a man’s skin and stayed there. Having Grace back in his life in such a platonic way was torture; a torture he wasn’t about to give up. A friendly lunch every two weeks or so was better than nothing, so he purposely refrained from talking about the past. He kept the conversation light and friendly and safe, so she wouldn’t run off again.

Until today.

Hellfire, this was getting complicated. The best thing he could do for himself would be to hurry back to the office, call Stan, and agree to be in Mobile on Monday.

He paid for his lunch and walked back to the office, trying to enjoy the sun on his face and the gentle breeze that wafted past. Spring in Alabama was always a reminder of why he stayed here, why he’d made Huntsville his home. Up north they were still fighting snow and ice in some places, but down south the girls had started sunbathing and the kids ran around in shorts and T-shirts after school. Dogwoods bloomed, birds flitted and chirped, summer was just around the corner.

And Mobile was just a hop, skip and a jump from Gulf Shores, the Redneck Riviera.

There wasn’t anything on his calendar that couldn’t be farmed out to another P.I.; an insurance fraud case he was about to close up and a couple of divorce cases—the least favorite and most profitable part of his business.

But beach or no beach, he wasn’t leaving just yet. Gracie was the one who did the running away, not him.

The modest offices of Madigan Investigations were situated on the ground floor of an old redbrick building in the heart of downtown Huntsville. The furniture was cheap, the sign painted on the glass door discreet and tasteful. He got a lot of his business from the lawyer on the second floor.

“You had two phone calls,” Doris said the minute he opened that door. She waved two pink slips of paper before her and then dropped them on the desk. “One about business, one from that second ex-wife of yours. She’s getting married again, and she wants you to give her away.” Doris showed her disapproval with a wrinkling of her nose and a pursing of lips. “Can I go to lunch now? I swear, every time you have lunch with that first ex-wife of yours I end up half starved before I get out of here.”

In Doris he’d found the perfect secretary. Built square and solid, she was old enough to be his mother, sassy one minute and mothering the next, more than competent where her secretarial duties were concerned, and—most important—he’d not been tempted even one time to ask her to marry him.

“Take the rest of the afternoon,” he said, well aware that his lunches with Grace usually ran long. “I can answer the phone for a couple of hours.”

Doris smiled as she walked by, stopping just long enough to reach up and give him a maternal pat on the cheek. “You’re a good boy, Ray.”

Rather than go into his own inner office, he sat at Doris’s desk to read his messages. One of his most persistent clients had called; a man who was certain his wife was cheating on him, even though Ray hadn’t been able to discover that the woman did anything more illicit than floor it through the occasional yellow light. When he read the other message he smiled.

He’d have to call Trish, wish her luck and decline her request. He hadn’t met her fiancé, but even the most saintly man would have to balk at having his bride walk down the aisle on the arm of her ex-husband.

Oddly enough, he wouldn’t actually mind giving Trish away. She was a sweet girl and he wanted to see her start a new, wonderful life. She deserved it. And if Patty ever married that doctor she’d been seeing for the past year, he’d be there with bells on, he’d toast the bride and groom and wish them a long and happy life together.

If Grace ever decided to get married again…his smile faded. Hellfire, no matter how nonchalant he tried to be about Gracie, he couldn’t quite pull it off. No matter how hard he tried—and dammit he gave it his best shot—he still thought of her as his wife.

To take his mind off of a subject he’d rather not ponder, he recalled a more pleasant memory; the look on Dr. Doolittle’s face when the dentist had opened the door to his fine home two weeks ago and found Ray standing there. The way the creep had paled when Ray had very calmly threatened to rip out his spleen if he ever harassed Grace again, and then threatened to do the same if he ever felt the need to share the details of their conversation.

Hell, a man could live without a spleen, Ray thought as he positioned his locked hands behind his head and leaned back in Doris’s chair.

Since the house she rented was situated near downtown Huntsville, Grace had the pleasure of taking her morning jog down quiet streets lined with old houses and even older trees. A small neighborhood park was especially beautiful in the spring, with the flowering dogwoods and pear trees in bloom growing gracefully around a small pond.

On occasion she’d see another runner, but most mornings she had the sidewalk and the park path to herself. It was worth getting up while the sky was still dark, leaving the house before the sun actually peeked over the horizon. She loved jogging in the gray light, watching the day come alive.

Ray lived close by, a fact she’d been well aware of when she chose her house. He rented an apartment over a garage, just a few streets north. She’d told herself, more than once, that knowing Ray was near had nothing to do with her decision. Living in Madison or South Huntsville would require driving every day in rush hour traffic on the Parkway or I-565. The house she rented, a rather small old house that had been recently remodeled, was convenient. And she liked the neighborhood. In order to convince herself of this truth, she never ran down Ray’s street. In fact, she made it a point to run in the opposite direction.

This morning she couldn’t completely clear her mind, as she usually did when she ran. She kept thinking about Ray, wondering if moving back to Huntsville had been such a good idea, after all. It had seemed so when she’d made the decision. The offer from Dr. Dearborne had been a good one, and besides, she needed to get over Ray, to put what they’d had in the past and move on. As long as she continued to make him more than he was, in her mind, that would never happen. A good dose of reality would remind her of the reasons she’d left him in the first place, and then she’d be able to get on with her life. Maybe with Ray finally in the past where he belonged, she’d be able to think about getting married again, having children, being happy.

So far it wasn’t working. Until yesterday, when he’d mentioned the job offer in Mobile, she’d been in serious danger of falling in love with him all over again. He could be charming, when it suited him, and there were times she forgot the problems that had driven her away and remembered the nights he’d come home to her.

The nights he’d come home after a hard day to forget all that had happened outside their house. Those times when he went undercover for weeks at a time, but sneaked into the house and the bedroom and the bed in the middle of the night on occasion. Just to hold her, he said. Because he couldn’t bear to be without her.

Some nights she still woke from a dream feeling the dip of the mattress as if Ray were climbing into the bed to lie beside her. For an instant, a heart-stopping, impossibly bright instant, she thought he’d come to her; that the years had rolled away and he had come to whisper in her ear, take her in his arms, and love her.

Some mornings she’d actually lie in bed and close her eyes and pretend she could hear Ray singing in the shower. Lyle Lovett songs, always. Off-key, but just a little. He hadn’t sung in the shower every morning, but usually, after a long, wonderful night when they’d gotten little sleep, she’d come awake to hear him singing. She knew his favorite Lyle Lovett songs by heart. “She’s No Lady.” “If I Had a Boat.” “Here I Am.” As she ran, an unwanted smile briefly crossed her face.

This was getting dangerous. She had to erase these thoughts and remember the bad days; like the first time Luther had come to the door to tell her Ray had been shot.

Even running and working up a sweat, she went cold at the memory. Luther had assured her, that night, that Ray would be all right, that the wound wasn’t serious. She hadn’t believed him, not for a second. She’d thrown a coat on over her nightgown, stepped into a pair of tennis shoes, and as Luther drove her to the hospital she wondered how she’d ever survive without Ray.

She couldn’t, and she knew it. Ray was too much a part of who she was, and without him she was nothing. Nothing. Riding in Luther’s silent car she’d tried to imagine her life without Ray in it. Long before they reached the hospital she’d felt hollow and achy, like someone had reached inside and ripped out her heart. When she’d sniffled and wiped away a few relentless tears, Luther had tried to assure her that Ray was all right. She hadn’t believed him, not until she walked into the hospital room and saw Ray sitting up, his shoulder bandaged, a couple of buddies laughing at some joke she’d missed.

He’d been pale, she remembered, and his hands trembled a little; something no one else seemed to notice. When he’d seen her he’d smiled. Smiled! Suddenly her untied shoes and her nightgown peeking out from the knee-length coat seemed ridiculous, her tears seemed silly. But even though Ray was fine, the emptiness didn’t quite go away. She had a new and very real fear to deal with, now: losing Ray to a job he loved.

She rounded the corner, her mind a million miles away. The squealing of tires brought her to the present.

A car jerked to a stop at the curb as a man rolled from the open passenger door, over the grass, onto the sidewalk. She jogged in that direction to see if she could be of any help.

The man who’d fallen tried to get up but couldn’t. Even from here she could see that he shook, and she heard what could be crying. He was apparently badly hurt. Someone else, a rather large man in a baseball cap and a wrinkled tan trench coat, stepped from the driver’s side of the car. His attention was on the man on the sidewalk as he ran around the idling car.

Grace was still a good distance away, in the shadows of the trees that lined and shaded the sidewalk. The man on the sidewalk lifted his head as the driver approached and reached down to help him up. Some friend he was, Grace thought as she drew closer. The poor man who’d fallen from the car was jerked to his feet, and the driver wrapped an arm around his neck in a way that had to hurt, and then reached up to lay his hand on the side of the injured man’s head. He quickly executed a powerful wrench, twisting the head unnaturally.

She heard the crack, and the bone-crushing sound brought her to a halt. The man who’d fallen from the car…no, she realized with a chill, he hadn’t fallen, he’d jumped…went limp and silent. The big man had broken his neck.

Grace stood on the sidewalk, no more than eighty feet away and frozen to the spot. She couldn’t believe what she’d just seen, and her mind searched rapidly for an alternate explanation she couldn’t find.

The big man in the tan coat lifted his head and saw her. For a split second their eyes held; she held her breath as she met the murderous gaze of a cold-blooded killer. He dropped his victim, and the dead man crumpled to the sidewalk.

Grace turned and ran. She didn’t jog, not this time, she ran as fast as she could away from the murder she’d witnessed. Her feet barely touched the ground; her heart pounded fast and hard. It wasn’t long before she heard footsteps behind her, heavy footsteps that gained on her too quickly.

The killer wore hard-soled shoes. His steps clipped heavy and loud against the sidewalk. She hoped the shoes would be a disadvantage, but that hope died quickly. He continued to draw closer.

Her right hand settled over the canister at her waist. Bless Ray for insisting that if she was going to jog alone she carry this spray. For dogs, he’d said, but she knew Ray too well, she knew how he thought. He saw danger everywhere, and this time he was right.

If she waited much longer it would be too late. If the man in the trench coat caught her from behind he could very well snap her neck just as he had that poor man who lay on the sidewalk. If she turned too soon, he’d have time to prepare. She waited—a few more steps, let him come a little closer—and then she plucked the pepper spray from her waistband and turned to face her pursuer.

The move surprised the killer, she could tell by the way he suddenly slowed his step, and by the startled widening of his eyes. No time to think about those pale eyes, she thought as she raised the canister and sprayed directly into his face.

The murderer came to a halt with a howl, covering his face with two beefy, strong hands. While he had his hands over his eyes, Grace kicked him between the legs, as hard as she could. He screamed again, louder, and hunched down to shield the newly attacked area with both hands. Taking a deep breath, she lifted her knee and snapped her foot out to kick him once more, in the face this time. The big man went down hard.

She turned and ran, picking up speed with every step. Her heart pounded furiously as she listened for movement behind her. If he got up after taking those two kicks, the best she had to offer, she was lost. She was dead.

Chapter 2

Ray rolled over in bed and glanced at the alarm clock. Who the hell was ringing his doorbell at this time of the morning? It was barely light outside. He mumbled a curse as he swung slowly out of bed, grabbed his Colt from the bedside table and made his way to the door, flicking off the safety with his thumb as he yawned. Whoever was out there didn’t let up on the buzzer.

He cursed again as he threw open the door, but stopped as soon as he saw Grace standing there, trembling, sweating and much too pale. He took her arm and pulled her into the room, and she fell into him.

Still half-asleep, he intuitively cradled Grace protectively. She lay almost limp against his chest, a surprising and somewhat disturbing place for her to be. For a second, maybe two, he closed his eyes and just held her. Didn’t he dream about this? The way she felt lying against him, soft and shapely, strong and still yielding. The way she smelled, so sweet and warm.

He had to force himself fully awake, he had to remind himself that something was terribly wrong. Grace breathed much too laboriously, as if every time she inhaled it hurt. Her entire body shook, from head to toe. Much of her dark hair had fallen out of its ponytail; sweat dampened tendrils fell across her face and shoulders.

Forcing himself to clear his mind and face reality, he kicked the door shut. “Okay,” he said calmly, “tell me what happened.”

She took a deep breath and tried to talk, but couldn’t. Not just yet. Her lips trembled; she still wasn’t breathing right.

“Take your time,” he said, struggling to remain calm, tightening his arm around her. There was nothing else he could do; he practically had to hold her up. If he let go she’d probably fall to the floor. He held her tight with one arm, placing his hand against her spine. His other hand, the one with the Colt in it, hung at his side. He clicked the safety into the on position.

He could feel and hear Grace’s breathing return to near normal. She took one deep breath and then another, inhaling slowly, exhaling warmly against his chest. The trembling subsided, but her heart continued to beat against his chest; too hard and fast.

Grace was fragile, feminine and delicate, but she’d never been helpless. It wasn’t like her to fall apart. She was falling apart now, right here, with her head buried against his chest as if she were trying to hide from the world. Still, he found the time to note, again, that she smelled like heaven, that she was soft and sweet and alive. And here.

Suddenly he wished he’d taken the time to step into a pair of jeans, maybe a shirt as he made his way to the door. All he’d grabbed as he left his bed to the jarring ring of the doorbell was his pistol. Standing here practically naked, wearing nothing more than a pair of boxer shorts while he held a woman he’d tried his best for the past six years to forget, was almost more than he could stand. For a moment his mind flitted to impossible notions; about kissing her to calm her nerves, about holding her close long after whatever had scared her into his arms was gone.

And then he noticed the canister of pepper spray in her hand.

“Gracie,” he whispered hoarsely. “What happened?”

She lifted her head, stared warily at him, and stepped back; as if she’d just realized where she rested. “I saw a man murdered,” she said, her voice so soft he could barely make out the words. “The killer, he just…snapped this poor man’s neck like it was nothing.” She swallowed hard and lifted her hands to look at them, as if she couldn’t understand how anyone could have so much strength, or could use their hands in such a way. “He chased me, when he realized that I’d seen what happened. I thought he was going to catch me, so I used the pepper spray, and then I kicked him. Twice.”

“Good girl,” he whispered.

“And then I ran.”

Here, she didn’t say. She didn’t run home, didn’t run to the nearest phone to call the police. She ran here.

“First things first,” he said, gently taking her arm and leading her to the couch. She apparently didn’t need to hang on to him anymore, but he wasn’t sure she was ready to stand on her own, either. Not just yet. As she sat, tense and shaky still, on the edge of the couch, he grabbed the phone and dialed Luther’s home number.

“Did he follow you?”

She shook her head frantically. “No. I didn’t look back for a long time, but when I did…he wasn’t there. Not the man or the car.”

He nodded. “That’s good. Now, where was the murder?” Luther still hadn’t picked up the phone.

“The corner of Magnolia and Lincoln on the park side,” she said. “He just snapped the guy’s neck and let him fall to the sidewalk.” Once again, she numbly stared down at her own hands.

Luther finally answered with a low growl.

“Meet me at the corner of Magnolia and Lincoln,” Ray said curtly.

Luther mumbled into the phone. “When?”

“Now.”

He hung up while Luther complained, profanely, into the phone.

“Luther’s been in the homicide unit for almost two years now,” he said, watching as Grace relaxed until she looked nearly catatonic. He almost preferred the fear. Right now she looked like she could feel nothing, like what she’d seen had numbed her.

But then she turned clear, intelligent eyes to him. Her brown eyes were so dark, so warm, there were moments he wanted to fall into them. He’d always loved her eyes; he’d never told her so.

Sometimes the years melted away. When he said something funny at lunch and she laughed, when they argued about her working for Dr. Doolittle, when she smiled in a certain way or looked at him…the way she looked at him right now. It was, for a moment, as if she’d never left him, as if nothing had changed.

She took a deep breath. “Thank you.”

He shrugged his shoulders as he turned his back on her. Who was he kidding? Everything had changed. “For what? Look, I gotta get dressed. It won’t take Luther more than fifteen minutes to get downtown, and he’ll be pissed if we aren’t waiting for him.”

“Sure,” she said, and then she sank into the soft cushions of the couch.

“Right here,” Grace said, pointing down to a perfectly innocent-looking section of the sidewalk. “A man jumped out of a moving car…at least I guess he jumped. I didn’t see that part. When I first saw him I thought maybe he’d fallen out of the car.”

She noted the skeptical glance Luther cut in Ray’s direction. No longer frightened out of her wits, she was offended by his obvious disbelief.

“What kind of car was it?” Luther asked, holding the tip of a pencil to his small notebook.

“Dark,” she said, “and kind of big.”

Luther glanced up at her and wrote down nothing. “Dark and big. A van or a SUV?”

She shook her head. “No, it was a car.”

Okay, it was a poor description, she admitted silently, but she’d never been good with cars. Darn it, she’d been surprised and terrified. Noting the make and model of the car idling at the curb hadn’t been her major concern at the time.

The weary homicide detective apparently decided it would be a waste of time to write “big dark car” in his notebook, so he snapped it shut and looked around with sharp, narrowed eyes. Light traffic whirred past on the street, and a few early morning walkers claimed the sidewalk. All was apparently perfectly normal here. In bright sunshine, it seemed impossible that a murder had recently taken place in this very spot.

Luther reached into the pocket of his dark suit jacket and pulled out a piece of hard candy, slipped off the cellophane wrapper and popped the sweet into his mouth. “I’m trying to quit smoking,” he explained as he placed the wrapper back into his pocket. “It’s hell. Pure hell, I tell you.”

He looked like hell, to be honest. Tired and haggard and worn out, he showed the years Ray did not. They were the same age, within three months, but today Luther appeared to be several years older. He’d always been the more serious of the two, the cop who took everything to heart, who wanted to right every wrong. Maybe he’d finally figured out that he wasn’t going to change the world after all. Life’s disappointment showed on his face.

Ray hung back while she answered Luther’s questions, but he stayed close enough for her to feel he was with her, that he supported her. Silly notion. She hadn’t leaned on Ray, hadn’t depended on him, for years. The lessons weren’t always easy, and some days they were damned hard, but she had learned to depend only on herself.

“Tell me what the man looked like, the one who was driving the car,” Luther asked as he sucked on his candy.

She did have a better description of the killer than of the car. When she’d turned to attack him with the pepper spray she’d gotten a pretty good look. “He was a big guy, maybe six-two or-three, with kind of a Neanderthal face. Lots of forehead, square jaw.” This Luther deemed noteworthy. “He looked strong,” she added. “Like maybe he works out.”

“Hair?” Luther asked, raising his eyes from the notebook.

“Under a baseball cap, and since I didn’t see much I’d guess it’s pretty short. Brown,” she added. “Not as dark as yours, not as light as Ray’s.”

She described what he’d been wearing, his broad face, his pale eyes—those eyes she remembered well, though at the moment she couldn’t be sure if they were blue or green. Luther wrote everything down, but she could see he was supremely unimpressed.

Inside, she was still unsettled by the experience. Her heart beat too fast, her palms were sweaty and her mouth was dry. The memory of what she’d seen remained solidly in her mind, too vivid. Too real. If it wasn’t for Ray she’d be a basket case right now, she knew it.

So much for her newfound independence.

The three of them walked down the sidewalk to the place where she’d sprayed and kicked the murderer. Again, there was no sign of violence; no blood, no dropped clue. Nothing. Everything appeared to be normal, as if nothing unusual had ever happened here.

Luther closed his notebook again and shoved it into the pocket of his dark suit jacket. He dressed more traditionally these days, thanks to his job in homicide she supposed. Black suit, white shirt, gray tie. His hair was shorter, too, cut in a quite conservative style. She didn’t remember Luther being so conventional. He’d always been as wild as Ray, just in a different way.

“Maybe the man isn’t dead,” he offered tiredly and with a brief spark of optimism. And more than a spark of condescension. “Maybe you saw two men fighting and you panicked and thought…”

“No,” Grace interrupted, annoyed that she had to try so hard to convince Luther of what she’d seen. Dammit, she’d heard the crack, she’d seen the murdered man crumple like a rag doll. “He’s dead.”

Luther grumbled and turned to walk back toward the curb, where his car and Ray’s were parked; one nondescript gray sedan parked before another, vehicles that were forgettable, invisible, anonymous. Cars that would remain unnoticed on the street. Neither of them wanted to be noticed when they worked.

“There’s not much to go on, but I’ll keep an eye out for missing persons and see what comes up,” Luther said casually. “Would you recognize the victim if you saw a picture?”

“I don’t know,” she said honestly. “It happened fast, and I wasn’t very close. He had dark curly hair, that’s all I can be sure of.”

The homicide detective sighed: a long suffering, weary, “why do I bother?” sigh.

How could she convince him of what she’d seen? Grace tried not to give in to frustration. Luther would know the truth soon enough, when the body showed up. Then he’d listen to her. She took some comfort from the fact that Ray stood supportively beside her. He believed her.

Deep down she knew she shouldn’t find comfort in the fact that Ray remained with her, reassuring and strong and constant. They weren’t married anymore, and she didn’t lean on him the way she used to. She didn’t lean on anyone. Ray Madigan was no longer a part of her life.

And yet, after this morning’s harrowing experience she did feel much better when she turned her eyes and thoughts to Ray. The world stopped spinning, and it was almost like the old days, when he was a part of her and she couldn’t imagine life without him.

Luther shook his head and bit down on the last morsel of his hard candy with a loud crunch. “So, how do you like being back in Huntsville?”

“Fine,” she said, puzzled that he wasn’t more concerned about the murder.

“Are you going to stick around this time?” he asked as he threw open his car door.

She heard censure in the question, undisguised, open hostility. Of course he was hostile; he was Ray’s friend, had been his partner for years. Ray had forgiven her for leaving, but apparently Luther never had.

“For a while, I guess,” she said uneasily. “You’ll call me when the body’s found?”

Luther gave her a quick, joyless grin as he slipped into the driver’s seat. “If anything turns up, I’ll give you a call.”

If?

Her heart fell as she watched Luther drive away. “He doesn’t believe me,” she said softly. “I know,” Ray answered. He didn’t sound at all concerned.

She looked at Ray, really looked at him. He was dressed in soft, cool blues, yet the morning sun made him appear golden and warm. The light shone favorably on slightly waving pale brown hair and tanned skin. His stance was casual, easygoing, but for the hint of tension in his hands and the set of his neck.

He squinted slightly against the bright sunlight, deepening the new wrinkles around his eyes, and her heart leapt. All her work, her dogged determination to put Ray behind her, had been for nothing. A waste of time. Because right now she was overcome with the certainty that she could hide in the shelter of his arms and he would protect her from anything, from everything. She had the urge to go to him right now, to press her face against that chest and breathe deep, to hold on…just for a while longer. Heaven help her, what she felt for him was so much more than a need to hide.

He’d touched her. She’d touched him. Old desires she’d thought long gone flitted to the surface to tease and taunt her. He looked so deliciously inviting she was tempted to fall into his arms again and stay there. She didn’t, of course. Reluctantly wanting Ray was one thing. Relying on him to fill the void in her life would simply be asking for trouble she didn’t need.

Ray never gave away much with his facial expressions, and this moment was no different. There was no emotion on his handsome face, no annoyance or concern or affection. He was cool and calm, almost indifferent. In spite of it all, she was glad he stood beside her. Where would she have run if not to Ray?

“You believe me, don’t you?” she asked as he headed for the curb.

Before he reached the car he spun around to face her. “Of course I do.” He said the words as if not believing was unthinkable.

She nodded her head as she joined him. He opened the passenger-side door and she dropped into the seat. “Thank you,” she said as he closed the door. She had to learn to put her mixed feelings for Ray aside and accept their present circumstances. He was a friend, the best friend she’d ever had. Anything else was impossible.

She trusted Ray with her life, but she did not trust him with her heart. Not anymore.

He shut the door without responding to her thanks, and for a moment Grace gazed out over the park. It was too early, still, for mothers to be out with their children, as they would be later, so the place was almost deserted. Still she felt a chill, as if someone were watching.

She wrote the warning chill off to nerves as Ray cranked the engine and pulled away from the park.

Cops. He could smell them a mile away, and those two, with the woman, they were definitely cops.

Standing behind a wide-trunked tree and watching the second of the two gray cars pull away from the curb, Freddie laid a hand over his cheek where the woman had kicked him. For a little thing she packed quite a punch. Quite a surprising punch. His jaw still hurt like hell, but fortunately nothing was broken.

He lowered his hands and thrust them impatiently into the pockets of his trench coat, silently cursing the woman. She’d surprised him, caught him off guard. And she didn’t fight fair. If he wasn’t in public he’d cradle his battered privates, as well.

He should kill the woman simply for hurting him, but he never, never killed anyone in a fit of anger. This was business, and he was a professional. Besides, killing the witness now would only give credence to her claims. He couldn’t have that.

At the present time he wasn’t particularly worried. There was no evidence that a crime had been committed. That one cop, the one who had arrived alone, obviously didn’t believe her. Freddie gave in to a crooked smile. The body that currently rested in the trunk of his car wouldn’t be found for weeks, maybe even months. The death would be made to look like an accident, as the client had requested, so odds were no one would even make a connection to the woman’s wild story and the tragic accident that took the life of one of Huntsville’s most respected businessmen.

He walked away from the tree and towards his parked car, limping just a little in deference to his throbbing, aching privates. Just to be safe, he’d dump the old Thunderbird coupe. Dammit, he hated to do that. It had been a good car. But, he thought without rancor, it was just a car. It could be replaced.

This afternoon he’d be paid the second half of his hefty fee. He should get out of town immediately, but he didn’t like to leave loose ends. Maybe he’d keep an eye on the woman for a while. Just to be safe.

Chapter 3

Ray wasn’t surprised to see Luther come strolling into his private office unannounced. Doris had always been a little afraid of the irascible Detective Luther Malone; she let him have the run of the place. She was usually such a stickler for making clients and visitors wait, guarding his domain from her post in the outer office like a friendly but potentially dangerous guard dog.

“So,” Luther said, propping himself on the edge of a messy desk. “What’s up with Grace?”

“I took her home to shower and change clothes, and then I drove her to work,” Ray said, closing the file before him. “She’s still shook up, but figured working would be better than sitting around thinking about what happened.”

Luther raised his eyebrows and shot Ray a look of sheer disbelief as he reached into his pocket for a piece of hard candy. Peppermint. “You didn’t buy that story, did you?”

He’d known from the start, as Grace had, that Luther was skeptical about her account; they’d worked together too long not to be able to read each other’s reactions to any given situation, not that Luther was exactly subtle these days. “Why would she make it up?” he asked calmly.

“I was hoping you could tell me.”

Until recently, they’d had an unspoken agreement not to speak about Grace. She was a forbidden subject. Right now Ray saw more than skepticism in Luther’s eyes; he saw a detective’s unquenchable curiosity. Luther had a ton of questions that had nothing to do with murder.

Ray leaned back in his chair, not quite ready to satisfy that curiosity. “I’m telling you, she was spooked when she showed up at my place.”

“Really?” Luther said dryly. “That’s another thing that bothers me. She ran all the way to your apartment, instead of stopping at one of the many houses she had to pass to get there.”

“Instinct,” Ray said slowly. “She was scared so she went looking for someone familiar.”

“You guys are divorced and have been for years,” Luther grumbled. “Why would she go to you, of all people, when there’s trouble?”

Ray flashed a wide smile. “You know all my ex-wives still adore me and depend on me to take care of them. Gracie’s no different.”

His smile didn’t falter as Luther shot him a biting glance that said, too clearly, that Grace was different. Luther knew too much.

“I have no body,” Luther said in a low voice. “No blood, no sign of a struggle, not a single corroborating witness, even though this supposedly happened right out in the open. I’m looking for a big dark car, and a big guy with medium brown hair under a baseball cap, a trench coat and hard-soled shoes, and evil pale eyes. Blue or green, take your pick.”

“And a temporary limp,” Ray added lightly.

Luther delved in his coat pocket for another piece of candy. Strawberry, this time. He played with it instead of placing it in his mouth, rolling it in his palm and between his fingers. “She might as well have given him a hook and sent me chasing after the one-armed man. Why can’t I get something easy like the Taggert case? A body, a murder weapon, blood, fingerprints, enough evidence to convict the guy twice…but no, that jerk Daniels has the easy cases fall into his lap, and I get a hysterical woman’s fairy tale.”

Ray wasn’t yet ready to admit that Grace might be lying. He couldn’t forget the vulnerable expression on her face as she’d looked at him and said, You believe me, don’t you?

“Maybe it happened the way she said, and maybe she saw something and just overreacted,” he reasoned. “I don’t think she’d make this up.”

“You don’t?”

He knew she’d been terrified when he opened the door to his apartment, when she’d fallen inside and into his arms. She’d have to be terrified to forget her unspoken rule and actually touch him.

“I don’t,” he finally said.

Luther shook his head. “Well, think about it. Has anything happened lately that might upset her? Something that might send her off the deep end.”

“We had lunch yesterday.”

“That’ll do it,” Luther cracked.

Ray’s smile faded. “I told her about the Mobile job offer.” He didn’t like the niggling seed of doubt that settled uneasily in his brain.

Luther stood and lifted both arms wide. His dark suit jacket gaped to reveal his shoulder holster and the snub-nosed six-shooter in it. “That’s it. Don’t you see? She figures if you stick around here to protect her from some big, strong killer in a trench coat and a mysterious dark car you’ll forget about the undercover job.”

The theory made too much sense. He might not like the idea, but he couldn’t immediately dismiss it, either.

“She always hated the undercover work,” Luther added needlessly. “Divorced or not, I think she’d do anything to keep you from going into that again.”

He remembered the look on her face yesterday, when he’d told her about the job offer. Terror, anger, revulsion. She hadn’t even tried to disguise her true feelings. Would she lie to keep him from taking that job? Did she know he wouldn’t leave town if he thought she was in danger?

Of course she did. Like it or not, she knew him better than anyone else ever had.

“Well hell,” he drawled, as if this new wrinkle didn’t make a bit of difference. “If a body shows up with a broken neck, or if you get a missing persons report on a man that matches her vague description of the victim, then what?”

“Then we reevaluate,” Luther said as he made his way toward the door. “Frankly, I don’t think anything’s gonna turn up. I think Grace pulled a nasty trick out of her hat to make sure you stay right here in Huntsville for as long as she wants you here.”

“And if she didn’t?” Ray asked as Luther opened the door.

“Then we could all be in a heap of real trouble,” Luther said, and then he closed the door softly.

The numbers on the computer screen added up perfectly, as usual. Things had been a mess three months ago when she’d taken this job, but the accounts were beginning to look good. Everything on the screen before her made perfect sense. Losing herself in the menial task had almost made her forget this morning’s horror.

Grace heard a soft noise, a shuffle and a sigh behind her, and she glanced over her shoulder to see Ray standing in the doorway, leaning against the doorjamb with a smile on his handsome face and his arms folded across his chest. He looked like he didn’t have a care in the world. She had never been more glad to see anyone in her life.

She didn’t want to depend on Ray, to need him the way she once had, but again her heart gave a little leap at the sight of him. Why did he have this effect on her? Her heart melted; she felt a rush of warmth and tenderness in her body. She’d never been able to completely get Ray Madigan out of her heart, no matter how hard she tried. And she did try.

“Almost finished,” she said. “Come on in and have a seat.” She gestured to the single unoccupied chair in the room, a rather uncomfortable, hard chair against one wall.

She returned her eyes to the computer screen, even though she’d finished with this particular task. Ray’s presence unnerved her, and she needed a moment to gather her wits. She moved the mouse and clicked the icon to save her changes, again.

Running to Ray this morning hadn’t been a mistake, or so she’d told herself again and again during this long day. Falling into his arms, that had been a mistake. A big one. She liked being there too much, even though she knew they had no future together. He would never forgive her for leaving him, and she couldn’t live with the knowledge that there would always be an enticing, dangerous job waiting for him around the next corner. An enticing, dangerous job he loved more than he’d ever loved her.

She swiveled in her chair to face him.

“How are you feeling?” he asked. She had the strange notion that something new lurked beneath the surface; a wariness in his voice and in his blue eyes.

“Fine, I guess. Did Luther find anything?”

Ray shook his head. “No.”

She didn’t think there was any way the killer could find her, but she worried just the same. What if, somehow, he knew where she lived? What if she walked into her house tonight and found him waiting for her? She shivered as she recalled the way he’d so easily snapped a man’s neck. She’d surprised him and gotten away once. She didn’t think she’d have the opportunity again.

“You’re really worried about this, aren’t you?” Ray asked softly. He stared at her obstinately, as if trying to read her thoughts. If anyone could…

“Yeah,” she admitted.

Ray looked comfortable in his uncomfortable chair, at ease in a cramped office he’d never set foot in before. But then, he always looked at ease. He fit in, wherever he happened to be.

“Grace,” a gratingly familiar voice called from the hallway just before stepping through the doorway into her office. “Did you finish…” Dr. Dearborne suddenly stopped speaking, as he saw Ray sitting against the wall. He even took a half step back. “What are you doing here?” A hint of revulsion touched his voice, and he paled. Just a little.

“Hi, Doc,” Ray said with a wide smile.

“You two know each other?” Grace asked, more than a little confused.

“We’ve met,” Ray said casually.

Their meeting had probably had something to do with Trish’s unpleasant encounter with the dentist, Grace reasoned. Ray could be downright old-fashioned about some things; like honor and the way a lady should be treated. It was the Southern gentleman in him, she supposed. Still, he sometimes went too far.

Dr. Dearborne put his less than steady eyes on her. “Never mind, Ms. Madigan. What I wanted to speak to you about can wait until tomorrow. Or Monday.” He gave her a sad, weak smile as he backed out of the office. “Nothing important.”

Grace hadn’t been working for Dr. Dearborne all that long, but she recognized fear when she saw it. The poor, personality-challenged dentist was so anxious to get out of the room he tripped over his own feet. After a quick recovery, he disappeared down the hallway.

“What on earth did you do…” she began.

Ray stood, quick and graceful. “How about I buy you dinner?” he interrupted.

Just as well. She didn’t need to hear how he’d so gallantly defended ex-wife number two from the man he insisted on calling Dr. Doolittle.

But dinner sounded too much like a date. “I don’t feel like going out,” she said as she reached into the bottom drawer of her desk for her purse. But oh, she didn’t want to be alone. Not yet. “I can cook you dinner.”

He made a face, screwed up his nose and squinted his eyes until she could no longer see the vibrant blue. “What have I done to deserve this?”

She smiled as she stood. “I’m a much better cook than I used to be. Give me a break. I was just nineteen when we got married. At the time all I could do in the kitchen was make macaroni and cheese out of a box and open a can of soup.”

She wished she could take the statement back, or at least reword it. Suddenly she remembered the times they’d made love in the kitchen. On the table, against the counter, on the floor. Ray would come home and find her trying her best to hone her abysmal domestic skills, and with a touch and a whispered word or two the recipe was forgotten. He’d lift her up or lower her down and she dismissed everything else. Everything. How many pots had she burned? How many leathery roasts had they laughingly tossed in the garbage? It was no wonder she hadn’t learned to cook until after the divorce.

Her face felt warm. Once the memories came they were hard to shake. She tried to put the heated recollections in perspective. So, they’d had great sex. She’d learned the hard way that you can’t build a lasting relationship on lust. Eventually you need stability, commitment, compromise. Ray didn’t know the meaning of the word compromise.

“And if it was the kind that said ‘add water’ we were in trouble,” he said.

“What?”

“The soup,” he clarified.

If he knew what she was thinking about he didn’t show it. But then, Ray was a master at concealing his feelings. No wonder working undercover came so easily to him. He could become whomever and whatever he wanted; he revealed only what he wanted to reveal.

“Steaks,” she said, headed for the door with her purse clutched in her hands. “Salad and baked potatoes. We’ll have to run by the grocery store, though.” She glanced over her shoulder to see that Ray followed; close but not too close.

“No problem,” he said, as he ushered her out the door and to his car.

Ray hadn’t expected he’d ever find himself sitting on the couch in Grace’s new house. Sure, they saw one another now and then, but she always managed to keep her distance, to keep things casual. In order for her to actually invite him here, she had to be either really scared, or else desperate to keep him from going to Mobile.

He wondered, as he watched her work at the bar that separated the long, narrow kitchen from the living room, just how far she’d go to keep him around.

He had no illusions about Grace. She’d loved him once, and she still cared for him; at least a little. She cared for him enough to worry on occasion, and she trusted him enough to come to him when there was trouble. Enough of a spark remained between them to provide the occasional uncomfortable moment, like in her office just a short while back.

But she didn’t care enough to stay. Sometimes he had to remind himself of that fact.

In a flash he knew Luther’s suppositions about the murder story being concocted just to keep him in town were bull. Grace hadn’t made anything up. She didn’t care enough to stay; she sure as hell didn’t care enough to fight.

Annoyed at himself for studying Grace so intently, he turned his attention to the room. This house was old, but had been recently remodeled. Instead of a small parlor and eat-in kitchen, there was now one main room that consisted of a living area with a sofa, chairs, television and small stereo; the open kitchen and the bar that separated it from the living room; and a smaller space for a round oak dining room table with four chairs. The layout was simple and practical.

He saw Grace in this room, in the comfortable caramel-colored furniture, in the fat pillows scattered about the seating area. He saw her in the thriving plants and the lace curtains and the knickknacks on the single bookshelf. Snow globes. She loved snow globes. He recognized a couple of them as gifts he’d given her, years ago. A big snow globe with a white carousel horse, given to Grace for her twentieth birthday; a smaller one with a little boy and a little girl leaning forward for an innocent kiss, presented on their fourth anniversary.

She chopped vegetables for a salad while the potatoes baked, keeping her eyes on the knife and the cutting board and the vegetables. A strand of hair fell over her cheek, a long, dark strand that looked so soft and tempting his fingers itched.

What would she do if he walked into the kitchen, put his hands on her face, and kissed her long and hard? If he pulled that body up against his and quit pretending he didn’t want her? He had a feeling that before this crisis was over, they were going to find out.

When they’d come in from their trip to the grocery store, she’d declared microwave potatoes “not the same,” so they waited for the real thing: big fat potatoes baking in the oven. The steaks were marinating, a gas grill awaited on the patio out back, and the ice cream he’d sneaked into the grocery cart sat in the freezer. And if Grace chopped those vegetables much more they would be baby food, not salad.

“Gracie,” he said softly. “Come in here and sit down. I’m not so old that I can’t chew my own food.”

Her hands stilled, and she looked down at the vegetables on the cutting board as if she hadn’t realized what she’d been doing to them. Very carefully, she laid her knife aside. “I guess I’m still a little distracted by what happened this morning,” she said as she wiped her hands on a dish towel and tossed it aside.

She stepped out of the kitchen and headed straight for the chair adjacent to the couch. Ray had no illusions that she might actually sit on the couch next to him. That would be too close, much too dangerous. Did she think he didn’t notice the way she reacted when he touched her? The way her eyes went wide and her lips parted and her heart raced?

But no matter how Grace reacted, she continued to manufacture a false barrier between them. She hadn’t even taken the time to change out of her work clothes, as if to slip into something more comfortable would send the wrong signal. She wore a straight, knee-length brown skirt and a tan blouse, very businesslike, very professional. On coming home she’d taken off the matching jacket and hung it in the closet, but she still wore panty hose and low-heeled shoes. She hadn’t even let her hair down. Just that one stubborn strand touched her face, one misbehaving lock of dark hair that had fallen from her oh-so-sensible hairstyle.

A nervous Grace didn’t settle back into the overstuffed chair, but reached for the remote control that sat on the coffee table and turned on the television. “Maybe there will be something about the murder,” she said as she returned the remote to the table.

The news was on, and investigative reporter Sam Morgan’s face filled the screen. Ray’s instinctive reaction was to snag the remote for himself and turn the television off. “There won’t be. Luther will contact us if anything comes up.”

“Still,” she said, snatching the remote off the coffee table and switching the TV on again. “You never know.”

And, of course, if the television stayed on she wouldn’t have to talk to him. She could keep her eyes and her attention on Morgan and pretend nothing was going on, here. This time after Ray turned the television off, he placed the remote on the couch beside him. It would be safe there.

“Do you want to talk about what happened this morning?” he asked, managing to make Grace even more skittish.

She placed luscious big brown eyes on him while she twiddled her thumbs in her lap. Her knees were clamped together, her spine straight; she looked like she’d just finished a class on how to sit like a little lady. She looked like a scared little girl.

“Not really. I’ve told you everything already. Talking about it isn’t going to make me feel any better.”

“Are you sure?”

Grace gazed longingly at the remote control. “I’m sure,” she said softly. Poor girl, she was about to jump out of her lovely skin. “You know, I’d better check those potatoes,” she said, practically jumping to her feet.

Without thinking, Ray reached out and snagged her wrist. With a gentle tug, she fell back and into his lap, landing there soft and wonderfully, arousingly heavy. She didn’t stay there long, but slid off his lap to sit beside him. As she landed on the remote, the television came back on. At least Morgan wasn’t on camera anymore.

“The potatoes won’t be ready for at least another half hour, and you know it,” he said, refusing to release her wrist when she tugged gently.

“But I really should…” she began weakly.

“What are you afraid of?”

He hovered over Grace, and she lifted her face to him. She didn’t tug against his grip again, or try to slide any farther away. He reached out and tucked that strand of hair behind her ear, his fingers brushing lightly against her face and grazing her ear as he accomplished the task.

“I’m not afraid of anything,” she whispered, but the fear in her eyes told him she lied.

“Not even the man who chased you this morning?”

Her eyes widened. “Him? Of course I’m afraid of him. I’m not stupid.”

Her short slide across his lap had caused her skirt to ride up, just a little, and when he glanced down he caught a glimpse of shapely, silk encased thigh. He placed his hand there. Grace trembled.

No matter how hard he tried he couldn’t forget how it had been with them. He touched her and she was his. She laid her head against his chest and he forgot everything. When they came together there was power, and heat, and lightning. Like a spring storm, they lit up the sky and rocked the world.

He lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her, soft, tender, tentative. He felt the tremble of her lips, the gentle sigh of acceptance that touched his mouth. His mouth lay over hers, fixed for a long moment. God, she tasted good. Warm and soft, sweet and real and hungry. There was something akin to relief in the kiss, like he’d had an itch in the middle of his back for six years and someone had finally scratched it. The unexpected comfort of the kiss terrified him, but he didn’t move away.

Feeling bold, fearlessly greedy, he moved his lips against hers, ever so slightly. Grace answered with a soft, gentle draw of her own. A tender sucking, a deep and arousing reception. Everything inside him tightened and heated, as if a bolt of lightning coursed through his body.

His hand, resting on her leg, inched higher until his fingers brushed her inner thigh. The flesh he stroked was giving, soft and warm, enticing and irresistible. This was familiar territory, even though it had been years, six long years, since he’d touched Grace this way. She trembled, but didn’t take her mouth from his.

Ray Madigan was not a complete fool. He didn’t love Grace anymore; how could he? She’d left him, she’d hurt him in a way no one else ever had or ever would. She’d taken a world he’d thought was safe and happy and blown it apart. No, he didn’t love her, but he did want her. Yes, dammit, he did want her.

If the response of her mouth against his was any indication, she wanted him, too. She moved her lips against his and inhaled as if gently sucking the life out of him, as if she wanted to taste deeply but was afraid. Soft and hesitant and almost innocent, she brushed her lips against his.

He leaned over her, pressing her back into the soft cushions of the couch, and deepened the kiss. When he slipped his tongue into her mouth she gasped, and her hands went to his face, his head. She touched his cheeks and speared her fingers through his hair, and she answered the kiss, for an all-too-brief moment.

And then she pushed his head back, forced his mouth from hers. “I can’t,” she whispered. Unshed tears made her dark eyes sparkle, the flush on her face made her look nineteen again.

“Why not?”

She shook her head. “I can’t sleep with you, Ray. I can’t.”

“I wasn’t exactly thinking about sleeping, sweetheart,” he said huskily as he moved closer. Her thighs fell slightly apart; she had to feel his arousal pressing against the inside of her thigh. He could so easily take her, here and now. He needed it; she needed it.

“You know what I mean.”

Ah, she was serious. “What’s wrong? Have you gone back to your ten date rule?” he asked lightly, as if it didn’t make any difference one way or another if they finished what they’d started. As if he didn’t want to ask her, here and now when there was no escape for either of them, why she’d left him.

He’d never understood the way she’d left. A damn note on the refrigerator, like a grocery list. Milk. Eggs. Goodbye.

He would never ask. The question would sound too much like pleading, and he would not grovel in front of Grace. Not now, not ever. He wanted her as much as he ever had, right now he hurt for her, but by God he did not need her.

“Don’t you think a ten date rule is a little excessive in this day and age?” he asked casually, holding his body against hers. He felt and savored every breath she took, the tension in the length of her bewitching body.

He remembered how she’d explained it to him, the first time he’d tried to make love to her. Still a virgin, she’d concluded that she wouldn’t know a man well enough to sleep with him until they’d had at least ten dates. Never a patient man, he’d asked her to marry him that night, on their third date. She’d said yes and they’d been married three days later. He’d been so sure that what they had was real and deep and lasting, that Grace was the one person who would always be there. He’d been young and stupid.

“And if that’s it, do I have to start all over?” he smiled as he delivered the joke. “Can’t I at least get credit for the dates we had before we were married? How about all those lunches at Pop’s?” Suddenly he knew why she’d never allowed him to buy her lunch. “Is that why we always go dutch these days?” he teased.

“Be serious,” she said, as she tried to gently push him away.

He wasn’t going anywhere. Not yet. He pressed his body to hers, hovered above her so close he could feel her intense warmth and the beat of her heart, the slight tremble of her legs. Already she was inside him, as if he’d inhaled her, as if she seeped beneath his skin when he held her tight.

“Tell me, Gracie, when was the last time you had a tenth date?”

She pursed her lips, a sure sign she wasn’t going to answer. He raked his body against hers, moving slowly, and kissed the side of her neck. When he did let her go, he wanted to make damn sure she left with the same torturous longing he felt growing inside him. He allowed his lips to linger, tasting her, feeling her heartbeat beneath his lips and his tongue before he released her.

As soon as he let her go she scrambled off the couch. “I imagine,” she said, almost steadily, “that a ten date rule does seem excessive to you.” She tried to hide her anxiety, but she couldn’t disguise the faint quiver in her voice. “You probably wish willing women would just show up at your door naked.”

“Bearing food,” he added lightly.

She turned to stare at him. Her face was flushed, her lips damp and slightly swollen, well kissed and, like it or not, craving more. And such pained incredulity lurked in her luscious eyes. What had she expected, that he’d give her some romantic song and dance about wanting her and no one else? He didn’t wear his heart on his sleeve; he didn’t lie or make promises he wasn’t prepared to keep.

“Preferably pizza,” he added. “After all, it’s good hot and cold.”

His smile faded as she spun away to return to the task of mutilating the vegetables. Damnation, he wished he was already in Mobile. No good could come of this, no good at all.

If Grace actually thought they were going to get through this without ending up in bed together, she was crazier than she was making him.

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